Author Notes: This chapter seemed to be about Greta's fight, but it's is more about Orihime's development into an actual fighter with her learning the truth about her powers.
More of Ronove's allies are introduced and will be Orihime's threat of the week, though some may survive.
Chapter 17: Six Worlds Angel
Six winged entities flew around the pink haired girl as the two Diable's eyes widened in horror. They knew on a subconscious, fundamental level that if they touched it directly- they would be gone forever. So Halthus began to dig into the ground, tunneling away form the creatures.
Need to retreat! Otherwise, I'll be Morte! That mademoiselle's powers are genuine! The magnum opus of what their ilk can achieve! I must-, thought the stork Diable before he felt a tug on the back of his taloned right leg. He was suddenly pulled backwards and thrusted into open air before being tossed into a side of a building.
Halthus looked in shock at the girl named Maschera who gave a smirk to indicate that she had done this through unknown means.
What is she?! She can't be human or one of their kind! Otherwise, I'd have died from contact with me!, thought the long beaked avian Diable in panic.
"Herr Halthus, I heard you're capable of generating ammunition and weapons from your energy...And you can start wars...Did you start that war to save your own skin? Did you? It doesn't matter because I know all about it, how you swept the truth of the Quincy's true abilities through the genocide orders 200 years ago. Because I was there back then to see it happen. And now...," Greta said as the six entities obscured by white light hovered over her.
"You get to experience the same fear you forced onto them.," she added as she pointed at him.
This threat of demise made the stork like Diable shout-
"Malphus! Stolas! Sabnock! Shax! Vepar! Vine! Bifrons! Vual! Orias! Crocell! Haagenti! Furcas! Alloces! Caim! Flauros! Ose! Don't just stand there! Get a hostage or something! To dissuade them from killing me!"
Greta then turned in the direction of the Student's lounge.
Dang it! They're with Lady Orihime! I can't let them take Lord Kazui either, but they're too many! Even she can't handle all of them with their caliber of power at once!, thought Greta with disgusted realization.
Student's Lounge
Shunya Asō who had been frozen alongside the others, started to move. He then tapped Nana Baba, Takie Higashi, Shunsuke Kobayakawa, Shōko Kusama, Fuminobu Miyagawa, Jinpei Nagase, Kenichirō Nanbu, Yūya Nitō, Sayaka Nogi, Satoda Toshima, Terunari Toda, Makoto Senoo, Satoshi Terasawa, Mikako Tomoshige, and Miho Yokomori, sequentially on the shoulder to get their attentIon.
"Stop pretending to be affected., Nobody can see us.," said the man with a raised eyebrow.
The touched individuals proceeded to move their limbs, eyes and bodies at a gradual pace.
He then scratched his head as he said,
"Halthus is complaining like a mother hen as usual. Let's get the mother of that brat that hurt Ronove and let her be a hostage for leverage."
He then opened his mouth wide as a featherless, naked head of a fanged beard with large eyes constantly narrowly open to reveal beady eyes and a single horn on his head jutted out. Then like an unnatural parody of removing clothes, the creature would remove itself from Shunya's body, which now laid on the floor like a limp costume before swallowing the shell whole. Its body was covering a bell-sleeved robe and had black wings covered in purple, glittering star lights.
He then turned to others to do the same, finally deciding the ruse wasn't necessary.
Nana Baba inflated herself before deflating into a loose shell, from which an owl stepped out from. The single horned Diable owl had four eyes- a set of two placed on the forehead above the second eyes, wore a crown, long legs and black wings with glittering, purple star like lights. It then stomped on the skin, burning it to nothing.
Terunari Toda's skin was shredded from the inside out as the figure within attacked wildly. It wore a furred lion head, from which the manic eyed, axe-shaped beaked head of a reptilian creature protruded out, it had a mace and sword respectively for hands, the lower torso to its upper, muscular torso was an equine beast with a prominent nasal bone shape that extended outward with a single large nostril, somewhat like a cannon. It had the same black wings with purple star like lights like its peers on its upper back as well as a set of three cannons attached to narrow tube-like extensions on its back. His horn grew on the top of his head.
Miho Yokomori unzipped herself to reveal a a slim human like entity with ample breasts, long legs, and blue waist-long hair had a water molecule shaped clip that clung on the back to make some of the hair look like a seashell with spikes crest. Her horn growing from her forehead, but was angled towards the right, black wings with purple star like lights growing from her shoulder blades and a whale finned tail growing from her tailbone. She wore a neck/shoulder collar, crop top, detached long sleeves ending in fingerless gloves, a long skirt that covered her legs, and long toeless socks all made of the same segmented metallic material. She reflated the body and tossed it to the original owner of the body's home. She sighed in annoyance, obviously disliking the form while the others looked at her in contempt for not destroying or devouring it.
