NOTE:

"Doryaaaaaaaaaa!": normal talking

"Charge!": special case

'Darn!': thoughts

GWA HA HA HA! : Giant creature speech

DISCLAIMER: I OWN NOTHING!

Please… read and review

Chapter 33:

The Record Gazer

Back in the road to Archangel…

The soldiers were easily outnumbered and fell one by one. Tolle were impaled multiple times and Sai's head roll down from his shoulders. Milly lay broken on the ground with all her clothes torn and her eyes empty, having been ravaged until her mind broken. Kuzzey died having been impaled by multiple spears. And Kira lay down on his knees, losing an arm. Unable to do anything as Shiki was also taken away…

0000000000

The blast from Yuki's Pentagon Shock obliterated everyone down to the last molecule. A moment before the five element explosion completely consumed Kira, a seed dropped and break apart. Kira's right eye turned into the usual dilated seed eye.

00000

The Pentagon Shock from Yuki engulfed everyone. But the blinding light died down, and all that's left are Kira, Waltfeldt, Lowe, Gino… and the other barely survived Pilgrims… the ones strong enough to survive that blast… most of them were those who were equipped with Kira's Shadowforged Weapons. But they are all smoking… Pentagon Shock destroyed targets down to the molecular level, they've practically lost a few percentage of their mass… fortunately they survived that but… they're all in no shape to fight or to do anything.

Yuki and Ace looked at the fallen pilgrims.

"What now, Yuki?" Ace looked at the Lifeless Lord. His expression is hard to read.

The ground rumbled, and then behind them, the Mother rose up again. Her face was torn apart thanks to that explosion, revealing a monstrous demonic face. She slowly approached the obliterated platform where the pilgrims were lying.

The Mother screeched, communicating to the Knights under her command in a language no one can understand. No one but her children.

But her orders were clear and precise.

000000000

During Fuji's attack to Archangel…

The wall crumbled down as Fuji literally punched his way through the giant wall. Once the fortress was taken down, Kira watched in horror as Gates, that demented doctor began performing experiments one by one to his friends, and then finally, the mad doctor turned his scalpel unto him…

000000000

Yuki reluctantly swished his whip, and like a living snake, the whip slithered around the battered Kira and wrapped itself over his broken being. Lacus, the only one closest to him, lifted her head weakly and saw what's happening. She weakly lifted her bleeding trembling arm, trying to reach out to Kira.

"K… Kira…s…"

Yuki frowned behind his helmet. It's almost too painful to watch. But he has to do this. Yuki yanked his whip, trying to pull the boy up, but then, he was surprised when he felt resistance:

Levi and Megi came to their senses and quickly grabbed hold of Kira's body. Lacus, seeing her two Shikigami's efforts, pushed herself up and joined the two and grab hold of Kira.

"Let go!"

"NO!" Lacus screeched. "I won't let go."

Yuki growled.

"Lord Yuki! I DON'T CARE IF THE DEMON HAD CREATED YOU OR RESURRECT YOU OR WHATEVER! BUT PLEASE! OPEN YOUR EYES! THIS MAN! THIS BOY! Y… You are every bit of a father to him! Please!"

"I know." Yuki muttered.

Lacus paused her struggle.

"And he's always been every bit of a son to me." Yuki mournfully noted. "That's why, this… is my form of mercy." And with that, Yuki ceased all talk and violently swing his whip, striking all the Shikigami within range as well as knocking them away. Lacus struggled to maintain her hold on Kira, but it was no use. The whip hit her multiple times, ravaging her petite flesh. Lacus squealed, HARD. For a moment, Lacus gave in to pain and collapsed. Thinking the matter is resolved, Yuki returned to the task at hand lifted Kira again, preparing to hand him over to the Mother in a sling.

"…" Without a word, Yuki yanked his whip and was about to throw Kira, but then, once again, he encountered resistance. He looked again and was surprised to see Lacus, bloodied from head to toe, but still trying to hold on to Kira. Her other Shikigami also helped, in human form (Megi, Levi, Lily, Ghienny) or in Haro form (the rest).

"I… won't… let you…" Even Lacus was quite surprised at her own resilience. But then again, after feeling the pain from her experience inside Kira's mind, the pain that Ray gave her felt like a prick.

"You realize my Quadra Whip is no different than the other Genma weaponry? You're infected Princess."

Lacus chuckled while fighting the pain. "Tee-hee…" as Yuki get a better look, all her injuries burst into white fire as well. It's smoldering light fire, but smokes still arise as all the infection was burnt out. Lacus was uninfected. She's immune to Genma infection.

"You…?"

"My whole body still stinks of Kira's blood…" Lacus once again remembered the fact that operating Kira's body literally redefines the word 'Bloodbath'. "That means I'm practically laced in his blood."

"Hoo…"

00000000

Duel against Veia…

Veia unleashed his Ougi a millisecond before Kira's sword even touched him. In an instant, Kira was slashed three times and his body was parted to pieces.

00000000

A shriek attracted their attention. The Mother grew impatient and charged forward towards the platform.

"Mother? What…?"

The Mother no longer wait for Yuki, she took a personal approach and loom over Kira and Lacus. Before Yuki can do anything, the Mother slammed her palm right on top of the two with a loud crash. The Mother took the two in her hands, along with a handful of earth. She lifted the two over her head.

Kira was still unconscious while Lacus, who's still holding on to Kira was squeezed and groaned in pain. "Ngrh… Ng…" All of her Shikigami were smashed down, back to their original haro form, and their glow is also weak and faint.

The dark bile from the mother began to envelop them both… but…

Kira burst into white flame, burning all the infectious bile away. The said infection also protected Lacus and burn any attempt of the black bile to infect them. The fire is hot, but, as Lacus noted, to her, it felt more like warm blanket. 'It felt like I'm in a hot bath…' Lacus thought dreamily as she momentarily forgotten her precarious circumstances and immerse herself in the comfort of the white cleansing fire.

The Mother groaned. For humans, the White Fire is harmless, but for Genma, it felt like she's holding two incredibly hot lead in her hand. What's worse, the dark bile from her hand can't seem to penetrate and infect the two.

Yuki and Ace looked at the situation. It was obvious what the mother will do next.

The Mother brought the two closer to her lips, and then opened up her mouth.

"She's going to swallow them both!" Ace commented.

The Mother let go Kira and Lacus, and the two fell straight into her maw.

And in one clench, the Mother closed her mouth and swallowed them both in a gulp.

0000000

Ambush attack in the forest…

The Ambush squad led by Kira and Lockon was attacked by the mercenaries who had already slaughtered the escaping refugees, down to the last child.

0000000

And now, the mother focused her attention to the other pilgrims. She shrieked again and raised her fist. An enormous amount of her black bile gathered up on her balled fist and swelled up, forming a massive black bulbous mass emanating black purple fire.

At that time, the pilgrims had begun to come to, though they're still injured and was unable to move. Even the mighty Andy could barely move a finger.

"W… What…" Lamia choked blood. Her whole body is burning. "W… Where's… where's… Onee…sama…?"

The mother slammed the black blob to the platform. And from the crater where the blob landed, Genma arise.

…as in…

An entire battalion of fresh new Inferno Knights!

Ace and Yuki can only watch helplessly as the Inferno Knights marched straight towards the helpless pilgrims. Apparently the Mother has no intention to spare anyone.

000000

The Babylon Chase…

Kira was too late to save Lacus and the Babylon smashed the mountains apart a moment later, plunging and killing everyone into the abyss. Consuming Lacus gave the monster her miasma, and the demon spread the deadly plague across Junius, desecrating everything with its monstrous bile.

000000

The blast from Yuki's Pentagon Shock obliterated everyone down to the last molecule. A moment before the five element explosion completely consumed Kira, a seed dropped and break apart. Kira's right eye turned into the usual dilated seed eye.

00000 Chapter 31: Hell's Cauldron

Back to the tunnel network of the Genmas, Kira, in the middle planting another set of explosives on one of the tunnels' foundation pillars, jerked in shock when images appeared on his head. Specifically the images regarding as to what transpire on the battles between the living and the Inferno knights. And the inevitable conclusion of Andy's defeat, their utter and complete destruction, and finally, the truth of the Inferno knights.

"Lord Shadow? Something wrong?" Hilda asked in concern when she saw the ninja was sweating buckets.

"I…" Kira rummaged his hair. "I think I sense some Genma coming our way…"

Hilda was greatly alarmed and prepared herself for battle, but Kira raised his hand. "I'll deal with it. The lot of you, stay here and tell Liam and Kisato to hurry up. We don't have much time."

"All by yourself my lord?"

"Relax. I'm okay all by myself. I'll see you again soon. Cheerio." And with that Kira dashed into the darkness and out of everyone sight.

Quickly making his way back to the surface, Kira found himself confused, yet at the same time, enlightened. He knew exactly what he needs to do, what he wanted to do. What he HAD to do. Hooding himself with a black coat, Kira dashed as fast as his feet can carry him. Away from the sanctuary, far, far away from the battlefield. He only stopped when he arrived at a cliff, overlooking a rocky plain. Kira stood on the cliff and looked down.

Behold, an entire army of Inferno Knights, roughly 1,000 in total, amassing under Ray Yuki's banner.

One of the Inferno Knights spotted Kira. And not a moment too soon, Kira was dragged before Yuki, escorted by at least 10 Inferno Knights.

"What do you want, Kira?"

"My friends are now setting up bombs on the tunnel network underneath our battleground. For all they know, I'm going on a Genma hunt in a different part of the area. So I don't have much time." Kira smiled like the devil. He won the first gamble. "I had an offer in mind."

"An offer?"

"Who controls you?"

Yuki blinked. "What?"

"I'll change the question. Who took out your hearts?"

Yuki's eyes widened. "How did you know?"

"Not sure." Kira rummaged his hair. More in discomfort and confusion. "I just know. Who was it?"

Yuki frowned beneath his helmet. It's not like he can just answer straight on… a moment of thinking and then he answered: "Atbash Zoks Zhs Tizb."

"Atbash Zoks Zhs Tizb?" Kira frowned in deep thought. "Oh… I see. Sound rather familiar though. I think I've heard that name somewhere during my time in Terminal…"

"Does it matter if you know or not?"

"…well…" Kira snickered. "I'm not sure what kind of difference it can make but… I won't stop trying." Kira turned around and prepare to leave. But before he went completely out of sight, Kira turn around and pointed at Yuki. "But! If there's still a fraction of you in there… then you should know what I would've done now that I know." And with that, Kira flashed one sight of his confident smile and then vanished out of sight in a puff of smoke.

"He came all the way out here, reveal a part of his grand plan… and then he just left?" Sabo was thoroughly confused. "What do you suppose he's trying to do?"

Yuki didn't answer and remain silent for the longest time. But then… "Hao."

"Yes?"

"Summon more Inferno Knights. We need 5 times as much."

"That's just about all Inferno knights in our sector! You want to use every resource we have just to beat that boy? We're ridiculously hard to replace, you know that?"

"Yes. I do." Yuki nodded. 'Fine Kira. Let's have it your way.'

0000 Chapter 32: THIS IS A BRAWL!

And then, Yuki simply let all 5000 of his Inferno knights to collapse straight into the trap.

Genma Hunters, Knights, and all other mindless variants, even the Hulks and Tyrants are really cannon fodder. But when high breed Genma such as Inferno Knights got beaten en-masse…

"Well… up until now everything has been going according to the plan…" Yuki nodded in satisfaction as he saw how Mother was finally brought to the surface after the mass slaughter of the Inferno Knights.

"What are you muttering about?" Andy frowned in suspicion.

"No. Nothing." Yuki turned his attention back to Andy. 'Now, Kira. Your move.'

000 Now!

"Okay… this is kinda unexpected."

Kira looked at his surroundings.

As he recalled, he was swallowed by the Hive Mother. When he survived the full blow Pentagon Shock from Yuki, he knew right away that his gamble had paid off. The Hakutenkun had decided to take his bet and honor their deal.

And when Yuki did give him a shot, he went all out to do so: Have the Mother swallowed him whole so that he can take a shot from the inside.

He was expecting organs. Tongue, throat, belly, gastric acid, etc, etc…

But… he didn't expect it to be like this.

He's standing in the middle of a white empty space. There's nothing here. But everything is… off color. And he's standing but… there's no shadow. One thing for sure: he's NOT inside the belly of a giant woman.

But that's not the biggest problem.

"Oi."

"Yes?" Lacus looked at Kira innocently.

"What are you doing here?" Kira deathglared at the unexpected stowaway.

"I got swallowed. Along with you."

"How in the world…"

"I was trying to save you! I even had to endure a few whippings from your foster father! It hurts like hell!" Lacus roared back. "And then the mother went ahead and grabbed us both!"

"…" Kira slapped his palm to his face. Just what sort of star this girl was born under? "But this is kinda complicate things…" Kira groaned. "My deal with Yuki was for me to do this alone!"

"YOUR DEAL?" Lacus glared back. "You brokered a deal with…" It took some time for Lacus to digest the word. Deal. "What deal?"

"Doesn't matter. We have to get you out of here. Somehow. I can't do my stuff if you're stuck here with me!"

"Arara! Well I'm afraid that's impossible." Lacus gleefully (evilly) glomped to Kira. "This isn't some organ or organic innards that you can just cut apart to a gory mess. This is some kind of a spatial distortion. We're inside another dimension not another creature's stomach. I think… this is a Reality Marble."

"So I noticed!" Kira grumbled as he rummaged his messy hair, partly at his own oversight of how the mother of all demons would never make things so simple… and partly because this girl is glomping at him. "Lacus… what's reality marble?"

"What deal?" Lacus quickly interject before Kira can complain any further.

"Sorry?"

"What kind of deal did you broker with Lord Yuki? Answer me this and I'll answer your question."

000

"He made a deal… with you?" Andy frowned as he looked at Ray Yuki gazing at them from above atop his chariot. Every Pilgrim stared wide eyed at the word: Deal.

"Yes. The deal was simple. I knew my boy even better than I knew myself. He told me that he knew about the fact that we were controlled. So when he did told me that… I knew his target right away. Against a large numerically superior force, his target has always been the head of the force."

000

"…I told Lord Ray Yuki about the trap beforehand. His entire army collapsed into that Hell's Cauldron was not a coincidence. Nor was the idea of summoning extra reinforcements of Inferno Knights. It was all just… a well orchestrated act."

000

"Inferno Knights are different than normal Genma. We are high breed Genmas. For each of us that were born, 1000 Genmas were sacrificed to create us. And even then, the chance of a successful creation of Inferno knights is horrendously low. From 10 creation attempts, only 1 will succeed, the rest will degenerate into Hulks or Tyrants. What's more… each attempt took a considerable amount of resources and the power to control us. Imagine an undying body, with sharpened human wits, unlimited stamina and endless supply of power. But… as we still retain some semblance of our will, we can use that power to turn back on our Demon Masters. You'll never find a more dangerous double edged sword. We are powerful… but we are also VERY hard to control."

"How'd it go?" Andy began to grasp where this is going.

Yuki looked at himself.

000

"Apparently, that's the reason why the Mother used most of her efforts to keep the Inferno Knights in check. So much effort and resources was poured into it, the Mother was rendered in a near comatose state to control the many high breed Genmas… I think."

000

"When one of us dies… like how Hao got hit by a mental backlash, the feeling when an Inferno Knight was taken down, for good, the backlash actually hurt the Mother. So when 5000 of them were butchered enmasse…"

"The bitch woke up with the worst hangover from hell?"

Yuki frowned beneath his mask and looked at Andy. "It's a lot more complicated than that, Andy."

000

"Someone had managed to take control of Mother." Kira also revealed his understanding to a jaw dropped Lacus. "My suspicion was first aroused when, after the invention of the Shadowforged Weapons, the Genma we encountered afterwards lost their hearts." Kira frowned. "You remember when we fought the Doppelganger, my sword went through his heart… but it didn't kill him, because he doesn't have a heart. Don't you find that rather odd?"

"I don't think so." Lacus shook her head in confusion. "The Knights realized that a shadowforged weapon straight into their heart will kill them, hence why they pluck their heart out!"

"You think so? Before the shadowforged weapons, before my arrival… the Genma had little to fear. They have not the need to protect themselves, much less protect a specific organ. They're smart, I'll give them that. But, you think they're smart enough to do something like that? Even if they are… let me ask you this: why would they even bother?"

"Wasn't it because Inferno Knights are very hard to spawn? I mean… I was so angry when Lamia ate a cake that I've eagerly waited for months. I mean… saved several months worth of allowance to but that cake all for myself and she ATE it! How dare she…!"

"…" Kira looked at the princess, questioning her sanity. But, he decided it was a proper analogy. "Well, whatever, but… still… don't you think it's rather odd, considering what we've learned?"

Lacus is still confused. "What we've learned?"

"The Inferno Knights had their hearts removed to prevent them from being killed by Shadowforged weapon." Kira reiterated. "And then the mother responded because you just said that each Inferno Knight cost quite a lot of resources." Kira surmised. "Tell me. Since when Genma cared about gains and losses of resources? Why would they care at all?"

Lacus blinked in realization.

"Not to mention the fact that, as we both had learned… we've known what the Pilgrimage really is. The whole lies of it. The clever deception of it all. If the Genmas' idea is to be free, then these enemies are supposedly, in any level of difficulty, NOT invulnerable. They're supposed to be LOSING spectacularly. Something akin to a convenient weakness such as dying after being pierced on the heart, and then the Shadowforged Weapons… shouldn't that actually be helpful to their goal? So why the act of removing that weakness?"

Lacus's narrowed to a frown beneath the bangs of her hair, digesting everything Kira had unraveled. And then… she arrived at a possibility. No. A definite conclusion. "Kira… are you trying to say…"

"Whomsoever did this… is trying to create an army of undead… and that person is a human. A living, breathing, human."

000

Everyone's throat had long gone dry out of horror, and now they began to tremble with shock.

"H… Human? Yuki, did you hit me in the head one time to many… I… I think you just said a HUMAN is controlling that… that… thing?" Waltfeldt's eyes are as wide as they can get.

"You know me better, Andy. My sense of humor are quite terrible, to put it KINDLY." Yuki crossed his arms.

"Why? Who would…"

000

"It's not unheard of." Kira remain calmly cold while Lacus' dried lips were opened ajar.

"So… a human. Your target is the human controller. The Puppeteer?"

"That has been our goal from the beginning."

000

"Your goal." Andy repeated in a calm tone. "You and Shadow worked together…"

"The 5000 Inferno knights were sacrificed intentionally. I knew, when Shadow told me he planted explosives on the underground, I knew right away what he was up to." Yuki looked at his back. "When Shadow massacred the Inferno Knights, it was the Master, NOT the Mother who was angry. He put no small amount of time and resources into amassing that army. And then in a blink of an eye, it was lost. And so… in a very humanly reaction of greed and anger, in an attempt to 'save' his 'investments', he brought the Mother to the surface…"

"The true master… and that Master of yours is… where?"

"Andy, a person who tried to create a weapon called an 'army of armed monsters'." Yuki snarled. "It's a very tricky business. One needs to ensure one's own safety before one dares to play that game. How else can he ensure his safety while at the same time maintain control of a demon he had brought forth?"

The safest place for someone to control an army of monsters in a land of monsters…

000

"Now you know why Lord Yuki offered me to be 'eaten' by the Mother." Kira stretched his arms to the side. "He and I had the same idea: To control an army of monsters in the land of monsters… the safest place to hide… is inside the bowels of the Biggest Monster there is… Like a mice standing over an alpha male lion to pass through an army of predators."

Lacus nodded in understanding. Finally understanding the true form of this whole battle. Kira and Yuki's target… has always been this. Lacus was amazed. These geniuses really live in their own world. Their battle of stratagems and ploys are so far beyond her scope of understanding until it was revealed to her. But then, as she gained this understanding, she also came up with another epiphany.

"Only that… I did not expect that the Mother's insides would be something like this!" Kira motioned at this unworldly scenery. "I was expecting demonic innards or even parasitic internal monster guard but… this is…"

"Well… good thing I'm here." Lacus chuckled.

"Eh?" Kira turned to Lacus.

"Now that you've explained this to me, I finally understand why I'm here." Lacus smiled in triumph. Lacus looked at her hand. There are still some leftovers from Lord Yuki's whip attack. "Lord Yuki didn't kill me right away when I tried to prevent you from being given to the Mother. He could've… I don't know, rip my arms off, behead me… but he didn't. What's more, all of his whip attacks at me were superficial. NONE of them hit me in my vitals. It was only made bloody and gory to make it as if I was injured, severely."

And for that, Kira gave Lacus his undivided attention. "You're saying…"

"Now, as I've said before… this place is a Reality Marble. In a laymen's term… it's an artificial space. Kira-san, we're currently residing inside of a… imagined world. Someone imagined a world like this… and they manifested it as a reality with magic. You were right Kira-san. The one we're looking for is a human. A Warlock." Lacus flexed her fingers as she smiled wickedly cute. "And I'm a witch."

000

"So that's why you put Lacus and Shadow together into the Mother?" Andy rubbed his forehead.

"My boy maybe many things, but for as long as I can remember, he has ZERO aptitude in witchcraft and wizardry." Yuki nodded.

