Capítulo 642: Alfonzo's Magical Prowess
Earth Land, Ishgar, Kingdom of Fiore, Akane Beach.
November, x788.
"When are you gonna start participating in the Battle of Fairy Tail Tournament again?" Laxus asked as he, Alfonzo, Marin, and Shizuka stepped into the Akane Resort.
"Who knows." Alfonzo replied with a shrug and a knowing smile.
"Clearly, you do." Laxus replied with a scowl. "Stop playing dumb and just tell me."
"I wanna know, too." Marin added. "It's been a while since we got to fight in the tournament."
"You know you could have joined another team, right?" Alfonzo asked as he looked down at Marin, who was walking while holding onto his right arm.
"Yeah, but that would destroy my undefeated streak." Marin said with a playful smile. "I mean, we've never lost in the tournament as a team, after all."
As she said that, Marin winked playfully at Laxus, who had lost the first two Battle of Fairy Tail tournaments. And with his pride in his strength, he could do nothing but grit his teeth at the reminder.
"Alright, take it easy, Laxus." Alfonzo said, trying his best to hold back a laugh. "You know she's just messing with you. "You're the undefeated champions of the Grand Magic Games, after all. And that trumps a little guild wide tournament any day."
"Whatever." Laxus replied.
"Fonzie! Fonzie! Can we go in there?" Shizuka asked while pointing at a shoe store, Valorous Feets. "I wanna get those shoes in the window. They're so~~~ cute!"
Hearing Shizuka's question, Alfonzo, Laxus, and Marin turned their heads in the direction she was pointing. However, Alfonzo and Laxus lost interest almost immediately. Marin, on the other hand, had her eyes light up at the sight of the shoes Shizuka was pointing at.
"OMG! You're right!" Marin squealed excitedly. "Those shoes would look uber-cute on you, Shizuka."
"I know, right?" Shizuka said happily. Then, she pointed at another pair of shoes on display. "And look at those! Those would be perfect with your new fighting clothes."
What Shizuka pointed to were a pair of knee-high black, high heeled boots. And just as she said, they would look perfect with Marin's new battle attire, which consisted of a black body suit, a metal belt that hung loosely around her waist, and a white, hooded cloak.
"We can go after our meeting." Alfonzo said, while regretting every word as they came out of his mouth. "But we're gonna be late if we go shopping first."
Hearing Alfonzo's response, Laxus nodded his head. Though, he had every intention of leaving immediately after the meeting with the representative from the Village Hidden in the Mist.
'I have to deal with women's shopping sprees enough with Saya and Chico.' Laxus thought to himself. 'There's no way I'm gonna put up with that shit for women that aren't even mine.'
As if Alfonzo could tell what Laxus was thinking, he turned to his longtime rival. And although he wanted to look at him as if he had been betrayed, he just could not bring himself to do so. And the reason was simple, had the roles been reversed, he would do the same thing that he could tell Laxus was thinking.
"Boo!" Shizuka jeered, making her discontent known.
"You promise?" Marin, on the other hand, knew how bad it was to keep the client waiting. So, she asked her question while extending her right hand to Alfonzo with her pinky extended.
"*Sigh* I promise." Alfonzo replied while hooking his own pinky with Marin's.
"Good." Marin said with a bright smile. "If you break your promise, you'll have to eat a thousand needles."
'Hmm… Breaking my promise doesn't' seem so bad if that's the case.' Alfonzo thought to himself as he pulled Marin and Shizuka to the restaurant where they were supposed to meet the client. "I mean, I could probably break the needles down to something harmless as soon as I put them in my mouth.'
"Oh, and you can't use magic." Marin added as if she could read Alfonzo's mind.
"*Sigh* Of course not." Alfonzo said, sounding rather dejected.
With that little interlude out of the way, the group made it to the restaurant in question. When they did, Alfonzo mentioned to the hostess that they were meeting someone and gave her the provided information before the group was guided to a private room.
"he's already inside." The hostess said with a professional smile.
Then, the hostess opened the door and gestured for the four to enter.
Upon entering the room, the four immediately saw a middle-aged man with blue hair styled upwards with mousse, an eye-patch covering his right eye, leaving his blue left eye visible standing at approximately 6' tall and wearing a blue kimono that revealed the mesh armor he wore underneath it, black pants, and standard shinobi sandals and a Mist forehead protector.
"Ah, you've arrived." The middle-aged man said once the group of four entered the room. "It would seem Fairy Tail is taking our request quite seriously if they've sent the Master of Metal and the Lightning Dragon to aid us."
