It took some convincing, but eventually, we had boarded Phantom Lord's machine, which was huge and shaped like some badass mechanical villain... Impressive, but I had my doubts about the effectiveness of this whole thing.

As we were walking, I leaned down to the blonde and whispered in her ear quietly enough to prevent even the sharp-eared dragon slayer from hearing me, "Quick question, there was an orange haired guy running towards us as we left with a weird look in his eye, do you know him?"

The blonde shrugged, evidently still irritated with me, but said nothing. This was something I would have to clear up eventually, though I wasn't sure just how much I cared right now; I already had two things on my mind, what I would say to Jose to get him to believe me, and why that orange haired guy had a weird sense about him...

I wasn't terribly perceptive about sensing a person's energy without their blood, so if I could tell that something was off about him from here, then it had to be a pretty major thing.

No, now was not the time to be thinking about this, Jose would be hard enough to convince without having my mind on other things, but I had a plan, one that would certainly put him on edge, even if it didn't convince him completely. My old flair was tucked safely into my pocket, where it would remain until it was needed, if it came out too soon, I would probably be carted to the Magic Council before I was able to get back at Jose.

As we neared what I assumed was the control room, I reached over to the blonde and patted her on the head, "Remember what I said and stay strong." She was confused for half a second before a person in a mask jumped out from a side corridor and grabbed her, pulling her away from me. 

That in and of itself made me want to kill someone, but I had to stay on task, the blonde was surprisingly strong, she could handle what Jose would throw at her... There was no way my guild would allow her to stay in their hands for long, the orange haired guy had already seen her being taken, so I had no doubt that everyone already knew.

A person was about to leap out at me, probably to pull the same shit they had with blonde, but before they could, my sword was drawn and I was glaring them down, daring them to try, "I asked to see Jose, is he close?" As I spoke, I watched the hooded figure shutter as Metal man sighed heavily.

"Give it up, she's too good. I'm just going to let the Master deal with her." His voice was cold and uncaring, but I couldn't help but grin, he recognized how good I was, the snarky part of me cooed slightly.

"Aw, the metal man recognizes that I'm a threat? I'm so flattered!" 

Immediately he spun around and sent a metal arm at me, "I didn't say that, you pea brain; I just don't want to deal with how irritating you are! Keep up this shit and I'll change my mind, you got that?" I giggled sadistically as I dodged and nodded, he could play tough all he wanted, but he couldn't fool me.

We approached the room and my grin dropped as I felt the power building up, almost like there was a force field around the area, but that wasn't it... These people were all really powerful. (Not Laxus level or anything, but compared to most ordinary mages, they were really good.)

Thankfully, Metal man didn't seem to care all that much for dramatic timing, so he threw the door open and slouched his way in, "Boss, this chick wanted to see you, she said you would want to see her too."

I was all prepared for some crazy intimidating show of power, but when I entered... I couldn't stop a snort from bursting out of me. This ultra-powerful group was dressed more like a group of traveling entertainers than they were a powerful wizard guild.

Despite that, I knew better than to underestimate them, any of them. Power was not determined by appearance, as fun as that would be, and no matter how laughable they were I could feel an immense amount of power coming off of them.

"What do you want, brave fly," The obvious leader asked, as the Metal man went to stand in the lineup, creating a rather impressive group picture.

I grinned slightly, this is where the main part of the strategy came in, "Well I needed to come and check up on one of my former clients, see how you were doing and whatnot." Confusion filled the air as I continued, "I suppose you never knew my face when you worked for me before, perhaps you would recognize the name, Ghost of Fiore a bit more?" 

Gasps came from several people in the room, but Jose simply stared at me, skepticism obvious, "And what proof do you have to back that claim up?" He questioned, tilting his head and walking forward to circle me, "Do you realize how many people have pretended to be the Ghost of Fiore? They know names and dates, a few have even had the easily identified flair to 'back up' their claims, yet none have been foolish enough to try and pin me as being a customer of theirs."

The trap was set, and he was beginning to fall for it. I eased out my flair and began twirling it in my fingers as he came to stand in front of me again, "The first person you asked me to kill was a seemingly insignificant person in Ida, but under closer inspection, it turns out that this man was not only a rival within your old guild, he had also been the man your ex-wife cheated on you with. Along with the assassination request, you sent a cruel list of things you wanted me to do to him before he died, which included evisceration and an old method of torture known as the blood eagle. I ignored these requests because I'm not a monster, and simply killed the man as he lay in bed with another woman."

The more I spoke, the less color Jose had; he knew I was telling the truth, but I was having fun now. Watching him suffer like this made me far happier than it should have, "You made this request before I earned the name Ghost of Fiore, but even after we both began moving up, you still used my services. The requests for overly cruel assassinations continued, but were always ignored; because, once again, I'm not a monster."

