Levy McGarden

Levy McGarden is a 17 year old mage from Fairy Tail. She is the leader of Shadow Gear.

Appearance
Levy is a young teen-aged girl with a slender build and stands at a height below average for her age. She sports long blue hair, with a slight purple hue, normally tied up with a colored bandana around her head and dresses inconsistently. Her member stamp is located on her left shoulder blade. When performing tasks like researching, she wears a pair of Gale-Force Reading Glasses.

Personality
Levy has a cheerful and upbeat personality, being able to get along with many other guild members. Her kind spirit is shown by her reluctance to get involved in the many brawls the guild has together, as she is too nice to fight "just for fun." She is also a very forgiving person, as she reconciled with Gajeel for torturing herself and her teammates during The Phantom Lord Arc. Their friendship has also grown to the point where he has become her partner for the current S-Class Promotion Trial (albeit Gajeel more or less declared himself her partner). Levy is characterized by her love for reading, which is how she and Lucy Heartfilia quickly became friends through their mutual love. Levy has also been the only person to read Lucy's novel by Lucy's consent, showing their level of trust in each other. Levy can also be manipulative at times. She rewrote Fried Justine's runes seemingly for the whole boat in the S-Class Trial arc, but she actually only did it for her and her partner Gajeel. This surprises Lucy, but Levy shyly and sarcastically says she's sorry to her as she advances.

History
Not much is known about Levy's past, but it is known that her fellow Shadow Gear members Jet and Droy have asked her out. However, both were rejected by her in a matter of moments.

Daybreak arc
Levy was first introduced as wanting to accept the mission to retrieve the book Daybreak from the Duke of Everlue's mansion, though Makarov advised her not to take it because the quest was likely to become complicated.

Phantom Lord arc
Levy, with Jet and Droy were all attacked by the Phantom Lord Guild's Gajeel Redfox being badly beaten, as well as nailed to a tree in the "Crucifixion" style. Out of the three, Levy was the one who got branded with the Phantom Lord symbol on her stomach. This event is the trigger that starts the war between Fairy Tail and Phantom Lord. During the rest of the arc, Levy, Jet, and Droy were in the hospital recovering. After recovering, she celebrated with the guild over the end of Phantom Lord.

Fighting Festival arc
Levy is seen together with Jet and Droy swimming in the guild's new indoor swimming pool. After Makarov introduces Gajeel as a new Fairy Tail member, Levy is seen saying to Lucy that Gajeel's presence is not bothering her, although her shaking says otherwise. Levy, together with Jet and Droy, is then seen admiring Lucy's bravery to insult Gajeel as he acted arrogant towards her. As Jet and Droy went to beat up Gajeel for what he did during the Fairy Tail-Phantom Lord war, Levy tried to stop them. However, Laxus Dreyar arrives and beats him up also. Levy realizes that Gajeel was not fighting them on purpose since he want them to recognize him as their nakama. As Levy tries to stop Laxus, he shoots her with a lightning bolt, but is surprised when Gajeel takes the blow for her. The two then leaves. She is next seen participating in the Miss Fairy Tail contest where she uses her Magic to make fancy text appear in midair impressing Jet and Droy. After her turn, she (along with the other contestants) was turned into stone by Evergreen and used as an hostage. When Erza Scarlet defeats Evergreen she and the rest of the girls return back to normal. While Makarov is briefing them about Laxus and the Raijinshuu's actions, Laxus activates Hall of Thunder making the whole town his hostage. She then notices that Freed's restrictions are a form of written based Magic and says she'll get rid of the barrier since she believes that Natsu and Gajeel can defeat Laxus. Gajeel is watching Levy undoing Freed's enchantments, and is amazed by her skill. Levy temporarily looks at him and tells him to defeat Laxus.



After Lucy defeats Bixlow, Levy states that's to be expected by Lucy and she'll do her best as well. She manages to figure out the code and overwrite Freed's enchantments and getting rid of the barrier allowing Natsu and Gajeel to leave. She tells them to stay away from each other, since Freed's enchantments are still set up around the area and if they were both caught in one, it would be over.

With ten minutes left until the Hall of Thunder is activated, Porlyusica arrives to help Makarov, who had a heart attack over Laxus's actions. Levy escorts her to Makarov. After examining Makarov, Porlyusica tells Levy to look for Laxus and bring him there. She thinks that Makarov doesn't have long left. Levy finds Laxus preparing to cast Fairy Law in Caldia Cathedral, she informs him that the master is dying and begs her to stop and visit him. But Laxus sees this as an opportunity to be master and casts Fairy Law. However, it fails much to Laxus' confusion. Suddenly, Freed arrives and informs them that everyone is safe. He also explains that the reason Fairy Law failed is because Laxus' heart still treats Fairy Tail his Nakama. Laxus was eventually defeated and Levy participated in the Fantasia parade together with the other Miss Fairy Tail contestants. She is later seen raising her hand, along the rest of the guilds, and signals to Laxus that they will be always watching over him.

