"Ha!" Yammy shouted, blasting Aeron with his Bala. Aeron blocked the bala with his blade and slashed at Yammy.
"Hmph!" Yammy sneered, whipping his hand at the blade and batting it aside. Aeron ducked low under the punch and fired an Aura Sphere into Yammy's chest.
"Argh! Why you-!"
"Shinsei Bakuha!" Aeron shouted. A ring of spiritual pressure drew to his finger, and then fired in a basketball sized teardrop-like blast, the round end zooming towards Yammy. The blast rocketed into Yammy's midsection, throwing him backwards several feet.
"Oogh!" Yammy grunted. He opened his mouth and charged his scarlet cero, and prepared to fire it.
Aeron pointed at Yammy's face and snapped off another shot. It rocketed into Yammy's still-charging cero and destabilized it, causing it to explode in Yammy's face.
"Agh!" Yammy yelled. He glared at Aeron. "You're going to pay for that, you ant!"
"Really? I don't know if you've noticed, but I don't have any money on me," Aeron replied.
Ashura, Annabelle, Ash, Anabel, Espeon, and Yammy all fell over in exasperation. Ulquiorra simply smacked himself in the forehead and shook his head. The ones that fell over then, as one (totally unrehearsed), yelled at him, "ARE YOU SOME KIND OF IDIOT?"
"Maybe," Aeron admitted. They fell over again, yet again exasperated.
"You've lowered your guard," Aeron noted, zooming at Yammy with his blade extended. Yammy whipped his hand back and prepared another Bala, but Aeron stuck his blade into it and negated it before it could even fire.
"It's over, Riyalgo." Aeron swung his blade at Yammy's neck.
Klang!
Ulquiorra stopped the blade with his tough hierro, grasping Aeron's blade with his bare hand.
Aeron raised an eyebrow. "Protecting your own? This isn't something I'd expect you to do, Ulquiorra."
"It would be a great inconvenience for Lord Aizen if Yammy were to die. The effort it would take to elect a new Espada to Yammy's position could hamstring his plans. Therefore, it would be in his best interests to preserve Yammy, however thickheaded he may be," Ulquiorra reasoned.
"Smart one, aren't you?" Aeron asked.
He and Ulquiorra exerted force at the same time and leapt away from each other.
"You may have a resistant Hierro, but how will it fare against my Kido?" Aeron asked, a ball of red fire forming in his palm. He pointed his hand at Ulquiorra. "Hado 31: Shakkaho!"
Ulquiorra fired a single Bala into the blast as it flew, negating it completely. Ulquiorra pointed his hand at Aeron. "Hado 63: Raikoho!"
Aeron watched with a hint of surprise as Ulquiorra fired a massive blast of lightning at him. He whipped his hand up and pointed. "Bakudo 81: Danku!"
A screen of clear energy projected from Aeron's hand and blocked the blast. Aeron smiled up at Ulquiorra. "So Aizen has taught you how to use Kido. Very impressive."
"I'm guessing you're currently the only arrancar to use kido?" Aeron asked as Ulquiorra fired a Sokatsui blast at him.
"Quite correct," Ulquiorra confirmed as Aeron filled the area he just occupied with a hail of laser blasts from Geki Rekko.
"Looks like we're even when using the same spells, eh?" Aeron asked, dodging the fourth hado, Byakurai. He whipped his hand up. "Hyouga Seiran!"
Ulquiorra brought his own hand up. "Bakudo 81: Danku!"
Ulquiorra's own screen blocked the blast from the front, but Ulquiorra was forced to jump away anyway, as the blast of ice flooded in from the sides.
Ulquiorra materialized high above. Aeron materialized a few feet away.
"We're getting nowhere with this," Aeron noted, and jumped at Ulquiorra with his sword outstretched.
Ulquiorra met his sword with his hand, blocking it completely. Ulquiorra frowned. From the reports, I would've guessed that he would've cut my arm, if only a little.
Aeron swept his blade around, smashing Ulquiorra with his blade. Each time, Ulquiorra blocked it with his own hands. Then he brought his leg around and, with barely any hint of effort, kicked Aeron through a tree.
