PROLOGUE:
PERCEPTION
CHAPTER 5 OMAKE:
TOKEN OF APPRECIATION
October 2nd, 1991; afternoon, West Rukongai District 34: A garganta opens up in the sky directly above the more populated township of the district where the peasants below are packing up and returning home for the day. Collectively, they gradually notice the giant black rift opening in the sky in plain view. The same happens in 31, 32, and 33: all have gargantas prying themselves open in the sky. From each, 10 various hollows fall before it closes back up, and they land, sending screeches across the miles and miles of countryside that make the majority of the outer precipice of each district.
Yumiko rings up the rest of her Vanguard squad form the Denreishinki as she spies through a telescope on the roof of the 10th Division's barracks. To each, she says, "Get your sword and report to our meeting spot as soon as possible." She speaks it robotically, as if over a radio during a military alert.
Within a minute, her and 6 other low-ranking shinigami arrive together at their meeting place near the far western gates in District 1. Four of them are rank-and-file soldiers of mixed gender and equally bland attire. Two of them are 20th seat officers who share the position with one other that couldn't be convinced, and both are male. Yumiko stands before them and makes role call, "Hayashida Saemon...Shiraki Kozue...Sasuke Maresuke...Suko Sanjuro...Umemoto Fumimaru...Kurokawa Maresuke!"
Each person yells when their name is called. Hayashida Saemon: a middle-aged-looking man who fancies a head full of black dreadlocks, is only decently tall, not actually very intimidating, and carries a yellow Katana with a five-point-star-shaped guard.
Shiraki Kozue: A much younger gentleman who looks more korean with darker-than-average skin and is quite concerned with appearing clean. His hair is neatly chopped like a short hime cut, and he has a very soft figure. He carries a Katana with a guard shaped like an Ouroboros that is scrupulously scrubbed to a shine.
Sasuke Maresuke: One of the officers; another younger man with distinctly long, brownish hair that drapes his back in a ponytail. He seems like your typical samurai build, complete with battle damage. He hides behind a Harimaki Do built into his Shihakusho and a Kabuto helmet with a tengu mask. He wields a nodachi as his zanpakuto, which has a guard shaped like two wings.
Suko Sanjuro: An elderly man who seems to have joined the Seireitei on his deathbed. While elderly, he still stands without help and does it proudly despite his seemingly frail body and humble look. This man has few words for anyone around him and acts like a stone-cold killer. He weilds a tanto with a square guard cut into four quadrants as his Zanpakuto.
Umemoto Fumimaru: The other officer. He looks to be Chinese, about 40 years of age, and is part blind, so he must rely on all of his other senses to confront danger. He wears a greatly reduced shihakusho to assist in this, so he isn't the most proper sight of the bunch. He wields a katana shorter than average with a guard in the shape of a horizontal cross.
Kurokawa Maresuke: The sister of Sasuke Maresuke who also outfits herself in a Harimaki Do and Kabuto helmet with a female Oni mask. She does not carry a sword, but instead a Bo-staff with iron caps on its ends. Like her brother, she holds her darker brown hair in a somewhat longer ponytail. Unlike her brother, she shows no signs of previous battle injuries. The two barely speak under normal circumstances.
After role-call, Yumiko stomps her foot on the ground and pivots, now facing the Rukongai, "If you will all look at your radars, you'll notice four large blips in the distance. From my calculations, there are 4 squads of hollows; 10 each." She turns towards them again and starts pointing, "Hayashida and Sharaki, you two take the squad in 34. Maresukes, you two go after the ones in 33. Suko, you approach 31. Umemoto, you're with me; we're going to 32." They all pair up and bow, then charge forth on her word.
Suko Sanjuro is the first to reach his destination: the central square of the largest town in the 31st district. Curiously, there don't seem to be any disturbances nearby. In fact, the populous are utterly oblivious to their surroundings for the most part. He takes another look at his radar; there are definitely at least 8 blips nearby. They're not moving for the most part, so he simply hops up onto a nearby roof and sits there, watching the screen intently.
Nearly 15 minutes pass without a single movement, and so he's just about to give up and dismiss it as a false positive. That is, until one of the blips suddenly appears directly behind his position. He whips around while yelling, "Hado 31: Shakkaho!" A massive fireball materializes in his hand and fires off in a split second, slamming into an invisible mass just a few meters away from him. The hollow's natural cloak fizzles out, revealing its ugly exterior: A massive, 6-armed, lanky beast resembling a centipede with the head of a deformed bird's skull. The entire body is covered in long, pointy hairs colored tar-black that would allow it to blend in with the darkness if it were night. When struck, it cries with a shrill screech that forces the nearby souls to cover their ears, but Suko barely flinches.
He flings out another spell, "Bakudo 9: Geki!" and a huge, red light scalds the beast. It falls to the shingles of the roof and can barely support itself, only just barely able to move. This means nothing, however, as Suko draws his sword and swifly plants it inside of the hollow's mask with an ear-raping scrape. Shortly thereafter, he plants a finger on the blade an commands, "Hado 11: Tsuzuri Raiden." In a quick flash, the sword vibrates with electricity that flows directly into the hollow, making it convulse and grumble while its whole body starts falling apart at the seams.
