"King! You bastard, get in here now!" The hollow shouted to the pouring sky. The battle had gone badly. Worse than anything the orange haired hero had been through before, and that was quite an accomplishment. He had been beaten so completely and so thoroughly that his Zanpakuto had reverted to its sealed form for the first time since he had called its name.

"He can not hear you..." The old man said, less than helpful. The hollow wasn't interested in such trivial matters as can and can't. The fool would hear him, or he would just keep making a racket.

"The hell he can't!" The hollow snapped at his companion. He had shared the peculiar landscape with the manifestation of Ichigo's Quincy powers since he had come into existence. When Ichigo was not involved, they got along rather well, for two beings who were completely abhorrent to each other. But the old man had only ever wanted to protect Ichigo from harm, while the hollow wanted him to grow strong. It must have been the fact that the boy's mother had passed him the Quincy powers that left them with such a desire to protect him. It was frustrating, but they both agreed, Ichigo had to live.

"It is better this way... Without us, he can not fight. If he is powerless, they will not feel the need to kill him."

"And guess what else? It'll never stop raining then! Not. Ever! You can't even be sure that they won't kill him! We may still die, without ever seeing the sun again! I am not going to sit back and let that happen!" The hollow roared at the sky, then fired a cero in a wide arc, blasting the glass out of a dozen sky scrapers. The glass fell sideways, never to touch the ground.

"What if you succeed in waking him? What if he even hears your voice and regains his strength? He was beaten even with us in his hands. Vollständig and Bankai together were not enough to defeat Yhwach. He is the father of all Quincy. Our Bankai was nothing to him, and he was able to turn my own powers back on us. What more can we do besides allow Ichigo to rest?"

"Resurrección." The hollow said, calming slightly. "He needs only accept the last third of his power, and Yhwach will be nothing before us."

"He fears your power. He fears that if he uses it, he will lose himself again, as he did when he destroyed Ulquiorra." The old man shook his head.

"Yes, I do."

The two turned to see the orange haired man standing nearby.

"Ichigo, I did not expect to see you again, much less so soon." The old man looked over the man he existed to protect. "Orihime's work, I imagine."

"Yeah." Ichigo turned to his inner hollow. "He's right. I fear using your power... But you're right as well. I need to, if I want to protect everyone..."

"That is all you ever care about. Protecting others. You give little thought to the desires of either of us. You endanger yourself recklessly time and time again, against the old man's wishes. You ignore your potential and only grow as strong as you need to be to match your latest challenge, and even then, you always draw out more and more of your Shinigami powers, and rarely ever touch more than the tiniest fraction of my power..."

"And what is it you want, hollow? To steal my mind and body? To kill and destroy in a world that will hunt you down and destroy you?"

"I want a heart!" The hollow snarled and turned on Ichigo, who stepped back, startled. "Your body... That was a foolish idea... Even if I ruled the body and mind, we would still be two separate souls. I would still be a hollow. I would still be empty. When we merged to fight Aizen, I was complete! I was whole for the first time since I came into existence! That is what every hollow craves... To fill the emptiness and become whole... I want to become whole, again, King. I want you to merge with me. Whether you merge with the old man is irrelevant. He has a heart..."

"Merge... I would never be able to return to the living world again... Aizen's power was so great and terrible that his presence would render human souls into nothingness, and our fully merged soul was so powerful even he could not comprehend it..." Ichigo looked at the manifestation of his Quincy powers. "Can it be undone again?"

"Possibly... But not safely. You could lose us completely if you tried. Having part of your soul torn away is not something anyone is meant to experience."

"You want me to live..." He turned back to his hollow. "You want me to merge with you again... And I want to protect everyone..." He thought for a moment. "Fight with me... Fight with me in this war, and I will live. I will be able to protect everyone. And when I graduate from college, I will come to Soul Society permanently, and I will merge with you again."

"You swear this? Five years... I fight by your side for five years, help you win this war and protect those you love, and you will let me have a heart again?" The hollow asked quietly, almost not believing the words he was hearing.

"That's right. And you know I will never go back on my promise. Will you fight with me, Zangetsu?" Ichigo extended a hand to his colorless twin. For a moment, the hollow stared at the outstretched hand, then it grinned, taking it firmly and locking eyes with Ichigo.

"I will fight with you, Ichigo." His grin grew even larger. "And they will not know what hit them."

"Even with your combined strength, a good plan would not hurt." The old man said with amusement.

"Did you have something in mind?" The hollow asked.

