Stairs. More stairs. Endless, bloody stairs. This unholy tower seemed to have been built by an architect with a fetish for dizzying vertical ascents and a profound hatred for lifts. Or perhaps it was just a cheap way to tire out invaders before they even reached the main fight. An irritatingly effective tactic.
We climbed in a tense silence, or at least as much silence as one could expect from a group that included Natsu Dragneel in a state of urgency. He was grumbling something incomprehensible under his breath, a guttural monologue that probably involved every fire-related insult he knew and the primal desire to punch Jellal's face until it was inside out. Gray, beside him, was muttering back, something about how he should shut up and save his energy before alerting the entire tower to our noble yet noisy incursion. Lucy, noble as ever, was trying to mediate, whispering "boys, please, not now," with the futility of someone trying to put out a fire with a glass of water. And Juvia... well, Juvia was taking every opportunity to vehemently agree with everything Gray said and to cast disapproving glares at the others.
(At least some cosmic patterns, like the predictability of this group, remain constant in the universe. It's almost... reassuring, in a way that gives me a headache,) I thought, ignoring the urge to simply silence them all with an area-of-effect silence spell.
[Detecting significant magical activity three floors above your current position, Azra'il,] Eos's voice sounded in my mind, cutting through the monotony of the climb and the argument. [Multiple low-level signatures… consistent with the tower's guards. And one… one central signature, in combat. Powerful.]
My heart, that treacherous organ, gave a painful leap before I could control it. (Is it her? Erza?)
[The magical signature matches the registered parameters for Erza Scarlet. The intensity and pattern indicate active and high-intensity combat. She is fighting.]
Without thinking, without calculating, without hesitating, I quickened my pace, taking two, three steps at a time. The sound of my boots on the stone became faster, more urgent. The others, noticing my sudden change of pace, stopped arguing.
"Oi, Azra'il, what's up? Why the hurry?" Lucy asked, her voice breathless as she tried to keep up.
"It's Erza," was all I said, without looking back. And that single word was enough.
I didn't need to say more. Natsu, upon hearing her name, shot past me as if someone had lit a fuse on his back – which, considering he was literally a fire-man, was perhaps not the best metaphor, but the urgency was the same.
"ERZA! WE'RE COMING! HOLD ON!"
"NATSU, YOU NOISY IDIOT! SHE'S NOT GOING TO HEAR YOU FROM UP THERE!" Gray cursed, but he also sped up, ice subtly forming under his feet to give him more traction on the slippery steps.
What followed was a chaotic and desperate race up the tower. We turned a corner, then another. The sounds of battle grew louder, clearer. The familiar clang of metal on metal, the sound of muffled magic explosions, and beneath it all, the screams. Screams of pain. Screams of soldiers. Many, many screams of soldiers.
And then, we burst through a double door and saw her.
The scene was a ballet of destruction. Erza. She was in the centre of a large, circular hall, surrounded by what must have been at least two dozen tower guards, perhaps more. Her armour, one I didn't immediately recognise, silver and blue, with stylised wings, shone in the dim light of the torches on the walls, each piece reflecting the chaos. And she… she moved like a scarlet storm, a force of nature. Every blow of her sword was an arc of death, felling an opponent. Every movement, fluid, lethal, trained to exhaustion, to perfection. Blood, dark and thick, stained the stone floor. And, to my immediate and overwhelming relief, none of it was hers.
A guard, a foolishly audacious one, tried to attack her from behind. She spun on her heels without even looking, her longsword cutting the air in a perfect, horizontal arc, and the man's head rolled before his body even began to fall. Two others advanced together from the front, one on each side, with spears at the ready, a basic flanking tactic. Erza, instead of retreating, leapt over them, spinning in the air like a deadly acrobat, and when she landed softly behind them, the two guards were already collapsing to the floor with deep cuts on their backs.
I had stopped running without realising it. I was just… standing at the entrance, watching. Fascinated. It was like watching an artist at their peak. A dancer of death. My dancer.
[Your heart rate has just increased by 340%, Azra'il. And your adrenaline levels are at a peak, even without you being in direct combat. This is… concerning and physiologically inefficient,] Eos commented, with her usual lack of sensitivity.
(Shut up, Eos. Not now.)
[I am just logging the data. You are, clearly, having a significant physiological reaction to the simple act of observing the scarlet-haired mage in combat. Perhaps we should catalogue this as a new type of… fetish?]
(I said shut up. Definitely.)
