Valvrave: The Founding of An Empire

by AJ-Writer

From the writer of Samurai Seed and of Demons and Gods who were so pissed by the ending of the anime. Witness the birth of an empire. HarutoXSaki, L-ElfXShokoXLiselotte? Started from the alternate ep 7 of the anime. Chapter 16 is up and fixed. R&R!

4. Us Against the World

Earth

Europe

1346,

Somewhere in Constantinople…

A knight walked past a field of green, alone. The knight's whole body was covered in dark red regal armor, with green gems decorating its various parts, and a figure of a three legged Raven figure prominently in the armor's design, including a full face helmet of matching color that was designed to look like a raven's avian face, crowned with a laurel crown whose leafs made of green emerald, eerily glowing bright neon green, emanating an aura of green energy particles. Draped over the knight's shoulder was a magenta red coat, decorated with red feather fur atop it. The knight was also fully armed with a sword and shield, and yet, despite the knight's fearsome visage, the feminine figure of the said knight can easily tell of the knight's gender. Her long and unique colored hair: gold and green, were braided and extended out beneath the knight's helmet.

As she walked through the green grass, she noticed that there are human skeletons scattered here and there. The presence of arrows and other broken weapons signify that this verdant green plain was once a battlefield. As she observed the human skulls, her eyes, her pink and red glowing eyes frowned, both in sorrow and curiosity. "Mortality…" The knight murmured.

"My Queen?"

The Knight reacted when being addressed as such. She rose up and saw another warrior. He was draped in a rather outlandish looking armor, quite outlandish in Europe anyway. His clothes look similar to an Arabic Saracen warrior, draped in easterly armor. Somewhat similar with his queen, the man's armor was green themed, with spider figure prominently in its design. "Queen Pino… your brother request an audience."

Pino chuckled as she shook her head. "Prue… I can guess what he's asking. Always the short tempered one, he is."

"My Queen."

"Yes Attlach. I can tell you've done your best trying to convince my hot headed brother." Pino still chuckled.

With Attlach at her side, Pino take her trip and arrived at an encampment, knights giving her salutes as befit her status as their queen, the Queen of the Magius race. As she neared the main tent, she chuckled as she can already hear her brother angry yells from here.

"The humans are regrouping! Pretty soon they'll be coming again! We must attack first!"

"Out of the question! We don't know what they're here for! They might come here to offer terms!"

"Offer terms!? After what they did to my familiars!? They're savages!"

"You shouldn't have sent them in the first place! We gave them a simple errand of asking them for food, and the villagers were doing just fine until those two perverts start flirting with the Mayor's daughter! And then went ahead and scare her off by transforming right in front of her, and she warned the whole town! Thanks to them we're caught up in this mess!"

"Look, if my boys screwed up, I'LL go down there and take care of it myself! Those villagers went ahead and burn them! They have NO right to do that!"

"Let's not make a big deal out of it. They survived it didn't they!?"

"NO! The honor of my Knighthood is at stake here! That attack was an insult to my order and to me! If you won't come along, Fran, fine. I'll take my Order and attack-"

It was at that point Pino finally entered the tent and the conversation. "Attack, attack, attack… is that all you can think about, my dear older brother?"

The entrance of Pino distracted the two arguing people. The first was a teal haired boy who's dressed in white knight armor with wolf theme, draped in black cloth. "Sister!" he stated. The second person dressed as a priest with yellowed color. But… bizarrely, the man's face was full of stitches… and screws bolted into his skull, with electricity coruscating in-between the bolts. What's more his skin looked rather pale, as if he's a corpse. And he's carrying a giant hammer… His hunched massive shoulders… were squirming… as if there's something in it that is writhing. He quickly bowed. "My Queen."

"Prue, Loukey is a mischief maker and Romulus is a pervert; they're digging their own graves… which I know they've easily escaped from." Pino laughed it out as she removed her crown helmet, revealing the woman's face that is her human vessel. In a sense, it looked exactly the same as to how she (will) look like, centuries later, but this one was more… earthly. Less fairy like. And though her beauty still shine, her physical human face has been roughened by the ages she had spent on earth, rive with experience. "They should consider themselves lucky they got away with a burning." Pino laughed. What is a burning for a Magius? Nothing but tickles. They can heal easily enough from being burned all the way up to their bones within seconds. They can also easily break free from the restraints when they had to. Of course that only applies as long as their rune reserves aren't in danger. "Rather than being angry over some human tickling your men with their fires, you should consider disciplining them, Prue. There's been lax of discipline from your Order lately."

Prue blushed in embarrassment and anger. "I assure you sister, I shall discipline them harshly until they wished they've never been born. But first, this blemish on our honor must be repaid-"

"Do you not hear me Brother? You will leave those humans alone." Pino stated firmly. A bit different with her usual cheerful tone. "These are simple people. Villagers. Civilians. Moreover, they're humans. Try to understand them a little. Unlike us, they're mortals. There are about 100,000 things that can end their lives in this planet, and we are one of them… when we shouldn't be. They have enough to worry about as is."

Meanwhile, down there in the village, the priest was riling the townsfolk. "These are the forces of Satan! It's not enough to fend off their minions; we MUST take it out to their source! BURN THEM ALL! IN THE NAME OF GOD! BURN THEM ALL!"

And that does it. The whole army of angry mob charged out of the town, heading straight towards the Magius encampment. The priest was at their head, wielding a massive cross.

"They're coming here…" Fran shrugged.

"Pfffttt… with farming utensils? These primitives are so rustic." Attlach snickered. "And is that cross was supposed to do anything?"

"Those are religious symbol my lord. These humans still believed in the concept of deities."

"And what would these 'deities' do to us? Burn us to ashes if they prayed hard enough?"

"That is their way." Pino chuckled. "By believing in something, these humans reinforced their psychological state by believing in beings greater than them are protecting them, beings that will help them make sense on things they cannot understand-yet. It made them feel safe and keep their still immature mind sane. One time I see one of those priest were so terrified of me, he swing his tiny cross right in front of me. He called me the daughter of Satan… I asked him what Satan is… judging by the way he answered me, it's seems this Satan is the symbol of a dark evil deity in which they directed their hate. Some character created to give these humans someone to blame for any misfortune that befell them. I find the concept so amusing that I just left him alone. Maybe that's why shortly after every one of those 'priest' thinks these symbols are effective potent symbol to send us away."

"What ridiculous notion…" Attlach shook his head.

"What do you expect? These humans' civilization level is still in phase… 2… or even 1.5… they got a long way to go. That's how they cope when facing forces greater than they are. They are petty, primitive… and in serious need of guidance." Pino looked at Prue with a gleeful smirk. "These are the sort of creature besmirching your honor. You seriously want to sully your hands for them? Oh my dear brother… and you call me childish." Pino chuckled. "Attlach was right. The humans are still so primitive. So backwards. But they have so much to offer to us. And we have so much to offer for them too. That is… if they just stop being scared of us." Pino took a red feather from her fur coat and whispering a few incantations, she infused runes into the said feather and then she blew it out. The single red feather multiplied into a whole flock of blood red ravens that swarmed the incoming angry mob.

"WHAT'S THAT!?"

The mob was terrified when they saw a massive swarm of vicious looking blood red ravens flying towards them. They immediately disperse into a chaotic disorderly band, and not even the priest yell can bring them to order. Out of mischievousness, Pino instructed her ravens to pluck the shouting priest. They did so, and the ravens carried the poor priest for a while before they dropped him down into a nearby swamp.

"Kyahahahahaha!" Pino laughed. "There you go. Honor, settled. Okay, big bro?"

A pouting Prue reluctantly nodded. "Sis… you're always being too lenient."

"And you are being too high handed." Pino grinned wide.

And then, all the sudden, a buzz of blue scarabs appeared behind them. Pino, Prue, Fran and Attlach turned around towards the swirling swarm of scarabs emerging from the ground. Amidst the swarm, a massive warrior with thick Scarab themed armor covering his heavily bandaged body rose up. "My Queen! I bring ill news!"

"What is it, Apol'khe?"

"The Grim Witch has lost her mind! The humans found her coven of human followers when she was away. They captured them all, burned them at the stakes. She went insane with grief… she's been murdering every human that crossed her path and unleashed a plague that is destroying every village in her way!"

And for the first time, Pino's cheerful expression turned to horror. "Where is she?"

"She destroyed 7 villages across the river so far."

"PRUE!" Upon hearing her yell, Prue readily transformed into a white smoke. And from amidst the white smoke, a massive armored wolf stepped out. It's entire body were composed entirely of armor plates of gold and silver color. Without further ado, Pino mounted the wolf and Prue dashed with all due haste. Upon reaching several steps, Prue and her sister disappeared in a cloud of smoke.

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A human village is currently being overrun. Not by human mortal army… but by rats.

And not just ordinary rats. These rats are huge, seemingly endless. Worse, they brought a plague with them. A plague that killed with utmost certainty and none can escape it. Doctors worked sleeplessly through night and day to find a cure, and yet the disease is also killing them where they stand just as their patients, and even the nurses, are dying left and right.

A mother tried to carry her children to safety, avoiding these unearthly black rats… but it was no use. They are everywhere. And then she took the wrong turn and saw, with horror as a whole swarm of rats are heading towards her, bringing with them this deathly plague. The mother hugged her children tight, vainly shielding them from the incoming slow death… and then…

An armored greave took a step forward, the clapping sound of its stomp seemingly echoed across the city, and every rats in that city stopped moving and looked at the direction of the sound.

Pino has arrived standing before the flooding rat swarm, shielding the terrified mother and her children who saw how the rats scurry back in fear, making way for the lady knight's commanding presence in their midst.

"Show yourself witch." Pino's terrible fury was laced in every cold and calm word she uttered. She pulled out a long two handed sword (which she wielded one hand) with a unique shape. The blade was split into a two pronged fork. What's more, the blade glow unearthly red. As red as her eyes, which glowed darkly. "I don't care if you are insane… are you insane enough to test the fury of your queen?" Gold and red aura of her Runes extended out of her hands and enveloped the forked sword. "SHOW YOURSELF!"

Pino stabbed the red sword to the ground, releasing a pulse of red and gold wave that coruscate throughout the whole town. The blast caused all rats to wince… and then, slowly but surely, the rats began to converge on a single point in front of Pino. Piling one another into a mound, it grew bigger until it reached the height of Pino's waist… and finally, as if emerging from beneath the swarm of rats, was a person. Its entire figure draped in tattered purple cloak, carrying a scythe. Despite its horrifying visage, the grim reaper bowed down like a supplicant before Pino, swarmed by its fretting and jittering rats.

"Witch… what have you done?" Pino growled.

"They… killed… my children… they killed… my friends… humans… must pay…" She whispered.

"Through GENOCIDE!?" Pino exploded. "You of all people!? I really did not expect this of you! How could you!?"

"Humans… unruly… barbaric… violent… hateful… they lie… they take… our love…your love… my love… for granted… and they throw it away… after everything… we did for them… they did not accept us…"

Prue, Attlach, Fran and Apol'khe had also arrived on the scene, looking at the witch with damning eyes.

"Humans… are not worthy… they will never be… worthy…"

Pino mourned. "…Witch… of all the members of my court, you are the last person I would expect to say those terrible words. Is it not you whom I trust the most to make our dreams a reality? Is it not you who are the most passionate about them… how can you say this…? Have their hate swallowed you up?"

As she said it, a rock suddenly hit Pino by the head, much to all of her entourages' fury, especially Prue. Pino looked and saw it was the very mother she was protecting, throwing rocks at her vainly in an attempt to send her away. "GO AWAY! GO AWAY YOU DEMON!" She shrieked.

"UNGRATEFUL ANIMALS!" Prue exploded and was about to rip said woman apart for her insolence, but Pino raised her hand, stopping him. She shook her head sadly. "Can we blame them, Prue? Can we blame these humans to be afraid because they are less enlightened than we are? Can we blame them for being an infant who still knew nothing?"

Another rock flew towards Pino, but then, they stopped inches away from her. And there it floated harmlessly before the queen. The mother stopped throwing and looked in horror at the she-devil before her. Pino shook her head. The woman was utterly frightened and she ran, taking her children with her. Among her children, was a silver haired boy, whose eyes never left Pino's beautiful visage…

Pino looked mournfully at the devastated state of this town. "It's too late for this town… and this country as well. The plague will spread and fester… there's nothing else we can do…"

"We can give them the antidote!" Fran stated. "This plague is not unknown to our science!"

"But it is not known to theirs. They're at the stage where they cannot accept anything that they don't understand, not even in desperation. Will they trust the people who caused this in the first place?" Pino shook her head. "They have to face this alone. We have to leave."

"To where? Should we try this land called Egypt, perhaps?" Apol'khe suggested. But Pino meant further than just another country.

"No. I meant that we have to leave this planet."

Everyone's eyes turned to Pino in shock. "Leave? You mean… you're giving up this planet?" Attlach pondered.

"No. Not giving it up. We wait." Pino stated. "I see now that these humans are still in far too early stages of their development to even comprehend the concept of our existence. If we try too hard to force them to understand, we'll only end up destroying each other's identities. As it did you." Pino gestured at the fidgeting Witch. "They aren't ready. We aren't either. We have to wait."

"How long?"

"As long as it takes." Pino nodded. Her decision is final.

"But our people…!? They are dying!" Attlach stated. "I'm not sure they can wait much longer! And we cannot wait forever!"

"What is waiting for us?" Pino chuckled. "A hundreds years? Two hundred? A thousand? They're but a heart-beat. Forever? Eternity? Dreams in our sleep."

"There are thousands of other worlds that we have seeded, eons ago. We barely covered them all." Fran answered calmly. "I agree with the Queen. We must set to the stars once again, and find them all. If nothing else, to find an alternative in case this world fails."

"True." Pino nodded. "However, of the thousands of failures we have found, this world holds the biggest promise for our future. With the right guidance… the humans would make a perfect ally."

"But what if they don't want to change their ways?"

"Then we have to ensure they change." Pino looked at the condemned witch. "Thanks to your hatred, we cannot stay here anymore. Humanity must face whatever horrors you have unleashed upon them alone. Your actions cannot go unpunished."

And now the witch grew fearful. "My Queen… send me not… from your side…"

But Pino had a different idea entirely. "No. I have a task for you. You will stay here, on this planet. You will aid the humans, uplift them, and illuminate their ways, accelerate their evolution. I will leave this planet now to check on other seeded worlds. But someday, I will return here, and so you must wait. That is your mission, and penance. As for your punishment however…" She grabbed the witch's head, and then, suddenly, the witch gasped and shrieked. Green markings appeared on her being, glowing underneath her cloak, and huge amounts of runes seeped out of her from the said markings. "These Geass seals will drain you off your runes, stripping you of all your powers. It will not kill you, and you would still live forever… but you will be as weak as the humans. That is your punishment. You will complete your mission: uplift them, and made them ready when I return. But you must do so as a human. This I decree."

And then, when it was said and done, Pino let go, and the witch fell on the rat covered floor, panting and gasping, incredibly weakened.

"It will take many lifetimes for her alone to change this world." Attlach stated. "Especially if she's to spend her time as a human."

"Then help her, Attlach, my love." Pino turned to her consort, Attlach. "During our long stay on earth, too many of our people have assimilated too deeply with the humans. The growing Magius society that has been formed here will require an overseeing, especially since they are growing. Pick your wisest advisors, and form a ruling body for them, lead them. After what happened here, the future of all the Magius on Earth will be bleak and trying. Protect them. Go into hiding within the obscurity of human's history. Let them forget about us, but we will not forget about them."

Attlach bowed down.

"Remember everyone: see but don't be seen. Guide. Never enforce. Use wisdom. Not…" Pino sadly looked at the destroyed city. "Not fear. Never fear."

The witch had also apparently regained her sanity… and her conscience. "My… Queen…"

Pino looked at the downed witch.

"You can count on me… no matter how long it'll take… I will uplift the humans… they will be ready… when you return."

Pino smiled kindly and approached the downed witch. She gently lifted her up and unveiled her cloak, rubbing the woman's face. "May the stars shine warmly upon us when we meet again…"

The girl cried before her queen. "My Que-… Pino…"

"We shall meet again… My Dearest Lieselotte."

