"Idiot… You think I'm going to tell you just because you asked?"
Zancrow had been burned almost beyond recognition, yet somehow he still found enough strength to be arrogant.
"You bastard!"
Natsu grabbed him by the front of his clothes, his right fist bursting into flames again.
Considering Zancrow was already hanging on by a thread, another punch would probably send him straight into the afterlife.
Perhaps the threat alone was too much for him, because Zancrow's eyes rolled shut and he promptly passed out.
Natsu blinked.
Then he scratched his head.
Gray stared at him in disbelief.
"Moron. You beat him half to death and now you're wondering why we can't interrogate him?"
"Huh?!"
Natsu immediately rounded on him.
"And you think you've got any right to say that?!"
A quick look around the carriage made Gray's criticism rather difficult to take seriously.
The entire express train had been forced to stop.
A large section of the roof had been torn away, the metal flooring was either frozen solid or sliced apart, and the tables and seats had been reduced to wreckage by violent winds.
Then there were the Black Magic Cult members themselves, scattered everywhere in various states of unconsciousness, most of them beaten so badly their own mothers would probably struggle to recognize them.
Wendy and Lucy scratched their cheeks awkwardly.
Gray and Erza, meanwhile, looked completely unbothered.
So what?
"Enough. Someone's coming."
Not long afterward, the terrified conductor came hurrying over from the front of the train.
The moment he saw what looked like an entire carriage full of corpses, he nearly fainted on the spot.
Technically, Team Natsu was supposed to be carrying out a covert infiltration mission.
They hadn't even crossed into Stella yet, and they had already caused a rather spectacular incident.
Their identities still needed to remain hidden.
Fortunately, guilds now worked closely with the Magic Council.
The moment Erza pulled out her Magic Mobile Phone and contacted the appropriate Council representative, the response came almost immediately.
Continue the mission.
The Council would handle the cleanup.
Ankh stared at the message.
"That's… impressively good service."
Before the conductor could spot them, Team Natsu grabbed Zancrow and quietly slipped off the train, deciding they would find another way to reach Stella.
Gray nodded in agreement with Ankh.
"Yeah. Ever since the guilds started working more closely with the Council, even compensation claims have gotten way easier."
Natsu stretched with a satisfied grin.
"Exactly! Now we can have a good fight and just leave afterward. We don't even have to apologize anymore."
Lucy looked exhausted just listening to him.
"That's because the Council staff are apologizing for us behind the scenes! Those poor people are probably bowing so much their backs are about to snap!"
Erza held up her Magic Mobile Phone.
"The Council registered dedicated contact channels for every recognized guild team. If property damage or other complications occur during an official mission, we can report them immediately and let the appropriate department handle the aftermath."
Ankh nodded in understanding.
Honestly, it was far more efficient than the old arrangement, where guilds provided the manpower, took most of the risks, occasionally paid for the damage, while the Council mostly handed over intelligence and called it a day.
The current relationship almost reminded him of the Avengers working with S.H.I.E.L.D.
Of course, Natsu's interpretation of "we don't have to pay for anything anymore" was complete nonsense.
If they caused unnecessary damage far beyond the mission's expected scope, the Council certainly wasn't covering it. Fairy Tail would still get the bill.
But considering how important this particular operation was…
Destroying one train was barely worth mentioning.
As long as they didn't somehow wipe the Kingdom of Stella off the map, they would probably be fine.
Probably.
...
With train travel no longer an option, the group rented a Magic Vehicle and continued south on their own.
Several days later, after switching between roads, vehicles, and eventually a ship, Team Natsu finally reached the royal capital of the Kingdom of Stella—
Altair.
Zash Caine, the former Fiorean minister who had betrayed his homeland and defected to Stella, was now one of the kingdom's most prominent officials.
That made investigating his routine surprisingly straightforward.
After several days of surveillance and repeated reconnaissance, Team Natsu had already mapped out most of Zash's movements and gathered significantly more information about Dragon Cry.