When Soku turns back around to address the people, he finds that they've already fled and presumably hid in their homes. The entire area feels like a ghost town...until the remaining hollows reveal themselves. There are 9 more, all the same as the last, and one even bigger. They all cling to the buildings like parasites and begin to make their way towards him.
He whispers, "Tsk, tsk, tsk; you amateurs need to learn a lesson in tactics. Zofukuki..." He holds his sword out as it transforms into its released state: A square chakram held in the center by four rods. He continues to hold it out and recite in full, "O lord, mask of flesh and bone, all creation, flutter of wings, ye who bears the name of man..."
The hollows start to speed up, closing in and gather in the central square like a tidal wave of arms and hair; a black mass that crashes through buildings with reckless abandon.
"...truth and temperance, upon the sinless wall of dreams unleash but slightly the wrath of your claws! Amplified Hado 73: Soren Sokatsui Zofukuki!" Upon finishing the incantation, the chakram glows bright blue and channels the power of Soren Sokatsui, but takes from Soku and the environment around him and powers it up by an utterly massive amount. He waits, letting it charge up to its fullest potential for as long as he can afford. The beasts are only seconds away, and he finally decides to unleash it.
With a quick twist, the blade emits two cones of blue fires so wide and bright that they appear to be one; it sears them so badly that the sound of burning flesh can be heard by those even blocks away. It not only engulfs the entire hollow mass in an incinerating wall, but nearly pierces the ground with its sheer strength. The ground itself becomes singed and starts melting into molten dirt where the hands of the hollows start sinking into. The entire square has been nearly obliterated by the heat, but it continues to spew forth for just several moments. Soon, it sputters and fades into nothing. He gazes upon the wrathful destruction that is the pit of lava that the mass of hollows is slowly roasting in, though most of them have been utterly roasted to the point of missing limbs. He turns away, dissatisfied with the lack of challenge that the hollows posed.
And then he hears a crunching sound. Turning around, he notices that the biggest of the hollows is eating the others. As it rips its maw open and devours the others who are now slowly dying anyways. It starts to heal, and then quickly grow, and soon becomes strong enough to simply ignore the pool of lava it sits in! Soku prepares for another charge, but finds himself dumbstruck when the eyes of the beast glow red and fires beams of thin light that drag across the rooftops where he stands and diverge rapidly like reverse scissors.
"A...cero?" he only has time to guess before everything the beams touched suddenly explodes in a flurry of dark-red plasmic death! The entire top-half of the building he's standing on and many more are instantly and completely destroyed. In response, the hollow screams like a banshee while still growing even larger; its arms becoming bulkier and more numerous. It arcs its body up into the sky, continuing its screams, firing ceros into the air in victory.
Meanwhile, Hayashida and Sharaki arrive in the 34th district, which is where the quality of life really starts going downhill. The area that the hollows have decided to invade is a fairly huge farm ripe with famine and a sparse population. The two look around silently, observing their radars and moving purely by them. Hayashida, the more mature of the two, reminisces, "You know, I grew up in a place like this. Not as bad, but still deep in the country." Sharaki, who hasn't heard his voice much before, is surprised by just how deep it is; like that a whale's. He spends a moment taking that in, and another questioning, "How did you live like that?"
Hayashida stops and glances back at the substantially less burly young man and dismisses that, "I'm going to pretend you didn't just say that."
Sharaki grumbles and insists, "I'm serious, how?"
With a sigh, Hayashida at least responds with a hint of nostalgia in his tone, "A lot of work. You get used to it."
Sharaki spots the tone and skips all the busy-talk, "Yet you chose to go to the Seireitei?"
Being reserved, Hayashida simply responds, "Though it would be better — you don't know how it is."
"You're right," Sharaki admits "but we both joined this team for a reason, right?"
Hayashida falls silent. He nods with a sigh, returning to the scouting. However, they need not venture far as an elderly farmhand runs up to the two and starts shouting something about a huge, black and white boar tormenting his horses. The two decide to follow him to the stable, only to find that the horses had not only been spooked, but have been ravaged by the beast! Several corpses lay strewn around the open field with a pitch-black boar the size of its prey standing over a recently mauled corpse. It notices the two shinigami, turning and revealing a white hollow mask covering the top-half of its face that traces out the contours of the pig's face below albeit with much sharper and more ornate eye holes than necessary.
Hayashida turns to Shiraki, gesturing to look at the radar. The latter confirms, "There's more than this one. Looks like a herd of them isn't far from here." Hayashida nods and tells Shiraki to stay close and watch the boar while he tries to overpower it. He hops over the fence like he's done it a hundred times before and starts to slowly walk towards the boar, which starts to squeal at him and rear up, poised to charge when he gets too close. It comes much sooner than expected; he only needs to walk within full, clear sight of it before it becomes aggressive!
The animal charges at him without a care or plan, and instead of leaping to the side, Hayashida stands his ground with arms outstretched and ready to impose on the enemy. Meanwhile, Shiraki jumps up on the fence and into the field, then circles around the two, well enough away to avoid being seen.