"Man, this Arrancar's tough," Aeron commented. He looked up as Ulquiorra came up in front of him and stabbed at him with his hand. Aeron caught Ulquiorra's wrist and managed to slow him down enough that his hand bounced off of his own hierro with a dull impact.
"You're very weak. It would be a stretch to say that you are a fifth of Captain General Yamamoto's strength. Is this really your level of power?" Ulquiorra asked.
"No, actually; I'm half-pretending to be weak," Aeron replied.
"How amusing," Ulquiorra shot back.
Aeron and Ulquiorra whirled away. "If you were pretending, then I'm guessing that you have a Gentei Reiin." Ulquiorra hypothesized. "Am I wrong?"
"No; you're actually quite on the mark, more or less." Aeron held up his left hand, which had a ring on it. "Do you know what's so special about this ring?"
When he got no response, Aeron continued. "This ring has a number of seals on it. About three, I should say. These seals exact a drain upon my powers. The drain for each is about 4/5 of my strength at that level. The first was placed on my full power, reducing my power by around 4/5 of it. The second was placed upon my resulting strength, reducing it by near 4/5. The third was placed on my strength at that level, reducing it to this state." Ulquiorra's eyes flared wide open when he realized what Aeron was implying.
"You've realized, haven't you?" Aeron asked. "My real strength at this level is 125 times this; 25 times more powerful than the current captain general!"
Aeron moved his hand over the ring, and the gold line of runes flashed brightly. Aeron's spiritual pressure rose by about 5 times its first level of might.
"Now, let's start again!" Aeron said, jumping at Ulquiorra.
Ulquiorra whipped out his sword and met the attack, noticing Aeron's augmented strength. Such power! He's roughly equal to Captain-commander Yamamoto, which is about the same as my current strength! Ulquiorra noted.
He didn't have time for anther thought as Aeron moved his blade to his left hand and struck again, forcing back Ulquiorra's blade. Ulquiorra noted this with alarm and moved away, charging a Cero as he did so. Aeron whipped up his hand and gathered three lines of light to his finger, and added two rounds of three more to the rapidly growing sphere at the point where they met.
"Shinsei Taiho!" Aeron shouted, and fired his attack directly into Ulquiorra's fully charged Cero. The two attacks met and cancelled each other out.
Yammy suddenly appeared behind Aeron and attacked him with his own sword. Aeron looked at him with annoyance and caught the blade in his hand, barely making any effort to hold back Yammy's blade. Aeron twisted the blade and flipped Yammy upside down and then kicked him high into the air. Then he flash-stepped, causing Yammy to look around in confusion.
Aeron appeared above Yammy. "Heavy one aren't you?" he asked, causing Yammy to flinch. "So heavy, that your ability to stand in the air will fail. Miserably."
Aeron pressed his foot against Yammy's shoulder and pushed against him, sending himself further up and thrusting Yammy into the ground, cratering the ground from the impact.
Aeron whipped his sword behind his back, and Ulquiorra's sword connected with it, foiled in its attempt to deal Aeron a potentially fatal wound.
Aeron looked at the Espada. "Now I have a question for you. Didn't you die?"
Ulquiorra nodded. "I did, as a matter of fact."
Aeron and Ulquiorra skimmed blades and then attacked each other head-on, clashing blades in front of them.
"Then how exactly are you standing in front of me and trying to kill me? Did you come back from the underworld? Oh wait, that's impossible, since you're already dead, given that you're a hollow."
"Lord Aizen saw fit to restore my life," Ulquiorra replied dispationately.
"Really? And what did he do, summon a fairy and bring you back from the extinguished?" Aeron asked, whipping his blade away. He raised his foot and stomped backwards into the nads of Yammy, who had tried to sneak up on Aeron and crush him.
A critical hit!
It's super effective!
Yammy's eyes rolled back in his head and he plummeted to the ground. Again.
Yammy fainted!
Aeron looked at the fallen Espada. "Perhaps I overdid it," he mused.
