Erza was not like Natsu or Gajeel. She lacked their natural resistance to hostile magic, and Rowan Mercer's stunning spell caught her completely off guard. She collapsed instantly.
"Juvia, take Erza with you. We're leaving," Rowan said, already moving. "The blast is coming in less than five minutes."
Charging headlong toward Jellal would have been reckless. Dragging everyone into that fight would have been worse.
Jellal had already proven he could command monsters like Ikaruga, fighters strong enough to overwhelm elite mages. That kind of authority did not come cheap. Whatever he was preparing inside the Tower of Heaven was no improvisation. It was deliberate, patient, and massive.
And hovering over all of it was the looming threat of Etherion.
Walking blindly into someone else's plan while a weapon of mass destruction hung overhead would have been stupidity dressed up as courage. The smart move was distance. Get out of the tower's range. Let events unfold.
If Etherion erased the tower and Jellal along with it, problem solved.
If not, they would adapt. Fight if they could win. Run if they could not. There were dozens of guilds in the kingdom, mages far stronger than any of them, and people whose job it was to handle catastrophes. Rowan had no interest in dying just to prove a point.
He preferred battles with exits.
And if Jellal truly needed Erza alive for whatever ritual he was planning, then forcing him to pursue them outside the tower would strip him of every advantage he had built.
Rowan retrieved a compact case expanded by a space-folding spell and secured Erza and the others inside. With a sharp twist of magic, he vanished.
Moments later, he reappeared above the open sea beyond the island.
At nearly the same time, Lucy and Simon escaped the tower by boat, bringing with them two of Erza's childhood companions, Wally and Millianna.
Rowan raised his wand toward a shattered royal vessel drifting nearby.
"Reparo."
Splintered wood knitted itself together. Torn sails reformed. Within seconds, a fully restored ship bobbed gently on the waves.
They regrouped aboard the deck. Rowan released Erza from the spell, and together they turned back toward the Tower of Heaven.
"Less than a minute now," Rowan said quietly. "We'll watch from here."
Erza clenched her fists. She already knew there was no time to go back. All she could do was whisper his name into the wind.
"Jellal…"
At the tower's summit, Jellal swept the pieces from his game board with a flick of his hand and stepped to the window.
"So be it," he murmured. "I'll deal with you later."
The system was not complete. Not truly.
Finishing it demanded an impossible amount of energy. Even he could not supply it alone. That was why years ago he had split part of his power away, creating a false identity that infiltrated the Council itself. From within, he had guided their decision to deploy Etherion.
They believed they were preventing a resurrection.
In reality, they were fueling one.
Etherion's strike would pour an ocean of energy directly into the tower. After that, all he needed was Erza.
His plans had shifted slightly, but nothing essential was lost. Once the system stabilized, he would reclaim his full strength and retrieve her personally.
Gasps rippled across the deck as the sky above the tower fractured into layers of immense golden sigils.
"So much magic…" Lucy whispered.
The legends had never done it justice.
Against that vast construct in the sky, against the overwhelming pressure of the gathered energy, everyone felt painfully small.
The beam came next.
A column of solid gold light tore downward, swallowing the tower in a blinding explosion. The sea reflected white. Instinctively, everyone shut their eyes.
When the light faded, silence followed.
The tower was still there.
Not rubble. Not ash.
It had transformed.
Where stone and iron once stood now rose a colossal crystalline spire, glowing from within like a frozen heartbeat.
"How is that possible?" someone breathed.
Rowan exhaled slowly. "I thought so."
Jellal had never fled. He had never even tried. That alone had been enough to confirm it.
Etherion was never meant to destroy the tower.
It was meant to complete it.
Erza stared, understanding finally snapping into place. "The tower was unfinished. He needed Etherion's power to finish it."
She knew the structure. She had built it with her own hands once. The original plan had required multiple towers to gather enough energy. Jellal had built only one.
Now she understood how he had bridged the gap.
"This is when the system truly activates," she said softly.
The truth settled over the group like cold rain.
Rowan, however, was smiling.
Not at Jellal.
At the crystal.
The air itself throbbed with power. Dense. Pure. Stable.
A structure like that was not just a weapon. It was a reservoir. A focus. A place where magic pooled so thickly it became tangible.
For someone who trained through meditation and mental discipline, it was a treasure beyond price.
Rowan's thoughts were already racing. If he could work inside that crystal, shape a proper focus, the gains would be extraordinary.
Ten times faster, maybe more.
That decided it.
Jellal's strength no longer mattered.
That tower was coming down.
And it was coming home with him.