Chapter 4:

Us against the World

Centuries later…

Earth, Present day…

Lieselotte stared wide eyed at the sight of her queen appearing on the TV. Tears welled up before they streamed down full force. "My queen!" She fell on her knees and cried in happiness. "My Queen! You have returned!"

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The Council of 101 jawdropped when they saw their legendary Queen in the flesh (so to speak), standing right there on the screen for the whole world to see.

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Amadeus dropped his phone on the ground, mouth open aghast.

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Jeffry spilled his coffee to his suit in shock.

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In Module 77…

The reporters were having the time of their lives, snapping pictures of the first Alien until they need to rapidly replace their memory cards again and again.

Pino grinned wide and waved her hand saying: "Hiya."

She turned around and saw Shoko whose jaw hung low… and then Haruto, Saki, even L-Elf, Ryuuji and Kibukawa… their jaws on the floor… they were all so shocked, it almost looked like their heart just jumped out of their aghast mouth.

And Pino, in all her naïve style, still had the guts to ask: "…something wrong fellas?"

"You… never told us… that you're… a queen…" Shoko stated word per word.

Pino blinked innocently and then turned to the shocked Ryuuji. "Really? I never told you?"

Ryuuji shook his head.

"Hummm…" She pointed at her chin and then smiled cutely while sticking out a tongue. "Whoops, sorry. My bad."

Every single being on planet Earth sta~are at the one and only Klutz Queen of the Kingdom.

But Pino quickly put her klutziness aside. "What Ms. Shashinami said is true. For centuries now, your planet, Earth, has been hosting refugees hailing from my world."

"Refugees?"

"Our world exists in an impossible warp of space, a universe where thoughts are made manifest into physical being. At its zenith, our empire spanned the farthest reach of the universe, accomplishing wonders. But… several eons ago, we foresee that our planet, or to be more precise, our universe is reaching the end of its lifespan, and it's about to be destroyed."

"What caused it?" Burnett asked.

"Our Universe literally got squeezed by another newly emerged but much larger universe… yours. For all our power, we have one weakness: we cannot exist for long outside our own environment. When I'm in another world other than my native world…" Pino demonstrated this by moving her hand towards the mike. The mike passed through her hand as if she was but air. However, the mike notably shot-circuited, becoming overcharged. "You see, in your world, we are creatures of pure energy. Energy we'd like to call Runes. The particles that compose the abstract object you call information. We have no physical beings, hence we, in sense, cannot affect your physical world directly."

The crowd nodded, the journalist jotting all this like crazy. Pino continued her story. "And so, to survive this calamity, under my orders, we sent millions of refugees to every part of the newly emerging galaxies, searching for a new home, a place that will allow our fragile disposition to exist. We seeded thousands of worlds, Earth being one of them. And then we waited, and we prepare. We cannot exist in your physical world, but we have an ability that allowed us to possess other lifeforms with physical body, allowing us to momentarily took control of other beings and use them to interact with the physical world for us."

"You mean like… mind control? Enslavement?"

Pino nodded. "Yes. However, mind you, they were dangerous and desperate practices. To be inside someone else's head risk corruption to our very essence… we're also a very fragile being, see. And we have no intentions to enslave other race. Our possession of their bodies was so that we can momentarily borrow their physical body to build what we need: a vessel for our essence that will allow us to survive in the physical world." At this Pino gestured… at the Valvraves. "The process took hundreds of years… we churned up millions of vessels, and yet there were uncountable trillions of us, and time grow short. Eventually, it happened. Our Universe imploded taking half of our people with it. The survivors then reached out to the farthest corner of the world. We searched the outposts on the worlds we had seeded. Between various kinds of space disaster, the mounting number of vessel malfunctions, and various other merciless cosmic predations… our number shrank explosively. Of the thousands of worlds that we rediscovered, hardly a handful can serve as nothing more than a reprieve rather than a solution. Some had even been hit by a cosmic calamity… and our population continues to dwindle. By the time we reached your world… there were hardly a few millions of us left."

"You've been here before?"

Pino nodded again. "A long time ago… we first arrived somewhere around… 50 BC, during the zenith of the Roman Empire, if I'm not mistaken." And then Pino's smile grew in excitement. "Earth instantly caught our attention. Of the expedition we sent earlier, there were no sign… but Earth harbor that which many worlds did not. Humans." Pino grew more excited as she continued her tale. "By coincidence or providence, most of our vessels suffered a catastrophic system failure right around that point. For all intents and purposes, we are stranded here on earth. Seemingly for good. We have no choice, we slowly began to adapt as we possess the creatures of this world. We also learned that though the expedition we sent here was gone, many of their incarnations appeared in your fairy tales and myths. Some of you worshipped us as gods and deities, others called us monsters and demons."

Burnett gulped, as do everyone. They realize now they're not just listening to a recounting of an Alien's chronicle, they're listening to a story that will twist the very truths of their world upside down. Religion, history, society, everything will be changed forever.

"By that time, we, the Magius had made earth as much as our home as our old world. Some had even agreed that our search is over and began assimilating with local populace. We admire human ingenuity, their passion to learn… you were at the peak of your ecosystem, and you are still growing. In you, we saw a potential to not only restore our race, but to also forge a future greater than any that had come before. But… as time went by… things changed, particularly, when we discovered one fundamental problem that greatly differentiated us with humanity." Pino stated. "Humans can die naturally."

Pino grew more solemn and calm. "Magius are immortal. We can only die by unnatural causes, such as the implosion of the universe that I mentioned earlier. Humans were the first race that introduced us to the concept of natural death and mortality, the concept of limited lifespan." Pino frowned in sorrow. "When we found out about this 'flaw'-" Pino actually made the quotation mark. "-it's like finding a crack in the diamond. Many of us began to have second thoughts of making Earth our new home. Some had adopted the mindset of using humanity as a mere tool to help them fix their vessels, and then move on to the next world. But… our vessels are bleeding edge technology, even for us. It took us years to build just one, and your technology at the time, I'm sorry to say… you're practically still living in the Stone Age."

The crowd winced, but not offended. For a race that had trudged the stars while the humans were still cavemen, Rome's civilization, lauded on Earth as one of the greatest civilization, must look laughable compared to an empire that had conquered their known universe.

"In time… we managed to fix our vessel, but by that time, we've grown accustomed to Earth. What's more we found out that while normal humans age and die, our human hosts inherit most of our powers, including immortality. While that's just fine for us… your people deemed us monstrosity for our inability to get sick and age." Pino looked at the crowd. "Worsening the matter was that, possessing human bodies for so long caused our human vessel, nourished by our Runes, to develop mutations. Many of which caused these mutated humans to figure prominently in your horror stories. Read Bram Stoker's Dracula, watch The Mummies film, and various kinds of Werewolf fiction like the Underworld Quadrology and Van Helsing, and read all other folklores for reference." Pino raised a finger and smiled wide, promoting earth's films that she spent time watching – and laughing her brains out at how amusing it was.

Sta~a~are…

"Things came to ahead when eventually, the rift between our two races had went past beyond the chance of compromise, turning into open hostility with one another, which… as Shoko-chan had said earlier… caused astronomical damage to both of our races. That's when I realized, humans aren't ready yet. You were a young species. You still have much to learn. And so we left you to your devices, but we haven't given up on earth. So I left behind some of my most trusted advisors here, along with some of my people to help humanity, uplift them to ascend to the stars… like we once did."

Burnett rolled his eyes. "Well… I would go so far as to say thank you… but… aren't you doing this so that you can possess us later?"

Pino chuckled. "How right you are. And I know for certain that you all would find that disagreeable and unacceptable. We understand. Before we get to that point, I'd like to point out another fundamental problem with our beings: Magius needs to feed on Runes to survive. Runes are information particle, richly found in sentient beings." Pino quickly followed. "When we are not in our native world, in your atmosphere, our body diminished gradually. In order to survive, we need to feed on runes. And on earth, Runes are most richly found… in humans. Excessive feeding on a human will cause amnesia… and then death." Pino quickly added with a smile. "Which is another way of saying: we need to feed on humans to survive."

The crowd grew terrified at this revelation.

"I understand you are terrified. But let me say one thing, JUST to be clear: OUR goal… is not dominance. It's Co-Existence. We have no intention to reduce human into cattle waiting to be slaughtered. We wish to aid humanity, so that our two races can stand together as equals. I know we can. How do I know this? Because I've done it before." Pino suddenly pointed at herself. Her form. "This form belongs to a woman, whose vessel I inhabit centuries ago, back during my stay in Europe. And I can tell you right now, we are not master and servants, we are friends, standing shoulder to shoulder as equals. When I ascend to the stars, we left behind her crumbling flesh, but her soul and mine united, we are one now."

"But you still need to feed on humans… aren't you?"

"Hence… why I started the VVV project." There. Pino stopped talking about the past and finally entered the present. "When I come back to this world, 20 years ago, I found humanity had changed greatly. You are wiser, civilized, advanced. On one hand I'd like to credit those whom I left here to aid uplifting you… but I'd like to think that humanity had also advanced themselves with their own effort. Of course when I first landed, I was first welcomed with fear and vigilance. But I'm used to such treatment and I persevere. And then, Prime Minister Shashinami Ryuuji began communicating with me, allowing me to gain sketchy understanding of how far humanity had progressed."

Pino smiled in gratitude to a flabbergasting Ryuuji. And then she looked at Shoko. "Let me correct you on one thing, Shoko-chan. The original goal of the VVV project was not to create a superhuman soldiers… but to create a new race of men who will possess all our strengths, Magius and Humans… without the weaknesses of the parent race: mortality, frailty, inexistence of a body… and, of course… the Magius' nearly uncontrollable thirst for Runes." Pino smiled at the crowd. "One quality of humanity that we would like to capitalize on is your ability to imagine many things that we aren't capable of. Your limits gave you the thirst to imagine, invent and create, so we would like to put our hopes that, with it, you would also be able to find a way to end this uncontrollable thirst." Pino waved her left hand to her side, presenting the Valvrave pilots and the Valvrave itself. "Homo Sapien Novus Magius… they are my gift to mankind! A gift that will allow both of our races to coexist and finally united together and ascend, as one people, one race!"

At this statement, the reporters went even more nuts with their camera. Flashes of light flickered nonstop, taking pictures of the Alien Queen in all her glory. Burnett understands, but he once again voiced one concern. "So… about this… new race of man…"

Pino looked at the reporter with a smile, asking him to go on.

"So am I to understand it… that you wish to convert the whole of humanity into Novus Magius."

Pino easily understand where this is headed and she suddenly reverted to her usual cheerful demeanor. "Well… in this case, it's my turn to ask. In the centuries that went by on earth… and all the cultural change you must have endured… how do people on earth treats gifts these days? If someone give something to you for free, but you don't want it, do you have the right to refuse? Or must you accept it?"

Burnett blinked in confusion and stated. "Well… on earth, if somebody give you a present that you don't want… you have the right to refuse… though doing so can be considered extremely rude to the one who gave the present…"

"Indeed? Humans have a saying: if you're in Rome, then act like a Roman. I'll do the same here. I'm in earth. So I'll act like earthlings." Pino smiled cheerfully. "This is a gift. Not an order or a demand. You are free to choose to be or not to be like us. Mind you, if you choose to be like us, there's no going back. But if you choose to reject it, that's fine. I'm not offended."

"However, I'd like to point out that, as things are, those who received this gift will be superior to those who do not." Burnett rebuked. "Even though you say that you have no intention to force this change, people will still be compelled to change anyhow. The society who will prefer the superior Magius will force them to."

Pino smiled. "Very good. Yes. That's true. But I was counting on human wisdom to sort that out. The fact that all of you are here, now, listening to my promises and being critical about it is proof that I think humanity is now wise enough to sort it out eventually." The Magius Queen nodded. "I know the consequences that will happen if this project was completed. We kept this project a secret precisely because we don't want anyone to try to abuse this gift. Not until humanity is ready. It's because of recent events that finally forced VVV project come to light when it shouldn't be. It's not ready yet, you see."

"Not ready… you mean the process is incomplete?"

"Tokishima Haruto." Pino gestured at Haruto. "He's the first of his kind, the first Novus Magius. A kind gentle soul who dislike taking pain and inflicting it. In my opinion, he deserved this gift more than anyone. But I tell you right now, this gift has been nothing but an unending torment worse than death for him." Everyone winced and Haruto merely frowned. "It granted him everything: immortality, strength beyond normal human, immunity to illness and death… but it also cursed him with our thirst to feed. The very thing I tried to remove. I had not succeeded. The transformation process is still flawed. It would take many more years of research for the process to be perfected, and the answer may not come out in a single human lifetime." Pino gazed in sympathy at Haruto. "Tokishima Haruto became a Novus Magius not out of choice, but out of desperate circumstances. Other pilots were no less different. They've been thrust out of their normal life into a battle for their life and soul… all because of this project. And for that, no amount of apology will ever make me deserve their forgiveness." Pino bowed her head down apologetically at Haruto. "Hence, I made it my duty to find a cure and perfect the transformation. And I will not rest until I find it. I owe them that much."

Burnett once again raised his hand, casually asked the question: "Alright, so you declared that VVV project is for civil purposes… and yet, we saw the Valvraves, and they are, beyond the shadow of doubt, the most powerful weapon the world has ever seen. If civil purpose is the main goal, why does it involve super weapons and super soldiers?"

Pino nodded. "Finally. I've been waiting for that question to come out." Everyone gave the eccentric queen their undivided attention. "But first… let us learn more… about this person here." Pino gestured at the bound and gagged Magius spy lying on the floor. Pino floated forward, phasing through the table, the podium, and landed gently next to the Magius. L-Elf caught the hint and took the gag off the spy, carefully so as to prevent the spy from biting him. Pino asked gently: "What's your name?"

The spy looked at the Queen… and finally said his true name, in his true voice. "Thorazes. Familiar of Fran."

"Fran. Ah my dear friend Fran." Pino mourned. "Fran fell during his expedition to the Nebulan Verse, when it was swallowed by a mega blackhole. I wept when I sensed his passing."

"As do we all, Queen Pino." Thorazes replied.

"If you wept for him… why are you doing this?" Pino mourned, and then he began addressing the crowd once more. "When I first returned here, it was to my rather pleasant surprise when I find out that a few select human was aware of our existence, and understand what we are. However… I also began to learn of a problem. From Shashinami Ryuuji, I learnt that those trusted advisors of mine which I left behind had gone awry. They dominate and rule humanity from the shadows. They diverged from the path I once set to them, the path that all Magius had agreed to thread, forgotten all our principles… they became the very opposite to what we're supposed to be… instead of a guide, they became an oppressor. A predator, a slave to our hunger for runes." Pino turned to Thorazes. "Why, Thorazes, Familiar of Fran. Why have you defied my directions, Magius?"

"Because we are dying, my Queen." It wasn't Thorasez who answered. Suddenly, the huge holographic screen in the auditorium went static, and moments later, the screen showed the image of men in hoods. That answer came from them

Haruto's eyes widened. "Is that…!?"

Saki gulped. They've done it now…

L-Elf narrowed his eyes in deep thought.

Shoko looked at all these people in hoods… and felt something really bad…

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Yusuke blinked. "They hacked the broadcast?"

Inuzuka frowned.

Ryuuji, Kibukawa and everyone gasped. They didn't expect this will happen. "Prime Minister… is that…" Kibukawa looked at Ryuuji. Ryuuji nodded. "I can't believe it. They actually did it…"

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A-Drei had regained consciousness and caught as well as tied the squirming and panicking Akira as he watched the event through his phone. He gritted his teeth in anger. "…so… they've shown their faces at last."

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Back in the Auditorium…

Pino looked up to the screen. "And you are…?"

"We are the Council of 101."

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And in that one instance, not just the auditorium of the Sakimori High… the WHOLE world went into an uproar. ARUS TV rating and view rate went through the roof. Every man, woman and child in the planet had their eyes glued on the screen, which quickly divided into the image of Pino and the Council of 101, getting ready to duke it out. Jeffry gasped his blessed heart in disbelief upon seeing this event unveiling before his eyes. The same can be said to Amadeus in Dorssia, who collapsed to his seat.

