Fairy Tail: I don't want to be the president

Chapter 241 Destruction, Black Flame

Since they set out in the afternoon and the destination was far away, Rod and Elfman had to spend the night on the way.

As he watched Rhodes use the costume-changing magic to take out the tent, cooking utensils, and food, Elfman thought that if this man could always be so thoughtful, he might be able to take good care of his sister.

It's just...

"My cooking skills are terrible! How can a man not know how to cook!"

Elfman pushed Rod away and occupied the makeshift chopping board himself.

Rod looked at the burly Elfman skillfully handling various ingredients and felt that something was wrong.

Half an hour later, Rod tasted the first bite of Elfman's cooking: "No buddy, you're really good at it!"

To be fair and objective, this skill is almost catching up with Erza.

Erza's craftsmanship is almost catching up with Mira's.

Mira is almost catching up with Mr. Cook.

Anyway, no one can catch up with Rod, and only Worm likes to eat the things he cooks.

The problem is that Rhodes has not yet found any food that Worm doesn't like. The child eats all kinds of food, sweet, sour, bitter, spicy, raw or cold.

He suspected that Worm's only requirement for food was to not kill him.

It was April, already deep into spring, and the weather had become much warmer.

After finishing your meal and packing up the cooking utensils, you don’t have to rush into the tent. You can just stay outside and look at the stars for a while.

But Rhodes glanced at Elfman beside him.

Forget it, let’s go back to the tent, meditate for a while and rest early, as we still have to travel tomorrow morning.

Elfman was confused. Did Rod go to bed so early every day?
……

The next morning, the two men and the driver had breakfast and set off again.

Although the target has a certain degree of self-protection ability, this kind of mission should be completed as early as possible.

The carriage followed the road through the wilderness and passed through a town, but did not stop again except for the driver buying some food.

As it was almost noon, Rhodes suddenly shouted hurriedly: "Stop the car, stop the car!"

The carriage stopped quickly, and Elfman asked in confusion: "What happened?"

"Something happened." Rhodes connected the vision of the river crab responsible for exploring the way and had already seen the village where the client was.

Everywhere you look, there are broken walls and ruins.

Rhodes' face was heavy: "Get out of the car."

The road ahead is no longer safe, and we can’t let the driver continue to follow.

It was not appropriate to call back the river crab in this situation. Rhodes summoned two shadow wolves, and he and Elfman rode one each, and rushed towards the village.

Rhodes did not stop observing on the way, and only dared to move forward quickly after confirming that there was no ambush.

After the two of them climbed up a small hill, they finally saw the village where the client was.

No, the current situation can no longer be called a village, but rather a ruin.

Looking around, there is hardly a complete building in the village. There are broken walls, broken stone pillars and chaotic rubble everywhere.

There was still smoke coming out of many places, and there was even a pile of black flames burning at the entrance of the village.

"Black flame?" When Rhodes saw the black fire, the only thing he could think of was Amaterasu from the ninja movie next door, or the strange fire from a certain continent.

He asked Elfman, "Have you ever heard of this kind of fire?"

Elfman shook his head. "Not at all, but it's definitely not ordinary fire."

That's for sure. The appearance of this strange flame has basically confirmed that the magician was the one who did it.

And he's not just any ordinary wizard.

As Rod and Elfman carefully approached the ruins ahead, their mood became increasingly heavy.

——They could not hear any crying, groaning, or cries for help.

This means that either all the people in the village have fled, or no one is left alive.

The black flames were very strong, and although only a small pile remained, its incredible heat could be felt from a few meters away.

When the two shadow wolves approached it, they subconsciously lowered their bodies.

Rhodes compared it with Natsu's flame, which he was most familiar with.

He was surprised to find that, except for the time when he used the red buff to unleash the Dragon Slayer Secret Technique, Natsu might not be able to match the black flame in front of him. "Who left this?" Rhode tried to recall the fire magic he had seen in the magic encyclopedia, but he had no clue.

He could only speculate that this thing was either a new magic created after the encyclopedia, or a very rare magic such as lost magic.

"Rod..." Elfman's voice revealed a sense of powerlessness, and he looked a little lost.

Rhodes looked in the direction he was looking. Weapons and protective gear such as spears, swords, and shields were scattered in the ruins, which seemed to indicate that the people here had fought hard.

The reason why Elfman lost his mind was that there was a corpse next to each weapon.

It's the worst case scenario.

Everyone in the village may have died in the battle or been murdered.

Rhode summoned all the Shadow Wolves and patted one of them with a heavy heart:
"Go find out if there are any survivors, and check if there are any strange people or suspicious things nearby."

The shadow wolves dispersed, lowering their heads and sniffing the surrounding scents.

Rod and Elfman were also searching with their last hope.

"Woo~woo~"

Not long after, a shadow wolf holding a tattered piece of clothing whimpered to alert its owner of its discovery.

Rhodes unfolded the ragged black clothes, which had a dark red pattern painted on it.

Although it is a bit damaged, you can still vaguely see that it has a heart shape, spikes, and a shape like a bat wing...

Rhodes' eyes widened: "Devil's heart!"

"What?" Elfman didn't react yet.

"It's the symbol of the Devil's Heart!" Rhode felt the hairs on his body stand up. "One of the Balamu Alliance, the strongest dark guild, the Devil's Heart!"

He didn't know how strong the Demon's Heart was, but since it was one of the three major dark guilds that could command more than 90% of the dark guilds, it would definitely not be too weak.

When Rhodes accompanied the president to attend the regular meeting before, he heard President Goldman mention the Balam Alliance.

When talking about the devil's heart, he even noticed that some presidents were sweating.

At that time, Rhode's guess about these three guilds was that they might be equivalent to the big guilds like Fairy Tail, Spectre, and Pegasus in the dark world.

Things are getting serious. This mission may not be something he and Elfman can handle.

Elfman also realized the seriousness of the situation: "What should I do now?"

"Ask for help first." Rhodes used the magic of changing clothes, and a pen and a notebook appeared in his hand.

Elfman opened his mouth, but was unable to utter an objection.

Generally speaking, magicians should deal with various emergencies independently during a mission. Asking for help is a sign of inability to act on one's own and is also somewhat shameful.

But the current situation obviously can no longer be calculated according to common sense.

Rhodes tore off two pieces of paper and quickly wrote down the situation here, then summoned Crab and Worm, asking them to deliver the letter to the small town they met on the way.

Towns usually have magic crystals for communication. Rod wrote a letter as a Fairy Tail wizard, asking the mayor to contact the guild and the Council.

The reason we sent Worm along was because it was the most intelligent of all the wild monsters and had the most friendly appearance.

After finishing all this, Rhodes began to arrange the next step.

In fact, the safest option is to run away immediately with Worm.

But there may be survivors buried in the village. Even if not, the brother and sister that the client asked them to find should still be alive.

Their sense of responsibility as wizards would not allow them to leave like this.

Rhode quickly gathered his thoughts and speculated based on the mission content that the devil's heart was most likely aimed at the 'Tears of Chris'.

The torn clothes just now should have been left by the members of the Devil's Heart. They may have suffered casualties in the battle, but they have already taken away the bodies of their own people.

The village had become like this, and they were still collecting bodies, which showed that they had plenty of time and evacuated very calmly.

In other words, the things should have been taken away by them.

In this case, there is a high probability that they will never come back.

Rhodes judged that he and Elfman were safe for the time being, unless the other party suddenly felt that he had not destroyed the body thoroughly enough and turned back.

"Try to find any survivors. We can't stay here for too long."

Rhodes sighed. He always felt that conscience would hinder his sense of security.

(End of this chapter)