With Erza's stunning appearance as the dashing Prince Frederick, the audience's anticipation was raised to extremely high levels.
Her costume was perfect, her posture heroic, and her entrance dramatic.
But then, silence fell over the theater.
Ankh watched Erza on stage expectantly from the wings.
Ten seconds passed.
Twenty seconds passed.
"..."
Erza still hadn't spoken a single word.
She stood frozen center stage, her eyes wide and unblinking.
Finally, she stretched out her hand with stiff, mechanical limbs.
Her legs were trembling nonstop, the knees knocking together audibly.
"I... I am Fr... Freddy... dy," Erza stammered, her voice cracking like a teenager's. "I came... came to, res... resc... rescue the princess!"
Ankh was immediately stunned.
He nearly dropped his microphone!
'Such great line delivery... like hell!' Ankh thought, resisting the urge to facepalm.
'You might as well just recite "one-two-three-four-five" and be done with it!'
'What was going on with Erza? Stage fright?'
The concept was absurd.
The "Titania," the Queen of Fairies, having stage fright in this kind of small-town theater was simply a bad joke!
Erza had faced demon hordes, dark wizards, and giant monsters without blinking. She had probably killed more monster in battle than the total number of audience members sitting below!
Ankh peeked toward the backstage area.
When he saw Lucy, Gray, and the others also looking pale and unwell, he immediately ran over.
"What's going on with Erza?" Ankh whispered urgently. "Is it the stage design? Is there a trap?"
Lucy looked up from her script. Her current smile was uglier than crying.
"No," Lucy whimpered. "Erza is nervous. She said she's never performed in front of a civilian crowd before without armor."
Ankh covered his forehead, speechless and choked up.
So the mighty Titania is defeated by social anxiety!
"Ten swords... I have ten swords!"
On stage, Erza remained dedicated to her duty, stubbornly reciting her lines despite her brain shutting down.
However, the sequence seemed to have skipped over a lot of the plot!
"Wait!" Lucy's composure completely shattered as she looked at the script in her hands. "That's wrong! That line is for the final boss battle in Act 3! We haven't even met the villain yet!"
Happy, wearing an adorable yellow children's jacket as part of his costume, pointed a paw at Erza.
"She seems so nervous she can't even breathe! She's turning blue!"
As if responding to Happy's observation, Erza's face on stage turned a deep, alarming shade of purple.
She was hyperventilating.
Then, instinct took over.
While muttering about how many swords she had, she activated her Magic.
"Re-Quip!"
Crimson light flashed. It transformed into dozens of sharp, real steel swords that hovered in the air.
"Prepare yourselves!" Erza shrieked.
Without hesitation, the swords shot down toward the audience below!
"NOOO!"
The anxious group backstage nearly had heart attacks when they saw this.
Of course, the audience members caught in the sword barrage were even more terrified.
Waves of screams rose from the seats as people dove under chairs.
Thunk! Thunk! Thunk!
Swords embedded themselves in the floorboards, armrests, and popcorn buckets.
One unlucky guy in the front row froze as a blade planted itself squarely between his legs, cutting his pants.
It was just one millimeter away from making his already modest "brother" even worse off.
In the VIP section, Makarov was so frightened he pulled out several strands of his beard.
"My insurance premiums!" Makarov wailed.
Yajima, sitting next to him, adjusted his glasses unhurriedly and asked in genuine confusion.
"Makarov... since when does watching a play... involve risking your life? Is this a new type of interactive theater?"
Watching this scene with terror, Lucy realized they had to intervene before Erza massacred the front row.
She quickly slapped Gray's shoulder.
"Gray! Let's go!" Lucy shouted with desperate determination.
Gray, Natsu, and Ankh all looked up dumbly at the ceiling, three handsome boys confused by the sudden order.
"Go where? To the hospital?"
"Nonsense! Onto the stage, of course! We have to save the show!"
Soon, just as Erza was about to suffocate from lack of oxygen and croak on stage, a prop rope descended from the rafters.
It tied up Lucy and hoisted her into the air, dangling her in front of Erza.
"Please save me, Prince Frederick!" Lucy cried out, acting for her life.
The spotlight shone on Lucy. Her voice sounded much more natural and pleading now—mostly because she was actually terrified.
"I've been captured by that evil villain, Shayhalt!"
Bora, sitting in the audience, couldn't help but twitch his mouth upon hearing this.
"Shayhalt? Who is that? How would the audience know who that is when he hasn't been introduced?"
The moment Lucy finished her line, another spotlight lit up.
Gray emerged from behind the curtain, dressed in noble attire with a cape.
In a professional broadcasting voice that sounded nothing like his usual tone, he proclaimed.
"My name is Julius! If you want the princess back, then face me in battle!"
Yet the audience remained completely lost!
'Wait,' they thought. 'Who is this Julius? What happened to the Shayhalt that the Princess just mentioned? Are there two villains?'
This play... was really impossible to understand.
Actually, that "Shayhalt" character was originally supposed to be Ankh's role.
But because someone was refused to act, the script had been hastily rewritten.
According to the new plan, Erza would later have to play both the hero and the villain via quick costume changes... which was clearly not going to happen now.
At this moment, Erza's face had turned a dangerous shade of purple.
She swayed on her feet.
"Air... air..." Erza gasped.
Lucy, seeing this, panicked. She quickly pulled out a golden key from behind her back while still dangling in the air.
"Open, Gate of the Clock! Horologium!"
POOF!
