Welcome back everyone! Before we start, a common complaint about the series that many, MANY of you have pointed out on AO3, , and Discord is that the middle chapters were too similar to the original game to be interesting to read. I apologize for that, as those were some of my earliest works writing alone. While I was initially planning on doing this once I finished the Kamoshida arc, I have decided to do remastery touch-ups of said chapters, as well as sprucing up some other ones, in order to provide a more unique reading experience!


Sumire wasn't at her desk today, but it was for a good reason.

She was patiently sitting in the hallway, waiting for someone to notice the multitude of printed copies of the Calling Card posted on the bulletin board. Watching students pass by without so much as giving them a glance made her groan in frustration.

First period went on forever, but eventually, right before second period began, Sumire heard the words she'd been waiting to hear.

"Huh? What's this?"

One curious student saw those bright red squares. Then another appeared, and another, and another. Soon enough, an entire class's worth of students had gathered around her team's work.

Akira and his friends walked by the scene of their actions, with Sumire cheering at Akira from above the crowd. They didn't stay for very long to avoid drawing too much attention to themselves, but there were smiles on their faces as they saw the recognition it was getting.

By the time the school day was almost over, there were still a fair amount of students fawning over the top hat logo Ryuji drew, conspiracy theories going around about who was the culprit.

"That was the most fun I've had on a project since elementary school!" Ryuji yelled a bit too loudly while stretching, the others quickly shushing him.

"You're lucky the crowd's louder than you." Morgana whispered, peeking out of his bag to look at Ryuji.

Twirling a pigtail, Ann looked at the bulletin board, a frown on her face. "Looking back, maybe I could've put a bit more thought into my part. I sounded like an online rant essay."

"I don't wanna brag or anything, but it's not like they're listening, I just wanna say that I nailed verbalizing how I felt about what I saw there." Sumire said with pride, putting a hand to her chest.

"You were a bit direct about the booby trap metaphors…" Akira mumbled.

As they walked out of the building, one of them overheard a student say, 'What's with this weird logo?'

Sumire facepalmed when she remembered who drew it, "Ok, looking back, we probably should've hired a professional artist to make that."

But they all dashed back into the school when they heard the voice they were waiting to hear say, "Hey, what's got everyone so distracted here?!"

They needed to see his reaction, even if everyone else scattered away like rats when he slammed his fist on the wall.

For Suguru Kamoshida,

The utter bastard of lust of the seven deadly sins.

We know how shitty you are, and that you put your twisted desires on students that can't fight back. So tomorrow, we will make you confess your sins. This will be done in a way which you won't expect.

Every innocent person you've manipulated should get revenge for what you've done. Hope you're happy that everyone now knows that that girl's near-death experience was by your hands.

No one's spoken up about this yet, which is why we're here to stand up for the little guys. It's time things changed here at this school, and no public service announcement will compare to our actions.

Anyone who has made an attempt got trapped in this castle you call a school. This prison that you send your "subjects" to for things as simple as justifiably rejecting your rigorous excuses for training.

You've put these kids through hell with all of these excessive workouts they have to go through. Don't even get us started on the lack of hydration that doesn't suit your complete lack of common sense.

We hope you're ready to get your heart stolen. It's what you deserve.

Sincerely, The Phantom Thieves of Hearts

Turning towards the group, the real Kamoshida wasn't enough to intimidate them anymore, though maybe a slight glance to the side from Ryuji and Ann.

"Did you two do this?" He yelled at them, putting his face right in front of Akira's.

Akira put his hand on his hip and shrugged. "Trust me, if we did do all of this, you'd have already figured it out by now." Then, as smug as he possibly could, he scratched his chin and followed up with, "That being said, there is probably a very good reason why whoever put all of that there is holding a grudge against you."

"Trying to backtalk, huh?" Kamoshida scowled. "Ugh, May 2nd can't come soon enough…the sooner you get expelled, the sooner I don't have to deal with your little quips."

"Yeah, we'll see about that." Sumire said with a hint of nervousness, and as if that wasn't uncomfortable enough, the hallway went dark around her. Neither Akira, Morgana, or anyone else was around, but Kamoshida's shadow stood right where the original was.

