Chapter 308 – The Merciless Sun
"This time... we definitely got him!"
Orga Nanagear was gasping for breath; that devastating strike had cost him most of his mana, and he was truly frightened.
If the man had merely blocked his attack, it would have been one thing, but to emerge completely unscathed from the five Sabertooth Mages' relentless, perfectly coordinated assault—he had just displayed power far beyond the norm.
The Black Lightning God Slayer leaned heavily against a jagged chunk of debris, his chest heaving violently as sweat poured down his ash-stained face.
"Probably..."
Rufus Lore couldn't be entirely sure. His Memory Make magic was usually infallible, capable of calculating and recalling every possible variable in a magical skirmish. Yet, his mind was currently drawing a terrifying blank. Ren was simply too strong—so overwhelmingly strong that he aggressively defied Rufus's entire foundational understanding of what a Mage could logically be.
Sting Eucliffe and Rogue Cheney lay buried under a nearby pile of rubble, groaning in sheer agony, their Dragon Slayer stamina utterly depleted by the monumental effort.
"After a combined, point-blank hit like that, there's absolutely no way he's still standing! Sabertooth wins!!"
Minerva Orland wiped the thick layer of grime and sweat from her brow. Her absolute spatial magic, Territory, had drained her mana reserves until she was practically running on empty. Her entire body trembled with fatigue, but defeating a monster like Ren—securing absolute supremacy for her guild—would make every ounce of this excruciating exhaustion worthwhile. She forced a victorious, arrogant smirk onto her face.
Clap! Clap! Clap!...
A slow, rhythmic, and incredibly heavy applause suddenly rang out across the devastated battlefield. Every single clap sounded like a thunderstrike, vibrating deep within the chests of the exhausted Sabertooth elites.
"What?!"
The five top-tier Mages instantly froze. They snapped their heads toward the sound, their pupils shrinking to the size of pinpricks. The terrifying realization hit them like a physical blow—the applause was coming from the exact epicenter of the massive, still-burning explosion.
"N-no way..."
All five of them paled drastically, all color completely draining from their faces. The blood in their veins turned to absolute ice.
The thick, swirling curtain of smoke and magical fallout was quickly blown away by a sudden, intense wave of heat. Ren reappeared before them, looking as though absolutely nothing had happened. He stood tall—impossibly tall, having transformed into his hulking, overwhelmingly muscular Take Over form. The blinding golden aura radiating from his skin vaporized the lingering dust. There wasn't a single scratch on his incredibly dense physique, nor a speck of dirt on his remaining clothes.
"Not bad, not bad at all! That last coordinated strike actually had some genuine bite to it," Ren chuckled. His voice was deep, resonating with an unshakeable, kingly authority. "It has been absolute ages since I felt even a microscopic flicker of pain. You are all truly worthy of praise!! Well done!!"
An intensely arrogant, yet oddly polite smile curved Ren's lips, looking down at the five S-Class Mages as though he were fondly patting a group of misbehaving toddlers on the head.
[Akarin's Note: Ren is currently fully embodying the persona of Escanor, the Lion's Sin of Pride from The Seven Deadly Sins. His extreme arrogance is a direct byproduct of his absolute peak power under the midday sun.]
[H-he's still alive!! The absolute monster, Master Ren from Fairy Tail, is still completely alive and completely unbothered!!] Chapati Lola screamed into the lacrima microphone, practically tearing his hair out in sheer disbelief.
BOOM————————!!
The entire Grand Magic Games Arena of Domus Flau instantly erupted into absolute pandemonium. The roar of hundreds of thousands of spectators shook the very foundations of the stadium.
"W-what kind of impossible monster is he?!"
"Is he even human? Seriously, look at the size of him! Is he really a human Mage?!"
"He's a monster—no, the word 'monster' isn't even remotely enough to describe that thing! Is he a reincarnated god?!!"
The crowd was losing their minds. Power like that—the ability to casually shrug off the ultimate attacks of Fiore's undisputed strongest guild—could logically belong only to a supreme deity.
"Bwahahaha!! That's right, boys!" Macao Conbolt roared from the Fairy Tail viewing area, tears of immense pride streaming down his face.
"Did you all see that?! This is Fairy Tail's absolute strongest Mage—Ren!!" Wakaba Mine shouted, blowing a triumphant puff of cigar smoke into the air.
The entire Fairy Tail crowd cheered at the absolute top of their lungs, their previous anxieties completely washed away by the blinding light of Ren's overwhelming presence. Erza Scarlet nodded in deep respect, while Natsu Dragneel simply pumped his fists, completely fired up by the sheer display of raw, unadulterated strength.
Back on the ruined battlefield of Crocus, Minerva took a terrified step backward, her knees knocking together.