Ulquiorra took advantage of his lapse in concentration and struck. Aeron noticed this and smashed the blade away with his wrist. He then struck with his own sword, forcing Ulquiorra took jump away.
Aeron pointed at Ulquiorra. Three lines of light pulled to his finger, and then three more added to the rapidly growing sphere at the point where they met, and three more.
"Shinsei Taiho! (Nova Cannon)" Aeron shouted, unleashing a roaring torrent of spiritual pressure, similar to a cero but with a different sound effect.
Ulquiorra stopped and charged his own cero, and fired it into the oncoming attack. To his surprise the attack merely ate up his cero and kept going. Ulquiorra narrowed his eyes and shot numerous bala into the blast to eat away at its power, then threw up his hands to block the attack.
Ulquiorra found himself being pushed backwards. Such strength! he thought.
The blast completely engulfed him, and when it cleared up he still stood, heavily burned however.
Aeron raised an eyebrow. "You're a very durable Arrancar, aren't you, Ulquiorra Schiffer?"
"Of course. The defensive power of hollows is superior to that of Soul Reapers," Ulquiorra stated blandly.
"Oh, you mean hollow powers like these?" Aeron asked, suddenly materializing a mask on his forehead.
Ulquiorra stiffened. What?
Aeron drew the mask down onto his face and attacked, his strength monstrously increased. Ulquiorra found it increasingly difficult to counter his attacks, as each one was coming from a different angle. Aeron was even outpacing his own ability to perceive high speed assaults. Only his reflexes saved him each time.
Aeron whipped up his hand, lightning crackling around it. "Denkou Shuuha! (thunder wave)" he shouted, filling the air in front of him with a wave of lightning that unloaded a thousand painful volts of electricity into Ulquiorra.
Ulquiorra whipped up his hand and sent a cero roaring towards him. Aeron whipped his sword up and sent a blast of sub-zero power into the cero, negating it and plowing through towards the Espada.
Ulquiorra vanished from sight and reappeared next to Aeron and whipped his blade at him, but Aeron caught the blade and yanked it from his grasp. He promptly tossed the blade to the side and pointed his finger. "Rikujo koro. (Six point light-rod restraint)"
Six bars of light slammed into Ulquiorra's midsection, completely freezing him in place. Aeron raised his hands and stretched them apart, revealing a white sphere of light. "Quite challenging, using a level 98 hado without declaring its name," he remarked.
Aeron raised the sphere and rammed it into Ulquiorra, creating an explosion of light and power and enveloping them both in a rapidly expanding blast sphere radiating the light of a thousand suns.
Ashura and Annabelle watched impassively while Ash and Anabel watched with slack-jawed wonder.
Ashura looked at them. "Now do you see? We are to captains as Captains are to regular Soul Reapers, and Aeron is to us as Captain-General Yamamoto to other captains- an anomaly among anomalies."
He turned back. "And among those with access to the spiritual world, there isn't a stronger person than himself."
Ulquiorra flew backwards out of the explosion, now burned all over by the blast. Aeron followed soon after, by comparison completely unharmed.
Ulquiorra's injuries began to glow, and they whirled out of existence, revealing him to seem almost uninjured. Aeron simply slashed at his midsection to split the Espada in two and kill him.
Ulquiorra abruptly created an energy javelin in his hand and parried the attack, straining a little against Aeron's intense strength.
Aeron raised an eyebrow. "Oh? You can still summon these when outside of Resurreccion?"
"Of course I can. It's just immensely difficult for me to do so. But as long as I have energy, I will always be able to create these energy javelins. And if this is your power, then my Resurreccion will be able to overpower you."
Ulquiorra pulled his sword out of the ground. "Enclose, Murcielago!"
Black spirit energy flooded out of the 4th Espada, coming down as black rain. Aeron watched as Ulquiorra emerged with black wings, a different robe, longer and wilder hair, wider marking under his eyes, and a different mask remnant.
Aeron regarded this new form with slight admiration. "Wow. You look very much like a vampire," Aeron said. "Looks like things are going to take another turn, huh?"
