Night Raid stood outside the Capital gates, "Hunter and Lubbock go find the boss and retrieve her, Sheele and Mine will take care of the Guards, I will try to Assassinate Esdeath if possible" Akame quietly commanded, Mine starts sniping the guards from a distance, Sheele pays attention to the enemy before attacking, and Akame starts to jump on ledges, hoping to reach the Jeager's room. Hunter and lubb look around the Dungeon, looking at the many cells of the criminals inside them "So the worst ones get thrown in here" Hunter mutters, they eventually reach cell 111 and get ready for the worst, they open the door to see the messed up Najenda waiting on the other side "Y-you're here?" she asked, Lubb cuts off her chains with his strings and helps her stand "Its ok Najenda, we're here, will you be able to stand soon?".
She nods "Not for a while, but I eventually will, thank you", Hunter looks around to make sure no one is nearby "So did anything in particular occur?", Najenda coughs and nods once again "I was face to face with one of the Wolf helmeted Knights, the black knight in particular". Hunter quickly looks back with concern, he breathes and asks "How did you know he was the Black Knight, was he wearing his suit?" and Najenda Replied "He wasn't, but I know who he is personally, for he is my Brother", the room stayed silent for a few seconds before she breaks it "I will discus it later, for now lets focus on escaping", the building was shaking slightly, Lubb scratches his head "What could that be?".
Tatsumi kicks Zariha through a wall, as Zariha slowly rises off the ground, he looks at his shield, a bright Purple light begins illuminating on the end of his shield, he aims it at Tatsumi and fires a Purple energy blast. Tatsumi dodges and part of the building explodes, they both clashed and a small shockwave occurs "I've heard that your Armor was corrupted, how so?" Tats asked, Zariha punches him away and begins to explain lightly "You see, in order to be a black knight, a Makai Knight must fall from grace, abandoning our code to be righteous warriors, as I did myself".
Tatsumi stares at the Knight, wondering what could have made this man into a husk, he charges at Zariha and rapidly punches him, Amond and wave begin to hear all the commotion and run outside, they looked in shock as they saw them fighting "So, Zariha was a malicious dude after all" Amond said, wave nods as he looks upstairs "We got to warn Esdeath, before any more damage is done".
Zariha summons his black Mado horse and rides on the roof, "What the hell is he doing?" Tatsumi thought, he spawns his spear and throws it at the horse's legs, Zariha crashes in the throne room and gets back up, no one was inside so he sighed "Good, no suspicions by the Emperor himself, unless he gets warned", Tatsumi lands inside and stares down at him, he summons his spear "Zariha, in the name of the Emperor, I will put you to rest", Zariha frowns and gets into his stance "So be it", as the 2 of them stare they instantly charged and clashed.
Meanwhile Amond and Wave enter Esdeath's room, She turns and tilts her head "I've been hearing a lot of noise, is something happening?" she asked, Wave nods and informs her "Mam, Zariha and Tatsumi are fighting through the capital, perhaps we were right about Zariha being trouble", Esdeath stands up from her chair and grabs her rapier "Alright, lets put that bastard to sleep", as they ran through the hall Akame blocked their way and unsheathed Murasame "Esdeath, I will cut you down!".
"Night Raid, how did they get here!" Esdeath shouted.
"Well today fucking sucks" Amond muttered as he unsheathed his daggers, he summons the Silver Knight Armor and looks back at wave "Wave, we must protect Esdeath as best we can, once we take down Night Raid's Akame we can check on Tatsumi", Wave summons grand chariot and they begin to charge, Akame dodged their attacks and tried to go for Esdeath, Esdeath smirked and blocked with an ice shield "You fool, you think you stand a chance against a General, you are destined to die".
They began swinging at each other, Wave kicked Akame away and sent her flying backwards through the hall, she landed safely and frowned "I cant kill her in these circumstances, I need to retreat", she began to run, making sure they don't catch up to her, Amond shakes his head and sighs "Forget her, lets catch up to Tatsumi" he said, Wave and Esdeath nod and they run looking for him.
Zariha punches Tats and kicks his stomach, Tats spins, kicks back, and uppercuts him into the throne, he clenches his fist and stares at Tats "You have won sir, I give up", Tatsumi shakes his head "How can I believe you, what makes you think you can trick me", Zariha looks down with blood dripping from his suit "I yield, admit defeat, I can not take the Emperors throne, now please, help me out my fellow Jeager…", As Tatsumi sighed and held his hand out he heard a familiar charging noise, it was too late to dodge and he got shot in the back by the Purple energy blast, he shouted and crouched down, Zariha grinned behind the mask and stood back up, he pointed his sword at him and quietly laughed "You fool, never let your guard down".
