— — — — — —
After everything was taken care of, Kazuma hopped back on the train heading for Hargeon Town—his next stop before reaching Galuna Island.
"Why is she coming with us?!"
Cana stared at Juvia, who was sitting right beside Kazuma with heart-shaped eyes practically glowing in her pupils. She couldn't wrap her head around it at all.
Just a little while ago, Kazuma almost killed her.
And now she's acting like they're a couple? What kind of sick logic is that?
Or does this woman have some weird kink?!
"Do you think I know why?" Kazuma said helplessly.
"Juvia knows."
Juvia clasped her hands and spoke with dreamy sincerity. "Because Kazuma-Sama is Juvia's sun! Ever since meeting him, Juvia's sky has finally cleared."
Juvia's personality was honestly like a child's—when she hated someone, she really hated them, but once she liked someone, it was full-on devotion.
Completely forgetting that they'd been trying to kill each other just moments ago, she now clung to Kazuma's arm and giggled affectionately.
"That's probably just because my magic doll brings good weather," Kazuma tried to explain.
"No, Juvia doesn't mean the doll," Juvia said, shaking her head. "Juvia means you, Kazuma-Sama."
She wasn't talking about clouds in the real sky, but the ones in her heart. Ever since meeting him, the gloom inside her had started to lift. All those years of heaviness and darkness had vanished the moment she saw the sun—and him—after that magic cannon blast.
"You're not from our guild," Cana cut in. "Actually, our guilds are enemies. You tagging along isn't exactly appropriate."
"That's fine. I'll just quit Phantom Lord and join Fairy Tail instead. As long as I'm with Kazuma-Sama, I'll be happy."
Juvia never had any real attachment to Phantom Lord anyway. It wasn't like Fairy Tail, where the members were a family. Phantom Lord was just… a workplace. Lose it, find another. No real emotion, no sense of belonging.
"Kazuma…" Cana looked at him, exasperated. Juvia was hopeless—completely fixated.
"Don't look at me," Kazuma said with a shrug. "She's already made up her mind. If she wants to come, let her. One extra or two makes no difference to me."
To him, a burden was a burden. One or two—same headache either way.
Cana sighed. She was starting to get a bad feeling about how this was all going to end.
...
Hargeon Town—one of the biggest ports in the Kingdom of Fiore, and also the place where Kazuma had met Lucy.
If they wanted to reach Galuna Island, this was where they'd have to set sail.
"Any boats heading to Galuna Island?" Kazuma asked a nearby boatman.
"Galuna Island? No way! That place's cursed. You go there, you don't come back."
The man refused without hesitation.
"I'll pay ten times the normal fare. Still not going?" Kazuma asked again.
"Not a chance. Sir, I'm not trying to rip you off, but even if you offered me a fortune, I wouldn't go. Even the pirates avoid that island."
"That whole region is forbidden water. If you're dead-set on going, rent your own boat and sail it yourself."
The boatman's tone was firm. He wasn't bargaining—he was scared.
"Is there really no one around here with balls? You don't even have to land us there, just drop us nearby."
Kazuma frowned. He'd been asking around for hours but couldn't find a single soul brave enough. He even thought about looking for that demon boatman, but the guy was nowhere to be found—probably out fishing.
"No one," the boatman said flatly. "Not even the crazy ones would go near that place. Ask all you want, you'll get the same answer."
"Alright then. What about a map? I'll buy one."
Kazuma's magic vehicle could travel over water, but that wasn't the problem—the real issue was direction.
Out at sea, a small mistake could send you hundreds of miles off course. He didn't know the island's exact location, so he couldn't just head out blindly.
"A map? There aren't any. We navigate by experience out here. But I can roughly tell you the direction, if that helps."
"Even then, it's not reliable. On the open sea, being off by a few degrees can mean you end up who-knows-where."
"Tell me anyway. Landmarks, sea currents, anything noticeable along the way," Kazuma said.
"That I can do."
The man spent the next few minutes explaining what routes sailors avoided, when to adjust course, and what signs to look out for. It wasn't precise, but it was something. And since he'd never go there himself, he didn't mind sharing.