"But he's been casting spells. He breathes fire, erecting walls of earth…" Lamia recounted the many jutsus Kira had performed.

"It's a bit different, Princess." Lowe explained. "Shinobi's Jutsus and Witchcraft may look similar, but we use a different principle."

"In any rate, he'll be helpless in there. Not without some help from a powerful witch… such as your sister." Yuki finally finished reiterated all his schemes. The fact that his explanation eerily resembles Kira's in many ways just shows how much the two really think alike.

Andy groaned in slight delight. "So those bastards haven't really taken control of you entirely after all, eh Yuki?"

"Not so." Yuki looked at his hand and flexed his fingers. "He's still in control of me but… apparently, something happened. Whatever pandemonium Shadow had concocted in there is being unleashed in full. So much so that…" Yuki looked at the Inferno Knights that stood absolutely still about a mile away from the Pilgrims. The same can be said to the Mother, who became as silent as a statue. They were charging towards the Pilgrims nary half an hour ago, and then all the sudden, barely a few seconds after the Mother swallowed Kira and Lacus, they just stopped moving. Yuki chuckled. "So much so that he had to divert all his attention away from controlling us."

"Is that why you can even talk so freely with us right now?" Andy crossed his arms as behind him, the pilgrims, until just recently were scared shitless out of their wits, and now they finally get the chance to have a break and recoup their strength.

"For now. I don't know how long will this lasts, but… as a precaution I suggest you lot keep your distance." Point taken and obeyed. And it's not like they had any choice on the matter, everyone's too tired and too tense to try anything funny. Andy looked at the Mother, wondering what's happening inside her…

0000000000

"Tell me again about this… Reality Marble."

"Reality Marble… is a very powerful illusion magic." Lacus' hands danced around fluidly in the air, with magical runes appearing and disappearing before her as she weaved them with her hands. "It's like creating a world based on one's imagined terra. Say like… I created a world which is full of sweets and I can eat again and again… or… or a world where the taste spicy is nonexistent… basically, it's about one creating an illusionary world based on one's imagination."

"Illusion… you're saying that we're an inside an illusion right now? Like we're being hypnotized and that in actuality we're inside the stomach of the Mother-?"

"No, no, no… you're comparing it with genjutsu. But no. These two are really different. Genjutsu disrupt one's senses. When you see a Genjutsu Illusion, it really happened only in your head. This is literally, creating a physical matter using pure magical power. We really are inside a different world, created by magical powers. The Creator created this World, in which, in this world, he's a god which can do whatever he likes. He can even decree his own laws of nature in this world."

Kira whistled in awe. "Whoa. Then you're saying that, as long as the Creator is inside his world, he's invincible?"

"That's one way to put it, yes." Lacus nodded. "But there are limits. For example, earlier I said I can create a world which is full of sweets that I can eat. But, those are not actual food. They're physical illusionary objects that will vanish once the Marble is taken down. I'll stay hungry no matter how much I ate."

"You can take down a Marble?"

"There are two ways in which a Reality Marble can be taken down: one, the Creator wills it so, or two, the Reality Marble get destabilized with a huge burst of Ether Mana." Lacus quickly added. "That's what we used to do magics. It's also what composed this entire space. Right now I'm trying to find the founding Framework of this reality, and then see if I can make sense of it so that we can track it to its source."

"Whatever." Kira nodded in understanding. "But I think you better hurry up. I'm a little concerned of what's happening outside."

"You and me both…" Lacus closed her eyes and quicken her work. After some time, Lacus perked up and smiled happily. "Ah. We're in luck."

"What?"

"Apparently, our captors want to torture us, mentally." Lacus chuckled. "I had a read on this Marble. It seems we're trapped in a world where the time accelerates at a geometric rate."

Kira was somewhat freaked out. "How is that a good thing?"

"Simply put, we're in a world where a million seconds here is only a second in the real world. A prolonged time distortion. We may have been here for hours, but outside, barely a second had passed by." Lacus explained with a smile.

"Oh." Kira lighten up a bit. "I guess that means the outside is still exactly as we left them then. But, how do we break out of here?"

"Well, that's a food for thought…" Lacus tapped her lips with her two fingers in deep thinking. "Reality Marble is an impossibly difficult spell. Can you imagine just much power needed to create an entire artificial world?"

"Well, it's not impossible. We're inside one right now."

"No. You don't understand. The natural law of a Reality Marble can be altered at the whim of the Creator's imagination, that's true. But to do so requires a significant amount of power. Creating the world is one thing, changing it is another. A warlock who did this practically distorted the law of nature by creating a reality on another reality." Lacus explained as she continued to gaze on the runic figures appearing in front of her. "Therefore, usually, Witch and Wizards, in order to conserve their energy, will usually model their Reality Marble based on the already existing natural laws. For example, Gravity still pull us down, there's still air, our space perception is still the same with up is still up and right or left is still right or left. But what he's doing here…" Lacus gulped nervously. "He changed the laws of nature of this space pertaining to the passage of time. That's one of the fundamental laws of nature. There's no way a Warlock can do this!" For a moment Lacus shrieked in panic. "And what is this? The Magical Framework of this space is incredibly complex! What kind of Warlock is he?"

"What about several?" Kira surmised and Lacus turned to him. "I'm no wizard or warlock, but I do understand, from your explanation, that to create something like this is no easy feat. But, if one person cannot do this… what of several person? Several wizards pooling all their powers together?"

Lacus was silent for a few seconds digesting Kira's words, but then, she shrilled happily. "You're right! Oh how stupid of me of not thinking it sooner! Okay! Let's see… umm!" and once again Lacus furious wove the space before her, with runic figures appearing and disappearing at a furious rate. A moment later she cheerfully squealed. "YAY! Found it! I got you! Yes, yes, yes! The magical framework of this place was completely complex because they were woven by several people… separating the framework into several individual types… if we follow the framework one by one, we should be able to nail the source! Kyahaha! This is amazing! It's just like what you said Kira-san!"

Kira tilted his head in confusion of what exactly had transpired. But he understands he managed to help her… somehow. Though Kira didn't even understand half the thing she's muttering about. Still… if it weren't for her, Kira wouldn't know what to do either. "You're the amazing one here." Kira muttered in appreciation.

"Heh? Nanni, nanni?" Lacus was too busy with her God Knows what.

"Iya. Nandemonai." Kira chuckled and smiled kindly. "I'm just really grateful you're here with me."

Lacus' movements went to a full stop upon hearing the statement. Her face turned as red as tomato in an instant. "I… Eh… O… OF course! Ehe, hehe! I am the only qualified witch within distance! If not me who else can help you? Mwuahahahaa-ha… ha…" and she continued her work at a slower pace…

"My point exactly. Thank you." Kira genuinely smiled in gratitude and, to a lesser degree, admiration.

If her face gets any redder, Lacus could've sworn her veins will pop and blood will burst out of every opening on her face at this rate. In sheer panic, her hand moved like a jet propelled rocket, blurring haphazardly. Within seconds (Local, Reality Marble, time) she had literally unweave hundreds of runic figures.

But Kira and Lacus' rapid progress did not go unnoticed…

0000000000

In the bowels of nowhere, inside the Mother…

Men in hoods, numbering in the hundreds.

Until a few moments ago, they were sitting on the ground, encircling an orb.

Until a few moments ago, they were chanting nonstop. Incantations and invocations were being murmured from beneath the darkness of their hood at a feverish pitch.

Until a few moments ago, they were steadily maintaining the Reality Marble which imprisoned Kira and Lacus.

But now, they're in the state of chaos. Their prized Reality Marble are being disassembled bit by bit by this wretched pink haired girl! Curse her! Of all the things the Mother could swallow, they had to swallow a witch like this! Worse, the Time Distortion Property of the Reality Marble was supposed to be their way of torturing the two supposed victims. What's happening only minutes in here is happening within years inside. To be trapped within nothing for decades is enough to make anyone insane… enough to break anyone's will… but now… it's being used AGAINST them!

In the reality marble, it took hours for Lacus to do what she's doing. But in the real world, the damage is happening rapidly within microseconds. The conclave of warlocks was in complete chaos. So much so that they focus all their attention on dealing with this internal disruption rather than controlling the army outside. Thus, just as Yuki had expected, everything that's happening outside are largely occurring beyond their control. The Inferno knights remained still, the Mother could not move, and Yuki was free to divulge many revelations to the listening ears.

"What is it with these two? The male asshole had just undone all of our hard work assembling that Inferno Knight army… and now that bitch is nibbling at our Reality Marble!"

The panicking Warlocks were still in the state of chaos, when all the sudden, a single clanking sound echoed from one end of the room, and the chaotic atmosphere of the room changed into horror. The commotion trailed to a full silence almost instantly. All eyes turned to the source of the clanking sound.

The clanking sound were footsteps coming from a man clad in a grey hood and cape. The man's head was completely covered in a Black Knight helmet, with golden trimmings. The rest of his body is shrouded in a cape, but it was unmistakable that underneath the cape he wore a full body armor with the same black and yellow coloration. The knight also wore a pair of spaulders atop his grey cape, decorated with green feathers adorning its sides. Despite its regal black attire, the Knight emanated a fierce bloodthirsty aura that sent shiver down to their spine.

Everyone held their breath in complete horror. One of them silently muttered: "Why is he here? Now of all times!" "Oh no, oh no…"

"U… Uhm… W… we are honored by your presence my lord…" one of the warlocks, apparently the Head of the Coven, hurriedly welcomed the Black Knight.

"And your incompetence dishonored my Master." The Black Knight's tone showed that the person was in anything but a good mood. "I came here to check on your progress. But WHAT THE HELL IS THIS?" His angry tone was somewhat distorted by unknown means, but given the emotion he shown, it was clear that he's human and currently, he's furious.

"Ah… W… We…"

The Black Knight ignored the head Warlock's stuttering answer and shoved him aside as he looked at the orb and beheld the source of the problem. The two teens that were unraveling the Reality Marble. His eyes narrowed upon seeing Lacus, the one wearing a red hued miko robe with… pink hair… The Black Knight frowned. And then he turned to the one with bandages allover and some patches of black armaments, carrying a katana. Kira. Just the two of them… but they are giving the Warlocks no end of trouble. "Then? What do you intend to do with them?"

"Well we were planning to break them! And then we will use them as the basis for a new breed of-"

"You do no such thing." The Black Knight barked, scaring the Warlocks into silence. "You will deliver them to me. You may use whatever means necessary but I want them alive and unspoiled."

"What was that?" One of the Warlock protested. "Do you have any idea how much damage… they… have… ma…" the warlock couldn't continue. He can feel the Black Knight glared straight at him. It was as if the Knight's eyes pierced right through his heart.

"Did you think this order came from me?" The Warlocks were completely horrified out of their wits now. And then the Black Knight pulled out an antique watch. "5 minutes. The lot of you have 5 minutes to do what I just told you. If after 5 minutes those two aren't secured in my custody…"

They don't need to hear the rest of the threat to know what will happen. The Black Knight's silent death threat was enough to propel the Head Warlock into desperate action.

"A…Alright. Alright. We'll separate the two. Put them in separate Reality marbles! QUIIIICK!"

"B-b-but… Even maintaining just ONE is taking its toll! If we force ourselves to do something like that our brain will-hggh!"

The Head Warlock was so desperate to stay the Black Knight's wrath that he put the protesting warlock in a choke. "DO IT! Or I'll give you something worse than a brain hemorrhage!"

And the Warlocks hastily get to work under the blank stare of the Black Knight.

0000000000

And just as Lacus was about to get to another breakthrough, sparks lit up from the runic figures she's currently interacting.

"Huh?" Lacus perked. But the next instance, the runes snapped at her fingers and pushed her away. "Kyaa!"

"LACUS!" Kira instinctively caught her before she fell on her back. "What's wrong?"

Lacus blushed as she lay on Kira's arms. But then she looked at her singed petite fingers. "The runes… they rejected me… something's happening… something bad…"

"Something bad?"

All the sudden, the ground between Lacus and Kira break apart. Kira's eyes widened in surprise. "What's this…!"

"Oh no… they're changing the Marble!" And just like that, before Lacus or Kira can do anything, the two were suddenly yanked apart. The two are now standing on what's left of the previous Reality marble, separated by a great distance by a vast darkness that they can't cross.

"KIRA-SAN!" Lacus vainly reached out her hand to Kira, but the darkness quickly consumed and closed him from her sight.

"LACUS-SAN!" Likewise, Kira could also so nothing as the darkness quickly engulfed him.

0000000000

"There… it is done." The Warlock sighed a breath of relief. "They're locked and secure."

"I want them alive and unspoiled."

"Worry not my Lord. They will be unspoiled… well… physically." The head Warlock began explaining the new Reality marble. "This new Reality Marble distorts the passage of time as well… though… 100,000 seconds down there is only about 1 second here. 5 minutes will be like a year down there… once we let them out; they'll be catatonic at best. Easy for you to bag and tag."

"I hope so, for your sake."

The Head Warlock swallowed a gulp.

0000000000

When he opened his eyes, Kira found himself floating in the middle of a vast endless empty chaotic black space. He's at the center of… well… nothing. There's absolutely nothing there but darkness. At first, Kira thought he had been blinded. That the darkness was because he couldn't see anything. But, that thought quickly perish as Kira can still see his being: his arms, his legs, everything. So he's not blind or anything he's just… he's just inside another world, not another creature's belly.

And about this world… there's… nothing in here. There's absolutely nothing. No smell, no sight, nothing. This is even worse than the previous discolored void world. "This… darkness…" He couldn't see anything to stand on, but Kira can feel that he's standing on a flat floor. Kira lifted his feet and start walking. Yes he can still walk. It felt awkward.

Kira walk and walk and walks…

Seconds became minutes, minutes became hours… and before he realized it, hours had turned to days… and finally, Kira's perception of time was gone as well. For several days, even weeks, Kira was trapped in this darkness, going nowhere, doing nothing, seeing, hearing, feeling absolutely… NOTHING. He tried everything. He used Aoiro Shiki to cut allover the place, nothing. He used the Midori Shiki, shooting the arrow to several spot, it hit nothing. He even used the Kurenai Shiki to fly allover the place, zooming as high as possible, diving as deep as possible… but he ended up in the same place: nothing.

"W… what the hell is this… place…? How long… have I been… trapped here…?" He felt his whole body withered with each passing moment. And above all… his mind began to wither as well. All this nothingness… for prolonged periods of time… it felt like he's been here for months… what's happening out there? Did the pilgrims survived? Mwu and Sai must've left the continent and returned to the Archangel. What happened to them now? What becomes of him?

Kira find getting more and more difficult to think. 'So that's how it is…' with his mind stretched to the limits, Kira began to see what's going on. 'A psychological attack… absolutely… nothing… to trap me in a space where there's absolutely… no…thing…' Kira's mind began to gave in. "NO! I… I have to remain sane… I guess there's nothing to it… Shiki…"

Kira pointed the Shiki to his chest. He knows the phrase.

"Slaughter All Creation…"

Shiki's blade turned into a black bastard sword.

"ANKOKU SHIKI!" And Kira stabbed his own heart with the sword. A burst of black chains later, followed by a distorted scream…

And the Insane Dark Knight roared…

0000000000

"The first priority subject is using the dark form."

"Let him rail on and on. Nothing can break through our barrier."

"What becomes of the second subject?"

000000000

Meanwhile, like Kira, Lacus is also in the exact same predicament. But if Kira had begun to fall victim to this condition, Lacus was able to resist. Somewhat.

"Her mouth must be a portal to some kind of… phantasmical dimensional space… like… some sort of portable Reality Marble…" Lacus rubbed her chin as she observed her dark surroundings. She looked at her arms, feeling the space she's residing in. "The passage of time in here is different… time moves faster here than the outside… and this darkness…" Lacus closed her eyes, feeling her surroundings. "I can feel a loop… a loop of spells… and an incredibly powerful barrier was set up to prevent anyone breaking out… this is bad…" Lacus smiled nervously.

Like Kira, Lacus began to feel the effect of the psychological attack of enduring nothingness. To feel, see, hear, and think absolutely nothing. "…a normal human mind would've collapsed from this torture… I need to find Kira-san first!"

00000000

"That woman… she's a witch?"

"A summoner type witch. Capable of summoning the Zodiac demons… but nothing to be worried about. She requires her so called Haros to perform the summoning. Without it, she's helpless. She's of no threat. What of the first subject?"

0000000

Kira let the insanity of the Dark Knight overtake him and for several good long hours, the Ankoku Shiki rampaged, clawing, roaring, sending burst of black chains haphazardly to every direction. But eventually… it hits… NOTHING. When Kira regained his sanity again, and see that he's still stuck in the Ankoku Shiki armor, standing in the middle of nothingness… Kira knew right away that he's still trapped inside this space. Worse, once he ran out of power and reverted back to his original form, the Shiki was completely greyed out and its blade were chipped badly.

Using the Ankoku Shiki was a VERY bad idea. Now in addition to his mind began to deteriorate under this mental torture, his body also began to collapse as his stamina reached rock bottom. This only worsened his condition. When Kira tried to fell on his knee, he suddenly found his knee was unable to hit anything. Kira ended up rolling around and returned back to his standing up position, but upside down. There's no direction in this place: there's no left, no right, or down… everywhere is up.

000000

"It won't be long now. The first subject is about to crack."

"And the second subject?"

00000

Lacus meditate and calm her mind. She kept trying to concentrate, find her center. Empty her mind. If she think of nothing she won't be affected by this nothingness… much. But like this… she really can't do anything. Lacus calmed her mind, trying to think nothing.

But then…

Kira's face flashed into her mind. Lacus cringed. Why did she think of him in times like this? Oh right, he's suffering the same fate as of this moment. No, no, no! Concentrate! Concentrate! I HAD to empty my mind or I'm done for! Empty my mind, empty, empty… empty… just like during the trance…

And Lacus remembered the one time he went into trance when she saw Kira's face…

And when they kissed…

WHAM! And for that, Lacus smashed her fist on her own face. "…why the HELL do I HAVE to remember THAT!?"

Things get a little bit complicated for her part…

0000

"The progress on subject two is rather slow… but I think we're getting there."

"And subject one?"

"He'll crack soon."

000

As time quickly passed inside the darkness, Kira found himself stop caring about anything at all…

"…getting… hard… to… th…" Kira's eyes went dead as the light vanished. And with that, his mind went blank and Kira collapsed on the inexistent floor. Or did he collapse? Kira wasn't sure anymore if he's lying on his body face down, or he's still standing on his feet.

And there Kira remained still, mind blank… completely… still…

A seed fell…

00

"The first priority subject has fallen."

"Good. Let him stay there for a little while longer and then we'll drop the barrier."

0

Back in the road to Archangel…

The soldiers were easily outnumbered and fell one by one. Tolle were impaled multiple times and Sai's head roll down from his shoulders. Milly lay broken on the ground with all her clothes torn and her eyes empty, having been ravaged until her mind broken. Kuzzey died having been impaled by multiple spears. And Kira lay down on his knees, losing an arm. Unable to do anything as Shiki was also taken away…

During Fuji's attack to Archangel…

The wall crumbled down as Fuji literally punched his way through the giant wall. Once the fortress was taken down, Kira watched in horror as Gates, that demented doctor began performing experiments one by one to his friends, and then finally, the mad doctor turned his scalpel unto him…

Duel against Veia…

Veia unleashed his Ougi a millisecond before Kira's sword even touched him. In an instant, Kira was slashed three times and his body was parted to pieces.

Ambush attack in the forest…

The Ambush squad led by Kira and Lockon was attacked by the mercenaries who had already slaughtered the escaping refugees, down to the last child.

The Babylon Chase…

Kira was too late to save Lacus and the Babylon smashed the mountains apart a moment later, plunging and killing everyone into the abyss. Consuming Lacus gave the monster her miasma, and the demon spread the deadly plague across Junius, desecrating everything with its monstrous bile.

The blast from Yuki's Pentagon Shock obliterated everyone down to the last molecule.

And more, and there were, are, and will…

All of this came to Kira in a vision and Kira jerked several times as his body went rigid. Kira screamed louder than he ever thought possible.

His one right eye turned dilated, into a single small cornea, with a flat pupil. Kira looked at his surroundings suddenly the nothingness is no longer there. Soldiers outnumbered. He turned his head around in confusion. Fuji smashed through the Archangel Wall. The place is full of things. Veia cut him apart into three. He didn't understand anything. The Babylon smashed through the mountains. And it's not like he can see it, they're being force-fed straight into his head. He beat Veia in a duel. What the hell? He defeated the Bladebanes. Smashed the Aquarius. Got his ass handed by Raww. And etc, and etc…

0000000000

"Everything in this world follows the law of Cause and Effect. All stored and noted down, by the Record."

"You mean the theory of Akashic Record? The Super Computer of the universe?" The red figure snarled. "Come on, Jorm, don't tell me you believe in… that…" The red figure snarl trailed to a full stop under the fierce angry sharp glare of Jorm.

"Akashic Record is VERY real. A detailed record which archived every data in history-nay-every creation, every existence, the things that are, were, and will be." Jorm lifted Kira's Seed eyeball in his hand. "And these eyes are the proof that it is real."

