Alastor read the three requests again.
Damaged fences.
Missing medicinal deliveries.
An abandoned waystation whose workers had been frightened away by something they hadn’t identified.
The last request sounded the most interesting.
That was probably why Makarov took it off the board.
Alastor stared at the empty space.
“I wasn’t going to choose that one.”
“You read it four times,” Makarov said.
“I was being thorough.”
“You smiled during the third reading.”
“That doesn’t prove anything.”
“It proves enough.”
Makarov placed the waystation request on the bar behind him.
Alastor looked at Zestial.
Zestial didn’t help.
“You did smile.”
“Whose side are you on?”
“The side that wants to leave Magnolia before sunset.”
Scout sat on Zestial’s shoulder, studying the two remaining requests.
“The medicine,” he said in Felyne.
“A damaged fence can wait.
Missing medicine usually means someone can’t.”
Makarov heard several firm meows.
Erza looked from Scout to the brothers.
“What did he say?”
“He prefers the medicine request,” Zestial answered.
“Someone may already need the delivery.”
Makarov passed the request to him.
The job came from an apothecary in a village north of Magnolia.
Two crates of medicine had been sent to charcoal burners working near the edge of Worth Wood.
The delivery hadn’t arrived.
The courier had returned the previous evening with an injured horse and half a wagon.
He claimed the road had collapsed beneath him after something struck the ground from below.
He’d escaped before discovering what had caused it.
The request required Fairy Tail to recover the medicine, determine whether the road remained usable, and deliver whatever supplies had survived.
No confirmed monster.
No bandits.
No missing people.
One damaged wagon.
Makarov tapped the request.
“This is an investigation and recovery job.
You’re not being sent to hunt whatever damaged the road.”
Alastor looked innocent.
Makarov continued staring at him.
Alastor attempted to look more innocent.
It made things worse.
“If you find the cause,” Makarov continued, “you observe it from a safe distance.
You don’t provoke it.
You don’t pursue it.
You don’t turn a recovery request into a hunting request because you find tracks.”
Alastor raised one hand.
“What if it attacks us?”
“Then you defend yourselves and withdraw.”
“What if withdrawing leaves someone in danger?”
Makarov’s expression tightened slightly.
“Then you protect them and send for help.”
Alastor lowered his hand.
That answer mattered.
Makarov turned toward Erza.
“You’ll keep the request and the emergency money.”
Erza accepted both.
She had begun wearing her new surname differently.
Not loudly.
She didn’t introduce herself twice or look for reasons to write it down.
But when Makarov had addressed her as Erza Scarlet that morning, her shoulders had settled as if something had found its proper place.
“You’ll also carry the signal lacrima,” Makarov said.
Erza nodded.
“Yes, Master.”
“Zestial will manage supplies and examine the recovered medicine.”
Zestial opened his notebook.
“Water damage, broken seals, temperature exposure, contamination, and magical interference.”
Makarov nodded.
“Alastor will handle lifting, tracking where Scout can’t, and defensive support.”
Alastor waited.
Makarov waited too.
“No unsanctioned hunting,” Alastor said.
“Good.”
“I understood the first time.”
“I know.”
“Then why’d you wait?”
“Experience.”
Cana laughed from the next table.
Gray tried to hide a smile behind his cup.
Alastor looked at both of them.
“Your support means nothing to me.”
“Good,” Cana said.
“You’re not getting any.”
A chair scraped near the bar.
Macao stood and finished wrapping a scarf around his neck.
“I’ll supervise.”
Alastor looked at Makarov.
“You didn’t mention him.”
“You didn’t ask.”
“Would asking have changed it?”
“No.”
“Then I saved time.”
Macao pulled on his coat.
“I’m touched by your enthusiasm.”
“It’s not personal.”
“That makes it worse.”
Makarov stepped down from the bar.
“This is your first request beyond Magnolia since I approved junior fieldwork.
Macao won’t perform the job for you.
He’ll observe, prevent avoidable disasters, and take command if the danger exceeds the request.”
