With Lucy's razor-sharp foresight, Carla found it far easier to navigate the air currents and close in on the Quadrans Lyrids.
The Celestial Spirit was being forced to move more and more frequently now, its graceful, measured displacements turning frantic.
And those very movements were what let Lucy piece together the rest of the puzzle.
First: the Quadrans wasn't built for offense. It had no visible attack spells, and probably not even any real defenses.
Second: it only relocated when absolutely necessary, because every time it did, it paused for a brief leveling process.
Lucy realized that during that calibration window, it couldn't move.
Her eyes lit up with understanding. If they could pin it down during that moment, they could finish this.
But to execute the plan perfectly, she needed someone else who could anticipate its moves exactly as she could.
So;
Lucy pulled out another silver key and shouted, "Open, Gate of the Twins- Gemini!"
A flash of blue light appeared beside her. Gemini from Battlefield One materialized immediately, twin bodies shimmering like drops of liquid starlight.
"Gemini! Copy my current state and thoughts, take my place, and act according to the plan!"
"Understood!"
The twin spirits high-fived Lucy in midair. Their bodies rippled and reshaped into an exact copy of her, eyes blazing with the same calculating brilliance.
In an instant, they understood everything, Lucy's deductions, the Quadrans's behavioral patterns, and the coordinated strike plan.
Then they reverted to their original form and slipped downward to take position below, hidden in the shimmering mist.
The operation began.
But before Lucy could make her move, the entire situation changed.
On a nearby mountain slope, Rhodes and Wendy were still pursuing the Hellhound and the Giant Bee.
By now, the Hellhound had already regrown two of its three heads, but it no longer dared to face them head-on. The moment it sensed danger, it turned tail and fled, snarling.
The Giant Bee was no braver, it only ordered its remaining swarm to attack from afar while it buzzed nervously behind cover.
Curiously, Rhodes and Wendy didn't engage the swarm either. They danced through the air, dodging every assault, never slowing their pursuit.
The Quadrans Lyrids, completely focused on Lucy, hadn't noticed their approach at all.
Cornered on both sides, its calm mechanical rhythm began to falter.
And just when Rhodes and Wendy were about to catch up, the Quadrans made its move.
"This time it's…" Lucy's face paled. "All of them?"
No sooner had she spoken than the air trembled.
Every Bee that had been fighting in the valley, thousands upon thousands, suddenly converged.
They filled the sky, forming concentric rings around Lucy and Carla.
Three layers deep? No. Thirty layers. Inside and out.
And that wasn't all. The Three-Headed Hellhound and the Giant Bee Queen were teleported right into the center—one diving from above, the other thrusting its massive stinger from below.
"This is bad!" Lucy's pupils shrank. She hadn't expected the Quadrans to go this far, sacrificing everything to crush her.
Then;
A deafening crack! split the sky.
A thick column of blue lightning shot down from above, swallowing the Hellhound whole in a roaring electric torrent.
And below, a howling tornado spiraled up from the ground, catching the Giant Bee and shredding it into the storm.
Two familiar voices echoed through the chaos.
"Mr. Rhodes!"
"Wendy!"
Lucy and Carla looked up in shock and relief, Rhodes and Wendy stood amid the stormlight, their mouths still faintly smoking from their dual breath attacks.
Then, as quickly as they'd appeared, their bodies dissolved into mist and vanished.
Illusions.
Rhodes's illusion magic had reached a terrifying level.
He'd crafted the mirage while climbing the mountain, cloaked himself in alchemical mist, and seamlessly swapped places, slipping right into position near Lucy.
He'd planned to ambush the Quadrans quietly and shield her if she drew too much attention.
But who could have guessed that Lucy would drive the Spirit itself into a frenzy?
In the end, Rhodes had decided to let her take center stage, and she had, magnificently.
Now, as the Hellhound's charred body faded and the Giant Bee's remains scattered into dust, the enormous swarm began to crumble, thousands of Bees flickering out of existence one after another.
Only a single, lonely Quadrans Lyrids remained in the sky.
"Don't just stand there," Rhodes said calmly, raising his hand. "It's your turn now."
Magic circles blossomed around him in rapid succession, twenty-eight in total, forming the radiant structure of the Amaterasu Twenty-Eight Style.