"How come?"

"Human perception of the world is highly based on what the sort of information they perceive using their senses. It means when they see the color red, the information of that color went from their sense of sight, and then to their brains, and then they perceive… red. Because the law of this Natural World determine that the information that enters their senses are red. Suppose to say they entered a world where the law says differently. Say it's a world where Red is Green. Or you go into the world where up is down. They will undoubtedly perceive the world quite differently. The information that you perceive with your senses built the foundations of the very fabrics of your world. That information is pooled together into one massive archive: the Akashic Record. And Kira's eyes have the ability to see it… to gaze at it, if you will."

"But… Jorm… if Akashic Record really exists and you say Kira-chan's eyes can see it…" The white figure frowned. "I mean… an unlimited reservoir of data and information… inexhaustible and ever-expanding endless library… a human mind, no matter how strong, no matter how brilliant… won't be able to comprehend that much information without going insane."

"Quite right." Jorm nodded. "And Kira never did saw the record… not consciously. But subconsciously, that's another story."

The three figures gave Jorm their undivided attention.

00000000000

Kira slammed his fist to the floor. As he did, his hand generated a ripple that revealed circuitry made of encryption of words… in a language and grammar completely incomprehensible to all mortal minds.

00000000000

"In its inert passive state, these eyes remain active and continuously read and perceive the Akashic Record at subconscious level. It sees it everywhere: the ground he walks, the air he breathes, the water he drank, the food he ate… all of it… ALL of it… the eyes perceive them all." Jorm explained. "But… that information is too much for a human sanity to handle. In an automatic defense mechanism, all these information were mostly thrown away, forgotten, or subconsciously stored as needed. But otherwise, Kira wouldn't realize just how much information he had acquired with but a single glance."

0000000000000

As Kira get back on his feet, his eye looked everywhere and realized the encryption is everywhere. Where originally he saw shapeless darkness… now he saw… shape… a spherical room, outlined by the encryptions.

0000000000000

"The law of Cause and Effect applies here." Jorm showed his brothers and sister the Seed Eye in his hand. "The one that Kira have right now… is the eye of Origin. The one in my hand is the eye of the End. Either eye, once activated, enable its user to perceive the Encryptions of the Akashic Record at his planar dimension. He will be able to interact with the information with all his five senses."

0000000000000

All this encryption is tearing his head to pieces. All this noise… all this… gibberish. Frighteningly, Kira found he understood this language. But it was too much. Like someone cram an explanation with a foreign language by having him read, write, hear it , do it, all at the same time while teaching him how to understand that foreign language. Kira suddenly found himself missing that calm quiet nothingness. He felt it was so much better than all this… noise!

Kira frantically bashed the ground. And the encryption rippled and altered.

000000

Lacus' eyes jerked open when the space literally tilted on her.

000000

Kira panted and gasped but then he looked at the encryption on the floor. Slowly, more gently, Kira began to move his hand around the encryption. Eerily enough, he can touch the words. He cannot pluck them out but he can move them… sway them like one move leafs on water. The circuitry looked like a very… thin… wire. It's very thin. It was almost as if it was one with the surface, but it's not. Kira could've sworn he could actually… pinch it out.

0000000000000

"Akashic Record is a reservoir of Information which is perceived by the universe, from which, the denizens of the said Universe subconsciously perceived that information, and then construct the very foundations of the world's reality the way they see it." Jorm continued his explanation. "They cannot consciously interact with the record, but, they subconsciously perceive it anyway. Kira's bloodline limit enabled him to perceive it… with all his five senses, this enabling him to interact with the Record as a tangible object."

"Cause." Jorm referred to the eye Kira had left and then he lifted one of Kira's Seed Eye in his palm. "…and effect. Kira's current eye, the eye of Origin has the ability to perceive information pertaining to the Cause. The source of everything. The Cause related information which pertains to a subsequent Effect. He can literally see the very foundations of the world."

The black figure's eyes slightly widened. "Jorm… you said tangible. Are you trying to say that Kira can… alter the Record in anyway?"

0000000000000

He did it. Kira pinched the circuitry out of the floor.

It's so… small… like a string wire. It's weightless… and very…

With a flick, Kira cut the circuitry.

…Fragile.

And in an instant, a small piece of the space shattered.

0000000000000

"But… still… how can Kira-chan see that sort of information and still remain sane? I mean… even if with the Eye of Origin Kira can perceive about… HALF of the Akashic Record that's still a BIG ass half!" the white feminine figure commented in concern. "Won't that endanger his mind?"

"Well that's just the thing about our host, dear Sister." Jorm mourned. "We all know he was never truly sane." Jorm tucked his head as he finished explaining to his brothers and sister as to why he asked for one bloodline limit in Kira's left eye…

…during the time when Kira was still lay sleeping in Lacus' tent after her operation (AN: which is to say this is really a flashback).

"But this is serious." The black figure sternly noted. "If Kira Yamato can perceive the Record that make up the fabrics of the world's reality… he can alter that record and even… bring about the end of the world as we know it!"

Jorm nodded. But then he added. "You guys ever wondered why our host had such a poor sense of direction?"

"And yet when danger comes, Kira-chan is always there to the rescue, at the right time, at the right place." The white figure nodded in understanding.

"Like some kind of a self defense mechanism. His brain had always been overtaxed just to process all that incomprehensibly immense amount of information without frying his brain." The black figure tried to catch up on what Jorm is trying to say. Even in its passive state, the two eyes had taxed their user that much… "Are you saying… that Kira can't use that power indefinitely?"

"More like, it was impossible." Jorm surmised as he pulled back the eye of the end. "Sanity aside, it took an insane amount of chakra to activate the ability. Even if Kira strengthen himself all his life, he'll never be able to come up with enough Chakra to make a full use of these eyes. There are some instances in which Kira did activate them, but they never showed up more than a few microseconds at a time. Barely enough time to cause any big changes."

"Until now!" the black figure pointed accusingly at Jorm. "You took away one of his eyes. But at the same time, it means you lessened the burden it'll took to activate the ability! Even if the power is halfed, do you have any imagination of how much damage the ability to alter the cause of effect can do to the world?"

"Actually I already thought about a quarter quadrillion possibilities and catastrophes, and counting by the millions, which will ensue if the Origin was misused." Jorm chuckled as he lightly listed several apocalyptic catastrophes with his fingers. "Assuming he gained enough power to do it he can… say… rewrite the laws of existence, reverse the law of life and death, restructuring the laws governing atomic matter, or go back in time to change the evolution and development of all life, to reconstruct the orders and laws of this world. Not making change to the existing world, rather annihilate the old one with a new reality. We can rest easy that Kira will never gain the power to do something like that. Not in one lifetime." Jorm quickly added. "Still… that was not the case if he's stuck in some kind of a… say… artificial space… like a Reality Marble."

"Reality Marble… you mean that fake World Spell?" the white figure frowned.

"The same." Jorm nodded. "A Reality marble is a world based on a bootleg Akashic Record. Pirate copy maybe just a copy… but it's still an Akashic Record. And Kira should still be able to perceive them as well. Only… he's not limited to the same restrictions of apocalyptic consequences like when he's dealing with real world Akashic Record. In fact… Kira… you can just tear apart that Reality Marble like a paper mache prison made out of tissue paper."

The 3 figures' eyes widened. They turned around, looking for Kira… but… he was nowhere to be found.

"Jorm?" the white figure timidly looked at the blue haired man.

"The most important ability of the Eye of Origin. The ability to send information back and forth through time."

000000 (okay, maybe it's not flashback at all)

And back to the present, Kira grinned as all that past conversation between Jorm and his three brothers and sister are now freshly imprinted in his head like they happened just now. He yanked a bunch of Fake Akashic circuitries that make up the Reality Marble together with his both hands. "…like a papier mache prison made out of tissue paper…" With a roar, Kira yanked all circuitry and tear them apart. In an instant, the whole dark space breaks to pieces… literally.

00000000000

"The information is not limited to time either. It can see information from the past, present, even future. Any Cause related information will be recorded, and everything in the Origin Record can be read by the Eye of Origin. And he can also interact with it. But that's not all he can do."

00000000000

"What the…?"

About a dozen warlocks went into coma with blood bursting out of their nose and they fell dead shortly after. Brain hemorrhage due to the lethal backlash when the Reality marble was torn apart like a crumpled dishrag. The insides of their head had turned to mush.

00000000000

"Once the Eye of Origin can see the Akashic Records pertaining to the causes of everything at conscious level, that's when its Active Power came into play. The Eye of Origin can also send the information back and forth through time. For example, just now, I believe Kira's future self… probably his future self a day after today were gazing at the records… searching for what he needed, a way to understand his Bloodline Limit. The Eye of Origin will go back in time, and gaze the Akashic Origin Records from the past, and then send the information forward through time. But the information won't be unloaded all in one go. No, it was too enormous. The information will be disseminated bit by bit to Kira's various future selves. For example, the Kira of 1 hour ahead, the Kira of 2 hours ahead, and so forth and so forth. This way, when the future self Kira who first gazed the record will gain a perfect understanding once the information has been completely transferred."

00000000000

Kira pant and gasped. It looked so easy… but it drained him like he just went through a gauntlet of marathon. And his head… it splitting his head to pieces. And…

Drip.

Kira looked at the back of his hand and saw a drop of blood… dripping from his nose. "Okay… this doesn't look good…" As expected. If his bloodline limit really was THAT powerful… it is inevitable that the backlash will be troublesome as well. Athrun call it… what was it? The Law of Equal Trade. The more powerful the bloodline limit, the steeper the price of using that Bloodline Limit. But he really doesn't have the time to worry about nosebleeds. "Need… to find… Lacus… if she can… unravel… this…"

"Use cutting weapons. That'll make your job more efficient." Jorm gave him a tip. "And take care on how much you actively use that ability. That blood came straight from the bloodveins in your brain. You overuse it, and you'll be lucky if you die straight away!"

"…r…right." Kira unsheathe Shiki and intensely glared with his Eye of Origin at his surroundings. He saw the encryptions allover the place, glowing with myriad of colors. And now that Kira noticed it, it wasn't just on the space or objects. Kira looked at himself, and he can see the Origin Record on his being as well. And on Shiki. His Record are colored in purple blue. And then, as he looked around he also saw a pink colored record, shaping the form of a woman. 'Lacus… she's right there…' and she's surrounded by a black colored Record that's slowly corroding her. 'Not… on… my… watch…!' Kira lifted Shiki and with one slash, he cut the Origin Records of the Reality Marble to shreds.

Another few dozen warlocks fell dead with blood bursting out of every opening in their head when their brain turned to mush.

Once the dark Reality marble was torn apart, Kira found Lacus clutching her head as she curled down. Her eyes were half blank. Apparently Kira had arrived just in time. "L… Lacus…"

"K…Kira!" Upon seeing Kira, life immediately returned to Lacus' eyes and before she can stop herself, she rushed towards Kira and jumped towards him, hugging him tight. "I'm so worried!"

"Y… yeah…" If Kira's head wasn't in such a torturous pain and he wasn't nosebleeding like crazy, he would've been blushing furiously.

When Lacus felt the wet dripping of blood on her shoulder coming from Kira's face, Lacus pulled back and beheld Kira's horrifying blood bathed face. She noted the blood gushing out of his nose and, more alarmingly, blood that began to trickle out of the corner of Kira's dilated right eye. "Kira…san… your eye… they're bleeding! Wh… What happened to your eye!?"

"My Bloodline Limit packs a punch." Kira gave the girl a bloody grin. "As consequences, the kickback's a bitch."

"Bloodline limit…?" Lacus had never heard of a Paramecia Eye Type ability that can damage the user to such a degree… what kind of power it possesses?

"Stand back. I'm getting us OUT of here." Kira gently pushed Lacus back, scanned the surrounding looking for the right Origin Record of the Reality Marble. It's strange. All this gibberish, and Kira understood which is which in an instant. But this he understand: the more of the record encryption he destroys the more painful it'll be for him. Does this thing burn his brain cell or something? Doesn't matter. He's about to destroy a lot more, after all. He lifted his sword again, and with a stroke, he literally ripped the space apart as all the encryptions that formed this Reality was torn asunder.

The world was literally split into two, and all the sudden, Kira and Lacus found themselves standing in the room which, until just recently, was the workshop of the Warlocks who were erecting the Reality marble that imprisoned them.

It is now… a mass graveyard filled with piles and piles… of dead bodies

Some of them died because of massive brain damage caused by Kira tearing apart their prized Reality marble.

The rest were piled together in separate pieces, scattered everywhere.

"W…What just happened here…?"

Kira, still in Seed Mode, understood what happened instantly. "The guys… with seemingly intact bodies… my doing…" Kira groaned as he fought the pain. But he knew that their brains are fried, courtesy of him. "The guys who were in separate pieces though…" Kira frowned as he saw the way they all died. They were cut clean in one stroke. "Not my doing… These people were wiped out wholesale… it happened recently and in an instant too…"

"N… No… help me. I… HELP-!" A horrifying scream quickly attracted their attention. The two looked at the direction where the scream came. A warlock was just bisected to two by a bastard sword. Sword belonged to the Black Knight, wearing a grey cape and hood. The Knight looked at the two and lightly swiped his sword away. And then, behind the Knight, there's the last remaining Warlock, the Head Warlock himself.

"Why? We've been loyal! All these years! We do his bidding! One failure and we get this?" The Head Warlock protested in horror.

"It has nothing to do with your failure at all." The Knight turned towards the frightened Head Warlock. "But your usefulness is at an end. I was going to simply let you walk and do whatever… But… you are compromised and now-" And before the Head Warlock can say anything, the Black Knight stabbed him by the chest and lift him up. "-the Master had considered you a loose end… and I was sent here to clean up all loose ends. That means the lot of you."

"G… G… Go… to… Hell…" The Head Warlock was obviously in sheer agony.

"Been there." Before the Head Warlock can say anything, the Knight toss him up and then bisected him in one stroke, spilling his innards out.

The gore was too much and Lacus swooned. Kira caught her and gently dropped her behind him as he move forward, shielding her behind him.

The Black Knight then turned his attention to his main target, namely Kira and Lacus. But Kira, in particular, eyed the Black Knight suspiciously. "You…"

"…easy… or hard way." The Black Knight pointed his… eerily clean sword. There's barely any drop of blood on his white and gold sword. All that slaughter and not a single drop of blood marred it. A sign of how skillful the Knight is in his bloody work. "You can come with me peacefully, or I'll bring you in pieces. It makes no difference either way."

"…tell me. How long has your master in the business of slaughtering fellow living creatures with undeads?"

"Long enough for most sane people to stop. And he had recently decided he had enough. Thanks… to you… Kage, the Black Devil." The Black Knight referred Kira by his moniker. Kira twitched. That means… The Black Knight answered his question by showing Kage an alarming black colored wanted poster. It bears his masked face… with a slight change in number:

Kage, the Black Devil, Captain of the 7th Division… bounty: 500,000,000.

"How long have you been in the business of killing your own kind, Kage?" The Black Knight put away the bounty.

"I'm sure it was not short enough." Kira make ready to fight. "But, when I kill them, at the very least, I did the courtesy of making sure they STAY dead. If it was because me that your master grew tired of playing with the dead, and he'll change his mind when you tell him, once I get off this place… I will devote all my undivided attention of making sure he leaves the ranks of the living!"

"That is… IF you get off this place." The Black Knight pointed his sword at Kira… and then… the grey blade was suddenly engulfed by red glowing matter. Soon, the sword turned into bright glowing beam bastard sword. Kira narrowed his eyes in anticipation upon seeing the red beam sword.

And in an instant, the Black Knight flickered from sight and rammed his red glowing sword to Kira's katana, from his flank. Kira was able to block it by luck. One vertical slash, and it was enough to slam Kira down to his knees, cracking the floor. Sparks lit up where the sword and katana crossed. And Kira can quickly see why: the Knight's red sword is literally grinding his katana. And that super speed just now… Kira get a close look at the glowing beam sword: There's only ONE type of soldiers that does that: "Y…You… you're a samurai?"

The Black Knight grunted, and with a flick of his beamsword, he knocked away Kira's Shiki. He looked at his sword to see if anything wrong, and then he looked at Kira's shiki. There's only a small chip where their sword clashed. "You have a very good instrument. Otherwise, I've already split your head cleanly in half. Who made it? Muramasa? Masamune?"

Kira snorted. "…Hattori Hanzo."

"USO-SUKE! (You lie!)"

"Well, I can't say anything else, and I'm not sure if it's true. But, if your glowing sword is as good as you say, the fact I'm alive confirms it right?"

The Black Knight looked at his own red glowing sword. He tilted his head as he looked at his sword. "This sword has been enhanced by a dense layer of Chakra and it has a monomolecular thickness. Incredibly sharp and cut people up without damaging their being. That's why there's not one drop of blood on it, even after all this slaughter. So when I kill these people… I can tell you with absolute certainty they don't feel pain at all." The Black Knight looked at Kira's features. He's obviously an Orb citizen. He may not be a Samurai, but he should still hold true to the law. "It's one of the seven techniques of the Samurai Bushido, Zantetsuken."

"BUSHIDO?" Kira's eyes widened. It's a public secret that Samurais became what they are because of their infamous super secret training system. Everyone also knew that there are 7 of them. It's just no Samurai would even speak the name or use it in public unless absolutely necessary. "How can a samurai use one of their seven secret techniques so brazenly unless…" Kira looked at the white armor. It's medieval, and resembles the Zaft medieval European Knight armor than the Samurais armor. "…unless… you really are not a samurai anymore… are you?"

The Black Knight tilted his head. This guy, he knew more than he let on. But, it should be expected. Besides, Zantetsuken is among the most famous of the 7 Techniques. Even the lowliest civilian would notice and grew curious of a glowing sword. So, it is understandable that even an outsider like Kira would know it, if only by name. It is the 'how' and 'what' which are the closely guarded secrets. "Whatever the case, that is my courtesy to my victims." The Black Knight pointed his sword at Kira again. "Now, allow me to once again extend my invitation to you. You are wounded and exhausted. The former case being far more severe than either you and I can imagine. Come with me peacefully, or I will kill you where you stand painlessly."

Kira swallowed a gulp. Being a citizen of Orb, of course he would know just how powerful those super soldiers in direct head on combat. But he's not the kind to just stand down and get intimidated by superior force. His defiance was shown by Kira moving into battle stance. "I'm sorry. I ain't built that way."

"…pity. I can't say I dislike your character." The Black Knight nod down his head, seemingly in sorrow. "In different times, I would've liked to be your friend."

Kira for a moment was taken off guard by such comment, but then he chuckled. "We live in crazy times."

"We are indeed." The Black Knight prepared himself. "As a courtesy, I will kill you in an instant. It will be quick and painless, I promise you."

Kira took a deep breath and prepare to use the only high speed Ougi he knew of. "Hyomon-ken Ougi…" He moved the phased out Shiki slowly, leaving behind remaining after-images of his katana. "Mikazuki no Kodomo."

The Black Knight was startled upon hearing the name. Incredible! An Ougi of the Regalia Technique? Who is he? Truly a pity he had to kill him! "Bushido Hijutsu: Sukuchi (Shrinking ground)"

Kira don't know what Shukuchi is, but upon hearing the word Bushido, Kira's eyes widened in fear, and instinctively, his body responded by taking the initiative and execute his Ougi first. In fact, Kira reflexively used Shunshin to accelerate. He zoomed at unbelievable speed and instantly closed the distance between the two.

At that critical moment, Lacus regained consciousness.

Only to be welcomed with another horrifying sight…

…the sadistic sight of a fountain of blood gushing out when the Black Knight sliced Kira's chest open.

"Shunshin… combined with a God Speed attack… splendid. That indeed worthy of being called Super God Speed… but… the speed of my Shukuchi…" The Black Knight finished. "…is 3 times the speed of Super God Speed."

"Kahakh!" Kira vomited blood from his mouth and nose.

Lacus can only shriek hysterically. "NOOOOOO!"

Kira collapsed to his back, and Lacus desperately caught him. Lacus looked in horror at Kira's condition. His chest was split, and some of his ribs were nearly cut apart. Fortunately… it was not fatal. But that was not Lacus main concern: Kira was vomiting and coughing up blood, and it kept bursting out of his nose and eye. This is not an injury caused by sword cut.

"…granted… you managed to survive. At the last moment you managed to back away with another timely Shunshin. You would've end up with just a light cut across your chest. Alas…" The Black Knight pointed at the nose bleed and blood trickling from Kira's right eye, which is no longer in seed mode. "You were already injured badly before this bout. You were not in your prime and as I feared, you've paid the ultimate price."

"Aha… gak… ehek…" Kira won't stop vomiting blood.

"Kira… Kira…!" Lacus was hysterical upon seeing the horrifying scar on his chest. Even though she's a doctor, for a moment, she really don't know what to do other than to cry and panic. Meanwhile, the Black Knight approached the fallen Shinobi. He placed his sword over Kira's head. Upon seeing this, Lacus moved in to protect Kira. With teary eyes she glared at the Black Knight.