The Council that has remained hidden in the shadows for hundreds of years now stepped into the light. Just like Haruto said… all the lies in the world are being unveiled at last.

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The hooded men and women of the Council bowed down to their knees. "Your loyal subjects welcome your return, my Queen."

"Loyal subjects you say?" Pino glared at the screen. "Very well then, Loyal Subjects. Answer your Queen. Why have you strayed from the path I set you? Why did you dominate instead of guide? Your Queen commands you to answer these questions!"

"After you left, humanity managed to overcome and recover from the Black Plague after a century passed. But the era that came after…" The Head Councilor spoke on behalf of the council. "Madness crept into the minds of the humans. A frenzy. Humans called it witch hunt. They hunt us all down, killing our vessel one by one, drown us, burn us… we tried to disappear but they drag us out."

"How did they found you?"

"They don't." The Councilor responded. "The humans will not hesitate to massacre millions of their own to slaughter just a handful of us! They killed more of their own than our plague in a frenzy. Older, more powerful Magius were able to survive… but they didn't even spare our young. They slay them all. In time, coupled with the lack of Runes, our people died one by one."

"I can understand how our people had suffered, and I grieve for them." Pino frowned and closed her eyes. "But what humanity had done to us was the direct result of what we've done to them before. We killed their children. We devoured and replaced their loved ones."

"My Queen…" The Councilor replied. "…they've killed all the Matriarchs."

Pino's eyes widened. "My sisters?"

"Matriarchs? What is that?" Saki asked.

"Like all other sentient race, we are also capable of reproduction. But that is a role that can only be done by a very specific caste: the Matriarchs… my kin." Pino shrugged. "You can compare it to the queen in an insect hive, if you will."

"Without the Matriarchs… the remains of our people can no longer replenish our dwindling number… there are so few of us left now, My Queen. The Covenant of the Seven Rainbows was failing. The familiars sensed the fall of their masters one by one. We've also lost hope… that you would ever return." The Council members looked at Pino. "But you have returned. Just like you said you would…"

"I failed you." Pino frowned in sorrow. "…I brought many of our people when I left Earth, to reach out the other outpost in other worlds. But all I found was death. Many of them died long ago. Of what little remained of our people that I brought with me… I'm the only one left, and I even lost my brother Prue upon my return here. I'm sorry… I failed you all."

"No you're not." The Councilor stated. "You are our queen. And you are the last of the Matriarchs. It is within your power to restore our race! With you once again stand by our side we can at last take revenge on the humans and rule them!"

However, contrary to what the Council members might have thought, Pino's expression turned to that of an absolute disgust. "Revenge? REVENGE!? Is that all you can think about now!? And what is this talk about rule?"

"My queen. It is for their own good." The Councilor replied. "Despite the loss of the matriarchs, we loyally obeyed your command. We continually uplifted human, elevating them from cavemen into the people they are today. But look what they've done." The Councilor moved his console, and sent a data through his runes. Somehow, Pino was able to perceive the data to her being and opened it up, displaying its content before her. The file that the Councilor had sent to her contains all forms of human atrocity that they've committed over the course of their civilization: Holocaust, systematic slaughter of the Jews, two world wars, ethnic cleansing, tribal bloodbath, opium war, human trafficking, terroristic bombing. The worst was the Nuclear Bomb. Firing it once was atrocious enough, human had fired it twice.

"Despite our best efforts, humanity's savage nature continues to exist. Every technology we taught them, every advancement we gave them, no matter how simple, how harmless, they somehow direct their ingenuity to turn them into a deadly weapon." The Councilor gestured at the Valvraves. "Take the Valvraves for example. We crafted the Valvrave to be our vessel. Our body. A simple, harmless invention that enable to us to interact with their world. Look what they've done to it. They strapped weapons to it, and before long, it suddenly became the deadliest weapon on earth. Despite our best efforts to direct them towards the right future, the better future, they continually choose paths that would lead to their own destruction. They are so pathetically like children. They need to be protected from their own destructive tendencies. Only by ruling them, can we protect them from themselves. We are not their worst enemy, My Queen. They are their own worst enemy."

Humans allover the world watched this and gritted their teeth in bitterness. Those who understand can only swallow their pride and suck it up, understanding the Council was right. Some angrily shouted at the screen, screaming angrily, shouting curses and protest to the uncaring council.

Pino watched all these files before her, her face frowned. "Who are we?" She asked.

"We are the Magius! The ultimate life form! The one race that will guide-"

"No." Pino cut him off mid rant. "Who are we to think we deserve to rule them?" The Queen raised her head and looked at the Council.

Allover the world, Pino's words were being broadcasted live. "You sent me the files that showed all the atrocities performed by mankind. And you call them children. Tell me. Were we so different? I see before me the repetition of our own history played out by mortal human hands. We came here, belittling them for their violent nature. And yet when it mattered, instead of sharing them our wisdom, you damned them to repeat the mistakes that we've made."

"When Shashinami Ryuuji told me of how far you have fallen, I don't want to believe it." Pino glared at the Councilor. "But now I see it clearly: I've made a mistake. A grave mistake of entrusting the fate of humanity to you. We play God and think we have the right to determine the fate of lesser species. I was wrong. A species must forge its own destiny. Without interference from anyone!"

The Councilor said nothing.

"I hereby order the Council of 101 to disband. All Magius on earth are now to report to me and release their host! We will then concentrate all our efforts to find a way to leave Earth, we will never come back here again. Let the humans decide their own future."

However, the Councilor, and by extension, the members of the Council of 101 said nothing.

The whole world awaits their response…

"Can you do it though?" The Councilor suddenly retorted.

"What?"

"Can you afford to send us all away?" And while Pino still wondered what he meant, the Councilor compiled another file and he sent it to Pino. Pino received the data and expand it. If the previous folder contains the all the data that pertains to humanity's atrocity, this data contain… something else entirely.

Economical growth, population control, geo-political stability, technological development, even ecological graphs, military deployment, and stock price. Pino trudged through all this data, understanding them with ease… and her frown grew. The silence was unnerving. Shoko, out of curiosity also take a sneak peek. The audience was somewhat confused with all this data. What's with all the graphs, numbers and charts…

Aboard 03, Yusuke, the tech wiz, looked at some of the numbers in that data and understand what it meant to human technology. "Wha…?"

Aboard 05, Inuzuka, the business savant recognized the dire situation of the economic sector. "Oh, you gotta be kidding me…"

Shoko frowned, not understanding what she's seeing in these datas. "What… exactly are we looking at here?"

"To explain it all would be too long." The Councilor stated. "But simply put, we just showed the Queen how we are governing this world for the sake of humanity."

"What do you mean?" Shoko growled.

"Queen Pino… you weren't gone for a decade or two. You were gone for several centuries. During which, the world has changed. And not only the humans… the Magius have changed as well. Suffice to say, both of our races had become… inextricably linked in various aspects of our respective society. Too many of our ranks had become integrated in various crucial aspects of human's society. We've become an irremovable part of your world just as you had become an irremovable part of ours. Neither race can live without the other. If we leave… or we stopped doing what we've been doing all these centuries… the world… our world… Humans' and Magius'… will be destroyed."

"That's not possible!" Shoko grunted.

"Let me tell you what will happen when we leave." The Councilor explained. "In two years, the economy of every human nation will face a total collapse to the point even the most powerful nation wouldn't be able to afford to hold on to their army for long. Countless people will lose their living, and in desperations, governments will fell upon one after another, and they will wage war to secure scraps that wouldn't be enough to maintain order for long. Nation will eventually consume themselves, expend what little resources they have left and fall. Without higher order, society will be reduced to anarchic state where even law and order will no longer be obeyed and they'll turn on each other. Soon, unchecked and unbridled, humanity will expend what little resources they had left, and they'll be reduced back to stone age. Even this is an optimistic prediction, assuming the humans survived the nuclear war that will happen when super power nations duke it out without us in the way. And for Magius? Our race will wander the cold dark of space, without home, without sustenance, in a path of slow and painful extinction, altogether."

The crowd was terrified at the prospect. As do the whole world.

"You made that up!" Shoko responded in place of the still frowning Pino.

"How would you understand, little girl?" The Councilor smugly stated. "You've only been living in this world for 17 years. We've been living in your world for centuries. We've been deciding the fate of the entire planet before you were even born. Humanity wouldn't be as they are today… if it weren't for us. And we must continue to do so, if this world is to survive. We are one. Your people and mine. Is this not what the Queen wanted? A unity of our two races." The Councilor glanced at the frowning Pino. "Go ahead my Queen. You, whose cosmic wisdom is greater than ours should understand the truth in what I say. If not then look at the facts we presented you, and tell us how we're wrong."

And much to Pino's sorrow… she had to agree with the Councilor. Humans and Magius are now part of each other's life. To take one, is to destroy both. "…but you dominate them. You enslaved humanity, caging them in this prison garden of prosperity!" She further added, though she was no longer as certain as before, with doubt worming their way into her heart. "And you still feed on them. I heard from Ryuuji that month after month, you demanded human tributes to have their runes sucked out."

"A mere trifle compared to their prosperity nonetheless. Those tributes are mere trickles compared to what we've given them back. What's more, it was not us who suggested it, it was the humans who came up with that idea." The Councilor replied calmly. "And perhaps that is their fate. The natural order of things. To be prosperous forever while being governed by a superior race. US."

"You're taking away their freedom. Their chance to become greater than we could!" Pino shrieked. "No more different with how you are jacking those bodies you're using; you're jacking humanity's soul! Turning them into dolls! I ask you now humanity… is that what you want!?"

"Fine. Let's ask them." Once again the Councilor arranged something with his runes, and then, it appeared. "We've sent this to every human population in this galaxy. 7.5 billion and all. Magius population is practically a fraction of that, so our opinion we'll hardly make any difference."

It appeared on every laptop, every computer, every phone, ipad, tablet… anything that is connected to the net… which is everything. ARUS, Dorssia, and even the new New Jiorian student's handheld. On the screen of every device of every human on the planet was a poll:

Do you wish for Earth to be rid of the Magius: Yes or no?

Next to the Councilor is a chart that depicts how many answered yes, and how many answered no.

"Now we'll see. Does humanity wants to be free to face the uncertain future… or remain in our cradle, towards a blissful prosperity."

And for a moment, everyone seemingly watched in held breath.

And then…

To the horror of everyone, the first to trickle up… was the chart depicting the No.

The Councilor smirked.

"What…?" Satomi gasped in disbelief.

"It's only just 1!" Shoko smirked.

"No. Not just one…" Satomi rebuked. "It's one percent. One percent of human's 7.5 billion population refuse to be free of the Magius. That's… 75 million people who has chosen no!"

And to their horror, that percentage continue to increase. 2%... 3%... 5%... And it continues to rise at an increasingly rapid pace. Before they knew it, it had reached 30% vs 0, and increasing.

The students grew more horrified as the number increased higher and higher. Raizo growled in anger. "OI! YOU RIGGED THIS DIDN'T YOU!? I KEEP PRESSING YES! BUT THE CHART DIDN'T GROW AN INCH!" "Yeah me to!" "Me to!" Some of the students of the Sakimori high did unanimously chose yes as soon as the poll showed up.

36% - 0

The Councilor hardly care of their yells. "What is a single voice against the roar of millions? If you go against the stream, you will be nothing but an outcast. Forever alone, a stranger in a world that go against you."

44% - 0

At this point, even some of the students of the Sakimori high chose No. A-Drei frowned in terrible anger as he watched how even his answer of yes did nothing. Akira, still squirming in the grips of her panic attack, peeked at A-drei's phone.

57% - 0

It was a total landslide in favor of no. Even the Valvrave pilots, Yusuke pressed no as well. Much to Inuzuka's anger. "YUSUKE!?"

"If they leave… humanity will be devastated!" Yusuke cringed. "We'll tear each other apart! You know this!"

In the Auditorium, Raizo growled in anger. "Fuck this shit!" And he ran off the Auditorium, going who knows where.

76% - 0

At this point it hardly mattered. More than half of the human population had chosen no. Even those who initially contemplated strongly to press Yes saw the futility of defying the majority vote and chose no as well.

85% - 0

"Do you see now?" The Councilor stated in triumph. "Humans don't care about their freedom. They want to be ruled. They don't care if they have to sacrifice a fraction of their number, as long as their bountiful prosperous life continued."

90% - 0

"To the leaders of the world whom I know for certain is part of this… hilarious VVV project… I say this: You're not defying us, really. You're defying the will of the entire human race."

93% - 0

Even Pino despaired. She understands why of course. It's not problem of how their people had been united in such a twisted distorted way. But the Magius had molly coddled humanity for far too long. They've become reliant on Magius council, on their advices and directions… they've become unable to make their own choices.

98% - 0

And the most painful part? It was all her fault.

Suddenly, that choice appeared before her. Do you wish for Earth to be rid of the Magius: Yes or no?

Pino's eyes went bloodshot in pure rage. "You dare… test me!?"

"This is the way of the current world, Queen Pino. Everyone, even the Queen, will be held accountable for the words of their voice."

Pino lifted her finger towards the option… everyone held their breath…

"I think I understand something." Pino answered with her eyes hidden beneath the bangs of her hair. "I understand now why humans created evil deities. They created them to find something to redirect their excessive hate from each other. Because when a human are so consumed by their hatred, it will either destroy themselves… or the object of their hate. When the latter happens, unbridled excessive hate that is without aim or control will lead to destruction of all. That's why they created the evil deities. They created a creature that cannot be destroyed no matter how much hate they throw at it, thus preventing them from being consumed by their hate. Regrettably… our people never tried to do this." Pino raised her head and showed how her bloodshot furious eyes are crying tears of hate. Unbridled fury and hate. "Damn you. Damn you all for making me do this." When she looked at her former subjects, the fury of the Queen was so great; every electronic device in the whole world momentarily suffered a slight malfunction, even the lamps dimmed on and off. So great was her power, so terrible was her fury. It was momentary though.

And she picked Yes.

Everyone gasped.

The Councilor feigned surprise and sorrow. "You sadden us, My Queen. You would rather see this world and its indigenous species fall together with what's left of our race?"

Pino didn't answer, but her eyes say it all.

"Then you understand of course, My Queen, why we cannot let you off."

As soon as the Councilor said this, the whole module shook furiously. The students panicked. "Wh… What is this?"

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Outside…

Yusuke and Inuzuka gasped when suddenly 4 Dorssian Walkit Class Cruiser appeared in front of the module, right out of thin air.

"What the hell!?" Inuzuka's eyes widened.

"S… Stealth Bubble field? I never know Dorssia had that kind of tech!?" Yusuke choked.

"No… Wait… I don't think this is Dorssia."

Indeed, unlike the usual red color scheme of the standard Walkit class, this Walkit Cruisers are colored in purple and green. Closer observation also showed that the Space ships had been modified. Notable among them are the change in its propulsion system. Instead of the ignition boosters used by conventional spaceship, all fours ships used something strangely similar to 01's wing, glowing brightly green leaving a trail of pink hard afterglow. The symbol used was different. It's not Dorssian. Instead, a green glowing luminescent symbol that looked like a four leaved clover… or to be more precise, the symbol that represents the neon green glowing head crests that is the signature of the Valvraves.

All four ships launched a whole swarm of Waffes, colored in purple and green. Other than color, the Waffe is slightly different with that of Dorssian Waffes… in that their shields seems to be partially composed by the same Clear Fossil material that composed 05's shield, and instead of rectangular halves of a square, their shields are halves of a hexagon shape. And there seems to be no manned Waffe. All of them are unmanned. Their designs are rounder and more compact, with purple and neon green coloration, and while they don't have any visible cockpit their 'head' features a single neon green glowing visor, a sense nerve not unlike that found on Valvrave. And unlike the usual ignition type boosters used by conventional Waffes, this one utilized a pink hard afterglow propulsion system, the same used by Valvraves, making them even faster than normal Waffes. Another point of similarity is that they also possess exhaust vents at the back of the unit. The Mag-Waffes are armed with a pair of Gatling gun, a slug gun, a pincer, or a combination of the three. That seems conventional enough… except the fact they all use the Hard-light ammunition.