Yūta Nitō's form evaporated to reveal a humanoid white dove with black wings with purple star-like lights on its back, a horn growing from the top of its head, wore a bell-sleeve robe, and had a smug expression on its face.
Makoto Senoo's body was impaled from the inside out by green vines as the form revealed itself once the body was shredded. The figure had an orange jack-o-lantern head with red eyes with black sclera, a mane of a green bush covered in black thorns surrounding the pumpkin head, a single horn growing from the forehead, two cactus arms with stubby fingers with toothy opened maws on the shoulders, a green thick-root upper torso, the upper torso being attached to a lower torso of a brown tree, bipedal creature with a vaguely horse skull like head with a sunflower growing from the top of the head, a green snake growing from the backside of the brown creature, and two black wings with purple, glittering lights on the back of the upper torso of the body.
Satoda Toshima was eaten from the inside out by a humanoid rat with three eyes- one eye in the center of the brow-ridge between the two eyes, hands with three long claws, a horn growing from its forehead, black wings with purple glittering star like lights growing from the back of its upper back, and wore a robe with long bell-sleeves.
Mikako Tomoshige's body dissipated into dust as a humanoid double-humped camel with monocle, wore a robe with long bell-sleeves, had a single horn growing from its head and a pair of black wings with purple, glittering, star-like lights emerging from its upper back.
Fuminobu Miyagawa'a form unraveled to reveal a pointy eared, beige skinned humanoid with a fanged lion like mouth with its gums exposed, wore a waist-length robe with long bell-sleeves, a lower torso with leonine legs and tail. It had a single horn on its forehead and a pair of black wings covered in purple, glittering, star-like lights emerging from its upper back. It then turned the unraveled body into a flock of birds that flew away from the lounge.
Satoshi Terasawa's form turned into a clay cocoon from which a crazed eyed, humanoid black panther, with one pupil pinprick and the other almost encompassing the entire eye, black wings with purple, glittering, star-like lights emerging from its upper back and a single white horn growing from its head. It then devoured the cocoon fragments that it had burst out of.
Shunsuke Kobayakawa's body dissolved into goo as a humanoid bull stepped out as the goo evaporated into nothing. The humanoid bull had a single horn growing the forehead, a third eye emerging on the brow-ridge between its two closed eyes, and had black wings with purple, glittering, star-like lights covering it- growing from its shoulder blades. It wore a hooded robe with long bell-sleeves.
Kenichirō Nanbu vomited out a pointy-eared girl of a young teenage appearance before the body that had vomited her began aging into a mummy before collapsing into dust. She had shoulder-length maroon hair and a snaggletooth emerging from her left side of her upper jaw. She wore a long-sleeved blouse with a long skirt and stockings made of the same segmented, metallic material. She had a red pendant with a neck cloth sticking from beneath the pendant, metallic-fingerless gloves, and metallic-round shoes. A single horn grew from the top of her head and a pair of black wings covered in purple starlights growing from her shoulder blades.
Shōko Kusama'a body exploded in a bloodied mess as the elderly humanoid stood in the middle of the carnage, which soon faded into nothing as if the mess never happened. The icy-blue skinned humanoid had pointy ears, bushy, white eyebrows that obscured his eyes, a round nose, a stout yet muscular body, a long white beard that rescued his chest, and white hair growing from the back of his bald head, which reached his upper back. He wore metallic, segmented arm bands that covered his forearms up to its wrists. He had black wings covered in purple starlights, emerging from his shoulder blades. His upper torso was attached to a white, aged horse with long eyebrows that obscured its eyes.
Sayaka NogI's body vanished as a humanoid Pteranodon with dull red skin, wore small round glasses over its serpentine eyes, it's body covered in a segmented, metallic bodysuit that ended at its wrists/ankles, and had a silver coated rapier as tall as it was on its back. Black, purple starlight covered wing membranes growing from the backs of its arms. And it had a golden pendant with a neck cloth beneath his lower jaw.
Takie Higashi's hair grew to cover her body before the hair morphed into a white Persian cat faced humanoid with a muscular upper torso ending in a lower torso, consisting of a long necked, bipedal creature with its upper part of its skull shaped like an elongated knights visor and had a long, black, bushy tail growing from its backside. It wore segmented, metallic armbands. He had a single horn from its forehead and had black wings covered in purple starlights growing from its upper back.
