Alastor returned to the mindscape with a hammer on his shoulder and an argument waiting in his mouth.
The argument didn’t have anyone to fight.
That made it worse.
He stood beneath the arena gate while cold wind moved across the stone floor.
The sky above the walls remained pale and depthless, bright without possessing a sun.
Nothing waited in the stands.
Nothing breathed behind him.
The storage box rested beside the gate.
Al stared at it.
“You could’ve mentioned the supplies last time.”
The mindscape didn’t answer.
It never did.
He opened the lid.
Inside sat the same organized rows he’d found before the Great Maccao hunt.
Wrapped rations.
Whetstones.
Bandages.
Bottles containing liquids he recognized by smell more than color.
Everything had returned despite what he’d used during the previous hunt.
Al picked up one of the small medicine bottles.
It felt real.
The glass was cool.
The stopper resisted his thumb.
The sharp herbal smell stung his nose when he opened it.
Still not real.
Not outside this place.
The supplies weren’t being pulled from anywhere.
They were pieces of the arena, given familiar shapes because his mind understood medicine, food, and preparation.
Whatever ruled the mindscape apparently believed hunters deserved provisions.
It didn’t believe they deserved explanations.
Al replaced the stopper.
“Z would hate you.”
A new line had appeared on the quest board.
He’d checked the board every night since defeating the Great Maccao.
For three nights, it hadn’t changed.
The completed mark remained beside the first hunt, carved deep into the dark wood.
Now a second notice waited beneath it.
BULLDROME
HUNT
Two stars had been cut above the name.
Al read it twice.
Then he looked toward the closed arena gate.
“That’s it?”
The gate didn’t answer.
“No warning?
No helpful description?
Not even ‘large angry pig?'”
Silence.
Al adjusted the hammer on his shoulder.
It was a projection of the weapon Z had made for him.
The real hammer remained beside his bed in Fairy Tail, where Z had ordered him to leave it after discovering Al asleep with one hand still wrapped around the grip.
Nothing that happened to the projection carried back to the actual weapon.
Chips vanished.
Scratches disappeared.
A broken handle wouldn’t shatter the one Z had spent weeks shaping.
Al still treated it carefully.
Z had made the real one.
That counted.
He took one ration, two medicine bottles, and a length of cloth from the box.
The objects settled into a pouch that hadn’t existed until he’d reached for it.
The hammer’s head rested heavily against his shoulder.
It wasn’t elegant.
Good.
Elegant weapons had too many opinions.
A hammer had one.
Hit the problem correctly.
Al approached the gate.
It opened before he touched it.
Cold air rushed through.
The arena had changed.
The Great Maccao’s sunbaked stone and scattered grass were gone.
Snow covered the ground beyond the gate, packed thin across frozen dirt.
Jagged rocks rose along the arena walls.
His breath fogged immediately.
Al stepped through.
The gate slammed behind him.
Across the arena, snow shifted.
A pair of tusks emerged first.
Then the Bulldrome lifted its head.
It was larger than any ordinary boar had a right to be.
Dark fur covered its heavy body, paling along its back beneath a layer of snow.
Its tusks curved upward beside a broad snout.
Small eyes fixed on Al with immediate, uncomplicated hatred.
Al considered it.
The Bulldrome snorted.
“So we understand each other.”
It charged.
There wasn’t a roar.
There wasn’t a warning display.
One moment it stood across the arena.
The next, several hundred pounds of muscle, tusk, and bad temper tore through the snow toward him.
Al stepped aside.
Too late.
One tusk caught the edge of his coat and spun him off his feet.
He hit the ground shoulder-first.
The hammer struck beside him, throwing up snow.
Pain flared through his ribs.
No blood appeared.
No torn skin.
The coat showed no damage despite the force that had caught it.
The mindscape didn’t reproduce every injury.
It gave him pain, exhaustion, loss of balance, and the consequences of bad decisions.
It didn’t waste effort painting blood across a place built to test him.
Al rolled as the Bulldrome turned.
Fast.
Far faster than something shaped like that should’ve turned.
“That,” Al muttered, climbing to one knee, “sucked.”
The Bulldrome charged again.
This time, Al didn’t dodge immediately.
He watched its shoulders.
The head made the tusks frightening.
The shoulders told him where the rest of the monster had committed.
Left hoof struck.
Weight lowered.
Right shoulder pushed forward.
Al moved right.
The Bulldrome tore past close enough for its fur to brush his sleeve.
