Chapter 261: Training
"Hearing this, the Seven-Year Group felt a little more confident. Even after seven years, Ren and Gildarts were still top-tier powerhouses."
Max Alors, standing near the bar with a broom in hand, nodded slowly. "That's right... Even if the magic world has advanced, monsters are still monsters. Gildarts-san is a force of nature, and Ren-san..." He shuddered, remembering the pressure he felt just standing near the white-haired mage.
"And it's not just them," Warren Rocko added, tapping his temple as he used his telepathy to gauge the room's mood. "Laxus has always been overwhelmingly strong; though seven years behind in terms of time, he remained a force to be reckoned with. And Erza... she's still Titania."
Erza Scarlet stood by the entrance, her armor gleaming under the magical lights. She was slightly weaker relative to the current era's top mages compared to before, yet she remained formidable—far beyond what the Seven-Year Group could match in a direct confrontation.
"I'm all fired up——!!"
Natsu Dragneel roared, shooting a column of crimson flames from his mouth in sheer excitement. The heat washed over the guild, drying the damp wood instantly. "A festival! A fighting festival! I can't wait to beat up all those guys who looked down on us!"
Ren sat calmly at a table, swirling his drink. He looked at Romeo Conbolt, who was watching Natsu with admiration mixed with worry.
"Romeo-kun," Ren asked, his voice cutting through Natsu's shouting. "How long until this festival begins?"
Romeo looked up, his eyes bright. "Less than three months, Ren-nii!"
"Three months?" Ren smirked, placing his glass down with a sharp clink. "That's plenty of time!! Before then, everyone trains hard!! Fairy Tail will reclaim its throne as Fiore's strongest guild!!"
"Well said!!" Makarov shouted from the bar counter, raising a tankard.
"Yeah!! If we all work together!"
"Manly!!" Elfman struck a pose, his muscles bulging.
The Tenrou group was fired up, their spirits igniting like dry tinder. They were the main cast, the heroes of the story, and they knew nothing of defeat that couldn't be overcome with guts and friendship.
However, the mood among the ones who had stayed behind was different.
Happy hovered over to Carla, holding a fish. "Did you hear? It's a festival, Carla!! We can eat lots of yummy food!"
Carla folded her arms, her tail twitching with annoyance. "This guild celebrates like every day anyway! What's the difference?"
The Seven-Year Group—Jet, Droy, Max, Vijeeter—looked uneasy. They exchanged glances filled with hesitation.
"For real?" Vijeeter muttered, rubbing his arm. "The Grand Magic Games... do we really have a chance?"
"I think I'd better sit this one out..." Laki Olietta adjusted her glasses, looking down. "The other guilds... Sabertooth, Lamia Scale... they're terrifying now."
"The battles there aren't what you think..." Max whispered to Natsu. "It's brutal. It's not just sparring; it's public humiliation if you lose."
The trauma of seven years of oppression by Twilight Ogre and the mockery of the entire kingdom weighed heavily on them. They had forgotten what victory tasted like.
"Relax!" Ren said, standing up. His presence immediately silenced the murmurs. He walked over to the quest board, his cape fluttering slightly. "Whatever the event, I've got a way to handle it. Rules, power levels, secret weapons... I'll dismantle them all."
Ren didn't particularly care about the "strongest guild" title for his own ego, but he knew the plot. And more importantly, he knew that the Grand Magic Games meant S-Class threats, Dragons, and massive rewards from the System. He needed those quests.
Makarov, seeing the hesitation in his children's eyes, decided to drop the bombshell. He leaped up onto the bar counter, tears streaming down his face as he thought about the guild's empty treasury.
"Listen up, you brats!!" Makarov screamed, holding up a finger. "The prize money... is THIRTY MILLION JEWELS!!"
"THIRTY MILLION?!" The guild erupted.
"Target: thirty million... Target: Fiore's strongest!!" Makarov declared, pointing toward the capital city of Crocus in the distance. "Fairy Tail will compete in the Grand Magic Games—decided!!!"
"Aye sir!!"
Erza clenched her fist, her expression turning serious. "Now that we're in, we'd better train properly! We cannot drag the guild's name through the mud."
She looked at her hands. She was an S-Class Mage, but her current strength wasn't even close to Ren's anymore. The gap had widened. She needed to sharpen her blade.
"Right! I've got to give it my all too!" Lucy Heartfilia clapped her cheeks, trying to psych herself up. "I can't just rely on Aquarius all the time!"
"Looks like everyone's made up their minds."
Gray Fullbuster stripped off his shirt instinctively, a confident grin returning to his face. He glanced around; the Tenrou group blazed with fighting spirit. Once elite among elites, they couldn't accept being third-rate Mages now—they had to claw their way back to the top.
