Although the main story of Assassin's Creed Shadows isn't quite as long as Odyssey or Valhalla, reaching the ending can be a surprisingly involved process. The main thrust of the plot focuses on assassinating a group of enemies called the Shinbakufu, but taking them down won't actually roll the credits. Naoe and Yasuke each have individual arcs to wrap up, focusing on Naoe's connection to the Assassin Brotherhood and Yasuke's opposition to the Templars.

Warning: The following article includes major spoilers for the story and ending of Assassin's Creed Shadows.

Unlike Odyssey and Valhalla, Assassin's Creed Shadows doesn't exactly have branching endings, although choices made within the endings can slightly change how the scenes play out. When playing in Canon Mode, which gets rid of choices, one specific sequence of events plays out as the canon approach to the ending. There's also an epilogue that can be accessed after the credits roll, which provides a little more closure for the found family aspect of the story.

What Happens After You Kill The Shinbakufu In Assassin's Creed Shadows

Confronting The Leader Of The Shinbakufu

Throughout Assassin's Creed Shadows, Naoe and Yasuke are both driven to hunt down of the Shinbakufu, a masked group of villains. Naoe seeks revenge for her father's death at their hands, while Yasuke remains loyal to his deceased daimyo, Oda Nobunaga, and considers the Shinbakufu traitors. The final known member they have to kill is Akechi Mitsuhide, who deposed Nobunaga, which then reveals the path to Ashikaga Yoshiaki, the unseated shogun.

While Yasuke and Naoe both have reason to kill Yoshiaki, he offers Naoe a mysterious box that was taken from her father at the start of the game in exchange for his life. This stays her hand, but Yasuke expresses that he has no such reason to show mercy. Yoshiaki then points him in the direction of the Templars, so Yasuke also chooses to leave Yoshiaki alive, but delivers a parting dig about how Nobunaga's name will long outlive Yoshiaki's.

What Happens In Naoe's Ending In AC Shadows

Naoe Learns The Truth About Her Mother

Naoe can then follow Yoshiaki's advice to find an underground Assassin vault, where she returns the box that he provided. While she's in the vault, Hattori Hanzo, a famous samurai of the era who shows up earlier in the game, enters to deliver his own box. Each of these boxes contains one of the three Imperial Regalia of Japan, leaving one absent.

The three Imperial Regalia of Japan are a sword, mirror, and jewel that represent valor, wisdom, and benevolence. These are said to have been ed down from the gods, but Assassin's Creed Shadows, perhaps surprisingly, doesn't use it as an opportunity to dive into the lore of the Ancients.

Naoe follows Hanzo out of the vault, and he proceeds to explain his involvement in the Kakushiba ikki, the Japanese splinter of the Assassin Brotherhood. Hanzo also reveals that he always loved Naoe's mother Tsuyu, and that he sold the Kakushiba ikki out to Yoshiaki out of anger that she was living a happy life with Naoe's father. He regretted his actions after the Kakushiba ikki fell and Tsuyu seemingly died, later sending a letter to Naoe to warn of the attack on Iga that occurs in the game's prologue so that Tsuyu's daughter wouldn't share her fate.

In the canon ending, Naoe attacks Hanzo, although she can choose not to with Canon Mode off. With or without a fight, Naoe and Hanzo ultimately agree to seek her mother together, as Tsuyu may still be alive. Naoe's story ends with this reluctant truce, leaving Tsuyu's fate unanswered for now.

What Happens In Yasuke's Ending In AC Shadows

Yasuke Confronts The Demon Of His Past

Yasuke, meanwhile, focuses his hunt on the Templars, a task that he may or may not have started before visiting Yoshiaki depending on individual player progress. Unsurprisingly, his conclusion is more action-packed than Naoe's. Once he's killed the Portuguese slaver Duarte de Melo, he goes after Kimura Kei, who trains a school of Templar acolytes that Yasuke has to fight his way through.

Yasuke kills Kei, then tracks down the Silver Queen, who turns out to be Mitsuhide's daughter. She drugs Yasuke on behalf of the Templar Nuno Caro, but when Caro arrives, she asks to kill Yasuke herself. Rather than following through on this promise, she requests Yasuke's help in rescuing her brother and helps him along the path to Nuno Caro when he does so.

When Yasuke comes face to face with Nuno Caro, it reveals that he killed Yasuke's mother to prove how he would punish insubordination. He also attempted to kill Yasuke, who escaped into the sea before ending up with the Portuguese Jesuits who took him to Japan. Yasuke defeats Nuno Caro in a duel, declares war against the Templars, and slices Caro's neck as the injured Templar attempts to shoot him. Caro continued to call him Diogo, so Yasuke declares that his name is Yasuke before the credits roll.

What Happens In The Assassin's Creed Shadows Epilogue

A Final Promise Of Tomorrow

After the credits, the story wraps up with some quests involving Junjiro, the child whose father nursed Naoe back to health at the beginning of the story. At Assassin's Creed Shadows' hideout, Junjiro makes a banner with the symbol of the Assassin Brotherhood, which is planted near the entrance. Naoe and Yasuke can then talk to Tomiko, who runs the hideout, to receive some words of advice about figuring out how to live and take care of themselves after completing their quests for revenge and justice.

Several more final conversations with characters at the hideout can optionally be played out, after which Naoe receives a message from Hanzo, who says he has a lead on Tsuyu. He also includes Master Assassin robes for Naoe in a bundle. In a final exchange on a cliffside, Naoe shares that she expects Hanzo to find her when he's ready, and asserts that she will find her mother when she's ready. Yasuke establishes his plan to remain and take care of Junjiro, who views him as a father figure.

Junjiro arrives as the conversation draws to a close, declaring his hope to grow into Naoe's Master Assassin hood someday. Naoe says that "It's a big job," to which Junjiro responds that "Anything is possible." The three characters look out on the horizon together, marking the end of Assassin's Creed Shadows' epilogue and the main story as a whole.