"Got it. Here, for your trouble." Kazuma handed him ten thousand J.
"Listen, kid," the boatman said, gripping the money. "That place is dangerous. Take my advice—don't go."
"I know it's dangerous," Kazuma replied casually. "That's exactly why I have to go."
He left the dock and found Cana and Juvia waiting.
"No boatmen are willing to take us to Galuna Island, but I did get a rough idea of the direction. If all goes well, we can reach it. I'll drive us there."
From his Treasury, he pulled out a magic motorcycle. The moment it touched the water, it transformed into a sleek magic water-rider.
"The fishermen here won't even approach that island?" Cana asked, looking uneasy. "Sounds like this mission's way more dangerous than I thought."
"No matter how dangerous," Juvia said softly, pressing a hand over her heart, "if Kazuma-Sama is going, Juvia will follow without hesitation."
She climbed on behind Kazuma and wrapped her arms around his waist, beaming.
"Juvia, can you take this seriously?" Cana snapped. "We're heading into a deadly mission, not a date!"
Watching Juvia cling to Kazuma like that, Cana felt her stomach sink. This team was doomed. Would she even make it back alive?
"Relax," Kazuma said calmly. "If something happens, I'll handle it. And just because nobody's gone there doesn't mean it's some nightmare zone. The real reason might just be bad sea conditions."
He glanced back. "Cana, sit tight. We're moving."
"Oh, okay."
Cana climbed on, hesitated about where to hold, then decided gripping the rear of the seat was safer. Juvia was made of water, after all.
The water-rider roared to life, cutting across the waves.
"By the way," Cana asked after a while, staring at the endless blue, "what kind of danger are we talking about here?"
"Nothing major," Kazuma said. "Just shark swarms. As long as you don't have open wounds, they won't bother you."
"Open wounds…?" Cana looked down at her arm, where a small scratch from earlier hadn't fully closed. "Does a little cut from a branch count?"
"Not really. You're not in the water, so it shouldn't attract much. Just don't let any blood drip in. Sharks can smell even a drop from miles away."
"..."
"Um… Juvia might've done something bad," Juvia said weakly.
They all looked down. The hem of her skirt was soaked, faintly stained red. It was blood from Kazuma's earlier cannon attack.
"Uh… that's not a big deal, right?" Cana asked with a stiff smile.
Kazuma sighed. "It's fine. Just means we'll be surrounded by sharks. And they're fast, too."
A few minutes later...
The fins began to circle. Kazuma could already hear faint voices carried through the water.
"Shark1: Dinner time?"
"Shark2: This prey's moving fast."
"Shark3: I'm tired, can we skip this one?"
Kazuma listened carefully. Then it hit him—he could understand them. Must be that Beast skill he'd picked up earlier.
Not that it was helping much right now.
"Hey, sharks. Mind swimming somewhere else?" he tried.
Cana gawked. "Oh no. He's lost it. Kazuma's talking to sharks now! We're doomed!"
Of the three of them, their strongest fighter was apparently the first to go insane.
"Shark1: Huh? Did he just talk to me?"
"Shark2: You're imagining things. Food doesn't talk."
"Yes, I'm talking to you," Kazuma said, his tone sharpening. "I'm not food. You've got three seconds to clear off, or I'll kill every one of you."
"Shark2: Huh. Guess the food really can talk."
"Shark1: Creepy."
"Shark3: I wanna taste them."
"Shark2: Same, bro."
"Shark1: How about—"
BANG!BANG!BANG!
Magic energy surged behind Kazuma, forming a barrage of floating guns that all fired at once. The sea around them erupted in chaos, crimson waves rising as the sharks were shredded instantly.
Cana let out a strangled scream. "You—why did you suddenly start attacking them?!"
Just moments ago, he'd been talking to them. Now he'd blown them to bits. Was he serious? Wait… come to think of it, Erza was kind of unhinged too. Mira, Laxus, Mystogan… none of the S-Class mages were exactly normal.
Don't tell me… that's the secret to becoming an S-Class mage—completely losing your sanity!
