Episode 42

Battle of Fairy Tail (バトル·オブ·フェアリーテイル Batoru Obu Fearī Teiru)is the 42nd episode of the Fairy Tail anime. It first aired on August 16, 2010.

Synopsis
The episode starts with Lucy complaining that she doesn't have the money to pay the rent. She returns home with Plue, and after she finishing her daily activities, she lies down, only to find Natsu and Happy already there. Natsu is apparently still suffering the consequences of eating Etherion, and Happy, which knows about Lucy’s financial trouble, gives her a flyer of the Miss Fairy Tail contest, in which the winner gets 500’ 000 jewels. Lucy decides to participate.

Elsewhere, in the town of Shirotsume, Laxus’ personal guards, the Raijinshuu, wipe out the entire Ghoul Spirit guild, claiming that they are too weak to be considered a guild. They speak of something with much anticipation Laxus is about to do.

Meanwhile, Mirajane and the Master are making preparations about the Fantasia Parade, and after learning that Laxus is in town, Makarov recalls of the time when Laxus was young, about his love and respect to Fairy Tail. In this time, Lucy, Gray and Juvia meet with Warren, a Fairy tail member with telepathic abilities. He speaks of the Miss Fairy Tail contest, and Lucy remembers that she is late for it.

The contest begins. The first one to perform is Cana, who uses her card magic to change into a swimsuit. This trend is followed by Juvia, who dedicates her performance to Gray. The next one to perform is Mirajane, who, even though is the guild poster girl and quite popular, decides to use her Transformation magic to change her head into Happy’s and Gajeel’s, and by doing so, disappoints everyone, except Happy. The next one is Erza, who uses her Re-equip kind of magic to change into a Gothic Lolita costume, gathering a lot of attention. Levy follows, who uses her magic to write something in the air after her. Then Bisca performs, and uses her sniper to hit 4 coins. The last one in Lucy, who would like to perform a cheer routine with her spirits, but is interrupted by Evergreen, who thinks the contest is over, because she is the winner. She turns Lucy to stone, and reveals she has done the same thing to all the female mages of the contest.

The Raijinshuu and Laxus reveal themselves. Laxus proclaims that they will hold a contest to see which is the strongest and that Magnolia will be the battlefield. They have three hours to do so, after this time, the statues will be turned to dust. He leaves and starts the battle of Fairy Tail.

Everyone leaves from the contest hall except for Makarov, who is prohibited from doing so from Freed’s Runes. These rules are absolute, and only the caster can remove them. Oddly, Natsu can't leave either, even though the condition is to be younger than 80 years old. In the runes screen, they see that a battle has begun between Alzack, Jet and Droy, and that Alzack is the winner. They don’t really want to battle, but Freed’s Runes will allow only the strongest to get out. In the end, Laxus is shown, asking himself how long will Makarov be able to stand seeing his “Fairies” fighting each other.