His booming voice made her cover her ears. "Is that so? Then come… Steal it if you can!"

"Sumire…Sumire?" The faint sound of Akira's concerned voice made her lift her hands from her ears, with no one in the hallways but the two of them and Morgana.

"Was that another memory?"

"No…" Sumire said with worry behind her glasses. "This was…very different."

Explaining it to Morgana, he looked down, the gears turning in his head as he thought about what Sumire had described. "If I were to guess, I would say that the Palace Ruler has read the message, which means that his Treasure should be tangible now. Maybe the shift in his mentality briefly pulled you into the Metaverse so you could see it happen."

Recovering from the shock, Sumire put her fists on her hips, and Akira had never seen more determination in her eyes.

"Alright, I'm ready. Let's get that treasure."


Today was, according to Morgana at least, the last day they'd be seeing this castle. Satisfactory grins were on everyone's faces thinking about how far they had come in this adventure, with all of the memories it brought to the newly christened Phantom Thieves, as well as how it brought them all together.

The source of their biggest problem was coming to an end.

"Oh, just a reminder, this will only work today, right?" Ryuji checked with Morgana.

"Yup." He confirmed, holding up a paw. "I doubt anyone would fall for the same stunt twice. So if anyone has any regrets before we end this once and for all, speak now, or forever hold your peace."

Sumire swore she saw sparks fly off of Ann's heels when she assumed a running ready stance and said, "Then we're either gonna take that treasure, or die trying."

Akira cringed at that line, considering who had heard that, yet Sumire was already staring at Akira's pocket, waiting for him to pull it out and take them where they needed to be.


Akira set his supply bag down in the safe room, taking out whatever the team thought they would've needed for the journey ahead.

"Okay, so I think we should definitely bring the bands… split the medicine between the four of us, though the revival bead, I only have one of them, so I'll hold onto it for now, and if anyone needs it, I'll give it to someone else if I'm busy… and as for anything else, I'll just leave it in here so we can pick it up later!"

"Crap, I forgot!" Morgana screeched.

"What is it now?" Ryuji impatiently asked.

"We won't be able to do that. The moment the treasure is taken out of the castle, it'll fall apart!"

Sumire raised her voice at that! "You're telling us that now?!" She hovered in place after she finished.

"Then, what do we do about our supplies?" Ann questioned. "It's not like we can carry everything in our pockets during battle. My outfit doesn't even have that many pockets!"

Akira pondered to himself before coming up with an idea. "I'll leave it at the end of whatever room we're in at the time, and then pick it up on the way out when it starts to fall. Will that work?"

"Hmm…" Morgana put a paw to his chin. "I guess so."

"Great!" Ryuji yelled before chugging down a soda can Akira bought from the vending machine as a power-boosting snack. "Let's get outta here already! I'm itching to go!"

Sumire was already going through the door as he said so.


The second they exited the safe room, an explosive alarm went off in the palace, likely due to the calling card. The other thieves simply covered their ears with their hands, but Akira pulled his hands into his sleeves, and tried to cover them with as much of his jacket as he could, and they went back into the safe room as soon as they could.

"Dude, you ok?" Ryuji desperately asked.

"Sorry, sorry! I just…wow, and I thought the earthquake drills in elementary school were hard…"

Ann and Sumire sat down at Akira's sides, and Morgana on his head as Ryuji rummaged through his things to pull out a pair of headphones.

"Here, this should drown out the noise enough. You can keep 'em. I don't even use these things anymore anyway."

Putting them on, and attempting to walk into the vulnerable palace again, the alarms were faint in noise, yet his friend's voices were clear enough. He held out his hand towards Ryuji for a handshake as thanks.

"No problem, man. I needed an excuse to get rid of those things, anyway."

"You look ridiculous." Sumire chuckled, Akira gently smiling back.

Seeing that the door to the throne room was open, they hesitated upon seeing that it was empty.

"Okay, I swear we locked it." Ryuji said curiously. "Who was the last one out of the room last time?"

