"We're from Earthland," Ace said, stepping forward. "The Fairy Tail you know is a parallel version of our guild."
Edo-Lucy dropped Natsu, letting him fall flat on his face against the wooden floorboards.
She cracked her spiked whip, glaring suspiciously at Ace and Wendy.
"Earthland?" Edo-Lucy scoffed, crossing her arms. "You mean the world the King is stealing magic from? You expect me to believe you just popped over from another dimension?"
Ace stood casually, his hands in his pockets. "That's exactly what happened. Our city got absorbed by the Anima portal. We're here to get our friends back."
Edo-Gray poked his head out from behind a thick wooden pillar, his teeth chattering uncontrollably despite the heavy coats he wore.
"You guys are crazy! The King hoards all the magic in Edolas. You can't fight the Royal Army, they'll kill you!"
Edo-Elfman wailed loudly, burying his face in his tiny lace handkerchief. "Oh no! They came here to get revenge on us! We're doomed! We're all going to die!"
"Stop crying, Elfman!" Edo-Lucy snapped, rubbing her temples in frustration.
She pointed her whip at Natsu, who was currently rubbing his bruised nose.
"Look at him. He can't even light a match. You don't have any magic here, we're the dark guild Fairy Tail, and we spend all our time running and hiding."
"We can and we will!" Natsu grinned, slamming his fists together. "Just point me to the capital!"
Before Edo-Lucy could yell at him again, a massive tremor shook the wooden floorboards. The magical lamps flickering overhead swung violently, casting long, erratic shadows across the room.
A loud, booming voice echoed from the forest outside the guildhall, magnified by a heavy magical speaker.
"FAIRY TAIL! THIS IS THE ROYAL ARMY! WE HAVE YOU SURROUNDED! SURRENDER YOUR MAGIC AND COME OUT WITH YOUR HANDS UP!"
Panic erupted inside the dark hall. Guild members scrambled under tables, shrieking in terror. Edo-Macao and Edo-Wakaba clung to each other, shivering just as much as Gray.
For a guild that was constantly on the run, they reacted to the Royal Army's arrival with fresh, unbridled horror every single time.
Edo-Lucy cursed, running toward a large, glowing lacrima console near the bar.
"Damn it! The Fairy Hunter found us again! Levy! Prep the jump!"
"I'm on it!" Edo-Levy shouted, her hands flying across a glowing keyboard. "It's going to take a minute to charge the teleportation lacrima!"
The heavy wooden front doors splintered and crashed inward. A squad of heavily armored Royal Guards marched into the hall.
They leveled long spears that crackled with strange, mechanical energy, aiming the sparking weapons at the terrified guild members.
"Nobody move!" the lead guard shouted.
Natsu charged forward with a feral grin. "I'll handle this!"
He threw a wild right hook, expecting his signature roaring flames to burst to life, but nothing happened.
The lead guard easily blocked the powerless strike with the shaft of his mechanical spear and kicked the Dragon Slayer backward.
Natsu rolled across the floor, gritting his teeth.
"Damn it! I keep forgetting I don't have my fire!" Natsu groaned.
Wendy shrank back, holding Carla tight against her chest. "We don't have any magic either!"
"Surrender!" the guard yelled, pointing his sparking spear directly at Wendy.
Ace sighed.
He stepped smoothly in front of Natsu and Wendy, standing between them and the armored squad.
He pulled his D-Tector from his coat pocket.
The device immediately glowed with a brilliant, fierce light, illuminating the dim, dusty guildhall.
"What are you doing?!" Edo-Lucy screamed from the console, her eyes wide with panic.
"My power doesn't rely on the ethernano," Ace said.
His voice was calm and steady.
His digital soul surged, entirely unaffected by the dimensional shift or the lack of atmospheric magic.
He swiped his hand across the scanner. "Execute! Spirit Evolution!"
Rings of fractal digital code erupted from the device, swirling around his body in a brilliant tempest of fire and light.
The intense heat instantly pushed back the damp, cold air of the forest. The fiery data encased his limbs, forging crimson armor over his arms and legs.
A fierce, horned mask materialized over his face, and wild white hair flared out behind him.
"Agunimon!"
The Royal Guards halted their advance, staring in shock at the towering, armored warrior wreathed in roaring flames.
"Fire magic?!" the lead guard yelled, taking a fearful step back. "Where is he drawing ethernano from?!!"
Agunimon dropped into a low, coiled stance.
He focused the intense, swirling flames into his right arm, causing the air around him to warp and shimmer from the sheer heat.
"Gatomon, keep the flanks clear," Agunimon's voice echoed deeply through the mask.
A stream of bright data shot from his side, taking the form of a small, white bipedal cat wearing oversized, striped gloves tipped with razor-sharp claws.
"You got it, Ace!" Gatomon darted forward, her claws glinting in the dim light as she vanished into the shadows.
Agunimon thrust his hand forward.
"Pyro Darts!"
He launched a rapid-fire barrage of small, concentrated fireballs.
The fiery projectiles slammed into the heavy silver armor of the front line, blowing the guards backward out the broken doors in a wave of heat and smoke.
The remaining soldiers tried to regroup and aim their mechanical spears, but Gatomon was already moving.
She darted between their heavy boots, leaping off the wooden walls with blinding agility.
"Lightning Paw!"
With a flurry of impossibly fast strikes, Gatomon shattered the mechanical spears into pieces, leaving the guards disarmed and stunned.
Before they could even draw their sidearms, Agunimon waded into the fray.
He didn't rely solely on his flames; his martial arts skills were devastating.
A sweeping kick broke a guard's stance, followed by a heavy palm strike that sent the soldier crashing into a nearby wooden table, shattering it to splinters.
"Pyro Tornado!"
Agunimon launched himself into the air, spinning like a fiery drill.
His flaming kick tore through the remaining squad, scattering them across the forest floor in a heap of groaning, scorched armor.
The entire skirmish lasted less than a minute.
Agunimon landed smoothly on the wooden floorboards of the guild. In a shower of glowing data fragments, he reverted back to Ace.
The Edolas Fairy Tail members stared in stunned silence.
Edo-Gray dropped his fluffy winter hat. Edo-Elfman stopped crying, his jaw hanging wide open.
Edo-Lucy stared at the young man and the tiny, lethal cat sitting calmly on the bar counter. "You... you just wiped out a Royal squad in seconds. With magic."
"I told you," Ace said, slipping the D-Tector back into his pocket. "My power works just fine here."
"The teleportation lacrima is ready!" Edo-Levy shouted from the back of the room, snapping everyone out of their daze.
"Do it!" Edo-Lucy yelled.
The entire guildhall flashed with a blinding blue light. The world outside the windows blurred and twisted violently.
A second later, the heavy scent of the forest was gone, replaced by the dry, arid heat of a desert wasteland.
The guild had successfully teleported away from the Royal Army's perimeter.
Natsu picked himself up, staring out the window at the endless, rolling dunes of sand.
"Whoa. The whole building moved."
Edo-Lucy walked over to Ace, her spiked whip hanging loosely at her side.
The hostility in her eyes faded, replaced by a mix of genuine awe and a desperate, fragile hope.
"You weren't lying," she said softly. "You really are from Earthland."
Ace nodded. "We didn't come here to start a war with your kingdom, but they stole our home. We're going to get it back. Can you help us?"
Edo-Lucy exchanged a long look with Edo-Gray.
The shivering ice mage gave a slow, hesitant nod of approval.
"Fine," Edo-Lucy sighed, crossing her arms. "But you're playing by our rules now. The Royal Army is hunting us, and the King is hoarding all the magic. If you want your guild back, you're going to have to go through the capital."
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