บท 235: Forcing the Snake into Hibernation
Earth Land, Ishgar, Kingdom of Fiore, Magnolia.
November, x784.
"Whoa!" Natsu shouted as he looked down from mid-air. "Look, Happy, it's moving."
"Focus, Natsu." Happy said while watching Cobra and Cubellios. "We can check it out after we beat this guy."
"Right." Natsu said through gritted teeth. "But how are we gonna do that? No matter what I do, I can't hit him."
In response, Happy fell silent. Like Natsu, he had no idea how to get around the fact that Cobra could seemingly hear their thoughts.
In fact, ever since the mid-air battle started, Natsu had yet to even land a glancing blow. Naturally, this frustrated Natsu to no end. As a result, thanks to his [Flames of Emotion], his power had shot through the roof. Unfortunately, having all that power and not being able to hit his opponent with it was meaningless.
Meanwhile, Cobra, who was still completely unharmed was sweating nervously on the inside.
'He was already stronger than me at the beginning of the fight.' Cobra thought to himself as he watched and listened to Natsu and Happy from atop Cubellios back. 'But for some reason, he's been getting stronger ever since the fight started. If he were able to land even one lucky hit, I'd be done for. And the worst part is, no matter how hard I hit him, I can't keep him down. I've even tried targeting that blue, flying cat, but he always takes the hit in his place.'
Just like Natsu, Cobra's frustration had been rising since the beginning of the fight, as well. He had even started taking on draconic traits to try and improve his offensive output, with his arms turning into dragon claws covered in purple scales.
"Argh!" Natsu shouted in frustration once again. "Let's just go, Happy! I'll just use my dragon roar as hard as I can. And if that doesn't work, I'll just keep trying."
Though Happy thought yelling his plan of attack was one of the dumber things Natsu had ever done, Happy did not have a better idea. So, with Natsu in hand, he decided to just follow the pink-haired Dragon Slayer's instructions.
Cobra, on the other hand, only smirked in response. However, that smirk widened into a smile after hearing Natsu's thoughts.
'So, he's not even trying to deceive me, huh?" Cobra asked himself after hearing that Natsu's thoughts matched his words. 'You'd think he would get tired of doing the same thing and failing so often. Whatever, I'll just try to knock him out of the air and onto Nirvana, the Dragon' Slayer's weakness to vehicles should do the rest.'
While Cobra prepared himself to counterattack, Natsu and happy approached at high speed. This time, however, Happy did not stop at a safe distance. Instead, he came close enough that Natsu's breath attack would be fired point blank.
Natsu, on the other hand, took a much deeper breath than he had for any other breath attack during the battle. Then, when he was right in front of Cobra, ignoring Cubellios, who seemed to be ready to sink its fangs into him, Natsu opened his mouth to roar.
"Fire Dragon's Roar~~~~~~~~~!" Natsu roared at the top of his longs.
Instead of using a spell, Natsu simply shouted the name of his spell as loud as he could. And somehow, this caught Cobra off guard. As it turned out, Natsu meant that he would roar as hard as he could, literally.
Unfortunately for Cobra, due to his super-enhanced hearing, this was a more powerful attack than any he had faced up to this point. As a result, he could not do anything but cover his ears with his hands while wearing a pained expression on his face.
Even Cubellios, who was lunging towards Natsu with its mouth open, forcefully came to a stop thanks to the high volume roar.
In fact, even those who were not involved in the fight stopped what they were doing to look in the direction of Natsu's roar, which from a distance actually sounded like the roar of a real dragon.
"Now!" Natsu shouted once his roar ended. Then, taking advantage of Cobra's current state, Natsu chanted his next spell. "[Dragon Slayer's Secret Art: Crimson Lotus: Fire Dragon's Fist]."
With that, Natsu's hands were lit a blaze with much higher temperature flames than normal. Then, he threw a barrage of punches towards both Cobra and Cubellios, with each punch triggering an explosion on impact.
After about ten seconds and more than two hundred punches landed, Cobra and Cubellios were both sent hurdling down towards the city atop Nirvana's back.
*Boom!*
A moment later, after crashing through several buildings, Cobra and Cubellios came to a stop at the bottom of a crater. With Cubellios unconscious and Cobra on his way to joining it shortly, Cobra could only stare at his closest companion with sadness.
"Cubellios…" Cobra muttered as he stared at the giant cobra with his fading vision. "The only thing I ever wanted was to get strong enough that I would be able to hear your inner voice…"
With that said, Cobra started to close his eyes and fall into unconsciousness. And just like with all the other defeated members of the Oración Seis, he started recalling the events that led him to this point after being defeated.
Cobra, or Erik as he was known in the past, was also a slave forced to build the Tower of Heaven as a child. An orphan who had never had anyone to rely on as far as he could remember. He eventually came across a small snake while resting after a grueling day of forced labor.
Quickly becoming friends with the small serpent, Erik would spend almost all of his free time speaking to it. At the same time, he always wished that he could hear the snake, who he named Cubellios, respond to his ramblings.
Meanwhile, Brain, who had arrived at the palace's throne room, which served as Nirvana's control room, felt another one of his [Six Prayers Seals] vanish from his face.
"Cobra lost as well." Brain muttered as he fed his magic power into the throne that served as Nirvana's control device. "No matter. Now that I have control of Nirvana, none of those foolish children are necessary anymore."
Back at the crater, Happy lowered himself and Natsu into it. Watching the unconscious Erik and Cubellios, they could not help wearing relieved expressions on their faces.
"Wow, Natsu, that was incredible." Happy said with praise. "How did you think of that?"
