"So what you're telling me is… we got kneaded into dough by that reaper on our side, and you still failed on yours?"
Inside a dim room, Jackal was furious.
One of his arms had been torn off at the shoulder, leaving only a few ragged clumps of flesh still clinging there.
Blood streamed down his entire body, and he looked like a skinned beastman as he glared at the calm man in front of him.
Seilah was not as badly wounded as Jackal, but she still had some strength left.
Her cold, beautiful eyes fixed on the man as she asked in an icy voice, "Silver, you'd better give us a proper explanation."
The man called Silver—the same imposing man who had instantly frozen Gray during their fight—removed his armor and answered casually.
"I already explained. Even if the Fairy Reaper wasn't there, other powerful Fairy Tail mages were still guarding that woman. I couldn't get my hands on her."
"Bullshit! You could've dealt with those guys easily!"
Jackal's one visible eye, the one not hidden beneath his yellow bangs, had gone blood-red.
With his remaining hand, he grabbed Silver by the collar and roared at him.
Silver let out a cold laugh, gripped Jackal's wrist, and shoved him away hard.
"Then you can go try it yourself, Jackal."
His tone turned mocking. "Though with your strength, you won't get anything good out of going against Salamander and his group."
"You Dare!"
Jackal roared, while pale purple cold air gathered in Silver's hand.
Before things could go any further, Seilah finally snapped, "Enough! The task Kyoka-sama gave us was not to kill each other!"
The man and the wolf glared at each other for a moment before snorting and pulling back their power.
Seilah pinched her chin with her fingers, narrowed her eyes, and began calculating.
"If this path won't work, then we'll take another one. If I remember correctly… the other half of the Phoenix Stone is in the hands of that small country's king. Then we'll start with him."
...
"Achoo!"
Inside the hotel, Gray, wrapped in a thick blanket, suddenly sneezed hard.
His eyes sharpened with anger as he clenched his fists, and the pressure around him was frighteningly low.
Natsu heated a cup of water with his flames and handed it over. For once, he did not mock Gray.
Instead, he frowned seriously and said, "The guy who came to assassinate Éclair really did use some crazy ice."
Gray took the cup and felt the warmth through its walls, but his voice was still filled with frustration.
"He wasn't with that first assassin. And the difference in their strength was obvious."
"I've never seen ice magic like that before."
That man had clearly gone easy on Gray.
After Gray was frozen, Natsu had immediately tried to melt the purple ice with his flames, but it had not reacted at all. Not even a single drop of water had melted off.
It was only after they returned to the hotel that the ice trapping Gray disappeared on its own, though a chill still lingered and moved through his body.
After Ur and Invel, another ice mage who Gray could not stop thinking about had appeared.
But all he knew was the man's title.
"Absolute Zero…"
It was already late at night.
Erza, who had spent the entire evening searching for the enemy without finding anything, had also returned to the hotel.
She repeated the name, thinking through every powerful figure she had ever heard of, but none of them matched.
"According to Wendy, he's also an executive from Tartaros, but… he doesn't seem to be a demon?"
Carla nodded. "The two we saw were obvious at a glance. One had horns on his head, and the other had leopard-like markings on his body. They definitely weren't human."
Wendy still looked shaken as she said, "And their abilities were terrifying too. One could create explosions out of nowhere, and the other could directly control people…"
"Speaking of which, are you sure Ankh doesn't need support?" Lucy asked worriedly from where she sat with Éclair.
Wendy opened her mouth to answer, but just then, the door to their room suddenly opened.
Everyone tensed at once, only to relax again the moment they saw Ankh walk in.
Ankh was not injured.
His clothes had only been torn in a few places. In his hand, he was carrying a bloody severed arm, which he tossed heavily onto the table.
Lucy sucked in a sharp breath.
Then, unable to stop herself, she glanced curiously at the arm and asked, "That's… whose?"
"Some loudmouth demon's. I thought it was interesting, so I tore it off to study it."
Ankh calmly poured himself a glass of water and drank it, his tone so casual that it sounded as if he had simply pulled off a chicken wing.
Wendy and Lucy both swallowed.
That was way too brutal to hear so calmly!
Ankh and the others exchanged information.
When he learned that, aside from the powerful members of Tartaros, a skilled assassin had also appeared, he could not help looking at Éclair, who had been silent the entire time.
"Miss Éclair, do you know why they're targeting you?"
Éclair was quiet for a moment.
Then she reached toward her collar and said slowly, "The only thing I have that might be valuable… is this."
As she spoke, Éclair pulled out the half-stone hanging from her neck and handed it to Ankh.
Ankh took the half of the stone, and his eyes narrowed slightly.
The unpleasant aura he had sensed had not come from Éclair.
It had come from this stone.
"What is that thing?" Happy asked curiously.
Éclair pressed a hand to her head, her eyes empty. "I don't know… I don't know anything…"
"All I remember is a great fire in my mind, burning down an entire village. And a voice that kept shouting at me to escape… to give the stone to a mage named Harland."
Everyone fell silent as they listened to Éclair's lost, helpless confession.
Gray frowned in confusion. "Who's Harland? I've never heard of him."
"I know a little."
After observing the half of the Phoenix Stone for a long while, Ankh returned it to Éclair and spoke up.
"The Council's confidential archives mentioned a mage named Harland. In his later years, he joined one of the Council's research institutions, but a few years later, he disappeared. It was suspected that he died of illness…"
"And at that time, both the Council and the organizations above it were nowhere near as powerful or as large as they are now. That was over four hundred years ago."
"Over four hundred years ago?!"
Everyone in the room shouted in unison.
Lucy asked in disbelief, "Why would someone from over four hundred years ago ask Éclair to find him?"
Ankh turned his gaze to Éclair. Seeing the faint realization dawning on her face, he said, "Because Éclair is a human from more than four hundred years ago."
"I can tell that this so-called Phoenix Stone is actually part of a powerful creature's body. Most likely, it was what gave Éclair the miracle of immortality."
"And I think that is the real reason all these forces are coming after you."
Éclair's eyes trembled.
As she listened to Ankh's words, fragments of memory from the destruction of her hometown began surfacing uncontrollably in her mind.
It had been a remote village called Fire Village.
A greedy blaze had burned everything down.
People who craved immortality had slaughtered their way into the village, harvesting lives without mercy.
The ambitious members of the Veronica family, seeking to seize the Phoenix Stone enshrined by the village, had massacred everyone there.
The village chief, who knew a little magic, had risked his life to rescue the dying young shrine maiden.
He fed a small vial of liquid into her mouth, tears streaming down his face as he spoke the final words of his life.
"You must… never let the Phoenix revive. Find Harland…"
--------
Read 40 chapters ahead and support me on patreon.
patreon (.)com/Newbietranslator