Raizel didn't sleep that night.
Fueled by the Mayor's ambitious vision and perhaps a bit of his own perfectionism, he worked straight from the afternoon until the clock struck midnight.
He drafted rules, calculated points, and sketched bracket systems, drawing on memories of tournaments from his previous life.
The next morning, bleary-eyed but determined, Raizel marched into the Mayor's office.
He slammed a thick stack of documents onto the desk.
"Here is the plan. Individual brackets, Team brackets, and the 'Playoff' system."
The Mayor picked up the documents.
He scanned the first few pages, his eyes widening with every line. He looked up at Raizel, impressed not just by the efficiency, but by the sheer detail.
"This... this is perfect," the Mayor breathed. "It's professional. It's marketable."
He didn't keep Raizel for small talk. He stood up immediately, grabbing his coat.
"I need to go. With a plan this solid, I can secure double the funding I initially thought. Raizel, you are a genius!"
The Mayor rushed out to meet with the merchant consortiums.
The scale of the project had grown overnight—from a simple arena to a "World-Class Entertainment Complex"—and that required serious capital.
Raizel watched him go, sipping the tea the secretary had left behind.
'If he fails to get the money', Raizel mused, 'I suppose I could ask Jude Heartfilia to invest. It would be a mutually beneficial deal for the Heartfilia Konzern and Fairy Tail.'
...
Fortunately, Raizel's backup plan wasn't needed.
The Mayor of Magnolia was surprisingly efficient when he smelled profit. Within 48 hours, he had secured the investments, signed the contracts, and sent a messenger to inform Ur and Makarov that the project was a go.
...
Three Days Later
The morning air was crisp and cold.
On the northern outskirts of Magnolia, a rugged, rocky mountain peak pierced the sky. It was wild, untamed land—until today.
A massive crowd had gathered at the base of the mountain.
Hundreds of construction workers, engineers, and surveyors stood in formation, holding blueprints and tools. Behind them stood almost every member of Fairy Tail currently in Magnolia.
Erza and Ultear, who had just returned from their mission yesterday, stood at the front, looking curious.
"Is he really going to do it alone?" Ultear asked, crossing her arms.
"That's the plan," Ur replied, shielding her eyes from the sun.
The construction crew had already marked the "cut lines" with magical chalk along the mountain's waist.
Raizel stood alone in the clearing.
"Shall I begin?" Raizel asked, turning to look at the Mayor.
The Mayor, wearing a hard hat that looked ridiculous with his suit, rubbed his hands together nervously and nodded repeatedly.
"Please! Proceed!"
Raizel took a deep breath.
"Take Over: Omegamon."
A pillar of light erupted from the ground. When it faded, the white-armored Royal Knight stood tall, his cape fluttering in the mountain breeze.
Raizel bent his knees.
BOOM.
He launched himself into the sky, breaking the sound barrier instantly. He soared upward—ten meters, fifty meters, one hundred meters—until he hovered parallel to the marked line on the mountain.
He raised his left arm. The jaws of the WarGreymon head opened.
"Grey Sword."
A blade of pure, concentrated magical energy extended from the gauntlet. It grew longer and longer, humming with terrifying power, until it was a hundred meters of solid light.
Raizel focused.
He didn't just need power; he needed surgical precision.
Slash.
The beam of light sliced through the solid granite of the mountain like a hot knife through butter.
There was no resistance. The sound came a second later—a high-pitched shing followed by a deep, resonant rumble.
The top half of the mountain began to slide.
"He cut it..." the foreman whispered, dropping his clipboard.
Raizel wasn't done.
He couldn't let the peak just fall; it would cause an earthquake.
"Take Over: Switch."
The white armor dissolved, replaced by the sleek, draconian armor of the Wyvern.
Huge wings spread from his back.
"Take Over: Dynasmon."
Raizel flew toward the sliding mountain peak. He gathered massive spheres of kinetic energy in his palms.
"Dragon's Roar."
He fired rapid pulses of energy, shattering the falling rock into manageable debris. Then, flapping his massive wings, he generated a hurricane-force wind.
WHOOSH.
He swept the millions of tons of rubble through the air, carrying it over the ridge and dropping it safely into the sea behind the mountain range, where it would form a new breakwater.
When the dust settled, the mountain was gone. In its place was a perfectly flat, smooth plateau of solid rock.
"It's... flat," the Mayor gasped.
The area was massive.
The Mayor had kept the blueprints confidential, but now Raizel could see the scale. It was over 30,000 square meters.
"Wow," Raizel muttered, hovering above the new plateau. "No wonder the height estimate was lower."
It was still high enough to command a view of the town, but wide enough to build a city.
The silence on the ground was absolute.
The construction workers stared with their mouths open. The Fairy Tail members looked on in awe, gaining a terrifying new understanding of their guildmate's destructive power.
Then, a scream broke the silence.
"COOOOOOOL!!!"
Raizel froze mid-air. He knew that voice. He dreaded that voice.
'Oh no. Not him.'
Raizel turned his head. Far away, perched precariously on a distant pine tree, was a small man with a camera.
Jason from Sorcerer Weekly.
"HOW DID HE CUT IT SO CLEANLY?! SO COOL! LOOK AT THAT POSE!"
