While Kael and Nozomi faced Reimu with everything they had, the earth trembled beneath the impacts, buildings collapsed in a crash of concrete and dust, and Paris was transforming into abandoned ruins. The vibrations from the ground travelled up through their legs, each distant detonation rattling broken windows and sending clouds of grey ash billowing upward. On the secondary front, Aria, Harris, and Shinrei had quickly found themselves surrounded by Reimu's army — on all sides, with no way out. With no means of escape or even retreat, the only solution available to them was to take up arms, to fight, to resist, and to defend themselves as best they could.
Though numerous, Reimu's army launched coordinated attacks at a sustained and relentless rhythm, with cold mechanical precision. Their assaults were entirely coordinated, as though each soldier had been trained for years to fight in formations of several dozen. They attacked, repositioned, yielded their place to other formations — all without ever granting our heroes a single second of respite, striking systematically wherever the damage would be most painful.
Attacked from all sides, our heroes could do nothing but defend. Harris used his mastery of wind to absorb or deflect the army's own attacks back at them, turning their strikes against their authors in slicing gusts. Aria, for her part, created barriers to protect them — her hands outstretched, sweat beading on her forehead as the pressure mounted.
They were being pushed back from every direction. However, Shinrei, thanks to his speed, was able to dodge the enemy attacks and slip through the middle of the army like a ghost. He tried to fight them as best he could. His speed made him difficult to track, allowing him to strike without being noticed. Unfortunately, the enemy soldiers were entirely on the defensive, showing not the slightest crack. Their senses were sharp and, even without seeing him, they could feel him — reacting to the faintest disturbance in the air.
But Shinrei's attempts were not in vain. His attacks, even if they yielded few direct results, at least had the benefit of opening windows of opportunity that Aria and Harris immediately exploited to launch counter-attacks.
A fierce exchange of defensive spells, gusts of wind, and projectiles of pure aetherium — it was their only means of holding on and not collapsing before an army of such numbers. Their muscles burned, their breathing grew increasingly ragged, but not one of them let their guard drop.
Suddenly, a massive bolt of lightning struck at the foot of the Eiffel Tower, making the very air vibrate. A second later, an intense sound resonated throughout the entire city, and a gigantic shockwave hit them full force, nearly throwing them off their feet. Smoke invaded the landscape — thick and acrid — concealing everything in sight. Aria, Harris, and Shinrei drew together so as not to lose one another in the chaos that had just erupted.
Harris spoke, his voice taut but controlled. "That lightning and that shockwave — they came from where Nozomi and Kael are fighting. I hope things are alright on their end."
Aria answered him, her eyes still scanning the smoke. "They're tougher than that. It takes more than this to finish them off. But we need to find a way to hold these soldiers in check, or we won't last much longer."
They had no time to think further before a sound came from their bracelets and Elyra's voice emerged, transmitting information with reassuring clarity. "Children, can you hear me? Good — I've been able to analyse the surrounding area and locate where the civilians are being held prisoner."
Without a moment's hesitation, Aria said: "Thank you, Elyra." She turned to Shinrei, her gaze resolute. "Shinrei, go and save them. Use the smoke and the confusion to slip away unnoticed, then go free the prisoners. With your speed, you're the best suited for this mission."
Shinrei hesitated, his gaze moving from Aria to Harris, visible tension in his shoulders. "But the plan was to hold them back and then go save them together. I can't leave you two alone. Just the two of you — you'll have no chance against them."
Harris cut him off immediately, his voice firm and absolute. "Nozomi put this plan together because he didn't want to put us in danger. But if we follow his plan to the letter and all three of us leave, the army will reinforce Reimu and Nozomi and Kael will have no chance. We need to stay here and hold them back while Kael and Nozomi deal with Reimu, and you go free the imprisoned population."
Aria added, her voice softer but no less resolute: "Don't worry about us. Go quickly, before the smoke clears."
Shinrei clenched his fist, his fingers so tightly gripped that his knuckles went white. He looked at them one last time — a heavy, grave look. "Don't die," he said, before disappearing into the smoke, slipping past the enemy's gaze unseen. He made the decision to trust them, even as every fibre of his being screamed at him to stay.
