Celes from Final Fantasy 6

VS
Esdeath from Akame Ga Kill

This is a match up I didn't come up with myself, but after bumping into it I've grown to love it. Two sword-wielding female generals to a corrupt empire, infused with magic essentially turning them into walking talking weapons of mass destruction with both having an affinity for ice magic. You could argue Kefka would be a better match given he shares in Esdeath's crazy sadism, but I prefer Celes in this case for one good reason. This match up to me has the same appeal as matches like Balrog vs TJ Combo, a hero going head to head with what's essentially a dark reflection of what they could have become, giving the fight more of a story than your average vs match. I only have a fairly surface level understanding of the two, so as far as I know there could be even more connections and fight potential than I brought up.

As for how it would go, this fight could be surprisingly brutal. Both Celes and Esdeath can take some pretty serious injuries, so that partnered with Esdeath's sadism could make for a very bloody battle. I could just see a lot of it being focused on them throwing out magic attacks at each other, with Esdeath being able to use her ice magic more tactically while Celes' more varied types of magic allows her to endure the brutal wounds she receives and strike back just as hard, and near the end as they've both gotten used to each other's powers and exhausted themselves it devolves into a head to head sword fight where every slash landed feels like it could potentially be the killing blow, eventually ending with either Celes managing to cut down the cold blooded general, or Esdeath making sure her challenger suffers before she dies. So as for who wins, I'm thinking Celes. Depending on what you give her, Celes can have much more versatile and powerful magic than Esdeath, as well as better weaponry. But if you only go with what Celes can learn on her own without customization, the battle's more pitched, but I still think she could win more often than not. Esdeath's power is at best continent covering, but Celes can help fight final form Kefka, who to my understanding has enough power to tear a continent apart, proving that even if Esdeath is at her full maximum power, Celes is still fully capable of contending with it along with her other hax abilities like self healing, status effects, and the fact that she can actually absorb magic attacks via Runic. Now that's not to take anything away from Esdeath, I personally think she's the better mid-battle strategist, she's definitely one of the most versatile cryomancers I've ever seen, and her time stop might just be a broken enough trump card to take Celes out right then and there. But overall, I just see a few more win conditions for Celes at the moment, and think she'd probably win 6 or 7 times out of 10. Again, my knowledge on both is a little more surface level, so I'd definitely need to look deeper into this if I ever tackle it myself.

So what do you think? Would Esdeath's more tactical and sadistic approach be enough to put down Celes, or would Celes' versatility and power give her the leg up she needs to defeat her cold blooded opponent?