Chapter 27 – Kido, the best way to win

Just as the blade was about to reach, someone intervenes just in the nick of time. Hikari blocked the blade and hoists Haodong on her shoulders and flash steps near the cave entrance where she sets him down lying against a wall.

'You again?' said Matthew in annoyance.

'Leave now or be killed,' said Hikari in her most threatening voice.

'Firstly can I ask who you are?' said Matthew politely!?

'I guess it is common courtesy to tell the person you're going to kill your own name. Very well, I am Hikari Uera. Captain of division 5.'

Matthew's eyes widened at the word captain, 'I see.'

'You've hurt my friend, now I can't let you live,' said Hikari forcefully. She walked one step forward as her spiritual energy enveloped her.

'I'm not afraid of you,' said Matthew as he jumped up into the air and blasted 10 successive arrows at her.

'You're just a weakling. Bankai, Gosai Rozehana.' Her blade shattered and each piece extended to that of a knife size. Ten flew up and intercepted the arrows splitting them in two, they carried on flying and stabbed into Matthew. He puked up tonnes of blood, hung in the air for a couple of seconds and dropped with a thud onto the ground. But Hikari wasn't finished yet she waved her hand in a circle above her and swung her hand in Matthew's direction. All blades that was above her zoomed at Matthew and slammed into him. There was a great explosion and the force of the blades blew Matthew down the mountain via the stairs they climbed up. Hikari reverted her sword back to normal and resheathed it.

'Kari, are you okay?' called Naomi suddenly appearing near her. Toshiro and Rangiku appeared a second later.

'I'm fine, but Haodong needs medical attention quick,' said Hikari hurriedly.

'What about Haruka? Where is she?' asked Toshiro looking around.

'She's in the cave, I'm sure she'll be fine but I need to get Haodong back to squad four, and fast, his breathing is faint.'

'I know, how about I and Captain Uera go back, and you two can stay and help out Haruka,' suggested Naomi, nodding at Toshiro and Rangiku.

'Sounds good, let's go Matsumoto,' ordered Toshiro and he set off into the cave without another word.

'Yes captain,' agreed Rangiku and she also followed.

'C'mon, let's hurry,' urged Hikari. She opened up a gate to seireitei and she and Naomi disappeared back to soul society.

--

Back in the cave, Haruka has just arrived in a large dome shaped room. The walls were rock but neatly arranged. In the centre of a room there was a large squad altar and in the middle of the altar was what looked like a hollow hand, and a golden eye sat in its palm.

'That must be the eye of divinity, I can feel it.' Haruka reached out her hand to touch it but just before she came in contact a force field of some sort instantly sent her flying off her feet. She back flipped and landed just before she hit the wall. Suddenly a huge light switched on above the altar and the gate of the tunnel she came through was sealed by a thick steel gate that rose out of the ground.

'Huh? Was that supposed to happen? Or did I just trigger a trap,' she asked herself. She walked over to the gate and knocked on it. She instantly knew that she wasn't going to escape that way, as the gate was made from a type of stone that absorbs spiritual energy so any type of attack from a soul reaper was going to be useless.

She searched around the other walls but there was nothing except a blank thick wall that would take months to blast apart. Finally she reduced herself to pacing in circles around the square alter. She even dared to try and get the eye again but obviously to no success and was blasted away just like the first time.

After pacing around the altar for the fiftieth time she began studying every inch of it.

If you are wondering what happened to Toshiro and Rangiku, well they're at the other end of the gate constantly shouting Haruka's name but the wall was too thick to let any sound through.

After studying the altar for some time she noticed a hole at one side of the altar. The hole was the exact shape of Haruka's sword guard and the whole was long enough for a sword to be put in.

'Oh? Could this be a clue?' so, out of instinct she pulled out her sword and stabbed it into the hole. Suddenly a large rumbling noise sounded from below her feet like something had just dropped, and just as suddenly the light above the alter went out, all was dark until a candle appeared on the wall opposite her and lit up a small piece of wall above it that had some writing on.

She hastily walked across to it with an, 'Ah, bugger, that hurt,' when she hit her left foot on the edge of the altar. She then hopped the rest of the wall massaging her foot. The message on the wall was written in another ancient language but somehow Haruka could read it.

'Let's see here. Hmm… Let the square be surrounded by light and your next path will be in your sight.' She took a moment to think, 'Square? Surrounded by light? It must mean the altar, but there's no light here?'

'Tch, isn't it obvious?' said a sudden cool female voice from inside Haruka.

'Hidoragon? Did you just say something to me?' thought Haruka surprisingly.

'Ah yes, well since we entered this room it felt like a part of me detached from you and I was able to speak to you, so guess my thought was correct.'