Erza felled the last guard with a precise blow with the pommel of her sword to his ribs, not lethal, just incapacitating and painful enough to ensure he wouldn't be getting up anytime soon. She stood there for an instant, in the centre of a circle of fallen bodies, her sword pointed at the floor, her chest rising and falling with her panting breath. Sweat shone on her forehead, and a few strands of her scarlet hair, previously perfectly tied back, were now stuck to her face. And then, as if finally sensing our presence, she turned.
And she saw me.
Her brown eyes, previously hard and cold with the concentration of battle, widened. The sword in her hand trembled visibly. The warrior's tension in her body seemed to dissipate, replaced by a pure shock, a vulnerability she rarely showed.
"Azra'il…?" the name came from her lips as a whisper, a breath of disbelief and, perhaps, of relief.
And my body, that machine of logic and control, moved before my mind could even process the decision. One step. Two. Three. And then I was running, no longer with the speed of a predator, but with the desperation of someone who has finally found what they had lost. I crossed the hall, not bothering to dodge, stepping on unconscious guards as if they were mere stepping stones, the sound of my boots echoing on the stone.
Erza opened her mouth to say something, perhaps a protest, perhaps a question, but I gave her no time, no room for words. I collided with her, not in an attack, but in a hug. A hug with so much force, with so much desperate relief, that it would probably have knocked any normal person to the ground. My arms wrapped around her waist under her armour, ignoring the cold metal, and I held her with a strength that came from the depths of my soul. My face buried itself in the curve of her neck and shoulder, and I breathed in deeply, inhaling her scent, a mixture of sweat, steel, and that subtle aroma of strawberries that was so, so Erza. I held her as if she were a ghost about to disappear, as if the entire world could crumble around us, and nothing else would matter.
(You idiot. You complete and utter idiot. Why do you always have to be so… so you? So noble, so reckless, so willing to throw yourself into danger…)
I felt her body go rigid in my arms for an instant. Tense. Shocked. But then, slowly, like a flower opening at dawn, I felt her relax. Her arms, one still holding the heavy sword, rose hesitantly. And then, they wrapped around me in return, pulling me even closer. The sword fell from her hand with a loud metallic crash that echoed through the silent hall, the final sound of that battle.
"You… you idiot," Erza whispered against my hair, and her voice was trembling, broken by an emotion she was trying, unsuccessfully, to contain. "Why… why did you come? After everything I said… after our argument on the beach, I… I thought you hated me. I thought you…"
"That I what, little red? That I would leave you?" I pulled back just enough to look at her face. Her eyes, those beautiful and expressive brown eyes, were shining with unshed tears. "You were kidnapped, Erza. Dragged back to your greatest nightmare. Did you really, honestly, think I would stay peacefully at Akane Resort, sunbathing and drinking drinks with umbrellas, while you were here, in danger?" The idea was so absurd it made me want to laugh and cry at the same time. "I was a complete and monumental idiot. What I did on the beach… it was stupid. Unforgivable. But not even in my greatest stupidity would I abandon you. Never."
"I… I said horrible things to you…"
"And you were right about every single one of them," I said, and the sincerity in my voice surprised her. "I hurt you. And I am sorry for that. More than you can imagine. But understand one thing, Erza Scarlet," and here I held her face between my hands, forcing her to look at me, to see the truth in my eyes, "I may be an idiot. I may be a trouble-maker with a terrible sense of timing. But from now on, if I am an idiot, I am YOUR idiot. And you, unfortunately for you, will have to put up with me for a very, very long time."
Her lower lip trembled. Just for a second. A single, fleeting instant of total vulnerability. And then, with a sound that was half a sob, half a sigh of relief, she hugged me back, this time with a force that took my breath away, crushing me against her cold armour in a way that would probably leave some interesting bruises later. And I didn't care in the slightest.
(Ah, yes. Definitely worth it.)
[Observation. The probability of damage to your ribs is 32%,] Eos commented, ever the spoilsport. [However, your respiratory capacity, although significantly diminished, is still within the parameters of survival. Therefore, I suppose… it is also worth it.]
(I think you're starting to understand, Eos.)
[Unfortunately.]
Behind us, I heard the unmistakable sound of Lucy making that little noise that was somewhere between a cute "aww" and an emotional sob about to turn into full-blown crying.
"O-oh, my god… this is so… so beautiful!" she said, her voice choked, her hands probably pressed against her chest.
"Tch," Gray crossed his arms, trying to look indifferent, as always, but I could see a small smile at the corner of his mouth. "At least we've found her and she's in one piece. Less work for us."
"Juvia thinks that Azra'il-san's love for Erza-san is almost as intense, almost as dramatic, as Juvia's love for my beloved Gray-sama!" Juvia said, her eyes shining with pure romantic admiration. "Almost."