Tatsumi looked down in shame, he had fell for such a vile tactic, deception, he sighed and was ready to face his fate, Zariha raised his sword and quickly swung down, but just before it can hit Esdeath jumped in front of him and blocked with a ice shield, the sword went through the shield and cut her, she fell next to Tatsumi and she looked at him, Zariha breathed heavily and reverted back to normal, he turns back and walks away, Amond and Wave appeared and stared at Esdeaths body, Tats touches her head and hugs it, he makes sure not to shed and tear and stands up, then he takes off Incursio. Suddenly many Brotherhood of black knights surrounded them, Amond summons his horse and he cuts down some of them, Wave helps and begins punching them, Tatsumi just stood, too broken to d oanything, 3 knights still remained but their eyes glowed red, they began to shake violently and they transformed into Gargoyle like beasts "Horrors!" Amond shouted, the beasts roared and tried to grab Tats, but Amond cut their arms off and slayed 2 of them, Wave manages to punch one hard enough in the head to kill it.
They both returned to normal and stood in front of Tatsumi, Amond looks down at Esdeath "I…cant believe she's gone, may the gods have mercy on her", Tats still stood motionless, unable to move, Wave puts his hand on his shoulder "Hey, she wouldn't want you to endlessly grieve over her, she would want you to be strong and carry her legacy", Tats slowly looks back and nods, as they talked Hunter, Lubb, and Najenda sneaked away from them and managed to get back outside the city walls.
Meanwhile back at Night Raid base Akame entered the meeting room to see Najenda sitting in her bad condition, Lubb helps Najenda get back to her room and the rest stay, Akame looks down "Im glad shes ok, but…I failed to take down Esdeath", Hunter turns to her and informs her "Don't worry, she got killed by her own soldier".
Akame sighed in relief and crosses her arms "All this stress is beginning to affect me", Hunter pats her back and smiles "Its ok, things will get better soon, I know they will", Akame looks back and smiles, "Hunter, can we meet up tomorrow night, there's something I need to tell you" she said in a quiet tone, Hunter nods "Ok" and smiles more, she walks in her room and gently closes the door, Sheele wiped the sweat off her head and fixed her glasses "At least we all made it alive".
Hunter enters Najenda's room and sees her laying in bed safely, Lubb rubs his eyes and stands still "Ok Najenda, what about that Knight?" Hunter called out, She sat up, trying to remember the best shecan "Well, like I said, he is my older brother, we used to work together in the Empire when it wasn't corrupt, for some reason he always looked to be in his prime, he did mention that he found a small unique fountain of water that tasted divine, some people say it makes people biologicly immortal, anyways we were a great team, until one day, he started to develop a power obsession, always wanting to gain more strength to protect his people, so he started sacking villages with his knights, making sure to find any unique weapons or artifacts to increase his power".
Hunter's eyes grew, flashbacks of Skyreach creeped in his head, he touched his forehead with both hands and groaned, Lubb pats his back to snap him out "Hunter, calm down, I know it hurts, but we need to know this information", Hunter breaths heavily and calms down, then Najenda continued the story "after that day when he raided the village of Skyreach, I realised he isn't himself anymore, he was replaced, so I decided to switch to Esdeaths party, I was 18 at the time so luckly I was able to switch".
Hunter looks out the window and crosses his arms "So what your saying is, he was hungry for more power, but not for personal gain, but for simply protecting his people", Najenda continued "his lust for strength is slowly eliminating his desire to protect, and thus he fell from grace, becoming the Devilish beast you saw before you, but…I don't exactly remember how he obtained armor like yours", Hunter talked to himself in his thoughts "If I still stuck with my path to vengeance, I would have ended up like him, I shouldn't take these things personally, no more will I fall victim to my rage, I must follow the footsteps of my Grandfather".
Najenda took a sip of water and yawned "Now, I don't think I can take lead, Akame will be the leader for the time being", they both nod and walk out.
Hunter walks outside and takes a deep breath, he sits down on the grass and looks at the moon, it was quiet and peaceful, Hunter rests his shoulders and continued to contemplate to himself, he remembers the words Leon Luis gave him in his vision "In times like this you must ask yourself, who is it I must protect". He stands up and clenches his fist, he begins to smile as he remembers to follow the path of the Makai Knight, Akame was looking out her window watching him with a smile, as she was happy to see his smile.
Meanwhile Zariha was back in his Makai Armor, but instead with the Emperors cape, he has slain both the Emperor and his advisor, he then sits on the Emperors throne, and rests.
*To be continued*