Fairy Tail - Eyes of Ice

Chapter 23 - Nirvana Pt. 3

"Jellal, stop this!"

The magic in the room intensified. The two Self-Destruction seals glowed brighter. Jellal bowed his head, unable to meet anyone's gaze. Erza held her hand out to Jellal while Kai remained frozen in shock. Even Cobra didn't know what to do.

"This is what I must do." Jellal touched his chest gingerly. "I will erase the two darknesses cast over this land: Nirvana and my—"

Erza blitzed to him and slammed him to the ground, punching him hard across the face. "Snap out of it!"

"Be careful!" Kai exclaimed, and stepped forward but Cobra's great purple snake slithered in front of him.

"Don't be hasty now," Cobra said.

"You wouldn't dare escape the repercussions of your actions!" Erza exclaimed. "You can't easily escape the past, Jellal!"

"Then don't let the past bog anyone else down. If I'm gone what does it matter? Let me do this in death to forgive whatever transgressions I've committed."

Kai gritted his teeth. Jellal wasn't helping his case, nor did he want to, anyway.

"Absolutely not." Erza yanked him by the scruff of his shirt. "You will make up for these transgressions in life. That is what makes life worth living: the betterment of others through your action and experiencing that newfound joy with them!"

"My sins are—"

"Many!" Kai shouted. "But don't let them define you, Jellal."

Jellal looked to him, eyebrow raised. He didn't recognize Kai, and that was fine. That would make talking him out of it easier.

But why? Because Erza was doing the same? Kai shook his head.

No. Because Kai, who had attacked Fairy Tail just like Jellal, got a second chance. Jellal had beaten and killed so many people but had not been left to pay for it. He didn't even know what he'd done. He couldn't just escape that. He had to be left to remember, to learn.

Jellal didn't need to come back to the light. Hell, he may not have deserved it at all. But he deserved to know what he'd done.

The guild alliance could stop Nirvana—Erza and Kai could do that right here and now if they were able to overwhelm Cobra. But saving Jellal? That required more than just Erza and Kai.

"Well isn't this a show."

Kai spun as Cobra barked a laugh. A grey-haired man in a flowing robe wielding a skull-topped staff sauntered into the room, a sneer on his face.

"Jellal, just what do you think you're doing with that spell? It's quite dangerous."

He aimed the staff at the wall and the orb in it glowed green before the wall lost the Self-Destruction seal in seconds. Cobra chuckled while Kai raised the sword to Brain.

"What did you just do?"

"I undid the spell."

"How?"

Brain continued forward, ignoring Kai. "Simple. I know the spell. After all, it was I who taught it to Jellal during our time together at the Tower of Heaven."

The name shot a chill through Kai. "Where?"

Brain stopped, sighing. He half-turned to Kai. "You're him, then. The Dragon Slayer that escaped my grasp. Oh how I would love to have learned all about your magic. Perhaps I still can. If not for Erza and Jellal I may have had the chance back then. Perhaps that would have completed the R-System much faster—"