Chapter 41: Byakuya vs. Kouga
Byakuya's POV
"A mere tool shouldn't be so CONCEITED!"
The deranged man that I used to call a relative yells at his zanpakuto spirit like a mad man, completely oblivious to the fact that all that Muramasa had done leading up to this moment was in order to set him free from his concealed prison. He moves to strike down Muramasa with what was left of his once feared weapon, but I prevent it from happening, moving my blade into Kouga's path before he could strike him down.
"Kouga, you call your own zanpakuto a tool and then you try to kill it in cold blood," I say in stoic shock as I held firm against his blade. "You do not deserve to call yourself a shinigami after saying such words."
We both jump back to assess the other, and his time in jail has not done him justice. The years he spent being sealed away has left him as an emaciated version of what he once was, with his skin now grey and withered and his ribs peeking out in malnourishment. His eyes barely move as he looks over my form, his eyes lingering on my scarf and kenseikan the longest.
"A silvery white windflower silk scarf, and a kenseikan," he says in a hushed tone, his eyes narrowing slightly as we lock eyes. "A member of the Kuchiki Clan hmm? Why am I not surprised?"
"I am Byakuya Kuchiki, the Head of the Clan, 28th generation."
"Not just any member, but the current leader eh?" a vile smirk showed on his shriveled face, his arrogance apparent in that one action. "So, Ginrei finally kicked the bucket. . . It's a shame I didn't send him off myself. I owed him that much."
"You have no right to say his name, not anymore," I say, irritated that he would say my grandfather's name so nonchalantly and without any respect. I notice Senbonzakura speaking with Kurosaki and Rukia from the corner of my eye. He was likely explaining why I had to defect from my post. Hopefully those two will not interfere once they get all the details. "You will pay for disgracing the name of the Kuchiki Clan."
"We shall see about that young one," he sneers before readying his blade. He leaps to attack, but after parrying off a few of his hits, he jumps back to grab one of the spears that my grandfather and the Captain Commander used to seal him with. "I don't need to use my sword to fight you. I can fight you just as well with a spear."
"We shall see about that."
We crossed swords again, and it wasn't long till we both realized that we were both even in the art of the sword. We moved onto Shunpo and Kido, firing attack after attack at each other while moving at breakneck speed to gain the upper hand on the other.
"You're going to have to try a lot better than that to overmatch me and my Senbonzakura," I say as my blade regroups into its single shape after protecting me from a powerful blast of Kouga's Hyoga Seiran. I had originally employed the use of Danku to block the attack, but Senbonzakura proved to be a much better defense for it. "This was simply child's play."
"You shouldn't be talking like that youngster! Your smugness will be your downfall!" he angrily exclaims he shunpoes to my position. I leap away before he could strike me, but as soon as I'm high up in the air, I suddenly come to a stop. When I looked down, slivers of shadows were attached to my own. "I've captured your shadow, and as long as we're connected, you can't move an inch."
"You think so?" I say, his arrogance already wearing my patience thin. "Scatter, Senbonzakura."
The blades easily cut the shadow strings away like they were flimsy pieces of paper before moving onto Kouga. The fallen shinigami spins his spear around to deflect my attack. However, his weapon is shredded into pieces as a result. I quickly take that as my chance, reappearing right behind him to finally strike him down. I make contact with Kouga, slicing him cleanly across his upper body, which instantly raises a red flag.
Blood will spill no matter how cleanly you cut a person, but no blood can be seen.
"You left yourself wide open, Kuchiki clan leader . . ." I hear him maliciously say from right behind me. I wasn't able to deflect his strike in time, his weapon cutting me right in the back, the resulting momentum making me stumble forward as a result. "I'm not done with you yet!"
Kouga moves in for another strike, but I strike him down, his body dissipating like an illusion like it did mere seconds ago. He appears up in the air and moves his weapon wielding arm, striking me vertically along my upper torso without touching me. For the first part of this battle, Kouga and I were fairly neck and neck in skill level. But in the past five minutes alone, Kouga has managed to turn the tide in his favor with his last two attacks alone.
"How are you doing this?"
"It's fairly simple once you think about it," he tells me with a smirk. "Muramasa was able to gain control of others' zanpakuto spirits by gaining control of their minds. He was able to do this through my spiritual energy, and by sending my spiritual energy into my adversaries, I can confuse all five of their senses."
As soon as I noticed his presence on my left, I strike , but it ended up being another illusion, a figment of my imagination due to my disoriented senses. With my dimmed senses, it is now hard for me to differentiate between the real Kouga and the many duplicates that appear in front of me. If only I had Minata's ability to sense even the smallest of spiritual pressure. . .
"You cannot tell which one is me and which one is fake. Your perception is clouded. You cannot fight effectively," he taunts as he continues to appear in multiples. "If only you had closed your mind off to me, then maybe you wouldn't have fallen for my illusions so easily."
"If I had closed my mind, I could probably have sealed you again, but I wouldn't have been able to kill you," I tell him, mostly so that he could be rendered quiet for just a moment, no matter how small the moment was. "I faced you with my mind open so that I could destroy you."
"You have a lot of nerve to speak to me like that young one!"
I ready my blade to attack him, but he quickly retaliates by throwing one of the sealing spears right at me. I knew the spear would be trouble as soon as it began to appear in different positions along its trajectory. It gets my hand on contact, sending Senbonzakura across the ice. My other arm ends up in the same predicament not long after.
"Hyoga Seiran!"
I quickly call forth Danku, the clear shield appearing right before me to deflect Kouga's incoming attack. However, my clouded senses misjudge the path of the oncoming blast, the icy blast coming at me from my left instead. I could barely move once the Kido attack ceased, my arms and the entire lower half of my body now entombed in an icy prison.
"See?! I didn't need a zanpakuto to take you down. I did this through my own power!" he exclaims, the once esteemed Shinigami now reveling in his madness. "Let's make this your last day as the Kuchiki Clan leader!"
And then he leaps, heading straight toward me to drive his blade through my skull. And with my arms and legs bound by this ice that imprisons me, all I can really do is wait for the killing blow.
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