Macbeth's cool voice broke the silence.
"The White Magic Cult follows a doctrine of 'returning the world to pure white nothingness.' They carry out acts of terror across the continent under something they call Whiteout."
"Whiteout?"
Ankh frowned.
Ultear explained, "Their idea of 'staining someone pure white' basically means erasing all the Magic Power from that person's body."
Sorano nodded and continued, "Based on the rough figures we've gathered, there have already been more than a hundred Whiteout incidents in the Kingdom of Fiore this month alone. More than seventy people have died."
Ankh's expression immediately darkened.
Magic Power was almost as essential to a mage as blood.
Everyone possessed some amount of magic within their body, but only mages were capable of actively circulating and controlling it.
If a mage suddenly lost all their Magic Power and developed Magic Deficiency Disease, they at least had the physical resilience and magical constitution to survive long enough to receive treatment.
Ordinary people were different.
For them, severe Magic Deficiency Disease was practically a slow death sentence.
"That cult can just erase someone's Magic Power?"
Ankh thought back to the pieces of trash who had ambushed Lucy the night before.
"How?"
"We think it has something to do with alchemy," Jellal replied after a brief hesitation. "We stopped one Whiteout incident ourselves. The cultists used some kind of strange white cross to carry it out, and I suspect it was an alchemical artifact."
Sawyer, who had remained quiet until then, suddenly glanced toward Ankh.
"You probably don't know much about alchemy, do you?"
"I've heard about it."
Ankh rubbed his chin thoughtfully.
"But Ishgar's alchemical technology was never advanced enough to produce something like that."
"That's because it didn't come from Ishgar."
Jellal sighed.
"It spread here from Guiltina during the last six months."
"In Ishgar, magic has always overwhelmingly overshadowed alchemy. But on the northern continent, alchemy developed to the point where it stands on equal footing with magic."
Ultear pulled a file from a nearby stack and ran one finger down the page.
"The timing lines up almost perfectly. The mass migration and refugee waves from Guiltina began at roughly the same time the White Magic Cult became active again."
"So we're fairly certain their Whiteout devices are connected to alchemical technology brought over from the northern continent."
"I see…"
Ankh quietly sorted through everything they had told him.
Then another thought occurred to him.
"I caught a few members of the White Magic Cult yesterday, but none of them had anything like a white cross."
Ultear shrugged.
"That thing apparently requires at least two people to summon. It seems to be some kind of restricted formation designed by the cult's upper ranks."
Jellal turned toward him.
"The people you caught—are they still alive?"
Ankh went silent.
He mentally replayed the previous night.
Kusin had received one slap from him, gone headfirst into the pavement, remained alive for a little while despite looking like someone had rearranged his face with a hammer… and then died.
The subordinate had realized what was happening and tried to kill himself too, but Ankh had stopped him in time.
"One dead, one alive."
Ankh shrugged.
"I questioned the survivor last night. He doesn't seem to know much."
Jellal slowly nodded, looking thoroughly exhausted.
"That's the biggest problem with organizations like this. Their hierarchy is designed specifically to compartmentalize information."
"Even now, we still haven't found any of their major bases. All we've managed to collect are scattered rumors about their leader."
Ankh's curiosity was immediately piqued.
"Who's their leader?"
The others exchanged glances.
Eventually Sorano stepped forward with an exasperated expression.
"You might not have even heard of her."
"She's a mage known as the White Wizard Touka, supposedly famous enough to be mentioned alongside the Black Wizard Zeref."
"Who?"
The moment Ankh heard someone being placed on the same level as Zeref, his face immediately took on the same expression he had worn when Ignia claimed the Five Dragon Gods were equal to Acnologia.
Another ridiculously famous person he had somehow never heard of.
Perfect.
Ultear continued with the little information they possessed.
"According to the stories, Touka is an incredibly powerful witch who has lived for more than four hundred years. She supposedly comes from the same era as Zeref and possesses the ability to Whiteout other people."
Ankh clicked his tongue.
"Until I meet her myself, who knows how much of that reputation is actually deserved."
Then he shrugged.
"But if she really can erase someone's Magic Power the way the rumors claim, she'd still be extremely dangerous to any mage."
"Exactly."
Jellal gestured toward the streets of Magnolia visible outside.
"And based on the cult's doctrine and recent movements, we believe Fairy Tail is very likely to become one of their next major targets."
The White Magic Cult considered excessive concentrations of Magic Power a sin.
Fairy Tail was now recognized as the strongest guild in Ishgar, packed with powerful mages whose combined Magic Power was enormous.
As far as the cult was concerned, Magnolia might as well have had a giant target painted over it.
"What a load of bullshit."
Ankh snorted.
"Let me guess. Most of their members are people who never got anywhere with magic themselves."
Ultear looked surprised.
"Yeah. How did you know?"
"Because I've seen this kind of crap plenty of times."
Ankh couldn't even be bothered pretending the cult's philosophy deserved serious consideration.
"They see other people reaching heights they'll never reach, get bitter about it, then dress up their jealousy with some grand moral philosophy so they can feel righteous while ruining everyone else's lives."
That was about as much thought as Ankh intended to give their ideology.
If those lunatics ever dared set foot in Magnolia with hostile intentions, he would deal with them first and worry about their doctrine afterward.
Preferably by twisting their heads off.
After discussing several additional security measures for Magnolia, Ankh finally noticed something that should have occurred to him much earlier.
"Where are Erik and Meredy?"
Sawyer yawned.
"Erik went out with Kinana. They were acting all secretive about it, but I think they're looking at wedding dresses."
Ankh raised an eyebrow.
"They're getting married?"
Sorano covered her mouth, barely hiding a grin.
"Now that the Council has officially recognized our status, Kinana's been over the moon. Those two have been running themselves ragged preparing for the wedding lately."
Ultear spread her hands.
"Meredy went to give Wendy some special training. She won't be back until later."
Meredy had always been close to Juvia, but aside from her, Wendy was the person she got along with best.
The two girls were around the same age in this timeline, after all, and had become especially close over the years.
Ankh nodded, then glanced at the thick stack of White Magic Cult files in Ultear's hands.
He sighed.
"Compared to everyone finally getting to enjoy their lives, these troublemaking bastards really are annoying."
He shook his head.
"Funny. Somehow the Black Magic Cult is starting to look like the well-behaved cult by comparison."
...
At that very moment, back inside the Fairy Tail guild hall, Makarov was personally greeting an unexpected visitor.
He stared in surprise at Princess Hisui.
"Your Highness? What brings you here personally?"
A strained smile appeared on Hisui's face.
"I heard that Ankh-sama had returned, so I wanted to come and see how he was doing."
Her expression then grew noticeably heavier.
"And there's something else."
She handed Makarov a wanted poster.
The old man looked down at it, and his brows immediately drew together.
"This person joined forces with the Black Magic Cult and stole an extremely important weapon from the kingdom."
Hisui's voice turned grim.
"They've already escaped across the border."