Chapter Summaries

After Imperial Consort Marianne was assassinated, Ask Vi Britannia discussed the danger to his family and his own political position with Emperor Charles. Charles sent Lelouch and Nunnally to Japan and approved Ask’s plan to strengthen his faction, while Ask began identifying unreliable allies.

• Ask told Emperor Charles that Marianne had likely been killed by someone she knew and warned that her children could be targeted next.
• Charles said Lelouch and Nunnally would be sent to Japan as political pawns, while Ask would stay in the palace until being sent to the EU front the following year.
• Ask asked Charles to let Monica join the Knights of the Round, and Charles agreed to promote her if she earned sufficient distinction within three years.
• After leaving the audience, Ask ordered his knights to have the old duke rein in the faction and find its fence-sitters.
• Ask asked about Earl Weinberg and Earl Asprius, and the older knight reported that Weinberg had turned unfavorable while Asprius had brushed them off as usual.

Ask decided to pursue the throne after his mother's death and revealed his suspicions about her to Monica, whom he pledged to make his guardian knight. He planned to bring Lelouch into his struggle and left to take Monica to the EU front.

• Ask arranged to invite Beatrice to his palace and summoned Jeremiah, hoping to gain an ally in the Secret Intelligence Bureau.
• Ask dismissed Lelouch as weak but told him his duty was to protect Nunnally.
• Ask told Monica that he had once sought only to survive the imperial struggle, but now planned to seize the throne and suspected his mother had orchestrated her own death.
• Monica swore loyalty to Ask, who said he needed Lelouch to help him ascend the throne rather than use him as a rival claimant.
• Ask ordered Monica to double her training and accompany him to the EU front, where he intended to help her earn a place among the Knights of the Round.

Ask confronted Beatrice with the deaths of her younger siblings and the human experimentation tied to them, seeking to draw her into his support. Beatrice found the word “Geass” written in blood on the back of a letter, leaving her shocked.

• Ask met Beatrice over dinner and deliberately invoked his mother, Marianne the Flash, prompting Beatrice to reveal her hatred of her.
• Ask explained that his investigation into Beatrice had uncovered suspicious records about her younger brother and sister, who were said to have died during the Bloodstained Rebellion.
• Ask mentioned human experimentation, and Beatrice angrily swept the tableware to the floor as Monica aimed a handgun at her.
• Ask signaled Monica to lower her weapon and asked Beatrice to explain what had happened; Monica then gave her a sealed letter.
• Beatrice opened the letter, found it empty, and discovered the word “Geass” written in blood on its back.

Ask V Britannia persuaded Beatrice to support his bid for the throne by revealing his suspicions about Emperor Charles and asking for her intelligence resources. Beatrice accepted, seeing Ask’s ambitions as a possible path to revenge against Marianne, Geass, and Charles.

• Beatrice praised Ask’s intelligence after learning that he knew about Geass, and Ask resumed their discussion.
• Ask argued that Charles was neglecting the empire and losing the support of its nobles and royals.
• When Beatrice asked whether he intended to seize the throne, Ask admitted he had no chance of winning without better intelligence and support.
• Ask asked Beatrice to help him, promising that the empire would eventually be his.
• Beatrice clasped Ask’s hand and agreed to put her faith in him, hoping his goals might align with her own desire for revenge.

Ask weighed the rival factions and his limited strength as he prepared to pursue power, then attended Emperor Charles’s routine meeting. The meeting turned to Lelouch, who confronted Charles over Marianne’s assassination and received a dismissive response.

• Ask considered the strengths and weaknesses of Odysseus’s, Schneizel’s, and his own factions, and concluded that Charles and the Knights of the Round were his greatest obstacles.
• Ask decided he needed another fighter at the level of a Knight of the Round and planned to get Monica into their ranks.
• Ask attended the imperial meeting and watched nine-year-old Lelouch enter to address Charles.
• Lelouch told Charles that Marianne was dead and demanded recognition that she had been assassinated in the palace.
• Charles dismissed Lelouch’s request as trivial, leaving Lelouch angry and disbelieving.

