Raizel helplessly rubbed his forehead, letting out a long sigh before explaining.
"It's Happy and Carla. We clearly talked about this exact scenario last night, Natsu."
"Oh, oh," Natsu nodded blankly, clearly still not getting it.
"Hey! I have something to ask you!" he suddenly shouted, taking a few steps forward toward the fleeing locals.
"HELPPPP!!!" The two herb gatherers were so terrified by the approach that they bolted before Natsu could even finish speaking, running away at an incredibly fast pace.
Gray rubbed his temples and said irritably, "Great job, Natsu. You scared them off!"
Wendy, however, shook her head in disagreement.
"I don't think it was Natsu-san. It seems like they were so scared because they saw Carla and Happy."
"Indeed, their gazes were fixed on Carla and Happy the entire time," Lucy noted, recalling the locals' fearful expressions and nodding in agreement with Wendy.
"Was my expression really that scary just now?" Happy asked, his ears drooping as he felt a little hurt.
Wasn't his adorable appearance the very thing that made him so popular wherever he went in Magnolia, allowing him to enjoy good food and free fish?
To think that today, he actually terrified people away...
"They probably thought you were going to eat them! Hahaha!" Natsu joked loudly, clutching his stomach.
"You know that's impossible," Happy mumbled, feeling that this was absolute slander against his character.
Suddenly, Raizel frowned slightly. "There's a massive fluctuation of Magical Power nearby," he warned, sensing the unusual, erratic movement echoing through the dense forest.
"Wait, didn't Mystogan say that Magical Power can't be used freely in this world?" Erza asked, her eyes narrowing in suspicion.
"Never mind that for now, let's go check it out first and see for ourselves." Raizel made the decision immediately, leading the group as he headed swiftly in the direction of the magical disturbance.
...
Deep within the vast forest stood an enormous, giant blue tree.
Built right into the middle of its massive trunk was a sturdy wooden door, with a large, familiar flag hanging proudly above it.
The flag bore the unmistakable "Fairy Tail" emblem, completely identical to the marks worn by the Earthland members.
Inside the tree, Nab pushed the front door open, panting heavily as he shouted to the crowded room.
"It's a disaster! It's the Fairy Hunter! The Fairy Hunter is here!"
Panic erupted instantly, and everyone's faces were filled with sheer terror.
"Darn it! Has our location been exposed already?!"
"Are the Royal Army's soldiers coming after us again?!"
"This is getting way too troublesome now..."
"What should we do...?"
At the center of the frantic room, a blue-haired woman—Edolas Levy—sat in a mechanical chair, her hands flying rapidly as she continuously operated a complex control console.
"Reactor ignition prepared, coordinates set... Distance correction error remaining... 5, 4, 3, 2, 1..." she read aloud off the glowing screen.
"Mark confirmed accurate! Begin supplying Magical Power to the shock absorbers!"
"Is the Teleportation Magic Circle not ready yet, Levy?!" Edolas Lucy, dressed in a tough black bodysuit and sporting a fierce scowl, demanded angrily.
"Can't you see I'm working as fast as I can?! Stupid Lucy!" Edolas Levy didn't hold back at all, snapping right back at her with equal venom.
Around them, the terrified guild members huddled tightly together or desperately held onto fixed tables and pillars within the building to brace themselves.
"You're too slow! The Fairy Hunter is almost here!" Lucy yelled.
"I know that without you telling me, you brute!" Levy shot back.
"Stop arguing, you two! Just hurry up and prepare the jump!" another member cried.
Levy focused back on the console. "Approaching teleportation critical point... Output power has reached 40%... 43%... 46%..."
"Don't panic like that! Have some backbone for once!" Edolas Juvia, looking sharp and confident, scolded Edolas Gray, who was bundled up in countless layers of heavy coats, covering his mouth with a terrified, shivering expression.
"Hurry up, Levy!" Droy and Jet, both clinging desperately to the back of her command seat, urged her on.
"Shut up, both of you! Two minutes until full teleportation!" Levy roared.
...
Outside, Raizel and his group followed the intense vibrations of the magical power and finally arrived at the clearing.
"That's the 'Fairy Tail' banner..." Kagura and Lucy muttered in awe, looking up at the familiar flag hanging proudly on the giant blue tree.
"The entire atmosphere around here is vibrating wildly," Wendy noted, sensing the intense magical abnormality saturating the air.
"Look above!" Erza suddenly pointed upward toward the sky.
Flying aggressively through the clouds was a giant, blue, dragon-like beast known as a Legion.
The enormous creature continuously crashed through the upper canopies of the trees as it descended.
"What is that monster?!" Happy and Carla cried out, cold sweat breaking out on their furry foreheads.