For the moment, they were staying at an inn called the Hornet.
Lucy leaned out of the second-floor window and looked up at the night sky.
Countless stars glittered overhead, brighter and denser than she was used to seeing back home.
"No wonder Stella is famous for having the most beautiful night sky on the continent…"
She sighed dreamily.
"The stars here really are incredible."
Inside the room, Natsu was chewing on a chicken leg.
He stared at her in complete confusion.
"Lucy's saying weird stuff again. Isn't the sky the same everywhere?"
Happy sat nearby hugging a fish.
"That's because Lucy's a delusional novelist."
Lucy whipped around.
"The 'delusional' part was completely unnecessary!"
She glared at both of them.
"Stella's geography and architecture were designed around viewing the night sky! The entire atmosphere here makes it easier to appreciate the stars. You two just don't understand anything!"
"Alright, alright. Save the argument for later."
Ankh waved everyone over.
"We need to settle tomorrow's plan."
Natsu and Lucy immediately joined the others around the table.
Maps, notes, surveillance reports, and everything they had gathered over the past several days were spread across its surface.
Erza pointed toward the layout of Altair's royal palace.
"Based on the routes we've used during our previous infiltrations, there is only one place Dragon Cry could realistically be stored."
Her finger stopped over a heavily secured section.
"The treasury."
"The treasury itself is constructed from Stellarium, making it exceptionally difficult to damage. There are also detection enchantments around the entire structure that react to fluctuations in Magic Power."
"Even if we could break through the walls silently, the moment we used enough magic to do it, the alarm would almost certainly trigger."
"The only practical entrance is the main door."
Erza tapped another mark on the map.
"The key takes the form of a ring. As far as we can determine, only the King of Stella and Zash possess one."
Ankh added, "The king almost never appears in public. Even the Magic Council doesn't have a reliable record of what he looks like, so we're ignoring him for now."
"Our target is Zash."
He looked around the table.
"The plan is simple."
"Steal his treasury key."
"Then steal Dragon Cry."
Natsu immediately raised a hand.
"What about Zash himself? Weren't we supposed to take him out too if we got the chance?"
Ankh pointed toward another part of Altair's city map.
"Every other night, Zash visits this tavern to drink and entertain himself."
"Gray will be part of the tavern team. Once you get close enough, use Ice-Make to duplicate the shape of the ring key. Zash shouldn't notice anything has changed."
Gray nodded.
Ankh continued.
"Once the treasury team confirms Dragon Cry has been secured, the tavern team will lure Zash to the secluded location we already chose."
"Then we take him down quietly."
"That part is optional."
"The real priority is Dragon Cry. Once we have the staff, we withdraw immediately whether Zash is dead, captured, or still walking around."
"After Dragon Cry is safely out of Stella, we'll have plenty of time to investigate the connection between the kingdom and the Black Magic Cult."
This wasn't the first time they had gone over the operation.
Tonight's discussion was mainly a final review to make sure everyone understood exactly what they were doing tomorrow.
Once they finished, Gray's attention drifted toward a large sack sitting in the corner of the room.
He stared at it for a moment.
"Speaking of which…"
"Is that guy still alive?"
Inside the sack was Zancrow.
Gray sighed.
"Without a proper confession, we still can't prove Stella is working with the Black Magic Cult. That means we can't just start openly smashing things."
"It's seriously inconvenient."
"Destroy his magic source first."
Ankh answered almost casually.
"Whatever testimony we get out of him later, there's no reason to leave an enemy like that capable of fighting."
Then his eyes narrowed slightly.
Something about this still bothered him.
"More importantly…"
His voice became quieter.
"Why did they appear exactly where we were traveling?"
Ankh glanced toward the sack.
"I don't buy the idea that the Black Magic Cult somehow found survivors from the Seven Kin of Purgatory after they'd been thrown into the sea, dragged them out of the aftermath of Acnologia's roar…"
"And then conveniently recruited them."
"There's something else going on here."