Alastor glanced at the older mage.
Macao smiled.
“I’m very good at preventing disasters.”
Wakaba snorted from the bar.
“You’re better at causing them first.”
“That gives me practical experience.”
Makarov ignored them.
“You leave after breakfast.
If the road can’t be crossed safely, you return.
If the medicine’s destroyed, you document it and return.
If you encounter a threat you can’t identify, you return.”
“An extremely repetitive strategy,” Scout observed.
“Return,” Alastor translated.
Scout looked at him.
“That wasn’t what I said.”
“It captured the important part.”
“It removed my criticism.”
“That was also important.”
Erza watched the exchange without understanding a word.
“What did Scout actually say?”
“He understands the instructions,” Zestial answered.
Scout’s ears flattened.
“I’m being censored by my own summoner.”
Alastor smiled.
“Now you know how I feel.”
“You require editing.”
Makarov looked between them.
“What’s the mission?”
Alastor glanced at the request.
“Recover the medicine, inspect the road, and deliver whatever’s still usable.”
“What isn’t the mission?”
“Finding whatever damaged the road and convincing it to fight me.”
Makarov nodded.
Alastor sighed.
“I liked the arena better.
It never made me repeat instructions.”
“The arena threw a Bulldrome at you.”
“Exactly.
Clear expectations.”
They left Magnolia two hours later.
Erza walked at the front with the request tucked inside a leather case.
Macao followed several paces behind her, hands in his coat pockets.
Zestial carried his field box across his back.
Scout sat on top of it with one paw resting on Zestial’s head whenever the road became uneven.
Alastor carried nothing beyond his pack.
His hammer remained in the guild.
He hadn’t needed it for the request, and bringing it simply because he owned it would’ve meant carrying the weight for two days without a reason.
His magic already gave him claws, armor, strength, speed, and enough natural weapons to make most conventional steel redundant.
The hammer had served its purpose against the Bulldrome.
He’d wanted to test its balance against a moving target that could hit back.
It had worked.
Zestial’s handle had held.
The projection had reproduced the real weapon’s balance closely enough for the mindscape to accept it.
There wasn’t anything else to prove today.
“You’re walking strangely,” Zestial said.
Alastor looked over.
“I am not.”
“You keep reaching toward your shoulder.”
Alastor’s hand had moved toward the place where the hammer usually rested during practice.
He lowered it.
“Habit.”
“You’ve carried it for less than a week.”
“I form habits easily.”
“You form bad habits easily.”
Scout leaned over the edge of the field box.
“You also keep checking where it isn’t.”
“I know where it isn’t.”
“Then the inspections seem unnecessary.”
Alastor pointed at him.
“No one asked you.”
“You began the conversation by moving suspiciously.”
Erza glanced back.
“What’s Scout saying?”
“He thinks Al misses his hammer,” Zestial said.
“I don’t miss it.”
Scout’s whiskers twitched.
“You reached for it again.”
“I was adjusting my pack.”
“You missed the strap.”
Macao looked back.
“Everything all right?”
“Yes,” Alastor said.
“No,” Zestial said at the same time.
Macao considered them.
“Good.
Sounds normal.”
The road north remained quiet through the morning.
Farms gave way to low hills and scattered woods.
The summer air carried damp soil, leaves, and distant chimney smoke.
Wagon tracks crossed the road in both directions.
Zestial examined each set until Alastor asked whether he planned to interview every wheel in Fiore.
“Tracks tell us what passed through.”
“So do people.”
“Wheels complain less.”
Macao laughed.
Erza didn’t turn around.
“They’re also quieter.”
“You too?”
“I’m leading.”
“That doesn’t require insults.”
“It requires accuracy.”
They stopped at midday beside a narrow stream.
Macao made them review the request again while they ate.
Alastor suspected Makarov had instructed him to do that.
He suspected it more strongly when Macao asked what they’d do if the medicine had been exposed to river water.
“Reject anything with a broken seal,” Zestial answered.
“Dry the intact containers, check for temperature-sensitive mixtures, and document every loss.”
