After her initial surprise at the closeness between Karen and Jenny and Kabe, Lucy quickly came to terms with it. And from their conversation afterward, she picked up on a piece of key information.
Besides Fairy Tail and Blue Pegasus, two more guilds were taking part in this operation. One was Lamia Scale, a guild likewise commissioned by the royal family and ranked among the continent's finest in both reputation and strength. The other was a small guild that had asked to join of its own accord after hearing the news: the Cait Shelter.
Needless to say, Lucy had already heard of Lamia Scale, but she had never once heard of this Cait Shelter. And it wasn't just her. Aside from Kabe and Ichiya, who had a vague idea of it, no one else present knew the first thing about this obscure little guild.
Yukino grew a little suspicious and voiced the worst possibility:
"Could this Cait Shelter be a spy the Balam Alliance planted among the legal guilds? Otherwise I honestly can't see how they'd have the nerve to take part in a mission at this level."
Hearing this, and knowing what Yukino herself had once been through, several of those present found their own doubts about this mysterious little guild growing as well.
Ichiya, however, just smiled and wagged a finger, looking entirely confident.
"Please, don't say that, Miss Yukino. The reason the Cait Shelter keeps such a low profile is that it's less a mage guild in the usual sense and more of a village. The people there live off what the village produces, more than enough to sustain themselves, so they rarely go out to take on jobs.
As for why they were brought into this operation, the reason is even simpler. The Six Demon Generals have been active right around the Cait Shelter's territory, and it was actually they who first brought word of it to the royal family."
As expected of Blue Pegasus's ace, Ichiya's grasp of the situation was remarkably thorough. He'd even looked into the fact that the Cait Shelter was the original source of the information, a detail even Kabe hadn't known.
With Ichiya vouching for them, everyone's misgivings were soon put to rest. Seeing this, Kabe didn't bother explaining any further. Besides, he was confident that the moment everyone laid eyes on the small, adorable Wendy, whatever reservations remained would be forgotten entirely.
After a short wait, the mansion soon welcomed its third wave of guests.
"Forgive us, I hope we haven't kept you waiting."
The words came together with a large, smooth bald head gleaming under the light. The newcomer had bronzed skin and a tall, powerfully muscled frame. It was none other than Lamia Scale's ace, whom they'd also crossed paths with at the Grand Magic Games.At the sight of the three familiar faces, Kabe smiled and tipped his chin toward them in greeting.
"Good to see you all again, especially you, Jura. Congratulations on becoming one of the Ten Wizard Saints. Pity I had something to attend to at the time and couldn't be there in person to witness it."
At Kabe's words, a rare smile broke across Jura's normally stern face.
"You flatter me, Lord Kabe. And I still haven't offered my congratulations on your marriage."
With that, the two of them shared a hearty laugh, clearly on easy terms with one another.
Of course, just because the leaders got along didn't mean their respective teammates did. The moment Lyon appeared, Gray had already locked eyes on him. Sensing the stare, Lyon glared right back without backing down.
After a few seconds of the two of them locked in a staring contest, Lyon was the first to speak, needling him:
"Gray, I hear you still haven't made S Class. That won't do at all. Having such a weak junior reflects poorly on your senior, you know."
Just as one would expect from someone who'd once trained alongside him day and night, Lyon had zeroed in on Gray's sore spot right from the start.
Gray, his expression darkening, looked Lyon up and down before answering with feigned indifference:
"Tch. If S Class mages are all trash on your level, then I couldn't care less about becoming one. And don't underestimate Fairy Tail. Our guild's S Class exam is nothing like what ordinary guilds put you through."
"Are you looking down on Lamia Scale?"
Lyon's temper flared, and a chill began to radiate from him. Gray, refusing to back down, let his own magic power burst forth and shot back without flinching:
"Don't get me wrong. The whole time, it's only ever been you I was looking down on."
"Gray!"
"Lyon!!!"
Seeing the two of them looking ready to come to blows, Ultear didn't wait for anyone else to step in. She simply walked forward and planted herself between them. She turned to give each of her juniors a look, crossed her arms, and said irritably:
"Stop embarrassing yourselves, both of you. Ur didn't teach you magic so you could turn it on each other. Or have you two brats grown big enough wings that you don't even take your senior sister seriously anymore?"
Looking at Ultear's face, so strikingly similar to their teacher Ur's, Lyon felt for a moment as though he were seeing Ur herself standing before him, scolding him all over again. That old instinct, the one born of being disciplined by someone who'd been both teacher and mother to him, kicked in again. He reflexively withdrew his magic power and lowered his head, cowed.
Gray, for his part, had already been on the receiving end of plenty of Ultear's lectures back at the guild. Cowed by her sheer force of will, he wasted no time hunching his shoulders and stepping meekly aside.
Once she saw both of them fall in line, Ultear let out a satisfied little huff.
Watching this, Jura couldn't help laughing out loud. He clapped Lyon on the back and teased:
"Lady Ultear is as magnificent as ever. That's the first time I've ever seen you this obedient, Lyon."
"Mister Jura!"
Lyon's nose flushed faintly red as he shouted, thoroughly mortified.
Kabe chuckled along and chimed in, "Well, they're master siblings, after all. A bit of bloodline dominance is only natural. Our Gray's shown himself to be even more pathetic than that."
"Damn it, Kabe, since when did I become 'yours'!"
Gray's voice was every bit as loud.
As soon as he said it, everyone present broke into good natured laughter. Natsu laughed loudest of all, drawing repeated glares of fury from Gray.
Just as laughter and cheer filled the mansion, outside, from behind a small tree by the roadside, a little dark blue head peeked out.
"What should we do, Sharuru? Everyone in there seems so close already. If I go over now, won't I just be intruding?"
At hearing this needless worrying, a white cat wearing a little yellow and red dress, a red bow tied to her tail, stepped out from behind the tree and said firmly:
"It's exactly because you always overthink everything and hesitate like this that I couldn't let you come out here alone. Wendy, you need to summon up your courage as a mage. Go introduce yourself to them. Show them that people from the Cait Shelter are no pushovers either!"