In the combined effort of several Officio's to counter the threat of Walpurgisnacht, the Black Templars cooperate with the Ninth. Alongside High Marshal Raleigh Alondight, Enyo meets up with Malal in the Ninth's assembly hall where they wait for the Culexus assigned to their squad.
Once the girl arrives, Malal reprimands her for being late and hits her head for getting smart with her before introducing her subordinate Omegon, or Yuma. The Black Templars are to protect her so that she can do her job of protecting them when things go awry. She then introduces Enyo and Alondight while joking about the High Marshal's height and wheels for feet.
Having them pointed out, Yuma can't help asking about the wheels. Malal warns her about asking, but Alondight calms her down and explains that she has wheels to move as fast as possible, following the First Knight's credo of delivering swift judgment.
Malal signals that they are under time constraints and asks the Templars to gather the rest of their squad while she has a word with Yuma, upon which the Marshals leave the assembly hall. Within minutes they line up their subordinates and return to the hall, ready to depart.
While standing at attention, the Black Templars witness Malal repeatedly shouting at Yuma, loud enough to short her vox speaker out and broadcast her unfiltered, furious voice. Alondight moves in and interrupts the Culexus, apologizing and reminding them that they are pressed for time.
Malal tells her that Yuma will lead them to the teleportation facility in her place while she takes care of something important before joining up again. The Grand Marshal then starts to drag Yuma off, but the Culexus resists and tears herself out of the High Marshal's grasp despite her warning that her Rank Leader is angry enough to kill her.
The wheeled girl grabs Yuma again, but Malal already noticed the commotion and shouts at her. Malal stumbles back and freezes in place before she is overcome by rage, screams out loud and starts to beat the younger girl. Enyo holds Malal back from behind while the other Templars form a line between them to protect Yuma.
Malal shouts about how they will all die because of Yuma's selfish actions, how she knew what damage forcing herself into Girl A's mind could cause and doing it anyway, her voice hoarse and bleak over the shorted out vox.
Alondight tries to calm Malal down, who repeats that Yuma's deeds domed them all, wondering how she managed to go from her most trusted subordinate to making everything worse than even the Rank leader expected, in merely three hours. Malal sends her off to guide the Templars while she goes to try salvage whatever is left, apologizing to Enyo and Alondight on the way.
Yuma no longer resists the High Marshal who drags her off to go and save the world. They leave the Officio headquarters and head towards the teleportation facility by public train, much to the Templars dissatisfaction. Alondight asks Yuma where the savings of this pragmatic transport go, who politely replies that the facility is deep underground and can currently only be reached this way and apologizes for the inconvenience.
The High Marshal tells the Culexus that she understands and is only unreasonable to make Yuma talk, punching Enyo into agreeing that she complains less than their comrade Mordred. With a wide smile, she offers Yuma one of her handmade macarons, mentioning how everyone at their castle likes them.
Yuma politely declines, explaining that she doesn't like sweets and doesn't feel like eating at all. Alondight forces the treat into Enyo's mouth while explaining that sweets provide the necessary energy to crush heretics, earning a battle shout from the group of Templars in return.
The High Marshal then inquires about the incident with Malal, justifying her bluntness with their imminent death and mentions that her reaction was rather unusual for the infamous Culexus Rank Leader. Yuma decides to give her a censored explanation, leaving out the worst and likely classified details.
From the vague explanation, Alondight fills in most of the blanks on her own and tells the younger girl that her mistake is in the past and that dwelling on it is useless, no reason to refuse her gift and an insult to the Black Templars who she supposedly doomed. She tells Yuma that she needs to ask herself what she wants and takes a guess that it is not pity, despite her behavior calling for just that.
Yuma rises up and claims that her horrible sin compromised the operation, but Alondight, rising herself to tower over the Culexus, has Enyo confirm that Walpurgisnacht has not yet arrived and killed them all. The High Marshal explains that while their Officio values prophecies and respects Malal's skill, they believe that even the most accurate predictions can be wiped out by fighting hard enough and that they intend to do just that.
Yuma takes the macaron from Alondight's hand and opens her visor to eat it, tears of realization flowing from her eyes as she understands that there can still be something she can do. As she finishes, the Templars get up and uniformly salute while the High Marshal asks if Yuma will fight with them or wait for death. The Culexus slams her visor shut and growls that she will fight, her spirit rekindled.
Alondight grins and takes a badge from her armor and explains that the highest ranking Templar picks one from her squad to serve as the Emperor's Champion before every mission, someone she thinks will be vital to the battle, someone to fight alongside with the will of the First Knight. Whispering that this is a very important hing for the Templars, she pins the badge on Yuma's armor and proudly proclaims her as the Emperor's Chosen of the Walpurgisnacht Crusade, followed by a collective salute.
After a while the group arrives at the teleportation facility, hidden in a subway tunnel which is the only place to build a huge, experimental complex out of sight of the public eye. Alondight seems unimpressed at first, but agrees with Yuma's explanation. Admiring the Ninths resourcefulness, she mentions that their own projects are more martial in nature and that they would have to deal with the Fourth for anything more. They even had to go to great lengths to make the secretive technology experts assist in the creation of their armors.
