Salisbury
Yeah.
Hokage deserved some respect.
While he kept talking to me, he was simultaneously preparing some nasty Shadow Magic.
It looked like a bundle of extremely sharp shadows eager to chop me into salad.
I wasn’t wasting time either.
I slipped into combat mode and put my calculated plan into action.
Pieces of symbiote flew toward the shadow blades, looking from a distance like ordinary sand.
The mage clearly suspected something and hurried out of the path of my projectiles.
He even executed his maneuver successfully.
Unfortunately for him, I slightly altered the shape of the symbiote pieces flying toward him.
Simple physics and geometry.
No magic required.
Only a few grains struck the leader of the Night Shadows.
That was more than enough.
They entered his body and struck his nerves with maximum intensity.
That was it.
Very few people could cast spells when their arms and legs were screaming that they’d been shoved into boiling tar.
All I had to do was walk over and knock him out.
I’d need him later.
The entire fight took less than five seconds.
Now all I had to do was wait for the rest of the guild members to return and crush them one at a time or in small groups.
Combat mode faded on its own, leaving behind a faint feeling of emptiness and irritation.
I’d expected much more from an A-rank mage.
Part of my disappointment faded when I discovered an entire system of traps concentrated in one particular area.
Apparently, Hokage had wanted to lure me there and use the surroundings to multiply my chances of dying.
Judging by the size of the lacrima crystals powering some of the traps, the blast could have been strong enough to make even an S-rank mage unhappy.
I was also pleased to discover a large collection of magical restraints.
Apparently, the guild had been involved in slave trading as well.
While I searched through the spoils, the remaining members of the dark guild began arriving.
Unfortunately for them, they used the passages I already knew about.
Placing my little traps in them took only a couple of minutes.
Everyone who passed through inevitably picked up a small amount of symbiote in their bodies.
Not enough to knock them out, much less control them.
But enough to trigger a burst of pain at the worst possible moment while also revealing their location to me.
By the next morning, all the Shadow mages could boast stylish new accessories, while the guild members without magic were forced to wear ordinary restraints.
I wasn’t in a hurry to drag the whole crowd upstairs.
First, handing them over to guards they had already bought was stupid.
Somehow, the story would become that these were respectable citizens and I was the criminal.
Second, I wanted to thoroughly search the leader’s mind for extra money and valuables first.
Well, damn.
I hadn’t expected such a large amount of money from a dark guild that wasn’t particularly powerful.
There were **thirty million jewels** in the communal funds and the guild master’s personal stash, nearly a hundred lacrima crystals, some of them programmed in ways that would let me study the basics of local artifact creation, though perhaps I’d be better off asking someone to explain it to me, and a small collection of various artifacts, ranging from a lighter to a combat staff.
And most importantly, there was a library.
Thieves and robbers really did live well next to the capital of magic.
Very well.
There were books on fire, water, and wind magic.
For some reason, there were no books on earth magic.
What a shame.
Hamster disapproved, even though I didn’t need it.
It was a matter of principle.
There were also books on Shadow Magic, but the most important collection was on ritual magic.
The funniest part was that no bounty had been placed on the guild master’s head.
He’d never been caught red-handed, even though his guild had caused plenty of trouble.
So there was nothing stopping me from absorbing him.
The conditions were almost perfect.
An underground hideout, every entrance and exit under observation, and Gray still sitting in jail.
I’d even managed to match the mark on him with the map of the city.
So I hurried to perform the necessary ritual.
A missing guild master could become an excuse to withhold the full reward, but money wasn’t everything.
I’d already gotten plenty from them, and nobody was going to take the books away from me.
So why not gain some additional power as well?
The victim was securely restrained.
The runes were drawn correctly.
The words and actions were all performed properly…
And nothing happened.
The damn mage refused to be absorbed, no matter what I did.
But why?
Everything was correct!
I found the answer in one of the ritual books.
Yes, everything had been done correctly.
Absorption Magic simply had one amusing limitation.
You couldn’t devour someone belonging to your own species or a closely related one.
There were no rituals, diagrams, or spells for it.
And throughout the centuries that mages had practiced this school, nobody had managed to create one…
or perhaps someone had and simply hadn’t shared it with the public.