"This is mercy. He will not suffer any longer than this." But Lacus won't budge. The Black Knight was stunned at the sight of the pink haired girl protecting Kira to such extent. The Knight finally nodded and closed his eyes behind his visor in understanding. "So be it. As you wish." He held his sword with both hands, and with finality, the Black Knight bring the sword down.

CLANG!

The Black Knight's eyes widened. And then he looked at what happened. His sword clashed with two other weapons: one is a Katana. The super heavy Nodachi: Gerbera. The other weapon is a sword. A normal Emerald Knight sword, customized to be used by a hakutenkun. Black Knight came face to face with the owners of the said weapons. "Ray Yuki… and… Lowe… Guele?"

The Lifeless Lord and the Junk Guild chief can only be defined as the physical incarnation of one simple word:

Word, thy name be RAGE

Two fists: one bandaged with explosive tags that blow up at impact and another is covered in an armored gauntlet; collided with the Black Knight's face. Severely smashing it in and sent the Knight flying through the wall. Ray Yuki didn't even say a word and quickly chased after the bastard knight who did this to his foster son. Lowe hand Lacus something. A bag… filled with all of Lacus' medical helpers, the haros. "Tend to his wounds the best you can jou-chan. We'll take care of this." Everything said and done Lowe quickly zoomed through the hole in the wall, screaming bloody murder in pure undulated rage.

The Black Knight was smashed out of the room and went straight into a fleshy tendril.

The building he and everyone were in just now was a huge and tall black tower with gothic design. The tower's structure is made of black marble stone of unknown origin. The tower was decorated with many jagged spires jutting upward, formed of fused skulls and bones. The tower's base float midair, the entire gigantic structure was held together in the center of a network of hundreds of fleshy tendrils and synapses, pulsing. God knows how the whole structure was made and resides in what part of the Mother's body.

The Black Knight touched his blackened faceplate. It's completely dented in. Luckily he can still see, but if the idea is to take it off, he had to tear it up to pieces later. At any rate, the Black Knight looked up and saw Ray Yuki charging through, his bloodlust evident which has nothing to do with a Genma's thirst for blood. "Right… without the warlock to control you, you can quickly regain your true self."

Yuki didn't answer. He was too furious to respond. He's just here to kill him for what he's done. That much is a given.

'This is troublesome… and there's Lowe too…'

Speak of the devil, the spiky red haired man popped out of the tower, his sword in flames. The Black Knight pulled a second sword, and just like that, it also ignited and became another red beam sword. The Black Knight now holds two beam swords. Yuki paused for a moment upon seeing the two beam swords. He looked at Lowe and the two nodded at each other. Yuki concentrated on his Quadra Whip, and soon, the whip began to glow blue and green. A beam whip. Yuki violently swished his whip and carved the fleshy ground like it was butter.

Likewise, Lowe took a deep breath and then concentrated on his sword. The blazing wild fire suddenly began to shrink… the flame did not die down though… they were being compressed! Lowe tightened his grip on his Gerbera, and in response, the blazing Fire of Kagutsuchi continue to compress… until it formed an exact shape of Gerbera of a beam katana… but it's somewhat different with Yuki and the Black Knight. It's a gleaming hot orange beam sword but of solid composition, with gradation to show differing temperature. Its sharp edges are white, showing the highest temperature. In a sense, it's far more perfect beam sword than the Black Knight's or Yuki's. "Bushido Hiken, Kagutsuchi Zantetsuken."

All traces of Lowe's laid back self was completely gone. His upbeat and cheerful was replaced with a disciplined and stern tone that's impossible to be seen from a rowdy mere mercenary.

Lowe roared viciously and all the sudden he performed a shukuchi and appeared right in front of the Knight's nose. And when the sword was brought down, the Knight quickly realized blocking it was not an option, even with his Zantetsuken beam sword. The Knight performed a shukuchi of his own just to narrowly dodge it, and he was right to do so. The Knight could barely see the sword mid swing, and where Lowe's sword landed, the land was split… and then explode with such heat that the Knight felt his armor is on the verge of melting just by being grazed by its fumes. Any later and he'll be split into molten glob of metal and flesh. Before he can blink, the junk guild chief swing his Zantetsuken towards him in a horizontal arc. The Knight managed to jump away in time, but the tip scratched his cloak. Just a graze, but to the Knight's horror, his cloak began to explode and burn violently.

"Whoa." Slightly in panic, the Knight quickly cut the part of his cloak that are burning violently and throw it away. The piece of cloth was turned to cinders just as it left his hand. Lowe relentlessly and without a word chased after the Knight like a blood hound and once again brought down his Zantesuken. No way to dodge it, the Knight had to block. And as he was well aware, it was a bad decision. One stroke and now it's the Black Knight's turn to be forced down to his knees. And he can see; through the glow of the clash of their swords; that Lowe's obviously superior Zantetsuken are slowly, but surely, eating away at his Zantetsuken. The Knight desperately pushed the Kagutsuchi Zantetsuken away and quickly made his distance. But before he can get far, he saw a flicker of wildly swishing green and blue beam whip that tore apart the tendril just behind him and they're rapidly coming his way, courtesy of Yuki.

The Black Knight had no choice, he had to jump to the sky. In a blink of an eye, the Knight is in the sky, seemingly jumping to nowhere near another footing. But the Knight pay no heed and concentrated on the situation below.

Yuki's Quadra Whip went forward unabated towards Lowe who happened to be in the way. But Yuki has no intention on stopping. Apparently he had full faith that Lowe will survive it.

He thought correctly. Instead of dodging, Lowe calmed himself and placed his sword in front of him in a normal sword stance, in a perfect symmetrical stance, at the center of his body. Lowe took a deep breath and exhale: "Bushido… Hyakku Shiki." And Lowe's hand flickered and calmly blocked every whip that came his way… and more: he deflected the whip and unerringly directed it straight towards the Knight, trapped in the midair, unable to move.

The Knight gasped. But then, like Lowe, he also concentrated, and he also performed the same Bushido technique: "Hyakku Shiki!" and began deflecting the redirected beam whip. He somehow managed to deflect them all even when he's in midfall. But when Yuki personally directed his attack to him, he knew he's out of his depth. A second before the beam whip reached him, the Knight kicked his legs in the air. "KAMIKAZE!" a booming sound echoed and the Knight literally flew a mile away from he was, avoiding the beam whips. But then he looked at Lowe and his eyes widened again.

Lowe entered the state of a battoujutsu stance. "Kagutsuchi…"

The knight quickly knew what's coming, and he also sheathed his sword. "Tobi…"

"Tobi…"

Lowe and the Knight roared: "ZANTETSUKEN!"

The two swing their swords with such force, they generated a kamaitachi, a vacuum blade that, just like their swords, were coated with a dense layer of chakra, increasing its power hundredfold. The orange blazing Kamaitachi from Lowe collided with a pair of red kamaitachi from the Black Knight. They exploded midair, but the force of the explosion propelled the Black Knight backwards. The Knight used that chance to kicked himself to a different direction again with Kamikaze. But before he can get far or reach a footing, Yuki appeared before him, having arrived there using his own Kamikaze. The knight looked his way back, with a booming sound, Lowe had also arrived behind him using his own Kamikaze, blocking his way back.

Lowe kicked his leg to the air. "Kamikaze!" And once again, with a sound of a sonic boom, Lowe vanished midair and instantly closed the distance between the two.

At the same time, Yuki also pressed in as he kicked his leg back. "Kamikaze!" Another booming sound of the sound barrier being broken, and Yuki flew straight towards the Black Knight.

The Knight knew he couldn't dodge this in time and so…

CLANG!

Lowe and Yuki's eyes widened when 3 pairs of energy sword emerged from the green feathery decoration from the Black Knights cloak spaulders. The energy sword is enormous, almost as tall as the Knight and it enclosed his being like fortress walls, blocking both Lowe's sword and Yuki's whip slash.

The Black Knight roared and the 6 swords blared open, knocking his two attackers away while the Knight literally took flight using his wings of swords before he landed on another tendril, far above the two.

And for a moment, Lowe was somewhat bewildered. "What the… is that a new Bushido tech?"

"I don't think that's a Bushido technique…" Yuki calmly rubbed his chin, ignoring the situation where they are free falling to the abyss. "More like… arcane magic… he's a Magus Knight. From Magia Colegia… he's from Zaft!"

"Oh… okay." With his question answered, Lowe and Yuki calmly position themselves and then simultaneously kicked their legs again. "KAMIKAZE!" and once again the two boosted up towards the Knight.

Seeing his opponents are back for more, the Black Knight raised his twin red beams swords… and all of his green broadswords.

0000000000

Meanwhile, Gino had finally managed to catch up.

He was quite surprised when Lord Yuki suddenly collapsed on them, and after briefly uttering a name he could barely hear, the former Hakutenkun literally jumped sky high and then flew straight towards the Mother's exposed eyesocket-on his feet. Much to the bewilderment of the rest, the only one who can follow the Lifeless Lord was Lowe, who used an exact same technique of kicking his leg in the air to fly and followed him into the Mother. Gino, the only Avian zoan of the group followed the two, with Torii in the lead. The bird seems to be in panic.

When he finally reached the destination, it was then he understood why.

Shadow is lying in the pool of his own blood, gasping for breath, with his chest carved open, and Lacus was lying on top of him, trying desperately to do something about that vicious wound.

"Oh my God… Lord Shadow!" Gino was about to just rush in when Lacus snapped at him.

"STAY WHERE YOU ARE!" Lacus shrieked.

Gino stopped.

"You get within 10 feet perimeter, you're dead. I don't have time for additional patients; I'm quite BUSY right now!" She was quite hysterical, but she was right.

"My lady… PLEASE… tell me… how I can be of assistance."

"Stand guard. We're inside a Genma Lair, I don't want any stragglers while I'm working!" Lacus also looked at all this accursed Necromancer Warlocks. They're humans alright… but to think that they're the ones who were responsible for all this… "And if any of this people get back up… bring them down!"

Gino put what Lacus had just said with what his Great Grandfather had told him together. Two to two together and he understood. "It'll be a pleasure."

And so Gino stand guard while at the same time eying at how Lacus is desperately trying to do something about Kira's split chest. Gino winced in horror, trying to imagine just how painful it was, being cut apart like that. "I… Is he gonna be okay?"

"…the spot where his chest was split was carved out. That is to say it's not like being cut… more like a portion of his flesh was disintegrated… scooped out. If it was a simple cut I could easily stitch it back together in an instant… but this is…" Lacus gritted her teeth. How was she supposed to put it back together if a portion was gone? So this is what it's like to be cut by a Samurai?

Gino cringed seeing at how Kira was gasping for breath, clinging to life. "How can he survive that?"

"No vitals were hit… but a part of his ribs were cracked…" Lacus checked and found his lungs, and heart mostly are fine. The slash didn't go deep enough as to reach the organs on the chest… but… with his ribs broken like that, one wrong move and the broken rib may puncture his lungs.

Just then, in between his gasps, Kira's eyes opened. He regained consciousness and immediately groaned as the immense pain is still stinging on his chest.

"Lord Shadow!" Gino was somewhat relieved upon seeing that Kira's awake.

"Kir… Kage-san! Please don't move yet! I… I…"

"W… What happened? Where… where's that Black Knight?"

"Knight? What Black Knight?" Gino was somewhat alarmed upon hearing the moniker.

"Not your concern! Now we have to do something about that wound of yours!" Lacus' lips had dried out in fear.

"I'll… decide… WHAT is my concern!" Kira growled, earning another blood spurt. "WHERE is he?"

Lacus bit her lips in horror. "He's outside. Lowe-san and Lord Yuki are engaging him right now."

"Okay… Okay." Kira seemingly struggled to get up, but his injuries forced him down. He choked blood and gasped for breath again.

"Lord Shadow!" Gino grunted.

Kira gritted his teeth. "Lacus."

"Kage-san?" Lacus looked at Kira.

"Help me… see… my wound… help me… see… my chest…"

"It ain't pretty, Kage-san."

"I know! I've been cut before… just… let me… see it. Tuck… my head… up."

Lacus, completely confused looked at Gino. But the Exorcist was as confused as Lacus. Finally, Lacus relented and gently tuck Kira's head up. With difficulty Kira bent his head to get a better view of his chest. Just like what Lacus had said… it's ugly. He can almost see his lungs.

"O…okay… keep it like this… keep it like this." Kira closed his right eye, concentrating.

The Eye of Origin saw the Origin portion of the Akashic Record. That is to say, in the laws of Cause and Effect, the Origin pertains to the Causes of an Effect.

And right now, the effect is: the Cleaved Chest, torn ribs, torn muscles, carved out flesh, etc2.

The Cause is: Cut by a Beam Sword.

Kira's Right Eye opened and entered Seed Mode. Gino and Lacus gasped upon seeing the bloodline limit went active. Kira took a deep breath and all the sudden he plunged his fist to his open chest.

"GYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGHHH!"

0000000000

Meanwhile, The Black Knight's battle with Lowe and Yuki is steadily reaching its zenith. The Black Knight took to aerial combat with Lowe and Yuki chasing after him in the sky. In the air, the Black Knight proved himself to be superior to Lowe due to his Sword Wings. The Black Knight can fly around more fluidly than Lowe. Lowe and Yuki had to perform one Kamikaze after another to stay in the air. What's more, it seems that their 'flight' is severely limited in that Kamikaze can only send them flying to a single direction in a straight line. Unlike the Knight who was aided with his wings thus allowing him to remain airborne indefinitely, and his wings allow him more maneuverability in the air.

Even worse, the wings can do more than just flying around or defending the user. The Knight batted both wings forward, and it launched hundreds of green energy feathers allover the place. Lowe and Yuki jumped away to avoid contact. But when the feathers do HIT something… they explode, violently. When hundreds of them were sent simultaneously, the whole place explodes and cause massive destruction. Many synapses that are holding on to the Warlock's dark tower were blasted to bits.

The tower rumbled eerily. The whole structure was being held suspended in the air by these tendrils… if sufficient tendrils were broken…

"Why you…!" Lowe realized that Kira and Lacus are still in there… if that tower fell… He kicked the air several times, thrust vectoring haphazardly with Kamikaze to avoid the multitude of explosions from the Black Knight's wings, but he desperately tried to close the distance between the two.

Yuki used his whip to take down some of the projectiles midair, causing them to explode in the air, clouding him from view. Yuki used the opportunity and swing his whip to a tendril, wrapping it up and then pulled himself up before jumping straight towards the Knight, sending another barrage of whips that slice and diced everything in his path. The Black Knight narrowly dodged this attack, and at the same time returning fire by sending some of his explosive feather projectiles from his sword wings. Yuki muttered incantations beneath his helmet while charging green energy to his left hand. "VORTEX SHIELD!" Yuki shoved his palm forward, generating the barrier. The barrier created a gust that sucks in all feather projectiles and gathered them together in one point in front of him, creating a large sphere of energy from the collected energy.

"Uh-oh."

Yuki pushed his left arm for the second time and fired all that concentrated energy as a stream of energy beam heading straight towards the Knight. Yuki even added some of his own energy into it as well. The Knight barely dodged the attack and the energy blast instantaneously punched a hole, and on the outside, the pilgrims were wondering what on earth is happening inside the Mother as the Demoness, and by extension, her army, had not moved an inch in the longest period. And then, that's when the Mother's chest suddenly exploded and a green energy beam burst out and drilling a hole on her chest.

Upon seeing that, Andy was alarmed and quickly realized there's a battle going on in there. He tried to get up but grunted back in pain. Yuki had really done him in. He don't think he can move properly for at least 48 hours. "Damn… he really showed me no mercy…"

Meanwhile, the Black Knight began to realize his early advantage of aerial combat is rapidly diminishing. This aerial battle is severely limited within the confines of the Mother's insides. It was further proven when, as he deflect many of the whip attacks, 2 or 3 whips still managed to pass through his own Hyakku Shiki defenses and hit his green wings. One of the swords that composed his wings cracked under pressure. The Knight moved away and to his shock, Lowe appeared on his flank with another booming Kamikaze and swung his glowing hot blade to the Knight's neck. The Knight blocked the attack, if only momentarily and he was thrown off by several hundred meters until he was slammed to the fleshy walls of the Mother's insides. The Knight grunted and for a moment he faltered due to the pain but remained where he is catch his breath. But that momentarily pause cost the Knight dearly.

Yuki seized this chance. The moment the Knight regained his bearings, he was enveloped by whirring after images of Yuki's Quadra Whip. Definitely no escape this time and the Knight quickly crossed his swords and closed down his wings. The Knight was subjected to a brutal whipping from Yuki. The Knight still managed to move away from that death spot, but Yuki did not stop for a moment and intensify his attack. Wave after wave of the Beam Whip attack shower him one after another, until finally, one whiplash tore apart one sword off his wings, disintegrating it to nothingness. With the defense pried open, one opening allowed another wave to come in and this time, it's completely unstoppable. The attack tore his elegant black and gold armor to scrap within seconds, forcing him to crash land on the top of the tower. His armor in shambles and his green sword wings in pieces, barely forming the shape of jagged and horribly chipped swords. The Knight was clearly injured, and before he can do anything, Lowe zoomed across the sky, diving dead vertical and was already right in front of him, preparing to deal the final blow with a stab to his heart.

The Knight used what's left of his sword wings and his twin swords to block the incoming attack. It came with the force of a meteor strike.

More than enough force to send the Knight and Lowe plummeting down through the tower, breaking through several floors. However, the shock caused several synapses that suspend the tower to be cut off. Now there were only a few synapses left, and the Tower is in a dangerously precarious state.

The Knight and Lowe fell through several floors until the two finally stopped on the floor where Kira and Lacus were in. Lowe and the Knight locked gaze for a moment as the Knight struggled under the pressure of Lowe's sword nearly piercing his heart. Both of his swords were on the verge of breaking. His whole body is in pure pain of having his back smashed through several layers of floor. And yet, he still managed to somehow summon the strength needed to kick Lowe away.

He rolled to the side, avoiding follow on attack. A quick scan on his surroundings and the Knight suddenly recognized the place. This is the place where he massacred the Warlocks. He's back to where the fight began. But that means…

He looked around and saw Lacus, covered in blood… and… The Knight frowned: There's Lacus, there's one Exorcist, there's the bodies of the warlocks he butchered early on, there's the Orb they were using… then where's…

"Looking for me?"

The Knight turned around and came face to face with Kira.

…donning the Red Kurenai Shiki…

…and he's as good as new.

Kira swing his sword at unbelievably blinding speed and the Knight could barely dodge it. This time, one of his already battered swords was cut cleanly in two. The knight looked at the broken sword. The stump was red hot. But he's more particularly surprised of the fact that Kira's chest was as good as new. Last time they fought, he literally carved his chest open. But now… they look as good as new. It was as if he was never injured before… wait… the Knight blinked several times. When did he carve that chest? How did he carve that chest? And what wound? Did he ever carve that chest? The Knight felt a slight headache and clasped his head. If he had carved a man's chest… he would know… right?

And then, as if it wasn't enough trouble, something else came down, and that something is Ray Yuki. Yuki looked at Kira and he looked as if he was never injured safe for blood on his face coming endlessly from his nostrils and eye. Well… he had never been injured have he? Wait… what?

W-Whatever the case, this is really bad. Ray Yuki, Lowe Guele… and now Kage the Black Devil is back to full strength. Even if he grew extra arms and legs, or even run to the ends of the earth and he still won't survive this. Knowing this, the Black Knight dropped his weapons and resigned to his defeat. "Go on. Take my head."

"Not yet." Kira barked. "Not yet. First, you're going to do a few things. Like giving Lord Yuki his heart back. Then a few questions about your boss… then you'll have my permission to die."

"Tall order." The Knight tucked his head down. "…but I'll tell you something. Lord Ray Yuki is amongst the most powerful creation my master had ever created. But, as you can imagine, that also makes him the most dangerous double headed sword. And my master… well… he's quite the coward."

Kira frowned, but then he quickly caught on. But Lowe had not. "What do you mean?"

"You think he'll create something like a Lifeless Lord… without an 'off switch'?"

And Yuki screamed in agony the next second and fell on all fours, clutching his chest. "Gyaargh… GaaAAAAAAAAAAHHRGHHH!"

Lowe quickly realized this is the Knight's doing. He lifted Gerbera and attempted to stop the Knight from doing anymore damage. But before he can bring his sword, something wrapped around his sword and stopped it mid swing. Lowe looked angrily to his back. It was Yuki. He used his Quadra Whip to catch his Gerbera. "What are you doing?"

"I'm… I'm not in control… I… I can't…"

Lowe's eyes widened in shock.

Against his will, Yuki yanked his whip and pulled Lowe back violently. The Junk guild Chief rolled in the air for several spins and then landed on his back with a violent thud. But before he can even land, Yuki unleashed several dozen whippings on Lowe. 'oh shit…'

Blood sprayed from Lowe's battered body as Yuki ruthlessly flayed him down.

Kira quickly reacted and charged towards the Black Knight, ramming him to the ground. "Stop this… or I'll kill you slowly, I swear to God."

"It's not me… it's out of my hands." The Black Knight was telling the truth.

"Lord Shadow!" Gino screeched as he pointed at what's coming.