Where did he get the news? Raizel wondered in despair.
Does he have a radar for cool events? Is this the frightening instinct of a professional reporter?
Raizel didn't wait. He didn't want an interview. He didn't want to explain why he just decapitated a mountain.
He flew down, landed next to the Mayor, and gave a quick thumbs-up.
"Excellent!" the Mayor cheered. "We'll leave the rest to the workers!"
Raizel nodded, grabbed Ultear and Erza by the arms, and vanished before Jason could climb down from the tree.
...
Fairy Tail Guild
The guild was buzzing.
The members who had witnessed the event were excitedly reenacting Raizel's sword swing.
"Why is it that every time we're not at the guild, you're involved in something big?!"
Erza Scarlet slammed her hands on the table, looking at Raizel with intense jealousy.
"First, an SS-Class Quest to kill a demon! And now, leveling a mountain to build a super-arena?!" Erza pouted. "It's unfair! I want to cut a mountain too!"
"You've cut plenty of things, Erza," Raizel laughed nervously.
Yesterday, Raizel had mentioned the meeting with the Mayor, but he had conveniently left out the part about blasting a mountain.
Erza felt cheated out of a training opportunity.
"I'm all fired up!" Natsu shouted, punching the air.
He was breathing small bursts of fire. "If Raizel can blow up a mountain, I can blow up... two mountains!"
Raizel sighed. He hoped Natsu wouldn't develop a new hobby of terraforming.
'If Cana were here, she'd calm him down,' Raizel thought.
Gildarts destroys mountains by accident just by walking into them.
To Cana, this is just a Tuesday.
"Hahaha," Raizel chuckled, looking at Erza's earnest, angry face. "The venue planned by the Mayor is so massive that mountain blasting was the only solution. Magnolia didn't have enough flat land."
"I'm actually quite curious about what the final structure will look like now," Ultear admitted, raising an eyebrow.
"I've never seen such a large-scale project start from scratch."
"We should see it before the Harvest Festival," Raizel said. "Though the Mayor mentioned it will be officially unveiled on the festival day as a surprise."
In the world of Earthland, construction magic existed.
With teams of Earth Mages and strongmen, buildings went up remarkably fast. They had seven months until the festival—more than enough time to build a colosseum.
...
A week later, the new issue of Sorcerer Weekly arrived.
As expected, Raizel was famous again.
The cover featured a high-definition, full-color shot of Omegamon.
Raizel was suspended in the sky, the massive Grey Sword raised high glowing with ethereal light, poised to strike the mountain.
[THE ARCHITECT OF DESTRUCTION!]
[FAIRY TAIL'S RAIZEL RESHAPES THE LANDSCAPE!]
"I didn't even see him," Raizel muttered, flipping through the magazine at the bar. "There were hundreds of people, and he still got a clear shot."
It turned out Jason had been hiding hundreds of meters away with a telescopic magic lens. The photos were... undeniably magnificent.
The framing was golden. The lighting was perfect.
Page after page featured the sequence: The leap, the transformation, the strike, and the final shot of the newly created plateau glistening in the sun.
Jason had included interviews with the awestruck townspeople, the giddy Mayor, and various Fairy Tail members (mostly Natsu yelling "Cool!").
It was a masterpiece of journalism.
"You have to admit," Raizel said, taking a bite of his lunch. "These are pretty well shot. He made me look heroic instead of terrifying."
"I want to be featured next time too!"
Erza was holding her own copy of the magazine.
She was so engrossed in the centerfold of Raizel that she had forgotten to eat her strawberry cake.
"These shots are amazing," Erza murmured, eyes sparkling. "Jason really is a professional. Next time, I will wear my best armor and strike a pose. I need a two-page spread!"
Raizel chuckled. He didn't mind the fame, as long as it didn't involve people asking him to blow up more landmarks.
"Is this your first time complimenting him?" Ultear asked, sitting next to Raizel with an amused smile.
"Usually you want to hit him."
"Actually... no? I think I praised him after last year's Harvest Festival issue," Raizel recalled. "Those photos were good too."
"That issue wasn't shot by him," Ultear corrected him, giving him an exasperated look. "He was sick that week. Someone else took the photos. Jason just wrote the captions."
"Oh," Raizel blinked. "Then... yes. This probably is my first time complimenting him."
"Will we be able to compete in those tournaments you mentioned?" Kagura asked, cutting through the small talk.
She was sitting quietly at the table, polishing Archenemy, but her ears had perked up at the mention of the venue.
She was more interested in the fighting than the photos.
"We'll definitely compete," Raizel assured her. "But the exact format is uncertain. I submitted the rules, but the Mayor might tweak them for 'entertainment value.' We'll have to wait and see."
Kagura nodded, satisfied.
As long as there were strong opponents, she was content. Sparring with Erza was beneficial, but she craved fresh challenges.
"According to the Mayor's plans," Raizel added, glancing at Ultear, "that venue will be multi-purpose. It won't just be for brawling. We might even be able to watch concerts there later."
"Concerts?"
Ultear's eyes lit up.
She wasn't a battle maniac like Erza or Kagura.
"That," Ultear smiled, resting her chin on her hand, "sounds much more interesting to me."