"I believe it was… Mona?" Ann cautiously guessed.

"I remember seeing Joker close the door." He responded.

Akira began looking through his memories. "Did I…?"

"You did, don't worry, I remember." Sumire answered for him.

"Yeah, I remember now."

Morgana put a paw to his head, keeping in mind everyone's info. "So someone must've opened it for us for some reason… Keep your guard up, okay guys?"

So they kept their eyes on the prize, that prize being the giant crown the size of a person in that final room.

Morgana was immediately enamored by it, drawn to it like a…well…cat to catnip as he lept onto it.

"Hey, no. Bad cat! Bad! Focus here!" Sumire shouted, flying in front of Morgana in an attempt to blind him combined with the light the crown was already emitting.

Akira tried to pull him off, but Morgana's claws just dug deeper into the crown. It took some yelling from Ryuji to finally get Morgana to come to his senses.

"Sorry, sorry. Got a little distracted back there." He apologized, scratching the back of his bulbous head. "But hey, it's a human desire, I was obsessed with it, see where I'm going with this?"

"I'm pretty sure any being would see something big and shiny and get distracted by it." Sumire snarked.

"Especially cats." Akira said through his teeth, snickering with Sumire after saying so.

"What was that?" Morgana asked in an angered tone, hand already on his sheath.

Ryuji walked between them with his hands up. "I dunno what he's saying, but I think he's onto something there with the whole cat thing."

"I'm not a-"

"Anyways, back to the whole giant crown thing." Ryuji changed the subject. "I'm kinda shocked there's no giant final guard dog we gotta sneak past in order to get this thing outta here."

"Maybe the challenge is carrying the thing." Ann half-joked. "I mean, look at the size of that thing! That's gotta weigh at least a ton!"

Akira went over to the crown and tried to pull it off of what could only be an invisible pedestal. "Well, it's not gonna lift itself." It barely budged. "Okay guys, on three!"

It took a ton of effort from the three who were able to grab it to even keep it off the ground, let alone push it off the pile of coins.

"Wow…three persona users…two awakenings…and my first successful heist…all in less than a month." Morgana puffed his chest, putting in as much effort as his small body would allow. "I am…so glad I met you guys…especially…so that we could actually…move this!"

Not even the warmth in Sumire's undead heart from that statement could satisfy her own desire to help add a fifth pair of arms to the crown.


"Go, go, let's go, Ka…" Whatever that noise was, it was quickly drowned out by all of the grunting everyone was doing as well as the sliding of solid gold scraping against the floor.

"Panther…I don't care what you're saying, but cheering us on is not going to help this heart change any faster!" Ryuji huffed. They weren't even at the safe room at this point, and had only made it out of the throne room.

"That…wasn't me!" Ann cried.

"Joker!" Sumire called out before, out of nowhere, an unknown projectile blasted towards them. It knocked the crown into the air, causing it to roll when it landed on the ground, and was effortlessly lifted by, well, who else could it be?

"I'll be taking that, thank you very much!"

The crown shrunk to the size of a normal one and teleported itself to Shadow Kamoshida's hand.

"Oh come on!" Ryuji yelled at the top of his lungs.

"I'll admit, I'm surprised all of you made it this far into my kingdom. Most subjects don't last this long."

The ears on Ann's mask went ablaze. "You dick!" She screamed before conjuring a fireball and hurling it towards the crown, but the moment it made contact, pink circles briefly flashed in front between the projectile and its target, and the flames disappeared.

"Ah, getting a little feisty, aren't you, babe? Well good thing I like playing rough."

In his free hand, the caped doppelgänger spawned a flaming volleyball with purple flames emitting from it. He proceeded to toss it into the air and spike it towards Ryuji and Ann. Akira and Morgana managed the dive in opposite directions, but Sumire caught the full blast. However, being incorporeal, the most she got was a bunch of wind in her face, hair, and glasses. When she finally opened her eyes again, Ryuji and Ann's bodies were lying on the floor, struggling to get up. Sumire frantically looked all around her, and saw two familiar silhouettes rushing towards the blonds.

"You okay?" Akira and Morgana asked in unison.

