章節 607: Ten Years Quest - Completed
Earth Land, Ishgar, Kingdom of Fiore, Tatsumi Port Island.
June 22, x788.
The sun hung high in the sky over Tatsumi Port Island. However, the scene in the most luxurious suite in the most luxurious hotel on the island was uncommonly quiet. Alfonzo was not moving around or cooking lunch, Elicia was not laughing or designing new clothing, and Alzack and Bisca were not maintaining their guns or chatting happily.
Instead, the four wizards from Fairy Tail were still lying in their beds and enjoying the final remnants of their trips to dream land.
Apparently, fighting the Reaper during the Dark Hour was much more tiring than any of their other excursions into Tartarus. However, at this moment, Alfonzo, the earliest riser of the four, finally started to stir.
"Damn… I've never been so exhausted after a battle before." Alfonzo muttered as he wiped away the sleepiness in his eyes. "Going all out like that during the Dark Hour is something else."
After speaking his thoughts, Alfonzo looked at his other arm, where Elicia was hugging his arm while sleeping peacefully. Though, the look on her face made him a bit worried.
And he had every right to be worried. Currently, Elicia was drooling and she looked quite impatient.
"Is she dreaming about food again?" Alfonzo asked himself in a daze.
A moment later, Alfonzo's eyes widened and he quickly pulled the arm Elicia was hugging away from her.
*Click!*
In the next instant, Elicia opened her mouth and bit down where Alfonzo's arm used to be. In fact, she bit down so hard that the sound of her teeth colliding could be heard clearly. Then, she frowned from the apparent pain before her eye lashes started to quiver.
"Fonzie… Why did you take the chicken away?" Elicia asked sleepily.
Alfonzo could only look on at his first wife dumbfoundedly.
"She tried to eat me in her sleep again." Alfonzo said in a daze. "This is the first time this has happened in a while."
"Huh?" Elicia exclaimed in confusion. Then, she looked around in a daze as she continued. "Where did the chicken go?"
Alfonzo maintained his dumbfounded expression while he watched Elicia wake up slowly.
"Huh? Fonzie? Where am I?" Elicia said after she recognized that she was not in the place where she thought she was. "What happened?"
"Nothing." Alfonzo said while shaking his head. "Good morning, Lici."
Elicia smiled brightly after hearing Alfonzo's greeting. Then, she hugged him tightly once again.
"Good morning, Fonzie!" Elicia said happily.
Seeing Elicia's happy smile, Alfonzo's dumbfounded expression relaxed. Then, he started combing his fingers through her hair, causing her eyes to narrow like those of a cat.
"Fonzie, I'm hungry." Elicia said. "What's for breakfast? If you haven't decided, I want pancakes with strawberries and whipped cream."
Seeing Elicia's expression and hearing what she just said, Alfonzo's smile widened.
'I remember, back in the day, I wondered if she would be able to stay the person she is after being transported to this world.' Alfonzo thought to himself. 'And although she's more resolute about solving problems with violence, overall, her personality is still the same.'
"Okay, I'll go cook breakfast." Alfonzo said with a smile. "I think we should have the ingredients to make some pancakes. But I don't think we bought any strawberries yesterday."
At first, Elicia smiled happily when she heard there were pancake ingredients. But she looked like her world was ending when Alfonzo pointed out that there were no strawberries.
"We have bananas and I can make a syrup to go with them, though." Alfonzo said in a consoling tone. "So, don't worry too much, okay?"
In response, Elicia nodded her head. Though, it was obvious she was still a bit disappointed.
Then, Alfonzo got up and prepared breakfast for himself, Elicia, Alzack, and Bisca. After that, the day went by in a rather lazy fashion. Until it was time to go out and make their way into Tartarus again, that is.
June 23, x788.
As soon as the Dark Hour began, the wizards from Fairy Tail, Mitsuru, Akihiko, and Yukari stepped into Tartarus' lobby. However, the three students were looking at Alfonzo and the others with a bit of worry in their expressions.
Well, Mitsuru and Yukari looked a bit worried. Akihiko, on the other hand, looked rather excited.
"Are you four really okay?" Yukari asked in a concerned tone. "You still look so exhausted. Maybe you should wait until tomorrow night to continue climbing the tower."
"Indeed." Mitsuru added while nodding her head. "I don't want to see any of you get hurt because you are too fatigued"
"Don't worry about us." Alfonzo said while waving his hand dismissively. "We've been doing this for a long time. Trust me, if we weren't up to it, then we wouldn't be here."
Elicia, Alzack, and Bisca nodded along with Alfonzo's words. However, Mitsuru and Yukari continued to look at them with concern. Akihiko, on the other hand, stepped forward with his fists clenched.
"Since the four of you look so tired, why don't you take me along?" Akihiko asked excitedly. "At the very least, I can provide some support in a battle."
Hearing that, Yukari rolled her eyes. Over the past few days, although she had not known Akihiko for long, she realized that he was the type that looked for any reason to have a fight. Meanwhile, Mitsuru stared at Akihiko coldly.
"Akihiko." Mitsuru said in a frigid tone. "Do you want to be executed?"