"You're right." Ulquiorra said from behind him.
"Wha-?" Aeron was taken completely by surprise. He whirled away, barely avoiding Ulquiorra's attack with his energy javelin. The same could not be said for his mask; Ulquiorra managed to slice off the top left section.
Aeron regarded the situation. I couldn't follow his Sonído. Things really have taken a turn; for the worse.
Aeron moved his hand to his blade. "Rule over the raging heavens, Tsubasa no Rai-oh!" he shouted.
Aeron's rise in power put him roughly on par with Ulquiorra's released state, for a Resurreccíon is actually causes a greater rise in power than shikai.
Aeron and Ulquiorra rushed at each other, their weapons ready to shed blood. Aeron brought his blade down in a vertical slash, which Ulquiorra parried with his energy javelin. He then yanked his javelin away and stabbed at Aeron's chest, which Aeron blocked with a shield of ice.
Aeron jumped away and gathered wind to his sword. "Kamaitachi!" Aeron shouted, slashing and sending the winds towards Ulquiorra.
Ulquiorra dodged the deadly winds and hurled an energy javelin directly at Aeron, which Aeron split in two. Aeron leapt back and unleashed a volley of icicles to skewer Ulquiorra. Ulquiorra created another javelin and waved it in a circle, leaving more javelins in its wake. Ulquiorra slashed, and the javelins shot at the icicles and atomized them.
Ulquiorra appeared directly in front of Aeron, a black cero forming at his fingertips. Aeron responded by powering up his Shinsei Taiho attack. The two blasted each other, and both attacks were cancelled out.
Aeron flash-stepped rapidly around Ulquiorra, leaving behind many afterimages to confuse the Espada. As he did so, he thought, I can't remove the seals on my ring in rapid succession. I thought that this would be enough to oppose him, but I underestimated his strength. It'll take another hour before I'm able to initiate another seal removal. I'm not sure that I'll last that long at this rate…
He suddenly noticed Ulquiorra taking to the air, his hand wreathed in lightning. He pointed at Aeron, and uttered "Relampago esmeralda! (Emerald lightning)"
The lightning leapt from his hand and arced towards Aeron. Aeron sighed and raised his sword. "Maybe you shouldn't try hitting me with my own powers," Aeron gently advised. He closed his eyes, and his sword began resonating with his spiritual pressure. He waved his sword, and the lightning arced into it, absorbed by Aeron's emerald blade.
Ulquiorra was quite surprised by this. What was that? Ulquiorra wondered, frowning. I never knew about that sort of thing before!
"Don't try lightning on me," Aeron restated. He pointed his sword at Ulquiorra, and it immediately began crackling with golden lightning. "I'll only throw it back at you with greater force!"
"Raikou Amimono! (Lightning Web)" Aeron shouted, and grasped his wrist with his free hand. He tensed his body and fired a web of gold lightning at Ulquiorra, many times stronger than what Ulquiorra threw at him. Ulquiorra got a nasty shock from the attack, burning through his robe and hierro in some places.
Ulquiorra simply regerated his wounds. He took to the air and waved his hand. Numerous energy javelins formed in front of him, all lined up in a row.
"Los Miles Jabalinas! (Thousand Javelins)" Ulquiorra uttered. The Espada waved his hand again, and the javelins all began rushing at Aeron, replaced by more as they left their places, which soon followed the others.
Aeron whipped his blade back, gathering arcs of icy energy to his sword. "Hama Hyouketsu! (Freezing Magic Wave)"
Aeron slashed at Ulquiorra with his sword, sending a massive wave of icy energy at Ulquiorra's javelins, freezing them all in a massive glacier. The blast continued freezing its way towards Ulquiorra, threatning to freeze him, too.
Ulquiorra vanished in a blur of supersonic speed. He reappeared in the sky, and whipped his hand to the side. A massive storm cloud formed out of his black spiritual pressure, blocking out the bright, sunny day.
"Tormenta de la Sentencia! (Storm of Judgement)" Ulquiorra declared. The storm immediately began unleashing lightning bolts from its pitch-black expanse, all arcing towards Aeron.
