"Damn it!! Take my strongest ultimate technique—Wind Demon Slash!!"
"Hmph!! Too weak!"
Boom!!
A black light flashed and vanished, directly cleaving through the Wind Demon Slash and severely injuring the Swordsman who unleashed the ultimate technique.
"The Swordsmen of this world are truly tragic! Without magic power, they can't do anything. S-Class Magic Swordsman? What a misnomer!"
With the black blade on his back, Phoenix kicked the half-dead Swordsman flying. Behind Phoenix, a group of men with bruised faces and injuries all over their bodies were forcibly piled into a mountain by him.
"Don't compare him to you, given his pure ability, he's already very impressive."
Mavis, seemingly oblivious to the groaning humans behind Phoenix, denied his statement while munching on a strawberry cake. It wasn't that Mavis was particularly cold-blooded; it depended on who the targets were. If those behind him were all Dark Guilds, then severe injuries would be considered light. Or, if Mavis hadn't been present, whether these people would still be alive would be a big question mark.
"Let's go, the people here are really too weak. Where's the next place?"
"North, about forty-seven kilometers away. That's the lair of the Dark Guild, Purple Bat."
"Ha~ I hope that place won't disappoint me!"
"Let's hope so."
Mavis nodded noncommittally.
The two left hand in hand. Behind the group of groaning men lying on the ground, a sign engraved with "Black Vulture" hung forlornly on a corner of a house that appeared to have been forcefully cleaved in two by a sharp blade.
If anyone from the Magic World saw it, they would be incredibly surprised, because "Black Vulture" was a top-tier power among Dark Guilds, with two S-Class Mages and over a dozen A-Class Mages in the entire guild. Unexpectedly, they were completely wiped out this time.
However, it couldn't really be called bad luck that they encountered Phoenix.
From the moment Phoenix left the port three months ago, he had been traveling around to test his swordsmanship.
Yet, the legendary swordsmen, no matter how formidable they were rumored to be, couldn't last a single move against him. Their techniques were incredibly flashy, but their effectiveness was underwhelming. To put it bluntly, they were all show and no substance.
It was at this time that Phoenix truly realized that in this world, renowned for magic, there were almost no practitioners who relied solely on physical training for swordsmanship. Magic was the fundamental proof of strength; without magic power, everything was an illusion.
Since he couldn't find suitable opponents for pure swordsmanship, Phoenix could only settle for Mages as opponents. Originally, Phoenix would challenge any Mage he encountered, regardless of their guild affiliation. However, due to Mavis's intervention, Phoenix had to abandon this tempting idea. Of course, to be more direct, if Mavis hadn't been by his side, Phoenix would surely have become the target of the entire world.
Wandering around, Mavis, relying on her extraordinary intelligence, managed to gather almost all the information about the surrounding Dark Guilds within just three days. Especially those remote, forbidden areas became Phoenix's targets.
Consequently, all Dark Guilds marked by Mavis were in for a disaster. With Phoenix, a human weapon of mass destruction, present, any guild that became his training target was systematically crippled. If Mavis hadn't strictly warned him not to casually kill unless absolutely necessary, this entire region would likely have been drenched in blood.
And it was because of this—
Who was the most famous recently, and whose news was the most exciting?
Then, it was none other than Phoenix, the Phoenix.
Thanks to Mavis's promotion and planning, Phoenix had eliminated two hundred and thirty-seven Dark Guilds in these short three months. The "Black Vulture" he just dealt with was the two hundred and thirty-eighth. He eliminated at least two Dark Guilds almost every day, making it difficult for Phoenix not to become famous.
Because Phoenix always emphasized that he was the "World's Greatest Swordsman," although it was unknown how much exaggeration there was, purely in terms of swordsmanship, countless people had been defeated by him. In the sword competitions he participated in, he easily won first place. Therefore, until someone could defeat him with swordsmanship, no one truly had the right to say his title was undeserved.
However, compared to "World's Greatest Swordsman," the title "Phoenix" seemed to be more deeply ingrained in people's hearts.
This was both because of Phoenix's true name and because Phoenix's fire magic was also used with consummate skill.
Many even speculated that this nine-year-old blond boy already possessed the strength of a Ten Wizard Saints. Because of this, even the Magic Council extended an olive branch to him. Unfortunately, when faced with recruitment, Phoenix preferred to speak with his fists. If they couldn't even defeat him, how could they expect him to join them? After the Magic Council, Light Guilds, Dark Guilds, and even the Royal Army were all defeated by Phoenix with his fists and black blade, no one dared to recruit him anymore. And the Mages who had the strength to compete with him each had their own reasons and pride not to attack the nine-year-old Phoenix, which led to Phoenix's path being avoided by Light Guilds, Dark Guilds, and even the army.
Light Guilds both loved and hated Phoenix. They loved him because he acted openly and honorably, never easily harming ordinary people, and rarely bullied the weak. At least in human society, he always showed a very pleasant, bright smile to ordinary people. Especially after he eliminated one Dark Guild after another, they could not possibly reject him. However, they hated him because this kid's actions were simply too crude! Regardless of whether it was right or wrong, he always fought first and talked later. Especially when your strength caught his attention, sorry, you had to fight him first before continuing the conversation.
Dark Guilds avoided Phoenix like the plague, and I think everyone knows why. Actually, Phoenix's worldview didn't easily judge a person's right or wrong based on whether their guild was dark or not. Phoenix, who preferred to act on his own likes and dislikes, was actually more suited for Dark Guilds, but Mavis's presence kept him from going astray.
As for the army... that's a long story. Although many unpleasant things happened at first, and Phoenix even made it onto the army's wanted list for a time, as Phoenix's frequency of battling Dark Guilds increased, the army's perception of Phoenix changed repeatedly. At first, they thought Phoenix was subtly trying to apologize, but when Phoenix completely wrecked a town and even the army itself to battle a Dark Guild disguised within the town, they realized how naive and simple their previous thoughts had been. Originally, Phoenix battling Dark Guilds primarily benefited the country. However, his indiscriminate destruction gave the army a constant headache. If you tried to stop him, he was fighting Dark Guilds. If you didn't stop him, how could you bear to watch the tragic state of the town? In the end, they wisely chose to avoid him.
Phoenix's name was truly known by everyone in the Fiore Kingdom, especially with the convenience of magic communication. Every time Phoenix eliminated a Dark Guild, the news would spread rapidly.
However, behind the halo of fame that others could hardly achieve, Phoenix's personal life had a rather criticized aspect... In Magnolia Town, Fiore Kingdom, a famous guild that had existed for over a hundred years and created countless legends was located.
This was Fairy Tail.
However, the guild's interior, usually bustling and ten times more chaotic than a bar, was uncharacteristically quiet this time.
An old man with white hair and a very short stature stood sternly on the bar counter. Don't underestimate this short old man; he was one of the Ten Wizard Saints and the current Guild Master of Fairy Tail—Makarov Dreyar.
Normally, he always wore a benevolent expression while watching the next generation, or an angry but very happy expression while scolding his children. But now, his expression was terrifying, so much so that the Fairy Tail members, who usually loved excitement and brawled freely in the guild, all fell silent, truly fearing that the Guild Master would suddenly erupt in anger and give them a severe beating.