Chapter 483: Impressive? Of Course It Is; He Paid for It With His Life
"I see. You'll stay right here for now. Once I've spoken with Noah and confirmed everything you've said, we can talk properly," Laxus instructed, his tone still highly guarded.
"Understood. I will wait here until you are ready," Jellal nodded. He didn't expect Laxus to instantly believe his wild claims—if Laxus had, he would be a terrible commander. Dropping his guard around an enemy general based on a single conversation would be incredibly irresponsible to his guildmates.
Jellal sat down in the dirt, crossing his legs. He made no further moves, fixing his gaze entirely on the apocalyptic duel raging between Noah and Precht in the distance.
"What was all that about?" Gray asked, walking over to Laxus. The rest of the Fairy Tail candidates also gathered around, looking thoroughly bewildered. The fact that the enemy forces had just been single-handedly wiped out by one of their own commanders was incredibly jarring.
"I need to ask Noah for the specifics, but for now... he isn't our enemy," Laxus answered simply.
"In that case, let's head back to the base camp and rest," Mirajane suggested, her sweet smile returning.
No one objected. The Grimoire Heart army was utterly decimated; the only enemy left standing was Precht. Since Noah was currently occupying him—and the two were engaged in a battle far beyond anyone else's capacity to intervene—there was nothing left for them to worry about.
The smartest tactical choice was to return to the rear, recover their stamina, and watch the fight from a safe distance.
The group made their way back to the base camp where Gildarts, Ur, and Makarov were stationed. Laxus walked directly up to Noah's Thought Projection, who was still furiously typing away on his holographic screens.
"What's the deal with that guy?" Laxus asked, jerking a thumb toward Jellal.
Noah's projection paused his typing and looked up. "Ah, Jellal. His situation is a bit complicated."
Noah quickly summarized Jellal's history: his enslavement at the Tower of Heaven, his possession by Ultear's manipulation, his eventual defeat, and how Noah had secretly broken the mind-control placed upon him years ago. He also explained Jellal's subsequent decision to infiltrate Dark Guilds to gather intel and dismantle them from the inside out to atone for his sins.
"Wait, so the guy who got hit by your 'purification' spell back then was actually him? He's incredibly lucky your attack managed to shatter the mental programming," Ultear remarked, recalling the incident from years ago.
"He really was lucky. I honestly wasn't 100% sure the spell would work at the time," Noah's projection chuckled.
"The person who manipulated him in the first place must have been Precht, right? If it was him, it makes sense why the programming was so deeply rooted," Erza reasoned, glaring fiercely at the distant Dark Guild Master.
"Yep. It was Precht. But don't worry, he doesn't have the capacity to threaten anyone like that anymore," Noah's projection smirked confidently.
Ultear and the others smiled, looking back at the chaotic, earth-shattering duel. The sheer ferocity with which Noah was fighting Precht was proof enough of his confidence.
"So what are we going to do with Jellal?" Laxus asked, glancing back at the blue-haired mage.
"Once we take down Precht, I'll hand Jellal—along with the rest of the Grimoire Heart prisoners—over to the Magic Council. Over the past few years, Jellal has gathered a massive amount of highly classified intel on the Balam Alliance and various other Dark Guilds. He'll hand all of that over to the Council.
"Given his genuine repentance, his invaluable work as an undercover operative, the massive intelligence payload he's providing, and my personal testimony regarding his prior mind control, his sentence will be significantly reduced," Noah's projection explained. He then glanced at Makarov.
"Grandpa always taught us to give young people a second chance. Jellal spent his entire life being manipulated as a puppet, committing horrific crimes he never truly wanted to commit. While he must face justice and serve time for his actions, it shouldn't be a life sentence. Once he serves his time, he can finally step back into the light and start his life anew."
"That sounds reasonable," Laxus nodded, completely satisfied with the plan. The others murmured in agreement; Noah's approach perfectly aligned with Fairy Tail's core philosophy of redemption.
"Alright, everyone, start dragging the unconscious Grimoire Heart grunts over to the containment zone. I'll need to seal their magic and bind them so they don't cause trouble when they wake up," Noah's projection instructed the group.
As the Fairy Tail mages fanned out to begin the cleanup operation, Noah's projection returned his attention to the possessed angel lying in the dirt.
He noticed the angel violently thrashing, its jaw working frantically as if desperately trying to speak. Curious, Noah waved a hand, dispelling the silencing rune. "Did you have something you wanted to say?"
The angel gasped for air the moment its voice was restored. Its face instantly contorted into a mask of grotesque, arrogant malice.
"What a damn shame! If I had just possessed Leo's body and killed Lucy, I would have become completely human again! No, wait... she looks exactly like Lady Layla. A true beauty. It would be much more entertaining to enslave her and use her as a plaything!"
The angel's eyes darted toward Lucy, sweeping up and down her body with a look of pure, unadulterated, sickening lust.