"I didn't, really." Natsu replied with a sheepish smile on his face. "I was just so mad that I wanted to yell in his face. I was just as surprised as you when I saw that he finally stopped moving. But I wasn't gonna let the opportunity go to waste, so… I beat him up."
Once again, Happy could only look at Natsu blankly. On one hand, he could not believe that Natsu had won without a plan. But on the other, it was exactly something Natsu would do just because he was angry.
"Anyway, Happy, it looks like we've got company." Natsu said, his eyes narrowing as he did so.
Just as Natsu's words fell, a crowd of dark wizards, who had not been wiped out by the other members of the alliance while they were searching for the members of the Oración Seis, surrounded the crater where Erik and Cubellios fell.
Looking around at all the dark wizards who were looking at them with murderous intentions, Happy finally showed a panicked expression on his face.
"Natsu, this is bad." Happy said nervously. "I'm about to run out of…"
*Poof!*
At that moment, Happy's wings made with his [Aera Magic] popped out of existence. As a result, he and Natsu fell into the crater with Erik and Cubellios.
"Urgh!" Natsu immediately began to dry heave as he came in contact with the moving weapon of mass destruction.
"… magic power." Happy said, finishing his sentence.
"Well, well, well, what do we have here?" One of the dark wizards said with a cruel smile on his face. "Looks like a defeated member of the Oración Seis and an exhausted legal wizard."
"I bet we'll be able to replace the defeated members of the Oración Seis if we kill the two of them." Another dark wizard said while flaring his magic power.
"Oh, but they're both pretty good-looking." A scantily clad female wizard said in a lustful tone. "Can't you wait until I have a little fun with them? At least they could die happy that way."
Without exception, all the wizards surrounding the crater wore cruel smiles as they slowly approached.
"[Angel Magic: Punching Angel]."
"[Ring Magic: Fire Storm]."
Before they could act on their intentions, however, two spell chants interrupted the dark wizards' approach. A moment later, half of the dark wizards were engulfed by a spinning column of flames while the other half were sent flying by a large, muscular angel throwing powerful punches.
In the end, it did not take long for all the dark wizards to be subdued by the new arrivals, Sorano and Karen.
"What's wrong with him?" Karen asked as she looked down at Natsu who was suffering from motion sickness.
"Natsu doesn't really go well with vehicles." Happy said with a wry smile.
"I heard something about that from Erik a long time ago." Sorano said, looking at the downed member of the Oración Seis. "He never really had to deal with it, though. He would just ride that snake of his around. I never really understood the difference, though."
"Of course… it's…. different…' Natsu said weakly. "Just like Happy… that's his… friend…Ugh!"
"Whatever." Karen said while rolling her eyes. "That's not important. With that guy down, at least three of them have been defeated."
As she spoke, Karen pulled out a pair of anti-magic cuffs before using them to restrain Erik.
"Yeah." Sorano replied. "That leaves Hoteye and the most dangerous two, Brain and Midnight, left. Speaking of Hoteye, I wonder if he's still fighting Jura."
At the same time, Jura and Richard had made their way to the front of Nirvana.
"I don't' know where this thing is going, but we can't let it arrive at its destination." Jura said.
"Agreed." Richard replied with a nod. "But after seeing its destructive power, how are we going to do that?"
"Well, I doubt we could stop it permanently." Jura admitted. "But every second that we can slow it down, is another second those who managed to follow Brain will have to stop him."
Nodding in response, Richard flared his magic power with Jura following shortly afterward. A moment later, Richard used his magic to liquify the ground. As a result, Nirvana's front most leg sank deep int the liquified ground.. Then, before it could recover, both Jura and Richard used their magic to harden the ground around the captured leg.
Although this won't last long, it should buy them a little more time." Jura said while channeling his magic power into the ground he was hardening.
"It looks like Jura is working hard." Ur said as she and Ultear made their way towards the palace. "At least he's not slacking off. Though, I'm surprised that big guy from the Oración Seis is helping him."
"I guess he wasn't' as bad as we thought." Ultear replied. "He probably switched sides during Nirvana's first stage."
"Probably." Ur said with a nod. "Either way, they're buying us a little time. And now that I've had some time to calm down, stopping Brain shouldn't be all that difficult. Then, he'll finally pay for what he did to us all those years ago."
Nodding in response, it was clear that Ultear had not calmed her emotions as much as her mother. And naturally, Ur noticed.
"Ultear, leave Brain to me." Ur said, placing her hand on Ultear's shoulder.
Hearing that, Ultear looked at her mother with discontent. For years, Brain had experimented on her, and she wanted revenge. However, after turning her head to complain and making eye contact with Ur, Ultear's words were caught in her throat.
Swirling in the depth of Ur's eyes, Ultear could see the unimaginable out of rage her mother felt towards Brain. Yet, she could also see the concern she had for her.
'She's afraid I'm gonna lose control when I see him again.' Ultear thought after seeing the look in her mother's eyes. 'And I can't even, in good conscience, say that I won't. I mean, that iceberg in the middle of the forest should be proof of that.'
The iceberg Ultear referred to was actually the old Oración Seis base in the Worth Woodsea.
After realizing that Brain was able to escape from her, she lost control of her magic power and froze the entire thing, freezing more than a few dark wizards with it.
"Fine~" Ultear said with a pout. "But if we come across any other members of the Oración Seis, they're mine."
"Sure." Ur replied with a loving smile. "As long as you don't kill them, you can go as wild as you want. In fact, it looks like your chance to go wild is here."
As she finished, Ur and Ultear arrived outside the palace. In front of them, Midnight, still sleeping on his magic carpet, was blocking the gates. And as the mother-daughter duo approached, he slowly opened his eyes.
"You shall not enter." Midnight said while glaring at Ur and Ultear. "Father has ordered that he is not to be disturbed."
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