Natsu settled down and began consolidating his connection.
Though naturally talented, his personality had delayed his progress until now.
Things requiring "stillness" for comprehension were truly difficult for him.
Had it involved movement, he would have mastered it long ago.
The boy was now evolving in the direction of Gildarts - rarely staying home, constantly searching for the Fire Dragon King Igneel everywhere.
Of course, Natsu was still slightly better than Gildarts, who had taken on a century-level mission and hadn't returned for a year.
"As expected, Natsu is more capable than me too."
Seeing Natsu's success, Lucy felt both happy for him and somewhat sad for herself.
She remained the one who took the longest, unable to shake off being last.
"This isn't your fault. It's a matter of compatibility with constellations. In terms of pure talent, you're no worse than them. Don't underestimate yourself."
Marco patted Lucy's head to comfort the girl.
He wondered whether having Lucy choose the "Cygnus" constellation first had been the right decision.
He felt it might have discouraged her.
"I'll keep working hard, Marco-san."
Lucy nodded seriously, feeling she had found her goal and direction.
She wanted to explore more possibilities of 'old Celestial Spirit Magic' and integrate it with 'modern Celestial Spirit Magic'!
She would create more possibilities!
Natsu quickly stabilized his connection with the constellation and immediately began experimenting eagerly.
A crouching lion cub appeared behind him, while the "Leo Minor" constellation shone brightly in the sky in response.
The "Leo Minor" was a relatively dim constellation located in the triangular area between "Ursa Major" and "Leo".
Since "Ursa Major" had "Ursa Minor" beside it, and "Canis Major" had "Canis Minor" as companion, "Leo" should also have a lion cub by its side - thus "Leo Minor" was born.
The advancement path for "Leo Minor" was quite clear - it was directly linked to the neighboring elder lion "Leo".
Natsu fought with immense ferocity and passion, well-matched with "Leo" in their shared fearlessness and enthusiasm.
Thus Natsu had quite a few advancement options - "Phoenix" was more compatible with his flames, while "Leo" matched his personality and style better.
"Hum!"
Starlight descended, attaching to Natsu's body and exciting him tremendously.
The incredibly pure magic power felt extraordinarily comfortable to him.
The 'Salamander' burst into flames, and under the enhancement of Star Magic, his flames seemed to burn even brighter.
"Gray!!!"
Without any hesitation, Natsu's fighting spirit blazed as he directly challenged Gray.
This time, he was determined to wipe away his previous shame!
"Natsu!!!"
Gray also got fired up.
While Natsu had made progress, he hadn't been idle either.
He didn't believe Natsu could catch up to him.
"Calm down, both of you. This battle suit is for you, Natsu."
Marco reached out to restrain the two excited boys, then produced the "Leo Minor Battle Suit" he had prepared in advance.
"I can use a battle suit too?!"
Seeing Marco take out the "Leo Minor Cloth," Natsu's attention immediately shifted.
He had been admiring this "Cloth" for quite some time—Hisui, Lucy, and Gray all had one.
During battles, this "Cloth" demonstrated remarkable performance: not only did it protect the body, but it also comprehensively enhanced combat power, deepened the connection with the star chart, allowing them to draw more Star Magic, and made the Saint's combat techniques even more powerful.
In short, with this "Cloth," they were truly complete.
Of course, there was also a higher-level "Sacred Cloth," but there was only one of those.
Only those who truly earned Marco's recognition could gain the qualification to summon the Sacred Cloth.
When Natsu put on the 'Leo Minor Cloth' he indeed felt his strength increase significantly, which boosted his confidence.
This time, he was sure he could defeat Gray!
"You two, if you want to fight, take it to the dueling arena."
Marco approached the two restless youngsters, grabbed one in each hand, leaped into the air, and vanished.
When they reappeared, they were already aboard the Corvus Aircraft in the sky.
After tossing the two onto the aircraft, Marco didn't follow them.
Instead, he returned to the ground and stood beside Lucy.
High above, the crows flapped their wings vigorously, swiftly carrying Gray and Natsu toward 'Fairy Home.'
There was no other choice—Natsu and Gray had already started wrestling on the aircraft.
If they didn't fly quickly, a crash might have been inevitable.
"Lucy, you could also tap into your potential. In Celestial Spirit Magic, you possess talent far beyond ordinary Celestial Spirit Mages."
