With his newly found power, Shol slams the two dragons together before tossing them away. Though they recover quickly from the attack, Shol spreads his wings ominously as he lets out a horrifying roar, sending a chill down the spines of all the soldiers in Najenda's small band of Imperial Arm users. Budo looks up to the sky and notices the fire raining down from the sky and says, "We need to do something about this, or our army will be burned to ashes!" "Run, do you think you can make a wall of wind that can cover the Capital?", Esdeath asks the boy. He seems uncertain at first, but quickly nods to her before saying, "I believe I can, but it will take a great deal of concentration. I won't be able to aid you in your battle here." "We'll deal with this mess! Now go!", Budo shouts, his rage boiling over as he can't summon down his lightning. As the ferocious dragon looms over them, Najenda grits her teeth at the sight of her Night Raiders in such a state. "Everyone!! Use any means necessary to defeat this foe!! We at least have to make an opening for our comrades to finish him off!!", Najenda exclaims and her forces rush forward. "Insolent Mortals!! You dare challenge me!? A GOD!?! Burn for your ignorance!!!", Shol exclaims as he fires a wave of flames at the small army of Imperial Arm users. To his surprise, they're sent flying away as Lubbock weaves his Realm Severing threads around the group, creating a whirling defensive barrier. "Looks like you're underestimating us! You probably shouldn't do that!!", Lubbock exclaims as Susanoo takes the lead on the charge. Shol throws a punch at the Imperial Arm, but Susanoo manages to dodge the attack before leaping up onto and running up the length of his arm. As Susanoo rushes up the length of the God's arm, Shol ignores the pest to deal with the plethora of energy balls being hurled at him by a short, pudgy guy wearing a mask. Seeing an opening, Susanoo goes to slam his weapon into the beast's face, but when he does, it shatters against his scales. "I-It shattered..?", Susanoo thinks in complete shock before being completely engulfed in a flaming breath of destruction. "Susanoo!!!", Najenda calls out to him as the Imperial Arm leaps out of the flames, half his body charred by the overwhelming fire. As he lands next to her and his injuries start to regenerate, he bluntly notes, "His scales are tougher than expected. Physical attacks of our level might be ineffective." The God continues on his rampage, breathing a powerful wave of flames towards the mortal group of Imperial Arm users, but before the flames can consume the small army, they're protected by a wall of stone that rises up from the ground. To Shol's surprise, Tatsumi divebombs him from up above as Quake bursts out from under his feet, aiming to catch him off guard and land a few good hits. He manages to dodge Tatsumi's attack, sidestepping it as he pulls Quake up from out of the ground and slams the other God back down with an outrageous amount of strength. As he hits the ground, his stone wings shatter on impact and Shol lands a quick, yet overwhelming punch to Quake's chest, causing the scales he hit to crack dramatically and fall off. Shol's eyes widen confidently as a grin comes across his dragonic face, but he's suddenly sent crashing against the ground as Quake lands a Godly punch on his face. Though the attack sends him flying, Shol doesn't take any noticeable damage from the hit. He glance over at Najenda's small army and rushes over to crush them. "Where do you think you're going!?", Quake exclaims as he sends stone spears jetting out of the ground to run the God through, but Shol merely dodges them. A lone soldier wielding a mighty warhammer with a demonic skull as the head of the weapon swings his weapon at the beast, trying to slay the God, but is merely crushed under Shol's mighty claw, his blood gushing out from under the pressure. "You mortals are so ignorant to your situation. Even though you're going against a GOD you still insist on fighting to your last breaths, how annoying.", Shol notes as he lifts his claw up to reveal the crushed corpse of the former soldier. He stomps down on the corpse one last time, sending more blood squirting out of the man's remains as he exclaims, "I'll make every single one of you foolish mortals regret the thought of raising a hand against me!!!" To his surprise, the soldiers aren't even remotely phased by his boasting, still charging head-on at him. They quickly scatter as a young girl with rabbit ears leaps up into the air and uses Heavy Pressure's trump card: Nasty Voice. This sends a powerful series of soundwaves down upon the God of Destruction, shaking him to his very core. As he's left somewhat stunned by this annoying sound, another Imperial Arm user, this one a man wearing a mask type Imperial Arm that allows him to manipulate puppets like soldiers, rushes towards the dragon with his puppets, all of them wielding powerful spears for maximum range. Shol ignores this attack and simply sweeps the puppets and their master up into the air with his tail before going to blast him with a raging ball of flames. Before he can ignite the soldier, however, Akame rushes in and manages to fly by him, slashing him across the only part of his body without scales: his eyes. Though she only manages to get his left eye, the dragon is clearly phased by the attack, reeling back in pain from the attack as he holds his bleeding eye socket with one claw as he blocks a powerful punch from Tatsumi with the other. He delivers a quick headbutt to Tatsumi before smashing the crushed soldier's Imperial Arm with his now free hand. This causes a strange energy to leave the destroyed weapon as he lifts his claw, entering Shol's body through his wounded eye. "That was an interesting idea, mortal. I must say, I did not anticipate you being able to take advantage of the situation so easily. I won't make that same mistake a second time.", Shol says to the girl as his eye begins to heal thanks to the energy he just absorbed from the warhammer.