"N-no way! After a magical blast that strong... a blast that completely warped the space around it, how can you still be perfectly fine?! It's impossible! It violates every known law of magic!"
Minerva seriously wondered if she was suffering from severe mana-depletion hallucinations when Ren took a slow, heavy step forward. Every time his foot touched the ground, the cobblestones instantly melted into glowing, red-hot slag from his ambient body heat.
"Hmm... is the concept really that difficult to grasp? I honestly thought it would be quite obvious to Mages of your supposed caliber," Ren mused, tilting his massive head slightly. He looked at her with an expression of mild, condescending pity. "Since you're so desperately curious, I'll be merciful and explain it in terms your fragile minds can comprehend."
Ren raised a single, massive finger, pointing it toward the sky.
"On the third day of the Grand Magic Games, during the MPF—the Magic Power Finder—event, you all bore witness to the Wizard Saint Jura's magical output. His score was just over nine thousand five hundred."
[Akarin's Note: The MPF (Magic Power Finder) is a magical device used by the Magic Council to numerically measure the raw destructive power of a Mage's spell.]
Everyone in the arena instinctively turned their full attention to Ren. They vividly remembered Jura Neekis's MPF reading. It had been a historically terrifying display—a number that no normal human Mage should ever be able to reach, establishing Lamia Scale's elite status.
"And my current MPF..." Ren paused, his golden eyes glowing with the intensity of a dying star. "Is exactly one hundred and fourteen thousand!!!"
"..."
The entire artificial city, the grand arena, and the entire kingdom watching via lacrima broadcasts fell into a deafening, stunned silence. Had they heard him right? For a long, agonizing moment, they genuinely thought their ears had completely betrayed them. It was a ludicrous, mathematically impossible figure.
Even Makarov Dreyar, the battle-hardened Guild Master of Fairy Tail, gaped openly, his jaw practically hitting the floor railing. Laxus Dreyar, standing beside him, crushed the concrete railing to dust in sheer shock.
[114,000!!!] Chapati Lola's voice finally cracked the silence, shrill and utterly hysterical.
[Contestant Ren has just boldly declared that his current MPF output is one hundred and fourteen thousand!!!]
[That's more than ten times the maximum output of Jura—one of the legendary Ten Wizard Saints!!!] Yajima, the former Council member, gasped, completely losing his usual calm demeanor. [Can a magical number that high even exist within a human vessel?!!]
"Impossible——!!" Sting roared from the ground, spitting out a mouthful of blood.
"Absolutely, fundamentally impossible——!!!"
Minerva shrieked, her voice completely devoid of its former aristocratic grace. "One hundred thousand?! Don't you dare joke with me! The Magic Power Finder caps out at nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine! Even an actual god descending from the heavens might not top one hundred thousand! How could a filthy Fairy Tail dog like you possibly achieve that?!"
Ren slowly spread his massive hands in a gesture of mock helplessness, a deeply amused sigh escaping his lips. The heat radiating from his breath visibly distorted the air.
"As the old saying goes—a frog trapped at the bottom of a dark well knows absolutely nothing of the boundless, terrifying depths of the great ocean. You are simply too tragically weak to even catch a fleeting glimpse of the absolute Realm I currently inhabit."
He looked down his nose at the trembling Sabertooth guild master.
"Those who don't understand my true might look at me like a foolish frog staring up at the distant moon, thinking they can touch it. And those who do understand my power... they look at me like a fragile mayfly gazing upon the vast, unending blue sky, knowing their existence is entirely meaningless in comparison."
Ren's golden aura flared violently, the sheer pressure of it forcing the Sabertooth Mages to their knees.
"As for the so-called gods?" Ren let out a booming, arrogant laugh that shook the clouds. "Who in the world ever told you that I couldn't beat one to a bloody pulp?"
Every single gesture, every single spoken word dripped with absolute, undeniable arrogance. To the terrified onlookers, Ren seemed to be the very Incarnation of Pride itself, a being who stood at the absolute pinnacle of all living things.
"All right, my patience has reached its limit. Time is officially up. This tedious little game ends right here and now," Ren announced, his tone suddenly turning incredibly dismissive. "Thanks to your pathetic struggles, I actually had a brief moment of fun—and for that, I am genuinely grateful to you."
He slowly raised his hands toward the heavens.
"Allow me the honor of bringing this pitiful festival to a truly glorious, unforgettable close!"
Ren crouched slightly, the ground beneath him instantly turning into a pool of bubbling lava. Then, he sprang sky-high. The sheer kinetic force of his leap created a massive sonic boom, shattering every remaining glass window within a five-mile radius. He appeared high above the capital city of Crocus in a fraction of an instant, a tiny, glowing speck against the blue sky.
He raised his left hand, holding his index and middle fingers perfectly upright.
