User blog comment:Miskos3/Fairy Tail 538: When the Flame Goes Out, Review/@comment-135373-20170606083753/@comment-7418318-20170606120212

Regarding those that were killed by uncontrolled outbursts of deathwaves similar to what happened with the wolves on Tenrou sure.

But it was Zeref's decision to start a massive war between Alvarez and all of Ishgar. We barely saw any on-screen deathes, but with millions of soldiers being mowed down and the Bosco military destroyed by August's group, I wouldn't be surprised if there were quite a lot of people dead due to this war. And those people died because of Zeref's orders.

But then on the other hand from Zeref's words in his last fight with Natsu and from what Mavis said just now, we can infer that the curse also interfered with the very thought process of the victims to at least some degree... so it's hard to tell whether it was really Zeref's own decision to go to war or whether the curse is to blame for that too.