Chapter 204: Eat My Railgun

Chapter 204: Eat My Railgun

"It's Natsu and Gray's magic."

As he approached the tower's main gate, George noticed that all the guards in the area had been taken down. Judging from the magical traces on their bodies, it was clear that the magic used was Natsu's Dragon Slayer magic and Gray's Ice magic.

"It seems Natsu and Gray also made it here. Lucy and Happy are probably with them too."

Rather than being pleased that Natsu and the others had reached the island before him, George actually felt a headache coming on.

If it were just Erza, he could simply use the tracking spell to find her, then take her away with Phantom Shift. No matter how powerful those dark wizards were, it had nothing to do with him—the Etherion would naturally teach them a lesson.

But now, Natsu and the others were all inside the tower, and likely not even together. Finding each of them one by one and taking them out would be a hassle.

"No choice. After all, I'm the cat destined to become the next guild master. I can't just ignore the wizards from my own guild."

Shaking his head, George flapped his wings and flew into the tower.

But just as he entered, he heard a man's voice echo throughout the tower from every place inscribed with a sound spell.

"Welcome to the Tower of Paradise. I am Jellal, the ruler of this tower.

The pieces on both sides are now in place. Let us begin the Paradise Game!"

"Tower of Paradise? Paradise Game?"

Hearing this broadcast-like announcement, George silently pondered what kind of trick this Jellal was trying to pull.

"The rules of the game are simple. I will use Erza as a living sacrifice in a ritual to resurrect the founder of the dark wizards, Zeref.

In other words, as long as the gate to Paradise opens, I win.

If you can stop this from happening, then you win."

At this point, the voice paused, then continued with a chuckle:

"But if it were just that, it would be far too boring.

So I've arranged for three S-Class wizards from the Skull Guild to hunt you down.

Only by defeating them will you be able to reach me and stop the resurrection of Zeref.

Oh, and let me give you a little reminder—the Council is already preparing the ultimate destructive magic, Etherion, which can obliterate everything.

So you'd better hurry.

Otherwise, everyone will be turned to ashes and vanish from this world under Etherion's power."

"Wait a second… how does this guy know the Council is preparing Etherion?"

George frowned after listening to Jellal's full-tower broadcast.

He had spotted the key detail.

He knew about Etherion only because Councilor Yajima had informed him.

But how could Jellal, stuck in this tower, know what the Council was doing?

Could it be that he has a spy inside the Council?

If that's the case, then why go through with this plan knowing full well that Etherion could be fired? It's basically suicide.

And most importantly—

After all these years of secretly building the R-System without being discovered, why suddenly cause such a commotion at a resort? It seemed entirely deliberate, as if he was intentionally exposing himself.

There had to be some conspiracy behind this. Things weren't as simple as they appeared.

"First, find them!"

Whatever the enemy's plan, rescuing his comrades came first.

Following the traces left by his tracking spell, George flapped his wings and flew in Erza's direction.

First, find Erza. If he was lucky, the others would be with her, and he could take them all out at once. If not, he'd get Erza to safety first, then track down the rest one by one.

Navigating through the tower's passageways and past the corpses of several guards, he reached the sixth floor—and suddenly stopped.

He had heard a familiar scream.

"Ah! Ah! Ah! Ah!"

"That's Lucy."

Flying toward the direction of the screams, he found the first member of Fairy Tail—Lucy—in the central hall on the sixth floor.

However, Lucy was clearly in bad shape.

Her top had been torn halfway off. She was forced to kneel, using both hands to cover herself from exposure. Behind her stood Juvia, once one of the Phantom Lord's Element 4.

At that moment, Juvia was holding a water whip, repeatedly lashing Lucy like a lunatic.

Behind Juvia stood another wizard dressed in an extreme punk style, maniacally strumming a magical guitar.

"It's mind control magic."

As a psychic, George was extremely sensitive to mental magic. It was obvious to him that the guitarist was using the sound of his guitar to control Juvia into attacking Lucy.

"So this is one of the three S-Class wizards Jellal mentioned. He's definitely formidable."

Silently, George pulled a copper coin from his Requip space.

For someone like Juvia—an S-Class wizard herself—to be used as a puppet, these S-Class wizards in the Tower of Paradise clearly far exceeded the normal standard. He couldn't afford to underestimate them.

So to save time, he decided to go stealth mode and launch a surprise attack.

"Eat my railgun!"

The copper coin flew into the air, charged with 200 million volts. George gently tapped it with his paw, instantly turning the coin into a supersonic railgun shot aimed straight at the guitarist's head.

Since the target was an enemy, there was no need to hold back—aim for the kill.

"What?!"

The guitarist, who had been controlling Juvia with sound magic, suddenly sensed a surge of powerful electricity from the other side of the hall, and his heart jumped.

But the railgun attack came too fast. He had no time to make Juvia use her water magic for defense, so he simply whipped his head and used his unique hair magic to form a shield.

Boom!

The supersonic railgun blasted through the magic-charged hair in less than a second and smashed right into the guitarist's forehead.

He was instantly sent flying, slamming into the wall behind him and breaking a good portion of it.

With the sound magic interrupted, Juvia, the S-Class wizard, also broke free of the control and returned to normal.

"Lucy, I'm so sorry. I couldn't control my body. Are you okay?"

Juvia rushed over to Lucy, helped her up, and apologized sincerely.

Meanwhile, the guitarist clutched his forehead and slowly stood up, a huge lump swelling there.

"Despicable! Attacking from the shadows like a coward!"

If he hadn't used his hair for defense, his head would've been blown apart.

"My beautiful hair! Damn it, I'm going to kill you!"

Noticing that a chunk of his beautiful long hair was missing and now looked like it had been chewed by a dog, the guitarist flew into a rage. Grabbing his guitar, he prepared to unleash a powerful attack that would control every wizard in the hall with sound.

He didn't know where the attacker had struck from, but as long as they heard his guitar, they wouldn't escape his control.

(End of Chapter)