Yuki roared and swing his whips around, preparing for a very big indiscriminate attack to everything!

Kira roared and performed a Shunshin that brought him right in front of Yuki. Kira took a moment to grunt as blood trickled out of his overstressed bloodied Right Eye and he glared to Yuki, still under the thrall of the puppeteer. For some reason, Yuki didn't try to stop him, and then Kira did something the Lifeless Lord never expected: he shoved his fist through his chest, punching through his armor with sheer brute force. But Yuki did not say anything. "It's no use Kira. There's only an empty cadaver down there."

Kira glared intensely at Yuki's chest… Yuki quickly noted Kira's peculiar right eye. It was reading something that he cannot perceive. Kira's hand tilted and rummaged Yuki's chest… it was as if he's searching for something. He found it and Kira yanked it out. To outward bystanders, it looked as if Kira simply yanked out nothing but a bloodied mess… but to Kira… he pulled out certain circuits… At that point, blood bursting out of his nose and his right eye was bleached red. And then…

Kira looked at Yuki, and all the sudden, his body is surrounded by hundreds of afterimages of Yuki's whip.

"Time's up." Yuki nodded meaningfully to Kira.

Kira nodded in understanding. "…do it." And he smiled sinisterly.

The Black Knight's eyes widened when he heard the word from Kira. Regrettably, he was too late to understand what's coming.

In an instant, Kira was completely battered by Yuki's Quadra Whip. Blood splattered everywhere as Yuki's whip was bathed in Kira's blood.

But that's exactly what Kira and Yuki had wanted. "RAAAAAAAAAAAAWWWWRR!" Yuki viciously continued his attack and purposefully swing his blood laced whip haphazardly to EVERY direction, attacking and destroying everything indiscriminately. Hundreds of the whips' afterimages became thousands. Thousands became hundreds of thousands. The whip went everywhere, obliterating and slicing everything that gets in their way down to even the smallest pebble, causing untold destruction to the surrounding. This includes smashing the Warlock Dark Tower inside out, engulfing the people inside it-which includes obliterating all the dead bodies of the warlocks, even devastating the last remaining synapses that held the building aloft, and, more importantly: the Orb which the Warlocks were using in their enchantments were pierced multiple times by a multitude of whip lashes, until it finally shattered and vanished without a trace.

When Yuki finally stop, he quickly fell to his knees, clutching his chest. And then a scream. Louder and more ear splitting than anything they've ever heard resounded allover the place. And yet, it was also a silent scream. No sound can be heard. The scream was not on their ears, it boomed straight inside their heads. If anything, it was so horrifying, so pain filled that they are in no danger of forgetting that scream anytime soon.

Outside, the Mother was frozen in a state where her multitude eyeballs went completely blank and dark, and her mouth was left open ajar. Apparently, that internal scream came from her. The last howls of pain from a demon whose mind was destroyed beyond recovery.

Yuki clutched his chest even harder, as if holding it in pain. And yet, in spite of all that… he was laughing. "H…HAHAHAHAHAHAH!"

The Black Knight looked at the laughing Yuki in disbelief. Not because the Undead Lord was laughing. No. But because he also saw the barely conscious Kira was smiling. The tower resembled a Swiss cheese at this point and it's rapidly crumbling. It was only being held aloft by but a few synapses that were lucky enough to escape Yuki's onslaught. But these synapses were no longer pulsing and they can't support the tower's weight, even if it's just what's left of the said tower.

But they ignored all that. The Black Knight glared at Kira and Yuki. "…the Mother's mind…"

"…so…" Kira moaned painfully, but in satisfaction. "So I was right. THAT's how they control the Mother. Made a puppet out of her. An incomprehensibly powerful puppet, but still a puppet. The Mother's… mind… you say? Heh." That explain a LOT of things. They were fighting a giant mindless monster which was under control of these warlocks. Somehow, they managed to find a way to imprison the mother's mind in that Orb, and then they controlled it, and by extension, they controlled the Genma. That is, until… the Black Knight butchered them wholesale.

"That orb is a portable Reality Marble." Yuki explained. "The Reality marble held her mind trapped. She's just like a soulless golem that can be controlled at whim. Anyone who can control that orb will control the mother. But… I've killed it." Yuki lifted the Quadra Whip, laced in Kira's blood. Kira's Genma Killing blood. Even a Genma Demoness mind won't survive a genma slaying whip unscratched. "The thing about whips… is that sometimes… if they aren't used right… it can cause a LOT of property damage. Especially when it was done inside a Genma Demon, and when the weapon itself is laced with Genma Slaying property. Now this thing is just an empty mindless doll." A body cannot live without a mind. It holds true for human… and demons as well.

"You two… planned this?" The Black Knight looked at the two masterminds in disbelief.

"The whole… shebang…" Kira chuckled weakly. "I'll leave all the details to your imagination. Not all of it worked as we had hoped anyway."

"But we did manage it with a few… interesting bonuses…" Yuki grinned behind his helmet. "Like my Boy finally understanding what he can really do with his bloodline limit." Yuki rubbed his chest… and he can feel his supposedly inexistent heart beating. His connection with his master was cut (and to his delight, he can just imagine his pissed off expressions), and now, with the Mother's mind was killed off… the enslaving will is also gone. There's no more thirst for blood or craving for flesh… now it's just… him. "And now… I'm FREE. You have any idea what that means?"

"It means I need a different bargaining chip." It was then Kira and Yuki came to realize what the Knight had meant as bargaining chip: Lacus… and Gino.

Kira twitched. Did he do this during the chaos of Yuki's rampage?

The two seem unconscious. But at the present they were being completely encased in a separate diamond like structure made of green energy palettes, held suspended in the air. "I encased them inside these barriers because the Master wants the girl alive and unspoiled. And then there's the case where you, My lord, rampage haphazardly with your whip, smashing everything to smithereens. Just couldn't let them be destroyed by a stray shot."

As he said this, one of the synapse that held the tower break off and the tower budged down violently, and a large portion of the structure fell off to the abyss… no sound of it crashing. God knows what becomes of it.

The Black Knight generated his green wings and began to fly to the air. He flicked both of his fingers and the two green constructs with people inside it were also lifted up with him and floated just directly beneath his hands. It was obvious he intend to leave with the two, with Gino to replace Kira seeing that he can't lay a finger on Kira with Yuki protecting him like a father lion protecting his cub.

"…W… WAIT…" Lowe, who was battered by Yuki's earlier rampaging attacks tried to get up, but it was no use. Fortunately his second dose of whipping was done with the Quadra Whip that has been laced with Kira's blood, so he's in no danger of being infected, but technically; he's still got whipped. TWICE! His wounds are anything but light. "Don't you… dare… touch… her… Leave her… HERE! She's… my… CLIENT!"

"Not anymore. I'm sorry…. But I'm afraid I had to leave with them." And just as the tower was about to collapse completely, the Knight zoomed upward with his two packages securely in his arms, and in an instant, the Knight and his Packages changed into a blurring zigzagging green light.

The tower is on the verge of collapsing completely.

Kira gritted his teeth and ignored all his injuries as he slammed his fist to the floor, and then pushed himself up with great difficulty. When he saw how easily the Knight snatched the two so easily right in front of his nose, he never felt angrier all his life. His body felt so heavy, but he can still move… though he doubted if he can fight at this point.

Yuki saw Kira still wanting to fight even with that much injury. He smiled beneath his helmet and then he roared: "METEOR!"

Outside, Yuki's super chariot, the Meteor, literally roared back to life. Its 4 enormous horses whined and roared as they dashed to the sky with the Super Chariot Meteor in tow. Wailing souls of the damned screamed out of their hooves and went ahead of the steeds, creating a road made of their very own spectral bodies. The spectral corpse road hardened into a mish mash of thorns when the steeds' hoofs made contact with the road, and they quickly disperse into spirits again once Meteor's wheel had left them. Thus how the Meteor Chariot literally rode in the sky, courtesy of the Genma mutation.

The Meteor quickly went inside the Mother, plowed through everything that gets in its way until it finally smashed through the fleshy wall and headed straight into the crumbling tower. With another loud crash, the Meteor came charging in straight into the Warlocks' room, where Kira, Yuki and Lowe currently at. The tremor when the Meteor smashed through the tower simply accelerated the tower's collapse, with many more of its pieces falling to the abyss.

Kira looked at the super chariot. "Good. Lord Yuki, I'll get Lowe out of here while you-"

"Kira… nothing's faster than Meteor in full throttle. And other than me, you're the only one who knew how to operate it as well as I do. I've set them up to follow your command as if they were mine."

Kira paused for a moment and looked at Yuki, wondering what he meant. "I don't understand. Why don't YOU chase him! You can catch up with him, you can probably stop him…"

"Kira… I've destroyed the Mother's mind, releasing her control from every Genma in this sector. Do you know what that means?"

"I guess that means you're no longer under her thrall?"

"High breed genmas are capable of greater independence, but we're still slaved to the Mother's will. And now that will have been destroyed… Now I'm not even sure what we are anymore." Yuki was referring to himself and the Other Inferno Knights down there. "We're still dead. That's something that can no longer be changed. But… for the first time in the years of our enthrallment… we are free. And by that I mean: we are truly free. We no longer thirst for blood… or crave any flesh. We're just… us."

"I still fail to see…"

"I'm sure at this very moment, the low level Genmas like Hunters and Hulks have gone out of control without Guidance. Without the Mother… or whoever controlling her to take charge, they'll rampage uncontrollably killing and destroying everything in their way. And that is very dangerous, no matter how you slice it. And the pilgrim survivors out there won't stand a chance if the Genma went crazy, even with Shadowforged weapons." Yuki moved to the main point. "High Breed Genmas like me and the Inferno Knights are capable of limited control of the Genmas. Not as strong as the Mother, but we are her control proxies. She control us, and we control the demons… that's the way it used to be. Now… it's not the same anymore. We… are the only ones who can control these Genmas. Do you understand?"

Kira's starting to see where this is going. Yuki had to stay behind to control the Genmas. Even the Mother must be in comatose state to devote her attention to control the Inferno Knights, a 'mere' High breed Genma like Yuki would be overwhelmed like nothing else. "Okay… I get it." And so Kira boarded the Meteor. Yes. This is his chance. If Yuki can control the Genmas, he can secure the Pilgrims' safety. He will no longer be needed and if… ONCE he rescued Lacus from that Knight… his job will be over. "…this is… goodbye… I guess…"

"Save her." Yuki smiled.

"Eh?"

"For some reason I can't understand myself, I have a feeling that your fate and hers are inextricably bound. I don't know what, but I have a feeling that, for good, or ill, you should save her."

Kira couldn't imagine what kind of bond that could develop between the two. It's just that, every time he saw her, all he can think about is only the 10,001 ways of which she'll make his life Miserable with a capital M. It's also true that he can't stomach just leaving her be in the hands of a genocidal maniac. Yeah. Like he's one to talk. "…someday… I'll come back here."

Yuki looked at Kira.

"Someday I'll come back here… and I will KILL you all. I will kill every creature on this island. I promise."

"I'll be waiting."

Kira turned his attention to the Meteor. The Throne aside, he saw a few widgets inside the chariot, some levers and other stuff. Some of them, mutation notwithstanding, look strangely familiar. "Hey… isn't this…"

"Yes. The Modification Athrun made into the Meteor when you two rode it. Normally it needs 6 people to operate the chariot efficiently, and you two designed it so that the chariot can be controlled by one."

"I was under the impression you would've had it removed."

"Why would I? Damn useful and saved my life a few times. A little problem with the speed though. The Horses were trained to carry 6 people, now they need only to carry only 1. You can just about imagine how fast ride it will be. So for the love of God, please don't smash any more buildings!"

"In my defense, that was Athrun on the helm. Now… let's see if I still remember…" Kira pulled one lever, and the cannons on the wheels rotated and fired rapidly one after another, causing bigger destruction on the already crumbling tower. "Um… no. Maybe… this one?" Kira pulled another lever, and the thick wheels split up, revealing multiple small flaming barrels lining up the tires in a zigzag pattern, and one of them fired a stream of flame forward.

"Hey, I didn't know that one."

"No, no… uh…" Kira maybe a genius strategist, but when it comes to technology… he fall a bit short… that's Athrun's department… even the fused Genma on the Meteor chariot sweat dropped. "DAMN IT! Which ones are the forward cannon?"

"Kira."

"Yes?"

"The two biggest levers in front of you."

Kira saw the levers in question. "Oh. Yes, now I remember." He pulled both levers, and with a thunderous roar, the two frontal cannon fired and blasted a huge hole right in front of the Meteor. "Alright. HYAH!"

The Horses whined and once again took the sky and with that the Meteor speeding out of the tower on a road made of thorns. A form of mutation from Genma. Kinda useful since it practically allowed the ground vehicle to fly, in a fashion. Likewise, Yuki also grabbed Lowe and jumped out. Soon, the last strand of the synapse that held the tower finally broke, and the dark structure fell to the abyss as Kira looked on.

Kira gave one last look and then rode through the hole, within minutes, Kira had blasted his way out of the Mother and zoomed away at incredible speed.

0000000000

The Knight zoomed across the entire breadth of Junius at absurd speed. The many days it took for Kira and the Pilgrimage to reach the 4th sanctuary, he covered the distance in mere minutes. "It shouldn't be long now…"

Until suddenly, he caught the sound of a whistling.

'What's that sound?'

The whistling grew louder and louder… at the last moment the knight looked back and realized what that is: a pair of cannon shots heading his way!

The cannon shots missed him by the inches; the shockwave turbulence of the cannonballs' flight knocked him off balance. "Wha… What was that?"

The answer came in form of a giant chariot flying towards him atop a road of thorns in sky.

"Yuki's… Meteor? Are you kidding me?"

"KORAAAAAAAAAA!" Kira roared as the horses charged forward at unbelievable speed, all the while Kira fired the main forward cannon again. The Knight once again barely dodged the cannon shot to his left. "TURN LEFT!" the whole chariot drift-turned to the left, and the right side faced the Knight as it drifted towards the Knight. Kira speedily switched the next lever, and the cannons on the Meteor's right wheel began to fire rapidly, one shot after another as it closed the distance between them.

The Knight had to use his green wings to block the shots and can do nothing as the wheel of Meteor finally hammered him down to the ground, generating a crater upon his crash landing. At the same time, the barriers that lock Gino and Lacus shattered and Kira managed to catch the two. Kira put Gino and Lacus in different compartments of the chariot. "Guard them!"

The genma Knights fused on the chariot nodded obediently. Meanwhile, Kira directed the Meteor Chariot to the ground and quickly landed, after which he headed straight towards the downed Knight.

The Knight realized Kira intend to run him over.

"FIRE EVERYTHING!" By everything, it means every weapon on board that can be pointed forward: the main gun, the Lancer Knight and the archer Knight throw their spears and shoot their bolts. The Knight was practically outgunned and was forced to defend with his wings. But Kira has no intention of simply raining him with shots.

As expected, moments later the Meteor run him through and the four horses that pulled the Meteor trample him under their hoofs, followed swiftly by the steamrolling wheels. At that moment Kira pulled another lever, and the flamethrowers on the tires activated and turned the wheel into a flaming wheel that roast-rolled the downed Knight. Once he passed through him, the chariot stopped, leaving a trail of fire behind it and Kira take a look at his opponent.

The Knight was completely battered and was set on fire. But the Knight somehow managed to put it down with minimal injuries. His cape was burnt out as was the green feather decoration on his spaulders and the many parts of his black armor. The Knight gasped and panted. One more run like that and he's dead. But that speed… that incredible inhuman speed and acceleration! It even managed to overtake him when he was flying at full throttle, even when he had a massive head start! There's no way he can hope to dodge that!

Kira also came to that same conclusion and charged again. The ground rumbled immensely under the awesome charge of the Chariot as if there's a localized earthquake coming his way.

"…" The Knight collapsed to his knees. He's just too injured to dodge that charge now… The Meteor rapidly closed the distance, and the Knight resigned himself to fate and closed his eyes. '…with this… it's over for me…'

The Steeds' hoofs were just seconds away…

And then, all the sudden, a black aura exploded out of every chink of the Knight's armor.

The Knight stomped his feet to the ground, cracking it as the Knight nailed himself in. The Knight let out an inhuman roar and punched both of his fists forward.

Upon seeing that, Kira knew right away what's about to happen and quickly grabbed Lacus and Gino.

And just like that, 2.5 tons of a super chariot charging in excess speed of 250 km/hour suddenly went to a full complete stop.

The Knight stopped the charging super chariot by its main cannon barrels with his bare hands. The cannons were pulverized on collision and horribly bent to a useless contoured steel pipe. Seeing that the main cannons were fused to the yokes, and the yokes were fused to the undead Horse constructs, the destruction of the main cannons also obliterated the horses. The Chariot's car, still carrying the momentum from the fast charge was thrown upward when the horses stopped, flipping it to ruin, exposing its underside. Its occupants, if they weren't fused to the said chariot, were thrown sky high, the rest were squeezed flat by the sheer weight of the Chariot.

The said occupants: Kira in his Kurenai Shiki carrying an unconscious Gino in one hand and Lacus in the other were in the air as Kira managed to jump up at the last moment. Kira's eyes widened upon seeing how the Knight just stopped the charging Meteor in such a way. A little quick thinking and Kira threw Gino and Lacus to the sky and readied a Gurren sword… his last one for the day.

Target: the magazine of the chariot containing all the shots and gunpowder on its exposed underbelly.

Kira fired the gurren shahadou at the magazine area on the chariot's underbelly, igniting its contents due to the sheer heat of the slash.

A second later, the Meteor exploded in a massive, towering conflagration, completely engulfing the Black Knight, whereas Kira, pushed by the explosion, dashed up and caught Lacus and Gino before flying away from the explosion.

Kira crash landed a few meters away from the explosion zone. Kira gasped for breath and fell to his knees as the Kurenai Shiki coat vanished and reverted back to a greyed out Shiki. She's out of power. Completely. And so is her master. Not to mention all his injuries finally took its toll on him. The one on his right eye and his head were the most severe… among other things.

Kira looked at the blazing inferno of the Meteor. Lacus said all exemplars had been destroyed but one, including the blueprints. Now, the Meteor Super Chariot is officially gone.

And then, Kira's eyes caught something. "No… freakin… way…"

A black figure walked out of the flames. The Black Knight was a few shades darker… but he's very much alive… and there's something else. First, the Knight is engulfed in a mysterious black aura that distorted his form. The visor of his dented helmet glows red. He generated a new set of swords to be his new wings. His green broadsword wings turned into sleeker and longer pink long swords, with purple runic figures on its surface. And the swords, which initially were flat smooth broadswords suddenly, became more demonic with the addition of a few hooks pointing forward, sprouting out of the edges of the swords. But above all, what disturb Kira the most: a black menacing aura emanated from every chink of his armor.

This feeling… this black aura… it resembles something… or rather… it felt familiar to him… somehow… But it's weird… last time he felt this kind of aura… it didn't come from anyone… it came from himself… Kira was suddenly reminded back to that feeling he once had… during the slaughter of the Bladebane Infiltrators… during his insanity as the Dark Knight… that black… all encompassing emotion… it felt very similar… But… Kira didn't feel any bloodlust or murderous intent. It's different, but it's also the same…

Kira's train of thought was cut when the Black Knight approached him.

Kira tried to stand up, but he couldn't. His wounds were that bad. With no other option, Kira crawled his way toward Lacus, shielding her with his body.

The Knight continued to close in on him and extended his hand forward.

Suddenly, Kira felt angry. Very angry. So now he's going to kill him? "DO IT! COME ON! DO IT! YOU SON OF A BITCH!"

Something burst out of Kira. Just a minuscule pulse, but the Knight stopped. The Knight eyed Kira more closely, tilting his head. But then, he backed away, outstretched his wings, and just like that, he suddenly took to the sky, leaving a trail of darkness in his flight, and then he just… vanished.

Kira looked up to the dark sky, completely dumbfounded. 'What… what the hell is this all about?' Kira panted, but he dare not relax his vigilance. He looked around the area. It's completely a no man's land. He really had no idea where he is. But, judging by the 7 pillars of light so far in the distance, he's very far away. Yuki weren't kidding when he said the Meteor was fast. That thing was a literal speed devil! Everything just blurred and Kira has no idea where he was going or how far he went … only that he was chasing the Knight… here.

"K… Kira…"

Kira gasped and turned around to see who it was. It was a Genma knight. One that was fused to the Meteor until now. His lower half was blown off along with the rest of the chariot, and both of his arms were gone as well.

"Who…?"

"It's… me…"

Kira's eyes widened. "Lord Yuki?"

The knight nodded. Hundreds of miles away, Ray Yuki, together with the Pilgrim survivors and the Inferno Knights, were gathered together on a platform at the base of the 4th Sanctuary. 'What happened? How's it going?' Yuki closed his eyes, concentrating as he talked to Kira through the Genma Knight he controlled telepathically in front of Kira.

"I… I…" Kira looked at the unconscious Lacus… and Gino. "I'm half dead…" Kira quickly added. "…dead tired."

Yuki/the Genma Knight chuckled. "How's Lacus? And that Exorcist?"