"Its target seems to be this 'Fairy Tail' building!" Natsu realized. "Let's go help them, quickly!"
"Don't act yet!" Raizel commanded firmly, raising his hand to physically stop Natsu and Gray, who were already stepping forward to fight.
Simultaneously, Raizel discreetly placed a subtle magical tracking mark on the trunk of the guild's tree.
...
Inside, the chaos reached its peak.
"Good! We've finally reached the critical point! Activate the dampers now!" Levy screamed.
She stepped hard on the foot pedal and pulled the main controller lever down.
"Teleportation Magic Circle, deploy!"
"Everyone grab onto something, quickly!"
"I really wish Juvia would hold me!" Edolas Gray, looking like a round, heavily bundled ball of coats, whined as he kept waving his arms frantically, trying to grab onto Juvia beside him for comfort.
"Don't even think about it! I'd die from your excessive body heat!" Juvia spat, using one hand to ruthlessly shove Gray's face away, preventing the overly-layered coward from getting any closer to her.
...
Outside, the terrifying dragon Legion rapidly approached the giant blue tree, its jaws open wide.
"Beginning teleportation sequence!" Levy yelled.
"Will we really be teleported safely this time?" Edolas Cana, dressed in an incredibly elegant, high-class gown, held her cheeks with both hands.
She managed to maintain her refined, ladylike elegance even as the room's anti-gravity began to float her into the air.
"I'll take full responsibility for protecting Miss Cana!" Edolas Wakaba declared valiantly.
"No, stand aside, let me do it!" Edolas Macao argued.
The two younger, distinctly more polite counterparts never missed an opportunity to show utmost courtesy to their beloved lady.
BOOM—!
The dragon Legion dove headfirst toward the ground with devastating force, but it completely missed its target.
The giant blue tree had vanished in a blinding flash of light just a split second before impact, leaving the beast to crash violently into the empty earth, stirring up massive clouds of dirt and debris.
A massive crater appeared where the guild had stood just moments prior.
...
[Everyone stay quiet and keep hidden,] Raizel immediately communicated telepathically to the Earthland members hidden in the bushes.
"Tch. They've been teleported again," a voice echoed through the clearing.
"Hmm... Teleportation Magic, is it? To consistently use such a spell that requires enormous magical power... these dark guilds are really troublesome." A yellow-haired man wearing eccentric pink armor emerged casually from the surrounding forest, inspecting the empty crater.
['Fairy Tail', a dark guild?] Erza and Kagura thought to themselves, unable to help but frown deeply at the insult.
"Hughes, you're here too."
Only when a cold, authoritative voice spoke from high above did the Earthland members notice there was actually another person standing atop the heavily armored Legion!
"Really, these little fairies always escape so quickly," the rider scoffed. "Flying around everywhere like pests... such annoying creatures."
Hughes turned his head to look upward and grinned. "What a pity this time, Fairy Hunter. But those guys don't have many teleportation jumps left in their reserves. Hunting them down for good is just a matter of time."
"However, that giant Anima operation in Earthland seems to have finally succeeded. Because of this, the higher-ups have officially ordered all Magic War Force captains to return to the Royal Capital immediately," Hughes reported.
"Has Earthland's 'Fairy Tail' been annihilated then?" the rider asked.
"To be precise, they've been successfully absorbed. Our King's actions are truly grand in scale," Hughes chuckled.
The red-haired woman, who had been kneeling on the saddle, stood up to her full height.
She looked down from above the beast, asking coldly, "What happened to the Mages from Earthland who were absorbed?"
Hughes lowered his voice conspiratorially. "In the Royal Capital, they've been fused and turned into a single, giant Magic Crystal."
"Excellent! This means Edolas's Magical Power reserves can rest easy for now." The red-haired woman gripped her spear tightly.
"Let's depart for the Royal Capital!"
As she finished speaking, the dragon-like Legion let out a mighty roar, flapped its massive wings, and took off into the sky, leaving a gust of wind in its wake.
"What's going on? Why does that red-haired woman holding a spear look somewhat familiar to me?" Natsu muttered, pinching his chin in profound confusion once the coast was clear.
With his enhanced dragon senses, Natsu's eyesight was much better than everyone else's, allowing him to see her face far more clearly from their hidden vantage point.
But precisely because the uncanny resemblance was so unbelievably strong, he couldn't quite bring himself to confirm what he had just seen.
"She seems a bit like... Erza-san..." Wendy ventured cautiously, looking nervously at the red-haired knight in their own group.
Kagura remained entirely silent, her eyes narrowed.
That enemy commander had looked exactly like Erza—their facial features, their build, and everything else were just far too identical to be a mere coincidence.
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