If I were in his position, I’d have done the same.
But what was the problem?
I wasn’t human.
Yes, but the body through which my magic was currently flowing was completely human.
So for the foreseeable future, I’d only be able to feed on monsters.
Then it would be better to change hosts.
An A-rank mage was no small prize, but unfortunately, another disappointment was waiting for me.
I managed to transfer into the new host, but I couldn’t control it at all.
The body didn’t even try to move.
Why?
Its brain was completely shut down, wasn’t it?
I understood nothing.
In the end, I had to return to my previous body.
After struggling for a couple of days, and clearing out everything that wasn’t nailed down in the process, I began preparing to head back upstairs.
The dark guild was surprisingly large.
Besides the two dozen mages, nearly three hundred ordinary people belonged to it.
A couple dozen had died from pain shock during Simba’s “greeting,” but everyone else was perfectly healthy, which meant there were plenty of people available to carry the loot.
I hid the most valuable items, namely the books, inside my spatial pocket, filling it far beyond reasonable limits again.
The smaller and more expensive artifacts went into my cloak.
Everything else would be carried on the backs of the dark guild members.
After seeing my kind smile, and watching several of their comrades who had tried to escape suddenly roll around on the floor howling in pain, they all developed a burning desire to help me transport everything.
They called me a demon whenever they thought I wasn’t nearby.
Heh.
What did I ever do to them?
Almost nothing.
Whatever.
They could call me anything they wanted.
The important thing was that they worked properly.
There was only one question left.
What was I going to do about the chief of the city guard?
Among the dark guild’s papers, I found several very interesting receipts.
Apparently, the brave soldier enjoyed expensive restaurants and the appropriate company.
His salary clearly wasn’t enough to pay for that sort of entertainment, but there were plenty of “donations” from “conscientious citizens who supported the guard’s cause.”
Judging by the amounts, there was enough evidence here to earn him and all his deputies and assistants about twenty years in the quarries.
These papers would let me take him by the throat.
On the other hand, there was a good chance that once the entire guild was arrested, the local police chief would simply lose his position for failing to perform his duties, assuming he wasn’t imprisoned as well.
In that case, the receipts wouldn’t be worth much.
Hmm.
What if I handed them over to outside investigators?
I could probably get some kind of official thanks from the city, and Makarov’s complaint would quickly be forgotten, blamed on the schemes of a corrupt official.
In the end, I’d earn Gray’s gratitude for saving him from another round of Makarov’s signature punishment, which would help me become part of the guild much faster.
Maybe I’d even get something useful from Makarov himself, such as a couple of lessons in ritual magic.
Yes.
That was definitely the more delicious option.
Now, how could I get around the local guards?
Hmm…
Wait.
This might work.
Somewhere around here I’d seen an artifact with a magical messenger.
There it was.
Let’s begin.
“To the Magic Council of the Kingdom of Fiore, from a member of Fairy Tail…”
One day later.
The streets of Salisbury were in complete chaos.
Naturally.
It wasn’t every day that fifty Rune Knights arrived in the city alongside a Council messenger.
But the uproar became even greater when several hundred people in chains emerged from an inconspicuous alley, escorted by a single silver-haired young man.
The Knights surrounded the procession.
The young man approached the messenger, who was difficult to mistake for anyone else, since the mutant frog in a red coat and hat was an exceptionally distinctive individual.
He handed the messenger several documents, then leaned over and whispered something near the place where a normal person’s ears should have been.
As the amphibian read, his face stretched farther and farther in surprise.
When he finished, he called over the squad commander and pointed toward the guard station.
The commander nodded knowingly, took five soldiers with him, and headed in the indicated direction.
Gray Fullbuster.
The Ice Mage sat behind bars, thinking about the situation.
The situation was terrible.
His attempt to do the guards’ job had resulted in the guards asking him to come to the station.
Well, “asking” wasn’t exactly the right word.
They had tried to arrest him, and rather roughly at that.
Throwing the attackers around wouldn’t have been difficult, but suddenly he discovered that he could barely move.
Some kind of magic was holding him firmly in place.
He didn’t have time to break free.
The guards rushed in, expertly put magic-restraining cuffs on him, and dragged him to the station.