"H-He can heal like that!? That's bullshit!!", Lubbock exclaims, both in frustration and terror as he witnesses Shol's newest display of power. Najenda analyzes this information thoroughly, trying to observe ever possible detail of the process as she thinks, "So he absorbed the Imperial Arm and began healing his injuries? Then either he can both heal and gain the powers of the Imperial Arm, or he can only do one or the other." A small group of three of the soldiers rushes towards Shol, one weilding a giant anchor weapon, another wielding Adayusu, and the last one wielding a rapier Imperial Arm. The boy with the rapier lands a few quick stabs on the God, and with ever stab he lands he moves faster and faster. He speeds around the God as the two girls aiding him split up and attack from both of Shol's sides. The girl wielding Adayusu unleashes its Trump Card for more power as the other one wielding the anchor holds out her hand to the speeding boy. He quickly slaps her hand as he passes her and his speed is instantly transferred over to her as she dashes in with her reaper friend. They both unleash a powerful attack down upon the God, but not even their combined might can cause him to budge, which causes him to let out a maniacal laugh and the two girls to look on in disbelief. He goes to grab the two girls, but gets distracted by Quake sending thousands of small, stone arrows at him, missing the Imperial Arm users and shattering against the dragon's scales. The young boy with the rapier quickly builds up enough speed to help catch the two girls and retreat back to the other Imperial Arm users. "Our attacks aren't doing anything to him. What the hell is this guy made out of?", the boy asks as he puts down his comrades. "This is something beyond the average man or woman, we need to combine our efforts to defeat such an enemy. Simply attacking this thing alone will only lead in our deaths.", Najenda explains as she calmly analyzes the situation oncemore. The Imperial Arm users all look to one another, Lubbock and Susanoo as well, and nod before grouping up and heading back into battle. They approach the situation more cautiously this time as Tatsumi, Budo and Akame try to hold the dragon at bay. "You useless fool, you have no power here!! Die!!!", Shol mocks Budo as he slams his giant claw into the other God. Budo, however, barely manages to catch the claw with both of his hands before ferociously shouting, "I don't need lightning to destroy you!!!" Much to everyone's surprise, Budo manages to lift Shol into the air, though it was only for a short moment, before Tatsumi swoops in and throws a powerful punch at the God of Destruction. Tatsumi aims for the dead center of the beast's chest, but Shol manages to block the attack with his free claw, eyes widening in fear as Tatsumi's powerful attack collides with his claws, slightly cracking the scales along the claw. "That's it!", Quake mentally notes as he observes the interaction between the two dragon. As Budo goes to slam Shol down into the ground, Quake thinks, "He's been confident in his defenses this whole battle, but right there, I could tell he was afraid. If Tatsumi's attack landed there, maybe he could have hit it?" Shol manages to free himself by slapping Budo away with his tail as he unleashes a powerful headbutt against Tatsumi, causing the boy to reel back in pain. The small army of Imperial Arms users rushes in, trying to take advantage of the opening, but Shol unleashes a powerful blast of flame at the army. Much to his surprise, Esdeath manages to deflect the attack, using her own blood as a conduit to form a blast of red snowstorm that puts out the flames, saving the army from the attack. As the bloody snowstorm melts against the intense heat, only existing for just long enough to put out the flames, the small army charges on with intense fury. A few of the soldiers charge into close combat with the beast as the rest attack from a range. The boy with his rapier charges in first, stabbing away at Shol as his movements quicken at an unbelievable rate. The girl wielding Adayusu quickly unleashes her trump card again as the girl with the anchor twirls her Imperial Arm in between her fingers, building up momentum with the giant weapon. The masked man with his puppets and a man holding a traditional sword in one hand and Aegis in the other charge in as well, allowing the group of combatants to surround the dragon. "NOW!!!", the army exclaims in unison as they all charge in for their combined attack. As Die Leaguer's powerful balls, a volley of homing arrows, and a series of crescent blades of wind fly past the Imperial Arms users, the boy with his rapier speeds by his fellow comrades and transfers his speed to them, making them much faster. With this new boost of speed, they all quickly close the space between them and Shol, surprising the God as he deflects the incoming projectiles and quickly starts charging a ball of flame to blast the group back. Before he can must the strength to do that, he sees something coming at him from above. He glares up into the sky to see Susanoo with a makeshift axe twice the Imperial Arm's size. Susanoo quickly twirls the weapon in his hands before slamming it down with all his might. Shol is forced to catch the blade with his teeth as he knocks away the rest of the Imperial Arm users with a mixture of his tail, his claws, and a few gusts of wind from his wings. He manages to toss Susanoo away and goes to punch him, but hits the young knight's shield instead. Aegis absorbs the energy from the attack and in one quick motion, the boy unleashes the stored power back at the God, but it barely scratches him. Shol quickly grabs the boy and crushes him in his mighty claw as he flattens the speeding rapier boy with his tail.
