I have to admit, the ending of 457 had me really uneasy. I had some confidence that the author wasn't going to let one of the Spriggan 12 get defeated quite that easily, but this would hardly be the first time Erza would have won a fight in a completely underwhelming way. Surprisingly, this turned out to be a more satisfying fight than I expected.
It does seem a bit bit disappointing to see one of the 12 get defeated after a couple chapters of combat so early on in the arc when it wasn't that long ago the heroes were being terrified just by being in their presence. But I guess with 12 of them, Mashima would have to reduce their number at some point. I'm partially expecting a comment about Ajeel being 'Weak for one of the 12 anyways' or something to that effect to be dropped at some point later on. His squad was certainly useless.
I have other gripes too, unfortunately. Why is Erza only bringing out Neptune's Sword/Sword of Poseidon now? This has always been something that I've found a bit irritating - her fights often involve her being beaten mercilessly, until suddenly she brings out a new set of armor that completely turns the tides. Better than a friendship power up or 'because she's Erza', but still leaves me thinking 'Well, why the heck are you using it now!?' She would have taken a lot less damage if she'd used it at the start of the fight. That said, 'The power to harden sand' seems oddly specific, and the same logic applies. Why did you wait to use it against a sand user, when before you were being overwhelmed? Does any water work?
Ajeel's powers reminded me more of Crocodile than I would have liked in this chapter. Sand powers are cool and pretty general, but sucking up moisture seems like another step closer to the Sand Sand Fruit. He has the same weakness too. The moisture-sucking ultimately didn't do any visible damage, though. Luffy got rapidly mummified, while Erza just choked a little. I sort of feel as if this scene would have been much less dramatic for me if I wasn't familiar with Crocodile's power, as Mashima didn't, in my opinion, do a good job of introducing this aspect of Ajeel's abilities.
The cannon being used was a cool touch, but as fast as Ajeel was shown being a couple pages pages before, I expected him to dodge it. A few chapters ago, he blocked the same attack with one hand too. Also, for some reason Erza was being choked/drained to death by him in the same moment at arm's length away, but was not blown away by the same attack despite the beam's huge radius and destructive power. Did I forget something about it not affected Fairy Tail members?
Well, whatever, I liked the fight. Fairy Tail often has its 'Hell Yes!' moments on first read through, as it did for me on my first reading of the chapter, but upon going back and thinking about it, you realize that the logic holding it together is rather weak.
I'm expecting a couple more of the Spriggan 12 to fall with about the same amount of effort. The ones that are left after this attack (if this is not the Alvarez arc's big climatic battle, which is what I suspect) will probably either be more dangerous and treated more similarly to the Hades fight, or else the heroes will fight them on more even terms. Maybe Acnologia and/or Gildarts will show up at different points later on and oneshot one too.
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