Chapter 15: A Hero's Passing

Days had passed since the Grey Order's tournament team had discovered the plot against them, and tensions continued to mount in the league. Karma and Graves shot dirty looks at most other champions they came across, reserving their dirtiest looks for anyone aligned with Demacia or Noxus.

Hourse before their semifinal match with Noxus, the group sat a a lunch table, silently eating when Graves finally spoke up, "I'm all for running headfirst into traps, but we need some sort of plan for this."

Karma smiled, "Oh yes. I have a plan, and the wheels are already in motion. If all goes according to plan, we will all leave this match alive and we'll expose the evils of this league."

Graves nodded his head expectantly, "Annnnnnd that plan is?"

"I cannot tell you, you wouldn't agree with it, but it must be done."

Graves shook his head, "here you go again with all your mysterious bullshit."

Karma grimaced at him, and the group continued to eat in silence. After finishing everyone left and sat in Karma's room preparing for the most important fight of their lives.

Volibear silently sat, polishing his armor and silently growling to himself. Annie put a new scarf on Tibbers and passively threw a fireball from hand to hand. Graves sat there polishing the barrel of his gun and whistling quitely to himself. On the other side of the room Vi silently leaned against the wall, one hand gauntletless while she tinkered with the settings on her other gauntlet. Karma looked from person to person, amazed by their dedication to this and preparing herself to make the ultimate sacrifice for her order and for all of Avaron.

Suddenly, they all felt their bodies pulled from where they were. They all flew through the league until they reached the gate to the Summoner's Rift. Their bodies were pulled in and they awoke on the field.

...

Excited, Annie grabbed a deathcap and placed it on her head feeling power rush through her body, "This feels amazing." The effects had become even more potent, "so much power."

Karma nodded her head, "the battle is upon us, be ready for it."

With that the group split up and rushed to their various lanes. Annie allowed her fire to rush up her arms and engulf herself in it. Upon arriving to lane, she was surprised to find Leblanc there.

"Where is Swain?" Annie yelled to her angrily.

"Top lane, I will be your opponent today. Try to give me a challenge."

With that the battle was joined. Leblan fired a sigil at Annie which connected with her body. Barely phased Annie continued charging at Leblanc until the chain linked itself with her body. Suddenly she felt all the power drain from her for a moment and she couldn't fire her fireball at Leblanc. Leblanc teleported behind her and kicked Annie in the back sending her flying forward, when suddenly Leblanc teleported back to her starting position and Leblanc's foot connected with Annie's face. Annie was thrown backwards, dazed and confused. She telepathically called out to Vi for help, but Vi was already top lane helping Volibear. Growling, Annie silently vowed to win this fight, her life depended on it. Angrily, Annie rolled to the right as Leblanc threw another chain and she threw two fireballs in quick succession at her Leblanc was hit by the first but teleported away from the other.

"You're good," Leblanc remarked as she fired another sigil of silence at Annie which found its mark. Leblanc teleported to Annie again but Annie leaped out of the way, landing roughly on the ground.

She nodded her head and let lose a cone of fire in front of her, singing Leblanc who fell back and suddenly exploded. Surprise, when the dust settled there were two Leblanc's standing before Annie. Annie looked from one to the other confused. Sensing her advantage one of the two ran directly at Annie and Annie dropped a fire ball on top of the Leblanc, but was surprise to see her vanish in a puff of smoke. As Annie readied another fireball the real Leblanc flew through the clone and brought her knee to Annie's face. Annie felt her jaw break and cried out in pain. Tears streaming from her face she decided it was time to unleash the combo on Leblanc.

As Leblanc rushed towards Annie to finish her off, she smiled, although with her broken jaw it looked more like a grimace, and began her combo, using her fireball to stun Leblanc, stopping her charge in its track. Angrily, Annie allowed her jaw to drop and fire to engulf Leblanc who screamed out in pain. To finish her combo she threw Tibbers directly at Leblanc who exploded in Leblanc's face sending her flying backwards onto her back. Leblanc lie there, unable to move from the intense burns all over her body as Annie jumped on Tibbers, her face bloodied, but excited to see Leblanc's mangled body. As Tibbers crushed Leblanc under his paw, Annie heard a yell from bot lane and rushed through the brush, but to her horror she saw Karma on her knees, an axe protruding from her chest. Karma looked to Annie, then to Graves, before falling flat on her back.

"NOOOOO!" Graves yelled as he rushed at Draven, his eyes filled with rage. He brought the shotgun to Draven's face and blasted him in the face, however Draven managed to use an axe to knock the barrel to the side, causing the shell to only take a piece of his face off. Screaming in pain Draven rolled back and threw an axe at Graves which connected with his shoulder. Unfazed, Graves continued his assault, and as Talon leaped from the brush to stop Graves Annie leaped over Graves and crushed Talon under Tibbers weight. Enraged, Talon used his blade to slice one of Tibber's legs off. TIbber fell in pain, tossing Annie off. Annie cried out for Tibbers as she saw him writhe in pain. Graves threw a smoke grenade back over Talon, blinding him, and Annie used the opportunity to blast Talon with everything she had. Nothing remained except some charred flesh on the ground.

Annie ran to tibber crying, "No, Tibbers! You're fine. I swear you're fine, we/'ll stich you up and then you wont leave me and it'll be okay." Exasperated Annie could barely string together the words to say to her most trusted companion.

Annie looked up to see Graves putting a shotgun slug into a fallen Draven, killing him and securing their victory on the bot lane.

"Karma!" Graves cried out running back to her.

Karma lie in a pool of her own blood, coughing, "It's okay Graves. Everything is going as according to plan. I intended for this to happen."

"What do you mean," Graves asked, confused, "we could've done this without your death."

