Chapter 90
Throughout the entire month of July, a dark cloud hung over Fairy Tail.
The usual fights and noisy arguments still broke out from time to time, but they died down almost as quickly as they began.
The amount of alcohol being consumed soared, everyone left for jobs in a hurry, and the atmosphere throughout the guild remained oppressively gloomy.
The reason was simple.
The girls in the guild hadn’t smiled properly in a long time.
And the reason they had lost their smiles was equally obvious...
The little brat who normally drifted cheerfully around the guild every day was gone!
When Mira returned with Elfman and explained what had happened to Makarov, the guild immediately descended into chaos.
Once, even the Guild Master admitted that he couldn’t locate Marshall and officially declared him "missing,".
Then.... Cana exploded.
She beat Mira viciously.
It wasn’t a fight since Mira never struck back even once.
If Erza hadn’t returned in time to pull them apart, the situation would have ended far worse.
From that day onward, the entire guild changed.
Cana never spoke another word to Mira.
She began drinking constantly, emptying entire barrels at a time.
Whenever she felt herself getting close to passing out, she would stumble over to Marshall’s home and continue drinking there, spending nearly every night unconscious in his bedroom.
Erza became quiet and withdrawn.
Every day, she was either away completing a job or preparing to leave for another one.
She refused to let herself stop for even a moment.
Juvia stopped coming to the guild altogether, but rain fell over the girls’ dormitory every single day without pause.
Levy still hid in her usual corner with a book, though she often held it upside down without noticing.
Mira changed the most.
She stopped wearing the rebellious outfits she had once loved.
She no longer tied up her hair, instead allowing it to hang loose and unkempt around her pale face.
She completed several jobs, but her attacks became so ruthless that she regularly lost all sense of restraint.
The cold expression she wore while handing in each completed request was enough to frighten the clients into tears.
Her title, The Demon, was in serious danger of becoming The Devil.
Whenever she wasn’t away on a job, Mira changed into a server’s uniform and took over Kinana’s work.
Unfortunately, her ghostly complexion and chillingly indifferent service frightened away almost as many customers as she served.
It wasn’t only the girls closest to Marshall who were suffering.
Everyone in the guild felt his absence.
Even Laxus’s temper had mellowed considerably.
Elfman challenged Natsu and Gray to fights every day.
No matter how badly they beat him, he would shout, "A real man never gives up!" before dragging himself back to his feet and continuing.
"Real man" had practically become his new catchphrase.
Natsu and Gray, meanwhile, had lost their enthusiasm for fighting anyone else.
Elfman exhausted them so thoroughly that they barely had the strength to move once they returned to the guild.
Although Loki repeatedly assured everyone that Marshall was almost certainly still alive, no one could bring themselves to feel relieved.
The once cheerful guild had become miserable and lifeless.
Even Macao and Wakaba, the guild’s two shameless drinking companions, found that their alcohol no longer tasted the same.
"That rotten brat had better come back soon," Macao muttered. "At this rate, the whole damn guild is going to fall apart."
"Don’t say that. Even Master hasn’t properly smiled in ages."
Wakaba sighed.
"Now that I think about it, Marshall might’ve had a strange personality, a poisonous mouth, an annoyingly clever brain, and an unfairly handsome face... but he really was a good kid."
"I... actually miss him, Damn it!"
"...I didn’t hear any sadness in that. Only jealousy."
In another corner of the guild, little Wendy lay across a table with Ruby and Carla gathered in her arms.
"Ruby, Carla... Marshall-nii isn’t here, and the guild suddenly feels so quiet."
"Boss will come back soon, nya! Ruby believes in Boss, nya!"
"..."
Carla opened her mouth, then closed it again.
When she learned that Marshall seemed to have been transported into another world, she immediately suspected that he had gone to Edolas.
If her instincts were correct, then Marshall might never return.
After all, he was also a Dragon Slayer.
Carla had always known that she came from Edolas.
She had arrived in Earth Land carrying a supposed mission to eliminate the Dragon Slayers.