As he absorbs the spirits inside Aegis and the rapier, his cracked scales seem to heal and the scratches along his teeth from Susanoo's axe regenerate. Susanoo unleashes a quick combo of slashes on Shol, allowing the other Imperial Arm users to retreat in the process, as Tatsumi and Quake rush in to combat him as well. The fat man who uses Die Leaguer unleashes all of his balls of energy once again, hoping to aid in their battle, but Shol just catches them in his mouth, one at a time, before crunching them with his mighty teeth and adding their small amounts of energy to his own. "It was a mistake to bring so many meals here, Quake!! You've only made this battle harder on yourselves!!", Shol exclaims as he knocks the somewhat weakened Quake away with a powerful whip of his tail and unleashes a flaming punch on Tatsumi's dragonic face all in one motion. As he does this, Esdeath and Akame rush in to do their best to hold him off. The two swordswomen speed around the dragon at a remarkable rate before ending up on opposite sides and rushing straight for him. With both claws engulfed in flames, he unleashes two powerful blasts of flames at them, but they disappear before they're hit by his unyielding flames. Instead, Budo instantly hits the God in the face with a mighty punch that sends him flying backwards. "She managed to freeze time, even in my Mugen Jigoku!?", Shol thinks in a panic as he finally manages to stop himself. Budo unleashes a quick set of punches on the dragon, forcing him back into one powerful punch from Tatsumi, sending him flying again. This manages to knock off a few of his scales, much to the God's surprise, as Tatsumi's power seems to have gotten even higher. "He's evolving even further, if this keeps up-", Shol begins to think before Esdeath suddenly appears right on his snout and stabs him through his right eye. "Again!?", Shol thinks in a panic as he goes to knock the woman away with his claw, but she dodges away, landing on a patch of floating sand that takes her away. As he goes to unleash his wrath upon her, stone spears jet out from under his feet, aiming to run him through. There are a total of five of them, and they're moving at such a speed that he can't possibly dodge them all. On reaction he destroys three of them and blocks the fourth one, but is stabbed through the shoulder as the raw power behind the spear he stopped required both his hands to halt. Quake sees this and rushes in all by himself to take advantage of the opening he just made. "He blocked it! That only confirms my suspicions!! It's right there, behind the thickest parts of his scales, his heart!!", Quake mentally notes as he pulls his claw back, preparing to run Shol through with it. "This is over!!", Quake exclaims as he launches his final attack at the God. The two dragons clash and a few of each dragon's scales come falling off from the raw impact of their attacks. As Najenda looks up at the two Gods with widened eyes, she see that they have their clenched claws through each other's chests. The two stand there for a moment before pieces of Quake's dragonic body begin to fall off in droves. "It seems like I've won, just as expected, QUAKE!!!", Shol exclaims as he pulls his claw out of Quake's chest to reveal a large round gem in his hand. "You thought that I'd show you where I was hiding my heart with that last attack, didn't you? How foolish! You didn't think for a second that I might have been faking that the entire time.", Shol continues confidently as Quake continues to fall to pieces without his heart. Quake, tries to charge up a beam attack in his mouth, but like his other limbs, his head quickly turns into nothing more than a pile of rubble and stones. A wave of both shock and despair covers the Revolution's forces, Night Raid in particular. "H-He's...dead..!", Lubbock says, eyes widened in complete disbelief. Esdeath rushes in oncemore, shouting, "Don't be foolish!! Gods don't die so easily!! We just need to retrieve his heart!!!" Budo joins her, shouting, "Believing that a God of Quake's level could go down so easily!! What insolence!! You're talking about a GOD!!!" "You are real fools here.", Shol notes as he goes to eliminate the two Gods. The two Gods leap toward Shol and with a quick movement in the air, Budo chucks Esdeath at the dragon. She manages to cut her way through his fire breath before appearing right in front of his face. With one quick movement, she stabs him through a few cracked scales into his forehead, causing him to let out a loud, pain-filled roar. "So you can feel pain in that form! Good, I'll be sure to push you to your very limit before killing you!!", Esdeath exclaims as she makes her escape, retreating back to Budo's side as Tatsumi rushes in to take advantage of the situation. Tatsumi throws a few powerful punches at the God, but he manages to barely dodge all of them, knowing that he doesn't stand a chance if he tries to catch them and counter. Enraged, Tatsumi goes for a full-power arm swing, but it misses and gets his fists stuck in the ground. Shol notices this and throws a punch at the boy, using the same hand that holds Quake's heart to keep him from trying to punch it back and leaving him no other option than to try to dodge and make a bigger opening for the God. Tatsumi, however, finds a way around this and bites off the claw with his sharp teeth, catching Shol off guard as he lets out another pain-filled roar. Shol quickly slashes at Tatsumi with his other claw before kicking the beast away, exclaiming, "You damned bastard!!!", as he holds his nub in a panic.