Hearing that, Akihiko's excited expression froze immediately. Then, he began to shudder.
Meanwhile, Alfonzo and Elicia smiled at this interaction. In all the iterations of Persona 3 that they had played, Mitsuru was able to scare everyone with the word, "execute." Though, it was never depicted how she would punish them after using it. It was kinda like "that' punishment that Makarov used to threaten the members of fairy Tail.
"Haha… I was just kidding Mitsuru." Akihiko said nervously. "You know me better than that. I would never jump into something so dangerous without your permission."
While Akihiko spoke, his eyes swam around the room, not making eye contact with Mitsuru, who was standing there with her arms crossed.
"Anyway, we should get going." Alzack said, though he was amused by the interactions of the three kids. "We only have so much time to climb the tower each night. We don't want to waste it."
"Yeah, let's go." Bisca said with a smile. "We still have a guardian to fight when we first head up."
Alfonzo and Elicia nodded in response. Then, the group of four wizards drew nearer to Mitsuru to get the communication devices. Mitsuru, on the other hand, continued to glare at Akihiko for a moment longer. However, she eventually sighed in exasperation, handed out the communication devices, and summoned Penthesilea while the Fairy Tail wizards got on the teleporter device and headed up to the twenty-first floor.
"Alright, let's go take care of that guard… ian." Alzack said.
However, when he finally took the chance to examine what his [Magic Power Detection] was showing him, Alzack trailed off at the end of his sentence.
Not only Alzack, but the other three were confused by what they were detecting, as well.
"Wait… where is the guardian?" Bisca asked with a confused expression on her face.
"Maybe this floor… doesn't have one?" Elicia asked unsurely.
"That's what it looks like." Alfonzo replied. "But this has never happened before."
"Well, I guess the only thing we can do is go up and take a look, right?" Alzack asked.
In response, the other three nodded their heads.
Meanwhile, back on the first floor, Mitsuru, Akihiko, and Yukari were confused.
"Did they just say there was no Guardian on the twenty-first floor?" Akihiko asked.
"But wasn't the Guardian the reason they didn't keep going last night?" Yukari asked. "If so, where did it go?"
"Actually, there was no Guardian from the beginning." Mitsuru replied.
Akihiko and Yukari looked at Mitsuru dumbfoundedly after hearing that. Even Alfonzo, Elicia, Alzack, and Bisca paused their steps while climbing the long flight of stairs on the twenty-first floor.
{"Are you serious?'} Alfonzo asked.
{"If you already knew there was no Guardian, why didn't you tell us last night, Mitsuru?"} Bisca asked in a tone filled with disbelief.
"Because you all seemed so exhausted after your fight with the Reaper." Mitsuru replied. "I thought it would be better if you called it a night. Then, we could continue the exploration tonight when you were well-rested."
Everyone in the tower fell silent after that.
"Besides, we had no idea if there was anything even more dangerous on the floors above the twenty-first." Mitsuru continued.
Back on the twenty-first floor, Alfonzo, Elicia, Alzack, and Bisca were stunned into inaction. Mitsuru's reason for not telling them made so much sense that they could not retort. At the same time, however, they were frustrated that they did not realize it for themselves the night before.
"*Sigh* We really must have been tired." Alfonzo said while shaking his head. "We didn't even notice, despite the fact that we all had our [Magic Power Detection] active."
"That means Mitsuru did the right thing." Elicia said with a smile. "Thanks, Mitsuru."
{"You don't have to thank me."} Mitsuru replied. {"As the one assigned to act as your support during the exploration, it's my duty."}
"I think it has to do with the fact that we've been part of Fairy Tail for so long." Alzack said while smiling wryly. "We're so used to just charging forward that we don't' always think about what's going on around us."
"*Sigh* I really wanna deny that." Bisca said while sporting a similar smile to her husband. "But I'm not such a liar."
With that, the group of four started to chuckle at themselves. They all could not help thinking that they really were Fairy Tail wizards.
"Anyway, we can think about that later." Alfonzo said. "For now, let's just see what's up ahead on this floor. After that, we'll head up to the twenty-second."
Elicia, Alzack, and Bisca nodded in response. Then, the team started climbing the stairs again. However, after only a few steps, Alfonzo stopped and looked back at the others sternly.
"Don't let this get back to anyone at the guild, especially Master Mavis." Alfonzo said in a solemn tone. "They would never let us hear the end of this."
The three nodded with expressions that were just as serious as Alfonzo's. Then, Alfonzo, Alzack, and Bisca all glared at Elicia.
"What? Why are you all looking at me like that?" Elicia asked in a confused tone.
["It's because you're the most likely to let the secret slip."] Scylla said.
"It's because you don't' always think about what you're saying beforehand." Alfonzo said, mirroring Scylla's thoughts.
In response, Elicia pouted as visibly as she could, to show that she was not happy to hear that. However, she did not argue. Because she, too, knew that she was the most likely to say something about what happened here.
The group did not dwell on the topic for much longer, though. Instead, they started climbing the stairs once again. And what they found when they made it to a break in the staircase was a room with two chests, one they could open that held a magic power recovery medicine, and one they could not open because it required Twilight Fragments to do so.
