Boros straightened his body, green flames igniting in his eyes.
He opened his maw, and a green flame, like a breath attack, collided with Natsu's roar.
In that brief moment, Yuumi completed her attachment, and a pair of pure white wings stretched out from Natsu's back.
"I'm all fired up!" Natsu raised his hand and shook it, flames lighting up sequentially from the tips of his five fingers on his right hand. With a shake of his wings, he shot straight towards the werewolf Boros.
Just as he reached mid-air, a dark shadow shot out from the ground.
Demon Ape Jack, three meters tall with black fur, leaped up, swinging his giant fist down towards Natsu's head.
"Iron Dragon Rod!" Gajeel leaped out from the crowd, a steel-blue light flashed, and his right arm transformed into an Iron Dragon Rod, taking the blow for Natsu.
However, the Demon Ape's immense strength still shook Gajeel, forcing him back two steps before he could barely steady himself.
Gajeel, who had just joined Fairy Tail, had the strength of an A-Class Mage, which was quite impressive for a fifteen-year-old.
However, the members of Fairy Tail had made rapid progress in strength during this period, under the guidance of the Guild Master and the S-Class Mages.
Especially Natsu and Gray, who were naturally talented and highly competitive teenagers, their progress in strength was extremely evident.
In the original work, after the main storyline began, Gajeel's strength was on par with Natsu's, but at this point, there was indeed a slight gap between him and Natsu and the others.
In the team, Bisca and Alzack suddenly stopped, landing one on each side of Gajeel.
The tsundere Gajeel snorted but said nothing.
He was certain that in a one-on-one fight, he was most likely no match for the Demon Ape.
The rest of the Fairy Tail members continued to charge forward.
Ezreal and his two companions ran at the forefront, all three accelerating almost simultaneously to reach the black and white energy vortex.
The three formed a triangular formation, their gazes firmly fixed on Douglas, the horned man guarding the front of the portal.
Douglas stood his ground, feeling three sharp murderous intents fall upon him, a drop of cold sweat sliding down his forehead.
Douglas hesitated for a brief moment, then unhesitatingly stepped aside, making way.
Ezreal and his two companions leaped into the portal and disappeared.
Seeing Ezreal and the others successfully enter the portal, the remaining Fairy Tail members all breathed a sigh of relief.
Cana stepped out from the crowd, shaking her hands, a deck of fairy cards clasped between her fingers, facing Douglas.
Douglas expressionlessly glanced back at the silently rotating portal, then withdrew his gaze to look at Cana and the others, "There are even more terrifying guys over there; you've relaxed too early."
Cana raised her hand and flicked it, two fairy cards floated in front of her, one erupting with black light, the other with ice-blue light.
The light flashed and disappeared, and the Evil Crow King, with a bird's head, a human body, and two wings on his back, completely black and emitting black smoke, appeared to Cana's left.
On the other side, an ice-blue eye, as tall as a person, radiated a biting chill, landing to Cana's right.
The Frost Spirit's eyeball body quickly condensed into limbs, and a hideous maw grew in the center of its eye.
Having released two magical beasts, Cana shook her hands again, several fairy cards clasped between her fingers, and looked coldly at Douglas, "They have their mission, and our mission is just to defeat you all!"
"Comparing numbers, madam?" Douglas clapped his hands lightly. From the dense forest around them, numerous Orc Soldiers suddenly ran out, brandishing their weapons and charging towards the group.
The rest of Fairy Tail did not hesitate, leaving Douglas to Cana, and immediately engaged the surrounding Orc Soldiers.
Cana raised her hand and flicked it, fairy cards flying out, "fairy card: Bloody Ray!"
In mid-air, the fairy cards transformed into streaks of bloody rays, heading straight for Douglas.
The Evil Crow King also spread its wings, flapping them, and hundreds of black Death Feathers rained down like arrows towards Douglas.
