"120: The Rules of Toaru, Can They Restrain Fairy Tail’s Magic?"

Hearing Fairy Tail Su Mo's lament, Index Su Mo shot him a glance. "You've got it pretty good already. At least you've got monsters, demons, and even dragons to work with. My world's even worse. It's practically all humans—there aren't even any Philosopher's Stone materials to harvest!"

Human nature being what it was, Fairy Tail Su Mo couldn't help but feel slightly better hearing this. At least he wasn't at the very bottom of the food chain. But then, a thought struck him. "Wait a second! You might not have raw materials, but you've got 103,000 grimoires! That's still totally broken!" He immediately realized that Index Su Mo's world had plenty of resources of its own. Tears welled up in his eyes. Everyone said they were self-reliant, but it seemed like he was the only one actually grinding. The others were all cheaters in disguise!

Then again, considering his God Slayer constitution allowed him to learn magic at incredible speed, maybe he was kind of cheating too? Oh well, that made him feel better. "By the way, speaking of those 103,000 grimoires… how's your progress going?"

DanMachi Su Mo perked up at the mention of the grimoires. Based on their last meeting, Index Su Mo should have already begun... well, let's just say "recruiting" Index. If they could get their hands on those 103,000 grimoires, it would represent an enormous power boost. Even starting with just a dozen or so would rapidly advance their magical knowledge. The other Su Mos also turned to him with curiosity.

"It's all under control," Index Su Mo replied, giving a brief summary of his recent progress. "Right now, Stiyl and Kanzaki Kaori have already returned to settle things with Laura. Once we deal with Index's collar and remote-control spiritual equipment, her problem will basically be resolved."

"Sounds like things are going quite smoothly for you!" DanMachi Su Mo said, surprised. "Not only have you handled Index, but you even managed to extract the Right Seat of God's ritual formula from the Roman Church? That's unbelievable! The Pope was actually willing to give that up?"

The Right Seat's ritual wasn't some run-of-the-mill spell—it was one of the Roman Church's most closely guarded secrets. The fact that the Pope would hand it over was astonishing; wasn't he worried about creating another uncontrollable Right Seat member?

"At first, I was surprised too," Index Su Mo admitted after a moment's reflection. "Based on the current Pope's personality, even if he wanted the grimoires badly, there's no way he would've agreed to give me something like that. At best, he might've offered one formula as a reward after I completed my mission—not beforehand. It's completely out of character for him to deliver the prize upfront. My guess is that the one who authorized giving me the ritual wasn't the Pope, but Fiamma of the Right himself. Only someone like him would so casually hand over something as significant as a Right Seat ritual."

Even though he hadn't witnessed the events inside the Vatican himself, his understanding of the Roman Church's internal dynamics allowed him to deduce who had made the decision. It could only have been Fiamma of the Right; no one else would have been that generous.

"Agreed," Fairy Tail Su Mo nodded. "Only Fiamma of the Right would treat the Right Seat's ritual so lightly. Compared to us, he's the real cheat here."

Born with power strong enough to save the world, Fiamma of the Right possessed an overwhelming level of strength—greater even than the current Su Mos. The only reason he hadn't dominated everything was his inability to fully control that power, forcing him to pull strings from behind the scenes and even attempt to ignite World War III.

"Unfortunately for him, even cheats like him ran into even bigger cheats," Genshin Su Mo sighed. Between Kamijou Touma, Aleister, Ollerus, and the various Magic Gods, Index was overflowing with broken characters. While Fiamma of the Right had seemed formidable early on, by the later stages, he was little more than a rapidly spinning top, sent flying by everyone else's ridiculous abilities.

"Alright, let's not get too gloomy!" DanMachi Su Mo clapped his hands. "We may not have cheats, but we'll prove that through hard work, we can still catch up to the cheaters. I refuse to believe that with our combined efforts, we can't overcome even the most broken opponents. Hard work can defeat even genius!"

"Hard work, huh..." Fairy Tail Su Mo glanced at the others. One by one, they were all cheating in their own ways!

Still, if you looked at it objectively, none of them had really relied on anyone else. Even their so-called "cheats" were things they had acquired on their own. So saying they were relying on hard work didn't feel entirely wrong.

"Agreed! We'll defeat those cheaters through our own efforts!" Fairy Tail Su Mo quickly convinced himself.

"+1!"

"Seconded!"

The other two Su Mos immediately applauded in agreement. After all, Su Mo never cheats!

"Speaking of which, I'm actually more interested in the Right Seat of God's rituals than Fiamma of the Right himself," DanMachi Su Mo added. "Compared to learning difficulties, the real issue with these rituals is compatibility. Even though we've got the talent to study any power system, I doubt we can just pick up these rituals effortlessly."

Mastering an entire power system was one thing; special rituals like these were something else entirely. Su Mo might be able to quickly learn new types of magic, but those rituals often demanded very specific bloodlines or innate traits. Some prerequisites simply couldn't be bypassed. The Right Seat's rituals were all quite powerful, and Su Mo would love to acquire all of them—but reality was never that convenient.

"I actually looked into the requirements for these rituals," Index Su Mo spoke up. "The conditions for each of the four are extremely strict, and honestly, only one of them suits us right now. The others... we just don't have the right affinity for them."

"And you're forgetting something else," he added, glancing at the others. "Using angelic rituals requires you to suppress your original sin to the lowest level. But doing that also strips you of the ability to use ordinary magic. Do you really think it's worth sacrificing all other forms of magic for a single Right Seat ritual?"

In the world of Index, humans couldn't use angelic rituals, and angels couldn't use human magic. The Right Seat members could wield angelic rituals only because they suppressed their original sin to near-zero. Apart from Vento of the Front, who had a special exemption, the rest had to give up all other magic to access angelic power. What Index Su Mo brought up was a legitimate concern.

But—

"Your world's rules don't apply to Fairy Tail," Fairy Tail Su Mo said with a shrug. "In my world, there's no such thing as being unable to use magic because you've purified your original sin. Even angelic magic can be used by ordinary humans."

Fairy Tail's magic system didn't have the same restrictions as Index. The same went for the God Slayer authorities and Fullmetal Alchemist's alchemy system. For them, the original sin limitation of the Right Seat rituals simply didn't apply.

"Huh... you're right," Index Su Mo finally realized. "It's only in my world where magic comes with that kind of restriction. Purifying original sin disables regular magic. For you guys, there's basically no downside."

At that moment, DanMachi Su Mo chimed in teasingly, "Besides, let's be honest—you barely know any regular magic anyway!"

While Index Su Mo was well-versed in magical theory, he didn't actually know many practical spells. And many of the powers available to Fairy Tail and God Slayer Su Mo had higher-level equivalents anyway. The few basic spells Index Su Mo had mastered were pretty much redundant. Losing them wouldn't be any great loss.

"And once Su Mo from the God Slayer world start slaying a few angels, we won't even need to purify original sin. We'll just take their powers directly," DanMachi Su Mo added. Suppressing original sin was only necessary to qualify for angelic rituals. But if they acquired angelic powers through conquest, they could bypass that step entirely and avoid giving up their existing magic.

All things considered, this particular drawback was basically irrelevant to them. Which was why DanMachi Su Mo shifted focus to what really mattered. "So, which ritual are we actually suited for right now?"