A few days passed after the future troublemakers' visit, and the guild slowly returned to its usual routine.
Natsu, whose instincts were strangely sharp, kept feeling as if something was missing, though he could not quite put it into words.
Lucy had the same vague feeling.
Juvia, for some reason, found herself blushing more easily whenever she was with Gray these days, while Levy felt as if she had once heard something incredibly shocking, only she could not remember what it was.
As for Erza, she remained relentless in her efforts to take the first step toward meeting Elysia, but since she had absolutely zero practical experience and zero theoretical knowledge, she kept suffering defeat after defeat.
Once Mirajane realized there was nothing to worry about, she laughed at Erza for quite a while.
Ankh also told Erza and Ophiuchus not to mention any of this to the others, in case it affected the normal flow of history for those without divine power.
And so, on another perfectly ordinary day, Lucy finally grew restless again and remembered that her miserable life still came with rent to pay.
In a panic, she rushed off to take a job.
Ankh figured their team had indeed gone a long time without taking any work, so he went along with them.
...
And then… the town where the job took place suffered for it.
The request had been posted by the town mayor, asking mages to clear out the Paris Thief Guild, which had taken over the eastern market district.
The reward was very generous.
At first, the job went smoothly.
The team split up properly, each of them taking on multiple enemies and driving the thieves into retreat.
But once the Paris Thief Guild's shameless human-wave tactics grew more and more ridiculous, Natsu and the others finally started getting genuinely angry.
In the end, the eastern market's buildings were burned down by Natsu's flames, frozen and cracked by Gray's ice, blown away by Wendy's roar, sliced apart by Erza's sword, and even flooded by the tsunami Lucy summoned from Aquarius…
There was also the miraculous sight of Ankh punching the ground so hard that the foundation sank several meters, nearly giving the mayor a stroke on the spot.
It was honestly cursed.
When everyone fought separately, they had all been fairly restrained.
Even when they caused damage, it stayed within a controllable range.
But the moment they teamed up, everyone's hand slipped at the same time, and somehow they produced a suffocating disaster where one plus one became greater than one hundred.
And after all that effort, although the Paris Thief Guild was wiped out, their leader Paris still managed to escape.
The heartbroken old mayor pointed at Ankh and the others then and there, so furious he nearly kicked the bucket on the spot.
And just like that, the team returned empty-handed in a way everyone was painfully familiar with.
Lucy's soul nearly drifted out of her mouth!
Back in Magnolia, Natsu carried his luggage on his back and stretched comfortably as he shouted.
"Man, Magnolia really is the best!"
Lucy hugged her bag and smiled as she waved to everyone. "Before we take another job, I'm going home to take a bath. See you later!"
The others waved goodbye to her for now.
Carla, sharp as ever, sighed. "She's obviously forcing herself to smile."
Wendy asked worriedly, "Will Lucy-san be okay?"
According to the strongest team's income formula, final pay equaled original reward minus compensation fees.
Even though everyone had gone overboard, the jobs the strongest team took were all high-difficulty missions with generous rewards, so if they completed them properly, they still earned quite a lot.
But during the capture of Paris, the highly motivated Lucy had volunteered to be the final part of the encirclement.
And then… she failed to hold him, and he slipped away.
Although no one blamed her at all, Lucy still felt bad and blamed herself, especially since she had been the one who insisted on taking the job in the first place.
Ankh looked at Lucy's back and smiled. "Don't worry. She's Lucy."
...
"Miss~ If you fall into the river, we're not saving you, okay…"
Lucy dragged her suitcase along the riverside path on her way home, ignoring the boatman's usual worrying from the canal as she let out a gloomy sigh.
"Honestly… We finally took a high-paying job, and I'm the one who messed up at the most important moment…"
Then she quickly clenched her fist and encouraged herself with determination.
"Alright! Next time, I'll work even harder!"
Just as Ankh had said, energetic Lucy cheered herself back up almost immediately.
Then her eyes paused as a beautiful girl was walking toward her.
The girl wore an ancient-looking crimson outfit.
The patterns on the clothing resembled shrine maiden attire used for rituals in some isolated village cut off from the rest of the world.
However, the shrine maiden outfit exposed quite a bit of skin.
Underneath, she wore a wrapped chest covering, and her body was adorned with rare ornaments. Her ponytail, wrapped in cloth, nearly reached her hips.
Every special detail about her appearance made it clear she was not from around here.
Maybe she came from some faraway place. Somewhere remote, and possibly very dry?
For reasons Lucy could not explain, she was instantly drawn to the girl's lovely face.
She stared straight at her, and even after they passed each other, Lucy still turned back to look.
In the girl's eyes, Lucy seemed to see a kind of numbness and lifeless stillness.
That was not the kind of look a girl her age should have…
Lucy was still thinking about it when the girl suddenly went limp after only a few more steps and collapsed heavily to the ground.
"Are you okay?!"
"Éclair!"
Lucy jumped in fright and quickly dropped her luggage to run over.
Only then did she notice that beside the girl's feet, there was something that looked like a talking… bird?
Though with all those yellow feathers, it looked more like a chicken…
Lucy silently guessed that it was probably a creature like a Celestial Spirit or Happy, and seemed to be this girl's companion.
"Please, save Éclair!"
The little yellow bird stood beside the girl named Éclair, crying sadly as it looked up at Lucy and begged in a pitiful voice.
Being the kind-hearted person she was, Lucy naturally could not refuse to help.
She was just about to carry Éclair back to her own home and call a doctor to take a look at her when she lowered her head and suddenly noticed something that had slipped out from the girl's collar.
It was worn like a necklace.
An ancient-looking… half of a stone.
...
"Half a stone?"
The Principality of Veronica was a country far weaker than the Kingdom of Fiore, but in terms of history, it was not inferior in the slightest.
Inside the royal palace of Veronica, the young ruler, His Highness Cream, was currently meeting four figures hidden in the shadows, speaking at length about a legend known as the Phoenix Stone.
"That's right. That stone is the other half of the Phoenix Stone. As long as it is joined with the half passed down through my royal family, it will reveal an unimaginable miraculous power!"
"The celebration for the four hundredth anniversary of our nation's founding is almost here. I will join the Phoenix Stone in front of all my citizens and obtain that miracle!"
The four figures hidden in the darkness knelt on one knee.
The man at their head asked in a deep voice, "Then what is our mission?"
"You are the famous Carbuncle guild. Your mission is to bring back the little girl carrying that stone!"
"The reward is quite generous too."
Beneath Cream's blond hair was a twisted, ugly smile.
"Four hundred million Jewels! As long as you bring back the Phoenix Stone and that woman!"
The man slowly curled his lips into a greedy, sinister smile.
"As you wish, Your Highness!"