By this time, Jose looked as though he were a mere black and white painting and the people behind him all had looks of shock and fear in their eyes, even metal man... or should I say Black Steel, seemed terrified by this new information

My sweet smile was back as I leaned forward to him and showed off my flair, "Is that enough proof for you, Jose?" I sauntered past him and walked to a rather convenient seat that allowed me to watch over him with maximum smugness. 

"Wha... How?" Jose continued trying to talk for a moment but was unable to get out any words, while his henchmen were simply sitting off to the side, too afraid or intimidated to say anything.

My chin rested on my hand as I watched everyone before I spoke again, "If you guys aren't careful, I'm going to start assuming that Phantom Lord's best are all a bunch of fly traps with how you're staring at me."

As amusing as this was, we had other stuff that needed to be done, so I stood up and grabbed Jose by his collar, cutting off his stammering by slamming my knee into his gut, which got the immediate attention of everyone in the room, "Now that you're past that, I'm obligated to tell you that Fairy Tail happens to be under my protection, by attacking it, you've provoked me, so now I get an excuse to beat the crap out of you."

***

I crouched on the ground, staying in my defensive position as I panted, attacking recklessly did seem to be my M.O. lately, but in this case, it seems to have done more harm than good. Blood was dripping from my nose, but all I could do at this point was run forward again, longsword in hand (my dagger had been tossed away quite a while ago), and attempt to strike him again.

I was quick, quicker than most normal people, yet even I was struggling with this three on one fight; Black Steel, the earth guy, and the fireman had left right away, apparently, they had more important things to do. But that still left me fighting the water woman, the blindfolded dude, and Jose himself.

If this were a one on one fight, I could certainly take out both the blindfolded dude and the rain woman, but with all three, I was getting trashed. 

"I see why you were the best assassin back in your day," Jose's confidence had come back in spades, which was beyond frustrating, especially when you add to it the fact that every time I got close to hitting Jose, a wall of water or wind would get between us. Jose had yet to use his magic in this fight, "But it seems you've met your match here. You're good, but I expected more from the top assassin in all of Fiore."

His hand made contact with my face for a fraction of a second, but that was all it took. Power surged through me, seemingly bypassing my magical immunity and I was sent flying. I hit the wall so hard that the whole room seemed to shake... Though, that could have been my brain reverberating against my skull.

I tried to get back up, I really did, but the room was spinning so fast that there was no way I could think to move.

"Well, now that we're done with that pitiful excuse for a fight, I must go attend to Miss Heartfilia. You provided an adequate distraction, my dear Ghost. Aria, Juvia, take her into custody." I couldn't see where he was, or even if there was more than one copy of him, but I knew he was leaving.

"You won't win," I croaked out, trying to stabilize my vision. Thankfully, this seemed to stop Jose, who paused briefly before I continued speaking, "You can't win against Fairy Tail. Do you want to know why?"

Jose sighed slightly, "Not particularly, but I imagine you're going to tell me anyways."

I nodded slightly, "You right... It wouldn't be a good fight without... someone trying to monologue." He chuckled slightly, but I ignored him and continued, "You'll lose because you're underestimating them. You call them flies and treat them as though they are the scum of the earth, but you neglect to realize that they are fighting for their home and family, compared to fighting for money.

"Underestimating your enemy will eventually lead you to fail, which happened to me today, but it's also happening to you right now..." With shaking arms, I pushed myself off the ground and got into an unstable standing position, "The people here genuinely care for their guildmates, which is something I suspect you wouldn't understand even if it came up and bit you on the face."

One more go, I could give that much.

With a surprising amount of speed, I propelled myself forward, blinking something out of my eye (I later found that it was blood), as I aimed for the blindfolded man instead of Jose. Perhaps it was shock, but the water woman made no attempt to stop me as I ran, making it to the blindfolded guy before he processed what was happening.

My pommel collided with his temple, which nearly sent him down with just that, but I was done underestimating these guys; I followed my first hit with about three other strikes to his stomach and knee, which sent him crashing to the ground.

Perhaps I could have taken out the water woman if I had kept going, but I was still feeling the hit that sent me into the wall and my stamina had been knocked out of me. If I stayed I would lose again, and perhaps even become a liability to the guild, which was the last thing I wanted.

Without another thought, I bolted to the window and allowed my body weight to smash through, trying not to cry out as the glass shards cut into my arm.

Let me make this clear, as if it wasn't painfully so already; I had no plan when I jumped out the window, I could have just been jumping to my death, but apparently fortune favored the stupid at that moment, and there was a ledge not too far down from where I fell out. I was able to maneuver my body just enough to where I landed painfully on my side... Yeah, it hurt like hell, but I was alive, and a couple of scoots allowed me to get out of the view of the window I had just jumped through.

If someone came for me now, I was done for, but thankfully, despite my hearing them talking about the fact that I had gotten away, no one seemed to want to follow me. 

Perhaps my feat was simply so idiotic I was no longer worth following... I prayed Laxus never found out about this, but otherwise, I was okay with that.