While Shinrei was gone, Elyra made contact with Aria and Harris once more. "I didn't interfere in your decision — but I have no intention of letting you sacrifice yourselves."
Aria and Harris exchanged a surprised glance, slightly unsettled by Elyra's words, which had seen through them somewhat. They stayed silent and listened. "I've analysed the entire surrounding area. There is not the slightest sign of life or of anyone trapped or hidden in the vicinity."
And in a tone both concerned and solemn: "Don't worry about the infrastructure or the consequences of your actions. Fight without restraint for your survival."
The sun set and, as the moon rose, darkness fell over Paris like a shroud. Without electricity, the only source of light by which to continue seeing was the fires that had formed throughout the fighting — casting flickering orange glows over blackened facades and gutted streets. Shadows danced among the rubble. The hot air, thick with smoke, stung their eyes and burned their throats.
The smoke gradually cleared and Reimu's army reappeared, silhouette after silhouette, hemming our heroes in on all sides. Aria and Harris prepared to fight, knowing they were putting their lives on the line. They advanced toward that army of more than seven hundred, their stomachs knotted but their faces impassive. Aria spoke, her voice strangely calm. "Thank you for worrying about us, Elyra. But we don't intend to die. The other three wouldn't be able to accept it."
Harris followed, adjusting his grip on his staff. "We have no choice but to defend ourselves, then."
In a heroic surge, Aria stepped forward — her legs firmly planted in the rubble — and with a great sweeping motion of her arm, she formed a large luminous circle from which a destructive beam erupted, sweeping away everything in its path. The army retaliated immediately, launching spikes of earth from the left and leaping hounds of lightning from the right. She reacted with extraordinary speed, arms crossed before her face, erecting barriers to protect herself — the impact sending tremors through the entire ground.
Harris followed behind her with a fluid, rapid upward motion, sending the soldiers who had attacked Aria flying into the air, their bodies hurled several metres before crashing back down heavily. He spun around and performed a sweeping rotation across a hundred and eighty degrees, creating a gust of wind that drove the soldiers back against a wall of slicing air.
For greater mobility and effectiveness, Aria and Harris made the decision to split up.
Once Harris had put some distance between them, Aria placed her hands flat on the ground, palms pressed to the cracked concrete. Circles five metres in radius formed beneath her fingers in a blinding white light, and columns of pure aetherium reduced the soldiers standing on them to rubble with a deep rumble. These attacks, though they consumed a great deal of energy, were devastatingly effective. After that, the soldiers stayed on their guard and took no further risks.
They attacked Aria as a team, always targeting her blind spots to catch her off guard. Some created diversions — drawing her attention — while others slipped behind her and struck by surprise, their footsteps muffled beneath the noise of the surrounding battle.
At first, Aria found herself in difficulty, forced to spin around constantly, the back of her neck cold at every sound behind her. But she very quickly understood their strategy. Under these conditions, it was very difficult — near impossible — to parry everything and anticipate their movements. She made a bold decision: to leave her blind spots openly exposed. This way, she could anticipate where the attacks would come from. The plan was nevertheless very risky — a single lapse of attention and she could take a fatal blow.
But she chose to follow her plan and trust her instincts. Her right hand created offensive spells while her left managed the defensive ones. She fell back on basic spells that consumed little energy, so as to endure over time. This way, she could focus more on the enemy's attacks — on how to act and react — and less on managing her own abilities.
On Harris's side, he plunged into the thick of the crowd without hesitation, staff gripped tightly. While airborne, he took the opportunity to analyse the situation and the terrain with a quick, precise sweep of his gaze, absorbing every detail — the enemy formations, the open spaces, the angles of attack. Just before landing, the information gathered, he began to spin on himself at full speed.
Rings of air formed all around him, and once he touched down, Harris resembled a miniature tornado. Air currents spun around him at such speed that one could no longer even make out Harris's silhouette inside — only the piercing whistle of compressed air.
Thanks to this technique, Harris could move at full speed in every direction, changing course and angle at any instant. It allowed him to weave between enemies and dodge their attacks with disconcerting ease.
Furthermore, when adversaries launched long-range attacks at him — lightning bolts, fire breaths, or projectiles of water and earth — Harris was able to deflect them to the sides using his tornado. But he was not content simply to evade. He struck head-on with his tornado, and at the point of impact, the enemy was hurled at full speed into the air before crashing back down in a violent impact, their body battered by the force of the currents.