Jinpei Nagase compressed his body into a small dot before expanding into a yellow humanoid, mangy furred cat with a set of three claws growing from the knuckles, and wore a metallic, segmented speedo on his otherwise naked body. Black wings covered in purple starlights grew from his upper back and a single horn grew from his forehead.
"Fuckin' A! That body was too restrictive!," complained the yellow, red eyed cat as he stretched his arms and then his legs. He then hopped for a few moments.
His voice sounded like a perpetually high-pitched static.
As he started to run, the blue haired girl grabbed his tail. He then landed flat on the ground much to his annoyance.
"Vepar, you wench! What're ya doin?!," asked the feline as his body began to become engulfed in purple flames while still face-flat on the ground.
"You were going to mess around. You're only ranked as high as you are because you burn a lot, can't be tempted so easily and answer things even you never learned about it. You just get off on innate ability alone.," Vepar replied in a honest and mellow tone of voice as she leaned against the way. Her voice had a filter that made it seem she was always underwater.
The yellow cat got to his feet and looked at her with murderous intent. There seemed to intense bad blood between the two as the girl was already preparing a water sphere to attack him.
"You sent your shell home? What the fuck's with that?," he snarled.
The girl sighed as the sphere began to spin.
"It's not a big deal to occasionally not do something idiotic that'll bite you in the ass one day, Flauros.," She retorted.
An angry vein appeared on the cat's forehead as he gritted his teeth.
"You wench!," he shouted before he was kicked to the ground by the maroon haired girl.
She smirked as she pointed to Orihime.
"Did it feel good to pretend to be her classmate. Why don't you drag her by her stupid hair to her son so they can be reunited in death?," asked the maroon haired girl to Vepar. The girl's voice had a high reverb of a horrid siren.
Vepar looked good the side, but noticed Orihime's Shun Shun Rikka were rattling in the frozen time.
"Eh? The hairpin's acting up? That weird Fullbring?," Flauros observed.
"Dolt. Fullbring always generates a green light, this is not the same thing.," the bull said as the Shun Shun Rikka generated an oval shaped barrier.
Orihime suddenly became conscious and was soon able to move. Her eyes then glared at the gallery of human-like and non-human anthropomorphic entities. All similar to Jupiter earlier.
What's going on?, Orihime thought as she had been frozen like the others until that moment. Flauros then blitzed towards her, a few inches towards her face.
"Oi, Oi. Quincy Girl. Use your Six Worlds technique...I mean Ronove wouldn't have been warded off if it were the regular Quincy Joe, let alone be harmed. After all,, they're tampered in a way that we can shut them down at anytime. Yet you're different...Why's that?! You come from the past via time travel?! Answer you cunt!," he interrogated the frightened woman.
"What?," Orihime asked.
Run., Shun'ō's voice said to her within her subconscious, which confused Orihime even further.
"Don't what me? We bastardized your race through experimentation and slaughtered them! Why aren't activating it yet?! Grr! Such a pain!," he said as he put his hands into his speedo.
Vepar gagged as he did this.
"So revolting.," she muttered as she turned away.
"Sir Flauros. This isn't part of the plan.," said the older looking individual before Flauros looked at him with intense animosity.
The yellow cat proceeded to show a zipper with Gillian's head.
"We Diable can't touch you. You're too lethal for us. However, we got an ace in our hole.," he explained as held the zipper up high and as he pulled it down, the space "unzipped" to reveal a portal to a black space.
Orihime looked at the black space and then saw something familiar.
The White Hollow mask of her bother, Sora.
"Sora-," She cried in confusion before the face turned around and two purple lights flashed.
A burly, brutish looking suit of armor with a rounded, hunched upper torsos made of white segmented material, bird like legs with talons, clawed hands with long fingers, purple material wings with black stars glittering within them emerging from its back, shoulder armor of unique looking white mask on each respective shoulder and a helmet shaped like a horned, skeletal rhinoceros with purple orbs glowing in the empty eyesocktets.
That's Sora's Hollow mask. What's going on?, thought Orihime with dread.
"The Soul Society believes that the Hollows they kill get purified into the humans they were before. In actuality they're sent to a special lab deep within the Rukongai or to Hell. In either case, they're stripped down and remade into our weapons against the Quincy in case they ever learned of our existence and decided to kill us. The Soul Reapers themselves are unaware of this truth We call them Chevalier Creux (Hollow Knights). I'd feel bad for those Soul Reaper cretins for lying..., but I get off on exploiting their good intentions. After all, we made the current generation Zanpakuto for the purpose of making this army. Was that shocker or what?," Flauros explained as he knocked on the armor.
Orihime then went to a state of shock.