"No." Karma retorted, "If we all survived this fight the world would not know of the league's betrayal. I've become a martyr. I've already arranged for Nasus to take control of the Grey Order. The fight is not over, you must speak with Aka-"

Her voice trailed off as she died in Graves's arms. Graves looked up to the sky and screamed at the top of his lungs. Annie ran to Graves and wrapped her arms around his neck, crying into his shoulder.

Graves stood up with Annie still wrapped around him, "It's okay little one," he said, his voice calm despite the horrible pain in his chest, "let's finish this."

With those words Graves and Annie marched to the enemy base, and despite Darius's best effort to stop them, Graves and Annie destroyed the nexus, ending the fight and winning the biggest upset in league history.

Back in the Institute, the 4 of them came to, however Karma's lifeless body lie in the middle of the room. The four silently sat in the room, just staring at Karma's lifeless form.

Finally Annie spoke up, "She looks so peaceful. Maybe she's happy wherever she is now."

Graves nodded his head, "She deserves a proper Ionian burial. And this league deserves to burn to the ground."

While Graves's words struck an idea in Annie's head, Volibear sensed this and immediately discredited the idea, "dont dirty your hands. Averon itself will burn this league for us.

Volibear had never spoken truer words. As news of Karma's death spread throughout the league, champions began to refuse to fight, and when the viewers no longer could view matches they demanded to find out why and before long everyone had discovered what had happened and the league's plan. Riots were held all over the Institute and eventually the league of Legends Grand Council was impeached, replaced by a new Council, which changed the League and rewarded The Grey Order the benefits of victory in the tournament for the year. While the victory was bittersweet, the creation of a separate city-state for this Order made sure Karma's sacrifice was not in vain.

"She was a hero."

"We're all heroes, we did this. We created a new city-state. We fought the battle and earned this."

...

The four remaining members of the team stood over the coffin as it was lowered into Ionian soil. Many Ionian tribes had come for the funeral. Many people were very saddened to see the death of such an influential figure. The end to her life was so abrupt and out of place. Graves adjust his black tie and handed Annie a tissue. Annie rubbed her eyes with it, although their bloodshot state remained. Her hand finally found Graves's and she held it tightly. Volibear bowed his head and turned and walked away with Nasus.

"News of the league's betrayal has reached the furthest ends of Averon and already hundreds if not thousands of people are beginning to flock towards the Grey Order," Nasus began, "but this war is not won. Although the tournament has been cancelled and our team has been granted the victory for this year, there is still another problem."

Volibear looked at Nasus dumbfounded, "What other problem could we possibly have?"

"Although the city-state has begun to build itself, we have the threat of an invasion from Demacian and Noxian forces. As we speak, I was recently informed that there are two separate armies marching for our borders."

"This is not good. The Ursine have not yet reached this land, and we have no formal military to defend ourselves yet."

"And since the league has been discredited, they have no power to stop the attack. This is a battle we must fight on our own. We have no army and no means of fighting these armies."

"I heard you need an army," said a voice from behind the two of them.

Nasus and Volibear turned around surprised, as the voice continued, "It just so happens, my master has an army which I've recently inherited."

Nasus's eyes widened as he noticed the mask, "Zed?"

"Zed has died," the voice said lifting the mask to reveal her face, "It is I akali, I have become the new Master of Shadows, and I'm here to lead my army and fight under the banner of the Grey Order."

Speechless, Nasus's mouth opened and closed a few times. Sensing his comrades confusion, Volibear spoke up, "this must've been what Karma meant when she told us, an army will present itself when we are ready for it."

Akali nodded, "When I heard what had become of Karma, I rushed to her funeral hoping to find some members of the Grey Order, luckily I found it's new leader. This makes my search much easier. We need to leave soon, I'd like to stay and mourn longer but my troops have already begun to move into defensive positions around the city, however I still need your help to win this."

Nasus smiled, "Although we won the tournament and exposed this betrayal, our war has only just begun."

With those words, Annie, Graves, and Vi rejoined the trio and they prepared for the next step in the Grey Order's future. Becoming a world power.

END

(A/N: So that's it. i decided to end this story here before I dragged it out too far. Let me know how you guys liked it. Also I've got a few ideas for another story.

a sequel to this, which would basically depict the war and whatnot

a Zed focused story, but it would deal with the darkest points in his past and his coming to be the Master of Shadows but it would be different from Zed's backstory this one

An Akali focused story that would basically depict them going to a school to prepare ordinary people to become champions in the league, this one would feature more OC's in it and would be very expansive, longer than this story I think. For the record I've already written some of this so it would be published faster than the others

A Vi/Cait story about them kicking ass together. I depict Cait to be a bit of a tramp and she would sleep around alot and i would build humor off of that

TBH i'll probably end up writing all these stories because I like all the ideas, but if you guys maybe wanna see one before the other i'd take that into consideration. Although I wanna hold off on writing a sequel for this story because im kind of sick of this universe i created, I wanna make a different one before I come back. I wrote all these chapters over the course of 2 days, I really felt like I owed it to you guys after leaving you hanging for so long. Also I think I'm not gonna do a split story again, it started getting so difficult to keep track of, even after i reread my story. Yea but had a lot of fun writing this, and I really want to bring the champions back to life in another story in the future.

Also in other news I was reading a fic the other day and I noticed the author talking about alpha/beta readers. If anyone is interested in doing something like that for me, I'd be totally cool with it. For those who don't know, alpha readers read my stories before I publish them and gives me advice and offers their opinion on the things I've written and if they think the way I'm making the characters behave makes sense. A beta reader basically just corrects my mechanical mistakes. I'd really love another creative mind to help me with my story writing process, and another smart guy who knows how to clean-up the mistakes I miss. Think about it :D