"Happy New Year! Wishing you the absolute best in 2026! 🥂"
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Jenny's outfit shifted in an instant. A sleek diving suit wrapped tightly around her body; goggles and a snorkel snapped into place, and a pair of streamlined flippers extended from her feet.
The difference between her and Viya was obvious at a glance, Viya had put on diving equipment.
Jenny had become it.
The wetsuit clung like a second skin, each limb jointed with metallic seams that moved like articulated armor. She looked less like a diver and more like a biomechanical mermaid.
Viya froze, eyes wide.
Take Over Magic that absorbed machines? This was her first time seeing something so bizarre.
Before she could fully process it, Jenny twisted her hips, her flippers kicking powerfully, like a torpedo. She burst forward with the streamlined speed of a swordfish.
"She's, faster than me!"
Viya raised her arms, but the block came a beat too late.
Jenny's fist sank into her stomach.
"Bwah—!"
Viya lost her snorkel as bubbles escaped her lips. Even in the special water sphere, she choked, spinning backward helplessly.
"An opening!" Sherria swept her palm, releasing a spiraling gust of black wind that tore through the water toward Jenny's back.
Jenny twisted her body with mechanical precision, slipping aside, and the attack slammed squarely into Viya instead.
Viya had just regained her balance near the edge. The dark wind hit her chest like a hammer.
With a loud splash she was launched out of the lower part of the water sphere, tumbling onto the ground below.
"Oh my, contestant Viya's luck seems rather poor," Chapati announced.
"Contestant Sherria's spell missed Jenny but managed to eliminate her teammate instead!"
Yajima stroked his beard. "Mmm…She shouldn't have opened by targeting Jenny. Jenny Realight's Take Over specializes in countering simple mechanical structures."
Lahar made a show of nodding vigorously: "Thank you! Thank you very much!"
"Sherria, that wasn't very nice of you!" Jenny scolded, angling her body and flicking her flippers as she arced toward the God Slayer girl.
"This is a competition, Big Sister Jenny!" Sherria shot back, unfazed. Since her cousin dated Ren, she had known Jenny for a long time.
The two immediately clashed, their movements sending bursts of bubbles spiraling around them.
Meanwhile, on another side of the sphere, Jenni was locked in a duel with Mermaid Heel's Risley.
Her usual lollipop staff lost nearly all power underwater, so she hastily used her mediocre Transformation Magic to shift it into a large candy-cane staff. Unfortunately, she wasn't actually casting anything with it, she was swinging it like a club.
Still, the reach advantage kept her from being overwhelmed.
At the center of the sphere, Lucy, Juvia, and Minerva were locked in a tense, three-way standoff.
Minerva had claimed the dead center from the start, boldly, arrogantly, and without the slightest concern for becoming everyone's target.
It did, however, make it look like Lucy and Juvia were teaming up on her by default.
"Open, Gate of the Water Bearer! Aquarius!"
Lucy summoned the Spirit most suited to an aquatic battlefield. The blue-haired mermaid Spirit appeared in a swirl of bubbles, immediately scowling.
Lucy ducked behind her, clutching her keyring with one hand while preparing Gemini's key with the other.
Aquarius lifted her urn, snarling, "Move it, brat, I'm in a VERY bad mood today!"
Whooooosh!
Even underwater, her urn somehow poured out, or summoned, a massive swirling torrent. A colossal whirlpool formed instantly at the heart of the arena, dragging all currents toward it.
Contestants across the sphere were forced to abort their fights and swim inward with all their strength just to avoid being spun out of bounds.
Only Lucy enjoyed special treatment, shielded by Aquarius's power.
"A Celestial Spirit!" Chapati shouted, standing up so fast his headset almost fell off. "It's Aquarius, one of the Zodiac! Such a magnificent mermaid, such devastating force! Now then, how will contestant Minerva respond, wait! Contestant Juvia?! What's happening?!"
"Ah—!"
As Juvia surrendered ground to the violent currents, Minerva chuckled, soft, amused, intimidating.
She gracefully placed one hand on her hip. With the other, she lifted her palm and leveled it squarely at Juvia.
Juvia raised her guard, bracing for Minerva's attack, but in the next heartbeat, the entire battlefield shifted.
Her vision blurred.
Her position… had been swapped with Minerva's.
Spatial Magic.
"Water Current Typhoon!"
Juvia reacted instantly.
A spiraling, towering water vortex erupted around her, nearly matching the violent torrent from Aquarius.
But Juvia didn't fire it head-on. She angled it just slightly.
The two massive whirlpools, one summoned by a Celestial Spirit, the other conjured by a Water Mage, collided at an offset angle.
For a moment, they clashed in a grinding stalemate.
Then~
Boom
The combined force reshaped the entire water sphere.
The whole arena turned into a colossal centrifuge, the currents whipping outward with terrifying intensity. Water spiraled like a monstrous storm, flushing everything toward the edges.
It was like being inside a giant washer on its fastest spin cycle.
And the contestants on the perimeter… suffered for it.
Risley, Jenni, and Sherria were flung out one after another, crashing to the ground outside the sphere.
Jenny, thanks to her mechanical Take Over, managed to keep her balance, barely.
But even she wobbled dangerously, her flipper tips accidentally poking beyond the water sphere boundary.
Eliminated by inches.
In contrast, Minerva simply extended her arms outward.
A shimmering, prismatic barrier of warped space blossomed around her.
The raging currents hit her, and slid off harmlessly.
She didn't even sway.
Juvia was the first to recover, dissolving into water and drifting upward like a rising mist.
Aquarius halted her spell as well, her eyes narrowing at Juvia.
That girl… could match her attacks?
Annoyance flickered across the Celestial Spirit's face.
And remembering Ophiuchus's humiliation, she briefly considered making a "temporary contract" with Rhodes next time she had free time.
Jenny finally felt the pressure of the currents ease.
Just as she exhaled in relief;
WHAM!
A half-human-sized ball of white pressure struck her squarely, sending her shooting out of the water sphere.
"Wahhh!" Jenny tumbled across the ground, flopping on her backside.
She slapped the floor in frustration.
"Only fourth place, and I finally got such a great form!"
Sherria landed beside her, gently helping her up.
"It's only because those few are way too unfair."
Above them, Minerva drifted upward, effortlessly elevating herself with Spatial Magic.
"Well, the riff-raff are out of the way," she said coolly, casting a regal gaze downward at Lucy and Juvia.
"Fairy Tail, yes? Those few days of sloth seem to have made you forget your place. But your luck ends now.
"As a display of Sabertooth's royal dignity, the two of you may face me together."
Chapati practically exploded with excitement.
"Ohhhh! Contestant Minerva has declared a one-versus-two! Such majesty! Such overwhelming confidence!"
The Sabertooth fans, who had been simmering since the start of the Games., erupted in thunderous cheers.
Lucy didn't respond.
But Aquarius did.
"Don't get cocky, little girl! This entire water field is my domain!"
She raised her urn.
A massive column of water surged out, like a reversed waterfall aiming upward, rushing straight toward Minerva.
"Juvia will not be underestimated either! Water Flow: Ascending Mist!"
...
Stones Plzz
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