Once she joined Fairy Tail and discovered that two other Dragon Slayers also had cats at their sides, she became even more convinced that her "mission" was real.
She had never intended to complete it.
Carla planned to spend the rest of her life peacefully beside Wendy, pretending that she was simply too weak to accomplish anything.
But if a Dragon Slayer had been sent directly into Edolas, there might be nothing she could do.
Marshall would probably be captured and drained of his magic power.
He was incredibly strong, but magic couldn’t be used normally in Edolas. He might not even have been able to resist...
Should she tell Wendy?
But what good would that accomplish?
And how could Carla explain how she knew all of this?
What if Wendy discovered that Carla had originally remained beside her because of a mission to kill Dragon Slayers?
Would Wendy still accept her?
Carla sank deeper into indecision.
...
At that very moment, high above Fairy Tail, someone hovered in the freezing wind with cold sweat running down his back.
Marshall had already returned to Earth Land some time ago.
Unfortunately, he was now suffering from a sudden case of fear upon reaching home and didn’t quite dare enter the guild.
Fortunately, he had possessed enough foresight to observe the building first with Light Telescope Magic.
He had even used Past-Image Magic to investigate what had happened during his month-long absence.
That was how he discovered the terrifying pressure radiating from inside the guild.
Marshall was genuinely frightened.
Had his disappearance for only one month really affected everyone this badly?
Had he carelessly raised the girls’ affection for him far too high?
Marshall was seriously worried that if he suddenly appeared in the guildhall, the excited girls would crush him into a tiny pancake.
’Right. One at a time would be safer.’
After using Telepathy Magic to quietly inform Makarov that he had returned safely, Marshall decided to find Mira first and explain everything.
...
At that moment, Mira was alone in the kitchen, mechanically organizing the utensils.
Housework had long since become second nature to her, allowing her to complete everything without thinking.
Her eyes remained distant, as though her mind were somewhere far away.
The instant Marshall appeared behind her, however, Mira sensed the familiar magic power.
She turn around.
The dull grayness in her eyes vanished, replaced by a brilliant light that seemed to bring her entire body back to life.
"Mar—!"
"Shh!"
Marshall covered her mouth before she could shout and anxiously shrank back.
"Mira, don’t yell! Please don’t yell!"
"No one else knows I’m back yet, and I don’t want to cause too much commotion."
"You know I can’t handle enormous scenes like that."
"Mmph...!"
Mira threw both arms around him and pulled him against her with so much force that it felt as though she wanted to fuse him into her body.
Feeling the flood of emotion she had suppressed for an entire month, Marshall sighed helplessly.
’Just as I expected...’
In the next moment, he teleported both of them to his castle.
"Go ahead and cry. No one else is here."
"Marshall! Marshall!"
Mira finally broke down.
"Waaah! You finally came back!"
"I’m sorry! I thought you—"
Her voice dissolved into sobs.
"I’m sorry... I’m so sorry..."
"Honestly, what are you apologizing for?"
Marshall patted her back.
"You didn’t do anything wrong."
He realized that Mira had hugged him so tightly that both of his feet were dangling above the floor.
He still wasn’t tall enough.
"All right, stop crying."
Marshall softened his voice.
"Mira? Come on, be good. Don’t cry."
"I’m standing right here, aren’t I?"
"I told you I’d return soon. Why did you worry yourself sick?"
"See? When it comes down to it, you still don’t trust me."
"I do trust you!"
Mira became so emotional that a tiny bubble appeared beneath her nose.
The moment she noticed it, her face flushed with embarrassment, and she immediately released him.
The interruption finally snapped Mira out of the daze she had lived in for the past several days.
She suddenly remembered that she still had a younger sister.
"Marshall! Where’s Lisanna?"
Her expression changed sharply.
"Weren’t the two of you together?"
"That’s... difficult to explain quickly."
Marshall had no intention of dragging out the suspense.
"You should watch this first."
He took out the magical communication terminal and began playing Lisanna’s Humiliating Confession Video!
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