The charge is quick and hefty, powerful enough to immediately make Hayashida second-guess the current plan. Stubbornly, he decides to stick to moments before the beast slams directly into him, and he catches the boar by its tusks with his bare hands! He slides back quite a ways away as the boar pushes with its entire weight to overpower him, and nearly succeeds if not for him suddenly twisting its head to the side hard enough to topple the pig over entirely! He staggers back afterwards, still fatigued from just catching that thing.
Though it's his queue, Shiraki is distracted by the sheer might that his teammate just displayed. He stares at him, bug-eyed, but stops and notices the boar once it starts struggling to get up. He rushes over with his sword drawn and manages to slam it into the gut of the pig before it can topple back over! He drags the stuck blade along its underside and watches in disgust as black blood begins gushing from the wound! Not only that, but he nearly vomits when he sees that the blood seems to be infested with maggots of some sort. Not normal ones, but monstrous hollow-maggots! He pulls back and wretches, trying hard to spit up the disgust but failing.
Hayashida too is disgusted, but keeps calm and gets back up, backing away and sticking out his hand, "Hey, get away from it! Those things are fucking growing!" Surely enough, the maggots are not only pouring out by the dozens, but steadily growing in size like bloated ticks poised to explode at a moment's notice. Shiraki instinctively sprints in the opposite direction, ignoring the massive fireballs that Hayashida is now spamming into the cluster. Several explosions in, he stops, and his companion turns around to notice that the body of the boar is practically seared to a fine crisp while the maggots are shriveled and lifeless. The blood is dried and stained on the ground, and the corpses are slowly dissolving.
The two stand and breathe heavily, glad for it to finally be over. Their victory is short-lived, as another and even larger boar with huge horns on its mask comes barging into the field and plows straight into Shiraki! He goes flying through the air and lands squarely on his back without a sound, but Hayashida takes notice regardless and pulls out his sword to deal with this one. The beast who had plowed through is backed by what appears to be a massive, cloaked, humanoid figure. It adorns a shoddy brimmed hat, and holds in its disproportionate hand a whip. In the other, a lantern. Within its cloak, he can see a hollow mask looking like a much more rigid human skull. The giant, standing at least 4 men tall, whips at the boar and causes it to go into a frenzy! The beast squeals repeatedly, charging at Hayashida much more quickly than than the last one.
He waits for it to draw close, and just as it's about to hit, he flash-steps to the side and lets his blade slide along the side of it, making an awful scraping noise! He looks back in surprise, noticing that the beast has some sort of carapace covering its whole body — all except for the underside. Not only is the pig angered by its miss, but the giant is too; he whips to the side and groans angrily at the boar, which turns around and rears up once again! It charges with just a short span to speed up, and is easily side-stepped again. Hayashida bides his time for now, waiting to see how he can topple the beast over...
His time runs short very quickly, however. Another giant comes lurching in from the distance, much more aggressively than the other one! He starts thinking back on some of the spells he learned at the academy, and comes up with one that just might help...
The boar, passing by him a fifth time, keeps shortening its charge length in every iteration. Soon, it's nearly standing still and flailing about; so he takes advantage of its stillness and backs up, placing a hand on the ground and reciting, "Hado 23: Futto Retsu." A red glow is placed where he holds his hand, then he backs up again and snaps his fingers to get the boar's attention. It works like a charm, and it reacts predictably: another ramming attack. This time, however, the boar runs right over the glowing spot on the ground and is almost instantly toppled by a huge column-shaped explosion that goes off in that exact spot! It falls onto its back, and is swiftly dispatched with another stab-and-drag from Hayashida's sword. More maggots start to spill out just like the last one, but he can barely focus on them when the more aggressive giant behind him suddenly sprouts wings and dives towards his position!
Shiraki reaches forward and yells, "Behind you!" while attempting to shoot off a Byakurai to at least stun the giant. The lightning bolt strikes its wing from the back, which doesn't stun but instead provokes him! Hayashida turns around to meet the beast, swiping his sword across its body and leaping backwards at the same time. It just barely misses him, and then turns its attention to the younger man. Its gaze pierces his very soul, and so he's at a total loss for action. The giant starts to leap and glide towards him, with his current plan of action merely being to run away. He searches for an avenue, only finding the open field.
But then, a miracle. The elderly man who had brought them here at first leaps over the fence on a horse and swoops in, grabbing Shiraki by the wrist and pulling him up on horseback! "You best have a plan, kid!" he yells as they flee from the two giants that turn their attention back to Hayashida. Shiraki grits his teeth, "Keep us close, but not too close. I need to keep them away from him."
He obliges, and brings the horse slightly closer to the action. At that point, Shiraki begins to spam low-level Hado at the giants to grab their attention. It just barely works, and allows Hayashida to leap up and stab the winged one in the back of the head, ending it quickly. The other giant decides to throw the lantern it has at the two, however! It crashes into the ground in front of them, setting the immediate area alight and spooking the horse hard enough to make it buck them both off! The giant sprints towards Shiraki, grabbing him whole and lifting him up to eye-level. The beast wouldn't be too horrific, if not for it opening its mouth and revealing several smaller mouths within. Shiraki starts struggling, but can't even budge the fingers. In moments, its tiny mouths shoot out and latch onto him, biting his collarbone and shoulders, face and chest, all over until he's bleeding in several different ways.