After Emperor Charles dismissed Lelouch and Nunnally as diplomatic tools, Ask received word that a mysterious woman had been sighted inside the palace alongside Marianne. He ordered Jeremiah and Beatrice to capture her secretly, leaving the mission in the hands of a knight whose loyalty to Ask was absolute.

• Charles rebuked Lelouch for being weak and ordered him and Nunnally to leave for the Island Nation as diplomatic tools.
• Ask received a report from Beatrice that people had seen a woman inside the imperial palace, always in Marianne’s presence.
• Ask summoned Jeremiah Godwald and introduced him to Beatrice Franks, his future Secret Intelligence Bureau director.
• Ask gave Jeremiah the woman’s photograph and ordered him to capture her in strict secrecy, with Beatrice’s assistance.
• Jeremiah accepted the mission without asking questions, prepared to carry out Ask’s orders even if he became a disposable pawn.

Ask appointed Jeremiah to lead the Pureblood Faction and discussed Geass investigations and the coming invasion of the Island Nation with Beatrice. He tasked Beatrice with finding a woman connected to Geass before he left for the EU.

• Ask promised Jeremiah leadership of the Pureblood Faction once their plan succeeded, and Jeremiah swore fealty to him.
• Ask told Beatrice he would soon leave for the EU and asked her to continue investigating Geass and develop countermeasures.
• Ask predicted that the empire's Sakuradite negotiations with the Island Nation would be followed by an invasion, and proposed using the war for experiments on Geass countermeasures.
• Beatrice asked whether Ask worried about his siblings being sent to the Island Nation as hostages, but Ask showed no concern.
• Beatrice agreed to work with Jeremiah to find the woman connected to Geass before Ask departed for the EU.

Ask prepared to take command on the EU front while secretly pursuing Geass, then questioned the captured green-haired woman in a hidden chamber. She identified herself as C.C., and Ask demanded that she tell him everything she knew about Geass.

• Ask studied the EU and considered establishing a Geass Research Institute there.
• Jeremiah told Ask that his people had captured a woman, and Ask ordered him to bring her secretly to the palace.
• Ask arranged cover for the arrival and led Monica through the bookcase entrance to his concealed chamber.
• Ask and Monica shackled the unconscious woman, woke her with cold water, and Ask questioned her.
• The woman named herself C.C., and Ask demanded to know everything she knew about Geass.

Ask interrogated C.C. to confirm her healing and test whether she could survive death, while Monica helped him. C.C. revived after being shot, leaving Ask convinced she was immortal, but her muttered words remained a mystery.

• Ask tore C.C.'s straitjacket and cut her arm, then watched the wound heal without leaving a scar.
• Ask questioned C.C. about the symbol on her forehead and inflicted pain, but she refused to answer.
• Ask signaled Monica to shoot C.C. in the forehead, and she appeared to die.
• After about five minutes, Ask felt C.C.'s heartbeat return, and she began speaking in her sleep.
• C.C. woke and insulted Ask, who responded with teasing flirtation.

Ask forced C.C to reveal the truth about Code, then spent seven days talking with her and used the name she had spoken in her sleep to soften her defenses. He left her locked in the secret chamber as he prepared to depart for the EU, while C.C began to consider withdrawing from Marianne’s plans.

• Ask threatened to dismember C.C, frightening her into yielding and explaining Code.
• Ask spent seven days with C.C in the secret chamber, seeking to make her trust and obey him.
• When Ask prepared to leave for the EU, C.C asked whether he would release her, but he said he intended to keep her imprisoned and take her to the battlefield.
• Ask told C.C he had heard a name in her sleep, then spoke it tenderly at her request.
• Ask kissed C.C on the cheek, unlocked her restraints, and left her locked in the chamber.
• C.C reflected on her growing feelings for Ask and murmured that she might withdraw from Marianne’s plans.

Ask praised Jeremiah and appointed him to gradually take over leadership of the Pureblood Faction, while directing him to prepare for the coming war with the Island Nation. Ask then planned for Monica to distinguish herself on the EU front and resolved to establish a geass research facility there; the chapter ended with an eight-year time jump.