Lucy shuddered violently, taking several steps back in sheer revulsion, feeling physically ill from the gaze.
The rest of the Fairy Tail members froze, their expressions instantly twisting into pure, murderous rage.
Natsu practically growled, his fists igniting as he lunged forward to beat the angel to a pulp, but Mirajane swiftly stepped in front of him, holding him back.
"Don't worry. Noah won't let him get away with that," Mirajane said, her voice eerily calm and devoid of all emotion.
Seeing her unnerving, dead-eyed expression, Natsu shivered and instantly stopped struggling, suddenly feeling very cold.
"I thought you might have something useful to say. Turns out you're just delusional," Noah's projection shook his head, his gaze turning absolutely frigid.
"Do you really not realize it? After forcibly fusing with Capricorn for so many years, your soul has been almost completely eroded. In simpler terms: you have almost no lifespan left. The only reason you aren't currently dead is because you managed to hastily fuse with this weak angel construct."
"N-No! I don't believe you! You're lying to me!" Zoldeo shrieked, his arrogant facade instantly crumbling into panic.
But seeing Noah's cold, apathetic expression remain entirely unchanged, genuine terror began to set in.
"N-No! I don't want to die! Please, save me—"
Before Zoldeo could finish begging, Noah swiped a finger through the air, instantly reapplying the silencing rune. The angel's mouth continued to flap frantically, but no sound emerged.
"Is what you said true? Is his lifespan really that depleted?" Ultear asked, stepping closer. The others also gathered around to listen.
"Yes. He and Capricorn spent years inhabiting the exact same physical body. Because Zoldeo was not the original owner of that body, the inherent dissonance between his soul and the vessel caused a constant, severe friction. Simply operating the body caused an accelerated degradation of his soul," Noah explained.
He paused, looking over at Capricorn and Loke before continuing. "More importantly, Capricorn is a Celestial Spirit. His physical composition is attuned strictly to the Celestial Spirit World, not the Human World. As you all know, if a Celestial Spirit remains in the Human World for too long—even with a steady supply of magic power—their life force is rapidly drained. We saw exactly what happened to Loke."
"That's right. Loke stayed in the Human World for three years. If we hadn't resolved his situation right at the end, he would have faded away completely. To think Zoldeo managed to survive in the Human World for seventeen years using Capricorn's body... that's actually incredible," Sorano mused, looking slightly impressed.
"Impressive? Of course it's impressive. He literally paid for it with his life," Noah sneered coldly.
"Loke barely managed to survive for three years by constantly burning his own life force. And keep in mind, Loke is the leader of the Zodiacs; his raw power and vitality are at the absolute pinnacle of Celestial Spirits. So how could a normal human like Zoldeo possibly sustain a Celestial Spirit's body in the Human World for seventeen years without it fading away?"
"Are you saying...?" Erza's eyes widened in realization. Noah nodded.
"It's simple. Zoldeo used his own human soul as fuel to sustain the Spirit's body and prevent it from returning to the Celestial Spirit World. The rapid lifespan degradation that Capricorn should have suffered for remaining in the Human World was entirely shifted onto Zoldeo's soul.
"Why didn't Capricorn suffer? Because Zoldeo forcibly took dominant control of the vessel; therefore, the world targeted the dominant soul first. Furthermore, due to prolonged exposure to Capricorn's vessel, Zoldeo's human soul began mutating, taking on Celestial Spirit traits. While this gave him some unique abilities, it only accelerated his soul's degradation because human souls are fundamentally incompatible with the laws of the Celestial Spirit World."
Noah's projection stared down at the frantically thrashing angel, a mocking, pitying smile on his face.
"This is exactly why taboos are taboos. Breaking them always demands an unimaginably horrific price. Your price was the accelerated incineration of your own soul. And you made it exponentially worse by choosing to fuse with a Celestial Spirit.
"I just finished analyzing your spiritual matrix. Your soul is incredibly fragile, practically hollow. You literally have mere minutes left to live."
Hearing this absolute death sentence, the angel thrashed violently on the ground, its jaw working frantically as its eyes locked onto Noah, silently screaming and pleading for salvation.
"Heh. You brought this upon yourself. I don't have the sympathy, the time, or the energy to save a disgusting piece of human trash like you," Noah rejected the silent plea without a second thought.
Suddenly, an idea struck him. Noah's projection gathered magic in his palm and firmly slapped the angel's chest.
A shadowy, ethereal mass was violently ejected from the angel's body, tumbling onto the dirt beside it. The shadow rapidly solidified, revealing a scrawny, disheveled, and incredibly creepy-looking middle-aged man.
"Is that... the real Zoldeo?" Sorano asked, stepping back in disgust.
"Yep. That's him," Noah nodded. The rest of the group stared at the grotesque man with deep revulsion.
Having finally regained his true physical form, Zoldeo didn't even notice the hostile crowd surrounding him. He stared at his hands in absolute, euphoric joy.
