Chapter 147: The Sacrifice
The silence that followed the distant explosion of Etherion was deafening. The shockwave had passed, leaving the Tower of Heaven groaning and shaking, but still standing.
Jellal, his arms still raised in triumph, was frozen. His mind, which had been calculating every possibility for eight years, simply... stopped.
"Impossible..." he whispered.
Then, the denial shattered, and a manic, god-like rage took its place.
"IMPOSSIBLE!" he roared, his voice echoing across the summit. "That was ETHERION! It can destroy everything! What did you do?! WHAT DID YOU DO?!"
He had spent eight years meticulously building this tower, a monumental lacrima designed to absorb that specific, catastrophic blast. He had spent even more years climbing to the top of the magical world, becoming one of the nine Council Members, all to orchestrate this one, perfect moment.
For this, he had put in countless efforts. He had lied, manipulated, and sacrificed. And just as he was about to welcome his new world, the Etherion... vanished. His eight years of effort, his perfect plan, had been rendered completely in vain at the last second.
How could Jellal's emotions not collapse?
Ren, still in his Fourth Hokage form, stood calmly on the pillar, his white robe fluttering in the wind. He looked at the raging Jellal with an almost bored expression. "Didn't I just say?" he called down, "I teleported it away."
"Teleportation...?! You bastard!"
Jellal's face was extremely grim. His mind raced, re-calculating everything. He had investigated all of Ren's information. He believed he had made complete preparations. He was clear on all of Ren's known transformations: the black-winged demon (Ulquiorra), the "Sword God" (Yoriichi), the "Flame Emperor" (Ace), the "Tyrant" (Kuma), and the walking apocalypse (Whitebeard). He had contingencies for all of them.
The recently appeared white-haired man (Gojo Satoru) had surprised him, but it was also normal. The opponent seemed to acquire new transformed states every so often, and the abilities of each state were different.
But he had never seen this yellow-haired one before. And his ability... was teleportation? Not just teleporting himself, but teleporting Etherion? An attack containing 2.7 billion Edeas of magic power? This was a major miscalculation.
However... Jellal's panic began to subside, replaced by his familiar, cold logic. Things weren't disastrously bad. The Tower of Paradise was still there.
He looked at Ren, and a slow, cruel smile returned to his face.
"I underestimated you, Ren. As expected of the man who could defeat even Jose, one of the Ten Wizard Saints... you can even teleport Etherion away."
"However," Jellal continued, his confidence swelling, "teleporting such a massive, catastrophic thing, and so far away... you must have consumed a lot of magic power, right? Plus, dealing with all those small-fry guards... and the Trinity Raven earlier... how much magic power do you have left now?"
'He's weak,' Jellal thought, 'He must be. That was a bluff. He's on his last legs.'
"Ren?"
Erza heard Jellal's words, and her heart clenched. He was right. Ren had been fighting this entire time. He had used three... no, four different forms. And then he teleported Etherion. She, too, was now very worried about Ren.
Ren, still in Minato's form, simply nodded and smiled faintly. "I did consume quite a bit," he admitted freely. "But what's left... is more than enough to take you down."
"Huh?! Take me down?!" Jellal laughed, his composure fully restored. "If you were at full magic power, I might genuinely be a little worried. But now, with your magic power so heavily depleted, you still want to take me down? It should be me taking you down!"
"Hmph! Don't be so boastful, Jellal!" Erza shouted, her Binding Snake having dissolved when Ren freed her. She gripped her sword. "You're not even a match for me, and you still dream of defeating Ren? That's simply a fantasy!"
Suddenly!
A new, cold voice echoed from behind Erza. "A fantasy, you say?"
Erza froze. She knew that voice. She turned her head, and her blood ran cold.
A man dressed in the white robes of the Magic Council, looking exactly like Jellal, had appeared.
"Siegrain?!"
Erza's eyes widened in horror. The person was indeed Siegrain, one of the nine Council Members.
"Wh-why are you here?!"
Siegrain smiled, a cold, aristocratic smile. "Erza, you remind me of when we first met. You went with Makarov to submit a letter of apology, right? You mistook me for Jellal and attacked me."
"I can't blame you," Siegrain continued, "who made us look alike? You only stopped when I told you we were twins. But... you still hold so much hostility towards me."