But just in time, Hayashida catches up and lobs off one of the giant's legs in a single fell swoop! It lets go of Shiraki and topples over, allowing them to start recklessly wailing on the creature until it stops moving. Finally, the giants and boars were dead, but there were still more. The two help each other up and sigh. Hayashida remarks, "We've got our work cut out for us."
Shiraki just nods, and the two continue their battle...
In the 33rd district, the Maresuke siblings have reached their own destination: a tower of sorts where hundreds of souls have congregated to stay safe from a firebrand group of hollows that have managed to burn down plenty of dwellings in just a short amount of time. The two gaze upon the sight of dozens of eldritch-lizard-hybrid hollows crawling up the tower and belching out ashes; covering the building from base to top. A few can be seen from there spewing fire into the air after spotting the shinigami.
The siblings take that as a sign to act; they nod at each other and cross their weapons together. Kurokawa yells, "Fudosan, Lightning!" while Sasuke yells, "Tomaranai-Ryuko, Storm!" They both then yell in unison, "Fukanona Kumiawase!"
Kurokawa's weapon quickly morphs into that of an electrified Sasumata while Sasuke's turns into a Naginata whirling wind around itself like the eye of a hurricane. The two staves clasp together and conduct into each other, becoming swathed in dust, crackling electricity, and some unbridled force rivaling a thunderstorm in the tiny area around their blades. They both point the combined weapons at the tower and part the blades with a strike, sparks flying around like flint striking steel. The cloud ignites and sends a swirling vortex of scorching dust, powerful wind, and streams of lightning into the hordes of hollows charging straight at them! One after another, soon all at once in the devilish tornado do they get swept up and scoured; burnt to crisps at the very act of being engulfed by the attack!
The siblings stand and watching menacingly, stoically while their enemies are torn asunder with a mere flick of their weapons combined. Yet, more remain. The remaining lizards leap down from the building and open their mouths, screeching and chirping like cicadas while their tentacle tongues flip about! The dead bodies of the lizards that had been turned to ash rise once more and start to morph into abominable lumps of grey that rear back and hiss at the two.
Sasuke mocks, "Hmph. They think they can avoid death. Kurokawa, how should we deal with them?"
Kurokawa asseses the situation while casually slamming her sasumata against the neck of one of the ashen lizards, slamming it into the ground and pinning it. Her brother approaches and beheads it while it's pinned in time for a response, "Beat off the dead ones while I pin the living, then come finish them off. We'll destroy the persistent ones with another Fukanona Kumiawase afterwords."
"Good plan." Sasuke agrees and nods, then flourishes his naginata to the side to send a powerful gust of vaporous wind into several lizards that fall apart at the seams. The two stick to each other like glue and begin making their way towards the 6 living lizards that continuously revive the rest of their comrades. Nothing seems to stop them, with Sasuke batting the ashen lizards away like they're nothing, and every stomp of Kurokawa's sasumata on the ground making a electrical nova that paralyzes and disintegrates every enemy it touches. They tank right through the enemy offense like unstoppable demons, appearing even more threatening than their foe by virtue of appearance alone.
Every lizard that leaps towards her is grappled by the blade, as if they are somehow unable to parry it at all, and slammed into the dirt where they are finished off by the sheer force. Every one that makes it past her view is cut down and blown away by the unrelenting force created by Sasuke's blade.
After seemingly ages of walking, the two grow tired of enduring the onslaught and rush; now close enough to one living lizard for Kurokawa to lunge forward and grab it by the face, smashing it uncomfortably into the ground. No matter how much it struggles, nor how much more powerful it is than her, it cannot possibly escape Fudosan's grip. While it is held down, Sasuke approaches and raises his pole, contently slamming it down on the hollow's neck and almost instantly killing it. The other hollows who witness this and the futility of their assault shriek in terror, giving up their attack and simply running away.
Yet, they do not allow them to escape. Kurokawa points her pole at them and mercilessly orders, "Kami no Hari." The prongs crackle with electricity, and then start to rapidly spit out thin bolts of lightning that haphazardly lash out at the fleeing beasts! Most of the ashen ones are immediately destroyed, and only a few of the living ones manage to escape with their lives into the ruins of the destroyed township. Sasuke places a hand on her arm after they flee and forces it down. The two look at each other through their masks and put their weapons down.
"Our work is done," Sasuke says, "let's head back to Nishimura-koken and assist."
Kurokawa shakes her head, "I'll go, you escort the survivors out of that tower."
There's no convincing her, so he painfully agrees and leaves her to her own devices.
