-1New Captain Arc: Declare
Neliel stepped forward and right up to Grimmjow.
"Sorry Grimmjow," she said. "I'll be able to see to your wounds when this is done with."
"Tch, I don't need to be healed," Grimmjow said before walking off towards the sidelines. Nel sighed at how stubborn Grimmjow could be at times.
"Well Nel-chan," Kyoraku said. "Good luck in you fight against sempai." The captain shunpoed away to his spot between Hitsugaya and Byakuya.
"So Neliel-san," Nel turned to see Unohana walking towards the field, stopping at where should would begin. "Are you ready?"
"Hai." Nel drew her sword.
Unohana gave a nod before drawing her longer zanpaktou.
000
"Unohana's going to fight?" Ichigo asked, unsure what to think. He had never seen Unohana actually fight, though he had seen her release her Shikai. Ichigo shuddered that the memory of sitting in the manta ray-like beast. Why was spit such a powerful healing agent to Unohana and Nel? "So," Ichigo asked to anyone who'd want to answer, "just how does Unohana fight?"
"You'd be very impressed with her Kurosaki-kun," Ukitake said, "new to sensei and Hitsugaya-kun, she's one of our most powerful captains."
"Really?" Ichigo asked.
"Tch," Kenpachi grumbled. Despite his negative feeling towards the Fourth, he had to admit that Unohana certainly was strong; he had found this out when managed to provoke her into a fight. He had lasted ten minutes, and it was one of the best ten minutes of his life.
"Let's see then?" Ichigo asked. Despite what Ukitake had said, he had strong hopes for Nel; he may have never seen Unohana fight, but he had seen Nel's full capability and had nothing but the utmost confidence in his Third Seat.
000
Both Nel and Unohana stood five meter from each other, their swords drawn, then vanished. A second later a shower of sparks appeared in the area directly between them as their swords clashed against each other and were pushed back. Nel quickly dashed forward and stabbed her blade forward, only for Unohana to quickly bring her blade up and catcher Nel's by the flat side. The arrancar quickly brought her fist up and launched a bala at Unohana, throwing the elder women back a good distance. Nel then opened her mouth and a violet orb appeared and grew in size, she then launched the cero directly at Unohana, but the woman quickly shunpoed out of the way before it could hit her.
Unohana quickly appeared in to the side of Nel and swung her sword, but blocked the attack with her own blade. But Unohana wrapped her hand in a kido spell and thrust it, palm first, and struck Nel in the abdomen and sent her back, she then barely had time to jump back from Unohana's downward slice , resulting in a cut on her arm.
Nel looked down at he cut in surprise. During the years one of the skills she had been working on was the strength of her hierro and had managed to increase its strength to a point where Yachiru had difficulty cutting her where her sword was sealed. The fact that Unohana had managed to cut her so easily only spoke of how powerful the captain was. Nel pulled the sleeve up and spat on the wound, letting the healing agents work.
The arrancar quickly soindoed forward and sliced at Unohana, but the woman quickly parried the attack and jumped back, but Nel quickly cast a binding kido on Unohana, holding her in place when she touched the ground. Nel then opened her mouth and summoned a cero and fired it at Unohana, but despite being bound to the ground, Unohana quickly summoned up a Kido shield and threw it off to the side.
Nel then quickly vanished from her spot and reappeared in front of the redirected cero. She raised her hand to the cero and stopped it, only to swallow it whole moments later.
"Cero Doble!" Nel fired the larger violet cero at the immobilized Unohana, which created a massive explosion when it crashed down on the captain. Nel was not surprised when a large green creature quickly flew out of the top of the smoke plume.
000
"Now that was clever," Grimmjow said. "Absorbing her own cero to perform a Cero Doble. She always managed to pull something clever off like that as an Espada."
"Well let's hope that Neliel-san can keep that cleverness up," Matsumoto said, "because Unohana-taichou just summoned her Shikai."
"Her Shikai?" Renji asked. "What's that going to do? All it does is heal people."
"Not sure," Grimmjow said. "How can we be sure that's all it does? I mean everyone's afraid of the woman, so it's got to be powerful and do more then that."
"I think everyone's afraid of Unohana-taichou for reasons that have nothing to do with her zanpaktou," Renji said with a shiver.
. . .
"You know, the last time I was at the Fourth with Ikkaku and the guys, Nel displayed some very Unohana-like scare tactics," Grimmjow said. "I think that woman's been teaching Nel how to scare people without acting scary."
Each of the three shuddered at the thought of what Unohana could have taught Nel.
000
"Minazuki," Unohana said as she sat atop the head of the massive manta ray-like, cyclopean creature. The larger creature made a warbling noise as it dived down at Nel. She quickly jumped at the way of Minazuki and stabbed at it, but its skin flexed under her blade and bounced her back, causing her to crash to the ground. The creature quickly spun around, its eye beginning to glow, and fired an energy laser from its eye, which Nel barely managed to dodge in time.
The creature then dived at Nel, ready to swipe her up, she raise her sword horizontally in front of her.
"Declare," she said as the blade began to glow a faint pink, mist of the same hue streaming off the blade's tip. "Gamuza."
The air around Nel exploded, sending Minazuki and Unohana off their course and crashing into the ground. Unohana quickly jumped to the ground as Minazuki righted itself up, the captain raised the bladeless hilt of her sword and placed it against Minazuki's hide, only to pull it away moments later, but now with a piece of Minazuki forming the long blade again.
When the smoke cleared, Nel stood there, the lower half of her body now an ibex-centaur, her hands, arms, shoulders and chest armored, her mask now larger helmet with more curved horns while Gamuza itself had become a large double-sided spear. Nel then raised the spear in front of her and galloped forward with such speed that neither Unohana nor Minazuki had anytime to react.
The arrancar clashed her spear against the flat side of Unohana's blade and pushed her back with a great amount of force, that Unohana had to dig her heels into the ground and it flew underneath her feet, just to slow Nel down.
Nel then knocked Unohana back with the flat side of her spear. She made to attack Unohana when she sensed Minazuki quickly flying at her backside. Nel quickly raised herself on her forelegs and unleashed a powerful back-kick into the creature and sent it flying back and crashing to the ground until it managed to right itself in the air. And in a burst of shunpo, Unohana appeared on the creature's top.
Nel turned around to see that Minazuki was preparing another laser blast, but she could tell that this one would be much more powerful than the previous blast fired. She then reared herself on her hind legs and held her spear up high.
"Lanzador Verde," she called, before throwing her spear, just as Minazuki unleashed another laser at her. The two attacks collided with each other, each one pushing against each other, trying to outdo the other.
The attacks suddenly exploded against each other, causing the ground to upturn in the surrounding area.
"If the battles keep ending like this," Kira said as he observed the damage from this battle, and the previous two, "I doubt they'll be much of an area for Matsumoto-san and Hitsugaya-taichou to fight in."
Nel quickly dashed forward and grabbed the lance and soindoed forward and quickly positioned the weapon directly in front of Unohana, though Minazuki's eye was glowing, ready to fire another blast at Nel should she continue with her attack.
"Enough," Yamamoto called out as he banged his staff against the ground. "I have seen enough of this battle."
Both Unohana and Nel nodded and sealed their zanpaktous: Minazuki dissolving into green mist as Unohana sheathed her blade, while Nel's centaur-body ripped off her body, leaving her in her human form.
"Now that this battle is done with, we will continue the next, and final battle," Yamamoto said.
Both Hitsugaya and Matsumoto stepped forward.