Internet Magic in Fairy Tail (Re-upload)

Achoo.

Seilah sneezed and suddenly noticed a figure descending from the sky.

"Nate... so it was you pulling the strings?" She seemed to have misunderstood something.

Nate thought for a moment and didn't deny it. "We meet again, Miss Seilah."

"I'm just here to participate in the Pokémon Tournament," Seilah repeated, looking somewhat disheveled. Humans are so annoying!

Nate almost laughed; her tone carried a mix of grievance and indignation.

He said, "The magic energy you sensed in this city isn't from Zeref, but something else."

If his guess was correct, it was likely the faint, sinister aura leaking from the Eclipse Gate. The device itself had been created by Zeref, so it made sense for it to carry traces of his magic energy.

"Oh? You know something?" Seilah frowned.

Nate smiled. "The curse magic you demons wield is fascinating. How about we strike a deal?"

"What kind of deal?"

"I'll tell you Zeref's Magic Net username, and in exchange, you'll teach me the secrets of curse magic."

Seilah looked surprised. Zeref has a Magic Net account? Given that Nate was the creator of Magic Net, it wasn't impossible for him to know about Zeref's activities.

"Humans cannot possibly master curse magic."

Nate shook his head. "I'm just curious about new knowledge."

After a moment of thought, Seilah agreed to the deal. She began explaining the secrets of curse magic.

"Curse magic derives its power from negative emotions, converting them into curse energy, which is then used to cast curses. The essence of curse magic is the power of malice.

"For demons, curse magic is innate, but for humans, it's extremely difficult to learn. That said, it isn't entirely impossible—Mirajane, for instance, acquired my Command Curse through her Take Over magic."

"I've told you the secrets of curse magic, so now it's your turn to—"

Seilah's voice trailed off, her delicate face frozen in shock. Her mouth hung slightly open as she stared blankly at Nate, who stood not far away.

In his palm swirled a faint trace of curse energy, born from negative emotions.

"This isn't so hard," Nate said with a light laugh. "Unfortunately, I don't have much negativity, so the curse energy is rather weak."

"You're a demon too?" Seilah murmured in disbelief.

You're the demon! Nate silently retorted in his mind, casually dispersing the weak curse energy. Thanks to his Six Eyes, controlling curse energy was even easier than manipulating magic. Come to think of it, the Six Eyes' ability originated from another world, where a certain sorcerer excelled in the use of curses.

"Zeref's Magic Net username is 'I Want to Live and Die Naturally.' You can find him through the friend search feature, but I doubt he'll want to see you."

With a chuckle, Nate said, "Goodbye, Miss Demon." With a casual wave, he vanished before her eyes.

He really isn't a demon? Seilah stood there in a daze, taking a long moment to recover. She immediately opened Magic Net, used the friend search feature, and found the corresponding account.

Message: I am Seilah of Tartaros, one of the Nine Demon Gates.

After sending the message, she received no response.

Seilah's expression turned anxious. "He didn't trick me, did he?"

Achoo.

Another sneeze escaped her. Seilah turned and headed back to Crocus, returning to her hotel to take a hot bath.

…

Curse energy, derived from curses.

On his way back to the hotel, Nate attempted to input curse energy into his Magic Net ring, but it was rejected. He decided to tweak the underlying code of Magic Net to allow it to accept users' curse energy. Even small gains add up—waste not, want not. Though he wasn't sure of its immediate application, as a typical hoarder, stocking up on resources seemed like a good idea.

Upon returning to the Grand Garden Hotel, Nate skipped the ongoing banquet and went straight to his room to modify the code. Altering foundational code was no small task. Adding a new feature was like stacking blocks on an unfinished building, whereas changing the underlying code was akin to tampering with its foundation.

While he was busy, Erza sent him a private message:

Knight: "Nate, you're not in the banquet hall?"

Sigma Male: "I'm in my room writing code."

Knight: "You work so hard. Should I bring you something to eat?"

Shortly after, there was a knock at his door. Erza entered, carrying a plate of sumptuous food.

"It's lively downstairs. Aren't you going to join the banquet?"

Nate thought to himself, Without me, you six get along just fine. If I show up, you might just gang up on me.

"Thanks, I didn't have dinner yet." Gratefully accepting the meal, Nate helped himself to the food.

Erza sat beside him, bringing up the topic of Seilah. "…She seems to be looking for Zeref. Should we inform the Guild Master about this?"

Nate thought for a moment and shook his head. "This was likely discussed in previous council meetings. Don't worry, Zeref isn't here."

"Is that black mage really alive? Someone from 400 years ago… how could they live this long?" Erza asked in astonishment.

"Your mom is also from 400 years ago." Nate chuckled. "Speaking of which, how's it going with your mom?"

Erza shook her head. "I added her as a friend, but she hasn't accepted yet."

"That's odd. I'll ask Irene later," Nate said.

After finishing his meal, Erza collected the dishes and left without disturbing him further.

Nate continued refining the code, taking over two hours to complete the changes. Testing the new functionality, he successfully input curse energy into the Magic Net ring, which was now absorbed. He ensured that curse energy and magic energy were stored separately within the Deep Web's core zone. Mixing the two could cause issues.

The Deep Web currently stored over 200,000 stars of magic energy, while curse energy barely registered at 0.01 stars.

Is there anything else I need to work on? Having completed the curse energy integration, Nate reviewed his tasks:

1. Forum System: His Thought Projection was working on this; it would likely be done in a few days.

2. Celestial Pokémon Farm: Irene's designs were visually impressive, needing only minor adjustments before mass deployment to harvest more magic energy.

3. Text-to-Speech: This new feature had been written today and required testing.

4. Satellite Map (Magic Net Map): This required satellite magic or ancient texts to implement and wasn't urgent.

That seemed to cover it for now.

Time to test the speech-to-text feature.

Nate opened Irene's profile and sent her a message.

Sigma Male: [Speech-to-Text Beta]

Sigma Male: "Your daughter sent you a friend request. Why haven't you accepted it?"

Irene was offline at first, but after some time, she came online and responded:

Scarlet Empress: "Kami-sama, I encountered the Black Dragon… 😔"