Seeing Kabe's utterly baffled expression, Makarov immediately changed faces. Grinning, he pulled out the latest issue of Weekly Sorcerer.
After flipping to one of the pages, he pointed at the name at the very top and said,
"Look. In the latest 'The Man I Most Want as My Boyfriend' ranking, Kabe, you're number one again."
"Isn't that normal? If I remember right, ever since I came back from my Ten-Year Quest, I've always been first."
The moment the topic turned to that, Kabe's expression softened quite a bit, and his tone became even more smug.
"It's different this time. Look at the vote totals. Because you just defeated Wizard Saint José, your fame exploded again.
Compared to the last issue, your votes tripled.
More than 900,000 votes in total. That's more than the combined total of second place through tenth place!"
"Really? Let me see."
That made even Kabe's joy impossible to hide, and he immediately leaned over to look.
But by then, Makarov had already started imagining the possibilities.
"That's a full 900,000 girls, voting one by one with their own hands.
They're your loyal fans, and the guild's potential customers.
Just think. If the guild launches your figures and plush dolls right now, how many of those girls do you think would be willing to spend money buying them?
And if we tell them that anyone who spends over a certain amount can also get an autographed photo from you personally...
how much money do you think that would bring in?"
"So that's why you've set your sights on me?"
Kabe said it with some annoyance.
In the original story, the guild did eventually do something like this too, but he had not expected the old man to come up with the idea this early.
Makarov stroked his twin mustaches and admitted it very straightforwardly.
"That's right. Aren't young people nowadays all into buying merchandise of their favorite idols?
I want to use you to test the waters first. If it sells well, then I also want to add other popular guild members later."
"Hey, hey. I don't have any objections about the others, but no Erza, no Levy, and none of the girls.
I have no interest in some man hugging their figures to sleep at night."
On that point, Kabe felt he had to draw the line in advance.
Makarov clearly had not thought of that before.
Once Kabe said it, he scratched his head and had to admit it made sense, so he immediately changed his wording.
"Then we won't sell any of the female guild members' merchandise. Having you alone should already be enough anyway."
"Now that's more like it."
Seeing Kabe agree, Makarov slapped his thigh happily and immediately made the decision.
"Then it's settled. Tomorrow I'll take you to get fitted and photographed.
Once the photos are developed, you prepare 500 autographed copies.
When the merchandise and signed photos start making money, we split the profits fifty-fifty."
Kabe: "Five hundred? Old man, who exactly are you looking down on?!"
Makarov: "Then make it 5,000!"
Kabe: "Uh... that's a bit too much. My hand will break.
But if you change it to sixty-forty, with me taking six, then maybe I can consider it."
Makarov: "Deal!"
Kabe: "...Damn it. I quoted too low."
...
And just like that, under Makarov's shameless scheming, Kabe was dragged into the plan.
The very next morning, Kabe first went to a magic workshop, where the person in charge carefully measured out all of his body dimensions.
Then, leaving Makarov behind to haggle with them, he found a professional photographer and spent the entire afternoon striking all sorts of stylish poses.
After the photos were developed, on the third day he spent a whole day signing them one by one.
By the time he was done, his wrist was so sore it felt nearly crippled, and his eyes were so strained he could barely even recognize his own name anymore.
...
And while Kabe was busy with all of that, the Fiore royal family had begun exerting force within the Council as well.
If Kabe had been living in the height of glory these past few days, then the councillors led by Crawford were living in the exact opposite.
Especially Chairman Crawford.
Failing to capture Brain had already caused his reputation to plummet.
Then, just two days earlier, the matter of how he had privately run around stirring up hype before the operation even began was dug up and exposed as well.
Now, not only was he being cursed across the magic world, but even within the Council itself, his authority had been greatly reduced.
In the span of just two days, Crawford had been hammered by one problem after another until he was overwhelmed, frazzled, and completely exhausted.
And it was precisely at that moment that the royal recommendation letter from Fiore was delivered into his hands.
Bang!
Crawford furiously slammed the recommendation letter down onto the desk.
Breathing hard, he pointed angrily at the letter and roared at his assistant,
"Has old Toma lost his mind?!
He actually wrote to recommend Kabe of Fairy Tail to me. Is he trying to put a Fairy Tail mage into the Ten Wizard Saints?!"
As he spoke, he picked the letter back up and glanced at it again. The words Fairy Tail alone were enough to make the flames of his anger shoot up even higher.
"Fairy Tail... come to think of it, I nearly forgot.
If Makarov hadn't brought that woman named Sorano to me, saying she had detailed information on the Oración Seis, how could I have gotten hot-headed and ended up making such a ridiculous mess?"
Watching his superior throw a full tantrum, dumping all the blame onto Fairy Tail while never mentioning even one word about his own pig-headed decisions, the assistant cursed inwardly without stopping.
At that moment, he truly regretted ever deciding to follow a leader this brainless.