Suddenly, beams of light shoot up into the sky from the distance. Two thin, but extremely long beams of red light sprout into the sky and sweep down and to the sides, parting even the clouds with their immense power! One manages to sweep onto the Seireitei's barrier which suffers a massive explosion just seconds later that even those hundreds of miles away would be able to see. The two stare at the sky after it's done, completely in shock that such a powerful beast may lie in the earlier districts. They start to worry about whether the others will be okay or not. Kurokawa immediately retracts her previous dictation, "Sasuke, I changed my mind. This just got serious."
Finally, we come to District 32: Yumiko's home which she has just finished protecting from a very stubborn bunch of bulky but not particularly threatening hollows. She, along with Umemoto stand side-by-side on the roof of one of many nondescript dwellings in utter disrepair. People no longer roam the streets by now, and have all fled the area by their orders. After finishing dispatching the last of the beasts with a nice arrow shot to the eye socket, Yumiko turns to her companion and comments, "Never seen something like that before." while pointing at his sword which has morphed into a threaded cane.
"What, my performance?" he asks in a thick Chinese accent, facing her with eyes closed.
She taps his cane with her sword, "No, this thing."
"Oh! Yes, my cane! I was rather surprised that it came this way as well; it's not really a very wieldy weapon for me."
"Imaginable." Yumiko agrees, and the two fall very silent. Just in time, another group of people bearing the logo of the Zaraki Squad barge in on the two, with one bald strongman announcing their presence, "Nishimura Vanguard 11-1 is here, where are the bad guys!?" Yumiko can smell the alcohol on his breath from a dozen paces away.
"You missed the action." she tells them bluntly.
On queue, almost every one of them groan in disappointment. Yumiko can barely find the ability to care, however, as she doesn't really recognize any of them. So she asks, "So you guys are the ones that came of my little group?"
One skinnier guy stands and speaks, but it turns out she's just a very androgynous tomboy, "Yeah, we heard the stories about how much action there was and just kind of..."
Yumiko holds her hand up, "Say no more. I'm just surprised it's still together. You're all a little slow, though."
They don't seem to like that, and reply mostly with sour looks and scoffs. She adds, "Maybe I can teach you all how to hurry." They like that more, but are still bummed out by the failure to appear on time.
Yumiko shrugs, but her attention is grabbed by dual beams of red firing off in the distance and blasting the skies apart, then sending its explosive power into the Seireitei's barrier! Everyone around them swipe their heads towards the disturbance in time to see the smoke beginning to rise. Yumiko mumbles to herself, "That...that looks like it came from about a district away...Suko?"
She's about to leap towards the action, but Umemoto stops her with the blunt of his cane, "Stay. If he needs our help, he will come to us." She stops reluctantly and sits on the roof, silently waiting for the moment of truth.
Minutes later, the Maresuke siblings appear out of nowhere behind Yumiko and simply stand there, waiting for her to notice them. Doesn't take long, she just happens to turn around at the right time, "Oh, you two. Sit, we're waiting for Suko to drag the enemy back here. Should be any moment now."
The two comply, sighing and sitting with their weapons on the side. After a bit, Yumiko gets a call on her Denreishinki from Suko. Picking up, she is immediately assaulted by the screams of the hollow currently chasing him as he screams, "I'M COMING YOUR WAY! AS YOU CAN PROBABLY HEAR, THIS ONE'S BIG AND MEAN, SO GET READY!" He abruptly hangs up and she is left a little dumbstruck at the sudden noise. She looks back at the device and casually sends out an SOS signal for any other Shinigami in the vicinity to pick up. She stands back up and announces to everyone to get their weapons ready and in their best form possible.
Not even a minute later, they can see the massive cloud of dust being whipped up from the evolving hollow chasing Suko down. It's coming in fast, so she comes up with a quick plan, "11-1, you guys get into a wall formation and threaten, make sure it doesn't get past you! Maresukes, you get onto the side of them and hide; pop out and pin it down when they stop it! Umemoto, go ahead and hide in one of the buildings the next block over! I'll hang out in the distance on top of that town hall's tower and take shots at it! Keep a defensive stance until I give the word and above all: don't die!"
The soldiers move into place at her word, swiftly taking cover from the soon-to-come disaster of a crash. They only have seconds to get settled in before Suko and the hollow come crashing into the wall that the other 11-1 squad formed! He hops above them and dives beneath the building while the others send their weapons charging into the face of the beast! It screams and holds its head high, backing up as its eyes start to shimmer in the storm of dust it's kicked up. Yumiko recognizes this light and decides not to take any chances. She quickly knocks an arrow and pulls back to full draw, immediately letting go and sending the arrow flying into the glowing parts where it strikes soon enough to make it flinch! It lets off its beams that swipe across the landscape and obliterate all that they touch, but are weaker than what they last saw and completely miss the others.
The beam manages to swipe across the tower Yumiko stands on and blows it clean in half, forcing her to leap off of it and flash step onto another, lower building still far from the action. Behind her the building starts to collapse in on itself, making another dust storm that will hopefully conceal her location. After the shroud surrounding it is dissipated, it is revealed to be the bird-like creature that Suko had previously been fighting, but now morphed into having many more and smaller arms, more eye sockets covering its mask, tiny and razor-sharp teeth, and the hairs on its body being replaced by limbs that kick and squirm under the stress of its movements.