A giant grandfather clock with arms and legs appeared on stage. The clock-shaped Celestial Spirit opened its glass door and swallowed Erza whole, enveloping her inside its protective casing.
"The Prince says: 'I need oxygen,'" Horologium announced in his deep voice.
Inside the clock, pure oxygen was pumped in.
Horologium was the most "powerful" and economical self-preservation Celestial Spirit.
He was capable of providing immunity to external Magic and physical damage, transportation, shelter from natural disasters, and treating oxygen deprivation, insect bites, rough skin, itching, brown spots, and other super powerful effects!
Clearly, in this situation, Horologium had saved Erza's life.
Before long, Erza finished her oxygen intake. Her complexion finally returned to normal as she emerged from Horologium's stomach, looking refreshed.
"I have returned!" Erza shouted.
Now they could finally proceed with the play properly!
Gray, energized by the chaos, pointed at Erza while gripping an ice sword he had created.
"Fight me!"
Meanwhile, Erza on the opposite side entered her revival protection period.
She finally managed to deliver her lines completely. With a raised hand, she summoned ten more swords—fake ones this time, thankfully—and thrust them toward Gray.
"Take this!"
After narrowly dodging Erza's attack, Gray immediately screamed like a little girl.
"Ahhh!"
He turned and ran offstage, shouting while fleeing: "So scary~ I'll be back!"
Ankh, watching from the wings, felt his eyelids twitch uncontrollably.
This villain's screams were really over-the-top... and why did he run away immediately?
After driving Gray away, Erza set Princess Lucy down from the ropes.
She knelt deeply on one knee, taking Lucy's hand. Her stammering voice returned, and she even changed her tone to something terrifyingly aggressive.
"Princess Yandirika!" Erza shouted. "Let's have many children together! Right now!"
"Eh?" Lucy blinked.
"About thirty or so!" Erza demanded.
"Thirty?!" Lucy squeaked.
"This development is way too fast!" Ankh commented from backstage, once again becoming the audience's internal voice.
"Even cheap idol dramas wouldn't dare film it like this! They haven't even had a first date!"
In the VIP box, Makarov looked confused at the plot development.
His eyes were full of question marks as he complained to Yajima.
"Modern acting is so hard to understand," Makarov grumbled.
Mirajane, however, remained optimistic.
She clasped her hands together. "I think it's quite good! Everyone seems to be shining brightly! It's so romantic!"
Just as the story was becoming clichéd with the prince and princess about to elope to make thirty babies, Gray suddenly jumped out from backstage again.
"Stop right there!" Gray shouted. "Peaceful times are always short-lived!"
'True, true...' Ankh thought.
'But probably not this short-lived—you just got beaten and ran away ten seconds ago!'
"It ends here!" Gray declared. "Come forth, my loyal servant! Fire Dragon!"
As these words fell, the painted mountain props in the background began shaking violently.
"ROAR!"
The long-restrained Natsu finally made his explosive entrance!
Natsu was clad entirely in a green dragon costume that looked like oversized pajamas.
A little blue kitten spread its wings to pull the dragon's body into the air via wires.
"I am the Fire Dragon who can destroy everything!" Natsu roared, breathing real fire. "Rawr!"
"Dammit!" Gray, who had just summoned the Fire Dragon, wiped his nose.
He watched the Fire Dragon show off and suddenly changed sides.
"In that case, we have no choice but to join forces to defeat this beast!"
Erza blinked, dazed. "Oh! That's actually a great idea!"
'WAIT THE FUCK UP', Ankh thought.
'Wasn't that Fire Dragon summoned by you, Gray? What are you teaming up with the prince for? You're the villain!'
The audience below found the play increasingly resembling a surreal suspense film.
However, caught up in the chaos, they gradually lost themselves in the Fairy Team's bold performance.
Lucy couldn't help it either—the Rabian script was written this way, and she couldn't just forfeit her payment, could she? She played along.
Soon, under Princess Lucy's persuasion, Gray and Erza fled the stage to "prepare," leaving Lucy alone with the dragon.
Just as Lucy was about to confront the Fire Dragon, disaster struck.
Happy, who had been straining to pull Natsu on the wire system, finally couldn't bear the weight of the costume and the dense dragon slayer anymore.
Snap!
One slip of a paw, and he lost his grip!
"Aye!"
"Wahhh!"
Natsu screamed as he plummeted down from the ceiling.
He crashed heavily onto the center of the stage, smashing through the floorboards and stirring up a massive cloud of dust!
CRASH!
The theater shook. Debris flew everywhere.
Ankh couldn't stay seated backstage any longer.
He stood up, pacing.
'What kind of mess was this? With terrible acting, confusing plot holes, and now major stage accidents, could this mission still be completed?'
The audience was starting to murmur.
Just as Ankh was growing anxious, he suddenly glimpsed something in the backstage cloakroom.
Hanging on a rack was a set of dark-style clothing—a long coat, a mask, and mystical symbols.
'This seems to be... the costume for "Shayhalt," the original villain...' Ankh realized.
'The role I rejected.'
He looked at the chaos on stage. He looked at the confused audience. He looked at the costume.
'In that case...'
Ankh's gaze gradually shifted, hardening with resolve.
He gracefully reached up to remove his cute announcer mask.
He picked up the costume.
"Fine," Ankh whispered, dark energy beginning to swirl around him. "If you want a villain, I'll give you a villain."
He turned to the shivering female extras backstage.
"Sisters, don't be shy either! Get ready!"
He threw the coat on.
"Our Royal Assault begins now!"
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