"Of course!!" Erza spat, her blade now pointed at Siegrain. "As his older brother, you stood by and did nothing about Jellal's actions!! Not only that, you constantly monitored me!!"
"That's right, that's where I made my mistake," Siegrain mused, tapping his chin. "At that time, I should have said that I would definitely find Jellal and kill him. But, I had just barely gotten into the Council... that was my biggest mistake. There's no need to suddenly think of an excuse for more painful things."
Erza's face was grim as the pieces clicked into place. "Sure enough... you two are in cahoots... No wonder Jellal knew Etherion would attack here. You orchestrated all of this, didn't you?!"
Ren, who had been watching this drama from his pillar, let out an exasperated sigh. He deactivated his Take Over, his yellow hair and Hokage robe dissolving as he returned to his normal form, landing softly on the floor.
"Erza, Erza... where did your usual shrewdness go?" he said, shaking his head. "You really are a foolish woman."
"What do you mean?" Erza looked at Ren, puzzled.
"What 'collusion'?" Ren scoffed. "Open your eyes. They are one and the same!"
"What did you say?!"
Erza couldn't believe it and quickly turned her head to look at Jellal and Siegrain.
At this moment, Siegrain and Jellal had already walked together, standing side-by-side.
"As expected of Ren," Jellal said.
"You couldn't be fooled by this," Siegrain continued.
In unison, they said, "You're much more shrewd than this foolish woman, Erza."
As they spoke, Siegrain's body dissolved into golden particles of light, which then flowed into Jellal.
Jellal's magic power, which had been depleted, suddenly surged, exploding to a level far beyond what it was before. He was whole again.
"Thought-projection?!"
Erza's eyes widened, the final, terrible truth crashing down on her.
"That's right! Siegrain is me!" Jellal declared, his voice booming with his restored power. "Before, because most of my magic power was distributed to my thought-projection on the Council, and I also... underestimated your strength, I had no choice but to deceive you."
He laughed, a cruel, mocking sound. "Who knew you would believe it so easily? 'Oh, Jellal, you're possessed!' Heh heh, you're so foolishly adorable. I almost couldn't bear to keep deceiving you."
"How many people... how many lies... have you told in your life?!"
Erza roared, furious at Jellal, but also furious at herself. She couldn't believe what kind of terrible person could speak of deception so easily, as if it were a game. Did this guy truly have no heart?
Jellal flexed his fingers, basking in his restored energy. "Heh heh... My power and magic power have fully recovered. Now... it's time to prepare the sacrifice for Zeref."
As Jellal spoke, his gaze slowly, deliberately, moved past Erza... and locked onto Ren.
Erza also noticed Jellal's gaze. "Sacrifice? Could it be..."
She had previously thought that the sacrifice Jellal spoke of was herself. Sho and the others had said they wanted to capture her to be the sacrifice. But now, Jellal's gaze was fixed on Ren.
"That's right!" Jellal's smile was triumphant. "Ren, be honored. You are the sacrifice personally chosen by Lord Zeref. Erza... she was merely the bait to bring you here."
"Jellal—!"
Erza looked at Jellal, and the last of her strength gave out. Tears streamed down her face. She couldn't understand how a person could change so much. The once gentle and kind Jellal, her first friend... had now become this treacherous villain, full of lies, calculations, and despicable, bottomless cruelty. Could it be that everything she had seen, every good memory... was it all fake?
Just then, a finger gently wiped away the tear from her cheek.
"Don't cry," Ren said, his voice soft. He had moved to her side without her even noticing.
"You're already beautiful enough, and now that you're crying, all distressed and vulnerable... aren't you even cuter? I'm no gentleman, Erza. Isn't this just testing my self-control?"
"Ren..."
A slight blush appeared on Erza's tear-streaked face. She hadn't expected Ren to be able to joke in such a situation. But it was this joke—this honest, grounding, Ren moment—that completely put her at ease, cutting through the despair Jellal had spun.
Ren smiled at her, then turned to face the smug-looking Jellal.
"Alright!" Ren said, stretching his arms. "The Paradise Game is over. My turn."
He glanced back at Erza. "The next scene might be a bit bloody and... well, it could cause some 'viewing discomfort'. Do you want to stay here and watch, or return to everyone else?"
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