Silence

The episode drifts back to an orphanage, where a young L is collected by Watari and brought to the home that shaped him. In the present the detective slips into Watari's room and stands silent, the hushed, mournful mood suggesting he already feels his end drawing near. At headquarters he keeps pressing Rem about the notebooks, and she parts with as little as she can to shield Light and Misa, though her caution only sharpens his doubts.

On Light's instruction, Misa resumes killing criminals, crooning an eerie tribute to Kira in a maid's outfit. The detective's suspicion of her swells while Light waves it away, and he turns over whether a mere fragment of the notebook might work as the whole, mindful that the forged rules still appear to clear the pair. Overhearing the exchange, Rem grasps with horror that endangering Misa again is a deliberate ploy to push her into killing the detective and dooming herself.

Light later finds the detective alone in the rain atop headquarters, mourning his distance from other people, and the two trade thoughts on how readily everyone deceives. Back inside, the detective announces a plan to test the false thirteen-day clause by having a condemned prisoner write in the book. Before he can act, Rem yields to her devotion to Misa and strikes down Watari, who triggers an alarm that erases the team's data as he falls.

The detective barely registers the loss before his name takes hold in Rem's notebook, and he slumps from his chair into Light's waiting arms. Meeting Light's triumphant grin, he understands at last that his reasoning had been correct, then closes his eyes and dies in peace. The act of prolonging Misa's life destroys Rem, whose form crumbles to dust and leaves only her book behind. Light quietly pockets it, vows to the team that he will avenge the fallen, and silently crowns himself ruler of the world to come.

This installment ends the detective's pursuit, with Rem sacrificing herself to save Misa and Light inheriting her notebook. Several scenes appear only in the anime, among them the childhood arrival at the orphanage, Misa's costumed performance, the rooftop confrontation in the rain, and a quiet moment of L washing Light's feet that the director deliberately left open to interpretation, hinting at readings from a betrayed friendship to a detective bested by his quarry. Along with the following episode, it is one of only two to omit the usual rule card between segments.