And, of course, there was Natsu. "Huh?" he scratched his head, clearly and totally confused by the emotional scene unfolding. "Wait a minute, are they fighting or hugging? I don't get it. Are they going to fight now?"
"Shut up, Natsu. You're a complete idiot," Gray said, without the slightest hesitation.
"WHAT DID YOU CALL ME, YOU WALKING ICE PANTS?!"
"WHAT I SAID, YOU BURNT-OUT LUMP OF COAL!"
"YOU TWO, FOR THE LOVE OF THE GODS, CAN YOU SHUT UP FOR TWO SECONDS?!" Lucy shouted, pointing a trembling finger at us. "AN EMOTIONAL REUNION MOMENT IS HAPPENING RIGHT HERE, YOU INSENSITIVE OAFS!"
I finally, and very reluctantly, pulled away from Erza's embrace, but I kept my hands on her shoulders. And she, to my surprise and relief, didn't move away. She didn't try to recompose her usual serious expression, her Titania mask. She just looked back at me, with those brown eyes of hers that carried so much weight, so much history, and now, something new. Something that looked a lot like… happiness.
"How did you get here so quickly?" she asked finally, her voice still a little hoarse.
"We, uh, borrowed a boat," I replied with a half-smile, deciding to omit the "theft" part. "And we sailed to the tower, discovered a passage in the subterranean sector that had an underwater entrance, and got in. Juvia, I must admit, was extremely helpful and created an air bubble for each of us to breathe while we infiltrated like clumsy fish."
"You… you 'borrowed' a boat?"
"It was, technically, an 'unauthorised emergency loan'. They're just bureaucratic details." I hesitated for a second, my tone growing more serious, darker. "And as for knowing where you had gone… Erza, I… I told them the truth. About the Tower of Heaven. About our past. About… us. They needed to know."
I felt her tense again under my hands. "You… told them…?"
"They deserved to know what we were fighting against," I said, squeezing her shoulders lightly, a reassuring gesture. "They deserved to know about the tower. About what you went through. About Jellal." Her expression closed off at the sound of his name. "But I didn't tell them the more… personal details. That's your story to tell, if and when you want to. I just gave them the general context."
She was silent for a long moment, her gaze passing over my shoulder, observing the others. Observing Lucy, with her expression of genuine concern. Gray, trying to look indifferent but failing miserably. Juvia, looking at all of us with an almost childish curiosity. And Natsu… Natsu was simply punching his own palm, with an expression of pure and simple determination, clearly eager to get to the next brawl and hit something. Our friends. Our family.
"You… you really came all this way for me," Erza said quietly, not to me, but to herself, as if she were trying to believe it. "Even knowing how dangerous it would be. Even without knowing exactly what you would face. You… you should have stayed at the resort, safe."
"And leave you alone in the hands of that psychopath Jellal?" Lucy's voice sounded, strong and clear. She approached us, shaking her head with a stubbornness I admired. "You are our friend, our guildmate, Erza. We would never, ever, abandon you. Ever."
"That's right!" Natsu took a step forward, a wide, toothy grin on his face. "Fairy Tail doesn't abandon its own! That's rule number one! And besides…" his smile turned into something fiercer, more predatory. "I have a very, very serious score to settle with this Jellal bloke. No one kidnaps my friends and gets away with it, no way!"
Erza looked at him. Then at Lucy. At Gray. At Juvia. And, finally, back at me. "You are all… complete… idiots," she said.
But, for the first time, there was a wide, genuine, unbarred, and absolutely beautiful smile on her lips.
"The biggest idiots I know," I confirmed, and my own heart, for some stupid reason, was lighter than it had been in centuries.
Erza, recovering a little of her leader's composure, moved away from my embrace, but not completely. Her hand, almost by instinct, found mine and squeezed it tightly, a small, almost imperceptible gesture to the others, but which, for me, said more than a thousand words. A re-established link.
"How much, exactly, did you tell them?" she asked quietly, her voice just for me.
"Just the basics," I replied, squeezing her hand back. "About us having been slaves here. About the tower being the R-System. About the ridiculous and impossible goal of resurrecting Zeref. Enough for them to understand the gravity of the situation and the level of insanity of our opponent." I squeezed her hand a little tighter. "But I didn't tell them the details. The nightmares. The… losses. That's yours, Erza. And you only tell it if and when you're ready."
Erza nodded slowly, her eyes filling with a silent gratitude, seeming to organise the thoughts in her mind. And then, she turned to the others, her posture straightening, her chin lifting. Titania was back on the surface, the commander taking control.