Inside, the Culexus rank is already preparing for departure, led by Cavefish who greets the new arrivals in her usual friendly fashion. Still awestruck by the huge Culexus, Alondight introduces herself and Enyo and asks about the facilities readiness. Cavefish confirms, joking about the possibility to be tossed into the warp but assures that it has never happened during their previous two uses.
An automated voice rings through the hall, announcing the count down of twenty minutes until the emergence of Walpurgisnacht. Cavefish shouts at the gathered Culexus to be thorough with their final equipment checks, and the Black Templar Marshals excuse themselves to tend to their troops checkups and prayers.
While the count down hits ten minutes, huge screens in the main chamber transfer the Officio video communications, showing the five locations the other squads are deployed to: New York, China, Egypt, the South Pole and Australia where Kyoko and Sayaka are stationed. The Black Templars are caught in rapt attention, staring intensely at the screens showing the feed from Australia.
Yuma asks the High Marshal what caught their attention like this, who in turn asks about the blue haired girl on the video feed. Yuma tells her about Sayaka, second in command Eversor of the Ninth, and Enyo cuts in to tell her superior that blue hair and a sword don't necessarily mean what she thinks. The moment they see Sayaka's cape however, Alondight recites the description of the First Knight and her subordinate can no longer disagree.
The Templars fall to their knees in reverence and the High Marshal explains to the confused Culexus that they believe the girl who looks just like the First Knight to be an omen of good fortune and victory sent to comfort them in the coming darkness. While Sayaka notices the camera, flips it off and drags Kyoko and herself out of view, Yuma tells Alondight that their omen is far from being religious, but the High marshal replies that her identity matters not, only that they got to see her.
With only two minutes left, the Templars and Culexus group up under Alondight's command, small units of one Culexus accompanied by two Templars to shield her with strict orders to close in on the witch cocoon to destroy it as soon as they arrive, no matter what happens.
Alondight wonders if anything is wrong since Yuma and Cavefish have been quietly nodding at each other for a while. Yuma decides to take the risk of contacting Malal on a mental level, despite the possibility of interrupting her work and receiving a backlash. She pulses a message requesting confirmation to proceed without the Rank Leader. For half a minute, nothing happens, then Malal's reply arrives.
The words “Kharn is gone”, filled with fear and despair strong enough to cause pain, spread out to the entire group of Culexus who cry out in shock. In her death screams, Malal warns them that Kharn could not be stopped and is heading towards Walpurgisnacht. She begs Yuma to go, who roars at the upset group to get moving, followed by Alondight's battle shout as the teleporter tears them out of the world as the count down hits zero.
The group arrives at their destination scattered, their formation broken before it could be formed in the first place. The witch of Kharn awaits them with her host of Daemons. While Yuma is nowhere to be found, the Black Templars and Culexus fight on for two hours, taking heavy casualties. During this time, Enyo loses her remaining arm to a familiar that posed as an injured comrade.
During their continued battle, the presumably lost Yuma contacts the group. Alondight informs her of the current situation and locates her coordinates to join up.
The beaten up group quickly arrives at Yuma's location and Cavefish, in considerably better shape, lifts her friend up in a crushing hug. Yuma speaks with the remaining Culexus, learns their names and promises to do her best to bring them home before listening to Alondight's plan.
The High Marshal explains that they will exploit Kharn's personal weakness of craving a final sword fight by charging her witch with the main group while a small group consisting of Mordred Pendragon and two Culexus sneak up from behind to exterminate the still sleeping Walpurgisnacht with her strongest skill. While skittish in actual combat, her Sword of Promised Victory is a formidable ability passed on to all Pendragon daughters, with her being the strongest in this generation.
Yuma expresses her concern about Kharn's witch sharing her weakness, but admits that this is the best option they have. Cavefish enthusiastically chooses to accompany Mordred and Yuma follows suit. Alondight admits that Mordred doesn't look inspiring, but assures that she is more than capable as a Black Templar and Pendragon. Should she falter, Yuma should simply remind her of her vows and how she would shame the Pendragon family by failing her duty.
When Alondight tells Yuma to slap Mordred around for emphasis, Enyo cuts in, assuring that a verbal reminder is enough and that her behavior is only a matter of inexperience. The high Marshal smirks, mentioning that Enyo trained Mordred herself and sees her as the potential successor of Swordmaster Paladin Victoria. She also reminds her subordinate that Victoria betrayed her vows, making Enyo stomp off angrily after claiming that despite her bad decision the Paladin's legend remains intact.
Enyo asks if Yuma and Cavefish are ready and orders a white clad Templar to give them any ammunition and rations they can spare. Meanwhile Mordred keeps sitting on a pile of skulls, sword clenched, ignoring everything around her while Enyo grows angrier with each passing moment.