"Alright, let's head up to the twenty-second floor." Alfonzo said after they left the room with the treasure chests. "There's nothing left to see here."
The rest of the party nodded in response. Then, they headed up to the next floor. However, when they arrived, they were surprised to see that the floor was completely different from the floors below.
Instead of a maze-like floor, there was only one room. The side opposite the place where they entered the room was considerably higher than the place where they entered, as well. On top of that, the was a large gap separating the two sides of the room.
"This is weird." Alzack said as he approached the gap. He then looked down into the darkness below as he continued. "What's up with this room? And why is it divided like this? And this gap looks so deep. But shouldn't it just lead down to a lower floor?"
"I doubt it." Bisca said as she came next to Alzack and looked down, as well. "This tower is so strange. Common sense just doesn't apply here."
A moment later, Bisca giggled.
"A Fairy Tail wizard talking about common sense." Bisca chortled. "This tower really is something else if it can make one of us do something like that."
The others could not help but laugh at that thought, as well. A few moments later, Alzack turned to Alfonzo, who was looking around the half of the room they were in with Elicia.
"Hey, Alfonzo, can you fly us across this chasm?" Alzack asked.
"I don't think so." Alfonzo replied while shaking his head. "the movement of the ethernano in this room is really strange. "It feels like it's all flowing down into that gap. If I tried to fly over it, it would probably suck me down there."
After saying that, Alfonzo giggled at his own words.
"Suck me down there. Haha…" Alfonzo said while laughing to himself.
In response, Elicia, Alzack, and Bisca looked at Alfonzo blankly while rolling their eyes.
"Anyway, it looks like our exploration is going to end here." Elicia said.
"But we still didn't find Old Document 01." Alzack said in a forlorn tone.
"That might not be the case." Alfonzo said as a grin spread across his face.
At that moment, Alfonzo had just approached a treasure chest. This treasure chest looked like the ones that needed Twilight Fragments to open. However, there were no slots for Twilight Fragments. So, he tried to open it. And without much effort, the chest opened.
Lying in the chest was a document. And at the top of the document, the title read: "Old Document 01."
"Fonzie! This is it." Elicia cheered happily.
Alfonzo's grin turned into a wide smile as he reached into the chest and picked up the document. Meanwhile, Alzack and Bisca hurried over to the chest to see what Alfonzo found, as well. Then, Alfonzo started reading the document out loud once it was in his hands.
"The electricity's hooked up. But, why do they need so much? There's only a school on this island…" Alfonzo read aloud.
Reaching that point, Alfonzo's narration stopped.
"What else does it say?" Bisca asked in a curious tone.
Alfonzo's upper lip started twitching when he heard Bisca's question. And Alzack noticed that. And because he had known Alfonzo for so long, he knew what that small gesture meant. Alfonzo was annoyed.
"Alfonzo, what's wrong?" Alzack asked.
In response, Alfonzo's hand that was holding the document dropped to his side.
"That's all it says." Alfonzo said in an annoyed tone.
'I forgot how little information each of these damned Old Documents gives.' Alfonzo thought to himself frustratedly. 'And until you have enough of them, none of the information makes a fucking lick of sense.'
["Well, you should have extracted that information with [Archive Magic], if you were really curious to know."] Bedlam said from Alfonzo's inner world with atone of schadenfreude.
'I never thought I would need that information.' Alfonzo replied. 'Besides, I couldn't' really see back then. So, all the memories of Persona 3 are covered in a foggy haze.'
["I guess that's true."] Bedlam replied.
["Who fucking cares?"] Impatiently. ["Now that you have the damn document, we can go home. I'm fucking sick of the Dark Hour."]
["Yeah, but the longer we stay here, the closer Fonzie is to materializing us, right?"] Bedlam asked with a grin. ["and when he can do that, he'll finally be able to start training to achieve our full releases."]
'Did you just fucking call me "Fonzie"?' Alfonzo asked in an irritated tone.
["He would have to be able to kick our asses first, though."] Riot replied to Bedlam's comment with a sneer while completely ignoring Alfonzo. ["And we both know he doesn't have what it takes to do that."]
Hearing that both Riot and Bedlam was talking trash, Alfonzo's upper lip started to twitch again. At that moment, he started thinking that he would make a device like the one Kisuke Urahara created in Bleach so he would be able to kick their asses earlier. However, he quickly dismissed that idea. If he did that, he would only have one chance to achieve full release. And if he failed, it would be locked to him forever.
"Anyway, we got what we came here for." Alfonzo said in a perturbed tone. "so, let's get the hell outta here."
The other three nodded their heads. Then, they looked around to see if there was a teleporter on this floor. And as it so happened, there was. However, it was only a one-way teleporter. Meaning, if they wanted to come here again, they would only be able to climb up from the twenty-first floor.
A few minutes later, Alfonzo, Elicia, Alzack, Bisca, Mitsuru, Akihiko, and Yukari left Tartarus. However, there were still more than forty minutes left until the Dark Hour ended. But they had completed all their objectives. So, there was no reason to stay any longer.
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