Tatsumi goes flying from Shol's attack, skidding across the dirt until finally coming to a stop. With blood gushing out from the slice across his chest, Tatsumi seems to lay limp on the ground, quickly sending Akame into a panic. The assassin rushes to his side as she shouts, "Tatsumi!!!" "Just hang in there!!! I'm coming!!", she exclaims as she finally reaches him. She leaps on top of him and he doesn't seem to make any signs of movement or life, not even breathing as his mouth is gaped open with Quake's heart laying on the ground next to him. The assassin tries desperately to reach him as Quake's heart rolls away to the pile of stones that once made up his body. As she places her hand against his chest, she senses something and thinks, "What the- This is-", but before she can finish her thought, Tatsumi jets back to life. Much to her surprise, he lashes out at her, swinging wildly at her with his sharp claws, which she dodges with her speed. Tatsumi, however, is much quicker than her, and as she dodges he goes to grab her right out of the air. Before he does, however, his hand suddenly stops all movement, seeming to be locked in place by something as she lands on the ground. "A..kame...", she hears the boy desperately try to form the words as he covers his wound with his other arm. "Tatsumi!! It's me!! Listen we can-", Akame begins to shout, but she's instantly stunned when she hears him say, "..Kill...me.." Her eyes widen in disbelief at his request and he continues, hand trembling as he mutters, "Consciousness...fading away....can't...stop him...anymore..! Akame...you promised.... You...promised me...didn't you... Hurry..!!" Holding back every emotion she has flowing through her, Akame coldly replies, "Yes...I promised..." "Very well, it will be done.", Akame adds as she draws her blade from its sheath. She looks down at her blade and then back to her friend, seeing the boy's human face in the dragon's. With a single thrust of her blade, it's over. She pierces the boy straight through the chest with her blade and as the curse starts to take over, he falls backwards. As Akame stands there, looking at once was her friend and team-mate, her emotions start to overwhelm her. The countless lives she had taken before this, the carnage she cause, the blood she shed, it was nothing compared to this. Now, she stood before another friend in which she had to thrust her blade into. "So you still stand firm even after this? You're quite the master, aren't you?", a voice called out to her. She looked coldly to the blade, knowing what had spoken to her, before it continued, saying, "You have truly given up your humanity if you are able to do this with such a cold face, master. Very well, I'll grant you what you desire~" With that, the blade begins to glow ominously as the curse mark that usually comes from a cut caused by the blade starts to sneak up the length of her right hand, traveling up her arms and neck to her face. "I will grant you the power of our Trump Card. Use it well, master~", the blade calls out to her before fading away as it says, "Ennoodzuno!" Everyone left alive looks over at her in complete shock, her aura whirling around the battlefield wildly like a true monster. "Ah, so this is the true power hidden away in Murasame! How wonderful!!! Though, I am a bit disappointed I won't be able to kill that bastard Tyrant myself, but I guess I'll just have to enjoy my time with all of you then!!!!", Shol exclaims as he slams Budo into the ground. The assassin suddenly disappears and reappears in front of Shol before unleashing a powerful slash across his stomach. Murasame manages to slice straight through his cracked scales and gash a giant hole across his stomach, sending bits of his scales flying across the battlefield. Shol quickly flies up into the sky to escape the assassin's range. To his surprise, she leaps up into the air after him, aiming to cleave his head from his shoulders. He evades her attack, but he's even further surprised by Budo, who launches himself into the air and lets the girl use him as a springboard to go after the God. She manages to leap onto Shol and runs up the length of his back as she slices off his wings! The God crashes back down into the ground, shocking the mortals watching on from the sidelines.