"Yeah, something like that." Laxus replied with his arms crossed. "Anyway, who are you?"
"Oh, my apologies." The middle-aged man said. "You can call me Ao. I'm a Jōnin from the Village Hidden in the Mist."
"Just an A-Class, huh?" Laxus asked rhetorically in a dismissive tone.
"Well, I'm guessing we don't have to introduce ourselves, right?" Alfonzo asked as he took a seat at the table Ao was sitting at while changing the subject before Ao could take offense to Laxus' comment. "Instead, I have a question."
"By all means, please ask." Ao replied, deciding to go along with Alfonzo's subject change instead of retorting to Laxus' belittling comment.
"Why did you ask a guild from Fiore instead of one from Caelum?" Alfonzo asked as the others took their seats, as well. "I mean, wouldn't that be more convenient and less expensive."
"If only it were that simple." Ao replied while shaking his head. "Honestly, we tried. But for some reason, no matter who we sent the request to, no one would accept it. And the order to not accept came directly from the guild masters of each guild."
Hearing that, Alfonzo, Laxus, and Marin frowned in surprise. Shizuka, on the other hand, having never taken a proper guild quest, had no idea why something like this was so strange. So, she only tilted her head in confusion after seeing everyone else's reactions.
'I bet Obito put most of them under a [Genjutsu] that suggested they don't accept the quest.' Alfonzo thought to himself. 'Unless they were aiding Yagura's side, that is. That way, the destruction of the Mist Village would be a foregone conclusion.'
Earth Land, Ishgar, Kingdom of Fiore, Magnolia.
*Sneeze!*
"Ugh! This is the worst thing about wearing a mask." A man wearing an orange, spiral patterned, full face mask with a Sharingan visible through the only eye hole said in an annoyed tone. "The inside of this damn mask is going to be disgusting until I can get to somewhere where I'm sure no one is watching me."
Reaching that point, the man in the mask, Obito Uchiha, the man Alfonzo had just mentioned in his thoughts, shook his head. A moment later, however, a proverbial light bulb lit up over his head. Then, he ran through a series of hand signs.
"[Fire-Style: Fireball Jutsu]." Obito chanted while channeling his magic power at the lowest possible output.
In the next instant, steam began to rise from the inside of Obito's mask.
"Much better." Obito muttered. "Although I still need to wash the inside, at least there's no more snot dripping down."
After solving his little problem, Obito, who had been standing outside of the town, turned his gaze towards Magnolia.
"Why is Zetsu taking so long to report back about the situation inside?" Obito asked in a confused tone. "Did someone discover him? No... That's impossible. And even if they did, no one is better at running away then he is. Either way, the rebellion in the Mist will start soon. We don't have time to waste here. If he doesn't come back soon, I'll just have to go without him."
Meanwhile, Zetsu, who tried to infiltrate the town from the underground, was currently struggling with all his might to free himself from the viscous, liquid metal that was crawling all over his body.
"What is this?" Zetsu, a clearly non-human being with half black and half white skin and what appeared to be a Venus fly trap growing from its neck and wearing the same kind of cloak that Itachi and Kisame wore when they attacked Elicia and Naruto asked while being unable to free himself.
Unfortunately, Zetsu had no way of exclaiming any further because the metal that was crawling over his body had finally encased his entire body. At the same time, it started moving towards the surface in the direction of the Mansion on the Lake.
"*Sigh* Something must have gotten his attention." Obito muttered from his vantage point outside of the town. "Well, it's not like I need him for the next part of the plan. I'll just come back after the rebellion is over. Hopefully, by the time it's done, the Five Great Shinobi Villages will only have four left."
With that said, the pattern in Obito's Sharingan changed. Then, the space around him began spiraling. And Obito was seemingly drawn into that spiral. Then, when Obito's figure could no longer be seen, the space returned to normal.
Unfortunately, Obito had no way of knowing that he would never see Zetsu again when he left. Otherwise, he probably would not have left without investigating Magnolia, even if it meant he would probably miss the beginning of the rebellion.
Earth Land, Ishgar, Kingdom of Fiore, Akane Beach.
"Not that we revel in killing, but why would you want us to keep the casualties among your enemies down?" Laxus asked after hearing Ao's explanation of what would be expected of the Fairy Tail wizards during the rebellion.
