"Let's go!" Natsu shouted as he charged forward, flames trailing behind him.
"Dance, my demons!" Precht commanded.
The demons of various forms unleashed their dark skills, lunging at the members.
"Take Over: Omegamon X!" Raizel chanted, golden and white armor encasing his body.
"Flash Forward!"
"Ice-Make: Lancer!"
"Archenemy: Slashing Form!"
"Black Wing: Moon Glide!"
"Magic Card: Summoned Thunder!"
The members displayed their unique, powerful abilities, shattering and blocking all the dark attacks launched by the earth block demons.
Meanwhile, Natsu headed straight for Precht, while Raizel rushed towards the bulk of the demonic army.
Natsu's blazing fist smashed brutally into the confident Precht's face.
"No... impossible... How could my inner magic fail?! I don't believe it, my infinite magic..." Precht gasped, stumbling back.
Precht suddenly clutched his chest, his demon eye widening in sheer panic.
'Could it be...?!' Precht felt his magical power continuously draining away... and the speed of the drain was increasing exponentially.
'My heart was actually found...' Precht realized in horror.
"Ahhhhhh!!!" Taking advantage of Precht's sudden daze, Natsu charged forward and roared, delivering a devastating, flaming uppercut to his jaw.
...
Deep inside the power room of Grimoire Heart, Precht's massive mechanical heart was still beating weakly, but the glass chamber had been shattered by Happy and Carla working together.
The special magical fluid sustaining the heart was rapidly depleting, spilling uselessly across the floor.
...
The Grey Sword of Raizel's Omegamon X form extended, transforming into a massive streak of blinding white light that swiftly swept past the horde of earth block demons.
A clean, glowing crack appeared at the waists of the demons, followed by more cracks appearing all over their dark bodies as they slowly began to vanish into digital dust.
Raizel didn't pay much attention to the demons' destruction, instead steadying his mind to check his internal systems.
His Take Over synchronization rate increased from 90.5% to 91%.
'So one method of increasing the Take Over rate is using the 'All Delete' ability to permanently erase certain special, high-tier magical properties from reality,' Raizel speculated.
He had wanted to test this theory ever since Precht's inner magic first appeared.
This dark magic created by Zeref clearly contained a trait of physical creation that triggered the X-Antibody's deletion protocol.
Raizel released the Take Over armor and walked over to Precht, who was gaping at his hands in disbelief.
"The secret to your longevity and immense magical power comes from the giant mechanical heart hidden on this battleship, right? The 'Grimoire Heart'," Raizel stated coldly. "Once that is destroyed, your magic power vanishes."
'How is this possible... I actually lost to these brats...' Precht thought, his vision blurring.
He watched helplessly as Natsu's fire-wreathed iron fist swung towards his face.
"The winners are us!" Natsu roared.
"Wrong!" Precht spat. He blocked Natsu's face with his palm at the very last moment.
Utilizing his reach advantage, Precht temporarily halted Natsu's blazing assault.
Precht followed up with a dark bullet strike to Natsu's gut, pushing him back and then delivered a heavy kick to his chest.
"Before reaching the pinnacle of the demonic path, a true demon shall never sleep!" Precht roared, his expression feral.
A dark shadow appeared before him.
"Go! Fairy Tail!" Laxus yelled.
He had recovered just enough magic power to deliver a heavy, lightning-infused punch to Precht's ribs after elementalizing himself.
Flames and electric arcs danced violently across Natsu's body as he rebounded.
Erza quickly Requipped into her Clear Heart Clothing, wielding dual katanas.
Kagura fully drew Archenemy, her aura flaring.
Cana's magical bow and arrow were poised to strike from afar.
"Open, Gate of the Golden Bull! Capricorn!" Lucy summoned.
"Sky Dragon's Wing Attack!" Wendy unleashed twin tornadoes.
"Ice-Make: Ice Demon Sword!" Gray forged a massive blade of freezing ice.
Precht endured the members' relentless, perfectly synchronized combo attacks.
Capricorn's successive close-quarters martial arts left him dazed, while Wendy's wind blew him high into the air.
Gray followed up with a rising dual-sword slash, and as Precht fell through the air, Erza and Kagura each struck him with devastating, crossing blade strikes.
Just before he hit the wooden deck, Cana's lightning arrow pierced his shoulder.
Finally, Natsu leaped above him, gathering roaring flames in his left hand and golden lightning in his right.
"Dragon Slayer Secret Art Revision!" Natsu chanted, bringing his hands together.
"Crimson Lotus: Exploding Lightning Blade!"
Natsu violently rotated his hands, forming a massive, devastating vortex of fire and lightning that tightly enveloped Precht's falling body, creating a blinding explosion.
"Ultimate Magic World... just a little more..." Precht groaned, heavily burned.
He collapsed weakly to the destroyed floorboards, reaching out feebly toward the rainy sky.
"Sigh... still going on about the Ultimate Magic World," Raizel shook his head, walking over to the defeated Guild Master.
"Just a little more. Just a little more. I've gathered all the keys to awaken Zeref. If I can just open the Ultimate Magic World, I'll obtain the First Magic..." Precht mumbled delusionally.
Raizel truly thought the old man had lost his mind.
"Still clinging to this delusion? The so-called Ultimate Magic World doesn't exist, Precht. Nor are there any magical 'keys' to awaken Zeref."
When Raizel had previously communicated with Zeref in the jungle, they had briefly discussed the Ultimate Magic World and these supposed keys to awaken his power.
The answer from the Black Wizard was incredibly clear: they didn't exist.
Zeref had sealed his own mind voluntarily, struggling daily against the Curse of Ankhseram that plagued him.
He could release his own mental seal anytime he wished, requiring no external keys.
Zeref had also firmly stated that there was no such thing as an Ultimate Magic World that purged non-mages—at the very least, he himself possessed no such apocalyptic capability.
He had even laughed self-mockingly, saying that if he had such specific, god-like power, how could he fear a simple curse of contradiction?
Raizel speculated that the so-called "keys" were most likely embellishments added by crazy cultists and storytellers over the centuries.
Precht instinctively retorted, coughing blood. "Impossible! I've consulted numerous ancient archives! How could my life's research be wrong?!"
Precht had immersed himself so deeply in his dark research for decades that he had brainwashed himself, making it impossible for him to accept the simple truth.
After some thought, Raizel decided to finally put the old man out of his misery with the truth.
"Let me tell you something, Precht. I think you'll believe this. The person who originally taught magic to you, Mavis, Warrod Sequen, and Yuri Dreyar... was the Black Wizard Zeref."
When Zeref had taught the founders magic in the forest, he hadn't revealed his true name.
Only later, when Mavis encountered Zeref again, did she learn his identity.
But Mavis never had the chance to tell Precht and the others, because shortly afterward, she 'died' from the curse.
Thus, Precht never knew that the gentle, black-haired youth who taught them their foundational magic was the very Black Wizard Zeref he had been desperately seeking to awaken.
Mavis's consciousness awakened inside the crystal much later.
So even after Precht and Warrod Sequen left Fairy Tail, they remained entirely unaware that Mavis's spirit had revived.
Mavis couldn't recall the exact timeline, but as a ghost, she had always found Tenrou Island rather boring.
However, given her ethereal condition, she couldn't wander around freely beyond the island's borders.
It wasn't until Raizel, Makarov, and Gildarts came before her tomb years ago that she made her very first appearance before the living members.
Though the fact that Mavis's consciousness still existed was only known to the core S-Class members of the current Fairy Tail.
The regular guild members had only occasionally seen the blonde girl sitting on the bar and knew her merely as the Guild Master's distinguished, mysterious guest.