“What if the road collapses again?”
“Move away from the damaged section,” Erza said.
“Establish whether anyone’s trapped.
Signal the guild if rescue requires more support.”
“What if something attacks?”
Alastor swallowed a bite of bread.
“Defend, withdraw, and avoid pursuit.”
Macao nodded.
“What if it insults your hair?”
Alastor stared at him.
Zestial closed his eyes.
Erza’s expression became dangerous.
Scout looked between them.
“What did he say about Al’s hair?”
“He’s checking whether Al can ignore provocation,” Zestial explained.
Scout studied Alastor.
“Can he?”
“No,” Zestial said.
“I’m sitting right here.”
“That doesn’t change the answer.”
Macao grinned.
“Just checking.”
They found the damaged road shortly after noon.
Scout smelled it first.
His ears rose.
Then flattened.
He jumped from the field box and landed on the road.
“I smell broken wood, the injured horse, and several medicinal compounds.
The trail’s old.”
Zestial crouched beside him.
“Blood?”
Scout moved forward, nose close to the ground.
“A little.
It belongs to the horse.
I don’t smell human blood from here.”
Macao watched them.
“What does he have?”
“The wagon, the horse, and medicine,” Zestial answered.
“The blood appears to be from the horse.”
The road curved between two rocky hills.
Halfway through the passage, its surface disappeared.
A section nearly twenty feet across had collapsed into a wide depression.
One wheel protruded from the mud below.
Splintered boards and torn canvas lay scattered along the edges.
Erza lifted one hand.
Everyone stopped.
“Scout.”
The Palico lowered himself and moved forward.
He didn’t step onto the broken section.
He circled it, testing the ground with the butt of his small lance.
“There’s a hollow beneath the road,” Scout said.
“The edges are thinner than they look.
Don’t follow me until I’ve marked where the ground changes.”
Zestial removed a piece of chalk from his field box.
“Scout says there’s empty space below us.
We need to stay back until he identifies the stable edge.”
Erza nodded and motioned Macao and Alastor farther from the break.
Scout continued around the depression.
Whenever he tapped a secure section, Zestial leaned forward and marked it with chalk.
Alastor breathed through his nose.
Mud.
Broken wood.
Horse.
Medicinal herbs.
Something bitter.
Something metallic.
Something alive.
His hand tightened.
Macao noticed.
“What?”
Alastor looked toward the depression.
“I’m not sure.”
“That isn’t useful.”
“I know.”
He let his eyes change.
Only his eyes.
The world sharpened.
Colors deepened.
Small movements separated themselves from the wind.
He saw insects crossing exposed roots and water collecting beneath broken boards.
The Nargacuga impression stirred.
Darkness.
Movement.
Prey.
Alastor dismissed the eyes before the final thought finished forming.
He pointed toward the overturned wagon.
“Something’s underneath it.”
Erza drew her sword.
Macao stepped forward.
“Alive?”
“I think so.”
“Human?”
“I don’t know.”
Zestial looked at Alastor’s face.
“How long?”
“Two breaths.”
“Any pull?”
“A little.”
Zestial didn’t like that answer.
Neither did Alastor.
Macao took command without raising his voice.
“Erza, stay on the stable edge.
Zestial, find another approach.
Alastor, don’t transform again unless we confirm someone’s trapped.”
They moved.
There wasn’t another safe approach.
The depression wasn’t a simple washout.
The ground had collapsed into a hollow space beneath the road.
Old wooden supports protruded from the exposed walls.
Zestial touched one beam.
“This was built over something.”
Macao crouched beside him.
“Old mine?”
“Too narrow for a proper mine.”
“Drainage tunnel?”
“Maybe.”
Scout crawled along the edge, then stopped.
His ears turned toward the overturned wagon.
“Quiet.”
Zestial raised one hand.
Everyone stopped moving.
A sound came from beneath the wreckage.
Three knocks.
Pause.
Two knocks.
Erza stepped forward.
“Was that Scout?”
“No,” Zestial said.
