User blog comment:FairyRaven/Fairy Tail Chapter 416: Tartarus Arc: Final Part, Review and Commentary/@comment-1535822-20150119133432/@comment-7418318-20150119151327

As horrible as the filler arc is, it did have one interesting aspect for this situation.

If one of the Spirits is able to create a pocket dimension with a normal flow of time like Ophiuchus is doing in Astral Spyritus (or however it's spelled again), that would allow Lucy to kinda go to the CSW and still get some proper training. If she went to the actual CSW she'd only have ten days to train until the year is over.