"Actually, I have a plan. Orihime and Chad were able to free a few of the weaker Arrancar, but they also found out where the others were being kept. They would follow a hollow. I think rather than going straight for Soul Society, we attack Hueco Mundo instead. It will be less heavily defended. The nine days set down as the time frame for Yhwach's victory is almost up. They won't be expecting a sideways attack at the eleventh hour." Ichigo suggested. His companions nodded their agreement.

"The Visored would fight with you as well. A small army of Arrancar, Visored, and yourself might just be enough to topple the Quincy."

"There is one last thing... You are in your sealed state... How do I release you when I have recovered?"

Line -

Five figures slipped through the Garganta without so much as a whisper. Urahara had supported their plan completely. He would be going ahead of them to Soul Society to ensure the last of the Shinigami did not fall before their back up arrived. Orihime, Chad, Rukia, and Renji were all joining him.

The figures touched down on the desolate white sand that made up the majority of Hueco Mundo. Love, Hachi, Lisa, Hiyori, and Ichigo. They ducked behind a large dune and peaked over at the ruins of Las Noches. The walls were lined with dozens of Quincy, bows at the ready, Seele Schneiders hanging at their belts.

"Way to go, Baldy. What happened to 'There won't be many left to guard it, since they'll be focused on Soul Society.', Huh?" Hiyori growled.

"It doesn't make much of a difference at this point. This is our last card to play. If we fail, we're all dead, no matter how many Quincy are standing guard." Love pointed out.

"Can we do it, Ichigo?" Lisa asked. She didn't look worried, but her typical bored expression was gone as well. She looked alert... Maybe even excited. He let himself grin, and he felt his inner hollow's grin mirroring his own.

"Yes. Now, when we attack, we'll go in three teams. Lisa and I will break through their line. Hachi, you will get through and make your way straight for the chamber where Halibel is imprisoned. Hiyori and Love, you will watch his back and follow some distance behind him to draw the attention of anyone who might try to stop him. We'll remain outside and take on their front line, and hopefully draw their strongest fighters." Ichigo explained. The short girl immediately protested.

"I am the strongest next to you! I should be fighting on the front line!" The other Visored could not disagree.

"I know you are. That's why you're backing up Hachi. His mission is the most important. I would go myself, but I would only draw more attention to him. It is safest for me to be away from him, but they won't suspect you to be the next greatest threat." Ichigo watched her deflate and nod in agreement.

"What do we do once we free Halibel?" Hachi asked.

"Send her out to meet me, and continue to free any Arrancar you can find. Grimmjow, if he is still alive. If they can wield a sword, free them and send them to fight."

"Sounds simple enough. It is a good plan. I knew Urahara wouldn't have asked us to follow you unless he had faith in you." Lisa commented.

"Before we go..." Ichigo extended his hand, palm down, into the center of their group. Slowly, four other hands joined his. "I thought this was foolish the last time I was here, but we made it through, so it can't hurt."

"I thought this was going out of style a century ago..." Lisa smiled and looked around their small band. She stopped to focus on their leader. Ichigo Kurosaki. The man who had defeated Aizen. Human, Shinigami, Hollow, and Quincy, all rolled into one. He wasn't like anyone else she had ever met. Well, maybe her own captain came close, once, but he had never had as much fire as this young man did. He was someone she could follow into battle with no hesitation. His voice, quiet, but strong and steady, drew her attention back to their hands joined in the center of their circle.

"Here, we prepare to enter the decisive battle. Have faith that our blades will not shatter. Have faith that our resolve will not waiver. And if our paths should diverge, we share a heart of iron. Swear, that even if the ground beneath our feet should be rent asunder, we will live, and return here, together." He looked at each one of them, his cocky grin spreading over his face once again. Without a word between them, all five sprang into action.

The charge was laughable, from the perspective of the Quincy. A fat man, who they thought might break into a roll, rather than a run, a skinny woman in a skirt that left little to the imagination, especially while running, a child with dirty blond hair, and man with bizarre hair and sunglasses even though it was night, and... Wait, was that Kurosaki?

As they drew within range of the Quincy's arrows, they split into their groups, and four of the five donned their masks, their riatsu spiking and darkening. Ichigo heard a voice cry out in his heart.

"Call my name, King! Ichigo! Call for me now!" His inner hollow cried out. In his inner world, the rain had stopped, and as the voice filled him with hope, the first rays of sunlight tore through the clouds.