"What Azra'il has told you is the purest and most painful truth," she said, her voice firm, resonating with a new and terrible authority. "This tower, this abomination, was built with a single and blasphemous purpose: to bring Zeref, the most powerful and infamous dark mage that has ever existed, back to life." Her voice was cold, but I could feel the tension, the pain, under every syllable. "For that to happen, the R-System requires an absurd amount of magical power, an energy equivalent to 2.7 billion Edeas. And it requires a sacrifice. A body. The body of someone with an immense and compatible magical power to serve as a vessel."
"And that someone… is you," Gray said, and it wasn't a question, but a grim statement.
"Yes," she confirmed, without hesitation. "Jellal, the man who now controls this tower, has chosen me to be that sacrifice."
[Azra'il,] Eos's voice sounded in my mind.
(What? Not now, Eos. This is an important moment for her.)
[Precisely for that reason. You are not going to tell them, are you?]
(Tell them what? That Jellal is an idiot with a terrible fashion sense? They'll find out eventually.)
[Azra'il, don't play dumb. You know what I'm talking about. The truth. The great and ironic cosmic joke behind it all. The fact that this entire plan is, from its inception, fundamentally flawed. That one cannot, under any circumstances, resurrect someone who has, in fact, never died.]
I kept my expression perfectly neutral as the memory hit me, cold and clear. The face of Zeref on Tenrou Island, his sad eyes, and our philosophical and therapeutic debate.
"You need to understand who Jellal was. Before all this," Erza continued, her voice growing softer, laden with an old pain that was almost palpable. "When we were slaves here, in this very tower, he was… he was kind. And protective. A born leader. When the guards tortured me for a crime I didn't commit, and they tore out my right eye, it was Jellal who came to rescue me from the dungeon. He risked himself for me, for us."
I heard Lucy cover her mouth with her hands, a muffled sound of horror.
"But he was captured for it," Erza continued, her voice trembling, the memory clearly painful. "The guards took him to the torture chambers. And when, finally, we managed to start our rebellion, and I went there, to save him, to get him out of there…"
She paused. Swallowed hard, as if the words tasted of poison.
"The Jellal I found in that room… was no longer the same boy I knew."
[Azra'il. They deserve to know. The truth could change their approach,] Eos insisted, her logic relentless.
(And what would that really change now, Eos? Jellal, whatever he has become, is still mad. The tower is still real and dangerous. And Erza is still his target. Besides, imagine the conversation: "Oh, by the way, everyone, a small correction to the enemy's plan: that super powerful Dark Mage he's trying to resurrect? Well, I met him a few years ago, we had a quiet cup of tea on our guild's sacred island, and I forgot to mention it to everyone." Do you think that would make people calmer and more confident?)
My mind travelled to that day, about four years ago. Tenrou Island. A strangely silent forest, where even the birds and insects seemed to avoid flying. And him. Sitting under a tree, with the teacup I had prepared in his hands, a figure of pure and desolate sadness. A young man, with hair as black as night and red eyes that held the weight of centuries of suffering and loss. The Ankhseram Black Magic, pulsing around him like a visible aura of death, withering the very life around him. Zeref. Alive. Breathing. Desperately wishing to die, but cursed to never be able to.
We had talked, briefly. Two creatures trapped by longevity, silently recognising something in each other, that deep existential weariness, the pain of seeing everything you love turn to dust while you, somehow, remain. He was not the megalomaniacal monster that the legends painted, not anymore. He was something infinitely worse: a broken, tortured man who could not die, no matter how much he wanted to.
[If you tell them the truth, at least them, they would know that Jellal's ultimate goal is, from the beginning, impossible to achieve. That would change the risk calculation,] Eos insisted.
(And it would also let everyone know that I met the greatest Dark Mage in history, the catalyst for countless wars and sufferings, and also didn't tell absolutely anyone. That I kept this colossal secret for almost four years, from my own guild, from my own Master. Do you really think this is the best time for that revelation, while we are trying to rescue Erza?)
(…)
(Besides, Eos… the Jellal that Erza describes, the one who is being manipulated, who "heard Zeref's voice"… is clearly not being influenced by the real Zeref, the man I met, who just wants to be left alone with his misery. There is something else at play here. Another entity, another manipulation. And I need to understand what it is before I lay all my cards on the table.)
[Do you suspect who?]
(I'm not absolutely sure yet. But the residual magical signature in the tower back then, the type of mind control… I have my suspicions. And they are not good. But let's deal with one lunatic at a time.)
"When I entered that room," Erza's voice, lower now, brought me back to the present, to her own painful memory. "Jellal was standing in the centre. But there was something… wrong with him. A heavy, black aura was pulsing around him, like living shadows writhing. And his eyes… they were the same eyes, but at the same time, they were completely, totally, different. Cold. Empty. As if something terrible had entered him, emptied him, and taken his place. Something very, very dark."
