Date: July 10, X791 — Royal Castle, Crocus, Fiore — Upper Balcony
High above the celebration, where the music and voices reached only as a faint hum, Teresa sat alone on a marble balcony bathed in moonlight.
Below her, the grand hall of the royal castle blazed with warmth and light. Chandeliers sparkled like captured stars, pouring gold across tables heavy with food and drink. The sound of mugs clinking, voices rising in cheer, and laughter breaking into song floated upward like distant waves. It was joy she could see clearly, but would never step into.
Her battle armor caught the pale gleam of starlight, polished yet marked with the faint scratches of war. The short cloak at her back stirred gently in the night breeze, the stitched Fairy Tail emblem catching bits of reflected light. It was a mark she wore, but never claimed.
Her sword was nowhere in sight, safely re-equipped away. Still, the air around her carried a quiet sharpness, as though her presence alone could cut through the night.
"Echoes," she murmured, her voice a thread of steel. "They create warmth… and warmth burns."
Her fingers brushed the curve of her shoulder guard. She hadn't meant to remember, but the memories came anyway — the final moments of her first life, the warmth she had let in, the bonds she had trusted. How those bonds had slowed her, dulled her edge, given death the moment it needed to strike. She had chosen that ending once. She would not choose it again.
"Flaws," she whispered, almost to herself. "Change one, and you only make another."
For a heartbeat, a faint curve touched her lips — a shadow of a smile that never reached her eyes. She thought of Asuka's bright, trusting gaze. Of Romeo's stubborn fire. Of Macao's quiet, weary respect. Sparks, all of them. And sparks always burned.
From below, laughter swelled, breaking the stillness. Natsu and Gray were arguing like children over something ridiculous. Erza spun Cana across the floor in a rare, unguarded dance. Somewhere near the center table, Gajeel was singing badly enough to make Levy double over with laughter, covering her face.
A soft voice slipped into the moonlight behind her.
"A blade without echo is strong… but it cracks easily when alone."
Teresa rose in one fluid movement, turning just enough to meet the gaze of Mavis Vermillion. The ghost's golden eyes held calm understanding, her presence both light as air and impossible to ignore.
"I know my flaw," Teresa said evenly. "But replacing it with warmth would only trade one weakness for another."
"Even so," Mavis replied, stepping closer, "warmth is not always a flaw. Sometimes… it saves us."
Teresa's expression didn't change. "Warmth burned me once before. I don't regret what I chose. But I will not let it happen again."
They stood in silence for a moment, the faint echoes of music and laughter drifting between them. Mavis's small hands curled slightly, as though she longed to reach out, but could not.
"You are not just a blade, Teresa," she said quietly. "You could be more."
"I am a blade," Teresa answered, her voice steady and without hesitation. "That is all I need to be. Echoes are for those who can afford them. I choose not to change. Not even a little."
There had been times, before, when Mavis might have pressed harder. But tonight, she only let out a soft sigh. In her eyes was something like sadness, tempered by acceptance.
Teresa turned back toward the feast. The warm light of the hall spilled upward, catching in the silver of her eyes, but it brought no reflection inside them.
"Perhaps… in another life, Mavis," she said. "But not this one."
Below, the guild erupted again into laughter, a burst of sound so full it might have reached her. But the warmth behind it slid past without touching.
Mavis lingered a few seconds longer, her ghostly form glowing faintly in the moonlight. Then, like mist breaking apart, she dissolved into the night air.
Left alone, Teresa's fingers rose briefly to her chest. There was no heat there. No stirring. Only the quiet rhythm of a heart beating out of duty rather than desire.
She stepped back into the dark hall beyond the balcony, the sound of the feast fading behind her. The echo of laughter still carried through the stone — light, joyful, alive.
But for Teresa, they were only echoes. Reaching, yet never landing. Warmth she could see but not feel.
And so, in the cold moonlight above the crown's celebration, she disappeared into the shadows once more.