"This is no fun. Kill her.," the yellow cat said in boredom with a yan.
"Wait, Halthus wanted backup and leverage-," Vepar argued, but Flauros snickered.
"Screw him. He can die for all I care. I just wanna see this bint get killed by the remnants of her own brother!," Flauros replied in a way that implied that he ordered the creature to attack Orihime.
Orihime then summoned all of her Shun-Shun Rikka Rokūshin- Mūshun, but it phased through the barrier.
"This was built to kill things much tougher than you. Die. Au revoir Cunt.," he said as the entity punched her through the school.
Orihime saw in slow motion, the entities get further and further away as they began walking in Kazui's direction.
Suddenly, Orihime's eyes flashed golden as she became engulfed in powerful golden Spiritual Pressure sphere
And six wings appeared from the sphere to Flauros' confusion.
Orihime's Mind
Orihime opened her eyes to a white space and saw her Shun Shun Rikka and a black cage behind them,
"What's going on?," she asked.
"It's time that you knew about the truth...," Tsubaki said with a sigh.
"We're not your power. We're actually Quincy of separate birth that posed as your powers.," he added.
The six then began to glow with illuminating whiteness and grow in size.
They were now more humanoid versions of themselves and more importantly...
"Why are you wearing Uryū's clothes?," asked Orihime noticing that they were all wearing clothes, with blue stripes representing the Quincy cross, and a mantle.
"The cat's out of the bag. We're Quincy, but not the ones you know from the Vandenreich. We were assigned by the one known as Sōken to protect you by suppressing your powers until the time was right.," said Lily with a nervous shrug.
"However, it wasn't a pleasant affair. We had to hide you by sending you and your brother with the woman you had been told that was your mother.," said Baigon in a solemn voice.
"...She was your aunt actually, and your family's very...complicated to say the least...after seeing how horrid she was, your brother took you to raise you himself before he died and you were sent to live with your relatives, who are also in on the truth. Hiding their heritage in order to protect you from the beings you know face.," said Hinagiku as he adjusted his eyepatch.
"Why were you so small?," asked Orihime, stating the obvious.
"The hairpin you got was actually one of many True Quincy pendants that allows for the six powers of the Quincy to be released. However, in order to hide the truth, we had to use Sklaverei to break up the components that make up spiritual objects as well as bodies of beings composed of the same material. We assimilated your true Quincy skills by taking on their characteristics and associated capabilities, but it was with our abilities disguised as what you thought was your own. However, we will now free those true powers in order to fight for you as you metamorphose into your true being.," Ayame explained with a bow of apology.
"What?," Oriihme asked.
"We acted as both of your hairpins, but you don't have one set of six, but two sets. By taking them in, our own powers were severely weakened to avoid detection. That's why you had to rely on others to save you since it would've alerted them too early. They needed to be this relaxed in order to be taken off guard-," explained Shun'nō, now looking more handsome and with a more masculine voice.
"What about my real parents? Since you didn't bring them up, I'm ok with them being dead. I'm not accepting Sora's on that thing or still a Hollow. I mean he went to Soul Society to be cured! I need to-," she shouted, interjecting the blonde.
However, Tsubaki took off his facial mask and scarf to reveal that his heavily scarred face.
"Shun'nō. Open your eyes.," he said to the blonde, which made Shun'nō tense.
He then relented with a sigh as he opened his eyes to reveal four pupils arranged to leave a white cross-shape as a side-effect of the diamond-shaped pattern they form. They looked a lot like-
"Why do you have those eyes?," Orihime asked.
"You want the truth? Sōken and our merry band tore you from your parents against their will for the greater good. And Shun'nō's got the ability to alter the future to one that is more beneficial. So Ichigo turning into that Hollow, him losing his powers due to Mūgetsu, the Soul King being replaced by Yhwach, and every single time you were helpless and meek- was our fault...behind you in that cage is someone who won't-," Tsubaki said bluntly before Orihime slapped him.
Her eyes filled with tears.
"The truth always hurts...We're off to fight for your sake...you won't ever see us again.," he said as the six vanished.
Orihime then looked into the cage and saw eyes within the blackness staring back at her.
Ones with yellow irises and green sclera.
"It seems fate has brought us together for unusual circumstances. Hello again, Woman.," said the melancholy voice of the individual who brought Orihime flashes of someone who had vanished into dust before her eyes...yet was here of all places.
Real World
Flauros stared in confusion as six figures emerged from the sphere. Tsubaki glaring angrily at the 16 before him.
He then pulled on his right arm as it generated a bow like energy of golden light.
Next Chapter: Black Angel