Chapter 418: 418. Alakitasia
What Ben finds in the ruins of Vistarion is an underground room below the destroyed castle of Alvarez. He never explored Vistarion after the war, so he doesn't know about this place. But this finding makes him quite excited because there might be some good things here.
Ben enters the place alone while the others wait outside. He doesn't know what kind of traps got planted here, so he doesn't want to take any risk. His decision is correct because he already got attacked by a strong Black Arts attack right after he entered.
He brushes it off like nothing because his magic resistance is very strong. Some more traps get triggered, but Ben passes them all easily. He triggered those traps on purpose actually, to see what Zeref & the Spriggans prepared to keep this place safe.
"Well, not bad. Anyone other than me would've been killed already by now. They made such powerful defense, so I hope they stored good things here."
Ben reached the underground room after walking through the path for a while. The room is quite wide and it's filled with shelves. There are books, weapons, and other items that are still in good condition. Ben can sense magic all over the place that is used to maintain this room's condition.
"Heh, it looks like a secret treasury in those old movies. Let's see what kind of treasures they are keeping here."
His finding there isn't disappointing at all. The books here are research journals and magic books that Zeref, Irene, & August made in the past. This is a true treasure room even for Ben who has gotten very powerful with his magic.
He stores everything here including the weapons and magic items that are made of rare materials. These magic weapons and items aren't effective against Dragons, but they can be used well after this war ended. They are made by Great Wizards, after all, so they are surely powerful.
Ben is thinking of taking the treasures of Alvarez in his timeline. But he dismissed the idea because he needs Alvarez to be powerful now that it is affiliated with his family. Besides, having these things is enough because he can get all the information here already.
His finding here is interesting, but not so beneficial for this hunting mission. Although Ben now knows something. The Dragons weren't thorough in their attacks because there are places that weren't destroyed properly and many people still survive.
"Alvarez must've had many survivors too. We need to keep increasing our power by gathering more people to fight the Dragons. Tens of people won't be enough to defeat thousands of Dragons. We need a lot of people and it will be better if they are very powerful."
Ben's little wish gets granted very soon because his group finds a survivor group near Vistarion. This group is led by someone unexpected. It's led by Brandish, one of the Spriggans who still survives to this day, and they have some strong Mages among them.
"Y-you, I thought you were dead."
Brandish gets very wary when she sees Ben because their nations were enemies. Ben's name has spread very far when the Dragons' invasion happened. In this timeline, Ben never attacked Alvarez because of the Dragon, but Brandish still knows him because of his feat that kept being praised by Zeref.
"I survived somehow, and now I will attack the Dragons again. You are Brandish, a member of Spriggans 12, right? How about you join us in attacking the Dragons? We can forget about the past between Alvarez and Ishgar. Our top priority now is taking over this world from those Dragons."
"ATTACKING THEM?! ARE YOU CRAZY?! THAT'S A SUICIDE!"
"Then what? We just need to wait and wait until they disappeared from this world for an unknown reason that can't be explained properly? Don't be stupid, young lady. You are not a kid anymore. Freedom needs to be fought for."
"But how will we fight against them? Our magic wasn't working well against those Dragons."
"Do you think I would attack them without thinking about that? Why don't you check what my group members can do now?"
Brandish raises an eyebrow seeing Ben grins smugly. Then she widens her eyes when she sees the 15 Dragon Slayers other than Ben and the rest of the group members have Dragon Slayer Weapons. This group was really made to hunt and kill Dragons.
"Why don't you join us hunting a Dragon first to see what we can do? I'm sure you can make a decision after that."
".... Alright, let's do it that way."
Brandish follows the Dragon hunters to hunt a Dragon. They go to a quite far mountain where a Dragon lives now. The strategy is still the same. Ben sets up a space barrier and then they start attacking the Dragon under Wendy's lead.
Their target is a Blade Dragon, a Dragon that can make magic blades. It is very good at attacking, but its defense is quite weak because its scales aren't that tough. The battle looks easy, so it's enough to shock Brandish because she is seeing young Mages damaging a Dragon without Ben's help.