'Uh huh. Well then… light…'

'I guess I have to spell it out for you. To surround the alter with light, just bakudo sixty-one, six bars of light. I'd have thought that was obvious to such a highly skilled kido user such as yourself.

'Ah well, I just didn't remember straight away,' replied Haruka.

'Hurry up and do it then, I'm bored.'

'Alright, alright calm down,' Haruka walked gingerly forwards and felt the altar in front of her. 'Okay, 'Carriage of thunder. Bridge of a spinning wheel. With light, divide this into six. Bakudo 61: Six Bars of Light!' Instantly the room was illuminated by six bars of light that surrounded itself against the square alter.

The light above the altar lit up and filled the room once again with its light. The alter itself began to shake and slowly it descended downwards until you could only see the surface of it. The eye sank away as well, and when it did the surface slide away revealing a large staircase leading downwards.

'Did it just take my sword with it?' asked Haruka with disbelief.

'It appears so, don't worry, just go down and I'm sure it'll turn up. Maybe this is part of some test. I know you can survive with just kido, after all you can use that kido move.'

'Okay, okay, enough, I'm just gonna head downstairs now.' She stepped slowly and cautiously down the stairs which was all lit up by a regular pattern of torches on either side of the wall.

She stepped down to the bottom of the stairs and stopped at the beginning of a short hallway with a large door at the other end of the hallway within thirty metres away. She walked across the hallway with as little noise as possible and arrived before the door. Unfortunately it was locked but as soon as she touched it a large tablet rose out suddenly from the ground behind her.

'What's this?' On the tablet was there was written a few lines of text in the same ancient language. 'Let's see,' she said as she began to read what was written out loud, 'Answer the question below and pass through the doors,' she scanned down the tablet to the question, 'What is the meaning of life?' She stood there for a minute baffled by the randomness of the question, 'WHAT!?' she stammered loudly. 'What kind of question is this?'

'Troubled are we?' asked Hidoragon calmly.

'Well obviously I am. This question is just… I mean… WHAT!?'

'You need to calm down and think carefully first.'

'Easy for you to say, you're not the one answering the question.'

'It is easy for me to say, not because I'm not the one who's supposed to answer the question. But because I know the answer.'

'Oh? Is that so? Go on then, what's the answer.'

'Sorry, but I ain't gonna tell you. I can't babysit you through everything. However I will give you a clue.' Haruka didn't say anything, so Hidoragon continued, 'Basically, are you dead or alive?'

'That exactly my point I'm dead,' argued Haruka, 'so how am I suppose to know what the meaning to life is when I'm dead?' Suddenly there was a click behind them and the door swung open. 'Oh? Was that the answer?'

'Precisely, you don't know because you're not alive.'

'I see,' agreed Haruka thoughtfully.

She turned around and advanced through the door. She had stepped into another dome shaped room with the same square altar as above that probably dropped down to here. Her sword was floating upright on top of the altar gleaming magnificently. The room was built using a regular pattern of stone and a torch was seen at regular intervals along the wall.

'There you are, you're looking pretty aren't ya,' said Haruka happily to Hidoragon, but there was no reply and she could no longer sense her presence. She must've been absorbed back into the sword when they entered the room.

Haruka shrugged, 'ah well at least you're gonna be back where you belong now.' She walked across the room to retrieve her sword. She got half way and stepped onto a square shaped carving of a winged hollow in the centre of the floor, as soon as it was stepped on that part of the floor started shining brightly. She jumped backwards out of the light and was just able to witness the altar retreat back into the wall and disappearing once more. The doors shut loudly behind her.

'Aww damn, I've had just about enough of these riddles. It better not be another one,' she said frustratedly.

The square centre of the room slid away splitting into four revealing a deep dark hole beneath it. The room shook a little and a loud shrieking noise came from deep down in the dark hole. The shriek became louder and Haruka soon recognized it as a hollow shriek. Suddenly there was a loud wing beat and a winged hollow exactly the same as the one that was carved into the ground flew out of the hole and landed in front of the hole. This hollow had its hole in its stomach, it was mainly blue coloured apart from its green fur on its head and dark purple eyes. It had a rather bumpy body, with thin legs and arms, to great wings spread out from its back. It had a hideous and deformed face with its tongue stuck out drooling onto the ground.

Suddenly a warm female voice filled Haruka's head, but it wasn't Hidoragon this time, 'if you are truly Haruka, owner of Hidoragon then this will be your last test before you can obtain the eye of divinity. Defeat this hollow only using kido spells. If you do not succeed then you and Hidoragon will both perish.' The voice disappeared.

'So all I gotta do is beat this hollow with kido? Easy, I'm a master at kido,' thought Haruka relieved that it wasn't another riddle.

