Charles looked at the invitation, his expression growing serious.

The Grand Magic Games—a grand celebration hosted by the Kingdom of Fiore, inviting all magic guilds across the land to compete using magic to determine the number one guild in the kingdom.

Of course, the kingdom wasn't doing this just for fun. The whole event could be traced back to Fairy Tail itself.

After the Tenrou Island incident, the kingdom discovered that Zeref still lived in this world.

Possessing a strong sense of impending crisis, the kingdom feared the legendary Black Mage would once again bring about the world's destruction.

But they couldn't find Zeref's whereabouts, nor did they have the strength to defeat him.

That's when some "genius" came up with an idea—to use the Eclipse Gate to travel back in time and kill Zeref while he was still weak.

Yeah… not even getting into whether that plan was feasible, the Eclipse Gate was something created by Zeref himself. The sheer irony of using his own invention against him was absurd.

To activate the Eclipse Gate, two conditions had to be met: first, the Twelve Golden Zodiac Keys; second, an unimaginable amount of magical power.

The Zodiac Keys were scattered across the land—most of them were still with Lucy, who was sealed away on Tenrou Island. But the kingdom had enough faith in Fairy Tail to assume they'd survive.

As for the second condition—that was the real purpose behind the Grand Magic Games.

All the magic released during the battles would be collected and stored to power the Eclipse Gate.

In the original story, it took a full seven years to collect enough energy. It wasn't until Lucy and the others broke free from the Fairy Sphere and participated in that year's Games that the gate finally opened.

But the gate had a very specific method of operation: it required two Celestial Spirit Wizards to open it simultaneously from different points in time to properly connect distant eras.

Using it incorrectly—combined with the magical distortion caused by the Dragon King Festival—led the gate to connect to an era 400 years in the past, when dragons ruled the world.

Ten thousand dragons came pouring out of the Eclipse Gate, leading to the complete annihilation of Fairy Tail. Only Lucy survived.

In despair, she used the gate again to travel back to the time of the Games and shut it. But she didn't expect Acnologia, the Black Dragon, to follow—triggering another dark future.

To stop this, Rogue studied Dragon Control Magic, hoping to manipulate the dragons to fight Acnologia. But Acnologia, being immune to all magic, was a dragon beyond taming.

So Rogue also traveled through the Eclipse Gate, intending to unleash those 10,000 dragons and use Dragon Control Magic to turn them against Acnologia.

Naturally, Lucy—who had once closed the gate—became a major obstacle for Future Rogue.

So he tricked the princess of Fiore, killed Future Lucy, and successfully opened the gate.

Though Lucy and another Celestial Wizard, Yukino, managed to shut it again, seven dragons still escaped.

Thanks to Ultear sacrificing her remaining time to buy a brief window, Natsu managed to defeat Future Rogue and destroy the Eclipse Gate, sending the dragons and those who didn't belong in this era back to their rightful times.

As Charles reviewed all this intel, he couldn't help feeling troubled.

Time—even for him—was a rule-bound element not easily manipulated.

Thanks to his actions, many events in the storyline had already changed, and Charles couldn't be sure how things would unfold now. But with two Lucys existing simultaneously in the same timeline, the time paradox theory had already crumbled.

The most confusing part of this entire arc was whether the Eclipse Gate truly traveled through time—or merely to a parallel world with a different time axis.

In the original story, the worst future had been avoided thanks to everyone's efforts. But Future Lucy and Future Rogue still arrived in the past.

It was nearly impossible to determine how the Eclipse Gate actually worked. Zeref really had a talent for creating absurdly dangerous things.

Charles had a gut feeling that some things couldn't be avoided. The Dragon King Festival seven years from now likely wouldn't be peaceful.

But what he could do was make sure he was ready—he would never allow that nightmare future to occur.

Sting noticed Charles's heavy expression and asked, "Charles, is there a problem with the Grand Magic Games?"

Charles shook his head. "It's nothing. The Games are meant to determine the number one guild in the kingdom—we just can't afford to lose, that's all."

Sting flexed his arm proudly. "Of course! We're already the number one guild in Fiore—because we're Fairy Tail!"

Charles chuckled. "Exactly. We are Fairy Tail! The Games start in a month, so it's time to start preparing. That means you too, Sting. If you fall behind, you might not even make the lineup."

"Then we can't waste a second! Rogue, let's go train!" Sting shouted, dragging Rogue off with him.

Charles smiled and began mentally mapping out what lay ahead.

He had to participate in the Games. For one, the title of Kingdom's Number One Guild couldn't fall into someone else's hands—especially not when there was a 30 million Jewel prize on the line.

Fairy Tail's finances had always been tight. After all, those problem children they called members usually caused more damage during jobs than their commissions could cover.

In the original story, Fairy Tail fell into decline after the Tenrou Team was sealed away, mostly because of debt.

Charles had practically killed himself doing a string of high-level missions just to patch up the guild's financial black hole.

Even now, Fairy Tail was barely scraping by. It wasn't until Charles became involved in management that he realized just how much Makarov had shouldered.

He knew he couldn't let that 30 million slip away. And the championship reward included far more than just money.

Being declared the Kingdom's Number One Magic Guild wasn't just a title—it came with real perks. They'd receive higher-quality requests, greater recognition, and most importantly—clients would always choose #1 over #2.

Charles also wanted a chance to inspect the Eclipse Gate in person. Some preparations had to be made early.

Since the goal was first place, he had to give it everything he had.

The Grand Magic Games didn't just measure individual strength—it tested the power of the entire guild, its collective capability.

At the moment, the only reliable team he had was the trio he had personally recruited.

Adding himself and Stella, they could at least form a main squad.

But even then, Sting, Rogue, and Kagura weren't anywhere close to their future peak states.

For magic users, magic itself was important—but even more critical was magical power.

And magical power couldn't be shortcut. It required continuous mental refinement, physical training, and deeper understanding of one's own magic.

That's why, in the original story, the Tenrou Team had fallen behind—they'd lost seven years of growth.

Of course, the other guilds had also stagnated. And Charles had already pulled some of their future strongest members into Fairy Tail.

He was fairly confident about winning the championship—but that didn't mean they could skip training.

In addition to preparing their team, he'd need to start collecting intelligence on other guilds—at least enough to know the basics of his opponents.

Being guild master sure required a lot of mental bandwidth. Charles was already starting to miss Makarov.

(End of Chapter)

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