Burning Centipedes

Earth Land, Ishgar, Kingdom of Fiore, Galuna Island.

July, x784.

Once again, night fell on Galuna Island. For the first hour after sunset, nothing of note took place. The warriors of the village had taken their places on the walls, awaiting the arrival of centipedes, Elicia, Ultear, and Erza were stationed in a triangular formation on the walls, each guarding a third of the village, and the village chief, Moka, whose mind was in the right state, was in the center of the village ready to deploy the backup units to any part of the wall that was in need of assistance.

The only person missing from this set up was Alfonzo. Though his presence would undoubtedly ease the load on the defenders, his role would more than likely determine the outcome of this war between the two sides.

"Hey, Adramelech, have they ever taken this long to show up before?" Elicia asked curiously. "I mean, when we showed up last night, there were still a few minutes of day light left and they were already attacking fiercely."

"No, I've never encountered anything like this in the week or so since the attacks started." Adramelech replied.

"Maybe the big bugs decided to go home." Elicia said cheerfully. "Or maybe it's time for them to hibernate or something."

If Alfonzo, Ultear, and Erza had been nearby, they would have looked at Elicia with a deadpan expression. Her habit of unintentionally raising flags had once again reared its ugly head.

*Click!* *Clack!* *Click!* *Clack!*

Not even a minute later, the sound of insectoid legs marching across the ground could be heard from every direction around the village. And as time went by, they grew louder and louder. ON top of that, the three Fairy Tail wizards could not even sense their approach until they were within a one and a quarter mile (2 km) radius of the village.

"Adramelech, tell you people to get ready." Elicia said, her tone turning serious while her expression grew solemn. "They're on their way."

"How many?" Adramelech asked, a solemn expression on his face as well.

"Thousands of them." Elicia muttered as she started controlling her threads. "[Thread Magic: Subterranean Encapsulation]."

With that, Elicia retracted her [Detection Threads], pulling them back to the base of the wall. Then, she had them all burrow underground creating a domed-net under the village. On top of that, she hardened all the threads and made them start vibrating at high-speed, effectively creating a region where the centipedes could not enter.

"Warriors of Galuna!" Adramelech shouted, gaining the attention of all the village's warriors stationed on the wall. "Our enemies draw near, in numbers we have yet to face. Still, will you back down?"

"No!" All the citizens of the village, not just the warriors, shouted with fierce determination.

"Today, the existence of our village will face a threat like no other!" Adramelech continued. "Today, I will stand and fight to protect that which is important to me! Will you join me in this fight?"

"Rah~~~~!" The villagers roared in an unintelligible cacophony of acknowledgement.

"Then, ready your magic and do what is necessary to protect our home!" Adramelech shouted, raising a fist into the air.

"Rah~~~~~~!" The villagers roared once again, charging their magic power into their hands as they waited for the approaching centipedes.

"It looks like they're all ready to go." Elicia said as she generated more threads and waited for the centipedes to draw near.

Meanwhile, Alfonzo, covered in mud to hide his scent, floated through the trees toward the ancient temple. His objective, to disrupt the chain of command of the centipedes.

"According to Adramelech, on the night these centipedes arrived, there was one that was much larger than the rest of them watching the battle from a distance." Alfonzo muttered to himself as he made his way through the forest. "But why didn't it attack back then? If what we've seen and been told is anything to go by, the bigger these bastards are, the stronger."

That was one point that no one who had been dealing with these centipedes could understand. If they had such a powerful leader, why did it not attack and end this conflict at the very beginning.

"It's almost like someone wanted this whole thing to be drawn out." Alfonzo continued to mutter. "But why?"

Fortunately or unfortunately, Alfonzo would get to know the answer to that question before the night ended.

Back at the village, the centipedes had just burst through the tree line surrounding the village, some of the bigger centipedes uprooting the trees in their path.

"Attack!" Adramelech shouted at the top of his lungs as he released a condensed blast of magic power.

Following Adramelech's order, nearly a hundred magic power blasts were fired into the oncoming horde of centipedes. Considering the fact that they had the time to prepare after hearing the enemies' approach, all the fired shots of magic power were charged to their limit. So, instead of merely pushing the centipedes back or punching a whole through them, each shot exploded, damaging everything in a sixteen foot (5 m) radius around the point of impact.

Then, just after the first volley was fired, a scarlet-silver blur, with several dozen silver streaks of light following behind it, shot off the wall and split one of the larger centipedes in half as it passed by. Then, it created a small crater as it landed. Naturally, this blur was Erza donning her [Heaven's Wheel Armor].

"[Heaven's Wheel: Circle Sword]." Erza chanted as soon as she landed.

Like she had done the night before, Erza positioned her flying swords around her in a circle with the blades pointed outward. Then, as her chant ended, the swords began rotating around her at high speed, slashing apart the nearby centipedes and those that rushed in her direction when she flew by.

Considering that she was using many more swords than she did the night before, the circle was much larger as well. Unfortunately, that meant that there was some space inside the circle for a few centipedes.

And without minding the pain filled screeches of the other centipedes, they all lunched towards Erza.

However, Erza was unbothered by the approaching centipedes. She was fully aware of what would happen if she created such a large circle of swords in such a densely populated area on a battlefield. So, using the two swords she held in hand, she methodically dismantled the attacking centipedes with precise slashes and thrusts until there was only one, twenty-six foot (8 m) long centipede remaining in the eye of her storm of swords.

Not giving the biggest centipede she had seen thus far the chance to attack, Erza flapped her metallic wings and shot toward it with her swords crossed in front of her.

"[Heaven's Wheel: Trinity Sword]." Erza chanted as her swords glowed in a bright silvery light.