"A possession?" Gray asked, frowning, ice unconsciously forming on his fingers.
"I… I'm not sure," Erza admitted. "Perhaps. Or perhaps the torture just… broke something inside him irreversibly." Her voice trembled for an instant. "He smiled at me. That gentle smile, the smile I knew, that I loved. And then, he said that… that he had finally heard the true voice of Zeref. That the great Dark Mage had shown him the path to a perfect world, the true Paradise, where there would be no more pain, no more suffering. And that I… that I would be the final piece, that would help him build this new world."
"What a lying, manipulative bastard," Natsu snarled, the flames on his fists crackling with a new, righteous intensity.
"He destroyed the only escape boats left on the island," Erza continued, the pain in her voice almost unbearable to listen to. "And he blamed me. He told all our friends that I had betrayed us all, that I was trying to flee alone, that I had abandoned them to die. And Shô, Simon, Millianna, Wally… they… they believed him. Why wouldn't they? Jellal was our leader. Our greatest hope. The one who always protected us."
She closed her eyes for a moment, as if to block out the memories. "He gave me a choice. To leave the tower, alone, and never come back. Or to stay and watch him kill every single one of the other children on the island, one by one, in front of me." When she opened her eyes again, they were burning with a determination of cast iron, but also with the pain of a wound that had never closed. "I decided to leave, so he threw me into the sea… I left my childhood friends believing that I was the worst of traitors. And I have carried that secret, that guilt, for all these years."
The silence that followed her confession was heavy, crushing, laden with the weight of years of silent suffering. "Erza…" Lucy had silent tears streaming down her face, her heart breaking in empathy.
"I don't need your pity," Erza said firmly, wiping a stubborn tear with the back of her gloved hand. "What I need is your help to stop Jellal. Not for personal revenge, not anymore. But because if he manages to complete the R-System, if he really tries that ritual, hundreds, perhaps thousands of innocent people could die. The tower needs a sacrifice, and if it's not me, he will, for sure, find someone else."
(Except he won't. His plan would never work anyway. Because Zeref is alive. And all this… all this pain, all this manipulation… is for absolutely nothing.)
"We will stop him," I said aloud, and my voice was firm, full of a promise. I squeezed Erza's hand tightly, feeling her cold and slightly trembling fingers in mine. "Together. This time, all of us."
She looked at me, really looked at me, and for a moment, I saw something beyond Titania, beyond the S-Class mage, beyond the relentless warrior with her scarlet armour. I saw the frightened little girl I had met so many years ago, the one who had lost everything, but who still, stubbornly, refused to stop fighting.
"Together," she repeated quietly, and a small, fragile, but genuine smile appeared on her lips. And that, for me, was worth more than any battle plan.
"Juvia has a question, with all due respect," the water mage said suddenly, timidly raising her hand as if in a classroom, breaking the solemn moment.
We all turned to her.
"If… if this Jellal fellow needs a very, very powerful mage for the sacrifice…" Juvia looked directly at me, and there was something cautious, almost fearful in her blue eyes. Something that resembled a respect born of fear. "With all due respect to Erza-san, who is incredibly strong, but… why did he choose Erza-san… and not Azra'il-san?"
The silence that followed her question was different from the previous ones. It was charged with an uncomfortable logic that no one there had dared to vocalise.
"What do you mean by that, Juvia?" Lucy asked, genuinely confused.
"Juvia saw," she said quietly, almost as if confessing a dark, traumatic secret. "At the resort, last night, when Azra'il-san… when she released her power. That cold fire, that pressure… Juvia felt it from far away. It was… it was like the fury of a frozen ocean about to swallow the world." Her eyes did not leave mine, and I remained motionless, allowing her to speak, curious to see where she was going with this. "But before that, long before, at the time Phantom Lord attacked Fairy Tail."
The expression on Gray's face, beside me, instantly tensed. Lucy's eyes widened, understanding beginning to form.
"We all from Phantom saw. We saw when Azra'il-san… when she came back, after facing our Master, José Porla, alone. One of the Ten Wizard Saints. She not only defeated him, but she threw Master José's head in the middle of us. For all to see." Her eyes seemed distant, probably recalling the events of that day.
"If the R-System needs a truly immense magical power to work," Juvia concluded, her voice now a thread, "then… then the most logical choice, the choice that anyone who had seen what Juvia saw… would be Azra'il-san. Because the power that Juvia felt yesterday… she has never, ever felt anything remotely similar in her entire life. It was… it was like being in the presence of the end of everything."