With dust filling the air, nobody can see what's going on, but can hear the sounds of a struggle inside. "I guess I underestimated you, mortal.", Shol notes as the dust in the air begins to settle. Once it all clear, they all see that he has Akame pinned down with a claw to her throat as she struggles to reach Murasame. "To think Murasame's Trump Card could be so powerful, it's a shame I'll have to use it to sustain myself. I could use such power to shape my world quite nicely.", Shol boasts as he looks down at the helpless assassin as she continues to struggle. Pieces of his scales start to fall off of his back, revealing a glowing red sphere right on the back of his neck. "You even managed to reveal my heart, too bad you only grazed it, or you'd have actually killed me. That just goes to show you're truly outclassed here, mortal.", Shol continues as Akame grits her teeth in her fury. He starts to crush the girl under his claw, causing her to let out a terrifying scream, as he says, "But in the end, you're nothing more than some insignificant mortal trying to fly too close to the sun. I'll be sure to finish you off here and now!" Budo and Esdeath rush to attack him, but he quickly snatches Murasame as he leaps to Quake's remains. "It doesn't matter, once I've healed from absorbing Quake's remaining power and I've absorbed the overwhelming power left in this damned blade, I'll rid you all from this world once and for all!!!", Shol proclaims as he shatters Quake's heart under his claw with a terrifying stomp. He waits a moment before seeming to get a confused look on his dragon face, or what's left of it. "Where's the power? Don't tell me I-", he begins to think before a sharp pain cuts him off as it travels through his body in a split second. His eyes widen and he looks to the ground in a panic to see a stone spear has just pierced his throat, tearing his heart from the back of his neck. "But, he's-", he begins to say before hearing Quake finish, saying, "-dead? Hardly." Much to Shol's horror, he sees something moving under the rubble before debree goes flying everywhere and something emerges. Akame, Esdeath and Budo look on anxiously before seeing a human like figure pull itself out from the rubble. "M-Minazuki!?!", Akame exclaims in disbelief as she tries to take a step towards him, but winces in pain as Esdeath helps her stay on her feet. As the figure dusts himself off, they can see that his cheeks have scales creeping up them along with a noticeable dragon tail coming out of his back. "Surprised to see me I see. I guess my fake heart tricked you perfectly then, just as I planned. I've been waiting all this time, Shol. All this time for you to believe you had this battle in your claws and to let down your guard, and it all paid off.", Quake explains as he walks out from underneath the dragon. He glances back at Shol, seeing his defeated and still horrified expression before saying, "It's over, Shol. You've lost." The God's expression quickly shifts to pure rage as he charges a giant ball of fire in his mouth, claiming, "Damn you, QUAKE!!! DAMN YOU STRAIGHT TO HELL!!!!!" He goes to launch the ball, but before he can, Quake clenches his fist and spikes jet out from the stone spear holding Shol's heart, shattering it into pieces. With his heart shattered, all of the stored power flows into Quake's body, causing his already outstanding aura to skyrocket even higher. As the dead God's dragon body falls to pieces, Quake walks away with a slightly disappointed look on his face. He looks up into the sky to see the Mugen Jigoku disappear and the sky darken as it starts to rain. His gaze travels from the sky over to his fellow Gods as Run dives down to see the carnage left behind from the battle. The three other Gods all look to Shol's remains with worried looks before glancing back at Quake for guidance. "Is it over?", Run asks nervously as he looks to Quake, to which the God sighs heavily. He looks up to the boy and nods before telling him, "Yes, it's over. This war to end a corrupt Empire that lived for a thousand years and to help bring about a new world...it's finally over."