Makarov locked the metal box in the cabinet at the very back of his office.
"No one touches it tonight. Tomorrow I'll look for a complete translation in the underground library."
Mira looked at Lin Yuan. "Especially you."
"Why me?"
"Your magic would eat the power in the stone. What if it ate the evidence too?"
"I don't eat stones."
"That's not convincing coming from someone who's eaten a table."
Makarov pushed them both out of the office and added three layers of barriers to the door.
Downstairs, the celebration was drawing to a close.
Natsu had fallen asleep on a pile of overturned chairs, while Gray was missing his shirt and insisting he hadn't taken it off himself. Macao and Wakaba had retreated to a corner to count their reward, so no one could demand they treat everyone in the name of celebrating.
Makarov kept Mira behind to clean the hall.
Lin Yuan had intended to return to the dormitory through the back door, but she blocked his way with a broom.
"You got away without punishment earlier. Get back here."
"I didn't take part in the brawl."
"You made Natsu and Gray run around the table."
"They charged at me first."
"The table lost two legs."
Lin Yuan looked at the long table lying on the floor, then finally took the other broom.
They started cleaning from opposite ends of the hall. Neither was willing to be slower than the other, and wooden cups and scraps of paper were soon swept into two little piles.
Lin Yuan sat down to wait while Mira put the last row of chairs in order. He closed his eyes for just a moment, and his consciousness sank into darkness.
He saw the ten thrones again.
This time, the thrones were no longer hidden in a boundless void.
The first stood above a city submerged by a torrential downpour, the second was sunk into a burning desert, and the third was surrounded by countless broken swords. Beneath each of the ten thrones lay an enormous figure whose face he couldn't make out, their golden blood flowing together into rivers.
Unfamiliar voices came from every direction.
"Campione."
"Usurper."
"King without borders."
Every voice carried enough majesty to make a person fall to their knees, yet Lin Yuan felt no fear.
His self in the dream was taller than he was now, and more unfamiliar. He walked over the remains of gods and took the light from each throne in turn, his movements as practiced as if he had done it many times before.
Lin Yuan followed behind him.
"Who are you?"
The man ahead didn't turn around.
The ten thrones went dark one by one, and a door appeared at the end of the battlefield. The Lin Yuan in the dream stopped before it, and for the first time, he didn't immediately reach out.
There might have been an enemy behind the door, or another god, or perhaps nothing at all.
But those weren't what he was truly hesitating over.
The scene suddenly shattered.
Countless doors opened in the darkness. Behind each was a different city, wilderness, or coastline, but no one stood by any of the doors waiting for him.
No matter how many times he won, the place he returned to was always empty.
The clamor of the Guild came from behind the last door.
Lin Yuan had just stepped forward when the black snake coiled behind the thrones opened its eyes. Its tail swept past, and the door vanished along with the light inside.
"Don't close the door."
Lin Yuan's eyes snapped open.
A broom had stopped just in front of his nose.
Mira held the broom and looked at him strangely. "Who closed the door?"
The magic lamps in the hall were still lit, and Natsu's snores came from the corner now and then. Lin Yuan was still sitting beside the long table, but the wooden cup beside his hand had a crack where he'd squeezed it.
"A dream," he said.
"What did you dream about?"
"I don't remember."
"You shouted loud enough for the whole Guild to hear."
Lin Yuan looked around. Natsu turned over, and Gray continued looking for his clothes. No one had woken up at all.
"They didn't hear."
"That's because each of them sleeps more soundly than the last."
Mira put the broom aside and sat down across from him.
"Did you dream about the Sleeping Church?"
"No."
"That snake?"
"No."
"Gods?"
Lin Yuan fell silent for a moment. "A lot of them."
Mira didn't ask what the gods looked like. She merely pointed her chin at the wooden cup in his hand.
"Are you afraid of them?"
"No."
"I can tell." She snorted. "You were even more practiced at arguing with that statue of a god than you are at arguing with me."
"I don't argue with you often."
"That's an argument right there."
Lin Yuan had nothing to say.
Mira remembered what he'd said in his sleep and asked, "What you're afraid of is the door closing?"
The ten thrones in his dream had already grown hazy, but the sight of the empty space behind the door remained clear.
"Maybe," Lin Yuan said. "I don't know what was supposed to be behind the door."
"What's so hard about that?"
Mira reached out and tapped the tabletop.
"Since you live here now, of course the Guild is behind the door. You go out on a job, and once you've finished fighting, you come back."
"What if it's gone when I come back?"
"How could Fairy Tail be gone?"
No sooner had she spoken than a tremendous crash came from the other end of the hall.
Somehow, Natsu had started fighting with Gray in his sleep. A long table crashed through a window, and the chairs they'd just put in order toppled all over the floor again.
Lin Yuan and Mira looked up at the same time.
Natsu poked his head out from under the table. "I didn't do it!"
Gray scrambled up on the other side. "You obviously did!"
A vein bulged on Mira's forehead. She grabbed the broom and charged over. Halfway there, she turned back to look at Lin Yuan, who was still sitting at the table.
"See?"
She pointed at the broken window and the mess covering the floor.
"Even if it really does collapse one day, we'll build another one in the same place."