"YES! YES! I finally have my own body back! I'm human again!"
But his joy lasted exactly three seconds.
Right before his eyes, his fingertips began to turn translucent, slowly dissolving into sparkling motes of light.
Zoldeo's eyes widened in sheer, unadulterated terror as Noah's grim diagnosis flooded his mind. He whipped his head around, scrambling frantically through the dirt toward Noah's projection.
"SAVE ME! PLEASE! I DON'T WANT TO DISAPPEAR!"
He didn't even make it two steps before both of his arms completely vanished into light. He collapsed face-first into the dirt, writhing and worming his way desperately toward Noah like a dying slug.
"SAVE ME! I DON'T WANT TO DIE! I DON'T WANT TO DIE! UWAAAAAHHHH!"
His terrified, bloodcurdling screams echoed across the camp as his body dissolved faster and faster. His legs, his torso, his neck—piece by piece, he rapidly vanished into thin air until finally, his screaming head dissolved into nothingness.
Even after he was completely gone, his agonizing, desperate screams seemed to linger in the air, sending a collective chill down the spines of everyone watching. Wendy, Yukino, and Meredy huddled tightly together, thoroughly terrified by the gruesome display.
"And this is exactly why you should never attempt to break magical taboos. Those rules exist for a reason—they are usually warnings written in the blood of the mages who came before you. If you break a taboo, this is the price you pay. None of you want to end up like him, right?" Noah said seriously, looking around the group.
Everyone shook their heads so fast they nearly gave themselves whiplash. Absolutely no one wanted to slowly dissolve into nothingness while screaming for their lives.
"What did you just do...?" Sorano asked, rubbing Yukino's back to comfort her as she stared at the empty patch of dirt where Zoldeo had just vanished.
"I used an advanced Separation Enchantment to forcefully extract his soul from your angel summon. He was permanently fused with your magic; if left alone for too long, his corrupted soul might have negatively influenced your summoning magic. Since I had already gathered all the necessary data from him, there was no reason to keep him around. Because his soul was already completely out of fuel, the moment he was separated from a sustaining vessel, he naturally vanished," Noah explained calmly.
"Separation Enchantment? That's an incredibly high-tier, lost art of enchanting! You already know how to use that, Brother Noah?!" Wendy gasped, her fear instantly replaced by sheer awe.
"Mhm. I've got a decent grasp on it. If you want to learn it, I can teach you later," Noah promised with a smile.
Clap! Clap!
"Alright! Show's over! Everyone, get back to moving the Grimoire Heart grunts to the containment zone!" Erza clapped her hands loudly, snapping everyone out of their stupor.
Shaken out of their morbid reflections, the Fairy Tail mages quickly got back to work. However, the cheerful, victorious atmosphere from earlier was significantly dampened. Many of them worked in deep, solemn thought. Witnessing the horrific, absolute consequences of breaking a magical taboo was a profound wake-up call, forcing many of them to seriously reflect on their own paths and how they wielded their magic.
Sorano and the older girls stayed behind to comfort Wendy, Yukino, and Meredy, while Noah's Thought Projection returned to processing his massive influx of data. Information regarding the catastrophic backlash of a broken taboo was incredibly rare and highly valuable for his research. After all, very few people managed to survive breaking a taboo long enough for someone like Noah to study them.
SWISH! SWISH! SWISH!
KABOOM! KABOOM! KABOOM!
Back on the main battlefield, golden and dark-purple magic circles continuously flared into existence, overlapping, colliding, and detonating in a relentless, blinding cascade.
A staggering variety of magics—spanning countless elements, properties, and effects—were being launched back and forth at impossible speeds. Spells were intercepted mid-air, resulting in massive, catastrophic explosions that continuously ripped the terrain to shreds.
Thick clouds of smoke and pulverized rock billowed outward, only to be instantly dispersed by the hurricane-force shockwaves generated by the next collision. The sky flashed with vibrant, kaleidoscopic colors as the two titans waged their apocalyptic war, the deafening roar of explosions drowning out all other sounds.
Both Noah and Precht were entirely focused, locked in a hyper-lethal, high-speed magical shootout.
Spells that would take an average mage minutes to chant and prepare were being cast instantaneously by the two monsters. From incredibly complex, obscure ancient magics to highly destructive modern spells, the sheer variety of their arsenals was staggering.
The primary difference in their fighting styles was the nature of their spells. Precht frequently utilized obscure, vicious, and lethal Dark Magics, prioritizing maximum destruction and cruelty. Noah, on the other hand, stuck to 'standard' magics—though he often employed spells so complex and difficult to master that they were practically lost to the modern era.
However, his primary weapon of choice remained his absolute mastery over Light Magic. Given that Light Magic possessed a massive elemental advantage against Dark Magic, it was the perfect tool for dismantling Precht's arsenal.
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