The Mag-Waffe rained the two Valvraves with a rain of hardlight bullet storm. With 05's shield, Inuzuka managed to block most of them easily enough… but… hardlight ammo is significantly hotter than solid projectiles. Even 05's high heat tolerance was severely tested with the temperature rising rapidly to 36 within a few full blow salvoes. "The heck!?" 05 returned fire, but the Waffe's Clear fossil shields can easily blocked the shots. She dodged several more, blocked some, and then Inuzuka saw a chance and fired at the main ship. The multiple hardlight arrows merged into one large blast powerful enough to blew up the whole bridge, but much to her horror, it barely dented the Magius Cruiser's bridge armor. "Yusuke, be careful! Those things are a hell lot tougher than it looked!"

With the Cruisers effectively invulnerable to their attacks, they had no choice but to concentrate on the small fries. Each Walkit also launched a pair of modified Ideal Annihilators. Like the Mag-Waffes, they've been significantly modified to utilize the same pink Hard Afterglow propulsion, with green and dark purple coloration, in addition of being unmanned. In fact, instead of the usual cockpit head, they added an extra hardpoint appendage to mount additional weaponry and targeting system. The shoulder wings had been replaced with the same green material that composed Valvrave 01's wings, albeit heavily reinforced with heavy armor and Clear Fossil plates. Their main weapons are a pair of scissor swords, with a built in three barreled Gatling cannon at its base, as well as a strip of sense nerve for targeting system. The outer blade heated up till it glows red and then it launched the said cable controlled blade towards the defending 05.

"INUZUKA-SENPAI!" 03 charged in and smashed the scissor blade off track, using its Armstronger. But punching the hot blade yielded some consequences. 03's thermal gauge rise from 20 to 35 with a single punch. "What!?" The Mag-Ideal closed their distance and swing its scissor sword hard. 03 blocked the attack, but it was pushed back violently. The thermal gauge rise to 55 instantly. Even worse, the Mag-Ideal quickly dispersed the Electromagnetic Boomerang swarm. Both valvraves were hit by the boomerang. "These things…" Yusuke suddenly realized. "They're using the same tech as the Valvraves!"

"If they're also a valvrave, then they also have the same weakness! Overheat them!" Inuzuka open fire rapidly at the Mag-Waffes. They merely gathered together and interlocked their hexagonal shields. Yusuke follows through and charged the Armstronger cannon before firing at full power. The yellow blast joined together forming a huge energy stream, reinforcing the rain of Bolt Phalanx's blue hard-light arrow volley. The barrage could've easily punched through a normal Walkit class' armor, and yet it didn't even dent the clear fossil shield. However, it caused all the Mag Waffe's rear exhaust vents to glow orange, they've all been thoroughly overheated, at that point, they all looked like they went haywire…

"I knew it." Inuzuka grinned. "They have the exact same weakness as we are."

But Yusuke think differently. Those Waffe's twitching seems strange… and why is their neon green visor flashes on and off… at an increasing frequency?

Yusuke's curiosity was answered when each of the malfunctioning and overheating Mag-Waffe suddenly exploded in a huge and eerie green explosion with enough force to knock both Valvraves back. And when the whole set exploded, 05 could barely blocked the blast with its shield, and 03 was completely thrown off all the way back to the Module, smashing through its anti asteroid barrier and cracked the weather glass dome. The pilot was knocked unconscious. However, the worst damage is to their thermal gauge. 03's thermal gauge jumped to 70-73, and 05 is very nearly reaching 85-87.

The Potemkin finally went online and starts opening fire, backing up the beleaguered Valvraves. However, their cannon fire did little damage to Mag-Walkit armor. But the Mag-Walkit returned fire with green Rune energy beams, rune warhead missiles, both are weapons using the energy of runes, and virtually outmatched the Potemkin, effectively bombarding the Module… again. However, unlike before, the Module actually defends against the attack. Purple round shields appeared on the dome surface and blocked several blasts, though barely.

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Inside the Module…

Students panicked and screamed. The other occupants run haphazardly in fear. Raizo felt the shaking and growled. "See? I knew it! They've come again! Fucking idiots!" He quickly ran towards the hangar…

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Akira squealed and squirmed when she felt the rumbling. A-Drei looked at the situation and saw how the Module defenses are up. "Ninomiya Takahi, how are our defenses?"

0000000

In the Command center, where some of the students who were not in the auditorium were activating the Module's repurposed defenses, lead by Takahi. "Holding! We ain't gonna let any shots through this time!"

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A-Drei nodded. But he also understands that this is just postponing the inevitable. The Electromagnetic barrier which was designed to hold debris at bay won't be able to last long against concentrated Rune blast from a Walkit Main Cannon. He quickly shift his view to outside, where he can see how the Valvraves are faring poorly against Valvrave Tech enhanced Waffes and Ideals. But also noted how all units were unmanned drones.

'Normal Unmanned Waffes from our nation are slaved to a single manned waffes. We designed it that way for efficiency and ease of control using short range wave transmission, allowing the unmanned waffes to respond quickly to pilot command. The choice of using short range transmitter was not only for it to be cost efficient, but also to reduce lag. These valvrave-tech-enhanced Waffes were unmanned… and no manned unit in sight… I guess Valvrave tech clearly allows a greater range of radio control transmission, but it can't be that far… so the transmitter is in those ships… we just need to hack and overwhelm the signal…' A-Drei train of thought made him landed his eyes on the squirming Akira. "Come with me!" Avoiding her kicks (but got hit by one kick to the head) A-Drei lifted Akira over his shoulder and carried her across the corridor towards the hangar as the rumblings grew louder and louder.

00000000000000

In the Auditorium, the students were crying and screaming as they felt the rumblings.

Pino was the only calm enough to remain where she floats. "So you would kill your queen? Is that it?"

"You leave us no choice my Queen. You stood in opposition of the very ideals and goals you once championed. And that power surge you showed earlier… it was clear to us that even though your power had diminished significantly, they are still substantial. Substantial enough to threaten this world." The Councilor flatly stated. "I'm sorry, My Queen. But please die here."

"I don't care that you will kill me." Pino glared. "But what you're doing to this world is wrong."

"On the contrary." The Councilor's voice held no remorse. "We're doing this FOR this world. For humanity!"

The barrage from outside intensified and the rumblings grew louder and louder.

Haruto looked at the situation outside and find it is dire. "They need our help! Saki! Get to Carmilla! (GAH!)"

"On it! (Kyaa!) I need a lift though!"

"Right." Haruto and Saki went to 01. Haruto turned it on… and found to his horror, it can't come online without Pino inside. "PINO!"

Pino remained where she is, too lost in her thoughts of how far her people had fallen. She turned up and looked at the council members. "One more thing… where's Lieselotte and Attlach?"

L-Elf's eyes widened when he heard one of the name being mentioned.

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Dorssia…

Lieselotte ran across the corridor, passing many paintings depicting her and the Dorssian royal family throughout the generation. Her face rive with panic and worry. As she reached the end of her destination, she knew the door at the end was locked. But she doesn't care. She lit up her runes, pulling out what little power she had amassed over the centuries.

But then, she stopped midway when Cain opened the door from the other side and stand in her way. She stopped and gritted her teeth. "CAIN! GET OUT OF THE WAY!"

The one eyed man didn't respond.

"IT'S PINO! THEY'RE GOING TO KILL OUR QUEEN! GET OUT OF THE WAY!"

Cain remained unresponsive.

Lieselotte become more desperate. "CAIN! It's Pino, Cain! Ca-…" She couldn't stop herself and uttered his TRUE name: "ATTLACH!"

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The Councilor coldly replied. "Humans believed in the concept of life after death, Afterlife. If we have such thing… you will meet them again there, My Queen."

Pino gritted her teeth.

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Outside… things get steadily worse.

Yusuke woke up only to find 05 is right in front of 03, overheating pretty badly, using its shield to protect enemy barrage. His thermal gauge is on the range of 87-88.

"Inuzuka…senpai?"

"Yo, sleepy head." Inuzuka grinned amidst the blaring of the warning sound of 05's console. "What took you so long?" Her thermal gauge is already reaching 97-98… her unit is close to overheating.

"Senpai!" Yusuke looked at the situation. "Where's 01 and 04?"

"I don't know… but a little help would be nice!" Inuzuka grunted.

"No! We have to pull back! We can't fight all of them ourselves!"

"That's exactly what we've been doing." Inuzuka grinned. "That's the way we've been doing it. We beat the odds when the world is against us."

"Senpai… I…"

"We're holy spirits remember? We've been touched by Gods…" 05 returned fire, ignoring the damage it has been receiving. "So we beat the odds." 05 finally reached 99 to 100. "Could use a little shower here girls!"

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Takahi and her girls had been trained to do this, in case of Valvrave reaching heat. Inspired with the method used by L-Elf a little earlier, they jury rigged the trash ejector system used to send away compact trash, this time, they sent out a block of ice taken from the water supply that formed their ocean.

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The ice was ejected and headed straight to 05 and the stuck 03. Upon hitting 05's overheating figure, the ice melted instantly, cooling off both units in a spray of melted ice and water. The problem is to melt the ice instantly requires one Valvrave to be overheating.

Regardless, 05's temperature lowered to a mild 67-69, 03 cooled down to 59-62. However, with the amount of overheating weapons sent their way, this won't mean much. Yusuke knew this.

Inuzuka continued her counter barrage, nonetheless. "Come on Yusuke! RETURN FIRE!"

Yusuke was literally petrified by fear. When he first piloted the Valvraves, he was overwhelmed by his need to fix stuffs. That momentary bravery and recklessness was further enforced by the fact that the odd, at that time, was in their favor. But now… just two machines halfway to overheating, against this much enemy firepower… all thoughts of fighting back goes out of the window. With trembling fingers, Yusuke aimed the Armstronger cannons. They split up into 8 hands, and start firing back in a salvo of energy blast. But Yusuke could barely hit anything, suddenly a Waffe opened fire from the flank, destroying 2 of his arms. Yusuke finally panicked and attempted to run away from the battle; despite the fact his Valvrave is still combat effective.

03 flew away from the 05, braving the hailstorm of gunfire.

"Y…Yusuke!" Inuzuka grunted in annoyance. But he understands how Yusuke feels. He's a mechanic not a combatant. Suddenly being asked to fight such an exceedingly uneven odd after merely surviving a single battle is a bit too much to ask… Of course this is his second battle too, but… 03 doesn't have 05's defensive capability…

Unfortunately, by breaking away from 05's defenses, Yusuke made himself an easier target. The barrage hit 03 multiple times.

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At about the same time, A-drei is still running with a still panicking Akira on his shoulder.

"W-W-WHERE ARE YOU… T-T-TAKING… ME?" She screamed.

"To Valvrave 06. You're going to pilot it." A-drei answered short. He was so focused on this goal, he chose to ignore Akira's squirming, and he didn't even bat an eye when he ran across Raizo. Raizo didn't understand what's going on, but he knew something was wrong when he saw A-Drei carrying a Sakimori student… albeit he had never seen that one before. "OI! DORSSIAN BASTARD! THE HELL ARE YOU DOING!?" What's more, he noticed that A-Drei is going to the same direction he's going, the Hangar.

A-Drei has no time to answer, and he kept running.

"WAAAIT!" Raizo immediately gave chase.

Much to Raizo's disbelief, despite A-Drei's additional baggage, he completely outran him. By the time Raizo spent his breath as he arrived at the hangar, a Splicer carrying A-Drei and Akira had just taken off, leaving him to eat its dust.

"Oh you gotta be kidding me… this guy and that guy… are those Dorssian soldier monsters or somethin'?" At about the same time, Raizo witnessed the 03 were having the snot beaten out of him by the Magius fleet. "Yusuke…? The hell are you doin'?"

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A-Drei and Akira boarded the splicer and launched straight into a chaotic battle. He witnessed how 03 were being shot down until it finally crash landed right into the hangar, barely missing him. The Module 77 automated system quickly dragged the damaged Valvrave inside for repairs. He harrumphed and stepped on the throttle, the Splicer zoomed across the storm of bullets. His destination is the hangar of the Potemkin, where 06 are on standby.

The unmanned Waffes and Ideals were quick to notice the fighter, and they opened fire at it. A-Drei found himself hard pressed to dodge. "Those Magius make a nice autopilot program…" The Splicer barely survived the barrage, but just a moment from reaching the hangar, a few shots hit its left wing. A-Drei grunted as he steered the crashing plane into the hangar, barely missing a cannon fire from the Ideal. The ship was a total wreck when it landed and grind the hangar floor. The safety bag blew up on the occupants faces to protect them from injury. When the ship crashed, the safety bag shrunk back into the console. The ship is done.

But the most important thing, is that both of its occupants are in one piece. A-Drei unstrapped himself and pointed a gun at a curling Akira. "Renbokuji Akira! You have to pilot 06!"

But as A-Drei await her response, Akira fell further into panic.

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Raizo was still thinking about how to chase that damn Dorssian with nothing he can use when a smoking hot 03 were being cart wheeled in into the hangar. The hangar crew with special suit quickly took the hose and sprayed the overheating Valvrave with cooling agent. Raizo float towards it and stopped when he felt the heat searing his body, even through his space suit. This gave him time to observe 03's condition. Apart from the fact that the Armstronger Cannons suffered massive damage, 03 is practically without a scratch. "This guy ain't damaged by the least…?"

Once 03's temperature had cooled off well enough to a lukewarm state, Raizo floated towards the cockpit, despite the yells from the crew. "Oi! You're not supposed to get in there!"

"JUST SHUDDUP AND FIX THIS GUY! HE NEEDS TO GO OUT THERE AGAIN!"

He opened the cockpit and beheld the sight of Yusuke, crying and squirming with snot and tears floating inside his helmet and clattering teeth.

"YUSUKE!? THE FUCK ARE YOU DOIN?"

"I'm scared… I'm scared… I'm scared… No more… No more… No More…"

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The students in the auditorium were completely terrfied, the girls hugged one another and cried as the rumblings outside grew louder and louder.

Pino closed her eyes in despair. Until…

"And click…" Pino looked at Shoko who made her choice. And her choice is: "…No!"

Haruto and Saki jawdropped…

Pino's eyes widened. Of course with this odd, choosing yes by now is laughable… but she did not expect Shoko of all people to press No. "Shoko-chan?"

"What? They haven't retracted the poll!"

"Shoko… why?" Haruto gaped.

"Are you guys stupid?" Shoko stated at the monitor, addressing the council. "The poll says: Do you wish to be rid of the Magius: Yes or no? Right? Well of course I would've pressed No! If I say I wish to be rid of Magius, well check this out." Shoko pointed at Haruto and Saki. "My childhood friend who is already as good as my little brother, and his girlfriend, who's already as good as my sister in law are MAGIUS! And don't get me started on the children they'll be poppin' out soon!"

Haruto and Saki blushed furiously. Judging by the number of times they've done it, it's not impossible…

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The situation outside worsened, and A-Drei wouldn't wait anymore. He grabbed Akira and carried her to the docked 06.

Soon, he threw her into the cockpit and activated the console for her.

Do you wish to resign your humanity? Yes or No?

"Hurry up and answer the question, Renbokuji Akira!" A-Drei cocked the gun at Akira. "We don't have much time!"

"Don't want… don't want!"

"This is not a request!" A-Drei turned Akira around and shoved a gun to her head to make his point. "Pilot it, or I'll kill you and I'll grab someone else who can!"

Akira looked terrified… but not of the gun. She was terrified over something else. "Don't want… don't want… don't want…"

Even A-Drei realized this too. He dropped his gun. "What is wrong with you? You're scared… but not of my gun… and not of me either…" A-Drei looked at Akira's feature: thin due to malnutrition, pale skin due to lack of contact with sunlight, acute case of sleep deprivation, resulting in mental instability… specifically Anxiety attacks. Cause… something traumatic… probably childhood trauma. "Are you… scared of humans?"

Akira tearful eyes widened but she curled back into a ball, terrified.