The shinigami from Squad 11 are helpless to the horror, so shocked with its appearance that they can't pry away long enough to perform an attack! Fortunately, the Maresukes are not fazed. They leap up from the streets below and plunge down, with Korokawa's staff slamming into the back of the creature and pinning it to the ground utterly effortlessly while Sasuke's spears it whole in one minor thrust like a hot knife cutting through snow. This creature's body smashes through the building that lies before it, and nearly knocks the others off of their feet! Meanwhile, Umemoto leaps in from behind and lands on its back, whipping his threaded cane around its neck and choking it out while lacerating the skin.
Unfortunately for him, the beast has the ability to rotate its head 180 degrees. It twists its neck, nearly breaking it in the process, and its eyes gleam once more while aiming at him. Yumiko notices the glint and quickly hops up to fire another arrow from afar. The missile spears his face, making it writhe in pain while its head flails about and throws its beams in every direction, destroying everything around them! The siblings are almost crushed by the debris it flings around and decide to simply flee for now, but the hollow also manages to catch Umemoto before he can leave by grabbing his ankles with its body's extra limbs, then apparently smashing him between its primary arms!
Suddenly, all falls silent. Suko makes his way back to Yumiko's position and asks for directions. The only response he gets is her asking, "What the hell is that thing?"
He groans, "It was a normal hollow, but I must have pushed it too far, because it started cannibalizing its brethren. I'm guessing it's starting its transformation into a high-level hollow. Should be a Menos, but it might be trying to skip that phase and go straight to..." He stops, contemplating the hypothesis. "No, that's impossible."
"What?" Yumiko demands to know.
"An Adjuchas. But that can't be, that's a bunch of Gillian eating each other; something that it will regress to unless sated. it can't possibly skip such an important part of the life cycle..."
Yumiko, meanwhile, barely knows what an Adjuchas is. Regardless, this still-evolving and rapidly regenerating beast rises back up as if it had never been injured. It screams into the clouds, letting off another, much weaker dual cero blast that accomplishes nothing but showing off how pissed it is. In its hand is Umemoto, which it throws into the ground below with unbelievable strength!
"Oh yeah, it just regenerates whatever damage you do. Even my amplified Kido couldn't permanently hurt it." Suko adds as an afterthought.
Yumiko whips her head around to him and shouts, "Couldn't you have told me that earlier!?"
He decides not to answer, instead suggesting that they try gathering their strongest together and overpowering it with a combination attack while they wait for backup. Yumiko shakes her head, "Already tried brute force, remember? I'm sure that if you couldn't overpower its healing, it can't be done."
"Well...can't argue with that. So what do we do?" he wonders aloud.
Yumiko falls silent, unable to think of how they could possibly beat this seemingly invincible foe. It takes her a moment, but she finally thinks of something, indicated by her holding the denreishinki up and making its flashlight strobe, signalling the siblings to come to them; they respond in mere moments.
"Yes?" Sasuke and Kurokawa ask in unison.
"Pin it down again. This time aim for the head. Don't bother with the body, it's pointless." Yumiko orders.
"Anything to tell the rookies?" Kurokawa adds.
"Yes, tell them to distract it while you act and to cut off its arms after you've pinned it down."
The two nod, and move to execute. First, they flash-step to the awestruck warriors from Squad 11 and give them their orders. They shake out of their daze and leap down from the building where they begin to hack away at the hollow's feet! It works vaguely, as it's quite annoyed by the pricks they give it and tries to reach below to swipe them away. It swats them by the whole, but they just keep getting back up and slashing at it until such time as the Sasuke and Kurokawa can climb up its back. The sister plants her Sasumata at the back of its head and jumps, forcing her whole weight down on it! The hollow falls to the ground face-first, its head getting implanted in the dirt! Yumiko grins, running towards it and beckoning Suko to follow.
"Suko, use Sokatsui and burn its torso!" she yells at him, to which he nods and flash-steps towards the site of the battle. She meanwhile pulls out her bow and stops to take a shot at its face to keep it from letting out another Cero.
In a quick bout of smart thinking, Kurokawa releases her grip on the beast for a moment to slam the butt of the staff into its back and send a massive electrical current through its body that paralyses its limbs long enough for the others to get up and start hacking away. She plants the other end back into its head afterwards and allows her brother to slowly slice its head to pieces.
In less than half a minute, the others have already lobbed off its arms and legs, and continue to slice at them while it tries to regenerate. Soku arrives soon after and begins to roast its core with a sustained Sokatsui using his shikai, which effectively prevents it from being able to react in any manner. Finally, Yumiko arrives to deliver the final blow. She leaps from the top of the roof above and plunges her sword into the forehead of this monstrosity at the same time as Sosuke. She then commands, "Sosuke, Kurokawa, blast it!" They comply, each starting to charge up their weapons for the incineration.