(She is surprisingly, and perhaps dangerously, perceptive, isn't she, Eos?)
[Her question is logically valid. And the ocean metaphor, I must admit, is rather accurate to describe your soul signature. Why did Jellal, indeed, not choose you as his target?]
Erza was also looking at me now, and I could see the same silent question forming in her brown eyes, a question that, in all her suffering, she had probably never stopped to ask out loud. Why her, and not me?
"Because," I said simply, my calm voice cutting through the heavy air, "I am a risk that he, in his calculated madness, is not willing to take."
"A risk? What do you mean?" Natsu tilted his head, confused as always.
"Jellal, however much he has become a lunatic with a messiah complex, knows that I am powerful. He saw enough of my power when we were still children in this very tower. He knows about what happened with Phantom Lord." I crossed my arms, a gesture of calm and control. "But he doesn't know how powerful I am. He doesn't know the true extent of my power, because I have never shown it. Not to him. Not to anyone here, actually." (At least, not consciously.) "And that, for a strategist like him, makes me a variable that he cannot, in any way, calculate. An unknown factor."
[A strategy of power concealment that you have deliberately cultivated over years in this guild, and for ages in other existences,] Eos added.
(Exactly. It's always good to keep a few cards up your sleeve. Or, in my case, a private pocket apocalypse.)
"Jellal is many things," I continued, my voice cold and analytical. "But a complete idiot is not one of them, unfortunately. He is a strategist. He plans, he calculates, he moves the pieces on his board years in advance. And a good strategist, a good chess player, never, ever bets everything on a move he cannot predict, on a piece he does not understand."
"So he… he chose Erza because…" Lucy began to say, understanding beginning to dawn in her eyes.
"Because he knows her apparent limits," my hard, cold gaze met Erza's, who now seemed to understand as well. "He thinks he knows what she is capable of. And, more importantly than that: he knows, or at least believes he knows, that Erza, even at the peak of her fury, even in the face of the end of the world… would hesitate."
The air in the room grew even heavier.
"Hesitate… in what?" Gray frowned.
And it was Erza herself who answered, quietly, her voice almost a whisper, full of a pain and a truth that shamed her. "In killing him." Everyone looked at her. "Jellal knows that… that despite everything he has done, of all the evil he has caused… I still…"
She couldn't finish the sentence. But she didn't need to. Everyone there who knew her understood.
"Erza, in her nobility and in her big, stupid heart," I completed for her, my voice cold and without a hint of judgement, just a statement of fact, "still holds, somewhere deep down, the memory of the boy Jellal once was. The kind friend. The boy who saved her, who named her. And that memory, that hesitation, however small, makes her, for a manipulator like him… predictable. Vulnerable."
I turned my gaze back to the group, and there was no more softness in my eyes. Just a promise of ice and fire. "I… would not hesitate." My voice came out cold, flat, factual, and I felt a shiver run through the group. "If Jellal became a real and imminent threat to Erza, I would tear his heart from his chest with my own hands and make him swallow it, without a second thought. I don't care about the past. I don't care if one day, in a distant age, he was our friend. If the choice is between him and the people I have sworn to protect, the choice is terribly, obviously, clear."
The silence that followed my declaration was almost suffocating. I could see how disturbed Lucy was by my coldness. Gray, on the other hand, was looking at me with an expression I couldn't completely decipher. And Natsu… Natsu, surprisingly, just nodded, with a rather reluctant expression.
And Erza… ah, Erza. She was looking at me with something that, to my discomfort, looked a lot like sadness. Not for herself. But… for me.
(No, Erza. Don't look at me like that. Not now.)
"And that is exactly why he does not want me as his precious sacrifice," I said, breaking the moment with a calculated abruptness. "I am too powerful, too unpredictable, and, most importantly for him, utterly devoid of any sentimentalism that he could exploit to his advantage. Capturing Erza, for him, was simply safer. More… controllable."
"That… that's horrible. Using her feelings against her," Lucy swallowed hard, with a visible revulsion.
"That," I corrected, with a dark smile, "is called strategy, my dear. And now that we finally understand how his sick mind works, how he thinks, how he plays… we can, at last, use that against him and break his pathetic little board."
"THAT'S ALL A BIG LIE!"
The voice, high-pitched, trembling, childish, and laden with a pain that seemed to tear at the throat of whoever uttered it, came from behind one of the large pillars of the hall.
We all turned at the same time, in an instinctive combat movement. Natsu already had his fists in flames. Gray was already in position, ice forming around him. Lucy, her hand on her keys, retreated close to me.
But I… I recognised that voice before I even saw the face that accompanied it.