Aeron waved his sword parallel to the ground, causing a large amount of water to spread across the ground. Aeron then pointed his sword skyward, causing the water to whip into numerous whirlpools, growing larger and the velocity in their waters growing faster.
"Uzumaki Kyouran! (Whirlpool Frenzy)" Aeron shouted, and twisted his sword 90 degrees to the right. The whirlpools leapt skyward, albeit still tethered to the ground, and smashed into the lightning bolts, battling it out to a stalemate.
Ulquiorra also got enveloped by a whirlpool, and was struggling to escape when he suddenly noticed that Aeron hadn't disipated the sheet of water on the ground.
Aeron looked at the Espada. "Hopefully this ends here, because you're actually a pretty tough guy." Aeron said, swinging his blade into a reverse grip that he held above his head. "So, unfortunately for you, I can't take it easy on you."
"Ikazuchi Chikara! (Thunder Force)" Aeron shouted, his blade enveloped with the power of thousands upon millions of volts.
Aeron sank on one knee and stabbed his blade into the ground, releasing all the electricity in his blade. It shot through all the water and conducted all the way into Ulquiorra and his own attacks, eliminating his attacks and lighting the unfortunate Espada up like a lightbulb.
Ash and Anabel watched this in slack-jawed wonder. Ashura and Annabelle regarded this with a hint of admiration.
"Geez, he's a fighting machine!" Ash commented.
"That's Aeron for you; always able to overcome the impossible," Annabelle said.
Aeron simply looked up at the smoke his attacks had generated. "Don't start celebrating yet, guys."
"Huh?" Ash and Anabel were confused.
"It's not over."
The smoke floated away, revealing a heavily injured Ulquiorra, but still released.
"What? That didn't defeat him?" Ash yelled. Ashura and Annabelle were visibly shocked as well; they had thought that Aeron would have vaporized Ulquiorra in the blast, too, or at least knock him back to sealed state.
Ulquiorra gazed down at him. "Your power is impressive, Aeron Solo," Ulquiorra acknowledged. He began emanating his spiritual pressure, black with a green outline, which began whipping around him like a vortex. "I never thought that I would have to resort to this level of power," Ulquiorra admitted, and he quickly became enveloped in the whirling maelstorm.
Aeron looked at Ulquiorra. "So you have achieved that release."
"Oh, yes. I have." Ulquiorra agreed. The whirlwind blasted away, revealing Ulquiorra in a form with black fur on his legs, a long whip-like tail, dark green sclera and yellow irises, horn-like mask remnants, fur on his arms, and clawed hands and feet. His hollow hole had widened, and had a mark underneath it suggesting that it was dripping a black liquid, much like his tear marks, which had divided into two streams each and were black.
"Resurreccion Segunda Etapa," Ulquiorra declared.
Aeron whipped up his sword, but Ulquiorra was instantly in front of him. He tore at Aeron with his claws, but the shinigami responded by leaping away and carving the area where Ulquiorra stood with a large upheaval of stalagmite-like ice formations.
Ulquiorra jumped away and sped behind Aeron, and attacked again, this time with a crackling shaft of lightning. Aeron blocked the spear head-on with his sword, and the two strained against each other. Ultimately, Aeron lost the contest of strength, and Ulquiorra hurled him all the way to where the others stood.
Ashura and Annabelle grabbed their two companions and flash-stepped away barely before Aeron smashed into their former standing place, creating a huge impact crater at ground zero. Aeron groaned and looked up to see Ulquiorra, his lance held high and poised to throw.
"Lanza del Relampago!" Ulquiorra shouted, hurling the lance straight at Aeron. Aeron whipped up his sword and enveloped himself in a protective glacier of ice, knowing full well what was about to happen.
KA-BOOOOOOMMMM!
Ulquiorra's attack exploded in a truly enormous explosion, reaching high into the sky. All saw the blast from miles away, and knew that somewhere there was a titanic battle raging on.