"I'm all fired up!!!"
Flames erupted from Natsu again, hotter this time. After witnessing Ren's devastating power against Hades and the sheer hopelessness of facing Acnologia, a seed of desperation had been planted in his heart. He couldn't stomach his own weakness—he had to grow stronger. To protect his family, he had to become a dragon that could kill dragons.
The next day, the guild scattered like seeds in the wind.
Laxus Dreyar took the Thunder God Tribe—Freed, Bickslow, and Evergreen—off to the mountains for their own specialized regimen. Laxus was too proud to train with the main group, and frankly, he didn't need a babysitter.
Meanwhile, Ren's group—consisting of Natsu, Gray, Erza, Lucy, Wendy, Juvia, and Levy—headed to the famous seaside resort town of Akane Beach for what Erza termed "Hellish Training."
"The sea——!!"
The moment their feet hit the sand, the tension evaporated.
In their swimsuits, they sprinted toward the glistening azure water. The sun was high and bright, a luxury they hadn't felt while frozen in time.
"Cannonball!!"
One after another, they splashed in like dumplings dropped into a boiling pot.
Splash! Splash!
"Ahhh! It feels so good!" Lucy stretched her arms, the water lapping against her skin. She wore a cute two-piece bikini that accentuated her curves, drawing the eyes of several onlookers.
"Gray-sama! Look at Juvia! Look at Juvia's new swimsuit!" Juvia Lockser swam circles around the ice mage, wearing a revealing dark blue swimsuit that left little to the imagination.
"Yeah, yeah, it's great," Gray muttered, trying to look anywhere but at her, his face slightly flushed.
"Hey, we're not here to play!"
"We're really not here to play..."
Carla and Happy scolded them from the shore. But the effect was ruined by the fact that Happy was wearing snorkeling goggles and Carla was floating in a pink swim ring with a cocktail in her paw.
Droy, sitting under a parasol, muttered, "You two look the most excited..."
Erza floated on her back, looking at the clouds. "We know. Right now we need to reset—enjoy the games, the food, the sleep. Our magic containers have been dormant for seven years. We need to wake them up gently before we break them."
Jet adjusted his sunglasses, trying to look stern. "You've completely forgotten the training part. You'd better get serious."
Droy nodded, munching on a grilled squid. "At least be strong enough to beat us! Don't underestimate the Shadow Gear!"
Jet and Droy were technically stronger than Max; in seven years, their magic capacity had grown significantly. They claimed their magic had surpassed even Erza's—proof that Max could push Natsu back despite having weaker inherent magic.
They were here partly to supervise, partly to spar, and mostly to lord their "seniority" over the returnees.
But no one listened; they frolicked wildly. The lethal pressure of Tenrou Island—the roar of the dragon, the smell of fear—still haunted them. This relaxation was overdue. It was therapy.
Then Jet and Droy saw Lucy and Erza bending over to pick up a beach ball, the water glistening on their skin. The two "instructors" grinned like lovesick fools, nosebleeds threatening to erupt.
"Whew... it's only day one, let's chill~~!" Jet gave a thumbs up.
"Yeah! Let's enjoy it~~!! Visual training is also training!" Droy agreed instantly.
Soon, the morning passed in a blur of laughter and splashing water. As the sun began its descent, turning the sky a brilliant orange, the group finally buckled down to train.
"Huh? Where's Ren?"
Levy McGarden looked around the beach. She held a stack of ancient scripts she wanted to translate, hoping to ask Ren for his insight, but the white-haired mage was nowhere to be seen.
Mirajane Strauss, who was wiping down a table at the beach house, smiled gently. "Ren? He left about an hour ago."
"Left? Where to?" Lucy asked, wringing out her hair.
"His magic is... special," Mira explained, her eyes darkening slightly with the memory of Ren's battles. "It's too destructive. If he trains here, he might accidentally sink the beach or hurt someone. So, he went to train alone on an uninhabited island about fifty kilometers south."
"Uh..."
Levy was speechless. "Sink the beach?"
"That sounds like him," Gray sighed.
Ren's destructive power was terrifying; everyone knew it. If he'd had enough magic reserves back then, the fight against Black Dragon Acnologia could have gone either way. He was in a league of his own, a monster among monsters.
Dozens of kilometers away, on a jagged, rocky deserted island surrounded by turbulent currents.
Ren stood atop the highest peak, the sea wind whipping his cloak around him. He was alone. No need to hold back. No need to worry about collateral damage.
"System," Ren commanded. "Open Character Selection."
A holographic menu appeared. He scrolled past his usual forms until he landed on a card that pulsed with an ominous purple light.