"I've taken worse hits from him." Ryuji responded weakly.

Akira quickly flipped through his headspace to find a Persona that could heal while Morgana already began healing the others.

"I knew you lot were going to be coming to this room the moment you tripped the alarms. I mean, where else would you be headed?"

They hated to admit it, but he was right. The trap was right there, they noticed it, and did nothing about it to accommodate. Sumire flew right towards him to try and get him to drop the crown, but despite her best efforts, the shadow continued his monologue.

"I should've figured those knaves were too shrimpy to stop you. It's been a while since I've needed to actually try to keep someone in line."

Sumire was pulling her hair at this point, but Ann began to stand up again.

"Oh I've been in line. I've been in your line ever since I got into this damn school!"

"And we've stepped off of that line!" Ryuji said, bringing his knee up.

"Oh no, two students rebelling against me." Shadow Kamoshida mocked with monotone sarcasm. "It's a shame I only have literally every other student and teacher on my side!"

"Because they fear you." Akira grumbled loud enough for him to hear.

"And why wouldn't they? I mean, the principal loves me, students outside the volleyball team hear the legends, and let's not forget about that girl we all know and love. What was her name again? Shiko or something?"

All it took was a single spark to ignite that fire.

"Her name… was Shiho Suzui… and she had more integrity than anyone you tried to get your filthy little hands on!"

Ann's body became engulfed in a flaming orange aura. It was a miracle the carpet she was standing on hadn't set the whole castle ablaze. Ryuji had to jump away from her with how hot the air around her was getting.

"Ever since I got this power. I've only had one use in mind for it. To stop YOU. To finally, after all this time, destroy every idea in your head that you can do whatever you want! You may call this a kingdom, but deep down, it's nothing more than a playground to you."

Ann conjured her whip and smacked it on the ground, but the sparks only appeared for a second before being absorbed into the rest of her scorching body.

"So Kamoshida… no, whoever you think you are. You may be a demon, but I'm going to personally bring you to hell!"

Even Sumire had to wipe her brow from her unexplainable sweat. She may have been literally on fire, but that was Ann's greatest burn.

But Kamoshida was engulfed in his own type of aura. While still red, it wasn't anywhere near similar to the fire that enveloped Ann. This had black and pink over it as well.

"Aw, you wanna play the heroine, dontcha?" Shadow Kamoshida taunted as the crown shrunk and floated on top of his head. "Then let me show you what true hell is."

Sumire chuckled as she saw the crown shrink. "Well when you do, you just made our job easier!"

She may have spoken too soon though, as Shadow Kamoshida encased both himself and the cognitive Ann in a black and red cocoon that became larger and larger. The Phantom Thieves' eyes widened in shock when they saw what burst out of it. A big pink demon, just like Ann had said, with a large trophy resting in front of him.

"How's this for demonic, eh?"

Akira's fearfully clenched teeth changed to a snarky grin before he said the first one-liner that came to mind.

"It suits you perfectly."

Right away, two latches on the sides of the throne room opened up and launched a swarm of volleyballs, the four chained metal humanoid figures in front of Shadow Kamoshida proceeded to spike them straight into the team.

"Okay, ow." Ryuji rubbed his forehead. "That should not have hurt as bad as it did."

But the projectiles didn't stop there, they kept bouncing around the room, seemingly homing in on their masked targets. Everyone kept darting between pillars and friends in order to avoid them, with Akira and Sumire hiding behind a pillar with Morgana.

"Where do we even start hitting him?!" Sumire panicked, hyperventilating.

After Akira relayed the question to him, Morgana came up with a plan in mere seconds. "We don't need to take him out. We just need that crown!

"And as for the balls?!"

Akira poked his head behind the pillar to see Ann creating a fire spout next to her, blocking some balls that bounced off the wall. As they flew into the stream and popped, Akira's eyes lit up.

"That's it!"

It looked like Ryuji noticed too, he attempted to zap some of the spherical assault too. He missed a few times, but he eventually took a few out with a bolt.