• Ask praised Jeremiah for his discretion and told him he would eventually lead the Pureblood Faction as Duke Belia transferred authority to him gradually.
• Ask told Jeremiah to prepare to distinguish himself in the war with the Island Nation, which Ask expected to begin within a year.
• Ask reviewed how his weekly deliveries of gifts had concealed the cart Jeremiah brought on the day C.C disappeared.
• Ask told Monica that they would leave for the EU front within three days, where she would earn distinction while he commanded from the rear.
• Ask planned to establish a geass research facility after taking control of the EU front, then fell asleep; the narrative jumped ahead eight years.

Eight years after leaving for the EU, Ask returned to the Island Nation with Monica and Leila as Jeremiah briefed him on Clovis's murder. Ask learned that Suzaku Kururugi had been named as a scapegoat and realized Lelouch's plan had begun; C.C. awaited someone at a villa.

• Ask arrived in the Island Nation with Monica and Leila and was welcomed by Jeremiah and a military escort.
• Jeremiah apologized for failing to protect Clovis and told Ask that the killer had not been identified, though he suspected a member of the imperial family.
• Jeremiah revealed that evidence pointed to honorary Britannian Suzaku Kururugi, whom he planned to blame for Clovis's murder.
• Ask recognized Suzaku's name and said the plan had begun, then told Leila that C.C. had likely found Lelouch and given him Geass.
• Ask explained that Lelouch and Nunnally were secretly alive, while C.C. watched the sky from a villa and said he had finally arrived.

Ask met with Cornelia in Britannia’s prosperous settlement in the Island Nation and learned of a masked terrorist who had evaded her forces. He ordered a public execution to draw the terrorist out, while Lelouch recognized the plan’s sponsor as his elder brother, Ask vi Britannia.

• Ask told Cornelia that he had kept resistance groups active in the EU to conceal his secret operations and strengthen his position with the imperial family.
• Cornelia described a masked terrorist who had intercepted a Britannian machine, organized an ambush, and escaped; Ask became interested in meeting them.
• After Cornelia left, Ask ordered Jeremiah to announce the public execution of an Honorary Britannian and secretly let the terrorist escape if they took the bait.
• Lelouch watched the execution announcement and angrily condemned Britannia for targeting an innocent person.
• C.C. began to identify Ask to Lelouch, who revealed that he already knew Ask was his elder brother and a leading rival to Schneizel.

C.C considered Lelouch too inexperienced to recognize that Suzaku’s execution was a trap set by Ask, while Lelouch planned how to respond to Ask and Jeremiah. At Ashford Academy, Milly’s grandfather ordered her to visit Ask and explained that the family depended on her winning his favor.

• C.C watched Lelouch worry about Ask’s arrival and Suzaku’s impending execution, and concluded that Ask had arranged the execution to test Lelouch.
• Lelouch dismissed the chance that Jeremiah would intervene but struggled to devise a way to reach Suzaku through the obstacles posed by mechs.
• Milly’s grandfather told her to accompany him to visit Ask the next day and described the Ashford family’s need for a marriage alliance.
• Milly accepted that she would have to please Ask, then recalled her first visit to him three years earlier.

Milly recalled how her family had arranged for her to enter Ask’s household as a maid three years earlier. Now she was about to visit Ask again.

• Three years earlier, the head of the Ashford family brought Milly to meet Ask and offered her as a prospective bride.
• Ask assigned Milly to begin as a maid, leaving open the possibility that she might advance if she pleased him.
• The Ashford elder told Ask about Lelouch and Nunnally, and Ask arranged for them to stay at the Ashford family’s school under changed names.
• Milly decided that serving Ask might be safer than marrying into another noble family.
• Three years later, Milly prepared to visit Ask again.

Ask received Milly at the Tokyo Settlement and kept her under his control while watching Suzaku Kururugi’s public execution preparations from afar. After ordering an investigation into the terrorists, Ask learned that Emperor Charles had entered EU territory and ordered the Geass Ruins and his secret factories secured.