"Protect and defend, Zangetsu!" Ichigo drew the blade from his back, feeling it change smoothly into the unique black cleaver that fit his hand perfectly. His riatsu spiked immediately, bringing him to the level of a strong captain. He waved a hand over his face and his mask appeared, accompanied by another spike, more than doubling his power. "Bankai! Tensa Zangetsu!" The cleaver narrowed and the trailing cloth turned into a black chain that wrapped around his arm. His power grew by a factor of ten.

"Let me fight with you, King!" He heard the voice again, and he finally welcomed it. He drew upon the familiar, terrifying power he had only fallen in to on the rarest occasions. Now it did not overwhelm him, but lifted him up. His hair cascaded down his back. Horns arched toward the sky. Claws clutched the hilt of his blade in an iron grip. He saw his comrades faces twist with terror for an instant, afraid he had turned on them. It was nothing compared to their relief, nor to the terror of their enemies, when he unleashed a blast of red energy at the battlements of Las Noches.

Most of the Quincy had never seen a hollow stronger than a Gillian. Even fewer had actually fought one. They overtook Hueco Mundo in a surprise assault, knowing that a true confrontation with creatures who's essence was toxic to them would not have gone well. A small number of the generals had killed Adjuchas from a distance with arrows of light in the assault. Not one had ever come face to face with a true Vasto Lorde. None were prepared for the incredible power of the orange haired shinigami to spike by a factor of ten once again. The power of 200 strong captains behind a Cero... No one would ever blame those who took their last opportunity to turn and run in terror.

"Woah..." Lisa came to a stop, watching in awe as the Shinigami she had watched transform into a Vasto Lorde wiped out half of the enemy force in once earth shaking blast. She felt the reverberation of the Cero in her bones, and her inner hollow, subjugated and confined to a locked room in her mind, shuddered with fear. The girl, Orihime, had told them the story about how Ichigo had been on the edge of death in Hueco Mundo, but had turned into a powerful hollow and defeated the fourth Espada. From what she understood, the Espada has been wiping the floor with Ichigo until that moment. Then, he had been completely outclassed. Unable to so much as touch the monster Ichigo held in check every day.

Ichigo took a moment to admit to himself, he liked the way he felt. Before, his human mind had been on the verge of death, or overwhelmed by the atmosphere of hell. Now, he was clear headed and the power rippling through him left him with an electrical feeling in his pale skin. He bent his head and allowed his instincts to guide him as he fired a rapid series of Balas at the scrambling Quincy on the remnants of the wall.

He grinned beneath his mask as he saw his allies cheering and rushing forward without fear. He drew the power of his Bankai to the tips of his horns and used it to compress and refine the growing tempest of energy. He poured all he had into the glowing sphere of red. The ground around his feet vibrated until cracks appeared in the packed stone and the white sand began to form ripples like a lake frozen in the instant after a stone had plunged in.

He was vaguely aware of his allies calling up shields of Kidou simply to stand up under the weight of his riatsu. He growled and drew up the familiar glow of his Quincy powers and sent tendrils of the reluctant energy into the reservoir. It tried to pull free at first, but he forced it to intertwine with the structure he had forced the energy to take on, binding it together. With the addition of Yhwach's own powers, the Quincy's shields would not even slow down the attack.

When the ground felt like it may give way beneath him, he made his move.

The Quincy had been bracing for their last instant. They knew that no amount of hardened blood would save them. They could feel the pulsing energy even at such a great distance. They could see it warping the air around him. Even his allies were taking cover. Just when they thought he was going to release the monstrous Cero, he vanished. A crackle of static, and the nightmarish hollow stood there, close enough to count the teeth on his mask. The Cero tore down the battlements in a far narrower beam than before, so intense that the fragments of their father's soul could not escape.

Below, recovering from both their elation and terror at Ichigo's transformation, Hiyori and Love pushed Hachi back into action. Thanks to Ichigo's last attack, the entire front wall of Las Noches was crumbling above them, slowing their progress. On the other hand, their was not a single Quincy standing in their way.

At the center of the maze of hallways, they found their target, chained and gagged. Tier Halibel. They separated, Hiyori and Love each taking a side passage as Hachi went to work freeing the ruler of Hueco Mundo. As soon as her mouth was free, she looked up at her rescuer.

"The riatsu outside... Who is it?"

"Ichigo Kurosaki. The man who defeated Aizen after he cut you down. He needs your help. We all do. If we do not defeat the Quincy in Soul Society, Shinigami and Hollows alike will be wiped out." Hachi carefully broke through the barriers containing the powerful Arrancar.