“Someone’s beneath the wagon.”
The knocking came again.
Three.
Pause.
Two.
Zestial’s face tightened.
“That’s deliberate.”
Alastor moved to the marked edge.
“What do you need?”
Zestial looked over the slope.
“Weight distribution.
The mud’s too soft near the wagon.
If we walk directly across, we could bring the rest down.”
“Boards?”
“Some, but we can’t reach them safely.”
Alastor studied the exposed supports.
“Arzuros.”
Zestial immediately understood.
“Upper body only.”
“I know.”
“Don’t add another form if the ground shifts.”
“I know.”
“If you feel the form pushing—”
“Z.”
Zestial stopped.
Alastor looked at him.
“I know.”
That didn’t remove the worry.
It made movement possible despite it.
Alastor transformed.
Muscle thickened across his shoulders and arms.
Coarse fur spread from his wrists toward his elbows, and heavy claws curved from his fingers.
Hunger stirred first.
Then territorial anger.
Simple instincts.
He stepped onto the slope.
The ground shifted.
Alastor lowered his center of gravity and spread his weight.
One step.
Pause.
Another.
The mud pressed around his boots.
Behind him, Zestial directed every movement.
“Left.
There’s a support below your right foot.”
Alastor moved left.
“Stop.”
He stopped.
“Test forward.”
Alastor pressed down carefully.
The ground held.
He reached the wagon.
Its main body had collapsed onto one side.
Crates were wedged beneath the frame.
One had split, filling the mud with broken bottles and sharp medicinal smells.
The knocking came from below.
Alastor crouched.
“Fairy Tail,” he called.
“Can you hear me?”
Silence.
Then a voice answered.
Faint.
“Yes.”
“Three.”
Alastor looked back.
“Three people!”
Erza’s jaw tightened.
The request had said no one was missing.
Macao swore quietly.
“Condition?” he shouted.
Alastor leaned closer to the gap.
“Are you injured?”
“One broken leg.
Maybe.
The boy’s bleeding.
We can’t move the beam.”
Alastor looked through the opening.
Three charcoal burners had been using the old drainage tunnel as a shortcut beneath the road when the wagon collapsed.
One adult lay beneath a support beam.
A second had wrapped an arm around a boy who couldn’t have been older than eight.
The tunnel continued into darkness behind them.
Something scraped inside it.
All three survivors looked toward the sound.
Alastor smelled their fear.
“What’s back there?” he asked.
The uninjured man swallowed.
“We don’t know.”
The scraping came again.
Closer.
Macao called from the road.
“Report!”
“Three survivors!
One pinned, one injured child, one mobile adult!”
“And the sound?”
Alastor stared into the tunnel.
“Unidentified.”
The ground trembled.
Not much.
Enough.
Dust fell from the broken road.
Zestial looked toward the exposed supports.
“Al, get back.”
“I can reach them.”
“The ground’s moving.”
“I can reach them.”
“You can’t carry three people across unstable mud while supporting the wagon.”
Alastor looked at the beam trapping the first man.
Zestial was right.
Alastor hated that.
Macao pulled the signal lacrima from his coat.
“I’m calling for rescue support.”
A second tremor passed beneath them.
Stronger.
One of the surviving wagon crates slipped.
Alastor caught it against his shoulder before it crushed the gap.
The added weight drove him to one knee.
“Al!” Erza moved toward the slope.
“Stay there!”
The words came out closer to a growl.
Erza stopped.
Not because she’d understood the instinct beneath it.
Because the ground between them cracked.
A thin line raced across the slope.
Mud shifted.
The broken wagon settled harder against Alastor’s shoulders.
Zestial’s face went pale.
“The Arzuros weight’s making it worse.”
“If I dismiss the shoulders, the wagon drops.”
Alastor forced the shape below his waist away.
His boots sank immediately.
The wagon remained braced against his shoulders.
Inside the tunnel, the child began crying.
The scraping became a dragging impact.
Closer.
Pause.
Closer.
Something breathed in the dark.