Every demand that they release him was met with laughter and the statement that disorderly conduct carried a five-day sentence.
If he had a problem with that, they cheerfully offered to replace the charge with something else, perhaps harassment, since his outfit certainly made that accusation convenient.
All Gray could do was grind his teeth and wait for his detention to end, hoping that Sephiroth wouldn’t get himself into some kind of trouble in the meantime.
Imagine his surprise when, on the fourth day, five Rune Knights simply stormed into the station and began arresting the guards.
A man who appeared to be the squad commander approached Gray’s cell.
“Mr.
Fullbuster?”
“Yes, that’s me.”
“On behalf of the city authorities, I apologize for the inconvenience.” The man removed the magic-restraining cuffs from the prisoner.
“Those responsible have already been detained and will receive the appropriate punishment.”
The Ice Mage had absolutely no idea what any of this meant, but he nodded just in case.
The situation was, to put it mildly, unusual.
As far as he could remember, government officials had never apologized to him before.
Usually, the process worked in the opposite direction.
They demanded the apologies.
Something told him Sephiroth had something to do with this.
It would also be a good idea to find out where the hell he’d gone.
“Tell me, have you seen my partner?” Gray asked the commander.
Seeing that the man didn’t quite understand, Fullbuster described him.”Tall, long silver hair, usually dressed in dark colors.”
“He was the one who called us here.
The mage you described is probably in the magistrate’s office right now.
At least, that’s where he went with the Council messenger.”
Gray nodded and hurried toward the magistrate without saying goodbye.
“Sephiroth, you bastard!” the Ice Mage complained.
“You asked for help, and from the Council of all people!
How embarrassing is this going to be…”
Imagining the Master’s reaction to learning that they hadn’t merely failed the mission but had openly admitted their own helplessness, Fullbuster seriously began considering returning to the Northern Continent…
somewhere as far from civilization as possible.
At the entrance to the magistrate, Gray spotted the source of all his problems.
Sephiroth was standing there with a satisfied expression, whistling quietly to himself.
“Come on.
We’re going to talk,” the mage growled, grabbing his unresisting guildmate by the cloak and practically dragging him into the nearest alley.
“What the hell are you doing?
We can’t go back to the guild now!
What a complete disaster!”
The Ice Mage could have continued ranting for a long time, comparing Sephiroth’s intelligence to that of a stink mushroom, and not in Sephiroth’s favor, but a powerful punch to the stomach cut him off mid-sentence.
“Finished?” the silver-haired mage asked coldly.
“Now listen to me.
Before throwing accusations around, take the trouble to learn the details.
While one idiot first ran around the square with his ass hanging out and earned the guild a complaint, then relaxed in a jail cell, I completed the entire job.
“The Rune Knights came here to escort the arrested members of the thieves’ guild and put the city guard on trial because the guild had bought them.
I also presented your little performance as a distraction.
The complaint has been withdrawn.
More than that, the city has sent a letter of thanks to the Master.
You’ll receive your share of the reward from Makarov.
The money has already been transferred to the guild’s account.”
Without saying another word, Sephiroth turned and headed toward the station.
“Wait!” Fullbuster called after him as he got back to his feet.
“Is that really true?”
“I don’t recall giving you any reason to doubt what I say,” his companion replied almost spitting the words.
“Although human gratitude is an even more elusive thing than a politician’s honesty.”
“I…
I’m sorry,” the mage muttered awkwardly.
“I really handled that badly.”
His companion snorted.
“Oh, yes.
First we spit in someone’s face, then we say ‘sorry,’ and suddenly everything is wonderful.”
The sarcasm in his voice could have been served by the spoonful.
“I really was wrong.
I’m sorry.
I just thought we’d disgraced the guild.” Gray lowered his head.
A heavy sigh followed.
“Well, that’s not how I imagined our relationship getting better.
Fine.
First and last time.
Keep this in mind: screw up like that again, and I’ll beat your face in, and I won’t care that you’re A-rank,” Sephiroth said with a grin.
“Peace?”
“Peace.
But remember the part about your face.
And you’re buying the beer,” the silver-haired mage said with a grin.
“Now let’s go home.
I’ve had enough of this city’s hospitality.”