[Character Card: Nagato (Pain) - Six Paths of Pain]
[Sync Rate: 100% (Peak Condition)]
"Full Body Take Over – Nagato!"
Magic power surged from his core, dense and heavy. His body began to shift. His hair turned a vibrant crimson red. Metal piercings manifested on his nose and ears. But the most striking change was his eyes.
His pupils expanded, forming a pattern of concentric purple ripples spreading outward from the center.
The Rinnegan. The eyes of a God.
Though the Rinnegan wasn't originally Nagato's—it belonged to Madara Uchiha—the System copied Nagato at his Peak usage, granting everything he'd ever had in the anime, including the immense chakra (magic) reserves of the Uzumaki clan.
Ren blinked, the world looking different through these eyes. He could see the flow of magic in the air, the ley lines in the earth. He felt a profound sense of detachment, a god-complex naturally seeping into his mind.
"Which first?"
Ren looked down at the crashing waves below.
"Hmm... let's go with this! The classic."
Ren floated upward, defying gravity without any effort. He ascended until he was a speck in the sky above the island. He spread his arms wide, embracing the world.
He channeled magic into his eyes. The world seemed to pause.
"This world shall know pain."
Ren spoke the words calmly, channeling the persona.
"One bag of rice needs two floors..." Ren chuckled internally at the meme, but his voice remained cold and imperious. "Shinra Tensei!!! (Almighty Push)"
BOOM———!!!
There was no flash of light. Only a sudden, violent distortion of space.
A transparent, spherical wall of repulsive force erupted from Ren's body, expanding outward at supersonic speed.
The air screamed. The clouds were blown away in an instant.
When the force hit the ocean, the water didn't just splash; it was repressed. A massive bowl-shaped depression, over a kilometer wide, formed in the sea. The water was shoved back with such violence that it rose up into a towering wall—a tsunami—racing outward to the horizon.
The top of the rocky mountain he had been standing on was pulverized into dust, flattened by the sheer pressure of his existence.
Pain had wiped out Konoha Village with this move. Now, Ren was using it to carve the ocean.
"Incredible," Ren whispered, lowering his hand. The water began to rush back in with a roar, colliding in the center and sending a geyser of spray into the clouds.
"Now, the opposite. Banshō Ten'in! (Universal Pull)"
Back on the island, Ren landed on the newly flattened plateau. He raised a hand toward a massive boulder, easily the size of a house, resting on a nearby cliff.
An invisible magnetic grip seized the rock.
Whoosh!
The boulder flew toward him as if it weighed nothing. Just as it was about to crush him, Ren produced a black chakra rod from his palm and sliced it in half with a casual swing.
"Summoning Jutsu!"
Ren slammed his hand onto the ground. Black markings spread like a spiderweb.
POOF! POOF! POOF!!
Smoke exploded across the island.
From the smoke, three gargantuan figures emerged.
A giant multi-headed dog, its fur matted and savage, possessing the Rinnegan in its many eyes.
A giant drill-beaked bird, shrieking as it took to the sky.
A giant rhino, stomping the ground and causing tremors.
Their massive size rivaled that of the Dragonoids, and perhaps even approached the scale of Black Dragon Acnologia himself.
"So they can be summoned!"
Ren looked at the beasts. Each one bore the Rinnegan, and he could see what they saw. His vision was split into four, giving him 360-degree awareness of the entire battlefield.
"Attack!"
The beasts roared and began to tear the island apart, practicing coordination.
Next, he tested every Rinnegan ability. The Asura Path's missiles, the Preta Path's absorption, the Human Path's soul extraction (simulated on a wild boar).
After a while, Ren released the transformation. The red hair faded to white, and the purple eyes returned to normal. He collapsed onto the ground, breathing heavily. Sweat soaked his clothes.
"Experiments drained a lot of magic... especially the Rinnegan," Ren noted, checking his reserves. "It's a real mana-guzzler."
"Amazing!"
The Rinnegan truly was the ultimate power of the Naruto world. Even if Nagato couldn't draw out its full might compared to Madara or Sasuke, the basic abilities were overwhelming for the current Fairy Tail world.
"Sigh... pity I can't use Susanoo with this card."
The Rinnegan is the final form of the Sharingan; in Uchiha Madara's hands, it could unlock the Perfect Susanoo. But Nagato was not an Uchiha; he couldn't access the spectral warrior.
Overall, Ren was satisfied.
"Nagato's strength... the raw destructive power... it could go toe-to-toe with Black Dragon Acnologia for a short time," Ren analyzed, staring at the sky.
"But I'd still probably lose in the end."
Why?
"Insufficient mana."
The fatal flaw. To keep up the pressure required to hurt a Dragon King, he would burn out long before Acnologia even broke a sweat. He needed more. Much more.