Harris was handling himself very well. Unfortunately, the enemies had identified the weakness of his technique and moved in close to strike at short range, where the air currents were less effective. Harris found himself in a difficult position, hemmed in on all sides, the attacks coming one after another without giving him time to reclaim space.
With his back against the wall, he expanded his tornado with a cry of effort, raising it to several dozen metres in height — its gravitational centre absorbing every object and every person in close proximity. Standing at the heart of his tornado, Harris drew in all the nearby enemies, sending them spinning before hurling them away in a crash of bodies and debris.
The battle raged on. Aria and Harris had not lost hope and fought valiantly for what they loved — for the success of the mission and to protect the population. But their bodies were taking the toll: aching muscles, the light wounds accumulating, breathing growing increasingly laboured.
On his side, Shinrei had arrived in the area Elyra had indicated. Once on the ground, Elyra made contact with him again. "Shinrei, I'm sorry — I can't push my analysis any further within a radius of a hundred metres from where you are. The prisoners are somewhere in this zone."
Shinrei answered, already moving. "That's alright. I shouldn't take too long to find the place."
Setting off at full speed, Shinrei searched every corner of the area Elyra had mapped out. Every building, every dead end, every alleyway, every shop — he let nothing escape him, his soles barely audible on the rubble-strewn ground. Thanks to his speed, it took him only a few minutes to find where the prisoners were being held. However, ten soldiers stood guard at the entrance — armed and alert.
Shinrei had no time to waste. He attacked directly, without stopping to devise a plan. The moment the enemies caught sight of Shinrei, they unleashed a barrage of water and lightning at him. But Shinrei passed through their attacks using his intangibility and struck one of the guards at full speed — a direct punch to the face. The sheer impact knocked him out cold.
Then, using his speed, he overwhelmed the others with a dozen simultaneous strikes, putting them down one after another. Suddenly, one of the guards conjured a water dragon and launched it at Shinrei — but a second later he had vanished and the attack struck the guard's own comrades, sweeping them away in a crash of water and stone.
Shinrei reappeared behind the guard and swept his legs out from under him before grabbing him and sending him crashing into the others. Caught off guard, the remaining soldiers had to dodge — and in that brief instant, they took their eyes off Shinrei, losing sight of him entirely.
They no longer knew where he was. While they looked in every direction, ears strained and fists raised, one guard dropped — unconscious. Then a second. Then a third. Only one remained standing, his breath short, spinning on the spot in the darkness.
Unfortunately for him, before he could understand what was happening, Shinrei appeared before him in mid-air and delivered a spinning kick that sent him crashing into the wall with a sharp, brutal force — knocking him out on the spot.
Once the guards were neutralised, Shinrei reached the prison where the inhabitants were being held and broke through the walls with a single blow, releasing a cloud of dust and sending the crash resonating through the entire corridor. The inhabitants were startled and frightened to see Shinrei enter — some instinctively stepping back, others pulling their loved ones close.
At once, he said to them, his voice calm and reassuring: "I'm one of the good ones. I'm here to help you. Come with me — I'll get you to safety." He contacted Elyra and asked her: "Elyra, can you guide the population to a safe location? All the enemies should be concentrated on the main front — there shouldn't be any danger in the streets."
"Count on me — I'll guide them somewhere safe. You go and rejoin the others now. You've accomplished your mission."
While Elyra's ship showed the prisoners the way, Shinrei rejoined Aria and Harris at full speed. The battle was fierce, and the damage was felt both across the ravaged terrain and physically on the enemy — and on our heroes. Even as they defended heroically, the experience of Reimu's army, combined with their sheer numbers, was gradually wearing down their resistance. The wounds were accumulating, the attacks growing slower, Aria's barriers shortening, Harris's tornado dropping in height.
But just as the end seemed to be drawing closer, in the night sky, an enormous mothership appeared — descending slowly from space, its colossal mass approaching Paris with a sovereign, unhurried grace. In the darkness and obscurity that reigned, the light it radiated illuminated the entire battlefield in a powerful white brilliance, driving the shadows back to the furthest corners of the ruins. Like a semblance of hope for our heroes.