By the time Gray and the others made it back to the island, the place was a total wreck, its landscape completely transformed.
First off, the Tower of Heaven, built over eight years, was gone. No one cared much about that—it was a symbol of evil, a memory best left buried. But the rest of the island wasn't spared either. Palaces, rooms, roads—everything was reduced to rubble. What was once lush greenery was now a mess of debris and sand, barely recognizable.
Here and there, a few soldiers lay slumped, drained of strength. They were victims of the Tower of Heaven, but also its perpetrators. Right or wrong, it was hard to judge. With a sigh, all you could say was they were pitiful.
When the group reached the heart of the battlefield, only Kira, Erza, Natsu, Happy, and Simon remained.
"Natsu, Erza, Kira! You guys okay?" Lucy called out.
Listen to that—Lucy's priorities were clear as day. Poor Happy, barely an afterthought!
"We're fine!" they replied.
Seeing their friends unharmed, everyone breathed a sigh of relief.
"What about Jellal?" asked Sho, the card guy. He'd been itching to give Jellal a beating to avenge the others, but after witnessing the insane magic unleashed on the island, he clammed up. That kind of power was way beyond anything he could ever hope to reach.
"He sank into the sea," Simon said, pointing to a pit now filled with seawater. He glanced at Erza, hesitating, then swallowed the rest of his words.
But there's always someone with zero tact.
"Probably dead, right?" Kira said casually, sitting on a chair, elegantly sipping tea. His vibe was way out of place amidst the ruins.
Where'd the chair and tea come from? With Word Magic, what couldn't he whip up?
"Kira…" Erza started.
"But who knows? A guy like that doesn't go down so easily," Kira added.
By "a guy like that," Kira meant someone with plot armor. As one of the Fairy Tail world's key players, Jellal wasn't the type to just kick the bucket. Sure, he wasn't a Fairy Tail member, but his counterpart was!
Killing Jellal wouldn't do much good anyway. It might even drive a wedge between him and Erza. Letting him sink into the sea, though? That opened the door for more fun down the line.
As he sipped his tea, Kira mentally reviewed the arc. Compared to the original story, it lacked the dramatic bond-deepening moments between Erza and her Fairy Tail crew, but it still let her settle her past. She was strong—Kira had no doubt she'd bounce back soon.
As for Natsu, he missed out on fighting Jellal and unleashing Dragon Force after absorbing ethernano, which was a bit of a shame. But it didn't matter much—he'd already tapped into Dragon Force back in Xornia.
Jellal's fate was uncertain, sunk beneath the waves. If the world's timeline converged, he might still be saved by Brain from the Oración Seis—after all, they had that master-disciple bond. In the original story, Jellal lost his memories because he took the brunt of an ethernano explosion for Erza, breaking his body down to atoms. This time, who knows? If he's still a villain next time they meet, that'd make things interesting.
Simon was the luckiest of all—he got to keep his life.
And Kira? He scored big. Not only did he snag the ethernano-filled magic crystals, but his new magic was a success. Total jackpot.
His Fairy's Judgment, an upgrade of Fairy Law, was about as powerful overall. It didn't have that broken "wipe out all enemies" ability and required the user to pick a target, but the difference was minor. Fairy Law could miss, but Judgment wouldn't! Best of all, it didn't drain the user's life force.
Thinking of Makarov using Fairy Law to take out 70% of the Alvarez Empire's forces at the cost of his life, Kira couldn't help but be impressed. The old man was a beast!
A veteran Wizard Saint, living up to the title.
Kira still had a long way to go.
"By the way, where's Dispel?" Gray asked, scanning the area and noticing someone was missing.
Kira paused mid-sip. Yeah, where was that guy? Didn't he take off before the battle started?
"Who knows? Probably hiding in a corner reading a novel or something," Kira said. "When's that guy gonna grow up?"
Thwack!
"Talking trash behind someone's back is pretty rude, you jerk!" Dispel's sword sheath bonked Kira on the head as he stepped out from behind him. "And when the person you're badmouthing is right there, you'd better be ready to get schooled!"
Kira rubbed his head, curious. "Where'd you go?"
Dispel answered with a straight face, "Nowhere special. Just wandered around nearby."
"Yeah, right! There's nothing around here worth checking out!"
"Which is why I'm back, duh!"
Dispel plopped down on a nearby rock. As he turned, Kira caught a whiff of something—not a weird, gross smell, but a sweet, floral scent. Kira racked his brain but was sure he'd never smelled it before.
"No way… no way…"
Suddenly, it clicked, and Kira's face lit up with mischief, practically screaming "I'm curious!" "Spill the tea!" "You didn't… You're not that kind of Dispel, are you?"
To stop Kira's imagination from running wild, Dispel figured he'd better come clean. "Fine, yeah, I went to save that swordswoman. It's rare to find a pure swordsman in this magic-crazy world. If she gets stronger, she might make a good sparring partner someday."
"I believe you!" Kira said, nodding, though his gossip-hungry heart was a little disappointed. It made sense—Dispel wanting to duel a skilled swordmaster wasn't much different from Kira wanting to spar with a magic prodigy.
Dispel: That's not a believing face at all…
After a quick rest, the group boarded a ship to head back.
Once they reached the mainland, Kira and Dispel made a beeline for Magnolia. As for the people from the Tower of Heaven, their fates weren't Kira's concern.
In the original story, they didn't want to burden Erza and were eager to see the world, so they didn't join Fairy Tail. Now, it'd probably be the same. Simon might go look for his sister, and Wally might track down his brother.
On the way back, Kira pulled out a pen and notebook, pestering Dispel about his "Strongest Swordsman" deal.
"Come on, spill it! What's the deal with you and that swordswoman? Is it one of those 'I'll be waiting for you at the top, try to surpass me, Roronoa Zoro' kinda promises?"
"Don't drag your novel characters into real life, you moron!" Dispel snapped.
He was talking about Kira's adventure novel, One Piece, about a boy with rubber magic sailing the seas.
"And what's with the pen and paper? What're you writing? I swear, if you make up some nonsense, we're done…"
"What novel, what real life? You don't get it!" Kira shot him a look. "Writing a novel means drawing from the people around you, got it? You take real events, mix in a tiny bit of imagination, and bam—you get vibrant, living characters!"
"Shut up already!!" Dispel yelled.
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