Morgana went in for a test on his own of this new strategy, and it wasn't long before Akira joined in, using Jack-O-Lantern's Agi to replicate Ann's initial strategy.

It had been going well, with Sumire able to call attention to what they should focus on, taking advantage of her immunity to the oncoming fire to pick the best spots to scout. That, and the Thieves way of dealing with said onslaught, the monster watching it all was getting visibly angered.

"Come on! That routine took us weeks to practice and you couldn't even get that right?!" He slammed his fist on the ground.

In his distraction, Ryuji was able to get a strong hit in by swinging the hull of Captain Kidd's ship upwards onto his chin, pushing back his head. While it didn't loosen the crown, the damage was noticeable.

"Hah! Take that you-" Ryuji started to taunt, getting cut off as the giant shadow used the force from the attack to slam his tongue onto the ground, shaking, no, warping the area beneath everyone's feet. The carpet rose so fast that Sumire saw Ryuji bounce into the air, his landing on the ground cushioned only by Morgana's Garu .

"Thanks, man. But could you have done that a little sooner?" he grunted, pushing himself off the ground.

"Would you rather I let you fall on your fa-SKULL LOOK OUT!"

Turning her attention to Ryuji, Sumire hadn't noticed that the warped carpet flung some stray volleyballs from the earlier attack had begun bouncing around the room again. When Shadow Kamoshida commanded the metal soldiers beneath him to strike more, Sumire knew what she needed to do.

Being between the legs of the monster was not an ideal spot to be in, but Sumire knew it was necessary, and her signature blinding technique worked. One of the soldiers missed, its ball hitting the chalice next to it, making a small crack appear on its side.

With a demonic scowl, his trident (though really it was more of an oversized fork) stuck to the ground.

"That's it."

"You found something, Spirit?" Akira asked as he commanded Bicorn.

"The… the cup thingy with the women in it! He's protecting it!"

Morgana realized it as well when he saw one of the models inside land in a large, toothy mouth.

"Everyone, aim your attacks at that trophy!"

With her whip, Ann was able to hit the golden cup without getting too close to it. She froze in fear though when she felt something wet drop on top of her. She looked up and saw her worst nightmare above, staring directly at her.

"Panther."

Looking behind herself, she saw Akira, who spoke to her as calmly as he could.

"Just focus on me for now. Pull back when you need to."

She nodded, running back towards Akira for a baton pass, making it back before a tongue could graze her.

While Kamoshida's tongue was grossly sweeping itself across the floor, a few spit bubbles forming in it's wake, Sumire felt an intense breeze in her hair, needing to hold onto her glasses to make sure they didn't fall off. As her glasses rested in place, Ryuji charged past her in a Lunge, diving head first into the trophy. The trophy barely budged, but the recoil was enough to knock Ryuji backwards, far enough that it took a bit to get back up.

"What were you thinking?!" Morgana yelled as he healed Ryuji. "We shouldn't be experimenting during a climactic battle."

Before the spell had finished, a giant knife slammed into the ground behind Morgana, yipping as it made him stop healing. While it was still shaking from sticking into the ground, Morgana and Ryuji made a beeline for cover.

"Did you seriously think that would work?" Shadow Kamoshida bellowed. "This thing's made of cold, hard, one billion karat gold, baby!"

He was about to take another "snack" from the cup when some green and black dust flew towards his spirally eyes.

"It worked…" Akira's voice came from beneath, making Kamoshida look down. As the fork stabbed all around him, Akira flinched every time, even though none of them hit.

What did hit, however, was another volleyball straight to Kamoshida's face.

"Over here!" Sumire called as she waved to the soldiers. Whenever a hatch opened to bring out a new batch of volleyballs, Sumire would wave at the one closest to Kamosida like an orchestra conductor and land a shot at him.

One such shot knocked the shadow's chin onto the glass in one of his hands. A freezing shock sent shivers down Sumire's spine as his tongue flailed around to lick his lips. At her angle, it felt like the liquid she didn't ever want to know what it specifically was was about to drop onto her before all of it landed in his mouth. An aura the same color as the liquid flourished around him.

