In order to catch up with the main Shinsengumi branch, Chizuru and the still injured Hijikata have to pass through Nikko-guchi and Oouchi pass.

Okita finds out about Kondou’s death and is extremely angry at Hijikata for it. But Hijikata’s still injured, so Okita leaves him. Kijikata asks Saitou, and it seems it’s true, Kondou was beheaded.

Chizuru catches up with Okita and explains to him what happened that day when Kondou was captured. Okita reminisces about when he was younger and how Kondou looked after him. It seems that Okita didn’t like Hijikata back then because he was closer to Kondou than him. Okita doesn’t believe he can ever forgive Hijikata so he leaves him to Chizuru and walks away.

When Chizuru returns to Hijikata, she sees him and Saitou facing off with Heisuke trying to break up the fight. It seems that Hijikata wants to join the front lines again even with his injuries and Saitou’s completely against it. After only two slashes Saitou gets his blade to Hijikata’s neck. And he agrees to let Saitou take command at the front lines seeing as he’s the leader of the Shinsengumi now, he shouldn’t take risks again.

Soon, the new government army begin to attack and they’ve barricaded themselves in Kan’ei Temple in Ueno.

Harada hears about the war and stakes out somewhere waiting for the Rasetsu to show up to claim blood when the battle is over. Shiranui happens to be there as well, he came prepared with a huge bag of silver bullets as they’re the only things that can kill them.

As the Rasetsu unit move closer, the two greets Koudou and then attack. A long hard fought fight later and all the Rasetsu are dead. Koudou attempts to blow the two up but fails as Harada launches his spear into Koudou’s arm. He drops the bomb and it explodes by his feet. The two rest by a tree but it seems Harada’s injuries were very serious. And they were never seen again.

At the same time, Hijikata’s wounds aren’t healing well, so he and Chizuru go into hiding.

Okita’s randomly wandering around, not knowing what to do, and his illness keeps getting worse. One night he hears someone mention Hijikata and investigates. It was the enemy, so Okita follows them.

Okita waits as a bigger enemy group gets ready to attack Hijikata. After Okita coughs out a gout of blood, he knows he doesn’t have long left. Determined to protect the new leader of the Shinsengumi, he straps his sword to his hand with bandages attacks them with all of his Rasetsu powers.

In town, Chizuru finds that Hijikata has headed out of town and runs to catch up. Hijikata’s certain that Okita’s fighting out there, so he carries on, and Chizuru goes with him.

They arrive to see a massacre. Okita isn’t there, his sword is. Knowing what’s happened, Hijikata turns around and says that Okita will be fine.

Well… that was depressing… the ending theme coming in made it sadder. I knew it was heading for a sad ending, but this is coming too quickly. So many people died or disappeared in one episode. There was no need, for one thing they could’ve spaced it out a bit to let it sink in gradually. There were too many at once, it’s just not nice. It’s sad and I don’t like it. I even have a small temptation to stop watching… but I’ll keep going I guess I really can’t stop now.

So the deaths, first off, confirmation of Kondou’s death. Isaw that coming, even though I hoped he’d be alright. Then Okita left them, he’s in a bad state already, so I guess his death was inevitable, at least he went out with a bang. The most annoying one was Harada, he was perfectly fine, he didn’t have to get mixed up with the Rasetsu, he could’ve left it all to Shiranui who’s a real demon so he can’t die that easily. But he had to get involved and get killed. Although that’s not quite confirmed yet, they did leave it hanging. Though, by the looks of his injuries and facial expressions, he’s most likely dead. Even Shiranui knew it, probably why he didn’t take him to somewhere to get patched up.

Saitou and Shimada are the only two left who can fight properly and Hijikata’s wounds don’t look like they’ll heal. It’s good how Saitou was able to get some sense through Hijikata, but I don’t think it’ll help him survive for much longer.

I don’t believe how easily Koudou died, it’s like with Kaoru. Chizuru never had a reunion, and they didn’t even make a big fuss about it. The story started with Chizuru looking for Koudou, don’t tell me it’s strayed off course. And to me it seemed like they rushed it. I don’t think Koudou’s gone, I think he’ll be back later with an even bigger Rasetsu army, with himself as a Rasetsu or something like that.

I had no idea at all about the names of places and other names of things so I just wrote them down as heard. Although I think I got a little understanding of everything after reading into the actual Battle of Aizu. But I’m not gonna read too much into it in case it spoils the story.

Anyway, quite a well done sad episode, some bits went a bit fast, but still, very sad overall. It can’t get worse than this, most people are already gone and the sadness is, not badly done. I’m still waiting for some people to show their faces, like Kazama to come back and where did Osen and Kimigiku disappear to? And I want to know more about Koudou and the Rasetsu, something tells me we’re not done with them just yet.