Macao activated the signal lacrima.
Nothing happened.
He struck it against his palm and tried again.
The stone produced one weak spark.
Zestial turned.
“Magical interference?”
Macao examined it.
A thin fracture ran across the surface.
“Wonderful.”
Another support beam snapped beneath the road.
The slope dropped several inches.
Alastor grunted beneath the wagon.
Erza drew her second sword.
“What can we cut?”
“Nothing yet,” Zestial said.
His eyes moved rapidly over the wreckage.
“That frame’s transferring weight into the supports.
If we cut the wrong section, the whole road comes down.”
Scout stared into the tunnel.
His fur rose beneath his armor.
“Something’s coming.
It’s dragging part of its body, but it’s still moving quickly.
It’ll reach the trapped people before we can clear the wreckage.”
Zestial looked at him.
“How large?”
“Larger than Macao.
Smaller than the tunnel.”
Zestial turned toward the others.
“Something large is approaching through the tunnel.
Scout thinks it’ll reach the survivors before we can remove the wagon.”
Macao made the decision.
“We abandon the medicine.
Erza, get a rope around Alastor.
Zestial, mark the survivors’ position.
I’ll hold the slope while we withdraw and find another entrance.”
Alastor looked through the gap.
The boy stared back at him.
Eight years old.
Blood across one side of his face.
Trapped underground while something approached through the dark.
“Alastor,” Macao said.
Alastor didn’t move.
“Al.”
Zestial’s voice reached him more effectively.
“We can’t save them if we bring the tunnel down.”
“I know.”
“Then we need another entrance.”
“It’ll reach them first.”
Zestial looked into the darkness.
He knew Alastor was right.
Erza knew too, even without understanding Scout’s words directly.
Her swords lowered by half an inch.
Not surrender.
Thought.
The thing in the tunnel struck stone.
A low growl rolled through the gap.
The child screamed.
Alastor’s magic answered.
Great Jaggi could carry him into the tunnel quickly, but changing would force him to release the wagon.
Arzuros could hold the weight or move the beam, not both from where he stood.
Kulu-Ya-Ku offered grip and balance, but combining it with the Arzuros transformation would place exactly the kind of strain Makarov had forbidden.
Nargacuga offered sight he couldn’t safely maintain.
Separate answers.
Separate bodies.
He couldn’t hold the wagon, enter the tunnel, protect the child, move the beam, and carry three people.
He needed another set of claws.
Not an arena projection.
Not a defeated impression.
Not another body to wear.
Someone.
The thought changed something.
Alastor felt a presence beyond the familiar monster forms.
It had been there since the Great Maccao hunt.
No.
Longer.
Waiting beyond a place his transformations couldn’t reach.
He’d mistaken it for another form.
It wasn’t.
Forms didn’t look back.
This did.
The presence turned toward him.
Alert.
Armored.
Alive.
Alastor’s breath caught.
Zestial saw his expression.
“What?”
“I can feel something.”
“From the tunnel?”
“No.”
The growl came again.
Closer.
The wagon shifted against Alastor’s shoulders.
Macao started down the slope.
“Whatever it is, leave it alone.
We’re withdrawing.”
Alastor looked through the opening.
The trapped man.
The injured boy.
The darkness closing around them.
Then he looked at Zestial.
“I can’t do both.”
Zestial understood the sentence.
His eyes widened.
“Al, we don’t know what’ll answer.”
“That’s true.”
“You don’t know what bringing it here will cost.”
“Nope.”
“You don’t know whether you can control it.”
Alastor felt the presence bristle.
Not at the danger.
At the word.
Control.
“I don’t think I’m supposed to.”
The ground shook.
Stone cracked inside the tunnel.
A shadow moved beyond the survivors.
Alastor reached toward the waiting presence.
Not with the part of his magic that seized forms.
With the part that had learned doors existed.
He didn’t command it.
He showed it the trapped child.
The broken beam.
The approaching threat.
The job he couldn’t complete alone.
Then Alastor asked for help.
Something on the other side answered.