"I have no idea! What that is! But it's def! Not good!" Ryuji panted, his thoughts cutting off as he dodged and shot at the trophy between every breath.

Akira quickly downed a can he saved in his pocket before giving Ryuji a command.

"Skull, gimme a boost."

"Which one was that again?" He asked.

"Tarukaja."

"Right, that one."

Akira and Sumire's eyes sparked with vigor as Ryuji empowered them. He dashed forward, and, with only a little bit of damage as a projectile hit him in the back, started slashing at the goblet in front of him.

The attack caused numerous scratches to appear on the yellow mug. In a frenzy of rage from how often it was being hit, Kamoshida used one of his arms to take a swing on the ground, exposing the cup and leaving it wide open.One more well placed shot from Morgana, and it bursted into swiftly disappearing shards.

"That was from the nationals!" The gym teacher roared. "Do you realize who I am?!"

"A pedophile with a god complex?" Sumire snarked, floating up to his face to make sure he heard it. He didn't, but it felt good anyway.

"Oh, we know." Akira said, gun pointed as close to his head as he could from his height. "But do you realize who we are?"

Shing!

Bang!

Thwack!

Swoosh!

His weak point exposed, Kamoshida wasn't able to recover and block in time before being bombarded with an onslaught of attacks from everyone, with Sumire doing one more fake hit for good measure.

After taking all of the hits, Shadow Kamoshida's head drooped, fury in his eyes as he looked at everyone before picking it back up. Grabbing it with his hands, it made an unsettling cracking sound as it rested back on his shoulders.

"You kids were probably too young to see this back in the day, so lucky you! I've been waiting to do it all over again." The so-called king taunted, rolling his head on his neck as he did so. He put a long, slender finger to his mouth and whistled, as if for a dog. "Blue hair, get the big boy out here!"

On cue, an exact replica of Mishima (albeit with a ton more bruises than the original) handed his ruler a giant volleyball much bigger than the ones spiked by the minions before.

"Guys, we talked about this." Morgana warned. "It's not the real one! It's just a cognition!"

The beat-up boy began to throw the ball up high into the air, and the castle's ceiling warped to the height of a skyscraper. Shadow Kamoshida jumped as the ceiling g further away, shocking everyone as he moved his body in a way that conflicted with his size. Then, like a meteor, he spiked the ball so hard it lit ablaze.

"BRACE YOURSELF!" Sumire screamed as she processed what was coming to them.

But how could they possibly be able to survive such a strike? Sumire wondered. The blast was bigger than the first one he threw, and that was before he transformed! It was big enough to destroy the entire castle if it could!

When it struck the ground, all Sumire could see was a flash of white and Yuuki's doppelgänger being sent flying back.

She closed her eyes to avoid the light, and when she opened them, Akira, Ryuji, and Ann were all covering themselves, fully expecting to go the way of herself.

Morgana, on the other hand, was flying in the air, a wind strike he cast trying to stop his fall before landing on the ground on his belly, tail twitching in pain.

"Mona!"

"Useless, useless, useless! Couldn't he have sent it a little higher this time?!" Kamoshida shouted, his big, bulging eyes lit up as well as they could, a black light bulb might've unfortunately gone off in his head. "Of course. How could I forget my most loyal servant?"

"Loyal servant?" Sumire thought for a moment. There was only one woman they hadn't seen a direct cognitive double of that could've been the answer, and Sumire was too late, unable to say anything as she arrived onto the scene.

"Shiho?" Ann squeaked, frozen in fear, her jaw agape. She couldn't hear the constant "Panther" that came from Akira and Ryuji, desperately trying to get her to snap out of her stupor. She closed her eyes before feeling a gloved hand on her shoulder. The size of it meant that it wasn't her former captor, and she slowly opened her eyes again to see Ryuji next to her, and Akira calling out to her.

"Focus on healing Morgana." Akira recommended. "You don't have to fight her."

"Right." Ann nodded as Akira handed her the revival bead, and she popped it into Morgana's mouth. His eyes became half-open, mumbling a "Lady Panther?" From between his whiskers.

"Mona, important question." Ryuji said with his head right over the feline. "Will attacking her have any effect on the real one?"