Before they can even utter the first words, however, a Garganta opens up in the sky above them. "Everyone get out of the way NOW!" Yumiko screams at the others at the top of her lungs as yet another hollow descends like a spider from the dimensional rift. Everyone hops out of the way and tries to flee, but can't pry their eyes away from the sight: a massive, lanky, bird-like, sludge-covered hollow whose neck extends unnaturally from the shadows to reveal its mask: a pure white, blank mask with only two eye holes that could fool anyone into thinking it's made of porcelain.
It gazes around and down at the corpse of the nearly dead hollow and speaks, "ANOTHER MEAL." It reaches down with its immense claws and scoops up the dying hollow, then begins to absorb it into his body as it cries in terror. The blank hollow shivers shortly after consuming the dying one, and then turns its head around to meet Yumiko's gaze. It doesn't say anything, it just stares, and she stares back with eyes dilated and wide open in disbelief. They gaze at each other for a full half minute, but it soon detects an incoming presence and decides to leave. It parts after twisting the blank space on its mouth into a smile purely to fuck with her. The others can feel it too; a captain-level shinigami approaching very rapidly, so rapidly in fact that he gets there just as the familiar hollows sinks back into his rift.
In a very nasally voice and annoyed tone, the captain complains, "Oh, great! We missed it. This is what happens when you dilly-dally around in the sub-basement looking for spare parts, Nemu!"
Yumiko whips her head towards the voice so quickly that it gives her minor whiplash, and spots the most absurd and uncomfortable sight imaginable: Mayuri Kurotsuchi. The only reason she doesn't say anything is because he plainly wears his Captain's Haori and doesn't even look like the type of person anybody should be talking to without good reason. Regardless, he decides to intervene by calling her attention, "You over there, the girl who already looks dead!"
Yumiko is still a bit overcome with shock, but at least musters a weak, "Huh?"
The captain jumps down and approaches her, "Yes, you. Don't look at me like that, pay attention! You're going to tell me exactly what happened here, understand?" His stone-faced lieutenant follows behind.
"...What? Who are you, again?" Yumiko absentmindedly asks, intentionally ignoring his status.
Mayuri gets irate, "Why you little...!" He raises his hand to smack her, but realizes how bad of an idea that would be and instead turns around to slap Nemu, who barely reacts. "Nemu, question the others! I think I'm going to be here for a while."
Yumiko flinches and scowls at the captain's outburst, and doesn't even try to hide her disgust towards him. He turns back around and reluctantly introduces himself, "You will address me as Captain Kurotsuchi of the 12th Division! Now, divulge to me the events that transpired here so that I may...study them."
Yumiko decides to get on his nerves, "Okay, Captain Kurotsuchi of the 12th Division. Basically, Captain Kurotsuchi of the 12th Division, there were a bunch of squads of hollows that decided to invade the general area, and so we just decided to split up and deal with them. Well, Captain Kurotsuchi of the 12th Division, that didn't really play out how we expected. Turns out that there was a really powerful one trying to transform into a Menos, so we just cut it up into mince meat. But THEN there was this other hollow that came out of a portal of some sort and ate the other one."
By now, she's said the full title so much that the captain is visibly growing annoyed at her shenanigans. He regretably persists, "And what about the Cero? " She tilts her head at him, making him grind his teeth together and explain in layman's terms, "The giant beams of light it was firing in every direction, you drooling idiot!"
"Now now, Captain Kurotsuchi of the 12th Division, don't go getting angry like that! You'll set a bad example for the rookies, right Captain Kurotsuchi of the 12th Division?"
His eye twitches, but he realizes her intentions and just backs out, "I can see I'm not going to get anything useful out of a child such as yourself." He gives up and walks away, not savvy on being mocked any further.
Suko walks over to her and comments, "That joke ran on a bit too long."
"That's the point." she corrects him.
"You're also going to get branded for that." he adds.
"Worth it." she counters.
As the captain and his lieutenant are waltzing around and butting into everybody's business, Hayashida and Shiraki come limping back from their battle, covered in black hollow blood and fairly injured but clearly victorious from their wide smiles and glad waves. They greet Yumiko and tell her about the boars, giants, elk, and other assortments of mimic hollows that they had to deal with, her all the more impressed since neither of them have achieved shikai yet. Everyone else gathers back around after being interrogated and begin to search the area for Umemoto, eventually finding his body amongst the rubble of the well-fought battle. Nobody expected him to make it out of this one, but they're all disappointed at how easily he got beaten down by that thing. They know his corpse would soon disintegrate and return to the world of the living, so they simply gather his uniform and Zanpakuto to present to Toshiro later and then bury the body back in the countryside where it wouldn't be bothered.
On the way back, Yumiko is stopped before she exits the 32nd District by a familiar voice. She turns around to see a small crowd of people gathering, and closest to her is the smith from years and years ago that she hadn't seen in ages. In a rush of nostalgia, she's forced to grin at them. Even more-so, she finds herself in further inspection to be in that same little street that she had been living in for most of her early life, with almost everything intact. It gives a stark contrast to the destruction wrought deeper in the area, but that makes her even happier to know that nobody she knew was harmed.
"I suppose there's a reason you all have my attention?" she guesses towards nobody in particular.
