Fairy Tail: I Don't Want to Be the Guild Master-Chapter 330: Sol of the Earth, Juvia of the Water

"No one." Mira stood still, gently extending her senses.

There was no trace of magical energy nearby. If anyone from the guild were still here, she would've sensed them immediately. No one in Fairy Tail would ever try to hide like this.

"Given everyone's temperament... if something like this happened, they must've already left to fight." Rhodes guessed that Erza had managed to persuade the Master.

But still, they had promised to return by morning. Why would they have departed so suddenly?

His gaze drifted toward the basement's makeshift tavern. On the tables, wine glasses and dishes were left half-full, abandoned.

This wasn't planned.

Something urgent had pulled them away.

The two quickly returned to street level and headed to the nearby shops to ask around.

"Miss Mirajane? Mister Rhodes?" one shopkeeper blinked in surprise. "You haven't heard? Master Makarov stormed off with nearly the entire guild this morning."

Rhodes stepped forward. "Was someone hurt? Who? Where are they now?"

The man scratched his head. "I heard it was Miss Levy and her two teammates. They were taken to the hospital... everyone says it was Phantom Lord. It's disgusting, what they did."

At that, Mira and Rhodes both exhaled in relief.

In Fairy Tail, injury protocol was pretty clear: minor injuries got patched up on the spot, serious ones went to the hospital, and only truly dire cases warranted calling in Polyusica.

Being hospitalized meant it was bad, but not life-threatening. "Standard serious injuries," in guild terms.

But even as their worry subsided, anger surged in its place.

To attack them in the city? Phantom Lord had crossed a line.

Just imagining the condition Levy and her friends must be in... no wonder the Master lost control.

"Let's go after them right now!" Mira snapped.

"Wait." Rhodes grabbed her wrist, pointing toward the sky.

Above the hospital district, an unnatural formation of rainclouds was beginning to spiral, centered ominously in a single stormy patch.

"That's over the hospital, isn't it?"

...

Lucy walked alone through a narrow alleyway, a shortcut she often used to get back to the hospital.

She had gone to check the guild, only to find it empty. Now she was hurrying back to Levy's side.

She completely forgot what Erza had said the night before—never go out alone, not with tensions this high.

But what else could she do? Everyone else was either hospitalized or had gone to fight.

Despite how little time she had spent with them, the quiet emptiness of Fairy Tail's normally bustling hall had unsettled her deeply.

Then, to make it worse, it started to rain.

The sudden drizzle clung to her clothes and hair, making the solitude even more oppressive. Lucy, a naturally emotional person, found the atmosphere weighing heavily on her.

That was when they appeared.

A man and a woman, strangers dressed strangely, stepped into the alley ahead. Their voices carried bizarrely, talking about "targets" and "objectives."

Lucy's instincts flared. She stopped cold.

"Who are you?" she demanded.

The man stepped forward, lanky and tall. He had slicked-back green hair, a curled mustache, wore a crimson suit, and sported a pair of tiny monocles perched on his nose. His voice had a strange, theatrical rhythm to it.

"Ahh~ I haven't even introduced myself! How terribly rude. I'm Sol, Sol of the Earth! No, no, no~" He gestured flamboyantly with a spin. "Just call me Monsieur Sol."

The woman held a laced parasol in one hand, dressed in a heavy, deep blue gown. A black veil draped over her head, and pinned to her chest was a charm shaped like a teru teru bozu, a traditional sunshine doll.

Her voice was low and tinged with melancholy.

"Juvia is the Rain Woman. One of Phantom Lord's, Element Four. Yes, the Rain Woman... drip... drop..." Her tone lingered on the words with odd emphasis. "What kind of woman... are you?"

There was something bitter, almost vengeful, in the way Juvia said the title "Rain Woman," as if it carried with it years of buried resentment.

Lucy ignored the strange theatrics. One word had caught her attention and left her trembling.

"Phantom...! You're from Phantom Lord. You destroyed our guild... and hurt Levy!"

"Non, non, non~" The man, Sol, flourished his hands, shaking his head dramatically with each "no" as if that would clear up the misunderstanding. "It was Monsieur Gajeel who did those things. He destroyed your guild. He attacked Miss Levy. It was... how do you say... an executive decision made by our noble master."

Despite the honorifics and his overpolite manner, nothing about him felt refined.