Shô, the youngest of us, the boy with the magic cards, came out of the shadows, staggering as if every step cost him an immense effort, as if the ground beneath his feet were made of quicksand. His face was pale, his large green eyes wide with horror and denial. And the magic cards were trembling between his fingers, not in an attacking position, but as if he simply couldn't let them go, as if they were his last and fragile connection to reality.
"Shô…" Erza took a step forward, her voice soft, full of an old pain.
"STAY AWAY FROM ME, YOU TRAITOR!" he shouted, retreating, tripping over his own feet. "You… you're lying! All of you! Everything you said is a lie! Jellal… he would never… he would never do something like that! HE WAS THE ONE WHO TRULY SAVED US!"
(Brilliant. Marvellous. He heard every word. The situation, which was already complicated, has just become exponentially more… dramatic.)
[Alert. The emotional state of individual Shô is extremely unstable. Probability of irrational attack or nervous breakdown: 93.7%,] Eos informed, with her usual, helpful precision.
(Thank you, Eos. I didn't need a supercomputer to reach that conclusion. His hysteria is almost palpable.)
"Shô, please, listen to me carefully—" Erza tried again, with a patience that I, frankly, did not possess.
"NO! I'M NOT GOING TO LISTEN TO ANY MORE OF YOUR LIES!" The thick, hot tears finally began to stream down his face, but he didn't seem to notice, blinded by the pain and confusion. "For ten long and bloody years… FOR TEN YEARS I believed with all my heart that you had betrayed us, nee-san! That you had destroyed the escape boats and fled to save your own skin! And I HATED you! With every fibre of my being, I hated you for it! I… I…"
His voice broke in a painful sob.
"And now, after all this time, you show up with these new and noisy friends of yours, and you say it was all Jellal's fault? That he was the one who destroyed the boats? That he was the one who betrayed us, who framed you, who lied to us for a whole decade?!" Shô shook his head frantically, as if physically trying to expel the idea from his mind. "No. No, no, no, no. That can't be true. It makes no sense. Jellal… he saved us. He freed us from that tower. He gave us a purpose. He—"
"He used you, Shô. All of you," I said, and my voice came out cold and without a shred of emotion, cutting through his desperate speech.
Shô turned to me as if only now truly noticing my presence. And when his eyes, red from crying, finally met mine, something different, something more primordial, crossed his face. Fear. Pure and simple fear.
"You…" he swallowed hard, taking another step back. "You… I… I heard what you said. About… about Phantom Lord. About… about Master José."
I took a slow, deliberate step towards him. And Shô retreated two.
"You… you killed one of the Ten Wizard Saints," he said, and his voice, which had been of anger before, was now trembling with dread. "The stories I heard… they said you tore his head off with your own hands. And you… you just said that… that you would do the same to Jellal. Without the slightest hesitation."
"I would," I confirmed, my voice a whisper of ice, without emotion.
"BUT HOW CAN YOU SAY SOMETHING LIKE THAT?! HOW?!" Shô shouted, and the magic cards finally fell from his trembling hands, scattering across the stone floor. "HE'S OUR FRIEND! JELLAL IS OUR FRIEND! WE GREW UP TOGETHER! WE SUFFERED TOGETHER IN THAT BLOODY AND CURSED TOWER!"
"And now," I replied calmly, with a logic that, to him, must have sounded like pure cruelty, "he wants to take your nee-san and sacrifice her on an altar to resurrect a dark mage who's been dead for centuries, in a futile attempt to create a paradise that only exists in his head. The boy we knew, the friend who suffered beside us in that cell… died in that torture room many, many years ago, Shô. What's left is something else. An empty shell. A distorted echo."
"You don't know that! You can't know that! He's still there, somewhere!"
"I do know. I know because, unlike you and the others," my voice grew even colder, "I didn't have to spend the last ten years feeding on a comfortable lie to be able to move on. I saw the truth that day. I saw the darkness in his eyes. And I have never, ever forgotten it."
Shô staggered back as if I had just punched him in the stomach, the air leaving his lungs.
"Azra'il," Erza's voice, low and soft, sounded beside me, a clear warning in her tone.
(I know, I know. I'm being too hard on the child.)
[He is young. And he is having his worldview, his saviour figure, completely and brutally destroyed in real-time, before his very eyes. The shock is… considerable,] Eos pointed out.
(Thank you, Eos, for your obvious psychological analysis. But we don't have time for therapy sessions and pleasantries. He needs to understand. Quickly.)
I took a deep breath, forcing the coldness in my voice to recede a little, to give way to something less… cutting. "Shô. Look at me."
He didn't look. He was staring at the floor, his shoulders shaking with silent sobs. "Shô."