"They can hunt a Dragon without my help already. If this group grows, then we will be able to split into 2 groups and hunt Dragons separately. My target is to make each of them able to hunt a Dragon alone."
"Is that even possible?"
"Yeah, a Dragon Slayer grows by defeating Dragons, and the ones who wield Dragon Weapons will also grow stronger by fighting Dragons. The more Dragons we defeat, the more weapons and armor I can make using the materials acquired from the dead Dragons. We can upgrade our equipment as we kill more Dragons and get stronger."
Brandish is quite surprised at the potential of this group. She couldn't find a way to fight the Dragon army, but now she can see hope. If she wields a weapon that Ben made using materials from Dragons, then she will also have the power to damage Dragons.
"Alright, I have decided, I will join you with some of my men. But the civilians in my group can't be left alone, so some of my men will stay behind."
"No problem. Although I'm surprised you care enough about people's lives now."
"I just realized I couldn't live well in this difficult time without those 'powerless' people."
Ben just smiles and doesn't say anything. They return to Brandish's hideout after Ben took some materials from the Dragon's dead body and turned it into a Dragon Lacrima. On their way there, Ben asks to Brandish if there are other Spriggans who survived the invasion.
"I don't know. I was in a cave already the moment I opened my eyes. There were some food and even protection barriers there. I wanted to leave, but I couldn't break the barriers."
Ben doesn't even need to ask who sent her to that good shelter. It must be August who has taken care of Brandish since she was a kid. He is like her grandfather and Ben knows August really cares about Brandish like his own granddaughter.
"Hmm, the Spriggans will be great additional forces, but we can't hope too much. Let's just try to find more Mages and recruit them. The more people who join us, the higher our chance of winning will be."
Ben doesn't have any problem doing this alone even though his enemies are thousands of Dragons. It will surely be difficult and he won't win in one attack. He will need to attack repeatedly and defeats some Dragons at a time, but he's sure he can win alone.
However, that won't make this timeline's people independent after the Dragons' are gone. He wants them to be strong, especially his Guild members. So they will defeat the Dragons together with him. Besides, this is their timeline, their world, and their lives, so they need to fight for those themselves.
After Brandish joins with some of her men, the group becomes bigger & stronger. Their hunt becomes easier and they kill more Dragons on Alakitasia. They also find more survivors and get more personnel.
The hunting group eventually splits into 2 groups just like what Ben planned. So now they can hunt 2 Dragons at the same time. Ben leads the 1st group while Wendy leads the 2nd group. Brandish is in the 1st group because Ben still can't fully trust her & her men.
Also, Wendy already learned the space barrier as it is an enchantment. The space barrier is very important in their hunt, that's why they can only make 2 groups now because only Ben & Wendy can make the barrier. They still can't hunt without it because Ben is worried the other Dragons, especially Acnologia finds out about them.
Sooner or later, Acnologia will find out about this because the Dragons on a whole continent disappeared. But it will take some time because now the Dragons are busy attacking Guiltina. Ben knows there are many powerful Mages there, so he hopes they can stop the Dragons for a while.
The hunt on Alakitasia goes well and they get more allies along the way. There are no other Spriggans who survived, but there are a lot of young Mages with good potential. They will get stronger fast under the right guidance, so this is good enough.
When they leave Alakitasia for Eastern Continent, their group has 184 members already. There were more survivors on Alakitasia than Ishgar and a lot of them are Mages. This number is far lower than the Dragons, but it's better than just a few of them.
Now they are going to Eastern Continent, a place Ben has visited a few times for holidays with his family. Mira likes that place a lot. It makes Ben want to take Mira there after he returned. But now, he needs to focus because there are more Dragons on Eastern Continent, so this won't be easy.
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Hi guys, just a little announcement. Fairy Tail: Sun Eater has reached the last chapter in Patreon. You can read it faster there, but don't worry, I'll still upload here until the last chapter,
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