Edolas arc
Levy happily welcomes back Lucy together with Jet and Droy. She is later seen at Wendy and Charle's Welcome Party. She is then seen surprised to hear that Gildarts failed to do the 100-year quest.

She was sucked through the Anima and turned into lacrima along with the rest of the guild and the town of Magnolia. However, they were freed thanks to Mystogan, who returned everyone back to Earthland (excluding Gray, Natsu, Lucy, Wendy, Erza, Gajeel, Charle, and Happy), through the Reverse Anima Process, and so he, like all the rest of the guild and Magnolia is unaware of the events of Edolas.

S-Class Trial arc
Levy was named as a candidate for the S-Class Wizard Promotion Trial. She is surprised at first and wonders if Makarov actually called her name. Jet and Droy are delighted to hear her nomination. Jet and Droy start arguing about who's going to be her partner, while Levy begins to lose heart at the idea due to her lack of strength, when Gajeel comes up to her and proclaims if she wants to be an S-class, he'll be her trial partner. Though she still remained pessimistic about her chances of even lasting long, Gajeel gave her words of encouragement, saying he'd make her strong causing her to blush.

As the participants head towards the island, Levy gets dizzy due to the heat. Shortly after, the master arrives to explain the rules of the first trial. When the first trial started, Freed used a rune on the boat, which prevents everyone from leaving the boat for 5 minutes, however, Levy managed to rewrite the rune in an instant, though she only lets herself and Gajeel leave. Lucy was devastated that Levy didn't help her, but she told Lucy that she was sorry in a joking tone and that they were heading on ahead. It is unknown which path she and Gajeel have chosen, but they managed to pick the quiet path so they didn't have to fight against anyone to clear the first trial.

In the second exam, Levy and Gajeel start search for the first guild master's grave. Gajeel starts complaining about the Trial, saying how he wished to go up against Natsu and Erza. Levy gets mad that he doesn't "Look at (her)" and runs away from Gajeel, only to be surrounded by two Grimore Heart members. Giving her no hint, they make quick work of her and were about to kill her. Gajeel saves her, causing her to blush. After Levy and Gajeel find out that their plan was to "poach all the fairies on Tenrou Island", Yomazu uses Gou; which creates a painful sound. Kawazu goes in for the next strike and Levy pulls Gajeel out the way so they wouldn't get hurt, only for Kawazu to follow and then bombarded them with his Egg Busters, raining a barrage of punches at the Fairy Tail Mages; Gajeel managed to dodge most of them, but Levy ends taking the ones that didn't hit Gajeel. Levy uses her Solid Script: Silent to cancel out Yomazu's Gou and Solid Script: Fire to boil the eggs that Kawazu sent. However, Kawazu sends more eggs causing her fire to break apart. When Gajeel is hit by Dark Sword: Narukami which slices right through his body; Levy burst into tears. Gajeel tells her to let everyone know what is happening on the island. She uses Solid Script: Iron to create iron for Gajeel; telling him to "Please, don't die!" as she escapes and runs off.

As she looks for the other members of Fairy Tail, she frantically ponders to herself about what could be the reason for Grimoire Heart's impending invasion on Tenrou Island, and that she must warn every Fairy Tail Mage present on the island before something catastrophic happens. Not watching where she was going, Levy accidentally trips and then passes out. When she came to, she finds herself in front of Erza and Juvia. They asks her what happened and how she got all those injuries. Levy then presumably tells them about Grimoire Heart, as they are next seen running to Gajeel as he falls after just defeating Yomazu and Komazu. Levy runs to to him, telling him to "hang in there." She is then seen shivering in anxiety while leaning over Gajeel's battered body.

As Erza begins to interrogate Yamazu, Levy announces that she'll take Gajeel to the camp. She is later seen being surrounded with the mages deployed by Grimoire Heart with Gajeel still unconscious hanging from her shoulder. She presumably defeated or ran away from the mages as she is seen crying over Gajeel and Mirajane at the camp. Suddenly Elfman arrives at the camp carrying the unconscious Evergreen, he unwillingly admits that the enemy is strong and that they just can't win. Although Levy was also troubled by the truth, she stood up and stated that it is true about the enemy being strong. However that just means, that Fairy Tail should unite and become a group just as strong. She states that the exam made everyone go their separate ways, but the situation now calls for everyone to unite and she yells out loud to everyone and telling them to unite their feelings and fight back.

Levy is then seen watching over Gajeel, Mirajane, Elfman, and Lisanna when Pantherlily arrives and tells her that Natsu and the others are on their way. Soon after, Rustyrose shows up and challenges her along with Pantherlily and Lisanna to battle. She is later seen when she notices Bluenote's Magic.

