X717.
Five years after graduating from Fairy Academy, Darwin temporarily left Fairy Tail to travel abroad, using the excuse that he "wanted to see more of the world while still young." In less than six months, he was awarded the title of Wizard Saint by the Council. Imdiately afterward, Darwin pivoted and joined the Magic Council. Leveraging his imnse strength and formidable family background, he advanced rapidly within the Council, soon becoming one of the councilors.
X718.
The Fiore Royal Family, noticing that Fairy Tail had beco the sole dominant power in the dostic magic world, could no longer sit idly by. They personally stepped in to establish the Fiore Kingdom Public Magic Academy and supported several entrepreneurs in founding private magic schools, hoping to provide a counterweight to Fairy Academy. Under the Royal Family’s manipulation, Fairy Academy’s influence indeed began to weaken.
X720.
Darwin and Erza married, and they had a son following the wedding.
X730.
The six mbers of the "First Generation Fairies" simultaneously announced their retirent into seclusion.
Precht appointed Makarov as the third-generation Master of Fairy Tail.
Weston appointed Erza as the second-generation Principal of Fairy Academy, with Chris as the Vice-Principal.
After succeeding the position, Erza quickly implented reforms at Fairy Academy. She changed the original "6 1" academic year system to a "6 3 3" system: six years of elentary school, three years of middle school, and three years of university.
The enrollnt age was adjusted from "under 12" to "above 6." Every year, after passing the entrance examination, new students would complete six years of magical elentary school. If they had no intention of pursuing magic further, they could graduate and leave. If they wished to go deeper into the magical arts, they had to apply for an academy assessnt to promote to the middle school departnt; the sa applied to the university departnt.
Furthermore, to ensure students didn’t beco fragile "greenhouse flowers" buried in books, only the six elentary years remained full-ti. The three years of middle school beca part-ti, and the three university years were changed to a "Field Study System."
Through Erza’s reforms and Darwin’s constant support from the Council, Fairy Academy funneled a massive amount of talent into the Fiore Kingdom every year, greatly increasing the magic popularization rate. Other magic academies followed suit, and from then on, major magic schools beca highly bonded with nearby magic guilds, essentially becoming "talent cultivation bases" for their respective guilds. However, this also caused their individual influence within the Fiore Kingdom to dwindle over the years.
X748.
Due to several consecutive years of economic downturn, a large number of magic schools declared bankruptcy. In this environnt, only Weston’s Fairy Academy and the Royal Family’s Fiore Kingdom Public Magic Academy remained standing. Young, magically talented youths gradually gravitated toward these two institutions, causing the "Magic Academy" scene to show signs of a second spring.
X760.
Fairy Academy, Fairy Club.
"Did you hear?"
"Apparently, there are exchange students coming to our school this year!"
This sudden news instantly revitalized the students who were drowsy from the burden of schoolwork.
"Exchange students? From where?"
"Where else? The only one in the country qualified to compare with our Fairy Academy is the Public Academy founded by the Royal Family!"
"You an the Fiore Kingdom Public Magic Academy? But our relationship with them isn’t exactly great, is it? Why the sudden exchange student program? It’s nonsensical!"
"Exactly! Every year during recruitnt, their people always jump out to snatch students from us! What’s more annoying is that they always look down on people just because they have the Royal Family backing them..."
"I heard soone say those exchange students were specifically chosen to establish their academy’s prestige and authority here!"
"What!? To show off? Hmph! I knew nothing good cos out of that school!!"
"It’s too early to judge. Let’s wait until they arrive and see..."
The grudge between Fairy Academy and the Fiore Kingdom Public Magic Academy went back a long way. Years ago, after the passing of Queen Lily, the succeeding monarchs could not stand to see Fairy Tail’s developnt reaching its zenith as the sole power in the magic world. They shalessly stepped in to create and support various magic schools to compete with Fairy Academy.
The rift was ford then. During the economic depression of the ’40s, other schools went bankrupt, and the Public Academy took the opportunity to annex their resources, becoming Fairy Academy’s sole rival. For over a decade since, while there hadn’t been major conflicts, small frictions were constant.
As they spoke, the crowd instinctively looked toward a corner of the club. Sitting there was a handso youth holding a pen and paper, calculating math problems. The atmosphere of the Fairy Club was much like Fairy Tail—everyone did their own thing, and no matter how loud others were, they could concentrate intensely on the task at hand.
This youth was the perfect example. Sunlight spilled through the window onto his desk, illuminating the mountain-like piles of scratch paper. The paper was originally pure white, but it had turned a grayish-black, covered in letters, numbers, axes, and geotric shapes. Anyone looking at it would feel dizzy or nauseous—especially these students who knew exactly what those symbols implied.
However, the youth treated this pile of "filthy" things like treasure, taking them everywhere. Even more terrifying was the output! If soone looked away for just a mont and looked back, it seed as if the papers had learned to reproduce, with a new stack appearing out of nowhere.
"I say, Descartes."
"Do you know anything?"
The boy nad Descartes looked up, his clear eyes showing a hint of confusion. "What did you say? I wasn’t listening just now."
The crowd seed to have expected this reaction and collectively facepald.
"Exchange students! Exchange students!"
"Word is that students from the Public Magic Academy are coming here this year!"
"You must have heard sothing about this, right?"
No one doubted that this classmate nad Descartes had access to such information channels. In the Fairy Club... no, in the entire Fairy Academy and even all of Magnolia, his family background was unmatched!
After all, he was the great-grandson of the first Master of Fairy Tail, the grandson of the current Chairman of the Magic Council and the Academy Principal, the son of the Middle School Dean and the town’s wealthiest woman, and the biological nephew of the Mayor of Magnolia—
Descartes Lagrange!!
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