"Lacus' fine… unconscious… but fine. The Exorcist… Gino's okay too. The Meteor's toast. Literally." Kira grunted. "Still… tell Lamia I'll bring her sister right back, even if I have drag her sorry ass all the way there." Kira tried to stand up but it was no good. He's totally spent.

Yuki, via the Genma Knight, looked at Kira's condition. "Take it easy soldier. Those wounds are anything but light." Then the Genma Knight looked at the surroundings. "You're in the shore area… that's 400 miles from here… it's gonna take while for you to come back here without Meteor."

"Hogwash! I'll just charge Shiki for a while and then I'll fly straight back there with Kurenai Shiki. Just tell her to wait there!"

Lamia looked at the former Hakutenkun talking to Kira via the telepathically controlled Genma Knight. That is to say Yuki didn't utter any word out loud, and so Lamia had no idea of what the two are talking about. "Where's he? Where's Lacus-nee-sama?"

"They're all okay. But he's injured. Badly. And the Meteor's destroyed." Yuki's explanation brought a brief relief on Lamia's face when she heard her sister's okay.

"Can't he just fly here?" Andy asked.

"No. He's completely out. Shiki needs to be recharged. And that's gonna take a while, I think." Yuki frowned. 'Speaking of which, where's the black knight?"

"He's… gone." Kira blurted.

"You killed him?"

"No… he was playing with me I rammed the Meteor to his face at full throttle and then… I'm not sure what happened. He was suddenly engulfed in this black aura and his power went over the rooftop: he stopped the Meteor with his bare hands. I repeat: his bare-fucking-hands. I barely escaped with my life here."

"How?"

"I don't know. After I blew up Meteor's payload on his face, he still kept on coming… and then he just stood there… then took off without a word."

Yuki frowned in deep thought. He looked at Lowe and the spiky haired man just tilted his head and nodded meaningfully. "I see…"

"How are things on your end?" Kira asked.

"We're doing okay.' Yuki nodded in assurance. On their end, the Inferno Knights had finally regain control of themselves. Like Yuki, with the controlling will of the Mother destroyed, their humanity finally returned as the demonic control was lifted of their soul. 'We have a lot of things to sort out but…'

The Inferno Knights moved again… but this time… it's different.

"Eh? Wh… What happened?" Ace flabbergasted and looked around. Life and sanity returned to his eyes.

"Ashford! Richard! Can you please tell me what's going on?" One of the Inferno knights asked his colleague.

"I don't know… I felt like I just woke up from a very long nightmare…"

"I remember I ate a… child… oh God… what have I done?"

"It was a nightmare for all of us." It was Brera. "However… it's very much for real."

The Pilgrims were also as confused as they can get. When the Inferno Knights start moving again, they thought they'll have a nasty fight on their hands. They got another thing coming: the Inferno knights were still… well… burning… obviously they're still undead. But now, they seem lucid. For one thing, they start talking to each other like a normal human.

Yuki smiled. The Inferno knights were talking and discussing about something. Just the fact that they're actually talking and even compare opinions… discussing the future… that's something no undead are capable of doing in. They truly are free at last. 'We're okay here. We… We are free."

"I see…" Kira sighed in relief and finally, for the first time ever, he can lie down and relax. Kira sheathed his sword back, resting his battered body. "So… what now? Now that you're free from the demon's control maybe you can put that new freedom to a good use." Kira smiled. "You once said the Inferno Knights tried to use their newfound undead powers to aid the living. Maybe now, with the Mother's nothing but a hunk of mindless… thing… you'll have a better shot at it."

Yuki nodded. "Yeah. You maybe right. We may hit bullseye this time. But…" Yuki looked at the Inferno knights. His brethren in undeath. Even after all these decades their spirit is still there. And now they're remembering every atrocity committed by their hands. That's gonna be tough to deal with. "We'll take our time. After everything that has been happening, what we need… is time to get our bearings right again."

"I suppose so." Kira nodded in understanding. No. Really. Kira truly understand how these Knights must feel. The Inferno Knights massacred their own kind under the thrall of another. No more different than Kira who killed his own kind. The difference being, they cannot control themselves when they do so, while Kira was doing it on his own accord. In a sense, that makes him an even worse monster than these Knights. "I still don't get how did the 'Master' created you. I mean… did the Mother created you or did He?"

"It's a bit of both, I think." Yuki frowned. "The 'Master' came here some time back. He's been doing this for a long time but not from the beginning. Inferno Knights were already around way back during the first Pilgrimage, they were the standard template. He merely… 'perfected' the design. He took the knowledge from Mother after he imprisoned her and then began doing his own work. When he get to me… let's just say he tried to create something new."

"Well we kicked his lapdog's arse. That ought to get his attention."

"Granted. Or he's just distracted enough with something else that he decided to, for now, to clean up all loose ends to remove suspicions. Which is why he sent the Black Knight, to wipe out all of his accomplices so that we can't trace things back to him. I doubt he suspected that the dead would spill the beans on him. Still…"

"Still?"

"I'm not even sure if he's truly the mastermind behind all his work. I'm not sure if he really is in charge… or did the Mother… or the true source of the Mother merely used him as an unwilling and unknowing puppet ruler of the dead. At times I see him working, he was in trance… I'm not sure that was really him who's working… or… something else."

"The Mother…"

"We've destroyed her minds… dealt the demons more damage than anything that has ever been done… but… remember, the Mother is just a fragment. A little piece of a greater whole. And that whole is still waiting out there, on the other side."

"You know…" Kira started. "I think I finally understand."

"Yes?"

"I think I finally understand why the Genmas always attacked the Pilgrims that came here." Kira frowned. "…it's because… in part… they knew what the Purification really are… what the Pilgrimage is really all about. They knew. And in desperation they try to stop us. Tried to warn us in some way. We never listened. And the Genmas used that… and made them a perfect cannon fodder and a wall of flesh. A real scary wall of flesh that block us from seeing the truth."

"72 years of countless souls damned for eternity. All because of that one lie spread by the demons." Yuki closed his eyes, remembering Lennore's discovery on their second return. To say it was a shocker would be an understatement. "The human in me was horrified. The strategist in me can't help to be held in awe by their genius. For 72 years they've build an army, and when it's finally too late, a gigantic army is waiting for the ultimate demon to wake up. You should leave, Kira. You know the truth. And better yet, you have a chance to spread it. Leave this place Kira. And some day, tell the world the truth. Let them know what this place is all about."

"Yeah. That's the plan. But I'm not the only one who knew it." Kira chuckled nervously as he glanced to his side, looking at Lacus, still lying down unconscious, as if she was sleeping. "And I'm not sure I should be the one to do it."

"Ah." Yuki sighed. Right. Kira's in the Alliance now. Rather than spread it around, Alliance HQ would've wanted him to shut up. That should score a few hundred more Advanced Kills.

"Not that I'll shut up about it. One day… maybe." Kira nodded. "In a better day. But, as you say: right now what they need is time to get their mind right. As it is, Zaft have enough trouble with the living. Adding in the dead into it will be just… too much… I guess? I mean… I want to destroy Zaft one day, but… I don't think they need this. Not yet anyway."

Yuki sighed. Kira wanted to destroy Zaft, nothing he say can change that now. Not after he saw what happened to his boy. Seeing that, and it makes him wonder what the HELL has he been doing all this time? Did he, lennore, and countless other brave men and women sacrifice their lives, their existence all for the sake of these… these maniacs? Zaft DO need a wakeup call. A wake up call named The Black Devil. "Kira. That ability of yours." Yuki looked at Kira's left eye. "I see… so that's how you do it. Tearing apart the Reality Marble from the inside… healing your chest… restoring my heart…"

"Put it simply… My eyes… have the ability to see and interact with the laws of Cause and Effect… specifically, the Causes of Effect. I can interact with… let's call it a record which notes down every event that are happening in the universe. Though… due to recent events, I've only been able to see only about… half of it."

"Record of the Universe… the Akashic Record?"

Kira confirmed it with a nod. "I can interact with the record by… say… erasing the Record of a certain cause that made an effect happened… I can make it as if they never happened… or never existed at all." Kira forced a grin, but soon stop because his eye and head is still hurting like hell. "I torn apart the foundations that make up the Reality marble… destroying the origin and caused the Space to collapse and vanish."

"Destroying the Record pertaining to the Cause of your injury made the effect that is the injury itself vanished… making it as if you were never injured at all… even the perpetrator of the Cause lose memory of ever having done the act…"

"When I restored your heart… I saw the Record on the empty cadavers pertains to the effect of how you were being magically enslaved by that heart. So I erased that record…"

"And then I bet the Cause Record in my cadavers pertain to the effect of me missing my heart. You erased that record… and…" Yuki grab hold of his chest and he can feel his heart beating a mile a minute. Yuki swallowed a gulp. What kind of power is that? "Never. Use it. Again. You hear me? That power is dangerous. I don't know what sort of quirk the Gods were playing, giving you something that dangerous. But that's a power, no human should've wielded. But remember: the greater the power you possess, he greater the sacrifice it demands. I don't think bleeding eyes and nosebleeds are all it'll demand out of you. And I'm not sure I want to know just how high the cost can get. So let's not up the stakes. Don't use it again. You hear me boy?"

"I know. You're just about the second person who told me that. The other one was some… ghost…"

"Ghost?" Yuki blinked in confusion. His boy running around with the strangest companies. And speaking of company… "Whatever the case, with your current 'outfit' Kira, you really shouldn't be using that power of yours too often."

"With this sort of headache and risk of brain hemorrhage? Ha, ha, hah. Not a chance. Not… Not a chance." Kira grasped his bleeding left eye. In truth, Kira was never more terrified. He learned that the more records he altered, or in this case, erased, the more severe the backlash will be. And those nosebleed and bleeding eyes… he had a feeling they're nothing but small change. If he make more drastic changes… more radical alterfication… and making something vanish from existence… back then he only removed abstract things and artificial constructs: the Reality marble, the mortal injuries on his chest… When he returned Yuki's heart he thought his left eye was really going to pop.

But that's just it. And that's the punch line: he had gone so far as to erase something as if they never happened… and all he get from it is a head splitting headache (which he suspects came from damaged sections of his brain) and some bleeding eye. If he pushed farther… if he's prepared to make an even bigger sacrifice… what could he accomplish?

What if… the target of this power… is…? The more Kira think about it, the more horrified the boy of what he could've done. "Don't worry. I don't think I want to use this thing…" Kira nodded but he didn't say a word. He's shivering in fright. This thing he has was just HALF as powerful. He had given up the other half to Jorm. The thought of what it's like when his eye went active when it's in full set… "…I swear." Kira muttered loud enough for Yuki to hear. Kira wanted to say in full: I swear on my life I will never use it again. But something felt weird on his throat that Kira couldn't utter the rest of the sentence.

Yuki sighed and simply nodded. Kira's terrified of that power… the potential of how much destruction it can yield if used wrongly. That fear should be enough so that he won't get funny ideas. "And about your outfit… 7th Division is tough."

Kira turned to Yuki, noting the change of subject. He needed that anyway.

"Yes. 7th Division is formed, as you already know, of militia. Basically, you're using a poorly assembled civilians turned to soldier overnight. The Alliance used the Militia in great numbers as meat shield. They are pretty expendable, and the Alliance wouldn't want to skimp money on training or arming them. They'll just pay them enough to come, and fight, eat once a day, and then get butchered pretty quick. And make no mistake… they won't hesitate to sacrifice all of your men if it meant they can achieve their goal."

"That's why I trained them."

"And they worked like wonders. I know. I've read your memory from the Doppelganger. Throwing them straight from the boilers (Bladebane) into the roasters (Fire Knights and Exorcists) was a good idea. Raww was a… good 'teacher'."

"Teacher." Kira repeated the word.

"Many of our commanders had a critical flaw that I've tried, and failed, to rectify: in their books, they held nothing but contempt and no respect to militia, none whatsoever. In their mind, Militia is nothing more but glorified undisciplined farmers with broomsticks and pitchforks. And that's a weakness."

"Weakness?"

'Pride. Pride's a weakness. Mix it with a little bit of arrogance and you get yourself a nice recipe of making an idiot out of any pompous, overly decorated high ranking generals.' Yuki scratched his head. His medium cannot though. 'Raww is one of the rare few who take Militias very seriously. When he came to you, I have doubt he came near close to full power. You couldn't find a better opponent to train your men. But my concern lies with this over 2000 militias you've trained.'

"You suspect that they will be disloyal?"

'That's basic. Yes. But, you've packed some skills into them, there's some measure of gratitude came into play there. But more importantly, that makes them veterans.' Yuki glared through the Knight to make his point. 'Kira, here's my advice: beware of the 10th division."

"10th Division?" Kira's temple frowned, trying to remember what mwu had told him about that particular division. "That's the Alliance Regulars' division. What about them?"

"The 10th Division had a penchant of stealing aces and veterans from other divisions… particularly from the 7th Division you command. The worst thing is it's easy for them to do so: Alliance Regulars get better funding, better equipment… better missions…" Yuki finished up. "They'll take away a lot of your best troops, leaving you with weak and old soldiers. That includes the Juppongatana, if they aren't loyal to you."

"Are you sure you want to tell me this?" Kira frowned.

"Hm?"

"I'm one of the Captains of the Alliance. I'm an enemy to Zaft. Your country. You sure you want to give advice to a boy who one day may destroy the empire?"

Yuki chuckled. "Consider it payback. Payback to the Empire for making my son endured 2 years in Hell." The Lifeless Lord roughly patted and ruffled Kira's hair. Or at least… tried to. The Genma Medium he's using had lost both of his hands. The Genma knight ended up squirming on the ground like some ugly worm. "I don't care what becomes of you. What you choose to be. As long as you walk that path with pride… that's enough for me."

Kira's lips parted for a moment upon hearing the word… son. He smiled happily. That word meant a lot more than anything. "Thanks… dad."

Yuki smiled. Yuki moved his hand forward to pat Kira's head. For a moment, the two can only imagine it. The sight of Yuki patting Kira's head.

All the sudden, the ground began to rumble. Kira frowned as his instincts tell him of danger abound. Kira turned around and saw… of all things… a Genma rush coming his way. "Lord Yuki… I thought you said the Genmas are no longer under the Mother's thrall?"

Yuki also saw what's happening. Hundreds of Genmas coming towards Kira. Normally for Kira, this should be easy. But, given his injuries, even a Genma rush of this size is quite a threat. "I said: Without her control, the lower Genma went crazy and will attack anything anyway!"

Kira looked at his situation. There's no way he fight them all. "You said you can control Genma… now maybe a good time for a test? I can't fight a rush like this… not when I'm this tired."

Worse, this is kinda of a first time for Yuki to be in control instead being controlled. "Kira, you have to run away from there! I can't control that many Genma yet!"

Kira struggled to get up. It took everything he had just to get back on his feet. He could probably just run… but it's not like he can just leave Lacus and Gino to die. He grabbed Lacus and struggled under her weight. This has nothing to do with the fact she's heavy. His injuries were that bad, and he's completely wasted. "I… I can't… Lord Yuki, you HAVE to do something…"

"Okay… Okay… let me try…" Yuki released his control on the mutilated Genma Knight and grunted as he held his head. Seeing the Lifeless Lord grunting alarmed Waltfeldt and the rest that something's off.

"Yuki? What happened?" Waltfeldt frowned in concern.

"Genma Rush." Everyone gasped a breath upon hearing the announcement. "Coming straight to Shadow and the others."

"LACUS!" Lamia shrieked in horror and was about to rush to God Knows where, but Hilda stopped her.

"Milady! There's nothing we can do, we're stuck here!"

"Can't you do anything?" Waltfeldt balled his fist.

"I'm taking control of some of the Genmas to hold the rush off… but… Shadow really can't go far… I kinda made sure of that… and the Meteor's destroyed!"

At the same time, about a dozen hunters from the Genma Rush suddenly halted, and just like that, under Yuki's command they turned against their fellow Genma, attacking the others. The Hunters controlled by Yuki notably fight with more skills and vigor than their less intelligent beastly brethren, with their eyes glow green in comparison to the rest of the Undead with red glow. One of the Hunters turned to Kira and screeched: "GO!"

Kira nodded and lifted Lacus and Gino over his shoulders, and then he tried the best he could to move somewhere anywhere but there. "But… where am I supposed to…"

Suddenly, a loud BOOM can be heard from the distance. And all the sudden, a small portion of the Genma rush was blown to kingdom come. Kira gasped. That was cannonfire. And it came from the SEA! Kira turned around and saw… to his shock: a familiar looking Zaft Supply ship that had just fired one out of five of its available cannons.

0000000000

A few minutes earlier aboard the said Zaft ship, the crew had already given up on their Captain and just about ready to leave the Island. Mwu himself was about to try and convince Sai to leave. They've really pushed the one week period to the very limit. Even Sai had begun to lose hope as well. And then all the sudden, before Mwu can say anything, Torii landed on Sai's hand.

"Torii! Where have you been?"

"Torii! Torii!" Torii reverted back to his original realistic form and chirped loudly pointing at a direction with his wing.

"What? What?" Sai looked at the direction where Torii was pointing, and as if on cue, that was the time when Kira also blew up the Meteor's magazine. The explosion of which can be seen for miles around.

Sai's eyes widened and he looked at the also wide eyed Mwu. For a moment, the two looked like they still haven't understand the situation, but seeing Torii, and then that explosion… any idiot can put two to two together. "ALL HANDS ON DECK!"

The Alliance Crew quickly set about their work and the ship quickly set sailed towards the explosion. Once there, they gaped upon seeing the sight: a Genma Rush in chaos with its members seems to be fighting one another. But the main point concern is not the chaos… it's what standing at the edge of that chaos…

A certain figure wearing bandages allover, with a very familiar Katana in hand…

"Oh my God… IT'S KAGE!" Sai couldn't believe his eyes when he saw this through his binoculars. "IT'S KAGE! HE'S ALIVE!"

It took 5 seconds for every jawdropping crew aboard the ship to digest the info. The crew just dropped everything and quickly rushed to the portside and saw what Sai saw: indeed. Though he no longer wore his signature black attire, the way he bandaged himself… and that katana on his hand… it was unmistakably their captain alright.

"Oh my God… how many lives he have!?"

"We have to get him out of there!" Sai pointed at the battling Genma.

"Why are those Genmas fought one another?" Mwu frowned in confusion.

"WHO CARES! Let's get Kage out of there before they turned their attention to him!"

"Hold it lad… we can't just get in there with all those Genmas around… we need to draw them off…" Mwu rubbed his chin.

"With WHAT?" One of the crew gulped seeing the brutal fight between the genmas unfolding before them.

Sai looked at his options and saw the cannons aboard the ship. In these days even Supply ships came armed. Not as heavily armed as actual warship, but it's useful for self-defense. But today, Sai thought, it could be used for some offense. "That thing working?"

Moments later, the Supply Ship began shelling the beach. Each shot obliterated a small portion of the Genmas, but it also drove them off though it didn't really do much damage to the Genmas.

"KAGE! We're coming to get you!" The ship continue shelling the shores as they approached the beach where Kage at.

Kira/Kage looked at the incoming ship and realized, it was Sai and Mwu coming to get him. For a moment, Kira was elated that he actually made it back home. But that relief was replaced with horror. Kira looked at the still unconscious Lacus and Gino under his care. This… this is EXACTLY what he's been trying to prevent. Now, he was left with two impossible choices: leave the two here to die… or brought them aboard an Alliance controlled ship, with the risk of them being arrested, or worse, killed on sight. It's either deep fried or boiled choice either way. Kira looked at the infighting between the Genmas… and the approaching ship.

All the sudden, a Hunter's upper portion were sliced off and landed on his feet. Kira looked at the Hunter. "Lord Yuki."

Yuki frowned and assumed control of the said Hunter. Once again, Yuki talked telepathically through another Genma. "Yes Kira?"

"…my men… they have arrived to pick me up."

The Hunter… that is, Yuki, gasped and his mouth parted in slight surprise… and realization of what Kira was going to do. "Kira… they could HANG you for this."

"Let's not make this about me." Kira groaned. "…tell… Lamia… exactly as I say."

"Lamia." Yuki turned to the horrified Lamia. "This is… this is Shadow's words. Lamia… lady Lamia, listen. My team had come to pick me up, and there's a Crazed Genma Rush, right in front of our door. But my men and I can't beat them, not with our conditions. And we can't go to Zaft territory either. I'm afraid there's no way we can go back to your location or you come to us, not with the Genma putting this kind of pressure. Not with these demons rampaging all over the island. Of course, I will not leave her here to be butchered by these monsters. I'm sorry… but I'm afraid you'll have to wait a little longer to see your sister."

Lamia gasped realizing what Kira will do… what he HAD to do. And for a moment, she looked as if she's about to scream in protest, but then she held her tongue. "Will you keep her safe?"

Kira balled his fist. "I swear, on my life, that I will bring her back to you. Alive and unharmed."

Lamia held back her tears and finally nodded. "I'll hold you to it."

"…I promise. Well… I guess I'll take my leave here. Exorcists. It was fun while it lasted… but this is as far as I can go with you. Fate willing, let's meet again in a different circumstances. Good bye… and Godspeed." And that was the last words from Shadow as Yuki went silent soon after. One of the frustrated Exorcists angrily punched the rock in front of him. The same can be said to all pilgrim survivors: frustrated at their inability to repay even the smallest fraction of a huge debt they owed to this mysterious dark clad hero.

