Fairy Tail Zero

src: i.ytimg.com

Fairy Tail Zero (Japanese: ???????? ??, Hepburn: Fear? Teiru Zero, stylized as FAIRY TAIL ZERØ) is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Hiro Mashima. The series is a prequel to Mashima's Fairy Tail manga, depicting the events leading to the formation of the titular wizards' guild. It was released in Monthly Fairy Tail from July 2014 to July 2015, running 13 issues, and was later published as a single volume by Kodansha USA in North America. The Fairy Tail anime television series included an adaptation of Fairy Tail Zero, with its episodes airing from January 9 to March 12, 2016.

Video Fairy Tail Zero

Plot

In the year X679, six-year-old Mavis Vermillion lives on Sirius Island as a servant of the Red Lizard wizards' guild. A violent skirmish breaks out between Red Lizard and Blue Skull, a rival guild, leaving Mavis the apparent sole survivor alongside Zera, the young daughter of Red Lizard's master. Seven years later, a band of treasure hunters--Yuri Dreyar, Precht Gaebolg, and Warrod Sequen--come to the island in search of its sacred relic, the Sirius Orb. As Yuri contends with a teenage Mavis over ownership of the orb, they discover it has already been taken by Blue Skull. Mavis proposes she and Zera accompany the treasure hunters to recover the orb.

The group journeys to the city of Magnolia, where Blue Skull has established a brutal regime. Mavis fails to bluff the guild's master into returning the orb with her illusory magic, and she retreats into the forest with her outmatched allies. There Mavis encounters a young man who, unbeknownst to her, is the infamous dark wizard Zeref. Mavis expresses sympathy for the youth, who is afflicted with a curse that kills all life around him, and convinces him to teach her and her allies how to use magic to combat Blue Skull. After they successfully use their magic to overthrow Blue Skull, Mavis discovers that the orb has become contaminated with evil magic. Yuri ignores her warnings and takes the orb for himself, only to become possessed by its magic and unwillingly fuse with Blue Skull's massive skeletal dragon, which rampages mindlessly through the city. Mavis exorcises the magic from Yuri by casting Law, a prototype spell learned from Zeref. As a side effect of using the spell, however, Mavis becomes permanently ageless.

After recovering and learning of Mavis's condition, Yuri dedicates himself to protecting her as a friend. He also reveals to Mavis that Zera is an illusion only she can perceive; Zera further confirms that the real Zera died during Blue Skull's raid on the island, and that Mavis subconsciously replicated her to cope with her death. Mavis accepts Zera as an illusion, causing her to disappear. To help the people of Magnolia rebuild, Mavis and the treasure hunters organize the Fairy Tail wizard guild in Zera's memory.

Maps Fairy Tail Zero

Characters

Mavis Vermillion (????????????, Meibisu V?mirion)

Voiced by: Mamiko Noto (Japanese); Leah Clark (English)

Mavis Vermillion is the future first guild master of Fairy Tail, who initially lives with the Red Lizard guild on Sirius Island as a six-year-old orphan to pay back her deceased parents' debt. She enjoys reading and remains optimistic despite squalid conditions.^[ch. 1] At age 13, she surprises others with her vast intellect and magic abilities of creating convincing illusions of people, animals and monsters.^{[ch. 2, 4]}

Zera (???, Z?ra)

Voiced by: Kana Hanazawa (Japanese); Jeannie Tirado (English)

The spoiled daughter of Red Lizard's master, Zera is a serious girl who is the same age as Mavis. She is initially cruel and dismissive towards Mavis during the latter's servitude to the guild, but becomes her friend and sole companion on Sirius Island following Blue Skull's attack,^{[ch. 1, 2]} and later joins her on her adventures.^[ch. 4] It is later revealed that she did not survive the attack, but had been an imaginary friend that Mavis subconsciously created.^[ch. 12]

Yuri Dreyar (????????, Y?ri Dore?)

Voiced by: Katsuyuki Konishi (Japanese); Clifford Chapin (English)

Yuri is the future father of Fairy Tail's third master Makarov Dreyar.^[ch. 1] He is a user of lightning magic. Before meeting Mavis, he is a greedy and selfish explorer from Sylph Labyrinth, a treasure hunter guild, whose main concern is claiming the valuable Sirius Orb. After Mavis appeals to his better nature, however, he becomes one of her most trusted friends.