Slowly, hesitantly, he lifted his face. The tears had left tracks on his young, dirty face, a face that was still, deep down, that of a frightened child who had been forced to grow up too fast. The youngest of us all. The most sensitive. And, perhaps, the one who had suffered the most from the lie.
"I know it hurts, kid," I said, and the softness in my voice surprised even myself. "Believe me, of all the people here, I know exactly how much it hurts. To find out that someone you trusted, whom you loved, has betrayed you in the cruellest way… that everything you believed in was just a carefully constructed lie to manipulate you… it's like having the ground ripped out from under your feet and plummeting into a bottomless abyss."
He sniffed, trying unsuccessfully to wipe his face with the back of his dirty hand. "He… he was our hero…"
"I know. But the pain, however great, doesn't change the truth. And the truth is that Erza never, ever, betrayed you. She was cast out of this tower. Threatened. And yet, she never, not for a single day, stopped caring about every single one of you. She carried that guilt, that pain, alone for all these years." I gestured with my chin at the scarlet-haired woman beside me, who was watching him with a pain that mirrored his own. "Look at her, Shô. Look her right in the eyes. And tell me you really believe she is lying."
Shô's trembling, tear-filled eyes finally met Erza's. And Erza, the great and powerful Titania, the strongest mage in Fairy Tail, the woman I had seen face entire armies without shedding a single tear, had her eyes full of tears too.
"Shô…" she said softly, taking a hesitant step towards him, holding out her hand. "I am so sorry. I am so sorry for not being stronger back then. For leaving and leaving you behind. For letting you believe… believe that lie for so long…"
"Nee-san…" the name came from his lips as a sob.
"I should have told the guild the truth. I should have come back for you sooner. But I was… I was so afraid." Her voice broke. "Afraid of what Jellal would do to you if I came back. Afraid of putting more innocent people in danger. So… I ran. And I left you all behind, alone with him."
"The blame… the blame can't be yours, nee-san…" Shô shook his head, the tears starting to flow with full force again, the confusion and pain at war within him. "The blame is… it's…"
But he couldn't finish the sentence. He couldn't say Jellal's name. Because the truth, that terrible and inescapable truth, was trying to establish itself in his mind, but he, with the strength of ten years of devotion and brotherly love, was desperately fighting against it, with every fibre of his being.
"SO IT WAS ALL A LIE?! EVERY WORD?!" Shô finally exploded, falling to his knees on the stone floor, his hands in his hair, pulling with desperation. "EVERYTHING THAT JELLAL TOLD US?! THE PARADISE?! THE FREEDOM?! HER BETRAYAL?! EVERYTHING?! NO! NO, I CAN'T BELIEVE THIS! I REFUSE TO BELIEVE IT! JELLAL WOULD NEVER… HE WOULD NEVER DO THIS TO US! HE PROTECTED US! HE SAVED US! YOU'RE ALL LYING! ALL OF YOU!"
"It's not a lie, Shô. She's not lying."
The voice that sounded from the shadows was not mine. It was deep, profound, and laden with a weight that only years of suffering could forge.
And all of us, without exception, turned in the direction of the voice, our hearts in our mouths. A massive figure, which looked as if it had been carved from the very rock of the tower, emerged slowly from one of the side corridors. He was tall, incredibly muscular, with a white turban covering part of his face and a metal plate that concealed his jaw. A long scar ran down over his left eye, which was covered by an eye patch, giving him an even more intimidating appearance. And, despite the appearance of a brutal warrior, there was a sad kindness in his one visible eye.
It was Simon. And I knew, before he even spoke, that he, unlike Shô, had never really believed the lie.
-----------
💬 Author's Note
-----------
Yes… they are cute. Very cute. 🥹💖
In the middle of a cursed tower, trauma, blood, and chaos… Azra'il sees Erza alive and just goes straight for the hug. Priorities.
But this chapter isn't just about that.
This is where things really start opening up: the R-System, the weight Erza has been carrying for years, and Jellal, not just as a villain, but as someone who once mattered to her. And that matters, because unlike Azra'il… Erza still hesitates.
Azra'il, on the other hand, makes it very clear that she wouldn't. Not even for a second.
Then Shô shows up to make everything worse (or better, depending on how much you enjoy emotional damage 💀), proving that Jellal's lie didn't end in the past, it kept living inside the people who believed in him. That moment isn't just conflict, it's someone's entire reality breaking apart.
And to top it off: Simon shows up like "yeah… she's telling the truth" and just adds more fuel to the fire.
Now tell me:
what did you think about Azra'il and Erza in this chapter?
They were cute, right? Because honestly… dangerously cute. 👀💖