0000000000

0000000000

Epilogue 1:

Alliance

The Supply ship continues their mild bombardment of the beach until the zone was clear enough so that they can finally land, though the situation is still hazardous. The soldiers, led by Sai, didn't bother waiting for the drawbridge to be pulled down, quickly jumped down to the beach, and rushed towards the downed Kage.

Sai was the first to reach him, but before he can get far, he suddenly felt really… awful. Like all his strength were suddenly sapped out of him. 'W… What's going on? I…'

Kage quickly knew what's wrong. Lacus' miasma! "SAI! GET BACK!" Kira bat his hands, telling him to back away.

Sai quickly moved back until the awful feeling was gone. "Wha… who is that?" Sai quickly understood that the source was the pink haired person on Kage's shoulder.

"Precious cargo. Get to the Blondie, I'll take care of the girl! GO!" Kage pointed at the unconscious Gino. Sai had no time to get a better look at the said person and he signaled his men to help him carry the 'Blondie' up.

Kage somehow found his strength back and carried Lacus towards the ship.

Meanwhile, the last of the Genma Hunters controlled by Yuki was felled (disabled, unable to fight, rip to shreds, etc2) and the Genma Rush charged back in unabated towards the fresh meat.

Mwu rushed forward, finishing his handseals and released: "KATON, KARYUUHEKI NO JUTSU!" Mwu blew a mass of flames that formed a wall of fire, pushing the Genmas back. Buying the soldiers more time.

Kage carried Lacus all by himself and struggled, due to his injuries, to get her on the ship. Problem is, no one can help him. Why, no one can even get close to Lacus. Her miasma quickly pushed the other soldiers away. It seems on Naturals, the effect was even more strongly felt. Kage finally put her down on top of the rear deck, while Sai and the soldiers brought Gino up. Sai yelled back to Mwu. "CAPTAIN! WE'RE WAITING ON YOU!"

"SET SAIL!" Mwu replied as he began his retreat. The flame is dying down and the Genmas are coming in close. With one final dash, Mwu leapt aboard the ship, barely missing a few claws from the rushing Genma. The ship immediately sailed away from the shores, leaving behind a horde of angry and roaring Undead demons.

Mwu looked at this scene as he pants and heaves. That's a sight he hadn't seen for a long time. He was once again reminded of his time venturing in that Hell. And speaking of adventure, Mwu turned to his protégé, who's currently personally tending to the person he's carrying a little while ago. Mwu noticed that everyone's eyes are fixed on the said person.

Upon getting a better look at the person, Mwu quickly understood why: the person is a girl. A VERY beautiful one as well. Heck, exchange her torn, blood drenched Miko attire with a cleaner more proper dress, she might as well be a princess! What the hell? He ventured for a week in Junius, made the entire crew, including his best friend worried sick, and he still managed to get to play saving damsels in distress? "You sly dog!" Mwu laughed and he was about to rush in and gave his student a head tackle, but then he was stopped by Sai. "What?"

"Look around!"

Mwu did so… and then he noticed that the area of about 12 feet around Kira and Lacus was completely vacated. No one dared to approach the two. "W… What's wrong?"

"Captain Kage's orders." One of the soldiers reported. "He told us to stay out of 12 feet radius from that girl."

"12 feet…?" Mwu tried to sense the situation, and Sai was right. He felt it too. The girl is emanating… something…

"There's… something… off." Sai answered. Mwu looked at the bespectacled shadowguard. "There's something off with that girl. I know why Kage asked us to stay clear of her… she… I don't know what to call it… when I get close to her… I felt my strength sapping… like I felt really ill all the sudden."

Kira checked on Lacus. Her pulse is stable, aside of a few bruises. But she'll be fine. She's still unconscious though. God knows what the Black knight had done to her. Maybe some kind of long lasting sedative. Kira get up and noticed that the crews staring at her. Kira/Kage doesn't like this one bit. Her miasma is really problematic. When she came here, she must be using some kind of a special ship designed for her use. A ship with an isolated room or some sort, where her virus can't spread or infect anything else. The Supply Ship doesn't have such room! Why didn't he think that far! DAMN IT!

"Sai."

"Sir?"

"Is there any… some kind of a… isolated room in this ship? You know… a room you use to keep someone with infectious disease sealed up?"

Sai looked at the girl and murmured in thought. "We don't have that kind of room here… but we can repurpose one of the chilling room."

"The chilling room?"

"Yeah. The room we used to keep the food cold? We have a small compartment, completely separated and isolated from the rest. It'll be a bit cold on her, but… just for the time being…"

Kage nodded. "That'll do."

And then, slowly and with great difficulty to keep with the 12 feet radius rule, Kira moved the girl into the specially prepared chilling room. Kira gently placed the girl on the makeshift bed and then let her rest. And then he closed the door tight. He turned and saw the crew looking at him in confusion. But Kage replied their confusion with a glare. "No one. And I mean NO ONE… may enter this room, unless I say otherwise. Not even to bring her food or drink. That's MY job. Understand?"

Everyone nodded.

"Ki… Kage… who is she? Is she… sick? Does she come by… an illness or something?"

"…put it simply… she IS an illness."

"Huh?"

"Where' the other guy?"

"He's… Kage he's a…"

"I know." Sai took Kira to where they put Gino: the brig. Yes. There's one too in the supply ship. A small one… but it does the job. And there he was put on the table, where two soldiers pointed their spears at him as if he was going to wake up any moment and then conjure up some special ability that will tear them to pieces in a heartbeat. Kira shook his head and then pushed the spears down. "Calm down soldier. He's unconscious."

"B… But… Sir… he… he's a… he's a…"

"Yes. I know what he is. The torches on his armor are a dead giveaway. He's an Exorcist. And I knew that even before I brought him here, in case you're wondering." Kira's nonchalant explanation drained the last colors from their horrified faces. "Yeah, I'm not too thrilled about it either. Sai… could you please check him?"

"Check him?"

"For injuries and all that stuff."

"Kage-"

But Kira quickly cuts in and he exploded. "LOOK! Are you going to question my every request with horrified gasps and protest? I KNOW what it means when I brought those two here! I don't have much CHOICE in the matter! I had a HELL of a week OKAY? So please! Can the questions for later, and JUST do what I say for now! PLEASE!" Kira gasped and panted as he glared the shocked Sai with his remaining bloodshot left eye. "I'm done here. Helmsman! Get us off this accursed rock… I had enough of this place to last 2 lifetimes!" and Kira angrily stormed out of the room, leaving the confused Sai and Mwu.

A few hours later… the Supply Ship had left the Hellish Junius far out of sight.

As they left the island, the atmosphere aboard the ship that was initially filled with shock and confusion steadily mended. The crews now began to talk more, joke more, laughed more. But at the moment, chatters are more abound. The Crews discuss about WHAT exactly transpire on that island. The Soldiers made various speculations from guessing to outright make up stories. However, what they do accept as fact is this: their Captain, their incredible Blacklist Captain, went into the most dangerous place on Earth, all alone, survived in that Hell on Earth for a week, and then came back to them, partially mummified, badly bruised, a few shades darker, but alive and kicking ass… carrying an Exorcist and a Girl, the most beautiful girl they've ever seen. And yet, anyone who remained in her presence within the radius of 12 feet for more than 5 minutes had just bought themselves a one way ticket to Hades… anyone but their illustrious masked Captain, that is. The former portion of the tale was as incredible as it ever gonna get. A new world record that will be very difficult to break. Mwu was stuck on the island for 3 months but he was with his crew, so that doesn't count. But for the latter portion with the Exorcist and the death bringing Girl… now that's an unsolved wrinkle.

Speaking of the Captain, he's currently standing at the front deck, gazing at the dark sea, feeling the night sea wind on his injured body. It hurts, but Kira reveled in it. He reveled in the pain.

"No. I want to die in pain. Listen to me Kage… I will stab myself… and I will feel its pain… and I will feel for as long as I can… until at last when I became numb… that's when I want you to cut me."

Kira closed his eyes and focused on this pain.

"Pain is proof of life. Pain is a sensation given to us by God to tell us that there's something wrong with our body. I will die in pain… to prove that I was alive at the end."

Pain… is a proof of life. Yes. He felt pain. There's something wrong with his body and now it's telling him to fix it because his body wants to live. Just like what Veia said. "I'm alive. I'm STILL alive."

"Yes, you are."

Kira turned around and saw Sai and Mwu. That was Mwu just now.

"…how's Gino?"

"Gino?" Mwu perked. "The Exorcist? He's fine. Sleeping like a rock, but he's fine. Which is more than I can say for you really."

"Kira, let me get a look at those wounds. Please?" Sai pleaded.

Kira gave a nod, and that's all the approval Sai need. The bespectacled boy began checking on his best friend's well being. Having worked with the understaffed medical team of the 7th division, Sai can boasts that he had plenty experience in surgeries. But he had NEVER, EVER seen medical treatment as the ones that had been applied to Kira's body. Unraveling a part of the bandages that covered Kira's body, it was easy for Sai to see that his friend had sustained enormous amount of injuries… many of which, Sai noted with a gulp, were potentially fatal. And yet, they were expertly, no, beautifully treated. The stitches were barely visible (he can't make them out unless he really strain his eyes) but they are all perfect and incredibly efficient. Not one useless stitch can be seen. The injuries Kira suffered at the present mostly came from some of the stitches that had been forcibly reopened due to severe trauma. A VERY severe trauma. Any less, Sai hypothesized, and it won't be able to tear these stitches open. They were that strong!

"Ka… Kira… who did this? He… judging by some of these stitches, the doctor must've… like… pieced you back together. He's incredible!"

"She." Kira corrected.

"What?'

"She. The Doctor is a she. And she is the Precious Cargo who's sleeping peacefully in the chilling room."

"She's a DOCTOR!?" Sai gasped in shock.

But Mwu was not impressed. Doctors' skills aside, there's no question that his protégé were wounded badly… heck he might get his body torn apart bad that it requires such medical care from some hotshot doctor. "Kiddo… I think I'll speak for everyone when I ask you this: What happened in there?" Mwu's getting a headache trying to figure out what exactly did his boy went through.

"Let me debrief you. I…"

But before Kira can continue, a loud scream can be heard from the bridge, attracting everyone's attention.

Gino woke up, and the first thing he see, is two ALLIANCE soldiers pointing their spears at him. In a state of delirium from having just wake up, worsened by panic, Gino responded rather aggressively and pinned the two soldiers to the wall, slamming their heads and render them unconscious. He took their spears and went down. Imagine his surprise when the whole ship was filled with Alliance Soldiers, and they were all alerted to his presence. And now, he's surrounded. "Wha… Wht… What the hell…"

The Soldiers gulped and they all menacingly pointed their spears at him, threatening the Exorcist to back away. Unfortunately, it has a reverse effect on Gino. Instead, it made him even more panicked and, now, he's getting angrier. "Get out of my way!" Alas, his body had yet to recover, and he was really weak. He didn't even have enough strength to transform.

The soldiers looked at each other and nodded. They began to press in, spears at the front. Gino gritted his teeth and just about ready to fight to the death…

"STAND DOWN SOLDIERS!" A roar from their backs turned all eyes to a certain figure. Kage came marching back in with Sai and Mwu at tow.

Gino's eyes widened in relief. "Lord Shadow! Thank the Gods you're okay! I… I don't know what's going on… but… this is not a safe place for any of us… I… I…"

"Calm down Gino. They're not going to hurt you." Kage motioned the soldiers to stand down. The Soldiers looked at each other and then, reluctantly, slowly, lower down their weapons.

Upon seeing the Alliance Soldiers obeyed Shadow's orders, Gino's eyes twitched in suspicion. "Lord Shadow?"

"…put down your weapons, Gino. They won't hurt you."

"Wh… what do you mean?" Gino became really tense. "W… Why did Alliance Soldiers follow your orders? W… What's going on here?"

"Gino…" Kira sighed in regret. Regret that he had not come clear when he had the chance. "…this is what I've been trying to tell you from the start."

"Tell me… tell me what?" Gino's lips trembled in horror and disbelief. Now he began to panic. No. It can't be… it CAN'T BE!

"I'm…"

"Ara?"

Once again, all eyes turned to one direction.

"Ararararara?" Lacus suddenly appeared out of nowhere, just behind the crowd. Apparently she just came out of the chilling room. "Arara! Good evening everyone!"

The Soldiers looked dumbly at the pink haired princess. Silence for a moment, and none of them moved. None except Lacus, who took a quick observation of the tense situation. She looked at Kira and saw his wounds are being tended to, but otherwise, he seems okay. "Kage-san, you look better already."

Kira shrugged.

But then, she looked at this ship… and then its peculiar crew… "Ara? Arara? This is odd? Is this not a Zaft Supply ship?"

"Yes it is." Kira answered.

"Then… why is it flying the colors of the Alliance? And you all… you all are Alliance Soldiers? Kage-san? Is there something the matter? Where are Lamia and the others?"

"I'm sorry, Princess. But the situation was out of my hands. You two were unconscious, and a Genma rush was coming our way… I… I had to make a decision." Kage choked.

"Lord Shadow?"

"No, Gino. Not Shadow. I'm Kage, two different language of the same name… but ultimately one person: I am Kage, 'the Black Devil'. Captain of the 7th fighting Division of the Alliance Military. Blacklist-" Kage turned to Lacus."-for the killing of Goud Veia, the Immortal Abyss, one of the hakutenkun."

Gino's eyes widened in disbelief. So shocked he was that he dropped his spears in horror.

And Lacus… Lacus merely narrowed her eyes solemnly and muttered indifferently. "…I see."

0000000000

Epilogue 2:

Zaft

The Pilgrim survivors finally began their long trip of returning home to Zaft. It's funny. History shows that no one has ever managed a safe return trip back from Junius. The exception being lady Lennore on her first pilgrimage, and even that, she was the sole survivor, together with Lord Ray Yuki, in which the two eventually fell on their second trip. 'Going home' can actually be considered the most dangerous part of the pilgrimage itself. Probably even more dangerous than the trip of going into Junius. Curiously enough, they felt no such pressure. Not anymore. Now they're just eager to go home, instead of fighting for their survival.

Reason?

Zaft military discipline taught the Knights various kinds of formations. Some of them had been applied multiple times during this expedition: the arrow, the wall, the ring… Right now, the Pilgrim Survivors are inside the most unusual formation. A formation that surely, no living human had ever attempted. The formation is as follows:

The living at the center circle…

And an army of Undead at the outer circle, all tame as a kitten, led by at least a dozen Inferno Knights, courtesy of Lord Ray Yuki, the former Hakutenkun turned Lifeless Lord.

It was eerie and scary at first. It's just… earlier, they were fighting and running for their lives against these things… and now… all the sudden, they actually had the gall to trade JOKES with an Inferno Knight!

"What do you say to a Fire Knight who blew off his hand in a misfire?" The Inferno Knight asked.

"You're FIRED!" An Exorcist replied easily. "Come on! That was way too classic! That one goes WAY back to the Foundation War!"

"Gotta respect the classics, kid!" The joking Inferno Knights replied jovially.

And that's how it is. In a very short time after that accident with the Genma Rush, Yuki and his Inferno Knights had learned how to assert their control over other lower level Genmas. Inferno Knights can now control the Genma, a few dozens at a time for hunters, or 20 or so for Knights. And now, they're using that ability to its fullest by providing the Pilgrim Survivors a safe trip to the shores, where they can then signal for pickup.

"Are you okay with entrusting your sister to Shadow, milady?" Hilda asked the frowning Lamia.

Lacus' twin chortled nervously. "Let's recap: he bitch-slapped my sister in the face, threatened to tear her apart if she get within 20 feet of him, dragged her upside down across a cliff, brutally treated her like a ragdoll, baited her to a demon… w… what else did I left behind?"

"Calling her fat multiple times, indirectly and directly kissing her, the latter was done while they were fresh butt naked…" Waltfeldt continued the list.

"KHREEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAARGGHH!" Lamia screeched bloody murder, but then she calmed down. But she still looked manic. "All in all… No, Hilda. I'm NOT okay." Lamia sighed. "But… if he wanted to hurt my sister, he had plenty of chances. He even tried to do just that several times… and still he saved her. So… for now… I'll trust him."

By twilight, the Pilgrim Survivors had reached the shores. There's a stone tower there, and on top of it, there's pile of wood, ready to be burned. When it's burned, the idea is that the fire can be seen from miles away… especially, by the Guards in the Deathwatch Tower in Australia, stationed in Tasmanian island. The Deathwatch's, as their name implies, sole duty is to watch over the situation on Junius. The Beacon tower was built by the Deathwatch so that, if a pilgrim wishes to return, they will light the beacon, and the Deathwatch will send immediate pickup. The Deathwatch maintained a fleet of the fastest ships in the entire Zaft navy for that one purpose. They maintain a modicum of grimace at all time. The Guards of the Deathwatch has always been in a state of constant mourning while they maintain a constant 24/7 surveillance of the island. It is their duty to determine the fate of a pilgrimage, whether they fail or succeeded. Supposedly, the only time if a pilgrimage is a success, is when the beacon was lit. To their great sorrow, so far, the only time they rejoice in the 72 years of watching the damned continent was during the single instance in which the beacon was lit. That one instance was by Lennore Zala. The first ever Priestess who managed to penetrate deep into Junius, and then returned safely.

And today… as Lowe, using his Kagutsuchi to lit up the beacon… today… marks the second time.

As expected, it was chaos in the Deathwatch's Watchtower in Tasmania. Man in mourning garments and hoods were chattering nonstop, running all over the place carrying papers and widgets containing God knows what. For a place whose atmosphere were supposed to be in constant mourning and gloom… for the moment, it's roaring with life.

"Are you certain?" the Head of the Deathwatch barked at the observer. "We've been getting multiple purifications only up to the third sanctuary at an unprecedentedly fast rate and then during the fourth it became that phenomenon before the fourth confirmed purification… and now… you said… the beacon was lit?"

"As I live and breathe! The Beacon of Junius is lit! There ARE survivors!"

"…send word to our men! Pick them up on the double before the Genma get them!"

"Uhh… guys?" another Deathwatch Guard came in. "umm… Don't bother with the ship… they brought their own."

"What? What kind of ship that is faster than ours?"

"Well…" The Deathwatch guard gulped as he saw the Orb's insignia on the ship's standards.

0000000000

Epilogue 3:

Orb

"Thank you. Thank you for all your support, Lowe." Waltfeldt shook the Junk Guild chief's hand.

Lowe sighed. "Please. Don't thank me. I've done nothing worth mentioning. We were lucky that we got Shadow to help us. I never knew there's one among my countrymen who's like that…"

"Still… it was unexpected… that Knight… that Black Knight… you're saying he's a samurai?" Andy frowned.

"Former. He's a traitor now." After hearing the description from Kira pertaining to what the Knight did to the Meteor from Yuki, Lowe need no further second guessing. "The code of Bushido is clear. Any Samurai who had fallen into that dark path… those who embraced that path is to be shown no mercy. Kill. On. Sight. That is the way of the Samurai. It's even more unforgivable of the fact that it has been proven that he had worked for the devil." Lowe glared angrily, remembering that black Knight. "He's an insult to the Samurais. No longer worthy to be treated with honor… we will hunt him down, kill him, no questions asked." Lowe gripped his Gerbera tightly.

Even Andy was slightly unnerved as he can feel an incredible bloodlust emanating from the sword. It was as if the sword was as angry as the master.

"Or… that's what my master would've said, hah!" Lowe chortled, and the bloodlust aura vanished.

Andy chuckled. "But… seriously… you really caught me off guard. My formal request was asking for some of your available samurais… I did not expect…"

"Hey, your request was quite clear: any samurai that we can spare. That means, you're asking for some samurais that has some spare time… and I have some time to kill… So… I fit the job requirement and description."

"Quite… so… I guess?" The Desert tiger sweatdropped. He was expecting half baked Samurais or recruits… never thought… he actually get a… "But seriously… you would actually do jobs like this for… for a menial amount of… 30 cents per HOUR?"

"It's just a hobby. And it's 60 cents! Your Princess promised double pay, did she not?"

"Right. 60 cents. You've been with us for…"

"And yet… Keep it." Lowe smiled.

"Excuse me?"

"Keep the money. We don't need it. We've failed anyway. Our job was to keep the princess safe. In that regard, we've failed. Sure, you've entrusted her to Kage… but we didn't deliver as promised. And that constitute a failure, either way. Accepting that money after failing our mission will simply tarnish our name. We have a reputation to consider." Lowe smirked, ignoring the sulking Kisato. "Plus, it's a good training for my men as a contingency against the Genmas… in case the Alliance brass gets funny ideas."

Andy nodded in admiration to their integrity. Samurais. Now he finally understands Veia's great respect to these people. "Very well. Once again thank you. It's a pleasure doing this job with you."

"Likewise." Lowe and Andy shook hands one more time. "You should get those wounds looked at."

"Of course… General Guele." Andy saluted Lowe and then departed on Deathwatch' boats that had come to pick them up in the middle of the ocean.

