User blog comment:FairyRaven/Fairy Tail Chapter 362: Natsu vs. Jackal, Review and Commentary/@comment-24039250-20131129191034/@comment-7418318-20131129192304

But at least Mashima could have squeezed in a panel in which Happy was shown to have let go of Jackal and trying to escape the fireball, only to be overtaken.

That way he'd have survived because he was at the edge of the explosion, but like this...

I guess it's possible that next chapter Happy will tell them that it happened this way (I certainly hope so) and this way of drawing it was just to mess with people a bit more.

Still I won't get my hopes up.