Levy McGarden


 * The title of this article is sometimes called Levi 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. When performing tasks like researching, she wears a pair of Gale-Force Reading Glasses. Her guild tattoo is on her left shoulder-blade

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.

Jet]]&[[Droy]]
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 matter of seconds. Later on, when Levy was chosen to take part in the S-Class Mage exam, both of them competed to become Levy's partner, but end 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 Fried Justine's runes in the S-Class Trial arc, she only did it for her and her partner Gajeel. This surprises Lucy, but Levy sarcastically says she's sorry to her as she advances. In the Edoras, this is quite the opposite as Levy and Lucy have a strong hate for each other, as Lucy is very unpatient with her as shown in chapter 170; Fairy Hunting.

Gajeel Redfox
Levy's first encounter with Gajeel occured 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 began to got 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 pass through Fried'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 does not pay any attention to her, and 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 hurt.

History
Not much is known about Levy's past, but it is known that her fellow Shadow Gear partners 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 (the PL branding was removed). After recovering, she celebrated with the guild over the end of Phantom Lord.

Fighting Festival arc
Levy is first seen in this arc hiding from Gajeel who had joined Fairy Tail. She marveled at Lucy's bravery to insult him as he acted arrogant towards other members. As Jet and Droy went to beat up Gajeel for what his did during the war. Levy tried to stop them however, Laxus Dreyar appeared to beat him up also. As Levy moved to stop Laxus, he shoots her with a lightning bolt, but is surprised when Gajeel takes the blow for her. She is next seen in the Miss Fairy Tail contest where she makes fancy text appear with her magic. This impressed Jet and Droy. After her turn, she was turned into stone by Evergreen and used as a hostage. When Erza Scarlet defeats Evergreen she returns back to normal. She notices that Fried's restrictions are a form of written based magic and says she'll get rid of the barrier for Natsu Dragneel and Gajeel to defeat Laxus.

After Lucy defeats Bixlow, Levy states that's to be expected by Lucy and she'll do her best as well, quickly finishing the code to get rid of the barrier allowing Natsu and Gajeel to leave and greatly impressing Gajeel in the process. When she was trying to break the code, Gajeel seems talk that LOSU doesnt meant anything for him. That's gave Levy idea to change LOSU into OU. She tells them to stay away from each other, since Fried Justine's enchantments are still set up around the area and if they were both caught in one, it would be over.

After wards, Porlyusica came to help Makarov, who had a heart attack over Laxus's actions. She also helps Bisca Moulin, who had been damaged by the effects of Living Link magic after she destroyed part of Laxus' Hall of Thunder. Levy is then told to find Laxus and tell him he is killing Makarov, but when she finds him he tells her that he doesn't care for her news. Her outburst at Laxus' apathy towards Makarov dying helps him eventually go out and and talk to the master.

During the Fantasia parade, Levy performs on a float with Lucy and Bisca.

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, Fried 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. Right when she was going to get killed, 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 (including one that his her straight in the face that sent her face-first). 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.

She is next shown behind Juvia and Erza, who punched some information out of Yomazu. Yomazu explains that Grimoire Heart is after Zeref. Levy announces that she'll take Gajeel to camp, supporting him up. She is later seen being surrounded with the mages deployed by Grimoire Heart with Gajeel still unconscious, and hanging from her shoulder.

Magic and Abilities
Compared to the main characters, Levy has not demonstrated much in the way of actual fighting; it can be assumed that she is mainly a support-type Mage whose brand of magic allows her to give support to comrades rather than partaking in direct battles. She has also recently been chosen to partake in Fairy Tail's annual S-class trial meaning her skills are much more than they seem. During the S-Class Trial Arc, she held her own for a brief period against 2 Wizards from Grimoire Heart.

Solid Script (固体文字 ソリッドスクリプト Soriddo Sukuriputo): Levy's magic is called Solid Script. It allows her to make words (from the air itself and written in english) solid and then throw them at her opponent. For instance, if the word "fire" were to be thrown at her opponent the victim would feel as if he were hit by a fireball. In the Miss Fairy Tail contest, Levy has been shown to turn the words into the actual substance but still maintain the actual word form. The words that she produces actually mimic the properties of the aspect they were based from. For example, Gajeel was seen being able to consume the word 'iron' that Levy supplied him to regenerate himself. Her magic style can also be used to counter similar types of magic, as Levy has been able to disrupt Fried's runes and Yomazu's variant Solid Script skill. Levy's analytical nature and aptitude for interpreting languages have allowed her to adapt her magic to a variety of situations.


 * Solid Script: Silent (固体文字 靜寂 ソリッドスクリプト サイレント): Levy writes "Silent" on air and throw it to her enemy. This word can be used to cancel sound based attacks.
 * Solid Script: Fire (固体文字 炎 ソリッドスクリプト ファイア): Levy writes "Fire" on air and words begins to burn. Levy can use this word as a burning shield that protects her from Kawazu's Egg Buster. Similarly, it is assumed that she can use it offensively by throwing it at her opponents.
 * Solid Script: Iron: Levy writes "Iron" on air from iron words. Levy used this for feeding Gajeel but probably this magic can be used offensively. Interestingly, her "iron" has a heart in it, whether this is just her writing style or a symbol of her feelings for Gajeel is unknown.

Other
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 Fried's rune-based enchantments and negated Yomazu's kanji-based Solid Script attacks.

Weapons/Items
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 Pen: Levy used her Magic Pen to rewrite Fred's Runes. She also uses the pen to make her magic, Solid Script. Though during the battle with Gajeel against Yomazu and Kawazu, she was seen performing magic with her bare hands using what appeared to be hand-gestures

Major Battles

 * with Jet and Droy VS Gajeel Redfox = LOST
 * with Gajeel VS Yomazu and Kawazu = WON

Trivia

 * Ever since her brutal beating at the hands of Gajeel, she has become afraid of him but she apparently has gotten over her fears and is starting to accept him as a member of Fairy Tail. However during the S-class Trial arc it is heavily hinted that she has feelings toward him, as she is seen blushing and being nervous when she's around him and gets mad at him for not looking at her.
 * 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, further hinting that she has feelings for him.
 * 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!"
 * Like Lucy, she changes outfits each arc.
 * She is one of the few female characters who doesn't have big breasts.
 * She bears a striking resemblance to Belinka, a character from Mashima's previous work, Rave Master.