Bolts of golden light chained together, encircling the Quadrans Lyrids like a cage of celestial geometry.
The construct faltered. Its gyroscopic limbs spun wildly as it tried to level itself, but Rhodes had already forced its hand.
The Quadrans flickered, teleporting away in panic, and in that exact instant, a single gunshot cracked across the valley.
A bullet sliced through the air and struck the precise spot where the Spirit reappeared.
The impact echoed like a cannon.
The Quadrans's core ring exploded with a deafening bang, light bursting from its joints as its entire frame fractured into particles of starlight.
Just like the Hellhound and the Bee Queen, it disintegrated, vanishing into motes of silver that drifted upward and disappeared.
But… who fired that shot?
Rhodes caught Wendy, who was wobbling midair, and steadied her before glancing down.
Below them, someone stood up from behind a boulder, a green-haired markswoman with a long sniper rifle resting on her shoulder.
She gave a jaunty little twirl and saluted with a grin.
"Bisca?" Rhodes blinked.
But before his mind could process the absurdity, Bisca's body shimmered and collapsed into two small, blue, jelly-like figures.
"Jamie and Mini!" Wendy gasped.
Lucy blinked, realization dawning, and then pouted. "Ahhhh, Mr. Rhodes, forcing the Quadrans Lyrids to teleport was supposed to be my job!"
Her plan had been simple but ingenious: she would provoke the Quadrans into teleporting, while Gemini, using the data copied from her mind, would calculate its landing coordinates in advance and pull the trigger at the exact instant it reappeared.
A perfect ambush, a battle between mathematics and starlight.
And to execute a shot that demanded such microscopic precision of timing, distance, and velocity, Lucy had chosen the one person who could do it flawlessly: Bisca, Fairy Tail's sharpshooter.
Luckily, just a few days ago, Bisca and Alzack had gone out on a mission and left Asuka at the guild.
Lucy, ever resourceful, had asked Gemini to copy Bisca, thinking the mimic could help comfort Asuka if she cried for her mother.
Gemini's duplication ability could even reproduce small personal items and magical tools, so replicating Bisca's rifle and ammo was trivial.
She hadn't expected that little trick to save everyone today.
Still… having her big finale stolen at the last moment left Lucy feeling just a little deflated.
Rhodes, however, showed no mercy to her pride.
"Sorry, sorry," he said, utterly unapologetic. "But come on, you came up with that plan. That was brilliant."
He crossed his arms and nodded approvingly. "Keep this up, and we'll be calling you Fairy Strategist Lucy Heartfilia."
"How...how can you exaggerate like that?" Lucy laughed shyly, scratching the back of her head, her cheeks flushed pink.
"No exaggeration at all," Rhodes said warmly. "On behalf of the Master, I hereby commend you. Outstanding work, Lucy."
"Ha… haha…" Lucy's embarrassed grin widened. Somehow, this kind of praise felt very familiar.
Rhodes thought to himself, 'she really does have a bit of Natsu's vibe sometimes.'
Carla wasn't nearly as easily impressed. "Hey," she said sharply, "since you clearly didn't expect Lucy to actually finish the fight, why'd you send her after it in the first place?"
"—"
Rhodes hesitated. He couldn't very well admit he'd chosen her because she was the best at attracting enemy aggression.
So he said instead, "Do you remember why I insisted Lucy dress up as the Bee Queen in the first place?"
Carla's eyes narrowed. "To indulge your questionable taste?"
"That's slander!" Rhodes protested indignantly. "How could I possibly be that childish?"
"Brother Rhodes said," Wendy interjected sweetly, "that he'd only explain part of the reason after the mission was done, and the rest after we got back to the guild."
Rhodes reached over and patted her head with a proud smile. 'Truly an angel.'
"Alright," he said finally. "Now I can tell you part of it."
He looked at the team, his tone growing more serious.
"Do you all remember the first time we encountered the Hellhound… and when we were first ambushed by the Bees?"
Everyone nodded.
"I reviewed both incidents carefully," Rhodes said, his eyes narrowing. "And I noticed something strange. In both cases, their primary target wasn't me, or Wendy, or even our wild monsters."
He turned toward Lucy.
"They were after you."
Lucy froze mid-breath. "M–me? Why me?"