章節 29: Requip

Erza and Meliodas stood in the center of an empty lot that was located behind the guild. At the edges of the lot were a lot of leftover construction materials from the guild renovations, leaving the concrete area in the middle wide open for them to train in. Further past the lot was the vast Lake Sciliora. A few remains of the Phantom Lord guild's moving forretress still protruded out from the waters.

"So how does this work? I read a book on the fundamentals of it a couple of weeks ago. Something to do with a pocket dimension right?" Meliodas asked, recalling his torturous time spent in the library, reading for hours. Erza nodded.

"Yes. Are you already able to at least access it?"

"Nope. No clue how to do that." Meliodas replied.

"Hmm alright…" Erza crossed her arms and put a hand on her chin as she thought about how to teach Meliodas how to access his pocket dimension. A few moments of silence passed before Erza spoke again.

"It all comes down to visualization. Everyone who can use magic can also use a pocket dimension if they choose to learn requip magic." Erza said. She raised her palm up in front of her and a small holographic-like screen appeared in her palm. "This will be a lot easier since you've already read the fundamentals. Can you try to visualize something like this in your hand. This is an organization screen I use to organize and sort the various armors and weapons I use among other things."

"Hmm…" Meliodas thought as he raised his arm out in front of him with his palm facing up. He looked at Erza's screen she was holding up and tried to imitate it. A rectangular, flat shape started to form in Meliodas's palm as words began forming on its surface.

"I think this is it?" Meliodas asked. Erza walked up to Meliodas and looked at the interface in his palm.

"Good this will suffice. With this you can access your pocket dimension." Erza said. "Now the next step will be storage. Why don't you try with Mel Force? For now, I suggest holding Mel Force in your hand to let your weapon connect with your magic, but once you become more sufficient, you should be able to store it without even touching it."

"Okay here goes." Meliodas said with a look of determination on his face. He unsheathed Mel Force and held it out in front of him. The blade glimmered in the light from the sun and Erza had noticeable awe on her face. Meliodas concentrated and closed his eyes. Several seconds passed as Meliodas channeled his magic. His magic first flowed through the sword but eventually, was flowing throughout all of Meliodas's body, enveloping him entirely. Meliodas suddenly opened his eyes and looked down at Mel Force.

"Wait don't do it like that!" Erza exclaimed, but it was too late. Meliodas's sword glowed brightly as it began to dematerialize. In a bright flash, his sword vanished from his grip.

"Phew. That turned out well." Meliodas said. He looked up at Erza and saw her face was bright red. She immediately looked the other way.

"What's wrong?" Meliodas asked. Erza said nothing but pointed at Meliodas's body as she continued looking away. Meliodas looked down and saw his clothes were completely gone as he had not only stored his sword, but every article of clothing on his body.

"Oops." Meliodas laughed, scratching the back of his head. "I guess I'm like Gray now huh."

"J-just put your clothes back on…" Erza said sternly, still looking away. Meliodas closed his eyes and concentrated. His body began glowing and his clothes reformed on his body, along with Mel Force, which was now back in its sheath on his back.

"There! All done." Meliodas said. Erza turned her head again and looked at Meliodas who was now fully clothed. She took a deep breath and regained her composure.

"Good. You now know how to use requip. And as you can see, you can store not just weapons in there, but also clothing and other items." Erza commented.

"Oh yeah that reminds me. If you have access to requip, how come you always carry so many luggages with you like when you went on vacation?" Meliodas asked, remembering the dozens of luggages she hauled behind her in a wagon before they departed a week earlier.

"There is a limit to how much space is inside your pocket dimension. Although I could store all of those luggages in there, I choose not to because I keep food in there. Perishable food doesn't last long in a pocket dimension." Erza replied.

"That's interesting. I wonder how much booze I can fit in there…." Meliodas said to himself.

"So now that you learned requip…" Erza said as she began approaching Meliodas. She looked at Meliodas with a pleading expression on her face. "Tell me everything about Musica!"

"Hehe, sure!" Meliodas laughed as he began explaining to Erza his experience with Musica.

---

The next day, Meliodas entered the guild hall at noon. The guild was bustling and rowdier than normal. Surprisingly, there was a lack of furniture and silverware being tossed around across the room. Meliodas looked up at the ceiling. The hole where he had reflected Natsu's attack had been patched up, albeit poorly. The wood color did not match the rest of the ceiling and there were still traces of burn marks. Meliodas walked over to the bar but was surprised Mirajane wasn't there.

"Hey Meliodas!"

Meliodas heard a voice call out to him from behind. He turned around and saw Wakaba waving at him with Macao sitting across from him at a table. The table had many wooden mugs and various bottles of booze. Meliodas eyed the bottles of booze, seeing if there were any there he hadn't already tried before.

"Mira's not here right now. She's busy prepping for the interview. Come take a seat here we got extra drinks!"

Meliodas smiled and accepted their offer. He took a seat right across from Wakaba and Macao and they poured him a drink into an empty mug.

"Cheers!" All of them yelled as they picked up their booze.The three of them knocked drinks and gulped it down.

"So what's this about an interview?" Meliodas asked as he placed his mug back on the table.

"You don't know? Sorcerer Weekly is sending a reporter over to feature the guild." Macao answered. Meliodas thought about what Macao just said as he picked up his mug again and continued drinking. He remembered that sometimes while he was sitting at the bar, there were some magazines of Sorcerer Weekly. Thanks to those magazines, he would get baseline information of the world as it was all still brand new to him.