Several villagers roll up a wheelbarrow filled with enough food for a three-course meal and then some, albeit of a bit lower quality than they're used to in the Seireitei. A plain-looking woman tells her, "You deserve this. If not for that stunt, we'd all be dead right now!"
Yumiko's expression grows soft compared to the stressful smile just after their victory. She stares blankly at them in an almost serene state, daydreaming about something. She stays like that until the smith who had been standing beside her hands her another gift, "Here, I promised to have something for you, didn't I?" He hands her a heavy, hard, cloth-covered object. She opens it up slowly...
Inside is an emblem; a bronze emblem in an upside-down pentagon shape; carved in it is a crane in mid-flight with a plucked Higanbana in its beak and a shield strapped to its back. Above the crane and near the top of the emblem is "Rukongai West 32 ~ Nishimura-koken" written in old, almost ancient Kanji that very few outside of Rukongai would be able to read. The entire emblem is made of finely polished Bismuth Bronze to give it a nice goldenrod color.
Yumiko stares down at it, grinning and blushing slightly, then looks back up at him. He explains, "Bismuth Bronze. That'll last you a lifetime and never tarnish. Let that be the symbol of our history."
Yumiko raises her eyebrow at him, "That's...embarrassing."
He chuckles playfully, "Well, I guess that's just what we do! It took us a while to come up with what to put on it, so be grateful."
"I am." she reaffirms him. Checking on the back, there's three slots to slide a band through. She takes the cloth it was wrapped in and folds it, then slides it through and wraps the whole thing around her left arm. She turns to her comrades and asks, "How does it look?"
They all give her a thumbs up.
She nods and signals them to take the wheelbarrow while she bids farewell to the townspeople. By the time they finish, and get back to the Seireitei, it's already almost night. And by the time they get back to the barracks of Squad 10, it is night. That doesn't stop the captain from noticing their loot from his window and marching out to meet them, however.
He begins to approach them, only to notice how copiously drenched in gore and blood everybody is. The smell radiating from them is enough for him to keep his distance, but he still nags them, "Don't think I didn't hear about what you all were up to."
Yumiko decides to handle him, "Yeah? What of it?" She decides to be confrontational, unfortunately.
Toshiro retorts, "The 'what of it' is that you went out on a mission independant of my orders and wishes. I even told you not to go and form this little group of yours, didn't I?"
Yumiko rolls her eyes at him, "And what did we accomplish? Plenty of kills, fame, and even fortune!"
"And the losses?" Toshiro interrupts.
Yumiko sighs, "...A few injuries, and lost one."
"You lost one!?" Toshiro scolds, becoming increasingly angry with her recklessness.
"Nobody important." she reassures him, then resorts to criticism "Bet you wouldn't even remember his name."
Toshiro scowls, "You better have a good explanation for this."
"Oh, I do." Yumiko begins by clearing her throat, "We were attacked by a hollow powerful enough to apparently start transformation into a Gillian. We killed it before it could change, but in the process it managed to kill one of us. Got backup from Squad 11, too. Captain Kurotsuchi only managed to arrive after the battle was finished."
"Why didn't you wait for a proper response from Seireitei?" he barks at her with disregard.
Yumiko starts to grind her teeth in frustration, but can't take his attitude any more and blurts out, "Oh, oh, right, like anyone in this ridiculous mess of a beurocracy could have possibly finished your damn Mojang games in time to respond to a threat like that after we spotted it! I sent out an SOS for good measure, you know that? And nobody came. Nobody. Not a single soul in your division besides my vanguard was there to beat those monsters into the ground! Why the hell should I even trust that you would care enough to do more than throw pawns around? Do you have any idea of how powerful that enemy was? If we had waited for you or any of the assholes in this place to get there, the entire region could have been wiped off the map!"
By the end of her rant, Yumiko is nearly hyperventalating. Toshiro meanwhile is too shocked that she had the courage to do rant in the first place that he can barely respond. Not only that, but he knows she's at least partly correct. He calms down a little and admits, "You may have a point." She also calms down at this, but he continues, "But I still can't overlook your insubordination."
She's about to rant again, but he stops her, "Don't. I know what you're about to say. I've heard it many times before."
The two stand in a silent stalemate for long enough for Rangiku and the others to haul the wheelbarrow in stealthily.
Finally, Toshiro notices the emblem on her arm and points it out, "And what's that? A mockup lieutenant badge? Do—"
He can't even finish his sentence before she interrupts, "Oh, don't you even. I got this as a gift from the people of the Rukongai, said and done. Insult it and you insult them; insult them and you insult me. Got it?"
Toshiro has lost the motivation and stamina to argue any further, "Fine. I get it. Now that I think about it, I guess your outcome is...acceptable for the risk. You can keep doing your 'thing' as long as it stays well away from me, got it?"
Yumiko relaxes a little, "Yeah. That was a pretty quick turnabout."
"I decided to have mercy." he explains.
She sees right through him, "You just don't want to argue anymore."
"That too. Now get inside before I'm forced to punish you."
She shrugs and heads inside to meet with the others for their well-deserved little feast. Meanwhile, Toshiro heads back to his quarters while mumbling about how much of a handful she is.
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