User blog comment:Miskos3/Fairy Tail Chapter 486: The Fourth Guest, Review/@comment-24734624-20160525185535/@comment-7418318-20160525212214

Magnolia? He never was in Magnolia.

He took out Serena near the Bosco border, far away from Magnolia and then walked away, but we have no idea in which direction, or how long he kept walking. But considering how Jacob went form that spot to Magnolia, apparently without running into Acnologia again, we can pretty savely assume that whatever direction Acno took was not the one to Magnolia.

And the next time we saw him he is just about to arrive at the northern army.