Lowe watched the Deathwatch' boat left with their Zaft clients. And then, a black figure appeared out of the puff of smoke right behind Lowe. The ninja handed something to Lowe. Lowe took it and read it. It's the wanted poster of Kage, with the amount was updated, and Kage's crime list was also elaborated further, including his most recent undertaking. Lowe's lips parted upon seeing that absurd amount of bounty: half a billion. And then, Lowe remembered the most recent accident… pertaining to his VIP client. "Damn… they're going to increase this number again… soon."

"Orders?" The ninja asked.

"…tell Barry Ho to hurry the hell up if he's already finished his job in Japan and return the Green Kusanagi fleet to guard our sea borders, particularly ones around Asia; Tell Gai he need to get his Blue Murakumo Chapter to reinforce the Great Wall. And…" Lowe bite his lips. "…Contact the Sahakus and have the Violet Masamune and the Gold Muramasa chapter on standby in Scandinavia. My guess, there will be chaos in the Central Plain soon." High General Lowe Guele, one of Orb's 4 High generals, commander of the Red Murasame Samurai chapter (popularly known as the Junkers Guild), gave his orders in the stern tone of the Samurais. "…oh… and…"

"Yes?" the ninja paused for a moment.

On a lighter tone, Lowe noted as he looked at the black wanted poster of Kage. "Tell Kage…"

The Ninja gulped nervously.

"…the impostor isn't all that bad in terms of character. No, really. He really is a nice, swell guy, through and through. It's just that he's shit out of luck most of the time." Lowe snickered. "And he's got a seriously poor sense of direction! Wakakakakak!"

0000000000

Epilogue 4:

Genma

A pool of magma splashed out as a hand crawled out of it. And then, grasping desperately at the pool, the owner of the said hand finally managed to pull himself up.

When Sabo finally can open his eyes as he crawled his way out of the lava spawning pool; the birth place of all Inferno Knight; the first thing he saw was a pair of boots… belonging to his best friend. "Ace?"

"Sabo. Welcome back." Ace grinned and gave his hand to the revived Sabo.

"Ace… you look… different. What happened?"

"It's a new day." Brera, parched on a razor sharp rock in his crow form, muttered from above.

"New day?" Sabo felt weird. He felt… unshackled… free…

Ba-thump.

Sabo blinked. He gently moved his hand to his chest.

Ba-thump, ba thump…

His heart… it's beating! "How…?"

"It's a long story." Hao came in. "But… short version, we got work to do."

"Work…" as Sabo began to come to, it was also then he realized that he's looking at the largest gathering of Inferno knights he had ever seen. Far more than what they assembled during the preparation in the battle against the pilgrims earlier. If those 5,000 Knights were taken from an entire sector… the number of Inferno knights he's seeing… tens of thousands of them… they've must've been gathered from the entire continent! This is… full mobilization? "Did I miss something?"

"Relax, Sabo. You're just in time." The Explosion Regent turned around and saw Yuki coming in. "We were just waiting for you, in fact."

Sabo looked at his comrades. They were more human than undead now. No longer in servitude to the demons… And then Sabo began to grasp on what's going on. "Yuki… did you kill the warlocks?"

Yuki chuckled. "No. Not me. But I did get some help. From my son."

"Your son." Sabo repeated.

"We won't be having any more 'visitors' from our own country any time soon." Yuki began explaining. "The Clyne Sisters now knew the truth about this place. Lamia told me, her sister had an idea on stopping the pilgrimage. She needs time… but it'll work out. But that's not our concern. Right now, our concern is the visitors coming from the 'other' faction." Yuki tossed a badge to Sabo who caught it and looked at the symbols. "Picked this up from one of the dead warlocks. Gave one to Andy and Lamia. Something for them to think about."

"Bloody hell… I thought we wiped them out in our time?" Sabo frowned in anger.

"They resurfaced in our time, my Lord." Brera murmured.

"So… what do you intend to do, Yuki?" Sabo is beginning to get a grasp of the reason of this total mobilization.

"Lockdown. No one comes in… no one comes out. From hence forth, we'll make Junius the dominion of the Legion of the Damned. Come. Time to get suit up. Let's take back Junius." Yuki turned around.

Sabo and Ace nodded in agreement and followed the Lifeless Lord. "Just one thing I don't really get about these guys…" Sabo tossed the badge away.

"For the Pure and Blue World… in what way this blood drenched hellish world is 'pure' and 'blue' anyway?"

0000000000

Last Epilogue:

The Knight

The Plant continent Aprillus is the most prestigious continent among the 12… well, 11 continents that makes up the Empire of Zaft. It is a center of much of Zaft Empire's economical and political activity, and now, during the War, the Empire saw it fit to move their capital, the seat of their government, from Januarius to Aprillus. This move causes a booming of economic activity the likes of which has never seen before in any other continent. Business and economic trade skyrocketed, and as expected, a mass inflow of immigrants coming from other continents, searching for a better future. New citadels, gleaming spires, and splendor estates were built everywhere. Now, Aprillus is the most important continent in the entire breadth of the Zaft Empire, with its entire continent is practically one giant city. Naturally, Aprillus has become THE place to be for the rich and politically powerful.

On the far edge of the continent's northern shores, there's a small manor, colored in white, surrounded by lush greenery. A rare sight in a continent so tightly packed with buildings.

A young girl walked around the manor. Her hair were tied up into two buns behind her head, the rest of her very long hair were left streaming down till it reach just above her ankle. Her hair color… is pink. Strikingly similar with Lacus' hair color. She's wearing a white Victorian noble dress, with baggy skirt that go up to her chest, slightly showing her cleavages. She glanced here and there, apparently she was looking for someone. And then she caught sight of a certain brunette and the girl hastened her pace. "Mou! Where have you been!" The girl pouted.

The brunette teen laughed. "I'm sorry… just taking out a dangerous trash."

"You could've asked for the servants to do that for you."

"How could I? Am I not your servant, my Master, Euphemia Li Britannia?"

The girl chuckled timidly as a slight blush found its way to her cheek. "Indeed. And you are my Knight."

The Brunette dropped his so called dangerous trash-which includes pieces of a horribly dented and charred armor of the Black Knight and a pair of broken swords-and then get down to his one knee and kneeled.

"Yes, my Master. Kururugi Suzaku, at your service."

0000000000000000

0000000000000000

0000000000000000

Preview for the next ARC (not chapter, the next Arc!)

"I feel like I'm in this… story…"

The Zaft fleet of ships marched out of the Mirage Mist of the Empire borders…

"In that story, a dashing prince kidnapped a beautiful princess from a rival kingdom."

The heavily armed Alliance Central Plain Fortress stands tall…

"The Princess' husband doesn't like that, and he chased the Prince all the way back to his home country."

The Archangel, undergoing maintenance in the docks…

"…and in revenge, he burned the Prince's home country to the ground."

The banner of the Alliance stands tall… as it was consumed by fire.

"You need to wake up."

The Alliance regulars marched forward.

"The battles you guys had been having up until now are just sugar coatings."

The chimera roared and smashed through several dozen soldiers.

"For all your victories, you still don't understand."

The Captain smashed the tank with her bare hands, literally flipping it upside down.

"You're not in this war. Not yet."

The Archangel fired her newly installed turret.

"You want to know what it means to fight as the Alliance?"

The giant metallic juggernaut came roaring through the smashed down walls.

"You want to know what it REALLY means to fight in this war?"

A bunch of Scandinavian Berserker charged through the soldier's ranks, swatting them all over the place.

"Then you need to get yourself straightened up."

A few soldiers ignited their flamethrowers and unleashed hell.

"Cause you're in the shit now."

Let battle be waged

The cannon shell flew across the field, heading straight towards the complex.

"I did not remove the shackles from your neck just so that I can place one of my own."

In land

The mammoth Slayer tanks roll on and on, shelling the base from afar.

"If you want freedom, you already have it."

Sea

The Zaft fleet unleashed all their artillery payloads.

"But should you choose it, vengeance will be yours."

And Air

Kage, donning his Kurenai Shiki take to the sky and was quickly swarmed.

"Cause if they want a war…"

The next arc:

Battle for the Central Plain

"We'll give them one like they won't believe."

The Shockwave exploded right in the heart of China, its ripples quickly engulfed all of Asia.

0000000000000000

0000000000000000

United Emirates ORB

Orb, by its own definition, is a country made by and for the Samurais. Ruled by the 5 Shogunate family that are descended from the first 12 clans, handpicked by the White Emperor himself. The nation was born during the era of the Cold War, after the Collapse. Where other factions, the Alliance and Zaft were reeling from destruction, Orb was the only nation that actually progress VERY rapidly and rose to prominence. Enough that their warriors are just about as powerful as Zaft, and the Alliance dare not to challenge their navy in a gunfight. The current ruling system is somewhat similar with that of the Advanced, except if the Advanced made use of the high Council to pick the Emperor, Orb used a democratic system where the people may cast vote and pick their own candidates to sit as the Supreme Councilor, the true ruler of Orb. At the moment, the people has been consistently casting their votes for the Attha family. For 6 generations, the said House had one of its members hold the rank of Supreme High Councilor. This is in no small part due to the Atthas political strategy: complete neutrality.

Orb's ruling system are very similar to the Japanese empire of old, however, the Orb government had made various changes. Chief among them, was the abolishment of the Shogunate system. The Atthas are famous for their neutral policy which is best summarized in one statement: Orb will not attack another nation, will not allow another nation to attack them, and will not intervene in the conflicts of other nations. This is somewhat contradicted by the fact Orb is also willing to open its borders for immigrants from every part of the world to come and settle in their land, under the absolute condition that they must abide by this one rule. Those who cannot will be punished severely by Orb's military arms: the Samurais. Most sane people, after seeing just how powerful a Samurai can be, would obey. Orb prospered and became the jewel in a world filled with carnage and chaos. Many scientists and thinkers from Zaft who were dissatisfied with their life there went to Orb and contributed their intelligence. Scientists from many parts of the world, the brightest minds their age has to offer, Advanced or Naturals, gathered here, thus how Orb technological advancement was on par with that of Zaft.

Many able bodied warriors from the Alliance also decided to join the ranks of the Samurais or Shinobis. The Samurais were restructured, whereas previously they greatly rely on close combat, now, they began studying the use of firearms, with a proper integration of the gunslinging Ashigaru Samurais into one of their military branches. Some Naturals and Advanced had even settled down and raised their families. Thus how Orb became a superpower, its people prosper, its military and infrastructure are strong, its warriors trained, armed and well paid.

Unwilling to repeat the mistake in the past where landowners and civilians can become warlords overnight, the Orb Government forbid civilians from holding military arms. With the erasure of Shogunate system, the title Supreme Shogun was also erased. Instead, Orb divided the Legions of their Samurai Warriors into 5 chapters, each lead by a High General. As of the Bloody Valentine war, there are still 5 chapters, but only 4 High generals.

Red Murasame Chapter: the largest of all chapters that make up more than half of the current existing samurais. This large number attributed to the fact that this chapter is also responsible for training and recruitment from the populace. Another factor is because the chapter did not discriminate nor needing any specialized skills beyond the standard, but generally strict, entry requirements, resulting in a very large pool of recruits and a wide range of racial diversity of the army. Thereby, over ¾ of its ranks are composed of a combination of Bushis (a lower rank just beneath Samurais, in other words, Samurai Recruits), and Shinobis. Many Samurais from various chapters also begins here, before they were transferred to other chapters, ones that are more suitable to their personal style and skills. Nevertheless, the remaining ones who do remain as Red Murasame Chapter Samurai is still enormous in numbers, and thus, this chapter has no one huge single base to serve as their HQ, but they do have plenty of outposts throughout Orb's territory as recruitment centers. Currently led by High general Lowe Guele however, the Samurai had begun to call the Morgenroete First Academy as home, and the many Samurais that remained as the Red Murasame chapter had developed a very interesting penchant of literally creating anything using everything, anywhere, anytime. Often times they can create things using nothing but junk. However, thanks to this, the Samurais of the Red Murasame chapter were the one closest to the people, for most of the things they create were pretty useful. Roads that were originally littered with junk were cleaned in one fell swoop, leaving behind various widgets and stuff in their wake. Thusly, the Red Murasame chapter was most affectionally called by the people: the Junker's Guild.

Blue Murakumo Chapter: the second largest chapter, with their HQ in Archangelsk Workshop in the cold Russia. They share their guarding responsibility with the Violet Masamune chapter. The Blue Murakumo chapter was known mostly for their heavy use in Ashigaru Samurais, firearms experts of the Samurais. Not so surprising, considering that the Archangelsk Workshop they based on were the one of the biggest war factory responsible for the production of all military equipment of the samurais, that includes their armors, swords, the cannons and its shells, the guns and bullets. At the present, the Ashigaru Samurai make up more than half of the Blue Murakumo chapter. Their combat tactics revolved around raining the enemy with a shower of shells and bullets from a distance. A frowned upon tactics by the Samurais who greatly relied on their close combat superiority. Interestingly enough, the few close combat Samurais they do have has been known to be some of the most daredevil warriors of the Orb army. To compensate their small numbers, the Blue Murakumo samurais use enlarged versions of Samurais standard weapons, such as oversized Nodachi, super Heavy spears… and their skills with their weapons rivals that of the Bladebanes of Zaft – in fact, Murakumo Gai, the current High general of the Chapter and his team of special force, Serpent Tail, were once Bladebanes. The Murakumo Samurais also use special heavily padded armors to increase their endurance as they will always be overwhelmed by numbers. To aid them in moving rapidly, integrated to their armor are multiple specially designed propellants that, when used in combination of Shunshin or Shukuchi, serves as a means to propel them in and out of the combat zone at such speed, it was as if they disappeared from sight and reappeared straight in the hearts of enemy ranks, accompanied with a massive shockwave that came from their violent landing, did as much damage as possible with the initial impact, deal even more damage with their heavy weapons, and then move to another location, and then repeat the process. A very high risk high gain strategy they called Deep Charge. But the true reason for the daredevil moniker is because they usually Deep Charge when their Ashigaru Brethren were still in the process of raining the enemy with gunfire. As the result, the Blue Murakumo's friendly fire rate was the highest of all Chapters.

Green Kusanagi Chapter: The third largest chapter, just narrowly below the Blue Murakumo in terms of personnel number. They are the backbone of Orb's formidable navy. Like the Red Murasame chapter, they don't possess a single base per se. But technically, every port, harbor and docks in Orb's territory is their outposts, for they are responsible for the security of Orb's sea borders, and they take pride of the fact Orb's naval forces and its Marine Samurais were famously known by other factions as the finest in the world. The Green Kusanagi chapter has been known to have a long standing rivalry with the Blue Murakumo chapter. Often times they centered around the Blue Murakumo chapter's heavy use in firearms. Their harshest critique to their long range strategy was: Shoot as many bullets as possible and hope to hit the target. The Green Kusanagi started out as a chapter formed by the infamous Mongolian Archers. With a bow and arrow, their shot was so murderously precise, it was said that someone can shoot an arrow to a Mongolian Archer while on horseback, and they can still shoot the incoming arrow three times while the arrow is still midflight without stopping their horse. This skill was passed down even when the Mongolian archers were trained to be Samurais. When they joined the navy, they refuse to dishonor themselves by using firearms. At best, they'll tolerate the firearms which are the standardized artillery pieces mounted on their naval ships. But they will stick to their bows and arrows, whenever they can. These archer Samurais were then differentiated by having four katanas instead of the usual two. These katana can be connected end on end, forming a bow, connected by a chakra string. Ever since then, it became practice that all Marine Samurais will either carry 2 pairs of Katana, or they can still carry a pair of katana, but coupled with a naginata which also doubles as a bow.

Violet Masamune Chapter: The Violet Masamune chapter is based on the Morgenroete Second academy facility in Berlin, German. However, they operate mostly around the northern part of Europe, sharing responsibility in guarding Russia territory with the Blue Murakumo chapter. Due to its location in the European continent, most of its ranks are of Caucasian descent. The Violet Masamune chapter shared a very close relationship with the Kingdom of the Scandinavian Principality. A relationship that dates back a long time ago, when the first Samurais brawled with the Scandinavian Berserkers. Even today, many Berserkers became Samurais and vice versa, until eventually, the line of distinction between the two became slightly blurred, and the rank of Berserkers or Samurais was used interchangeably by its warriors. Eventually, it was standardized as Berserker Samurais. Because of its close ties to western civilizations, the Samurais of the Violet Masamune wield weapons and accessories which, by Samurai Standard, can be considered rather outlandish: battle axes, Warhammers, even Scythes. But more outlandish than their use of western weaponries, is their addition to the Samurai's heavy armory: the ferocious Gladiator Beast units. The chapter was known to use many exotic and mostly larger than life wild beasts as living siege weapons or beasts of burdens: Reindeer Riders, Armored Predator Grizzlies, Giga Fortress Mammoth chariot (AN: Yes. I kid you not, Mammoth chariots!)… among other, more exotic and bizarre, things. As of right now, the Violet Masamune Chapter is without a High General for some unknown reason. Thus, at the moment, the Sahaku family, the benefactor of the Golden Muramasa chapter took command of the chapter.

Golden Muramasa Chapter: the smallest of all chapters as the result of a stubborn extreme traditionalist pundits and prejudices. The Samurais of the Golden Muramasa chapter believed that only a true Japanese of pure blood can make a TRUE samurai. Currently led by High General Rondo Koto Sahaku, the Chapter was based, not so surprisingly, in their fortress Ame no Mihashira in Tokyo, Japan. They boast that their ranks have been handpicked by the High general himself to be the finest of all Samurais, following, what they claimed to be an even more stringent and brutal selection process than any other chapter. A stark contrast with the other chapters, the Golden Muramasa chapters frowned upon the admittance of Caucasian or non-Orientals into the army. And even other Orientals, such as Chinese and Koreans were held in lower light at best. They believe that only a true pure Japanese are worthy of becoming Samurais and that they are the singular most powerful force on earth. The beliefs were held in such an extreme, whereas the Red, Blue, Green and Violet chapter make use of a mixture of Samurais and Shinobis working in synergy and harmony, the Golden Muramasa Chapter was the only chapter that refused to use Shinobis, deeming them as cowards and intolerably dishonorable. However, their arrogance was justified in that the Golden Muramasa chapter is also the strongest of all chapters, despite their small numbers. They accept all combat doctrines from all other Chapters, even added some of their weaponries and strategies into their own repertoire, as long as it is within what they considered to fit the image of pure Samurais.

Other than the 5 Chapters of Samurais, Orb also makes heavy use of Shinobis. Their vast information network encompasses a huge portion of the world. Shinobi cells can be located almost anywhere, and each of these cells didn't even know one another, or employ other people. This information network is so vast and intricate, when 10 people congregate and talk, chances are at least 2 are Shinobis, and the remaining 5 are people who were unknowingly are in the Shinobi's payroll. It is even said that, thanks to this delicate information network, the Generals can spend the rest of their lives isolated in their home and they still know what's going with the world at large. Other than this, there are also various subfactions of the Samurais and the Shinobis… such as the Kabuki Gang, Rounin Mercenary guild, Yamabushis, and Sages. They are not part of the regular military forces in that some prefer to live as a recluse, away from the world at large in search of spiritual tranquility (Yamabushi and Sages) or… joining up regular army is just a bore (Kabuki Gang) or… they really have other reason that they cannot join the mainstream samurai (Rounin Mercenary guild).

Despite their powerful military, Orb has taken little to no part in the current Bloody valentine War, holding vast to their neutral principles. However, they don't rein their Samurais too strictly. They're allowed to do what they wish such as hiring out their services to the highest bidder or having a part-time job as hired guns. But they are expected to take responsibility of their actions to make sure that if they fail or caused an international accidents, Orb will disavow their existence and actions, citing them as rouge and, at the worst, marked them as kill-on-sight. Fortunately, things like this are rare. Most Samurais really do enjoy their job too much to risk their ridiculous salary over some escapade for extra dough. Zaft and Alliance had tried and failed time and again to draw Orb to their cause. Both are wary of Orb, in that if Orb joined either side, one side will be guaranteed for victory. However, Orb held fast to their neutrality principle and refuse to side with one. Sometimes even if that means denying supplies and entry to starving and dying soldiers or knights. It seems cruel, but it also the reason that many people during the Bloody Valentine moved to Orb for safe haven. As such, Orb was nicknamed the Country of Peace. A rather ironic but befitting epithet, considering that it was a nation established by a race of warriors who once nearly destroyed the entire world due to their warlike tendencies.

0000000000000000

0000000000000000

AN:

As for how fast the Meteor go and how it moves, as reference, think of the pod racing from Star Wars Phantom Menace. And for those of you who think the Samurai fights are like Jedi fights on Star Wars… Well the Jedi were from the Japanese word Jidai (era). So in part the Jedi were also based on Samurais. So it all comes full circle.

And IF YOU THINK that after I made you guys waited for 24.5 chapters and then I'm just gonna separate Kira and Lacus right after one arc and waited another 2 or 3 arcs until they meet again, you guys had another thing coming! I swear they won't part until the two get laid… at LEAST once!

TBA