A-Drei looked at this terrified look… and suddenly… came the understanding. She's prolly around 15… and yet she already showed such degree of skill and experience with computers and programming. Not the kind of skill that stereotypical people could easily understand, and not something someone, no matter how talented, can mature in one or two years. Clearly, she's what one would call prodigal genius ever since she was young. Too young. A girl who's been thinking way ahead of anyone of her age… she became alienated from the world… And then… probably out of jealousy and envy of her peers who cannot see the world the way she did, they isolated her… harass her…

Just like…

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98% - 0

"If I choose yes on that poll… then that means I have to kick them out of Earth now, would I? So how could I choose that!? They're my friends and family for cryin' out loud!" And then Shoko turned to Pino. "And you! Who gave you permission to take over this speech? Last I checked, I'm the one who started this speech! So it's mine to finish, no?"

Pino blinked several times in confusion, and then she dumbly nodded as she gave way for Shoko.

Shoko looked at the Council defiantly. Soon, the pictures allover the world showed the Council and Shoko, ready to continue the verbal duke out.

"This speech isn't about how we wanted the Magius to be kicked out of our world. No. Personally I don't mind to have extraterrestrial ghost race as a neighbor. It's kinda cool actually. Earth is big enough for everyone. What we DO take issue, is having a bunch of dumbasses like you councilors of the Council of 101 to run things for us!"

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"OI! YUSUKE! WHAT ARE YOU DOING, CRAWLING LIKE A LOSER DOWN THERE? INUZUKA-SENPAI NEEDS HELP OUT THERE!"

"I can't do it! I can't do it!"

"Stop your whinnin and get yer ass back in the fight!"

"I'M A MECHANIC DAMN IT!" Yusuke screeched. "…I… I fix stuff! Okay!? Something breaks, I tinker with it, and that's it! THAT'S ALL I CAN DO! I can't… I can't fight… not like this… I mean… did you see that poll!? We're fighting against the whole god-damn world!"

"So what of it!?" Raizo roared. "YOU'RE A VALVRAVE PILOT! YOU'RE A GODDAMN IMMORTAL!"

"But I can't! I can't!" Yusuke breaks down crying… "I can't do it! I can't do it…"

"Geh… you…" Raizo gaped.

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98% - 0

Everyone from the Council growled in anger. "You dare call us dumbasses? Us? The wisest of the Magius who had ruled your world since-"

"YES! I call YOU all DUMBASSES! Why? Because you're being ruled by a DUMBASS fairy Queen!"

Pino blinked in sheer confusion as she smiled nervously. "Me?" She pointed at herself. "A dumbass fairy queen?"

"YES! How else would you describe a Queen who lost control of her own ministers? Now I know why you and father can get along, both of your programs and cabinets are equally DUMB! My father who was dumb enough to authorize human experimentations, and you who are dumb enough to leave your people alone and now they overruled you!"

Ryuuji twitched and laughed nervously, while Pino rolled her eyes.

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"…I used to be scared of humans too."

Akira stopped and fidgeted as she turn to give A-Drei a peek.

His fierce look was gone, replaced with a solemn look. "…they fear you, because you were different. And you were different not because you choose to be… that's how you are. You tried your best to blend in, but you can't make them see the world your way, and they won't give you a chance. You became a lonely solitary existence. A stranger in a world full of strangers."

"All hail to Mr. Prince!" "Hahahahah!" "Hey Mr. Prince! You got any butler that can wipe your ass for you!?" "You should never been born!"

"But you know what I figure out? I may be scared of them… but in truth… they're more scared of me." A-Drei bent his head down. "They're scared of me because they can't understand me. And since they can't understand me, they feel like they can't control me, so they try to subdue me, through violence."

Akira stopped trembling and looked at A-Drei clearly now.

"Do you know what Karstein facility is?" Akira shook her head. A-Drei explained briefly. "It is a secret training facility. Children are being put through a harsh training regime, inhuman and merciless, with only 5% survival rate. They put me there when I was young, in a hope that I would die. And I didn't. I survived and grew strong. Strong enough to face anything the world will throw at me, including those who wanted me dead."

Akira frowned. "M-m-me… N-n-n-not… s-strong… cannot… s-survive."

"I found out later than you don't have to be strong to survive." A-Drei gently noted. "You just have to be brave enough to take a step forward and go at it."

"N-n-not… b-b-brave enough…"

"Not for yourself then." A-Drei activated his phone. The screen now showed Shoko and the Council duking it out. "Be brave now… for your friends." And A-Drei showed Akira the verbal battle between Shoko against the Council.

Akira's eyes widened. "Sh-shoko-chan?"

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98% - 0

Somehow, Shoko's ranting had caused the whole human race to stop voting, listening to her screams.

"You can change the question of course." Shoko glared at the monitor. "Instead of be rid of Magius, you can ask if we want to be rid of YOU. You the Council of 101! And this time don't you dare say Magius vote doesn't count!" Shoko pointed at the council. "But that's fine. The first question is just as good. To all of you out there, listen. I choose no, because my family, my friends are Magius. I cannot choose the independence of humanity over them. They meant the world for me." Shoko smiled confidently. "However, I'd like to point out that these dumbasses are fooling you. They make it as if there's only yes or no. Well, think it again buddy! THERE ARE THREE CHOICES!"

"What are you blabbering about-"

Shoko ignored the councilor and raised her handphone. "You can pick yes, or no… or… this." She dropped the phone and step on it until it breaks. "Choose: NEITHER."

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"You're the guy with the guts to beat the crap out of me! Me, THUNDER! The strongest man in Sakimori High!"

"I don't know what came over me! I'm sorry!"

"I don't want your apology! YOU HAD TO FIGHT, DAMN IT!"

"I CAN'T FIGHT THE WHOLE WORLD!" Yusuke screamed. In his panic, he turned on the console and showed Raizo the impossible odd that was presented on the chart before them. 98% of the world vs 0 them. "LOOK AT THIS! LOOK! 98% of every human in the world is against us!? HOW CAN WE WIN AGAINST SOMETHING LIKE THAT!?"

"LIKE I GIVE A FUCK! WHO CARES ABOUT WHAT THOSE YELLOW BELLIED, PANSY WANSY CO… waitdaminute… what's happenin in there?"

"Huh?"

Raizo and Yusuke looked at the screen.

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98% - 0

And the people allover the world stopped and watched.

"This poll was given to you by the council. In other words, it's also another form of control. And the main point of this speech, is to show you all that we don't have to follow through with the council wishes any longer. So by not choosing, that means you reject the wisdom of the council. Make your own damn mind on what to do with the fact that the Magius lived among you." Shoko grinned wide. "So… choose!"

The students looked at each other. They were a bit uncertain… and then…

CRACK! CRACK!

Everyone turned and saw Haruto and Saki just smashed their phones and step on it, breaking it. "I choose neither." Haruto smiled.

"Me too." Saki grinned.

The students grinned at one another. And then another student smashed their phone to the ground and step on it as well. And then another… and another… and another… soon, every student in the auditorium began smashing their phones to the ground, stepping on them. Kibukawa asked Rion to put his phone in front of his wheelchair. By that same token, Rion also put hers in the way before Kibukawa excitedly steamrolled them all.

Everywhere around the world, everyone laughed and mimicked Shoko's answer: drop their phone and crush it underfoot. Some who's still conflicted by the choice forgo choosing and drop it to the ground and crush it.

Crush, crush, crush…

The 98% - 0 comparison stopped completely, and it stuck there.

Ryuuji watched in admiration. Suddenly, his phone ring. He opened it… it was Jeffry Anderson. "Why hello, Jeffry! What winds brings you to call a dead man's cell phone?"

"Ryuuji! Stop your crazy ass daughter! Don't let her anger the Council any more than this! Take over, and tell the Council that you're going to give everything about the VVV project to them-"

"That's not going to happen Jeffry." Ryuuji smiled.

"The VVV project is our-"

"Wrong. It was our project. But… these children that we've remade… they grew, and grew… into this. All this. It has become something more than what we intended them to become. A new hope. A new future. A different future than that we envisioned. Neither you, me, Amadeus nor even the Council can determine their destiny anymore. They're forging their own now." Ryuuji smiled. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some very important business to attend to and it cannot wait."

"What business?"

Ryuuji smiled. "Crushing my cellphone in support of my crazy ass daughter. Don't call this number again." Ryuuji slammed the phone to the ground and stepped on it. And then he smiled ear to ear in relief, as if he just removed a big load off his back.

Shoko looked in triumph as the comparison of 98 vs 0 didn't move anymore by an inch. A sign that not only it meant 2% of the world agrees with her, there are probably pockets of the 98% who also agrees with her. "Well, how bout that?"

"Irresponsible."

"?"

"Irresponsible!" The Councilor roared. "Not choosing? What kind of irresponsible answer is that? You're running away from the matter at hand!"

"I'm not running away! I'm reminding you lot of the real matter at hand!" Shoko smirked. "How many times do I have to tell you? This isn't about how we don't want the Magius in our world, we just don't want YOU in it!"

"We are the defenders of the Magius race! Without us, the Magius race is as good as dead!"

"Didn't you say you're doing this for humanity?" Shoko smirked.

The Councilor flabbergasted.

"You call me irresponsible? I'm a 17 year old for cryin' out loud! I'm a teenager! I'm SUPPOSED to be irresponsible! I'm supposed to play all day and let the adults made the decision!"

"You think you can change the world acting like that!?"

"Let me stop you right there, Councilor." Pino smiled wide. "For centuries the council had remained hidden. Three of the earth's most powerful political leader spent 20 years in their convoluted scheme to expose you, only to be doomed to fail from the start. But with one speech, Shoko-chan did what the so called most powerful men in the world had failed to do. Try? She just changed the world right in your face!"

The Councilor's gritted his teeth in anger and he finally lost his composure. "SHUT UP! You're just a fallen disgraced Queen! You're not calling the shots anymore!"

"Finally." Shoko smirked in triumph. "Your true color. This is what it's all about. Just you attempt on a power play, right? To seize control from your queen you dragged our world into the mix. What are you going to do about this, Pino-chan?" Shoko looked at Pino.

Pino shrugged. "Customarily, I locked them away in a hole for the rest of their natural life until their runes drained out. But… I think I've been sacked. Not exactly a Queen anymore. As you say, I've lost control of my cabinet. Now I'm just a dumbass fairy."

"No. You're not a queen anymore… but you are their so called Matriarch." Shoko rolled her eyes. "That's to say, you're their mother, and they are your children. And from what I see so far… they're being naughty. Yesma'am, VERY naughty indeed."

"What do human mothers do to their naughty children?"

"Obvious isn't it?"

Shoko turned around and shake her pompom to the screen as she slapped her butt in front of the council. "We gave them a good old fashioned, honest to god, ASS SPANKING!"

The whole world snorted.

The Councilor blushed in embarrassment and anger. Never in his long immortal life had he been insulted to such degree. "You bunch of foolish children…!" The councilor growled. "You would defy us? Us and the whole world we commanded!?"

"We reject you!" Shoko pointed her finger at the screen. "Everyone here in New Jior had unanimously agreed to REJECT YOU AND YOUR RULE! RIGHT EVERYONE!?"

The whole school exploded with roars and cheers. "YEAH!" "THAT'S RIGHT!" "WE DON'T WANT YOU!" "WE'RE WITH YOU SHASHINAMI!" "WE REJECT YOU!" "GO AWAY!"

"Then we will not stand by it." The Councilor gave Shoko a terrible look. "The lot of you are now just a destabilizing agent to the peace of this world. Disappear!"

As he said this, the attack on the Module grew fiercer and fiercer.

Shoko was unfazed. "If that's the case, then we hereby declare war." She glared with ferocity that rivaled even the fiercest glare from the Magius' former queen. "We, the nation of New Jior hereby declare war on YOU and your world!"

"You? Declare war on us!? You will declare a war against the whole world! You think you can do this alone!?"

"She's not alone." Pino stood forth. "I'm here. The Valvraves are here. The Novus Magius… and the future of humanity… they're here. We are all here! She's not alone."

"YEAH!" "LET'S GET THEIR ASSES!" "FREEDOM!" The students roared and punched their fist to the sky in support of Shoko.

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And true enough, in some other parts of the world…

ARUS…

"SHASHINAMI! SHASHINAMI! SHASHINAMI!" A bunch of office guys yelled around a bonfire burning their handheld devices.

A bunch kids happily jumping up and down a bunch of their parents cellphones and handheld devices while their parents laughed.

If all his sweat were collected, Jeffry would probably have enough to fill an entire glass.

In Dorssia…

Lieselotte had to pinch herself to stop her from laughing her brains out at the balls this girl is showing.

Cain twitched several times as he looked at the proceeding of this speech.

Amadeus gritted his teeth at this insane girl. "Ridiculous… a little girl!? Just a little girl!?" One speech and she probably had just won about half the world to her side, statistic aside. Already his head began to think of a political angle on how to gain from this. 'How should I approach this… how…' But before he can think further, his secretary looked at him, and gritted her fanged teeth…

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Shoko declared. "We'll live through this as we always have! We'll survive! Yes we can! And after that, we're coming for you! So get your ass ready!"

"Because I'm gonna give you a long overdue ASS-SPANKING of a lifetime!" Pino followed suit.

The Council had enough and shut transmission from their end.

Shoko and Pino looked at each other, grinning like mad. "He, he, he, yay!" And they toasted, sending some parks of rune from Pino's hand.

Haruto and Saki also grinned. "Now come on. There's some other thing we need to deal with." Haruto jerked his thumb to his unit.

"Coming!" Pino shrank back and transformed once again into that small spark of light and she entered unit 01's core. Once again, the Valvrave went online with Pino showing up on the screen. Cheered by everyone, 01's neon green headcrest lit up and the unit once again went online and flew away.

First, 01 landed near a field where Carmilla is being parked.

After giving Haruto a quick passionate kiss, Saki jumped in to the unit. She turned on the console.

Inside 01… Pino was arranging something. "Wait Haruto… given the current event… I'm gonna tweak the OS a little…"

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The Councilor gnashed his teeth so tight it threatens to break his jaw. "Kill them. KILL THEM ALL NOW!"

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"Shoko-chan…" Akira looked at the proceeding with awe.

"Look at her." A-Drei nodded. "Just look at her. The daughter of the Prime Minister. She's clearly different from the rest. Born to lead… But she didn't try to blend in… she blend everyone into her pace. Tip my hat off for her." A-Drei couldn't help to say he admired her constitution now. Speaking from one son of a ruler to another. "She has the courage to face the world… but she clearly cannot face it alone."

Akira frowned. "…Shoko-chan…"

And then, Shoko still continued. "That being said… seeing we just declared war against the whole world… that means… there's a change of plan afoot. We will no longer go to the moon to ask refuge. We will no longer ask for some neutrality area of non violence. Violence is exactly where we're going. Instead of going to the moon to ask for some cover, we're hereby recruiting! Anyone who is willing to join up with us to fight the Council's oppression are welcome to join us on the Moon! This time we'll take the fight to them! AND WE'LL WIN!" And then, as if knowing Akira would be watching, she yelled. "Akira-chan! Remember, we promised to go to the supermarket together when we get to the moon?"

Akira gasped.

"It might get a bit delayed… but I promise we'll go there together! We're friends aren't we?"

"Shoko…chan…"

At about that time, the attack from outside grew fiercer. The Module shook again, violently this time. Enough to sent the cheering to a full stop and Shoko was thrown off her feet.

"SHOKO-CHAN!" Akira screeched.

"Enough!" L-Elf quickly helped her up. "EVERY STUDENT TO BATTLE STATION! ALL VALVRAVES LAUNCH NOW!" L-Elf quickly brought Shoko to safety, together with her parents. The Students scurry away towards their pre-described battle stations.

"…!"

Akira bit her lips. And then, she looked at 06's console. Suddenly, the console turned off. A-Drei blinked with worry. "What?" But suddenly, the console went online again… with a slight change…

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Aboard 03, the same thing also happened.

The screen on 03 turned off momentarily, right at the scene where L-elf harried Shoko away.

Went it went back on… a new question appeared.

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Saki turned on the Carmilla… there's a bit of a lag… but then a question appeared.

"Hehehe…" Saki smirked seeing the new question.

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Aboard 05…

Inuzuka laughed so hard, she forgot her own precarious situation. "That's our leader for you! Yeah!"