As she approached the large centipede, Erza made three quick sword slashes, leaving a delta shaped trail as she rushed past. Then, when she stopped, without giving the centipede a chance to screech in pain, it fell apart, leaving a long, triangular piece of flesh surrounded by blood, flesh, and carapace on the ground.

"I still wasn't fast enough." Erza muttered as she looked at the spots on her armor that were starting to dissolve after being splashed by the centipede's blood. "*Sigh* I'll have to ask Alfonzo to repair it… again. [Requip: Flame Empress Armor]."

With that, Erza was covered in a yellow glow momentarily. Then, when the glow receded, she was dressed in a completely different suit of armor.

Now dressed in a predominantly dark red armored breastplate that resembles a one piece swimsuit, with orange accents that resemble flames and black accents that outline the shape of dragon scales, revealing her upper chest, shoulders, and upper thighs. On her arms she wore s a pair of gauntlets with the same motif as well as grieves on her legs, reaching up to her mid-thigh, that followed the same design.

Around her neck was an orange neck guard while her hair was now styled into twin tails. Putting the finishing touches onto the armor set was a large, two-handed, dark red sword with a sliver of black in the center of its blade and an orange, flame-shaped handguard.

Once her [Requip] was complete and all the flying swords were stored in her [Requip] space, Erza spun once on her heels with her sword pointed outward.

"[Soaring Fire Blade]." Erza chanted as flames blazed around her sword.

Then, following the path of the sword, the flames were ejected into her surroundings, burning any and everything they came in contact with. Whether it be trees, shrubs, or centipedes, they were all reduced to ashes before the flames went out.

"That was a success." Erza said with a small smile. "But I should probably be more careful. I don't want to start a forest fire. If I do, I can only imagine the next time Alfonzo would bake a strawberry shortcake for me.""

Shivering at the thought, Erza lowered the intensity of the flames on her sword, reducing them to the point that they coated the blade with an ultra-high-temperature orange gleam.

"This should be enough." Erza muttered. "Now, the blood should be evaporated with every cut."

Like that, Erza rushed forth, dividing as many of the centipedes as she could into small pieces as she passed by.

Meanwhile, the area underneath the village had, for all intents and purposes, been turned into a meat grinder by Elicia's threads.

Although there were thousands of centipedes charging the village from above the surface, there were at least a thousand more trying to sneak attack the village from below.

The little bear, hellbent on bringing the villagers despair, figured this would be the most effective way to do so. Just imagining the looks on their faces as they were somehow holding off the overwhelming horde of centipedes from breaking through their walls, only to have their command center surrounded by centipedes that burst through the ground, made him shiver in delight.

Fortunately for the villagers, and unfortunately for the bear and the centipedes, the regular rank and file centipedes were not smart enough to stop rushing toward the underground of the village. Nor would any of them break off to relay details to the King Centipede without orders. So, the bear was unaware of what was going on under the village. All he knew was that the King Centipede was growing more restless as more and more of its children lost their lives.

"Damn, stupid centipede." The little bear slammed his paw on top of the King Centipede's head in anger. "I knew those pencil-necks at the Bureau of Magical Development should have tried to make you smarter. What the hell does all that whimpering mean, anyway?"

Continuing to smash his paw on the King Centipede's head over and over, the bear was not physically strong enough to do it any harm. However, that did not mean that the King Centipede was not annoyed by its actions.

"Oh, are you getting uppity again?" The bear asked, it's red eye starting to glow ominously. "Do I have to remind you what happens if you stop listening?"

Calming down immediately, the King Centipede lowered its head in submission once again. However, it continued to whimper every time it felt the loss of another one of its children.

At the same time, Alfonzo had just arrived outside the well-guarded cave that led under the temple.

"Damn, there are still like a thousand of these things outside of the temple." Alfonzo muttered as he lowered himself into the middle of the horde of centipedes. "Seriously, I can feel thousands of them attacking the village right now. How many more of these fuckers could there be?"

Although Alfonzo was now standing amongst the Centipedes, his scent had been masked, so they could not detect him by scent. On top of that, he was using his [Electromagnetism Magic] to control the visible light spectrum, rendering himself invisible, as well. As for seeing in the dark, he was watching his surroundings with not only his [Magic Power Detection], but he was also viewing everything in infrared, as if he were wearing a pair of night vision goggles.

"Well, I guess I'll start things off with a bang." Alfonzo said smiling in anticipation. "I'm about to pull a Doomsday. [Electromagnetism Magic: Super Flare]."

Generating highly condensed microwaves on the surface of his skin and clothing, Alfonzo started glowing in a bright red color. Unable to bend the visible light around him and generate the microwaves simultaneously, Alfonzo's invisibility was cancelled, resulting in all the centipedes turning in his direction.

*Screech!*

Immediately after seeing him, all the centipedes screeched, informing their king that there was an intruder before they rushed towards Alfonzo.

"Sorry… But that's not gonna work." Alfonzo said as he forcefully ejected all the microwaves in every direction.

In the next instant, the microwaves washed over all the centipedes, the ground, and the temple. Resulting in all the centipedes on and near the surface being cooked from the inside out, the ground being super-heated, and the outer walls of the temple being lightly scorched.

"Ugh!" Alfonzo groaned, now free from all the mud that was coating his body, as he waved his hand trying to blow the smell of burnt centipedes away. "This smell… Fucking horrible."

*Screech~~~~~!*

A moment after so many centipedes died outside of the cave, a long, ear piercing screech sounded from underneath the temple. Alfonzo did not have to be a genius to realize that screech was calling back all the centipedes to deal with an intruder near its lair.

"Great, now I'm on a time crunch." Alfonzo muttered in annoyance. "Whatever, I just have to kill it fast and get the hell outta here."