Al pivoted and swung.
The hammer struck its hindquarter with a thick, ugly impact.
The Bulldrome stumbled.
It didn’t fall.
It wheeled around with a furious squeal and swept its tusks sideways.
Al ducked beneath the first.
The second caught him across the chest.
The world became snow and sky.
He landed on his back and slid until one boot struck a rock.
For several seconds, breathing became theoretical.
The Bulldrome scraped one hoof against the frozen ground.
Al raised a hand.
“Wait.”
It charged.
“Rude.”
He rolled behind the rock.
The Bulldrome struck it hard enough to shake snow from the arena wall.
One tusk scraped stone.
Its head jerked sideways.
Al rose with the hammer already moving.
He struck beneath the jaw.
The hammer’s weight lifted the Bulldrome’s front end for half a heartbeat.
Its hooves came down unevenly.
Al didn’t chase.
The Great Maccao had taught him that.
The arena punished greed more reliably than it punished weakness.
One clean strike didn’t grant him three more.
A stagger wasn’t the same as helplessness.
A monster that looked open could still possess teeth, claws, tails, tusks, or simple spite.
The Bulldrome recovered and spun.
Its tusk missed Al’s stomach by inches.
He retreated.
The monster chased.
Good.
It possessed one answer to distance.
Charge.
Al ran toward the arena wall.
The Bulldrome thundered behind him.
Snow broke beneath its hooves.
Its breathing became a harsh rhythm, each exhale carrying anger and steam.
Al counted the impacts.
One.
Two.
Three.
He planted his foot beside the wall and pushed away.
The Bulldrome tried to turn.
Its momentum refused.
One tusk struck stone with a crack.
The monster staggered backward, shaking its head.
Al was already charging the hammer.
The projection hummed in his hands—not with Z’s magic, but with the mindscape’s imitation of stored force.
He felt the weight settle through his wrists, elbows, and shoulders.
He released.
The hammer rose from below and crashed into the side of the Bulldrome’s skull.
The impact traveled through the handle and into his bones.
The Bulldrome’s legs folded.
Small white lights spun around its head.
Stars.
Only stars.
The stars weren’t decoration.
Concussion.
Disorientation.
A brief failure of balance and awareness caused by repeated blunt force to the head.
The Great Maccao had shown them too.
Al had wondered afterward why the stars appeared when blood and visible damage didn’t.
The answer had come once he stopped thinking of them as part of a game.
The arena showed what he needed to recognize.
Not everything that happened.
The Bulldrome couldn’t defend itself properly.
That was useful.
Al stepped in.
He didn’t swing wildly.
First strike to the jaw.
The head snapped sideways.
Second strike behind the tusk.
The monster rolled onto one shoulder.
The stars began fading.
Al raised the hammer for a third blow.
The Bulldrome surged upright.
He abandoned the swing and threw himself aside.
A tusk passed beneath his arm.
The monster clipped his leg and sent him tumbling, but the hammer remained in his grip.
Al rolled onto one knee.
The Bulldrome stumbled several paces before stopping.
Its breathing had changed.
Heavier.
Foam clung to its mouth.
Snow darkened beneath its hooves.
Its head hung lower, but its eyes remained fixed on him.
Al stood.
His ribs hurt.
His right leg wanted to shake.
His arms felt heavy from the charged strike.
The Bulldrome wasn’t complicated.
That didn’t make it harmless.
Simple things killed people all the time.
The monster scraped the ground.
Al lowered the hammer.
“Come on.”
It charged for the final time.
Al waited.
The urge to transform stirred beneath his skin.
Great Jaggi legs could carry him clear.
Arzuros arms could add power to the swing.
He used none of them.
This hunt wasn’t asking whether a monster’s body could defeat another monster.
It was asking whether Al could.
The Bulldrome closed the distance.
Ten paces.
Seven.
Four.
Al moved left.
The monster adjusted.
He’d expected that.
He reversed direction.
The Bulldrome tried to follow, its wounded balance shifting too slowly.
Its front hoof slipped in the torn snow.
Its head lowered.
One tusk carved through the ground.
Al stepped inside the other.
Too close for the full curve to catch him.
Close enough to smell wet fur and hot breath.
He planted both feet and swung sideways.
The hammer struck the joint between jaw and skull.
The sound was smaller than he expected.
The effect wasn’t.
The Bulldrome’s charge collapsed beneath it.
Its body twisted, rolled once, and struck the frozen ground hard enough to send snow across Al’s boots.