Aeron allowed his glacier to melt away, having been almost blown completely away in the blast. He grimaced, sensing that his power was beginning to diminish. Aeron had an almost limitless supply of spirit energy, but he was using it up more than he could produce it. He had exhausted his reserves within his body, and was now limited to what he could produce. Aeron felt the intense reiatsu that Ulquiorra was emitting, and knew that there was no way he could win at this stage. He would have to use his Bankai to truly defeat Ulquiorra, but he didn't want to use it, because he had taken great precautions to keep Aizen from knowing what his Bankai could do.
Still, there was a way to end the fight without using any of his other powers...
Aeron raced at Ulquiorra, his reiatsu leaping from his blade as lightning. Ulquiorra simply caught the blade and yanked it from Aeron's grasp, tossing it carelessly into the ground.
"It's pointless to resist," Ulquiorra proclaimed, pointing at Aeron. A black cero formed. "Cero Oscuras!" he shouted, blasting Aeron with its power.
Aeron didn't jump away from the blast, nor did he try to counter the blast with his own. Ulquiorra looked impassively at the smoke that the blast had produced.
Suddenly, a hand wrapped in an armor of ice burst out of the cloud and latched onto Ulquiorra's shoulder. Ulquiorra was quite startled, and saw Aeron emerge from the cloud, covered all over except for his eyes in ice. Aeron held up his hand, which shone with a green light.
"45th of the Forbidden Spell: Jikanteishi! (Temporal stasis)" Aeron shouted.
Ulquiorra froze as time was halted around his body. Aeron leapt away and waved his hands, which whirled yellow light around the two Espada. "46th of the Forbidden Spell: Kūkanten'i! (Spatial Displacement)"
The two flashed, and got spirited off to someplace else. Aeron wavered on his feet, then collapsed as the energy drain caught up with him.
Ashura and Annabelle flash-stepped to his side and caught him before he hit the ground. Aeron's hollow mask shattered, dissipating into the wind.
Ash and Anabel ran over. "What was that spell, Aeron?" Ash asked.
"I used two, actually. The first was the 45th of the Forbidden spells, Jikanteishi, which halts time in a specific area. The stronger the person being frozen, and the more they resist, the more energy it takes to maintain the spell. Then there was the 46th, Kūkanten'i, which cuts out a certain portion of space and transports it to another area. Right now, those two are back in Hueco Mundo. Which reminds me," he added, opening his hands to reveal a purple light. "57th of the Forbidden Spell: Toransu-Jigen Fuusa! (Trans-Dimensional lockdown)"
The purple sphere flashed and flared outwards, painting everything with a soft purple light. The light vanished after a moment, and Aeron sagged even further down in his friends' grip.
"What now?" Ash asked, now visibly worried about Aeron.
"I used that spell to close off trans-dimensional travel, or travel via dimensional distortions. Now, for approximately one hour, nothing can move between the dimensions. That includes using Garganta, Senkaimon, or Kūkanten'i. Essentially, they can't get back."
"Will that be the last we'll see of them for a while?" Anabel asked.
"I don't think so, Anabel," Annabelle answered. "If Sosuke Aizen is truly involved, then we can expect that this is only one battle in a titanic war to come."
"So yeah, we're probably gonna see them again," Ashura said. He looked at the glum faces of the two youngest there and laughed. "Cheer up! You already saw it once; we can beat them! Trust me, we won't let them win this war."
"Unfortunately," Aeron yawned loudly as he said this, "Using these spells in this level of power exacted a huge drain on my power. I need some time, yawn, to...re...co...ver...good night...zzzsnore..."
There was a pause.
"And I thought Axel was the lazy one," Ashura remarked, setting Aeron down.
"Wait, did he just conk out on us?" Ash yelled.
Ashura nodded. " 'With great power comes great need to take a nap', says Nico from Percy Jackson and the Olympians. Aeron is no exception."
Ash sighed and sat down. "Better get used to this, huh?"
" 'fraid so, Ash," Annabelle said. The who-knows-how-old girl sat down and opened Aeron's cooler, and grabbed another sandwich with telekinesis. "So, wanna finish lunch?"