• Jeremiah greeted the Head of Ashford, who brought Milly to Ask’s room at the Tokyo Settlement.
• Ask dismissed the Head of Ashford and made Milly comply with his demands, keeping her in his room through the following evening.
• Ask watched Suzaku Kururugi’s transfer on television and recognized that Clovis’s hearse was being used to provoke Jeremiah and create a chance for Lelouch to approach him.
• Ask told Leila to investigate the backgrounds of the terrorists who had arrived with Suzaku Kururugi, then told Milly to return to school.
• Monica relayed Beatrice’s report that Emperor Charles had appeared in EU territory, and Ask ordered the Geass Ruins evacuated and his Military Factory and Geass Factory operations halted.

Ask heard Jeremiah’s account of the failed operation and ordered him to keep leading the Pureblood Faction while losing command of the Island Nation front. After learning that Villetta Nu had also encountered a student and lost her memory, Ask suspected Lelouch and decided she needed to be brought under control.

• Jeremiah apologized to Ask for failing during the previous night’s operation, and Ask said he did not blame him because Jeremiah had been at an informational disadvantage.
• Ask reduced Jeremiah’s command authority but kept him as leader of the Pureblood Faction, transferring command of the Island Nation front to someone else.
• Jeremiah asked what to do about Suzaku Kururugi, and Ask ordered Suzaku released for insufficient evidence while being designated as Clovis’s killer.
• Jeremiah told Ask that he could not remember his actions and that another subordinate had suffered the same memory loss after seeing a male student.
• Jeremiah identified the woman as Villetta Nu, and Ask suspected Lelouch had been responsible and resolved to bring her under control.

Ask investigated Villetta Nu after Jeremiah reported that she knew about Geass, then ordered her disposal when her records showed she was of no use. He and Leila discussed planting a spy in Lelouch's organization, leaving Leila to consider what kind of person Lelouch would promote.

• Ask questioned Jeremiah about Villetta Nu and told him to keep her under control without drawing attention.
• Monica suggested using Villetta for Geass experiments, but Ask rejected the idea because he could not guarantee her loyalty.
• Leila obtained Villetta's records, and Ask ordered her killed; Leila relayed the order to Jeremiah.
• Ask said Lelouch needed a catalyst to advance his organization and discussed planting a spy in its upper ranks.
• Leila concluded that Lelouch would promote someone capable, trustworthy, and loyal from the beginning.

Ask planned to exploit Lelouch’s need for a public victory by planting spies among the Island Nation resistance groups. At Ashford Academy, Lelouch considered how to grow his organization and worried that Ask might have discovered his Geass.

• Leila discussed why Lelouch would need to accommodate faction leaders and agreed to gather information on the terrorists for Ask.
• Ask told Monica that Lelouch would likely use the Island Nation Resistance Front to make a public debut after his setback against Cornelia.
• Ask ordered Jeremiah to place agents among the resistance fronts and wait for further instructions.
• At Ashford Academy, Lelouch reflected on his organization’s weakness and decided he would have to act ahead of schedule.
• Lelouch worried that Jeremiah might have noticed his Geass and wondered why Ask had come to the Island Nation.

Lelouch accepted the Island Nation Liberation Front’s invitation as Zero, while Ask arranged for the invitation to reach him. Ask also learned Suzaku had joined Lloyd’s team and directed his researchers to advance Monica’s seventh-generation transformable Knightmare.

• Lelouch arrived at his factory base, where Kallen told him the Island Nation Liberation Front had invited them, and he agreed to go.
• Ask learned Jeremiah’s attempts to infiltrate the Island Nation Liberation Front had failed, but the news of his contact with them had reached Zero.
• Jeremiah told Ask that Suzaku Kururugi had been recruited by Lloyd’s Specially Dispatched Guidance Technology Department, and Ask chose not to interfere.
• Ask called Bartley and learned Monica’s seventh-generation transformable Knightmare had passed tests and was being shipped toward Britannia.
• Ask instructed Bartley to prioritize the Energy Wing, use a second seventh-generation Knightmare as a test unit, and focus resources on upgrading Monica’s machine.