Seeing Lucy's evident envy of Natsu and Gray, Marco spoke up, deciding to give her some extra, one-on-one guidance.
The girl had always been diligent and hardworking in her studies.
Since becoming his apprentice, her strength had steadily improved.
Initially, Lucy had been quite unrefined—her mother Layla had taught her for too short a time, hardly enough to count as proper instruction.
Marco had taught Lucy extensively, covering every aspect, helping her grow quickly and adapt to life in the Magic Guild.
Now, Lucy was a qualified Mage.
Though she still fell short of the S-Class standard of Fairy Tail, she was solid enough to be a pillar among A-Class Wizards.
But this was clearly not Lucy's limit. She was still very young, with dreams of her own—she also wanted to become an S-Class Mage.
"Marco-san, I was thinking the same thing!"
Hearing Marco's words, Lucy exclaimed in surprise.
She hadn't expected Marco to be on the same wavelength as her!
"That's right. There's a natural connection between our new Celestial Spirit Magic and the old Celestial spirit magic, since both involve the constellations. However, our new magic holds a higher rank. At its peak, it can even dominate Celestial Spirits, while they cannot affect us."
Marco and Lucy sat together on the grass as Marco explained the intelligence he had previously obtained from Loke.
This naturally left Lucy gaping in astonishment.
"It's actually that overpower?!" Lucy opened her mouth slightly.
Forcing a summoning against a Celestial Spirit's will was something she would absolutely never do—it was simply too rude and disrespectful.
It was much better to establish a contract and agree upon the terms of summoning together.
"Don't worry, achieving the ability to forcibly summon Celestial Spirits is quite difficult for you all."
Marco couldn't help but shake his head with a smile.
Lucy was overthinking things—even he himself hadn't yet grasped the knack for summoning Celestial Spirits.
Of course, Marco didn't particularly care about this ability either.
To put it bluntly, summoning those Celestial Spirits wasn't very useful to him.
Rather than wasting magic power and time on it, he'd prefer to throw one more punch—one more punch might just solve the problem.
"That's a relief."
Hearing that forced summoning wasn't easy to accomplish, Lucy actually felt relieved.
She truly respected the Celestial Spirits, treating them as equal friends.
In this aspect, Lucy stood in complete opposition to a certain deceased individual.
A certain Leo Celestial Spirit who preferred to remain anonymous was utterly envious upon witnessing how Lucy interacted with Celestial Spirits.
This unnamed Leo Spirit paid close attention to Lucy—perhaps the more one lacks something, the more one notices it in others.
Actually, Hisui wasn't like that deceased Celestial Spirit Mage either.
After all, Hisui's Celestial Spirit Magic shared the same origin as Lucy's—both came from Layla.
Although Hisui hadn't spent much time with Layla either, she had learned Layla's attitude toward Celestial Spirits.
But Hisui was a princess, cherished like the moon surrounded by stars, and her father doted on her enough that she never had to rely on Celestial Spirits for survival through countless days and nights like Lucy did.
Consequently, her attitude toward Celestial Spirits naturally couldn't match Lucy's.
All these factors combined to create the current situation.
"Marco-san, where should I begin?"
Looking at Marco sitting beside her, Lucy widened her eyes.
Although she had made her decision, she genuinely didn't know where to start.
"..."
Marco pondered for a moment.
He actually had some ideas but wasn't sure if they were feasible.
He had previously asked Loke, and even that guy wasn't certain, only saying it was worth a try.
"Perhaps you could start by summoning only their power—without calling forth the Celestial Spirits themselves, but allowing you to directly use their abilities."
Marco proposed his idea.
In his view, this was actually the normal relationship between Celestial Spirits and Celestial Spirit Mages.
One day in the Celestial Spirit World equaled three months in the human world—summoning the Spirits' true forms directly was simply too frequent.
If they could avoid summoning the Spirits' true forms and only use their power instead, it would be much more reasonable.
This would definitely be better for the Celestial Spirits, and it wouldn't be worse for the Celestial Spirit Mages either—directly wielding the power themselves would allow them to control their own destiny.
"That's wonderful! Let's go with that!" Lucy's eyes lit up.
She also thought this was a great idea.
Even now, whenever she remembered how frequently she used to summon Aquarius to accompany her, Lucy still felt somewhat embarrassed.
After all, Aquarius had a boyfriend and her own life.
If they could truly summon only the power of the Celestial Spirits without disturbing the Spirits themselves, that would be perfect.