Equipment
Gale-Force Reading Glasses: Levy, an avid reader, possesses a pair of enchanted reading glasses that allow her to read at an extremely accelerated rate.

Magic and Abilities
Caster Magic User: Levy has not demonstrated much in the way of actual fighting but she must be a powerful mage since she is chosen as an S-Class candidate by Makarov.


 * Solid Script: Allows Levy to make the words she write solid and throw them at the enemies with different effects. For example, by writing the word Fire, the word fire ignites into flames.


 * Solid Script: Fire: Levy writes "Fire" on air and words begins to burn. Levy used this word as a burning shield to protect herself from Kawazu's Egg Buster.
 * Heat Spell: Levy transforms her "Fire" word into blue fire. (Anime only)
 * Solid Script: Silent: Levy writes "Silent" on air and throw it to her enemy. This word can be used to cancel sound based attacks.
 * Solid Script: Iron: Levy writes "Iron" on air from iron words. Levy used this for feeding Gajeel.

Enhanced Knowledge in Languages: Levy is very talented in the field of languages and can even translate several ancient languages. With this aptitude, she has shown being able to bypass barriers erected by Freed's rune-based enchantments in one minute and negated Yomazu's kanji-based Solid Script attacks.

Appearances in Other Media
Levy appears as a playable character in the first Fairy Tail Video Game, Fairy Tail Portable Guild, and its sequel, Fairy Tail Portable Guild 2. In both games, she is unlocked through quests.

Major Battles

 * with Jet and Droy VS Gajeel Redfox = LOST
 * with Gajeel Redfox VS Kawazu and Yomazu = UNDETERMINED
 * with Pantherlily and Lisanna vs Rustyrose= CURRENT

Droy & Jet
Levy, Jet, and Droy are childhood friends and often played together as children. In one point, they joined Fairy Tail Guild and formed the team Shadow Gear. Both Jet and Droy have crushes on Levy, but Levy already rejected in a matter of seconds. Later on, when Levy was chosen to take part in the S-Class Mage trial, both of them competed to become Levy's partner, but ended up distraught when Gajeel unexpectedly volunteered himself for the task.

Lucy Heartfilia
She and Lucy Heartfilia quickly became friends through their mutual love for literature. Levy has also been the only person to read Lucy's novel by Lucy's consent, showing their level of trust in each other. However, when she rewrote Freed Justine's runes in the S-Class Trial arc, she only did it for her and her partner Gajeel. This surprises Lucy, but Levy added she's sorry to her as she advanced. In Edolas, this is quite the opposite as Levy and Lucy have a strong hate for each other, as Lucy is very impatient with her.

Gajeel Redfox
Levy's first encounter with Gajeel occurred under less than cordial circumstances, since he was still affiliated with Phantom Lord at the time and was given an order to destroy the Fairy Tail Guild in order to provoke the members to go out on a war against Phantom Lord. As a result, Levy became one of his victims during the initial attack (along with Jet and Droy). After the war between the two guilds and Gajeel's subsequent convertion over to Fairy Tail, Levy was among those who had their doubts about Gajeel's entrance to the Guild as one of their newest members. Unlike the rest of her colleagues, however, rather than showing apathy, Levy instead was rather afraid of Gajeel, possibly as an aftermath of the attack that he previously made her suffer from. However, she appears to have gotten over her fears and start accepting him as a member of Fairy Tail after he saved her from Laxus' lighting attack. This event provided the turning point of Levy's overall opinion about Gajeel as she later aided both him and Natsu by helping them finally get through Freed's enchanted runes. During the S-Class Trial arc it is heavily hinted that she might have feelings for him. Levy was among the eight candidates who were selected to take part in the test; Levy (as usual) showed her lack of confidence, but in the end, was encouraged by Gajeel, who even volunteered to become her partner, which made her blush. During the "Intelligence" portion of the S-Class Trials, Levy was angry at the fact that Gajeel didn't seem to pay any attention to her and was even more upset when he belittles her abilities. However, when he comes to rescue her from Yomazu and Kawazu, she blushes at his "Don't leave my side" comment. She is also saddened when he gets severly hurt, causing her to use her Solid Script: Iron with the shape of a heart in it for Gajeel to eat as she flees to warn the others. After returning with reinforcements, Levy rushes to the Gajeel's side and doesn't leave his side while he is unconscious.

Trivia

 * During the S-class Trial arc when she used Solid Script to make iron for Gajeel the center of the "O" is shaped like a heart.
 * From the Volume 16 Limited Edition: Sorcerer Interview, the best quality of Fairy Tail according to Levy is that the guild has collected multiple varieties of books. She wishes to be the editor of an infamous magazine group in the future. Has a good relationship with the members of Team Shadow Gear and Lu-Chan. The most difficult mission she has ever taken, in her own words, is "infiltrating the home of an evil mage as a child... I...I'm NOT a child anymore!"