The pigtailed Meister buried her doubts and readied herself for battle. She had decided there was no time left for personal sympathy.
Nina let out a desperate battle cry as she used the Neptune Emerald Robe's flight drives to propel herself toward her rival. She held her lance in both hands at her side, and Akane responded by standing in place and crossing her metallic tonfa in front of her to firmly hold her ground. When Nina's lance clashed against Akane's defensive wall, she pushed with all of her strength in hopes of staggering Akane and opening a path to Mjolnir's control room.
As the attacking Otome poured all of her effort into one goal, Akane easily took the advantage and interrupted Nina with a harsh knee to the chest. As Nina painfully exhaled and stumbled back, Akane swiftly directed the blade of one tonfa into Nina's gut and the other through the armor around her neck. The blades of the second tonfa pierced Nina's throat, and the brown-haired fighter's face glowed with demonic delight as she pushed both of her weapons further into Nina's flesh. The fatally injured Meister dropped her lance and cried out in pain.
Sergei suddenly winced and grasped his own body in the same spots his Otome had been wounded, and Nina's weapon quickly disappeared from the ground. Before long, both master and Otome collapsed lifelessly to the ground at Akane's feet. The two bodies disappeared together in a flurry of sparkling green particles as the victor smiled softly. The world's last trump card against Schwarz had failed.
Knowing the end was only moments away, Akane quietly walked toward the opening Nina had blasted through Castle Windbloom's doors so she could take a front row seat to the battle outside. She became overwhelmed in excitement when she saw Schwarz's many Slaves suddenly pull back and hover harmlessly in the air. The armies of Otome on the ground and lower in the air reacted in collective terror toward this mysterious happening, and Akane knew it could mean only one thing.
As each girl was engulfed in the invisible energy wave created by Mjolnir, the doomed warriors dropped their arms in unison and began writhing in pain. The dark feline ears on Akane's hairband twitched slightly as their sensitive microphones listened to the agonized cries of Otome who had been fighting as far as several miles away from Castle Windbloom.
These Otome were all now feeling the same pain that had haunted Akane since the day she joined Schwarz. They had fought as hard as they could, only to find out their efforts were worthless and they couldn't prevent the deaths of the masters they had devoted themselves to. The bloodcurdling screams of hundreds of young girls' hearts suddenly stopping or exploding caused Akane to close her eyes and purr softly in comfort.
"Mmm..."
Several Slaves remained hovering in the air to monitor for any potential survivors, but Mjolnir's effect proved to be flawless. The resulting plumes of green mist that filled the valleys around Castle Windbloom as the girls' nanomachines simultaneously incinerated themselves were like fireworks celebrating a great victory to Akane. When this unearthly fog faded, the war was over.
Most of the world's governments were practically dismantled with the loss of their leaders and their ability to fight Schwarz, and Nagi's domination came swiftly and easily. Garderobe was quickly torn down, and all of its abandoned equipment was destroyed without hesitation. After Nagi proclaimed himself as the new world leader, Akane always stood by his side with an expression of cold contempt, and she was quick to butcher anyone who so much as glanced at her master impolitely. When she wasn't fighting, she was satisfied in simply knowing the world was being subjected to the Archduke's tyrannical rule.
To meet his masculine needs, Nagi supplied himself with a harem of nubile young women selected from the best his empire had to offer. After a suitable amount of time had passed, he then recruited a new generation of concubines for his entertainment. Many of these new girls were younger sisters of Otome who had lost their lives at the end of the War of the Five Columns and, had Garderobe's system still been in place in these days, they very likely would have followed in their siblings' footsteps. To Nagi, however, he was simply providing these young women with the career they were best suited for. His children were many, and his appetite was monumental.
Akane continued to serve as Schwarz's ruthless Otome for the rest of her days. She guarded Nagi unquestioningly both when he was taking care of business and "taking care of business." Her wounded heart would never discover love again, and the only thing she would ever receive from men after this point were terrified screams and begs for mercy.
THE END.