He kept the hammer raised.
The Bulldrome didn’t rise.
Al watched its chest.
One breath.
Then another.
Then none.
Silence returned to the arena.
Al remained where he was until his arms started trembling.
Only then did he lower the hammer.
“That was faster.”
The mindscape still didn’t answer.
He approached carefully and touched one hand to the Bulldrome’s coarse fur.
The body dissolved.
Light moved through the dark hide, breaking it into hundreds of pale fragments.
They rose around Al, circled once, then crossed into his chest.
The familiar pressure followed.
Not pain.
Possibility.
A heavy neck built to drive forward.
Dense shoulders.
A reinforced skull.
Tusks that could tear upward through an enemy’s guard.
The shape settled somewhere behind the forms he could already reach.
Available.
Not mastered.
Al closed his eyes.
Something else moved at the edge of the arena.
Smaller.
Several sets of hooves crossed stone beyond sight.
He caught the scent of coarse fur, dirt, and restless aggression.
Bullfango.
Not present.
Not yet.
But close enough to answer.
Al opened his eyes.
The arena gate opened.
Warm light waited beyond it.
Al rested the hammer against his shoulder and walked through.
He woke on the floor beside his bed.
That was becoming irritating.
Morning light hadn’t reached the window yet.
The guild’s sleeping rooms remained quiet except for Gray snoring somewhere down the hall and Natsu—
No.
Natsu wasn’t here yet.
The thought arrived with the strange weight certain memories carried.
Al pushed it away and sat up.
His real hammer rested beside the bed.
Untouched.
Al ran his thumb across the grip.
His ribs ached despite having no bruise.
His right leg cramped when he stood.
The arena hadn’t brought the injuries back, but his body remembered the exertion.
The door opened.
Z stood on the other side wearing a sleeping shirt, one sock, and an expression suggesting he’d already identified three separate crimes.
Scout peered around his leg.
Z looked at Al.
Then the hammer.
Then the sweat soaking Al’s shirt.
“You went back.”
Al considered lying.
“Nope.”
Z entered and closed the door.
“What was it?”
“Bulldrome.”
Z’s eyes sharpened.
“The large boar?”
“Very large boar.”
Z stared at him.
Al smiled faintly.
“It turns faster than it looks.”
“I assumed that.”
Scout padded closer and sniffed Al’s leg.
“Sore.”
“A little.”
Scout looked at Z.
“Bad.”
Al pointed at him.
“You’re supposed to be on my side.”
Scout sat beside Z’s foot.
“Z.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
“Z,” Scout repeated with great certainty.
Z folded his arms.
Al sighed.
“I got clipped twice.
Maybe three times.”
“How do you get ‘maybe’ hit by a giant boar?”
“One of them might’ve counted as being thrown.”
“That counts.”
“Then three.”
Z closed his eyes briefly.
“Did you use multiple forms?”
“No forms.”
His eyes opened.
Al’s smile faded into something more genuine.
“I used the hammer.”
Z looked at the weapon beside the bed.
“The projection?”
“Yeah.
The real one’s fine.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
“It’s what you were going to ask next.”
Z’s mouth tightened because Al was right.
Scout hopped onto the bed and inspected the hammer.
He sniffed the head, touched the handle, then looked at Al.
“Good?”
Al thought about the straight charges.
The sudden turns.
The stars circling the Bulldrome’s head.
The distant Bullfango waiting at the edge of his awareness.
“I unlocked the form.”
Z was immediately awake in a way sleep couldn’t survive.
“Full form?”
“Potentially.
I haven’t tried it.”
“Anything else?”
Al hesitated.
Z noticed.
Of course he did.
“What else?”
“I think I can call a Bullfango into this world.”
Silence.
Scout’s ears rose.
Z stepped closer.
“Call it how?”
“Like how you can summon palicos.
Maybe one day, I’ll introduce them into this world.” Al rubbed the back of his neck.
“It felt like a reward for completing the hunt.”
Z stared at him.
Al raised both hands.
“That stare is why I didn’t do it.”
Some of the tension left Z’s shoulders.
Not all.
“Good.”
“You sound surprised.”
“I’m appreciating evidence of judgment.”
“That sounds worse.”
“It isn’t.”
“It really does.”
Scout tapped Al’s knee.
“Food.”
Al glanced toward the window.
“It’s not breakfast yet.”
“Food.”
Z looked at Al’s shaking arms.
