"We’re back!"
Lucy pushed open the guild doors, her voice bright and cheerful, her mood soaring after days of work well done.
Unfortunately, in Fairy Tail, cheerful entrances rarely ended as planned.
Her radiant smile t the back of Natsu’s head head-on.
Rhodes heard the impact, a clean, satisfying thunk, and instinctively pulled Wendy aside just as Lucy and Natsu rolled past in a tangled heap of limbs and groans.
"Lucy-nee..." Wendy, still suspended in midair by Rhodes’s grip, looked genuinely worried even as chaos unfolded beneath her.
Rhodes sighed, perfectly calm. "Don’t mind them."
He took two steps further into the guild, just in ti for a blur of motion to fly straight at him.
He almost countered with a kick on reflex, but the size was too small. Instead, he caught the projectile midair, pressing a hand to its back to soften the landing.
"Roo?" Rhodes blinked and set him down. "How’d you get dragged into this?"
"Brother Rhodes, you’re back!" Roo grinned sheepishly, brushing off dust. "Because I’m also a Magician of Fairy Tail!"
"That’s not really sothing you say in a mont like this," Rhodes muttered under his breath, echoing Lucy’s exhausted sigh.
"Are you hurt?" Wendy asked kindly.
Roo bead. "I’m fine, Wendy-nee!"
Rhodes tilted his head. "Wait, Wendy-nee? Between the two of you, who’s older again?"
If mory served, Roo was thirteen this year. Wendy, counting her sealed years, was technically... thirteen as well.
"How an! Of course I’m older!" Wendy puffed out her cheeks, her tone uncharacteristically fierce.
Currently, the only ones who called her Big Sister were Roo and Asuka. And now her brother Rhode was trying to take half of that away. Too cruel!
Roo, sensing the danger, quickly recovered: "You can’t count age like that! Wendy-nee’s already nineteen!"
Wendy froze.
She was technically acknowledged... yet sohow, that didn’t feel like a victory at all.
"Roo!" Natsu roared, bursting back into view like a human explosion. "You were too careless! The battle isn’t over yet!"
"Yes, Natsu!" Roo replied instantly, charging right back into the chaos.
Rhodes pinched the bridge of his nose. "This kid’s being completely corrupted by Natsu..."
"Rhodes!" Natsu’s eyes lit up. "Perfect timing!"
The déjà vu was almost nostalgic, Rhodes didn’t even think before moving.
With a sharp spinning kick, he sent Natsu flying right back out the door he’d just co from. "Go help Lucy up and bring her in!"
"Whoa!!!"
"Ahhhh!!!"
Lucy had just managed to stand when Natsu’s body crashed into her again. The resulting bang sent both tumbling into a pile of chairs.
She went cross-eyed before collapsing in a daze.
Carla watched blankly. "You seem a bit... heavier-handed this ti."
Rhodes scratched his cheek. "I really didn’t an to."
The guild remained as chaotic as ever, tables overturned, laughter echoing, magic sparks flying everywhere, until a calm, lodic voice cut through the noise.
"Could you please make way?"
No one responded.
A mont later, a heavy thud sounded, and suddenly a neat path cleared straight through the crowd, as if an invisible bulldozer had rolled through.
Over toppled chairs and groaning bodies, Mira strolled forward, hands folded behind her back, smiling serenely.
"Welco ho, husband," she said warmly.
Rhodes smiled faintly and wrapped his arms around her. "I’m ho."
Together, the two walked hand in hand toward the front desk. The chaotic battlefield around them parted automatically.
"These people are so careless," Rhodes remarked dryly, stepping over what used to be a table, and possibly Elfman. "They suddenly all just fell down."
"Indeed," Mira replied, laughter in her voice as she gracefully stepped over her brother without breaking stride.
Wendy and Carla followed with matching expressions of long-suffering resignation.