Cana gulped. Maybe being ordinary wasn't such a bad thing after all.
"Kazuma-Sama is so cool," Juvia sighed dreamily, eyes sparkling like stars.
Love really was blind.
"Cana," Kazuma said, his voice calm again, "this is the first thing you need to understand about S-Class missions. They're not like normal jobs where you have a clear goal—find something, kill a monster, capture a bandit. Those have set methods."
"But in S-Class missions, the difficulty's way higher. Things will go wrong—constantly. You have to be ready to adapt to whatever happens."
He throttled up the engine, sending the water-bike racing forward, away from the blood-soaked sea. Any slower, and more sharks would be on them in seconds.
"Adapt to the situation."
Cana watched him and began to rethink what she'd seen earlier. Maybe Kazuma's actions hadn't been reckless after all. Maybe that whole shark massacre had actually been calculated.
So she hadn't understood because she wasn't experienced enough yet? If she learned more, would all this start to make sense?
...
Their trip didn't get any easier after that. They ran into pirates, giant waves, whirlpools—basically every nightmare the ocean could throw at them.
But Kazuma handled everything with ease, and before long they reached the island safely.
"Just getting here was this dangerous," Cana muttered. "What kind of hell awaits us on the island itself?"
"No wonder they call it the Cursed Island."
Her nerves were shot. Cards already in hand, she was ready to fight at a moment's notice.
"Cana probably thinks this place is terrifying," Kazuma thought, amused. "But the dangerous part's already over."
He shook his head and led them to a small settlement on the island. After proving who they were and showing their mission order, the locals finally relaxed enough to talk. Once they'd finished negotiating, the job officially began.
"So where do we start?" Cana asked, already setting up her cards for divination. She'd been a tag-along most of the journey—finally, her time to shine.
"No need," Kazuma said. "I've already figured it out."
"First, these people didn't turn into demons—they were demons all along. They just had their memories scrambled."
"Second, the cause of that confusion is that barrier of dark energy up in the sky. Break that, and the problem's solved."
He pulled out a magic cannon, dialed the output to ten percent, and fired. A blinding flash split the clouds, and the dark barrier shattered like glass. Ashy fragments rained down across the island.
Almost immediately, the "cursed" demons regained their senses. Realizing what they were, they thanked Kazuma profusely and paid the promised reward—along with the Celestial Spirit Key of Sagittarius.
"Huh?!" Cana's jaw dropped. "That's it? The S-Class mission's done? Just like that?!"
"This doesn't count as an S-Class mission! It was way too easy! That felt like a regular job!"
What she'd wanted was a high-stakes, heart-pounding, life-or-death adventure. Not… this. This felt like a sightseeing trip with extra steps.
"Juvia, don't you think it was too simple?" Cana asked.
Kazuma didn't bother to answer. Cana was clearly obsessed with the idea of S-Class missions—too stubborn to listen.
"Not simple at all," Juvia said softly. "If I'd gone alone, I never could've finished it."
She started counting on her fingers. "First, the sharks. Those weren't normal sharks—they were magical beasts. Stronger, faster, able to control water, and drawn to the smell of blood."
"Fighting them in the ocean, where our footing's terrible, is suicide. Even if you kill one, its blood attracts more. They'd overwhelm you eventually."
"Then there were the giant waves and whirlpools that could've crushed our ship in seconds. We could've died before even reaching land."
"And the demon issue might've looked easy to solve, but that's only because Kazuma-Sama saw the real cause right away. If someone else took the job, they'd waste days investigating the villagers, chasing false leads, and probably die before figuring it out."
"Even if they did find the dark barrier, they'd never reach it—let alone destroy it."
She looked at Kazuma with absolute devotion. "It only seemed simple because he's that strong."
Cana opened her mouth to argue but couldn't say a thing. Juvia was right… but still, it didn't sit right.
"I—I just can't accept going back like this!" she burst out finally.
Kazuma chuckled. "Fine then. You want to understand the gap between yourself and an S-Class mage? I'll show you. No magic—just our bodies."
He cracked his knuckles, eyes glinting.
.
.
.