“He’s right.”
“Don’t encourage him.”
“You completed a hunt, woke up exhausted, and haven’t eaten.”
“I ate a ration inside.”
“A projected ration.”
“It tasted real.”
“So does pain in the arena.
You still don’t have a bruise.”
Al looked down at his ribs.
Z had a point.
That was also irritating.
They made it downstairs before sunrise.
Makarov was already awake.
The guild master sat at the bar with a cup of tea and three open reports.
He looked toward them as they descended.
His eyes moved over Al once.
That was enough.
“You hunted.”
Al stopped on the final stair.
Z kept walking.
Traitor.
“Yes.”
Makarov set down his cup.
“What?”
“Bulldrome.”
“Result?”
“Successful.”
“Cost?”
Al took inventory.
“Sore ribs.
Tired leg.
Heavy arms.
No transformation strain.”
“Because?”
“I didn’t transform.”
Makarov’s eyebrows rose.
Z took bread from behind the bar and handed it to Al.
“He used the hammer.”
Makarov’s gaze shifted to the weapon Al hadn’t brought downstairs.
Then back to him.
“By choice?”
Al bit into the bread.
“Yes.”
Makarov waited.
Al swallowed.
“The form would’ve made it easier.
That wasn’t the point.”
A small smile moved beneath Makarov’s mustache.
It disappeared before becoming praise.
“Anything new?”
“Bulldrome form.
And possibly summoning smaller versions of it.”
“Smaller versions of it?”
“Yeah, Bullfangos.
These guys are mostly herbivores.”
Makarov studied him for several seconds.
“Good.”
Al looked at Z.
“See?
His sounded like praise.”
“Because he’s better at it.”
Makarov ignored them both.
“You won’t test the summon alone.”
Al opened his mouth.
“You won’t.”
Al closed it again.
“Yes, Master.”
“Nor will you attempt the new form until your body has recovered.”
“Yes, Master.”
“And you’ll eat more than one piece of bread.”
Scout climbed onto the bar.
“Food.”
Makarov nodded gravely.
“Scout understands.”
Scout puffed up.
Al looked betrayed.
“This is becoming organized.”
“It’s Fairy Tail,” Makarov said.
“Nothing here’s organized.”
Something crashed in the back room.
Wakaba swore.
Macao shouted that it hadn’t been his fault.
Makarov lifted his tea.
“See?”
By the time the guild woke properly, Al’s arms had stopped shaking.
His ribs still hurt.
Z recorded everything.
Charge speed.
Turning radius.
Tusk reach.
Concussion response.
Projected weapon condition.
Reward sensation.
Potential Bullfango summon.
At the bottom of the page, he wrote one line twice.
DO NOT TEST ALONE.
Al leaned over his shoulder.
“You’ve written that already.”
“You forget when it most suits you.”
“I remember important things.”
“You tried to eat arena meat.”
“That was important.”
“It dissolved in your hand.”
“Which answered the question.”
Z shut the notebook.
Across the guild, Makarov climbed onto the bar with a new bundle of requests beneath one arm.
The room quieted by degrees.
“Since some of you have recently demonstrated improved judgment—”
Al smiled.
Z immediately said, “Don’t.”
“—I’ve reviewed several low-risk requests suitable for supervised junior teams.”
Al’s smile vanished.
The arena receded from his thoughts.
This wasn’t a hunt created by his magic.
There wouldn’t be a gate keeping the danger contained.
No storage box would restore its supplies.
No defeated threat would dissolve into harmless light.
Outside the guild, wounds remained.
Mistakes remained too.
Makarov placed three requests on the lowest section of the board.
“Reading them doesn’t mean taking them,” he said.
“Taking one doesn’t mean you’ll go alone.
You’ll choose based on what you can do, what you can’t do, and what the client actually needs.”
Erza was already standing.
Cana leaned closer.
Gray stopped pretending not to listen.
Z opened his notebook again.
Scout climbed onto his shoulder.
Al looked at the three papers.
One concerned damaged fences.
One concerned missing medicinal deliveries.
The last concerned something driving workers away from an abandoned waystation on the northern road.
Al read that one twice.
The listed danger was low.
The handwriting wasn’t frightened.
The payment was ordinary.
It looked safe.
He’d already learned how much that meant.
Makarov watched him from the bar.
Al didn’t reach for the request.
Not yet.
First, he looked at Z.
Z was already looking back.
Outside, Magnolia’s morning bells began to ring.