The Frost Spirit was not idle either; it floated directly into the air, raising its hand in a gesture, and ice-blue cold energy bloomed in the sky, condensing into hundreds of ice cones that poured down.
The overwhelming, wide-area attacks sealed off Douglas's escape routes, but the horned man's expression remained unchanged. He took out a black magic cube composed of six skulls with his right hand, gently flicking his finger, "Demon Contract: Barrier!"
A dense black light radiated from the magic cube in Douglas's hand, and a square black energy shield firmly protected him.
The moment the bloody rays touched the energy shield, they vanished without a trace, like mud oxen entering the sea.
The Evil Crow King's Death Feathers directly exploded into black smoke upon contact with the energy shield.
The Frost Spirit's ice cones shattered into ice fragments upon hitting the energy shield.
Inside the energy shield, Douglas's lips curled into a smile. He spun the magic cube with both hands, "Demon Contract: Plagiarism!"
One side of the skull magic cube lit up with a strange black light, and then the energy shield dissipated, several bloody rays interspersed with black Death Feathers and ice cones flying straight towards Cana.
Cana's pupils reflected the triple magic that had been rewritten and copied back.
A gust of wind swept her long black hair, and new fairy cards were already clasped between her fingers.
"fairy card: Triple Mirror!"
Three prismatic ice crystals condensed out of thin air, refracting colorful light.
The bloody rays ricocheted and dissolved between the mirrors, the ice cones re-condensed into defensive shields amidst the cold, and the Death Feathers' black smoke, after being refracted by the mirrors, turned into mist and dissipated.
In the interstice of ice fragments and black mist, the Evil Crow King's dark wings suddenly obscured the sky, and its crimson pupils radiated terrifying bloody light.
"Death Gaze!"
Douglas's magic cube, which he was about to turn, suddenly froze, and blood seeped simultaneously from the eye sockets of the six skulls.
Countless bloody hands reached out from the void, wrapping around his limbs, and the whispers of rotting undead exploded in his ears.
The horned man's lips, however, curled into a cold sneer, and the third side of the magic cube glowed purple: "Demon Contract: Mental Synchronicity!"
Cana, in the distance, suddenly felt the world spin, and she herself fell into an illusion of a mountain of corpses and a sea of blood.
The beheaded Evil Crow King's head rolled at her feet, and the Frost Spirit's icy eye was covered in cracks.
At the critical moment, the Evil Crow King's piercing shriek broke the illusion, and Cana suddenly awoke.
The illusion before her shattered like glass. Cana retreated three steps and knelt on one knee, gasping for breath.
The Frost Spirit roared, and the ground within a ten-meter radius instantly condensed into a jungle of ice thorns.
Countless sharp ice spikes pierced through the ground beneath Douglas's feet, but he had already leaped up to avoid them—the fourth side of the magic cube was glowing green, and his legs were covered in lizard-like scales.
"He also has enhancement abilities?" Cana was slightly surprised, but her movements were not slow at all. She again threw out five spinning fairy cards, ice-blue and dark-purple light intertwining into a net.
The Frost Spirit opened its hideous maw and spewed a breath of absolute zero, the air in its path condensing into ice crystal dust.
Douglas twisted the magic cube in the air, and the second side of the barrier unfolded again.
The breath of absolute zero froze strange patterns on the surface of the black cube, and one of the six skulls suddenly opened its single eye.
"Demon Contract: Double Retribution!"
The cold current absorbed by the barrier transformed into two giant ice dragons that counter-attacked.
Cana's rapid card-drawing movements left afterimages in the air. Seven dark-attribute fairy cards formed an inverted pentagram, and a massive amount of dark energy condensed into a vortex.
"fairy card: Dark Erosion Black Hole!"
The spinning dark vortex shredded the ice dragons, and the Evil Crow King seized the opportunity to dive down.
Its dark wings completely transformed into a translucent ethereal state, and thousands of Death Feathers poured down like a torrential rain.
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