Roo stood at attention, torn between admiration and fear, wondering whether he should rejoin the "battle"... or wisely stay out of the line of fire.
Upstairs, Laxus heard the noise gradually die down.
He leaned over the railing and glanced down.
Oh. It was just another case of soone getting flattened by the Demon.
Nothing to worry about.
Still, he squinted slightly.
’Has Rhodes gotten stronger again?’
Noticing Laxus’s gaze, Rhodes looked up and waved casually.
Laxus gave a faint nod before sitting back down and taking another sip of his drink.
As Makarov passed his grandson, he chuckled. "I thought you’d go down and challenge him."
"Why do such a boring thing?" Laxus replied, not even looking up. "I’m not Natsu."
Makarov only shook his head with a sigh and continued downstairs.
By the ti he reached the main hall, the chaos had mostly settled.
Rhodes was sitting beside Mira, quietly going over the mission report. Wendy was perched nearby, sipping juice like a model student, while Carla clutched her own cup protectively with both paws as if guarding treasure.
Lucy had a bandage on her forehead and still looked a little dazed, so she just sat there listening, smiling faintly whenever soone spoke.
"Master," Rhodes began, "I actually have sothing to discuss with you."
Makarov’s eyes brightened imdiately. "Oh? Have you finally decided to accept promotion?"
"Stop, stop, stop." Rhodes raised a hand, already feeling a headache forming. "We’ve been through this, rember? It’s about sothing else."
He straightened a bit, voice turning serious. "There are a few missions completed by other guilds that I’d like to investigate in detail. But we’d need to contact their guilds officially, through you."
"Hmm..." Makarov rubbed his beard. "Mission records, eh? That kind of intelligence is usually off-limits... unless it’s important. Is this serious?"
Rhodes nodded. "Sothing’s happening in the Celestial Spirit Realm. It could threaten Lucy and other Celestial Spirit Mages. I need to confirm the scope."
That was all it took. When it ca to his children’s safety, Makarov didn’t hesitate.
"Understood," he said firmly. "We’ll handle it."
"Good," Rhodes said, then patiently explained everything that had happened over the past few days, about the Hellhound, the Bee Zodiac, the Quadrans Lyrids, and the strange pattern erging.
By the end, Makarov was chuckling.
He didn’t catch half of what was said, but the gist was clear enough: Fairy Tail had triumphed again.
"Haha! Another victory for us!" He laughed heartily to himself. "Take that, Goldmine!"
"Master...Master?"
Makarov blinked, snapping back to reality. "Hmm? Ah, yes, yes, do as you say!"
Rhodes raised an eyebrow, expression blank. "Really? Because I just said Mira’s been overworked lately and should take a week off, and that you should handle all the guild’s duties in her place."
"Absolutely not!" Makarov barked imdiately.
Mira giggled behind her hand, and Wendy tried, and failed, to hide her laughter.
Rhodes sighed good-naturedly. He knew the old man too well. At least, this way, the Master would end up handling all the cross-guild communication.
For now, Rhodes pulled out the mission logbook from the front desk, flipping through pages until he found one particular entry.
"Let’s see... ah, this one, Gray’s mission to subjugate the Ghost Reindeer."
He rembered it clearly. The Council had even praised Gray for it.
"Lucy," Rhodes asked, "is there a constellation related to reindeer?"
"Eh? Hmmm..." Lucy tried to coax her still-slow brain into motion. "Yes, there was one! It got rged into the Calopardalis constellation about three hundred years ago."
Rhodes nodded thoughtfully. "Figures. Gray! Co here for a mont!"
Silence.
He turned, and saw the aftermath of the "battle" still scattered across the hall.
The guild looked like a natural disaster zone.
Gray was half-buried in a table, completely naked as usual, his lower body sticking out like a flag of defeat. His legs dangled uselessly, and it was unclear whether he was unconscious or just asleep.
Rhodes sighed. "Honestly..."
Makarov rubbed his forehead.
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