"Ichigo... He was a Shingami, wasn't he? This is the riatsu of a Hollow... One that puts even Vasto Lorde to shame... Starrk and Barragan together would not hold a candle to this... What help can I be to such a creature?" Tier rubbed her wrists as the shackles fell free.

"Soul Society is on the edge of collapse and the Quincy now outnumber the Gotei 13... He could not release this power their without wiping out many he cares about. He needs an army to turn back the Quincy invasion."

"And an army he's got!" A fierce shout declared from one of the hallways. Grimmjow stood, sword in hand, with at least fifty Arrancar at his back. Beside him, smirking proudly, was Hiyori. Love came running from the opposite direction with another large group.

"Will you declare war on the Quincy and ally yourself with the Shinigami? You are the ruler of Hueco Mundo..." Hachi asked quietly.

"Hueco Mundo is ruled by the Hollow that the others will follow, and Hollows follow strength. I am no longer their ruler. Ichigo is the most powerful Hollow in all of Hueco Mundo. We fight for him, no matter the ally or enemy that entails." Tier drew her own short blade. "Lead the way."

Line -

"It is the ninth day... And victory has come as predicted." Yhwach smiled calmly to himself as he watched the last resistance make their stand on the Sokyoku Hill. It was truly admirable. They had regained some footing when Urahara and his band had arrived, but their retreat had begun almost immediately afterward. Now they formed a ring around the spot where the great execution spear had once stood.

"Why don't they lay down their weapons and surrender? Even Kurosaki has been defeated. They must know all hope is lost, why continue wasting their lives to defend a symbolic hill?" One of his advisors wondered aloud. For a moment, Yhwach felt a twinge of unease. It was illogical... They were forming a ring around a completely meaningless piece of ground... Unless it wasn't meaningless.

He had no time to call for his troops to regroup before the air was torn open and a hundred Arrancar charged between the ranks of Shinigami and into his men, slaughtering them mercilessly. The sudden attack turned their advance back and drove them down the hill, allowing the healers to immediately go to work on the Shinigami who had held their last line.

The Garganta closed, and where it had been, stood Ichigo. Yhwach growled angrily. His victory had come, as the prophecy had said, in nine days precisely. Now, he stood to lose everything in less than a day... He stumbled back as if he'd been struck. Hours... Nine hours... It wasn't possible. He pulled a silver watch from his cloak. It was ten at night... By dawn, he would either have his victory on the tenth day, or have been killed in nine hours.

"Do not let them have an instant to regroup! Kill the Arrancar first! The semi hollows will be deadly to you at close range, use your bows!" He called to his commanders. The orders were issued. He set off for the orange haired man who he had spared not long ago. He would not do so again.

His stomach twisted as if he had stepped off a ledge unexpectedly. He lurched to a stop as he blinked in confusion. The battle had changed. His men lay scattered and defeated across the hill. Only a handful still fought, and they were falling one by one. The others had retreated, but he had given no such command. Terror gripped him when he was the first rays of dawn lighting the sky.

"Aizen..." He stared at the First Division, under which the dangerous prisoner still sat, bound and helpless. Except, somehow, he wasn't. He still had some power of hypnosis... He had tampered with the man's perception of time once again.

"You're finished. Call them off and no one else has to die." With a crackle of Sonido, a black blade was pressed to his neck. He tried to twist it away as easily as he had before, but his hand burned at the contact. "Zangetsu doesn't like you touching him."

"You embraced your hollow side... I expected you to resist to the bitter end... I underestimated you, Ichigo Kurosaki." He watched a feral, blue haired panther tear the throat out of one of his commanders. "My men will die fighting... I will never call them off."

"I will." Uryu said coldly as he slid the paper thin blade of a Seele Schneider between Yhwach's ribs and into his heart. "My father made this blade specifically for you. It uses only pure hollow Reishi. You will not recover from this. Not even in nine thousand years."

"Traitor..."

"Loyalty is required before you can betray someone. Were you truly foolish enough to believe I would be loyal to the man who is responsible for my mother's death?" Uryu twisted the blade and withdrew it. "Quincy! Surrender immediately! I command you, stop fighting and lay down your weapons! The war is over!"

The Quincy took no further prompting to save their lives. The cheers from the Arrancar, Visored, and Shingami echoed far and wide. Deep below ground, Aizen smiled. Everything had gone just as planned.