Shaking his head awake, Morgana looked around, spotting the cognitive Shiho in front of him. "Oh, uh, no, no it won't." he answered, getting back to his feet.

"Then I won't have any regrets doing this." Ryuji said a bit too smugly. Despite that, he closed his eyes as he commanded a Swift Strike, looking away as Captain Kidd did his thing.

No one wanted to see what would happen, averting their gaze, but when they heard a cry, they opened their eyes, and Shiho was gone. Only some floating black dust remained where she had once stood.

"If you are wrong about that," Morgana flinched when Ann gave him a cold (ironic) stare. "I will never forgive you."

"Sorry…" Sumire quietly apologized for the comment.

"Eh, who needs her anyway?" The perverted king boasted. "I think we all know what happens when you want something done immediately."

Akira stared directly at the crown. Why was he so big? Their grand prize was right there, glued onto that giant mound of long curly hair (no, he wasn't jealous of it… at least he took solace in knowing that his hair was fluffier), and Sumire was right next to it, stumped on what she could do now that everything that she could affect was gone.

Watching Sumire move, Akira noticed something as she backed up, seemingly unaware of it as her lower body phased right through it.

"Wait… is that a terrace next to her?"

"Skull, how good is your throwing arm?"

"Pretty good, why?"

It didn't take long for Akira to explain his plan, taking a glance at Morgana before they almost got pinned between utensils.

"Yeah, I can do it, good idea," Ryuji smirked, lining up behind Morgana.

"Good idea, but what?!" Morgana asked, unaware of the thoughts and shared smirk between the boys.

"Throw me instead." Ann objected, the carpet below her feet turning black with soot.

"No, he'll notice you," Akira said, shaking his head as he focused on Morgana.

"Wait, what!?" Morgana shouted, dodging a jab from the fork as Kamoshida reminded everyone of his presence, seemingly enjoying the small squabble between them.

"Ugh…" Morgana facepalmed. "If you're really confident this will work…"

Akira ran alongside Ann, ready to cover for her if things got too overwhelming, and the pervert took the bait. Despite his chameleon-esque eyes mostly looking in different directions, both of them turned for Ann. Seeing his chance, Ryuji grabbed Morgana under his shoulders and pulled his arm back for the wind up. Sumire flew onto a spot on the balcony where the mittened missile should land.

Ryuji took a deep breath and almost let out a massive yell as he ran, before Morgana shushed him. "Don't yell anything, he'll hear you!"

"Right, right, sorry."

The best he could do was think it in his head as he threw Morgana as hard as he could, a black blur flying past Kamoshida's head.

A draft was placed just below his feet to lessen the impact and noise of his landing, even taking a little pose with his hands in the air as he landed next to Sumire.

"Nice form! Ten out of ten!" She clapped, the rating of one's landing coming almost too naturally to her.

Seeing that Morgana had safely landed, Ryuji ran back to the others to find Ann healing Akira, a sizable welt forming from a leg sweep attack he had taken. Seeing that a second one was coming, Ryuji slammed his pipe down, catching the leg mid sweep. A cross between a cry and a whimper came out of Shadow Kamoshida, words spewing out of no value. They were all lies anyway boasting about how great he was and this shouldn't be happening.

"Steady… steady…" Morgana whispered to himself as he aimed at the crown. He fired once, but despite the target's size, its erratic movements caused his balls from his slingshot to miss.

"Dang it."

Sumire bounced when he fired, wondering what she could do. Looking around, she saw the chandelier above Kamoshida's head, and her own lightbulb went off. Floating in front of the crown, Sumire followed it based on where Akira, Ann, and Ryuji were beneath it.

"Use me as a crosshair!" She shouted to Akira, getting him to look at her.

"Oh!" Morgana realized the intent when he saw Akira's smile and Sumire's waveringlocation. "Thanks, Spirit!"

Pulling back as hard as he could, Morgana's eyes focused on where Sumire's light was, making it far easier for him to aim. His paw let go of the rubber, and the small iron ball flew.