"You see last week's issue? Damn! Mira was looking fine!" Wakaba said enthusiastically. He pulled out a copy of Sorcerer Magazine and flipped quickly through the pages until arriving at the right one. He handed Meliodas the magazine with the page open.

Meliodas took a look at the page opened to him. It was Mirajane in a classic 'S' pose wearing a tight and revealing office uniform. Meliodas flipped through the pages of the various pin up photos of Mirajane wearing swimsuits and bunny outfits. Suddenly an idea popped in his head. 'I should make Elizabeth do these poses in these outfits! That would be perfect.'

Meliodas continued browsing the pages while sipping on his booze until he heard someone else call his name from behind him.

"Meliodas!"

Meliodas turned his head and saw Erza and Lucy approaching him.

"Yo!" Meliodas greeted them.

"So these old perverts are tainting you too…" Lucy commented upon seeing the magazine opened in front of Meliodas with Mirajane's provocative pictures.

"Oi we're not that old!" Wakaba and Macao exclaimed at the same time. Erza glared at Wakaba, causing him to grab his magazine away from Meliodas and put it away behind him.

"Meliodas, have you been practicing your requip?" Erza asked.

"Yeah!" Meliodas replied enthusiastically. He put his hand out in front of him. A light began glowing in his palm and a large, glowing, bottle shaped light appeared in his hand. As the light disappeared, a green glass bottle of Magnolia Ale appeared in his hand.

"I can now summon booze whenever I want!" Meliodas said with a grin.

Lucy's eyes widened in shock that Meliodas would learn requip just to keep booze on him as Erza clapped her hands and congratulated Meliodas.

"Good job. You've been practicing."

"Yup! A lot better than what happened yesterday."

Erza smiled and replied.

"Exactly."

"Wait what happened yesterday?!" Lucy questioned. Erza remained silent as Meliodas popped open his bottle of ale and refilled the glasses of Macao and Wakaba.

"OHHH TITANIA!!!" A voice yelled out excitedly from behind them. The group turned around and saw a lanky man with a large grin on his face. The front of his hair was a bit messy and the back of his hair was sticking up into a tall spike. A black camera with a large lens dangled around his neck and he wore a pink t-shirt with a bright logo that had the words "FAIRY TAIL" written on it.

"Who is this?" Meliodas asked, looking observantly at the strangely energetic man.

"I think he's from Sorcerer Weekly." Lucy replied.

"His name is Jason." Erza added.

"AHHH IT'S ERZA IN THE FLESH! SO COOOOL!" Jason yelled out louder and even more enthusiastically as he walked hastily to them. Lucy immediately walked up to greet him.

"Hi, I'm Lucy and as Erza's friend, I'd like-" Lucy was cut off as Jason walked passed her and up to Erza and began asking Erza questions. Lucy was left with an expression of shock on her face as Jason had completely ignored her. She sulked over to the table Meliodas was sitting at and sat down next to him.

"There there." Meliodas said as he patted Lucy on the shoulder.

"Thanks..." Lucy responded.

"How about some ale?" Meliodas offered as he summoned another bottle to Lucy's surprise.

"How many of those do you keep on you?" Lucy asked.

"Hmm...I don't quite remember. I stopped counting when it got into the hundreds." Meliodas replied.

"HUNDREDS?!" Lucy exclaimed. "You're practically a walking bar!"

"Ey Meliodas pour me another one!" Wakaba requested with his now empty mug raised.

"Sure thing!" Meliodas replied as he raised his hand up. Another bottle of Magnolia Ale appeared in his hand. He popped the cap off and filled Wakaba's mug.

"He has grown so proficient with requip hasn't he?" Erza commented as she walked over next to Lucy.

"Oh good he's done interviewing you now where is-" Lucy turned around and saw Jason was no longer there. Lucy turned back around and saw Jason talking to Meliodas. 'He's talking to Meliodas already?!'

"So you're the new guy, Meliodas right?!" Jason asked.

"Yup!" Meliodas replied.

"COOOOOOOL!" Jason exclaimed loudly. "What's your hobby?"

"Collecting Ale."

"COOOOOL!! Where did you get that sword on your back?" Jason continued.

"It was crafted for me by Musica."

"THE LEGENDARY BLACKSMITH MUSICA?!!! COOOOOOL!!! Do you have any special abilities?"

Meliodas paused for a moment to think about an answer. There was a brief silence around them. Wakaba and Macao looked at Meliodas, curious as to what he would tell the reporter to be his special ability.

"His special ability is his magic, Full Counter I think it was called?" Erza commented. remembering Meliodas shouting "Full Counter" when he reflected Natsu's Fire Dragon's Roar.

"If anything, I'd say his ability is to drink copious amounts of booze. I swear he could out drink Cana if he really wanted to." Lucy sighed.

Meliodas's eyes lit up as he thought of an answer.

"My eyes can spot an exposed pair of panties from a mile away." Meliodas said confidently.

"THAT'S SO COOOOOOOOOOL!!!!" Jason exclaimed. He pulled out a notepad from his pocket and began scribbling things on it for several seconds before he took off in a sprint to find the next person to interview.

"How is that cool?!" Lucy exclaimed.

"I see...Meliodas is a swordsman after all. His eyes have to be good at tracking small movements. He must have really high visual acuity in order to see that far..." Erza commented.

"Erza I think you're missing the point!" "Lucy yelled out.

"What an odd fellow…" Meliodas commented as he watched Jason run away towards another person to interview.