She eventually starts talking by complaining about her vanguard consisting of a gorilla and a child in gimp suits and that the High Marshal must either want her dead or be a fool. Enyo growls that they are going to follow the High marshal's plan and tells her to finally prepare herself.
However, Mordred matches Enyo's growl, telling her not to talk to her like this before angrily pointing at Yuma. She starts to blame her for jeopardizing the mission like Malal said, points out how she showed up two hours late and still wears the cross of Emperor's Champion. While Enyo tries to reign her in, Mordred rises, unsheathes her blade and shakily points it at Yuma, claiming the Culexus is unfit to bear the insignia.
Yuma pushes the blade away with one finger, complaining that she should wait to be sanctimonious until after they are all dead, mentioning that her family name must mean little to her if she makes a fuss like this. Furious, Mordred tries to assault her, but before she can lift her sword again, Cavefish catches her in a crushing hug, completely ignoring the Templar's shouts and struggles.
The huge Culexus lifts Mordred up and uses her large gun to smack the struggling girl's rear like punishing a child, happy to see that it seems to be working. Yuma turns to apologize to the Templars for shaming one of their own, but notices that they are smiling in amusement and satisfaction, murmuring about how they never thought of disciplining Mordred like the spoiled brat that she is.
Once Mordred stops her struggle, Enyo asks Yuma again if they are ready to head out. The Culexus confirms that they have everything they need, and the Marshal asks for one more favor. Yuma agrees, and the Templar Marshal asks her to tell Alondight that she always admired her should the two of them survive. Pointing out how important this is to her, Enyo admits that she should have told her herself earlier and heaves a sigh of regret.
Yuma agrees, but wonders why she doesn't simply tell her herself right now. Enyo explains that she does not want to risk distracting the high Marshal from her duties, from survival. In return for her favor, the Culexus demands that Enyo tells Alondight herself if she survives, who swears on her life.
Suddenly a huge winged daemon drops down, crushing Templars and one of the remaining Culexus under his feet. Enyo pushes Yuma away and shouts at her to get to her designated zone while the Templars deal with the enemy, raises chainsaw blades from her mechanical arm and charges toward the daemon.
Moments later, the Black Templars begin their charge, and just as planned, Kharn takes the bait and rises from her throne, confidently walking toward the group of knights. Kharn obliterates the Templars with ease, her prowess even greater than before and completely lacking in the Warmaster's playfulness. While the dying knights try their best to kill the monstrosity, Kharn laughs and turns around, raising her black blade toward Mordred's building lance of energy in mockery.
Alondight screams at them to abort and run, but Yuma decides to stay and builds up a shield with Cavefish, which is easily shattered by Kharn. After the third strike, Mordred drops her sword and escapes, crying for her family.
Malal appears out of nowhere, wielding a rosewood bow with a brightly burning tip. She fires a single arrow and defeats Kharn's witch, miraculously reverting her back to human form. The surviving Templars begin searching the battlefield for any survivors, aided by the arriving support troops from the Ninth Officio.
Alondight and Enyo are among the survivors. While the high Marshal is treated in the temporary hospital Kyubey had built, Enyo finds Yuma and tries to wake her up, relieved to find her still alive. She calls for an Apothecary to treat the Emperor's Champion, but the Culexus tells her that she is alright and asks for Alondight so she can fulfill her promise. Enyo thanks her for the gesture, but explains that she will talk to the high Marshal herself once she has recovered.
Shrugging the issue off, Yuma remembers about Cavefish and asks where she is, claiming that her best friend should be alive since she stopped the black blade from crushing them. Enyo confirms that she broke the blade and pulls the huge Culexus' helm from behind her, explaining that they found the suit close to Yuma but were unable to revive her as she dissolved into ashes.
Enyo explains that they analyzed her biometrics and found that Cavefish was completely drained of her magic at some point during the fight, apparently by something else using her power. Yuma realizes that it was likely herself while trying to stop Kharn, but Enyo tells her that it is only a theory and that they do not know for certain.
What they do know is that not even Malal could have done what Yuma did without help, and Enyo tells her that she is stronger than she realizes, mentioning that the Rank Leader chose a worthy prodigy.
Yuma remarks that Enyo refers to Kharn as the Betrayer and asks about the reasoning. The Marshal explains that it seems fitting after the Ninth Warmaster betrayed everyone. She remarks that she would challenge her to a fight if the Ninth Incubator did not request her to be returned intact- But in her current state, it would not be satisfying in the first place.
Kharn is in the center of the clearing, clutching Malal's still suited corpse, crying and pleading her friend not to leave her. Yuma decides to leave her to suffer on her own and instead asks about Mordred. Enyo tells her that she escaped and is hiding herself from their regular tracking methods, but there are already teams looking to find and capture the cowardly Templar to answer for her transgressions.
The Templar Marshal lowers herself to her knees and formally apologizes on behalf of the Second Officio, offering her sword to the Culexus with the promise not to rest until the debt of honor is repaid. Yuma accepts, mentioning that there might be a time when she needs them, and Enyo happily thanks her for this boon, promising not to disappoint her again.