Aina also chuckled happily in the console. And then, she sensed an upcoming data stream package from Pino. She opened it and smiled at the content.

"Senpai!"

"huh?"

Aina showed the update. Inuzuka grinned.

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Pino smiled to Haruto. "What do you think?"

"Well… we definitely know the answer to this." Haruto smiled.

Valvrave OS Ver. 2.0.

It is necessary that you must answer this question before you may utilize this unit:

Do you believe in humanity? Yes or No?

Haruto easily answered the question.

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Saki laughed as she clicked the obvious answer.

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Inuzuka still managed to smile as he input her answer, even when a cannonblast pushed the thermal gauge to the brink, again.

0000000

Raizo couldn't care less. He kicked the still fretting Yusuke and sit on the cockpit.

"Yamada-senpai! If you press it…"

"I'll become like Haruto-aniki right?" Raizo smiled. "Works for me!"

And before Yusuke can explain, without hesitating, Raizo clicked his answer. The sting injected into his neck, and Raizo roared when he felt lightning coursing through his veins.

The now fixed unit 03 suddenly trembled… and then transformed again. It was originally had a black base color with black stripes… and suddenly, as soon as Raizo finished his transformation, the color became inverted. Black becomes yellow, yellow becomes black.

0000000

A-Drei holster his sidearm when he saw Akira's finger clicked on the answer and the transformation had runs its course. He looked at the new question. "Interesting question. It's no longer about resigning your humanity… but believing in them… why did you press it? I thought you're scared of humanity."

"D-d-don't believe… in humanity…" Akira groaned as she endured this awkward feeling coursing through her body. "B-b-believe… in Shoko-chan."

06 changed color as the white part of the unit turned black.

0000000

Yusuke looked in awe and wonder at Raizo. "Yamada-senpai… you're still alive? You transformed too?"

"Huh? You got a problem with me surviving?"

"No… It's just… I thought every unit should be biometrically locked once the first pilot transformed! I was afraid it might reject you… or worse… kill you!"

"BAKA! Who do you think I am!?" Raizo grinned. "I'm THUNDER! The strongest man in Sakimori High!"

Yusuke smiled nervously and his eyes twitched.

"I get it. You're scared. You can't fight. You fix stuff. That's what you do." Raizo smiled, giving Yusuke a fierce reassuring look. "Problem is… that's what I can't do. That's why I let you take the unit the first time. Because at the time that's what needs be done. But right now, it's less fixing, more breaking. You fix stuff, I'll break it!"

"Senpai…"

Raizo grinned and then he roared at the people outside. "OI! GET OUTTA OF THE WAY! I'M DRIVIN' THIS THING!"

The crew ran away in fear as the 03-Reverse came online and moved to the launchpad.

0000000

At about the same time, Saki had activated Carmilla and quickly dashed up to join 01, and the two quickly went outside through the exit beneath the ocean bottom

0000000

The Red 01 and Green 04 flew out of the module.

The Yellow 03-Reverse flew out of the launchpad.

The Blue 05 could barely hold on, but it was intact, its absolute defense passed the test.

The Purple 06 fly out of the Potemkin.

All 5 Valvraves of the VVV project had finally came online.

Mijikai yume wo kasanete

"Inuzuka-senpai! Are you okay?"

Eien ni shite yuku hana no

Inuzuka grinned. "What took you so damn long eh!?"

Itsuwari ga setsunai

"Something wrong with unit 03?" Saki frowned.

Tojikometa inochi no

"It's me!" Raizo grinned ear to ear.

Kodoku wo kimi ni sasageru

"Yamada!?" Inuzuka gawked. "Where's Yusuke!?"

Preserved Rose

"It's THUNDER!" Raizo barked. "And Yusuke's here." He lifted the extremely mortified Yusuke, who gave a weak wave.

"2 people can pilot one valvrave?" Haruto blinked in surprise. "Then Yamada Senpai… you too… a Novus Magius?"

"Seems that way." Raizo smirked. "AND CALL ME THUNDER!"

Karada no oku afureru mono wo

"Who's controlling 06 then?"

hito to

The screen opened up. At first it showed A-Drei.

kaete iru dake

"A-Drei!?" L-Elf entered the com. "You pilot unit 06?"

Subete ga "tsumetasugiru" nante

"Not exactly." A-Drei motioned to his side where Akira is struggling to control this new machine in a way that allows her to remain invisible. She failed of course.

yubi wo

"AKIRA!?" Satomi shrieked in horror. "AKIRA! NO! HOW COULD YOU!? YOU… YOU THROW AWAY YOUR HUMANITY!?"

hodokasenai de

Shoko gasped in sorrow. "Akira-chan…?" And then Shoko get a message of an incoming text. It's from Akira.

Hikari to yami no

Don't care about humanity. Shoko-chan. I protect. I fight.

dochira ni demo ireru

"Akira-chan…" Shoko smiled sadly.

Kowagaranai de

L-Elf quickly took command. "Very well then. All 5 valvraves are online. Listen up guys. We have to win this fight. This is the first battle against the Council. Against the World!"

nozomanu asa wa

"Do you understand? We just declared war against the whole world, and now they are watching. We must win to show the world that we can do it!"

mou konai

"If we lose, we'll all die anyway." Inuzuka laughed.

Azayaka dake wo

"Do or die." Saki snorted. "Considering we're immortals, saying something like that does seem odd."

kurikaeshi

"Koraa! COME AND GET ME WORLD! THUNDER IS READY!" Raizo roared. "Yay~!" Yusuke peeped.

Tsunagari owari

"Everyone, focus!" A-Drei spoke, while Akira quickly familiarizes herself with the system. 06's main weapon caught her eye. 'Weapon… Hummingbird. I see… this is my weapon… Okay!'

kimi wa mata…

"We've unveiled all the lies in the world." Haruto chuckled. "Now let's live through it!"

Mijikai yume wo kasanete

"First priority, unit 05 had suffered critical damage. That unit is crucial to the battle ahead. 03, Yusuke Otamaya, fix it! 01, 04, protect them. 06, stay in the rear!" L-Elf gave the instruction.

Eien ni shite yuku hana no

Raizo understand and the 03 moved and position itself right next to the damaged 05. He switched control to Yusuke. Yusuke mourned. "Yamada-senpai… I'm sorry… I…"

"Yusuke! Man up now! You're needed! Don't run away again, okay!?"

"O-Okay!" Yusuke took control of the 03. As if recognizing the change in pilot, 03 reverted back to its original color. Its armstronger arms split into 8 and they start performing battlefield repairs on 05.

Itsuwari ga setsunaku

While this happens, 01 and 04 engaged the enemy. Before they do so, Inzuka warned them. "Haruto! Be careful! They're like Valvraves, but they'll explode when they're overheated!" She quickly sent something to aid 01 and 04's defenses. "Here, use this!" 05 detached its left Clear Fossil shields, giving the left to Haruto.

"Roger." 01 put the shell on his shoulder before he pulled out the Vurutoga and engaged at the distance. Setting the blast to full power, the Furutoga fired a massive green rune energy that punctured multiple Mag-Waffes in one shot. The blast from the Vurutoga overheated their systems within moments and they exploded full force in a massive violent neon green light. The massive explosion also caught several Waffe, resulting in a chain reaction that severely damaged an Ideal. A scissor sword went straight to 05, but Haruto quickly defended with the Clear Fossil shield. "Bastards!" And he returned fire with the Vurutoga.

Kobamu sekai wo kizutsukeru

Carmilla dueled two Mag-Ideals all at once. Using her high speed thrust vectoring; she dodged and weaved amidst the barrage of scissor blades. She threw her spindle knuckle and the wheel cut through the strings of the extended scissors midflight. Before the Mag ideal can withdraw some of its extended scissors, Carmilla pushed forward and throw her spindle knuckle, ripping the chest of a Mag Ideal and quickly jumped away, leaving the heavily damaged drone to explode full force.

"They're unmanned drones? Seriously? Is that all these Magius GOT!?" Saki scoffed. Seriously, after handling Dorssian elite pilots, unmanned drones, no matter how advanced, even if they're enhanced with Valvrave tech, seem like a joke by comparison.

Negau nara misaseru

"Move back to that area." A-Drei instructed. Akira followed through and moved 06 behind 03, still in the middle of repairing 05. As soon as they stopped, Akira quickly went to work. She typed the console of 06 lightning fast. As expected, with an actual pilot at the helm, 06's electronic warfare capability increase tenfold. Within seconds, Akira had found the signal controlling the unmanned units. 'Need to intercept the system… but… there are several batches of drones, each communicating using a different signal. Can't hack them all at once. Must intercept signal, do it one batch at a time.' Akira began her hack.

06's Sense nerves allover its body grew brightly green as the whole unit hums.

Dakara tooku kienai de

01 is on a rampage. Using the Vurutoga at a burst rapid fire mode, it managed to keep a suppressive fire on the Waffes with a storm of hard light ammo. It cannot exactly penetrate the shield per se, but it did rapidly whittle their thermal gauge, causing them to self destruct prematurely. Two ideals suddenly charged in from both sides, trying to flank him. He flipped a Z-Edge short katana out of the Vurutoga and throw it at the first Mag-ideal's main Sense Nerve with one hand while open fire at the other Ideal using Vurutoga with the other, also knocking out its main sensor. Both Ideals momentarily flying blind, 01 used the Bladed Baiken and launched the cable. The Scythe managed to hook one Waffe. 01 pulled it down as it charged upward, effectively substituting himself with a waffe, which he quickly barraged to the point of overheat. By the time the two Ideals had switched to back up sensors, the Waffe is on their collision course and ready to explode. All three was destroyed instantly.

Kimi ga miru ashita no

At the moment, Yusuke is nearly finished fixing 05. "Oi! I'm almost done! Somebody send a new shield here!"

"Gotcha!" The hangar crew in Potemkin yelled. Potemkin maintained its barrage of fire while closing in on the Valvraves. As soon as they're in range, an unmanned Waffe carrying a package containing the requested spare parts launched out.

Meanwhile, the students had manned the Module's defenses and now start opening fire. While it didn't do much good, a concentrated burst of the autocannons managed to take out a few Waffes.

Atarashii ibuki wo

Carmilla danced left and right, dodging bullets and missiles while her spindle knuckle wrecking havoc amidst the enemy. When Saki noticed the Ideal is preparing to launch the damned boomerangs, she now know well enough to steer clear. Keeping range, she sent the Spindle Knuckle forward. Seeing she's still out of range, the Ideal opened fire, attempting to destroy the incoming projectile. Saki controlled the spinning spindle manually to dodge the attacks and headed straight towards the launcher, alas, this leave her open to attack.

Nobashita ude ni mukaeru

At about the same time, Akira had cracked the signal of the first batch, giving her control to over 20 or so Mag Waffes. She quickly put them to good use by giving 04 the much needed protection. The help came just in time as an Ideal had just opened fire at the green Valvrave. Said Ideal was quickly chased by 01 who quickly engaged it.

A-Drei also observed the situation and give advices to Akira who obviously had no combat experience. "Concentrate on supporting 04. Out of all Valvraves, she's the fastest, but doesn't have much firepower and she has the lightest armor. Remember to keep the Waffe at a safe distance. They explode violently when they overheat. Use them as suicide pawn if needs be." In fact, Akira put the last advice into practice immediately by ramming the Mag Waffe to other Mag-Waffe that wasn't under her control. She took out nearly half of the remaining Waffe in the process.

hanasanai

Suddenly, multiple blue hardlight projectiles mixed with a huge pair of yellow energy streams barraged the enemy fleet.

03 and 05 is back in game. 03 are once again in its reverse mode, a sign that Raizo is piloting it. This was further proven with how, in stark difference with its previously defensive stance, the 03-Reverse aggressively, and recklessly, fired its Armstrong cannon again and again. "HORAHORAHORA! GUESS WHO'S BACK YA MAGIUS SONS OF BITCHES!" 03's armstronger split into 8 and fired in a rapid barrage of large Yellow Hardlight slug bullets, destroying Waffes left and right.

"Yamada-senpai! Calm down! You're overheating the Valvraves!" Yusuke fretted. The remaining Waffes were easily overwhelmed by 03 and 05's combined firepower.

In fact, when Haruto beheaded the last Ideal and fired on its exposed cavity, destroying it, all Valvraves' thermal gauge is in the vicinity of 67-70 to 80-83. However, the remaining Mag-Waffe shouldn't pose much of a threat. But even with that, they still can't damage the Walkits per se. And they're still gaining heat.

Pino glanced at the modified Walkit's armor. "They mixed the ship's alloy molecularly with Clear Fossil. You can't penetrate that armor with your current equipment. You might need to fire the Twin Harakiri Cannon… again. You'll have to feed again after this… sorry."

Haruto understand, but he still felt something weird. "Awkward… they should've known what we're capable of… so why… waste unmanned drones on us…?"

It was then, aboard 06, Akira detected something really bad when she was cracking the enemy's transmission. Upon realizing what this meant, she screamed and squealed in panic, much to A-drei's confusion. "Renbokuji Akira… what?" Akira typed furiously, hacking through what A-Drei recognized as Potemkin navigation system. He may not understand computers, but he understand combat maneuver and he quickly understand what Akira was trying to do, and her reason to do it. "Move the Potemkin over there, quickly!" He quickly grabbed the com and screamed: "EVERYONE! GET OUT OF THE WAY!"

The other Valvrave pilots also blinked. Suddenly, from behind the Module and the Potemkin, a massive energy built up appeared right out of thin air.

At the about the same time, Potemkin control system was taken over by Akira.

The energy built up erupts, unleashing a gigantic stream of green energy beam that headed straight at the seemingly unaware Potemkin.

Luckily, at the last minute Akira activated the emergency booster. The said hijacked Dorssian warship moved out of the way, barely missing the energy beam at a paper thin margin.

"Tokishima Haruto! Pull back!" L-elf saw the blast and understands what happened.

That was when Haruto also understand the situation. While the first four ships continued to open fire at the Valvraves, three Arus Carrier appeared out of their stealth bubble, right where that huge blast came from. Like the Walkit, they've also been modified with Valvrave tech: Neon green sense nerve, Rune powered arsenal, and Afterglow propulsion system and all… But the biggest difference were this massive cannon transfixed at the center of the carriers. They were brimming green, the light of runes.

Pino was horrified upon seeing those massive cannons. "Look at that thing… how many humans they suck out to gather the runes needed to power it?"

The three Mag-Carriers approached the battle in a triangle formation, with one flying above the other two.

They sent in another 10 Mag-Ideal Annihilators, with various kinds of Rune powered weaponries, and about two hundred Mag-Waffes to back them up, not counting the 20 Waffes that boarded 3 of the Ideals. Even worse, there's something different with the way they move. They were faster, and their maneuvers are more complicated, showing an even more advanced AI than before.

This was shown when the Mag-Waffe now actively dodged the Valvrave's barrage of shells. They even still managed to create a wall formation and fired in a phalanx. This was made worse when the 10 Mag ideals fired all their arsenals: beam cannon, auto-cannon, laser net blasters, homing missiles, virtually everything they got. The Valvraves were forced back, and even 01's Clear Fossil shield was accurately shot off his shoulder.

"So this is what they're up to? They're using drones with dumb AIs just to make us heat up?" Inuzuka grunted.

"Talk about overkill…" Saki shrugged as she looked at this number. Worse, the first 4 Walkit sent out their entire stock of Waffes.

"L-Elf… Vent the coolant! We need to cool down!" Haruto grunted as 01 cocked out an overheating thermal charge off the Vurutoga. "And we could use a little plan, right about now!"

L-Elf had just arrived at the command center with Shoko and Satomi, where Takahi had just confer with Haruto's request and sent out another package of cooling ice. L-elf looked at the situation and thought up a plan. "First we need to deal with those 4 Walkits."

"Our biggest guns can't touch it." Haruto stated. "And the bigger gun will need some time… though I seriously doubt they'll let me fire it."

"This isn't about guns. Instead of a bludgeon, we need scalpel, we need control." L-Elf analyzed his options. With 5 specialized Valvraves, the possibility of approach had expanded beyond simply blowing up everything in the way.