"Because regardless of if they support us or not, we're all shinobi of the Village Hidden in the Mist." Ao replied. "And the village will still exist after this war. We don't want our military strength completely crippled because of this."
"Yeah, that makes sense now that you mention it." Laxus replied with a nod. "In fact, I don't understand why I couldn't come up with that on my own."
"It's because we've never taken any quests like this before." Alfonzo said, answering Laxus' doubts. "And to be honest, I'm really not looking forward to fighting in a war."
"Me neither." Marin said. "But at least if we fight in this war, we can do our best to lower the casualties, right?"
"That's right." Alfonzo replied with a smile as he started combing his fingers through Marin's hair. He then shifted his gaze to Ao before continuing. "I guess the fighting will take place outside of the village, right?"
"That's correct." Ao replied. "We'd rather not have the civilians getting wrapped up in all the fighting.
"Good." Shizuka said with an approving nod. "Regular people have nothing to do with the fighting between all you ninja people. Besides, we saw enough regular people get hurt back at the other village."
Immediately, Ao connected that statement with the reports the Mist received about the attack on the Hidden Leaf Village a few months ago. And because of that, he was able to confirm some of the information in those reports.
'It looks like Mei was right.' Ao thought to himself. 'Fairy Tail seems to be in some sort of alliance with the Leaf. Perhaps it would be prudent for us to do the same. Maybe even getting into an alliance with Fairy Tail wouldn't be such a bad idea, either.'
"Yeah, I agree with Shizuka." Alfonzo said. "If they were planning to fight around the civilians, I would have probably just gone over and made a few assassinations to bring all this shit to an end."
While Laxus and Marin nodded in agreement with Alfonzo's claim, Ao wanted to dismiss it as hubris brought on by youth and inexperience. Yet, his instincts were strongly warning him against doing so. On top of that, the way Alfonzo had been glancing at his eye-patch and the paper tags he wore in the place of earrings was making him a bit uncomfortable and wary.
"Anyway, we'll meet here tomorrow morning at dawn." Ao said, deciding not to think about the glances he was receiving until he was alone. "We'll board my boat at that time."
"Why don't we take Fonzie's boat?" Shizuka asked while tilting her head in confusion. "It's really nice and comfortable, you know?"
"Because my ship won't draw unneeded attention like his would." Ao replied while gesturing towards Alfonzo with his chin. "A ship made completely out of metal is just too noticeable. And we don't want Yagura's forces, who will undoubtedly be watching the coast to see if we got any allies, to know about our forces."
"Yeah, and I guess the fact that you wouldn't be able to take down the Fairy Tail flag wouldn't help that, either." Alfonzo said with a smile.
"There's that, as well." Ao said while frowning slightly. "But if we take my boat and you keep yourselves hidden, they'll probably think that we found allies, but they'll have no idea of who."
"Actually, I think we can do something about that." Alfonzo said.
"Hmm?" Ao asked curiously.
However, instead of replying, Alfonzo flexed his magic power, causing everyone to disappear from Ao's sight by bending the light around the four Fairy Tail wizards with his [Electromagnetism Magic]. An instant later, Alfonzo warned his companions with the [Telepathy] provided by his [Archive Magic] before attaching magic power concealing cuffs on their wrists and ankles.
Meanwhile, Ao, after seeing the four younger wizards in front of him disappear, opened his visible eye widely. Then, against his better judgement, he activated what was hidden behind his eye-patch, causing the [Seals] drawn on the paper tags hanging from his ears to light up.
"What!?" Ao exclaimed in surprise while standing up from his seat at the table. "How is this possible? Why can't I see them?"
"So, you were hiding a Byakugan behind that patch, huh?" Alfonzo asked as he dispelled the cuffs, allowing Ao's Byakugan to sense them. Then, he continued as he dispelled his [Electromagnetism Magic] as he continued. "I was wondering what you were hiding behind all those [Seals]. I don't think the Hyuga Clan would like this very much."
"So, what if they don't?" Ao shot back on reflex. "They shouldn't have sent a member of their main clan onto the battlefield if they were so afraid of losing any of their precious Byakugan. Anyway, meet me at the port outside the resort by dawn tomorrow morning. We'll set sail then."
With that, Ao quickly left the private room, leaving the four Fairy Tail wizards behind. Undoubtedly, he had every intention of telling his side of the civil war about his encounter with the wizards from Fairy Tail. And Alfonzo had no intention of stopping him. When Mei heard about what had happened, even though it was unlikely, she would have second thoughts about betraying them once she got what she wanted.
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