A direct hit to the middle of the crown, knocking it clean off of Kamoshida's head, and just for good measure, he shot another ball to the back of his head.

And he fell.

Akira snatched the crown off of the ground as Sumire and Morgana came back to him. What was left of Kamoshida dissipated and turned back into the swimsuit wearing and more humanoid version they knew and hated. Ann and Ryuji had him cornered against a door to a balcony.

"You know, for an athlete, you're terrible at running away." Ann finally taunted back.

"You've always been the one screaming at me." Kamoshida said in an uncharacteristically melancholy tone. "Should'a known the day would come when you'd use that screaming against me."

"Feels great to be in the vulnerable position, doesn't it?" Sumire looked closely, and saw the faint outline of Carmen behind Ann. "Between an attacker and a ledge. Sounds familiar, doesn't it? Yeah, I bet it does."

Everyone stepped back as Ann's hands lit like fiery gauntlets. This was her moment, not theirs.

"Hey, no hard feelings, right?"

A plume of flames came towards him, barely missing.

"That's what you say to the girl who's life you ruined?!"

"Yeah, yeah. You got me, you win. In fact, just kill me already. The loser should be deposed. That's what you want, right? Not like the real me will be alive to see your victory."

All it took was that one slip-up for Ann to make her decision.

"I would love nothing more than to kill you right here and now. But…" The flames finally died down. "I want Shiho to see your defeat too."

"What?"

"I'd be satisfied… but she wouldn't." Ann explained. "I know she'd want to see your stupid, ugly face admit everything you did to her in front of the entire school."

Kamoshida hung his head low and sighed. "Gotta say, out of any princess I've done this whole song and dance with, you really were the smartest out of all of them for that alone."

"Thanks for telling us how to spare you!" Sumire waved towards the peasant as he started… glowing? Next thing they knew, Kamoshida's shadow was gone.

Suddenly, the ground beneath everyone's feet began to indicate an earthquake, or something similar, going on. Just like Morgana said, the palace was crumbling down.

"Mona, now is NOT the time to be cleaning yourself!" Sumire yelled as Akira grabbed his bag, sweeping an arm down to scoop Mona up.

Sumire dashed through every falling brick and set piece, all of it clogging up her vision, but as long as she was moving forward, and could see Akira and the others through it all. She could barely even make out Morgana changing into his quadrupedal real world form as he leapt out of Akira's hands.

She flew just as fast as she ran, which thankfully meant keeping an eye out for anyone being left behind in the rubble, such as when Ryuji tripped, which thankfully didn't eat up too much time.

By the time they were back on the first floor, Akira was about to run towards the way he came in before Sumire spotted someplace else.

"That wall just caved in! It's faster!"

And on a dime, Akira turned around, his vision focused on the purple sky the tunnel made visible.

Almost there, just one more jump for everyone to make. Sumire kicked her legs frantically during the final stretch, as if a second wind came to her. Did she need to? She wasn't sure, what was sure was that the moment she passed through the exit of the building the palace's impending destruction created, a white light flashed in front of her, with only the black ripple effect she'd gotten used to to assure her that she had made it.


The destination has been deleted. Thank you for your time within this palace.

"It's gone." Ryuji noticed.

"Wait… where's the crown?" Morgana asked in a light panic.

Akira checked inside of his bag for anything that felt like a crown. Nothing of that size was present, but there was something that felt metallic that wasn't there before, Akira pulled it out to reveal…

"A medal?"

"It's another metaphor thing." Morgana explained, a sigh of relief upon seeing something was in the bag. "Still, that means it worked."

It was over. They finally made it. Panting from all of the running, they simply sat in that alleyway for a few minutes for a well-earned rest. When the group got up to leave, Ann had tears noticeable from her red face, she held out her arms and closed her eyes before Ryuji went in for a hug. Ann opened her eyes and goaded Akira to join in. Hesitant at first, he accepted Ann's offer, and wrapped his arms around her and Ryuji.

"Thank you, guys. Thank you for everything."

It felt like they hugged for even longer than they sat.

And it was extremely noticeable to the one who couldn't, but so wished that she could be there for her.