The talk with Roubaul went well. Now Alex has all the information he needs about Nirvana. The most important information he needs now is Nirvana's entrance location because it's hidden somewhere in the forest.
After getting the information, Alex plans to go immediately. But the old man asks him to do it tomorrow because it's almost evening. Roubaul wants Alex to take Wendy and Carla to Nirvana with the pretext of doing a job to give them experience, so it's better to do it tomorrow morning.
Alex agrees and his team stays in the village for the night. It's also a good chance to get closer to Wendy and Carla before doing the "job". Though it seems he doesn't need to worry because Cana and Meteor seem to already get very close to them.
Wendy is very curious about the outside world, Mages, and other Magic Guilds because she has never left this forest since she arrived here. She is still very young, after all, so there's no way Roubaul will send her for a job outside the village even if it's an easy fake job.
That's why she is very excited when Cana tells her different stories like about Magnolia, the Fiore Kingdom, Ishgar, Magic Councils, Magic Guilds, Fairy Tail, famous Mages, etc. But what she likes the most are Cana's stories about the jobs they did because she can hear about different types of Magic and exciting adventure.
Wendy also seems very impressed with Alex after Cana tells her that he becomes the youngest S-Class in Fairy Tail's history at 14 years old. She even asks Alex about how he became strong, which he answers with a simple answer.
"Training."
"Just training?"
"Yeah, but what you train and how you train is very important too. I always think that the correct training is the key to our progress. To make the correct training menu or method, you need to know what you need to train and how you will train them. That's why knowing yourself is very important and you must have a strong will to improve yourself because if you don't have a strong will, you will never be serious with everything you do, including training."
Alex doesn't know how to teach this correctly, so he only tells her what he knows and what he experiences. He doesn't know whether what he did will be suitable for Wendy, but he knows that it will still help no matter how small, so he explains it sincerely.
Then when they eat the roasted meat, Roubaul tells Wendy and Carla to follow Alex's team on a job. They are confused why he suddenly issues a job and with Mages from another Guild at that.
"Initially, I wanted to ignore this job because this is a difficult job. But I decided to accept it now that an S-Class Mage from a big Guild is here. I have a good relationship with Fairy Tail's Guild Master, so it shouldn't be a problem and Alex-boy has agreed to it."
"Well, the job's pay is good and it's located in this forest. Might as well do it while I explore this forest."
"If it's really difficult, then why are you asking us to follow them? Won't it be better for them to do it by themselves with their power?" Wendy asks confusedly.
"Because I want you to gain experience doing a high-class job. Also, this forest is our territory. It doesn't feel right to just ask Mages from another Guild to do the job requested to us without doing anything. Besides, isn't it a good chance for you to learn about how powerful Mages from other Guilds work?"
Wendy buys Roubaul's reason with sparkling eyes because what he says really piques her interest. She has heard about Alex's and Cana's Magic from them, but she hasn't witnessed them using their Magic in real situations.
Also, as Roubaul says, it's a good chance for her to see how Mages from other Guilds work. She has always been curious about high-class jobs too. So this is a good chance to see what she always wants to know.
The next morning, they make some preparations before going on the job. Alex tells Wendy that it's very important to prepare well before doing any job because with good preparations, their jobs will be much easier.
"Preparations for each job are different, depending on many factors like their duration, difficulty, location, what kind of job it is, and even with whom we will be doing the job. However, we always need to prepare supplies like food, water, and even spare clothes, especially for jobs that might last for days. This is an investigation job, so it might take a while to finish, that's why supplies are important. We also always need to prepare for fights anytime and anywhere because jobs offered to Mages mostly need us to fight. So we need to make sure we have enough magic power to fight anytime."
Alex teaches Wendy the basic preparations before doing jobs. He never neglects preparations now because he has seen many of his Guild Mates failed and hurt badly because they didn't prepare enough for their jobs.
Failing is not so bad, being hurt badly and even dying is something he wants to avoid the most. It's better to take his time preparing for his job and be prepared for any situation than being killed because he isn't prepared well enough.
Even with good preparations, there are still risks of dying in difficult jobs. But the risks will be lower rather than if he isn't prepared for the jobs. For example, one can die from being bitten by a venomous snake in the forest if they didn't prepare an antidote beforehand despite knowing that there are venomous snakes in that forest.
Anyway, after making preparations, they finally set out to find Nirvana. Only Alex knows the true purpose of this "job". The others are only told that they are tasked to investigate a magical anomaly in the forest.
Even Cana doesn't question the job because Roubaul is really good at making it look like a real job. Her only worry is whether it is fine for accepting this job without their Guild Master's permission, but Alex tells her it will be fine. He will explain everything to Makarov later, so she doesn't need to worry.
The team sets out and dives into the forest. Now Meteor finally has a job. He's working as Wendy's and Carla's ride. They are small, so they can ride the bear that's as big as a donkey now. He seems to enjoy being ridden too because it's like playing for him.
They don't have a map and Roubaul only remembers the general location of the entrance. He tells Alex the clues of the spot where the entrance is hidden, so the team still needs to look for it based on the clues that Roubaul tells Alex.
It is not easy to find the location in this vast forest among all the big trees that block their sights. Inexperienced people would be lost because it is hard to navigate in this forest. Fortunately, Alex is a good hunter and forests are like his backyards, so he knows how to find his ways even in new and unknown forests.
Even so, it still takes them hours to find the entrance. They could be faster, but Alex takes his time to teach the others on how to navigate in a forest like this, especially to Wendy. They also stop to hunt some wild animals and even fight some magical creatures on their way which take more of their time.
It's night when they find the entrance, so they decide to rest after Alex confirms that they've really found the hidden entrance. They set up a camp, cook some food, and sleep after setting up some defense to avoid being attacked by wild beasts.
The next morning, Alex finally opens the entrance after they have breakfast. The entrance is hidden in a big tree and it glows brightly when Alex activates it. They get inside and arrive in a completely different place.
Everything around them is dark now, but they aren't in a forest anymore. They are inside a building that seems to be made out of metal. There are also some devices and furniture in the big dark room.
"This must be the control room. Alright, don't touch anything here. We don't want to activate this dangerous thing. Our task is to deactivate this ancient weapon forever because it's just in sleep mode, so it can be activated anytime unless we destroy its power supplies. Let's explore this whole place to find the power generators. We'll move together because there might be some defense mechanisms here, so we need to be very careful."
Alex has explained the task of this job to his team and he made it sound more dangerous than it should be. It's to make sure they are being careful here because even if there's no enemy, something very bad will happen if they make a mistake and activate Nirvana instead.
Fortunately, they listen to Alex and become very careful. Wendy and Carla are careful because this is their first high-class job while Cana and Meteor want to show how capable they are to Wendy and Carla, so they become serious.
The team explores the control room first and carefully checks everything there. Then after a while, they finally find a map of the whole Nirvana structure. Of course, it includes the location of the Lacrima Crystals that powered up this whole thing, so now they just need to find them.
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Ch. 129. S-Class Candidates