Mukizu no mama tokedasu netsu wo

Moments later, L-Elf texted his overall planning to the Valvrave pilots. "The heck is this guy thinking?" Raizo twitched.

"You think this can be done?" Haruto asked to L-Elf.

"It can be done as long as we have all 5 Valvraves."

ai wo

"So be it." Haruto need not further questioning.

"Are you sure?" Inuzuka had her doubts.

"I already said I'll trust him." Haruto smiled. "He led us this far."

masaguru omoi

First phase of the plan, 'take out' the first four Walkit.

"We clear on this? No matter what happens to us, the only one that can't get hurt is Akira and 06. Everybody look after Akira, protect her, no matter what!" Haruto stated.

"Roger!" Inuzuka and Raizo nodded.

Satomi had a few last things to say though. "A-Drei! If Akira loses even one strand of her hair, I'll throttle you six feet under! YOU HEAR ME!?"

L-Elf grabbed the com from Satomi, much to his chagrin. "A-Drei! You know what to do!"

A-Drei nodded. "We'll move to point 7-01." He instructed to Akira. "That thing is modified quite extensively… but not enough to make it completely different from the standard Walkit. The blind spot should remain the same. You can hack safely from there." Akira nodded. A-Drei contacted the other Valvraves. "We're moving!"

Tsukurimono no hohoemi utagau

Under A-drei field command, 3 Valvraves dashed towards the 4 Walkits, while 2 remain to stop any stragglers. Unit 06 at the center, protected at the front by 05, 03 provide cover at the back and support fire. 01 and 04 stayed behind to deal with stragglers. In the mean time, Akira had also managed to hack and bring more and more Mag Waffe under her control, sending them to help the other units.

Forget the fact the Waffes are smarter this time. 05 blocked all incoming shots and 03 launched his own barrage. 05 is good at extreme defense and 03 was geared for extreme offense, coupled with the right minded pilot at the helm. At the back, 01 sliced any that came close, destroying them without overheating them while Saki pick up any strays that tried to chase the hacking team. The three colored Valvraves pierced through the wave of Waffes in no time flat and suddenly they're already right underneath the Walkit's nose. Protected by the two Valvraves, 06, as in Akira, goes to work. She slammed the 'head' of the Hummingbird staff, a neon green crest shaped like a bird's beak, at the surface of the Walkit. Of course, the purpose was not to penetrate the armor. A pulse of green circuitry appeared right where 06 hit.

As per the Hummingbird manual, Akira hit it again and again, until the green circuitries were permanently grafted on the surface of the ship. As soon as it happened, Akira can now commence hacking. Unlike before where she remote controlled the Potemkin, with a pilot inside, the hacking signal of 06 is astronomically more potent. Barely seconds, and she's already more firmly in control of the ship than the ship's own crew, and unlike before, they can't change the frequency or do anything to stop her or interfere with her signal: she's as good as piloting the ship personally. By hacking the mothership, she can even hack the whole batch of waffes and send them to attack the other Waffes.

tsumi ni

When 06 moved away under cover of the other 2 Valvraves, the hacked Mag-Walkit opened fire at the Mag-Carrier, supporting the beleaguered Potemkin. The other two Walkit quickly understand what happened and intensify their firepower at the incoming Valvraves. Knowing what will happen if they managed to get close. The new Ideals that were sent in by the carriers moved towards the module and the Valvraves. 5 to the hacking team, 3 to the module, 2 to the Potemkin. They easily make short work of the hacked Waffes sent their way.

Now the 5 Ideal Annihilators that wish to go after the hacking team must face 01 and 04. "Saki, get the ones heading to the Module. I'll handle this!"

"Gotcha." Saki went full throttle, and soon, as expected of the fastest Valvrave, she already caught up with the 3 Annihilators attacking the module. "Going somewhere?"

torawarenagara

01 charged through the barrage of Scissor swords and closed the distance with an Ideal, slashing his Z-Edges on the cables cutting off the scissors. And then he slammed the Vurutoga at the chest, the folded sickles on the weapon clasped in, grasping the unit tight. Haruto grunted as 01 pulled the whole Annihilator and start spinning it around violently, knocking away the other two ideal while sending the other two away, and then he throw it towards one of the off balanced Ideal. The two ideal collided and suffered some severe damage, causing them to be momentarily disoriented and dazed. Haruto used this chance and charged to the other Ideal, barraging it with burst fire, severing one of its three cables. 01 closed the distance, and sensing its attempt to go close combat, the Ideal respond in kind and swing its sword at the incoming 01. Haruto dodged at the last second and the blade barely grazed 01's headcrest right above it. In that position, the Unmanned ideal launched its head mounted scissor blade. He can't dodge this one.

Instead, Haruto charged the Red Hard Afterglow into the Z-Edge katana, increasing its cutting power as well as turning the blade edges red. The Z-Edge easily cut through the hot blade into two right down the middle. Roaring, Haruto pushed 01 forward and violently sliced the Ideal in two right on its chest. 01 quickly moved away as it explodes in a distinct green light. The other 2 unscathed Ideal pick up the pace and approached him, launching missiles and energy cannons. Haruto answered by sending a wave of red hard afterglow that blew off most of the missiles before he moved forward, dodging the energy blast along the way.

Yogorete shimau

04 danced allover the three Ideals, moving faster than their sensor can comprehend. Catching an Annihilator off guard, Carmilla sent two spindle knuckles at its rear pod, tearing right through it. The explosion propelled the Annihilator out of control, but not before it unleashed its payload of missiles and boomerangs. Saki cursed as she truly hates that particular equipment with passion.

"Use the Vulkans to shoot them at a distance! They're pretty frail!" A-Drei instructed.

"Oh." Carmilla unleashed several burst of Hard Light bullets, shredding several boomerangs as she dodge the rest, keeping her distance while maintaining her barrage.

mae ni yuku to kimeta

03 and 05 managed to cover 06 till it reached the second Walkit, where 06 began repeating the process. Several Waffes attempted to close in on them, but they were essentially helpless against the two Valvraves protecting 06.

Potemkin however, is having a problem of her own, with the 2 Ideals are barraging them with everything they've got. Fortunately for the ship… the crew is also returning the favor. The CIWS tossed out literally thousands of spent casing as the crew shot down another set of missiles. Loading team injected another fresh batch of heat cartridge as soon as the cannon ejected another glowing hot and spent heat clip.

"DAMN! And to think I signed up on this Dyson Sphere as a gardener so I don't have to smell GUNPOWDER ANYMORE!" The Former Jior soldier roared in a mixture of frustration and relief as he shot down another missile.

"LESS TALK MORE SHOOTING!" A Salesman who happens to be a former gun crew of a Jior Artillery squad yelled as he fired the Walkit main cannon for the nth time, cursing as he missed the Ideal by a hairbreadth.

The entire crews of the Walkit, originally its captive, were former Jior civilians, and before that, they were EX military JIOR soldiers. And right now they're getting a quick crash course of being reminded of being the soldiers they once were. But even with their skills are being rapidly rejuvenated by this fierce combat, the fact is, they're outgunned. The opponent simply got better guns than they are. Not bigger, but better.

Fortunately, the tide began to turn when another batch of Mag-Waffes turned against the other units. 03, 05, and 06 fly away from the second hijacked Walkit of the day, who also start opening fire at the Mag Carrier.

Yagate koborete

Of course, the Magius fleet are not entirely unmanned. The Captain of the Mag Carrier groaned in frustration as he saw another Walkit were being taken over by the three Valvrave Team. As it stands, they might be defeated… by their own forces no less. "Can't those idiots do anything to stop the hack? Those damn Half Breeds!"

"If those Valvraves… are being made by the queen herself… I don't think we have anything that can stop it." The Captain looked at his fretting aide with bloodshot glare.

And then he smirked. "Oh no. We do have something… Prepare the Rune cannon."

The Aide looked in horror at the captain.

chirabaru mizu ni

01's hard-Afterglow enhanced Z-Edge pierced an Ideal's Scissor sword from the side, while the Valvrave pulled the Shield from the Vurutoga. Charging the shield with Hard Afterglow, the Valvrave let out a set of red hard light spikes, which he quickly jammed at the Ideal's chest, piercing right through its main reactor, before snapping the spikes and let it stuck there.

As it happened, an Ideal tried to attack him from behind and open fired with its Rune Gatling cannons. 01 noticed this, and taking a moment to reassemble the Vurutoga, the Valvrave quickly jumped away from the killbox, leaving the critically damaged Ideal to be riddled with friendly fire before exploding full force. The Ideal sent in its cabled scissor blade. 01 dodged the attack and sliced the cable off, and without stopping he grabbed the severed scissor blade and charged forward at full speed, carrying the massive blade. The Ideal didn't have time to dodge, and the scissor blade pierced right through its chest.

Three down, two more to go on his end. But then, Haruto noticed an unsettling notion coming from the Mag-Carrier at the back. His sensor detected a massive spike of thermal energy building up from one of the carriers. 'They're going to fire…? At what?'

hanayaka ni

03, 05, and 06 easily pierced through another blanket of Waffes and firepower, and 06 began her work on the next Walkit that will soon join their ranks of hijacked arsenal. Akira quickly typed at the console, overriding systems, decrypting firewalls, the whole nine yards of hacking. A-Drei watched the radar to get a good grasp on the current situation… that's when he noticed one of the carrier are aiming its main cannon. First glance, it looked like it was aiming at 04, who's battling three Ideals and winning.

Saki sent her hard afterglow charged spindle knuckle at an Ideal who dodged it easily while sending a wave of missiles and followed swiftly by an array of laser nets. Using her multi leg propulsion, Saki sent a huge wave of Hard Afterglow at the Ideal. It managed to destroy the missiles, but the laser net pierced right through the fragile hard light and ripped it to shreds. Fortunately Carmilla managed to get away from the laser net. The Ideal gave chase, until suddenly, the two Spindle-Knuckles Carmilla had thrown earlier flew back and ripped the Ideal from behind, all the way up till it burst through the Annihilator's chest at the front, and returned back to Carmilla's welcoming hands. Saki chortled. "Welcome back girls!"

Kokoro wo utsushi

It was then when L-Elf and Haruto thankfully noticed what's really happening. "SAKI! GET OUT OF THE WAY!" Haruto screeched.

"A-DREI! MOVE!" L-Elf also yelled.

A-Drei had already realized what's happening. Before Akira can say anything, A-Drei took the control and moved 06 off the Walkit, followed swiftly by 03 and 05, who caught on.

daseru nara

The Carrier fired its heavy rune cannon straight at Carmilla, and behind her, the Mag Walkit that was in the process of being hacked by 06.

With her speed, Carmilla easily dodged the massive attack, though her other two Mag-Ideal Annihilator opponents were not so lucky.

03, 05, and 06 were not as fast as Carmilla, and though they fly as fast as they could from the danger area, they won't make it. Akira thought quickly, and she reins every single Mag-Waffe that she had hacked, converging them right in the way of the blast, in front of the Mag-Walkit. There's enough Mag-Waffes to create five layers of 20 Mag-Waffe Wall of reinforced Clear Fossil barrier, a veritable fortress. But the Rune Beam Cannon blast was designed to penetrate and vaporize fortress walls.

Todaeru uta to

The first two walls were vaporized instantly, and the third managed to hold the blast for barely a second before they were blasted away. Upon reaching the fourth, the blast had diminished well enough, this wall lasted a full 2 seconds before the energy stream pierce through and hit the final fifth wall. At that point, the blast had also been weakened significantly that it seems this last layer of defense will hold.

Unfortunately, it was not quite enough. The wall managed to hold back most of the blast, but a splinter of the blast bent the wall and pierced right through in a pair of smaller of stray energy beams. One beam went towards the Mag-Walkit's bridge, and the other was accidentally sent towards an unwary Walkit next to the targeted Walkit.

It was just a sliver of the blast, but it's still potent. The sliver that headed towards the first Walkit was quickly welcomed by 05, who intercepted the blast using its shields. The stray beam was dispersed harmlessly, away from the bridge. The other Walkit was not so lucky though. The small stray stream of Rune blast punctured the said Walkit all the way to its very core reactor, critically damaging the ship, and it went down in a massive explosion soon after.

hikikae ni

All Valvrave pilots looked at this event with horror.

And not just the Valvrave pilots. The Magius crewing the ships also looked at this terrible spectacle, and how it was 05 and 06, the Valvraves, who tried to protect them… regrettably unsuccessfully, but the fact remains. "The half breeds… they're protecting us?"

Haruto, more than anyone, was enraged. There's the matter that the blast was aimed at his lover, but that's hardly the issue. What really infuriates him is how could these people callously fired at their own ship just to take out his friends. "Unforgivable… They just shot at their own friends… And they call human mad!?"

Hageshii iro wo sosoide

"Tokishima Haruto!" Came L-Elf. "We need to regroup. How's your thermal gauge?"

Haruto checked… "90-93. Just a bit more and I can enter 666 mode."

"All Valvraves, converge on 01, protect him at all cost!"

Kazaritateta maboroshi wo

"L-Elf! Need some cooling here!" Carmilla thermal gauge was also in the nineties, but unlike 01, there's no 666 mode for her.

"We're venting cooling water now. Hang in there, Rukino Saki!" Takahi arranged for another block of ice to be sent out. It should be easy, with Carmilla is in close proximity to receive support from the Module.

The same cannot be said for 05. Inuzuka laughed nervously at the state of her Valvrave. Her heat gauge is at a dangerous 152 over a 100. Her Clear Fossil shields are melting, and all of her exhaust vents are glowing red hot. The problem is that she, and the hacking team are too far from the module to receive any support.

Kimi ga shinjiru nara

A-Drei also checked the condition of the 06. The unit is relatively unscathed, but the heat gauge is in the 89-92 range. Not enough for further combat. "L-L-Let go!" He heard Akira squeaked.

"Hm?" A-Drei looked down and saw that in his zeal to move 06 out of harm's way, his hand is tightly grasping Akira's who's holding the control. "Ah, sorry." A-Drei knew just how strong his hand grip. And his concern was that he might accidentally break Akira' frail fingers. "Are you alright?"

Akira's face however, grew uncharacteristically bright red, rivaling her red hair. "O-o-okay!"

Shinjitsu datte koeru darou

In 03-Reverse, the thermal gauge is in 75-79 range. But, given Raizo's aggressive combat style, that will not be enough for the long run. Yusuke was greatly concerned over this. "Yamada! We… We need to cool down! We still got three more carriers, 05 is damaged, and 06 are heating up! We need to find a way to cool down!"

"CALL ME THUNDER!" Raizo roared, and then he quickly saw the situation is exactly as Yusuke described it. They're pretty banged up. "But how are we supposed to cool down…"

Akira swallowed a gulp. That was the first time a guy hold her hand like that. Regardless, she shook her head. Now is not the time. All Valvraves are overheating. They need to cool down. Akira frowned. 'The Valvraves are powerful but why do they overheat so fast? Was it their tech… or… wait. Tech? Valvrave tech?' Akira looked at the Walkit. She barely finished hacking the ship's system, she needs to continue on it.

06 banged the ship several times with the Hummingbird until neon green circuitry appeared. Now she had control of the ship, she went straight to its schematic. A-Drei also looked at the schematic and see what Akira was looking for. She's looking at the ship's cooling system. He understood.

Utsuru toki wo tomete

A-Drei quickly contacted Raizo and Yusuke. "Yamada Raizo, Yusuke Otamaya! Grab 06 and 05, take us to the Walkit's hangar!"

"CALL ME THUNDER! AND WHO ARE YOU CALLING THE SHOT!?" Raizo roared. Yusuke however was curious. "Why do you want us to go into their hangar?"

"You need to cool down don't you?" A-Drei stated. "Renbokuji Akira figured out that if this ship has been boosted with Valvrave tech, it should have some way to deal with the overheating problem. She discovered there's a cooling system integrated allover the ship's structure. One of them in the hangar is exposed. We can use that."

"Won't we meet resistance?"

"WE'RE INSIDE VALVRAVES! I'D LIKE TO SEE THEM TRY AND STOP US!" Raizo growled.