Sol wore a bright red suit and kept a stiff, awkward posture, his voice lilting like some cartoonish nobleman. Yet his body trembled constantly, and his speech pattern was so bizarre that Lucy could find nothing elegant in him at all, only something unhinged.

"Why would you do this?!" Lucy reached for her Celestial Spirit Keys, hand trembling with fury.

Sol twisted his body in an unnatural, fluid motion, almost as if his spine were made of wet noodles. He bowed with exaggerated politeness.

"We've come on behalf of the great Phantom Lord to escort you, Miss Lucy Heartfilia."

Lucy froze.

"You, how do you know my last name?!"

Her eyes widened in alarm, but before she could act, the parasol-wielding woman raised her hand.

A surge of water erupted from thin air and coalesced into a dense, shimmering sphere nearly two meters wide. It engulfed Lucy in an instant.

"Water Lock," Juvia whispered.

"Urgh—!" Lucy struggled inside the sphere, her hands clawing through the swirling water. Her keychain slipped from her belt and clattered to the ground, ringing against the cobbled stone street.

The current churned violently around her, pushing into her mouth and nose. Her limbs began to slow, her strength draining with every second.

"Juvia's Water Lock is inescapable... resistance is futile," Juvia murmured. Her voice was distant, cold.

Lucy's eyes began to blur.

But then—

A green blur dropped from the sky like a meteor.

A powerful crash shattered the water sphere.

Lucy felt an arm wrap tightly around her waist. In the next instant, she was pulled free from the trap and landed safely on the ground, supported against the chest of someone strong and familiar.

A deep, muffled voice spoke through a helmet shaped like a crab's shell.

"What do you think you're doing to our adorable new recruit?"

Lucy coughed violently, spitting up two mouthfuls of water before she could breathe again. Her knees buckled, but the man held her steady.

The green armor flickered and vanished, revealing the face beneath.

Only then did Lucy finally recognize who it was. freewebnσvel.cøm

She said in surprise, "Mr. Rhodes!"

Rhodes tapped the ground lightly with his foot, catching Lucy's fallen keychain and flipping it into his hand. He handed it to her. "A summoner should always keep hold of her tools. And..."

He pointed upward. "There's a bigger surprise."

Lucy looked up, and saw the demon she once feared. But now, seeing her descend from above, all Lucy felt was relief and safety. "Miss Mira!"

Juvia and Sol immediately sensed the overwhelming surge of magic. They glanced up just in time to see two demonic claws slam into their faces.

Mira didn't pause. She soared down like a shooting star, grabbed both by the face, and drove their heads directly into the street.

Boom! A single thunderous crash echoed as the stone beneath cracked in a spiderweb of destruction, leaving two deep craters that spread to the nearby storefronts.

But Mira's face showed no satisfaction. Something was off.

Sol slipped underground like a worm, disappearing into the stone.

Juvia's body liquefied into a stream of water, flowing away before reforming a safe distance back, completely unscathed.

Sol resurfaced next to her, his monocle shattered on the ground beside Juvia's crushed umbrella.

Mira narrowed her eyes and licked her lips. Her voice dropped into a low, dangerous register, laced with casual arrogance. "So you're not just fodder after all."

"No, no, no\~" Sol tried to maintain his awkward grin. "We're members of the Element 4, after all."

Then his tone turned theatrical. "Ah, so it really is the infamous Demon Mirajane and the Fairy Strategist himself. Our intel said you two were off on a honeymoon."

"Wait, what?!" Lucy's jaw dropped. "So what Happy said about Miss Mira and Mr. Rhodes secretly getting married was true?!"

Rhodes sighed heavily. "You really are something else..."

She was nearly drowned moments ago, and now she was gossiping about marriage?

And this wasn't the first time Happy had filled her head with this nonsense.

"But everyone in the guild said the two of you took a mission just to go on a honeymoon together!" Lucy insisted, cheeks flushed.

"We'll talk about that later. For now—" Rhodes clapped his hands. "I summon: Brambleback! Blue Sentinel!"

He figured Lucy must've heard the usual exaggerated gossip after he and Mira left for that mission. Phantom Lord must've caught wind of it, too.

But now wasn't the time to entertain her distractions. How could this girl get sidetracked with gossip in the middle of a fight?

...

Bonus