Voom—————!
The atmosphere screamed in protest. A violently blazing sphere, radiating heat exactly as terrifyingly intense as the actual sun, miraculously appeared hovering just inches above his extended fingers.
The miniature sun rapidly expanded, glowing with a blinding, searing light. It radiated a terrible, suffocating heat, casting harsh, unnatural shadows across the entirety of the ruined capital below, exactly as though the real star had been violently dragged down from the cosmos.
Even those sitting securely in the stands of the Grand Magic Games Arena, miles away from the epicenter, immediately felt its scorching, oppressive weight. The spectators began to sweat profusely, shielding their eyes from the blinding glare.
"Hey, Brat! Stop right there! Don't do anything reckless!"
Makarov roared from the Fairy Tail balcony, his voice laced with genuine panic. He frantically expanded his arms, ready to use Titan magic if necessary. "If that monstrous thing drops, all of Crocus will go sky-high! You'll destroy the entire capital!!"
The ancient Guild Master could vividly sense the world-ending, cataclysmic power compressed within that terrifying fireball—no, it wasn't a fireball. It was a literal, miniature sun perfectly balanced above Ren's palm.
But Ren couldn't hear him from that altitude. Or rather, he simply wouldn't have listened even if Makarov had been standing right directly in front of him, desperately screaming in his face. So absolute, so incredibly towering was his divine pride in this form, that no earthly voice could command him.
"Ladies and gentlemen of Sabertooth," Ren's voice boomed from the heavens, miraculously echoing clearly in the ears of the five terrified Mages below. "My method of execution may be a tad rough—but please, do forgive me!"
[Akarin's Note: Ren is using Escanor's signature magical attack, "Cruel Sun" (translated here as Merciless Sun), a miniature sun that he can control and detonate at will.]
"Merciless Sun!!"
Ren forcefully pushed his massive palm downward. With a terrifying, low-frequency hum, the small sun broke the sound barrier, beginning its catastrophic descent toward the center of the artificial city.
"RUN FOR IT——!!" Sting screamed, his voice cracking completely.
At the very first sight of the rapidly descending, blinding sphere, the Sabertooth Mages' faces twisted in primal, unadulterated panic. They instantly abandoned all semblance of guild pride and camaraderie, bolting frantically in completely different directions.
Victory no longer mattered. Ranking points were utterly meaningless. The grand title of Fiore's strongest guild was nothing but dust. Sheer, desperate survival was all that counted now.
The blazing orb struck the ground with devastating grace. It didn't explode immediately; instead, it instantly vaporized the stone, creating a vast, perfectly smooth, glowing crater of molten glass simply by existing upon the earth.
Ren, still hovering high in the sky, slowly clenched his left fist into a tight ball. His eyes narrowed mercilessly. He spoke a single, quiet phrase that sounded like the absolute judgment of a god:
"Detonating Arrogance!!"
[Akarin's Note: "Detonating Arrogance" is the translated name for Escanor's "Pride Flare," which violently detonates the Cruel Sun, multiplying its destructive force.]
BOOM——————!!!
A titanic, world-shattering explosion tore violently through the subterranean heart of Fiore's capital. It was like a modern nuclear warhead had been detonated beneath the city streets.
Crack-crack-crack——!!
The earth completely shattered. A blinding, apocalyptic pillar of searing heat and golden fire speared violently skyward, piercing straight through the clouds and illuminating the entire continent.
"Gyaaaahhh!!"
"Uwaahhh!!"...
The screams of the five Sabertooth Mages were instantly drowned out. They ran with absolutely everything they had left, pushing their broken bodies past their physical limits, but the blast radius was simply too incredibly vast. The very ground under their feet exploded violently upward into a sea of fire, swallowing all five of them completely whole in a blinding flash of solar destruction.
Rumble-rumble——!!
The massive Grand Magic Games Arena, despite being fortified with powerful defensive enchantments, shook violently. The sheer force of the shockwave knocked thousands of spectators entirely out of their seats.
Crack-crack——!
Massive, jagged fissures spider-webbed across the ancient stone walls of the coliseum. Pieces of the domed ceiling began to rain down upon the panicked crowd.
"Uwaaaahhh!!"
"Eeeekkk!! Save us!!"...
Terrified screams rippled endlessly through the massive stands until, at long last, the apocalyptic quaking slowly ground to a halt. A heavy, suffocating silence descended over the arena, broken only by the sound of falling debris and heavy breathing.
The giant magical lacrima screens fizzed violently with static, completely overwhelmed by the magical interference. After a tense, agonizing minute, they finally flickered back to life, desperately attempting to focus on the designated combat area.
But the image they showed left every single spectator entirely dumbstruck.
"T-the capital..."
"IT'S GONE——!!!"
[Akarin Note:
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