Kuchiru sube mo shiranai de

And so, 03 grabbed 06 and the overheating 05 and brought them into the hangar of the jacked Walkit. The crew gasped when they saw three gigantic robots just waltzed in as if entering a no man's land. One of the Magius hangar crew gaze in horror at the shape of these robotic titans. "Th… This shape… this form…"

A-Drei looked at the outlet of the hangar… The Magius had thoroughly changed its insides. He noted the presence of blue veins that doesn't exist on standard Walkit class. "There. Over there. All units, fire your vulkans over there."

03 and 06 aimed their head Varibale vulkan and opened fire at the blue veins. The glass veins cracked and blue luminescent substance spray out, showering all three units. Within seconds, their thermal gauge went down to near zero, even the severely overheating 05. Inuzuka whistled. "Wow."

Yusuke blinked at how fast they're cooling down. "What is this? They're not water… cooling agent? What are they composed of?"

"Like I give a fuck!" Raizo grinned wide. "We're all cooled down right? That means we can now go crazy! Right!?"

Chi wo nagasu sono te wa

And with their business done, all units left the hangar, while the Magius crew of the ship can only looked on dumbly. One in particular observed the details of the units. Purple, Yellow, Blue… and then there's the red and green one out there… "That shape… that color… and the Queen built it with her own hands… doesn't she?"

The Captain of the carrier gasped upon seeing all 5 Valvraves are now online. "All ships! Charge your rune cannons! We're gonna wipe them all out in one blow!"

L-Elf saw the moment is ripe. "All Valvraves. Concentrate on all remaining Ideals. 01, step back and charge. 06, you know what to do."

Satomi also noted. "Someone, send another new set of Clear Fossil shield for 05! Quickly!"

And with that, all five Valvraves re-entered the fray. 03 and 05 unleashed their firepower in a barrage of yellow and blue hardlights. 06 supported by bringing its remaining Mag Waffes to support fire and to substitute 05's broken shield. The three hacked Walkits were also brought to bear, unleashing all their firepower under 06's command.

Tojikometa inochi no

Haruto can only manage a single shot from his Volc Arms. The gauge went past 100. Haruto grunted as red markings appeared on his face. The Valvrave console scanned his eyes.

Eldar Valvire Magius detected. Releasing limiter.

The Valvrave's thermal gauge of 100 turned to 666, and the charging begins. Noticing the danger, all 4 remaining Ideals concentrated on 01, including those who were attacking the now heavily damaged Potemkin a moment ago.

Two Ideals launched a pair of scissor swords at the defenseless 01, but then a pair of spindle knuckles from Carmilla intercepts it and tear right through them. As if on cue, 03-Reverse entered the fray and fired a full charged Rune blast from the Armstronger cannons. One blast punctured an ideal, the other one claimed one of its wing mounted appendages.

06 stopped behind the charging 01 and lifted her staff, emanating the signals through her multitudes of Neon Green Sense Nerves. The Mag Waffes converge around 01 protecting it, and the Walkits intensified their fire, taking massive toll on the relatively less armed Carriers. 05 received her new pair of shields and joined the defense and adding firepower.

Kodoku wo kimi ni sasageru

The Ideals opened fire, but it was blocked by 05's shield. The enemy Mag Waffe step forth, but it was countered by the Mag Waffes controlled by 06. Amidst the chaos, 04 danced across the field and using her spindle knuckle as buzzsaw gauntlets, she ripped one of Ideals' wings off, and then tore through another's booster pod. The now defenseless Ideal had no way of stopping 03-Reverse who close the distance and sent a hard-afterglow enhanced drill fist that pierced right into its chest. The last Ideal was completely battered by the combined firepower of 03, 05, and 06.

motometeru

The terrified crews of the jacked Walkits saw this spectacle… and suddenly, every Magius had their centuries old memories jogged. An inherent racial memory, carved to their very soul… the memory of an old tapestry.

"The Grim Witch…" 06 lifted her staff and maintain control of the hacked arsenal.

"The Scarab Master…" 05 kept firing furiously at the remaining hostile Waffes, keeping them from exploding took close.

"The Lightning Bishop…" 03 fired a stream of golden hard light blast that swept several Waffes to oblivion.

"The Spider Queen…" 04 maintain her vigilant around the main Valvrave.

"And… and…"

01 had almost finished charging, emanating the gold and red energy from its entire being.

By that time, all three Carriers' main Rune cannons had almost completed its charging as well.

And suddenly…

The three hijacked Walkit suddenly dropped down their stealth field and appeared right on the Carrier's rear, coming in from three direction, one from the left, one from the right, and the other is descending from up top. While the carriers were distracted by the 5 Valvrave units, Akira sent them in a Kamikaze course at the Carrier's Hardlight boosters. Normally a heavy space cruiser won't be able to gather the speed for ramming maneuvers, but these are Walkits that had been enhanced by Valvrave techs, they're many times faster than normal cruisers.

"EVASIVE MANEUVER!"

"TOO LATE!"

Two of the carriers were hit hard on their rear, but one managed to get away, albeit barely. The shock of the collision caused all the collected Runes concentrated on the cannon barrel to destabilize and imploded, its feedback coruscates throughout the whole ship in a catastrophic backlash, overloading the systems and causing massive damage throughout its structure and runes bursting out of the exploded sections of the ship. The two carriers are out for count.

As for the one who managed to escape…

The Magius captain of the said Mag-Carrier looked up and saw the five Valvraves right in front of the ship. Five Valvraves. Five colors. Five familiar colors to all Magius. "…the Court… of the Seven Rainbows!?"

01 grabbed his twin Z Edges and stabbed them to his exposed Rave Engine. A pair of massive wings made of gold and red runes burst out of its wings. When he pulled the blades out, the said sword had been engulfed with gold and red rune energy. Reassembling the energized Z-Edges into the Vurutoga, and the Twin Harakiri Blade cannon was charged.

Haruto had the ship at his crosshairs… and yet he waited.

A-Drei twitched. "Tokishima Haruto! What are you waiting for? Fire!"

The Captain of Carrier was also wondering the same thing. "What is he doing?"

Suddenly, their com blared. They're being hailed by 01. The communication line was opened.

"To the Magius Crew aboard that ship." It was Haruto. "As you can see, I'm fully charged, and this thing has enough power packed in it to vaporize you all without a trace."

A-Drei blinked in disbelief. "What foolishness is this? Is he serious!?"

"Surrender the ship now, or we'll open fire."

Everyone, the ship's crew, the other Valvrave pilots, the students, and every people around the world watching the proceeding of this battle was completely shocked. Even after all that and the boy… the Novus Magius still offer something like that? Only two people knew this will happen: a grinning, knowing Shashinami Shoko, and the calm and calculating L-Elf.

The Carrier's captain looked at the impending doom, but in the end, his pride took over. "SHUT UP! HOW DARE YOU, A LOWLY HALF-BLOOD BASTARD ABOMINATION DARE TO THREATEN US!?"

"Listen to him you fool." Suddenly, Pino's face appeared on the screen. "It's not a threat, I kid you not, it's mercy. Surrender now. And you may walk out of this alive."

"I will not bow down to a fallen Queen who has been reduced to a mere lapdog to humans! WE'RE THE ONES WHO'S GONNA BLOW YOU ALL AWAY!" The captain roared. "RUNE CANNON! FIRE!"

Haruto frowned. "Pity." And the Valvrave pushed the trigger.

Mijikai yume wo kasanete

The Carrier's cannon fired a massive stream of green rune energy Beam that headed straight at 01.

Eien ni shite yuku hana no

A pair of gold and red Rune energy spun out of the Vurutoga barrel and twisted together in a helix, creating a gigantic whirlwind column of energy that rivaled the Carrier's rune cannon.

Itsuwari ga setsunaku

Both beams collided one another, its impact caused a massive blinding explosion whose shockwave rattled and even bend the space around the point of collision. The larger debris caught up in the shockwave were pushed back and pulverized while the smaller ones were instantly vaporized. The Valvraves had to take cover behind 05's shield, who's hard-pressed to defend. Even the massive Module that is some distance away from the point of impact shook violently, causing many of its occupants to lose balance.

Kobamu sekai wo kizutsukeru

At first, it looked like a stalemate. But as Valvrave 01's Rune Wings began to disperse and shrank, and to the horror of everyone, the green energy stream began to rapidly pushed back the gold and red rune from 01.

Negau nara misaseru

The whole world watched as the 01 began to be pushed back, and his gold glowing wings was almost spent…

Dakara tooku kienai de

But then, Haruto roared as gold and red runes emanate from his being as well. Pino also add her own power into the system.

Kimi ga miru ashita no

With one final blast, 01 amplified his shot, the spiraling gold and red runes were enlarged into a swirling storm of gold energy that engulfed, even swallowed, the rune cannon blast from the Carrier. The Twin Harakiri cannon blast rapidly pushed the rune blast back to where it came from.

Atarashii ibuki wo

Finally, after a brief struggle, the bright light where the two beams are connected were shoved back into the cannon barrel of the Carrier, completely vaporizing the cannon's insides, causing monstrous damage on the ship's system due to power surge overload, followed suit by a series of violent explosions all across the body of the ship.

Nobashita ude ni mukaeru

Finally, the gold and red energy pierced through the stalemate and pierced through the ship, right through the barrel, but at the same time, 01's Rune Wings dispersed completely and the Valvrave tucked down, having expended all its power, and the spiraling Rune blast died down before causing further damage to the already catastrophically damaged carrier.

Hanasanai…

The Carrier's cannon barrel had been melted inside out, and soon, with one last spark of electricity, it exploded full force, causing monstrous inside out damage to the carrier. The Carrier's hull soon followed and different sections of the ship also burst into green colored explosions. The ship has been completely damaged beyond repair… and yet it still floats and barely online.

Haruto gasped and panted upon seeing the still intact ship, shocked… and relieved. "Why… it's still… intact?"

"Uhh… well… that thing is made of tougher stuff… and your gun, the Volc Arm, isn't." Pino pointed out.

01 lifted the Vurutoga and noticed that the Volc Arm portion of his Vurutoga had melted, along with some of the Z-Edges and the Blade Baiken forward section. They were unable to withstand the power exerted by the Twin Hara-kiri Blade. But that's not the only reason. "The rune blast from that carrier had also reduced the power from my shot… significantly." Haruto added the last part… with a pleasant suspicion.

And then, Haruto hailed everyone on the open channel, his transmission was broadcasted throughout the world. "To Magius aboard the other ships… what's it gonna be? We took over your ship… we could've easily smashed you to one another, but we didn't. Surrender, shut down all your weapons system, and your life will be spared. Do it not… and we'll just destroy you all."

The Five Valvraves stood ready to support that warning.

The Magius fleet understands Haruto is not making idle threats. Finally, one of the Captains of the Carrier answered on behalf of the other ships. "Alright. You win. We'll surrender. We're shutting down all our weapon system. In return please do not harm my men and my crew."

Haruto smiled. "That's the way it should be." He gave a triumphant smile to everyone on the screen: Saki, Shoko, L-Elf, Satomi, Yusuke and Raizo, Inuzuka, A-Drei and Akira… and everyone in the world who witnessed the battle. "Everyone! Did you see that!?"

Haruto didn't just address the School, he addressed the whole world. "The Council of 101 had just sent that fleet to keep our heads on the ground while they take whatever they want."

In Dorssia…

The Karstein boys looked at the screen in disbelief – except Q-Vier who is… being Q-Vier. Krimhield's eyes widened as well. Somewhere in a vast complex of Dorssian imperial palace, a man watched the TV screen with great interest. Cain and Lieselotte watched the broadcast.

"And now I'm sending a message to them. This is our country. And in here, you CANNOT take whatever you want. In here, we won't just be quiet and let you silence us. In here, we will not stand by and stand down saying 'yes sir', 'no sir' as you see fit! In here, we are FREE of YOU!"

In Arus…

An army of protesters watched with spirited eyes at Haruto giving out his speech on the screen.

"In here there's no puppet that you can control. No strings that you can pull. In here there's only freedom! Freedom to choose to do what we want! Freedom to choose our own destiny! And we will fight you! We will defy you! We will reject this world, this false peace that you have created."

In the Council's secret domain…

The Council members gritted their teeth as they saw Haruto's speech being broadcasted.

"I'm a Novus Magius. As do Rukino Saki, Inuzuka Aina, Yamada Raizo, Otamaya Yusuke, and Akira Renbokuji. We are part human, part Magius. We were created to reject the rule of the Council. Why? Because we were made to become a bridge between our two species. Humans and Magius… whose fate had become one. We were made… so that our two people can coexist as equals. But that's not what the Council is offering. What they're offering is oppression. To stand above all others. Not just of humans… but Magius as well. You've seen to what they did to those who won't do as they say!?"

Inside the Module 77…

The reporters and the students looked intently at the screen.

"That's what they do. That's what they've done. And that's what they've tried to do to us. But they can't. They can't control us. They can't put us on collars, because we didn't let them. Because we choose to be free. And I say the same to you. To all of you. Do not let them control you. Do not let them think that you don't have a choice. You have a choice. You always have a choice. To remain as you are, standing stock still and subservient, like fattened cattle moving towards a slaughterhouse…"

In Valvrave 01…

"…or break free and choose, out of your own free will, to fight back and to be FREE!" Haruto roared. "We the Novus Magius had chosen to FIGHT back! We have chosen to stand up tall and say 'NO, we will not do as you say'! We will defy them! And we will win! We know this… because we've shown you that we CAN WIN! We CAN beat them! So choose! Humanity! Magius! Do you wish to be cattle… or do you wish to be FREE!?"

The students of the Sakimori High roared as one. "FREEDOM!" "OFF WITH THE COUNCIL!" "WE WILL FIGHT!" "WE'RE NO CATTLE!" "WE ARE FREE!"

In Arus…

The citizens of Arus screamed to the sky in support of Haruto, punching their fists to the sky in support, chanting his name and the word freedom like a mantra.

In Dorssia…

A cluster of grim but determined Dorssian soldiers joined with the Royalist resistance and marched out in open defiance, brandishing a standard with the word: 'Haruto, We chose to be Free' over their heads.

In Sakimori High…

In the Auditorium, in the command center, in every part of school and the module, the students roared freedom over and over.

Burnett and all the reporters realized they just broadcasted a history in the making.

L-Elf relaxed as they just passed the first test successfully with flying colors. And then, he heard beeping sound. A-Drei contacted him, with help from Akira. L-Elf opened it up.

A-Drei looked at L-Elf and started: "You've gone soft, L-Elf."

"Me?" L-Elf snorted. "Soft? I think you got the wrong person."

"You of all people should've known that Tokishima Haruto's shot will not be sufficient to go head to head with that Rune Cannon. Enough to overpower… but not enough to destroy." A-Drei further added. "You can make 10 scenarios that will result in the enemy being wiped out, but you arrange this merciful scenario knowing that Tokishima Haruto's kindness will make him offer that term of surrender. That gave the enemy time and chance to open fire at him first."

L-Elf's eyes rolled. "You think too much. Besides, Tokishima Haruto's sweet naivety has its uses. By letting him show mercy and compassion, it made him popular, garnering the world's support to him, thus strengthening our position. What's more, we've gained access to additional intact Valvrave techs. I pick this particular scenario because at the present, we needed an edge, and now we have that edge. One that we will put to good use now that we've officially entered open war with the Council."

A-Drei was not convinced. "Is that really all?"

L-Elf flatly replied. "That is all."

A-Drei remained silent, assessing his friends' seemingly newfound taste in minimum casualty plan. "Fine. Just make sure Tokishima Haruto's softness didn't rub off on you." And A-drei cut the com.

"Like I'll let that happen." L-Elf groaned and put his phone out. He turned around and saw Shoko… smirking mischievously at him. "What?" Did she hear that conversation just now?

Shoko smiled gleefully. "Nothing… nothing…"

Yes. Lord Help him. She did.

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The Lies of the World had been unveiled…

The Revolution has begun…

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To Fangking2: Loved your ideas and the electric based tech you mentioned. I'm definitely gonna use most of them… if not all. But unit 07 is not for Raizo. And that idea of using India Hinduism as a theme is a good idea. I'm gonna go with that theme. Thanks a bunch.

That's one idea, but I'm still open for suggestion on unit 07. Thanks for reading, please Review.