Precht Gaebolg (??????????, Purehito Geiborugu)

Voiced by: Yoshihisa Kawahara (Japanese); David Trosko (English)

Known in the Fairy Tail storyline as Hades, Precht is one of Yuri's treasure hunting companions who later becomes Fairy Tail's second guild master, and much later the leader of the dark guild Grimoire Heart.^[ch. 2] He is a stern man who disapproves of his allies' foolish behavior, and is a skilled fighter who wields retractable blade-tipped chain weapons. During one of the initial fights with Blue Skull, his right eye is hit with a magic blast, and he wears an eyepatch afterwards.^{[ch. 6, 7]}

Warrod Sequen (???????????, W?roddo Sh?ken)

Voiced by: Hiroshi Shirokuma (Japanese); Cris George (English)

Warrod is a jovial man who cracks jokes at inopportune times. He gains the power to control plant life. He later ranks fourth among the Ten Wizard Saints.^[ch. 1]

Zeref (???, Zerefu)

Voiced by: Akira Ishida (Japanese); Joel McDonald (English)

Zeref, the main antagonist of Fairy Tail, appears as a young man who is afflicted with a curse that causes life around him to wither and die. His true identity is not known to the other characters, but Mavis is able to figure out his curse and become his friend. He helps Mavis' group by teaching them magic that allows them to fight Blue Skull guild.^[ch. 7]

Zeeself (?????, J?serufu)

Voiced by: Makoto Tamura (Japanese); Mark Fickert (English)

Zeeself is the master of the Red Lizard wizard guild who cruelly mistreats Mavis, his servant, and pampers Zera, his daughter. He is killed during Blue Skull's attack on his village.^[ch. 1]

Geoffrey (?????, Jofur?)

Voiced by: Takashi Matsuyama (Japanese); Jeffrey Schmidt (English)

Geoffrey is the master of Blue Skull, the wizard guild that wipes out Red Lizard. After being thwarted by Mavis and her allies, he escapes to form the Phantom Lord wizard guild that would later be presided by his descendant, Jose Porla.^[ch. 13]

src: i.ytimg.com

Development

In an interview published in the Fairy Tail Zero graphic novel, creator Hiro Mashima said he had been busy with the manga and supervising the anime that he did not have time to do a series for his Monthly Fairy Tail magazine. After taking on a short job designing characters for a video game, he had time to focus on manga and planned a spin-off. He conceived an old, grandfatherly character named Mavis, only to realize that "Mavis" was a feminine name, and his editors expected Mavis to be a female as a result. He then made her a young girl and integrated her story of becoming a ghost into the main series. Her popularity resulted in her making further appearances, and also inspired him to make Fairy Tail Zero focus on how the guild was founded.

The chapters for the monthly series were 20 pages each, as with the weekly, and spanned a year across 13 issues. Mashima had planned the story to involve Mavis overcoming a hatred of guilds, but dropped the idea due to page limitations. He designed the character Zera specifically for the series as a bully who becomes a kind person later in life, likening her to the character Éponine in Les Miserables. He designed thick, black eyebrows for her to contrast with Mavis's short, thin eyebrows. He also tried to keep Zera's identity a secret, although his editors already figured it out after reading the first chapter, and were surprised when she reappeared in the next one; however, he was able to fool Mavis's voice actor, Mamiko Noto.

src: i.ytimg.com

Release

Hiro Mashima began publishing the series in the first issue of Kodansha's Monthly Fairy Tail magazine on July 17, 2014. The series ended in the magazine's 13th and final issue on July 17, 2015.

The series is licensed in North America by Kodansha USA, who announced their license at an event at Books Kinokuniya in New York on November 15, 2015.

src: i.ytimg.com

Anime

An adaptation of Fairy Tail Zero was announced for the Fairy Tail anime television series on the jacket bands of Fairy Tail volume 52 and on the single collected volume of the series. The adaptation premiered on January 9, 2016. Funimation simulcasted the series with a broadcast dub in North America.

src: 3.bp.blogspot.com

Reception

The tank?bon of Fairy Tail Zero ranked 11th in sales by the end of its first week of release, selling approximately 104,878 copies. The volume ranked 21st on its second week, and 40th on the third week. The New York Times listed the North American release as the 10th best selling manga at the end of its first week, and 8th on the second week.

src: i.ytimg.com

Notes

src: www.anime-evo.net

References

Fairy Tail Zero manga volume by Hiro Mashima. Original Japanese version published by Kodansha. English translation published by Kodansha USA.

Vol. 1 (ch. 1-13): November 2015 (in Japanese). ISBN 978-4-06-395540-8. July 2016 (in English). ISBN 9781632362841.

Other sources

src: i.ytimg.com

External links

• Official anime website (in Japanese)
• Fairy Tail Zero (manga) at Anime News Network's encyclopedia

Source of article : Wikipedia