She was left completely alone, forced to survive in that place for four whole months.
In those four months, she ran into danger again and again, skirting death more times than she could count. More than once, she nearly lost her life. Only after all that did she barely manage to grasp Crush Magic.
The others did not know the brutal details, but they could guess Cana had suffered plenty for it.
And if there was anyone here with the right to speak on the subject, it was Levy, the so called living library.
"Crush Magic is an ultra high class spell, and it's also a type of destructive magic famous for its sheer power.
Even putting aside how difficult it is to train, the training process itself is extremely dangerous.
In the past, who knows how many genius mages died because they made one careless mistake while training similar magic.
Cana, you not only survived perfectly fine, you actually succeeded in learning it too.
If you look across all of Ishgar, that's an incredible achievement."
"Eh, this magic is really that dangerous? Cana, you're so brave…"
Lisanna could not help admiring her courage.
And hearing that, Cana subconsciously glanced at Kabe, gratitude woven into her voice.
"Actually… Dad had that same worry at first. He didn't want me learning his magic.
Even I didn't have confidence in myself, so I hesitated for a long time.
It was Kabe who came to me on his own, praised my talent, and then helped convince Dad.
That's why he finally agreed to let me learn Crush Magic."
"There was something like that?"
Mirajane gave Kabe a suspicious look, but encouragement between guildmates was normal, so she did not overthink it. She tossed her apple piece into her mouth, chewed a few times, swallowed, then curled her lips in disdain.
"Compared to Uncle Gildarts' real Crush Magic that can pulverize anything…
yours can only slice fruit. It's just so so."
"Heh. If I cut you into pieces, you'd better still be able to run that mouth."
Cana grabbed a banana, hardened her heart, and in an instant sliced it into countless thin pieces.
Seeing that, Mirajane finally started taking her a little more seriously.
And then she felt Kabe suddenly shrink closer into her side. She turned her head with instinctive suspicion.
Kabe's eyes were locked onto the banana's tragically brutal remains. His thighs were clamped tightly together, as if he had imagined something far, far too vivid.
A voice drifted into his ear, low and eerie, like a demon whispering.
"If you dare go outside and casually flirt with other women, I'll have Cana slice your banana into pieces too."
Kabe jolted so hard he nearly fell straight to the floor.
The moment she saw his reaction, Mirajane could not hold it in anymore. She clutched her stomach and burst out laughing.
"Hahahaha! I'm dying, you actually believed it!"
With her leading the laughter, the women all followed one after another, laughing so hard they could hardly breathe.
Only the five guys present, including Happy, stared at the giggling women like they were a group of horned devils sitting there in human skin.
How could they make such a vicious joke so casually?!
Just as Kabe sat there restless and uneasy, considering switching seats to run over to Natsu and the others…
After laughing for a while, Erza suddenly stopped. Her smile vanished, and her expression turned serious as she pressed a hand down on Kabe's shoulder, pulling him aside for what looked suspiciously like an interrogation.
"You… seem very tense."
Kabe stiffly turned his neck and met Erza's sharp light brown eyes.
If this were a manga panel, cold sweat would already be pouring down his head like a storm.
In reality, the danger was just as real, but Kabe forced himself to stay composed, refusing to show too much weakness.
"N no, not at all. What you said… any man would be scared, right?"
As he spoke, he gestured with his eyes toward the other side, where Natsu and the others were also sitting with their thighs clamped tight and their posture unusually obedient.
Seeing that even they were like that, Erza finally released her grip.
"I see. I thought Mirajane might've been right… that you really were flirting with other women outside."
"Eek!"
Kabe almost screamed.
'Is this women's intuition? How can it be that accurate?!'
And right then, Mirajane, who had finally stopped laughing, slid over and draped herself onto Kabe's back.
"You're thinking too much. He probably doesn't have the guts for that."
Kabe nodded rapidly, his heart finally about to relax.
But the next second, Mirajane's pale, slender, clearly jointed fingers slowly brushed over the collar of his shirt, then trailed along the side of his neck.
"Still… if he really did do something like that, it can't just be as simple as making him a eunuch."
For the first time in his life, Kabe truly understood what it meant to feel his whole body tighten in dread.
With that hand deliberately, casually roaming his neck, he suddenly remembered the two golden keys sitting in his pocket right now.
'Damn. Thank goodness I haven't taken them out even once since I got back. If Mirajane saw them, she'd definitely guess something…'
He silently celebrated his own caution. After delivering her verbal threat, Mirajane finally loosened her hold.
The instant Kabe was free, he immediately fled to Natsu and Gray's side and clung to them like his life depended on it.
Seeing him terrified to this degree, Mirajane's eyes turned, and when she looked at Cana again, her gaze no longer carried the same resistance as before.
"Erza, listen to me…"
She suddenly grabbed Erza and whispered something into her ear.
Her voice was so low that no one else caught a single word.
But Erza looked at Mirajane in surprise after hearing it, then nodded solemnly, as if she had just accepted some extremely important conclusion.
After that, the two returned to normal and continued asking Cana about other details from the past year.
The others did not think much of it and soon joined the conversation again.
Only Kabe kept feeling like his lower half was icy cold, as if something terrible was hovering over him at all times, ready to fall.
As the discussion continued, the topic naturally drifted to Cana's plans going forward.
And the moment it did, Cana's expression suddenly became unusually downcast.
"This time when I came back, I should be able to stay in the guild for a long time.
Because Dad decided he's going to complete a very difficult mission by himself.
Even he can't guarantee he'll come out of it safe and whole… so there's no way he'd let me follow along."
Kabe, who had been distracted, twitched his ears and blurted out in shock almost instinctively.
"He's going to do the Hundred Year Quest!"