AKAME ASSASINATION (64)
CLAP!
Junichi brought his massive hands together in a sharp, resonant smack. Dust puffed from his palms.
"It seems Buddha has answered my prayers," he rumbled, eyes closed as if in genuine reverence. "Finally. A fight worthy of death."
"Junichi-kun, stop!" Maomao's voice cut through the settling debris. "We need to think this through!"
"Huh?"
"He's clearly goading you. Gaslighting you into doing exactly what he wants."
"And?" Junichi's eyes opened, flat and unimpressed. "It's not like that changes anything."
"Is your head really shoved that deep in your ass?" Maomao's voice rose, frustration cracking her usual composure. "The only reason any of us are still alive is because Akame-kun let us live back then! If you fight him now, you'll die."
"And?" Junichi yawned, a slow, theatrical gesture of boredom. "Isn't that the entire point of a real fight?"
"Are you stupid? Stand back and let me talk to him."
"Yeah, I saw your little 'talk.' It was a pitiful attempt—I couldn't stand to watch." Junichi laughed, a low, grating sound. "You think that thing has a heart? You think it'll listen to you?" He jerked a thumb toward Akame, who stood silent, observing them like a biologist watching two strange animals argue.
"He's smarter than you. So I'll take my chances."
"Women just don't get it." Junichi cracked his neck, his muscles coiling. "Sometimes, men just need to punch each other. At the cost of their own lives, if necessary. It's a known fact. Now get out of my way."
Maomao's fists clenched at her sides. Her knuckles turned white. She took a step forward, placing herself between Junichi and Akame.
"No," she said, her voice dropping to something low and dangerous. "If you want to fight him, you'll have to go through me."
The surrounding Okinawa shinobi tensed, eyes flicking to her for guidance.
"Tatsu-sama," one murmured. "Your orders?"
"We're protecting him," Maomao stated, her gaze locked on Junichi. "Restrain Suzaku Junichi. Do not let him engage."
Junichi stared at her, then threw his head back and laughed, a full, roaring sound that echoed in the hollowed street.
"Ha! Seriously? Well, I'll be damned. Looks like living with a man has finally helped you grow a backbone." His laughter died, replaced by a predator's focus. "Still won't be enough."
Maomao didn't look back at Akame, but she spoke to him, her voice trembling with a fragile conviction.
"Akame-kun… I know what you're trying to do. I know you didn't mean what you said. Or—no, it's more like I refuse to believe you're that cruel. So I'll take care of Junichi-kun."
'Well,' Akame thought, his expression unchanging. 'This isn't going to end well.'
He didn't move. Arguing with her now would only push her further down this self-destructive path of martyrdom.
"You know, Maomao," Junichi said, his voice taking on a lecturing, almost philosophical tone as he flexed his hands. "There are levels to being a sorcerer. Not everyone has the same technique. Even with similar affinities… we each use them differently. The height of sorcery isn't diplomacy. It's fighting. It's seeing how far you can push your technique, how you can evolve it, how you can surpass your own limits. You get what I'm saying?"
He breathed in—a deep, thunderous inhale that seemed to pull the oxygen from the air around them.
The buildings flanking the shattered street began to tremble. Chunks of concrete, rebar, and granite tore free from their facades, rising into the air like a reverse meteor shower. They swirled above Junichi, coalescing into a swirling constellation of raw, brutal mass.
"You have to be insane and selfish to grow as a sorcerer," Junichi whispered, a terrifying, ecstatic smile spreading across his face. "And me? I want to surpass everything."
EARTH ALCHEMY: RAINING FISTS—LIMIT BREAKER!
The sky fell.
Not in drops, but in fists—dozens of them, each the size of a car, hammering down with the force of orbital strikes.
The floating platform of asphalt they stood on vaporized under the onslaught. The road beneath it cratered, then cratered again, shockwaves rippling out through the city like seismic agony. Windows a kilometer away shattered in unison. It was a good thing the civilian evacuation had cleared a 100-kilometer radius; anything less would have been a massacre.
Dust and debris swallowed the world.
The Okinawa shinobi moved as one, a blur of black around Maomao, deflecting falling rubble with swift, precise strikes, shielding her in a pocket of relative safety.
She coughed, covering her mouth with her sleeve. "Tatsu-sama, are you alright?" a ninja asked, his voice tense.
"Forget about me—" she gasped, eyes straining through the particulate fog. "Where's Akame-kun?"
BOOM!
The answer came not as a sight, but as a sound—a deep, percussive thud that resonated in their bones, followed by another, and another. Not explosions of fuel and flame, but the cataclysmic collision of physical forces meeting in mid-air.
Junichi had unleashed everything. And someone was meeting it.
On opposite sides of a half-collapsed office building's rooftop, two figures landed, crouched, then rose.
The building groaned beneath them, its structure compromised by the shockwaves.
"Didn't think your frail little body could handle throwing punches like that," Junichi taunted, wiping blood from a fresh cut above his eyebrow. His chest heaved, but his grin was electric, alive.
"If you had brain cells, you'd know that's a dumb observation," Akame replied calmly. A sly, almost imperceptible smile touched his lips. "Then again, expecting you to think is a very… impossible 'if' scenario."
"Thank you," Junichi spat, his grin widening into something feral. "Thanks for reminding me why I fucking hate you so much. I'm gonna beat that grin right off your face."
***
SORCERER ASSOCIATION HQ – WAR ROOM
"What the hell is happening out there?" Rika demanded, her knuckles white as she gripped the edge of the central console. The holographic map of Nairobi flickered with overlapping damage reports and energy spikes.
"We're dispatching surveillance drones," a technician replied, fingers flying over her keyboard. "But the ambient fragment energy and shockwaves might fry their systems before they get close."
"I don't care about the drones. I need eyes."
"Miss Amanai," a male analyst called out, his face pale. "It's Mr. Junichi. He's engaged. Hand-to-hand combat. The energy signature is… exclusively his Earth Alchemy, but the counter-force readings are off the charts. Someone is matching him blow for blow."
Rika already knew. She had known from the first tremor. But hearing it confirmed sent a cold needle through her chest.
"Visual confirmation," she ordered, her voice tight. "As soon as the drones are in range."
"Yes, ma'am."
She stared at the map, watching the concentric circles of destruction pulse outward from the cultural district like a slow-motion detonation.
He's here.
And he's not running.
LIMIT BREAKER-END!