'Let's end this quick,' said Haruka full of confidence, she raised a finger and pointed it at the hollow, 'Hado thirty one, red flame cannon,' she said and a red ball of spiritual energy smashed into the hollow causing a small explosion. 'Done.'

The hollow shrieked once again and flew out from the dust cloud above her. It lingered a second then blasted a fireball at her.

'Guess I spoke too soon.' She flash stepped out of the wall to the other end of the room. She took aim at the hollow once more with her finger, 'hado thirty three, pale fire crash,' this time a blue ball of energy shot out at the hollow, but it didn't make contact. The hollow flew upwards and dodged the attack and descended quickly at Haruka. She jumped up kicked the hollow in the head and held out a hand at the hollow, 'hado fifty four, abolishing flames.' The circular room lit up ever more brightly as a blast of purple spiritual energy burst out from Haruka's hand. The area of impact was just too big and the hollow had no chance to escape and was engulfed by the purple flames of energy. But for some reason it had no effect and the hollow carried on its flight. It opened its mouth wide, energy gathered from everywhere in front of it and it shot a cero blast at Haruka.

'Shit,' she cursed as the cero hit her smashing her into the wall behind and then she dropped down barely able to land on her feet. The hollow didn't waste any time and was already on the assault again. It dive-bombed at Haruka and slashed her shoulder with its claws before she knew what had happened.

'Bitch,' she cursed grabbing her shoulder in pain. Droplets of blood trickled down onto the floor forming small puddles. The hollow made a u-turn and dived once more, but this time Haruka was ready, she let go of her shoulder and ignored the pain. Just as the hollow was about to reach her, she jumped up out of the way, 'hado four, pale lightning,' a blue stream of light shot and crashed into the hollow. The hollow stopped moving for a second when it was hit, Haruka landed perfectly behind it a few metres away. It turned around and charged at Haruka.

'Got you,' she raised both hands at the hollow, 'bakudo four, crawling rope,' the hollow was forced to stop as its arms and legs both got tangled up in some rope made from spiritual energy. 'Bakudo sixty one, six bars of light,' the light bars encircled around the hollow then slammed into its centre so that it was unable to move.

She grabbed her right arm with her left hand and pointed her palm at the hollow spreading out her fingers as widely as she could. Her huge amount of spiritual energy appeared in a large aura around her, 'Flight of a dragon, wing beat of a phoenix. Demon of the east, eagle of the west. Blade of thunder, spear of the leviathan. Cry of the heavens, shriek of hell. A power locked forever, a strength never to be revealed. All things flesh and blood meld into one. All wind and earth strike as one. The king of eusontias screams, the gob of this world attacks. All power virtue lost, all kindness vanishes. Zeal of dragon, eternity of dark waves. Weaklings that stand before me, feel the wrath of a new diety. Desolate all, hado ninty eight, Draco Lance.'

A huge amount of energy erupted from Haruka's hand, the force of the blast even knocked Haruka back a few steps. It was a very high density spiritual energy beam, the power was immense. The massive beam of energy overwhelmed the hollow and blasted right past it as if nothing was there. The ground below where the beam had passed was ripped apart and the wall behind the hollow had a massive dent in it like a crater from a meteorite. The hollow disintegrated into the air and all became unnervingly quiet.

'Well done, only that unique kido of yours could have beaten that hollow, I had to make sure,' said that voice that just suddenly appeared again.

'That wasn't unique. Anyone could have learnt that.'

'No, trust me, only you can learn that specific spell, only you have the correct spiritual energy identity to learn it. Trust me, now please walk forwards.'

Haruka hesitated but did as she was told, there was a small rumbling noise and the altar reappeared with her sword still hovering above it. She walked up, grabbed it and tucked it into her waist band. The hollow hand with the eye had also reappeared.

'Take it, you've earned it,' encouraged the voice. Haruka hesitated again but slowly and cautiously took the eye off the hand. She waited until the eye glowed brightly and floated in front of her.

'Congratulations,' said a voice from the eye as it floated towards her, 'To obtain the last eye go to China, a small village called She Xian.'

'Hey wait, She Xian? Where's that?'

'The eye faded into her necklace, 'you'll know,' it whispered before it disappeared.

'Whatever,' she said without showing care. She walked away. The door was unlocked and the stone gate of the first room disappeared. She met up with Toshiro and Rangiku. They explained what happened with the others, and the three of them left for China

Next wednesday i'll have just returned from London for my vacation!! so i dunno, i might have the chp done if i write quickly and finish before i leave, but we'll see, if i do have the chp then it'll be posted late at night again, sorry for being late this week, virus attack my pc so i had to take care of it, anyway hope u liked the chp