I walk
So others may sit
I run
So others may lay
I leap
To Heaven, so others may sleep
A Predator Among Us
The Hol(low)y War VI
March the King
Clak-Clak-Clak-Clak
The footsteps of two boots tread calmly through the halls of the Silbern fortress. Blood splattered about, corpses brought about in a myriad of grotesque angles and positions. The area scorched by reishi and bursts of reiatsu, the two pairs of feet stepping past without taking any mind to the death enamoring the scenery.
Arrancars, Quincy, they are all passed by a pair of cloaked figures. One a pure white with flowing luxurious blonde hair, reflected by the pale skin he possessed. The other, a sheer black exterior that covered the white uniform beneath, matching the pitch black mane flowing from his head.
The Quincy King and the Sternritter Grandmaster, both staring ahead with stoic expressions of focus, marching out of the destroyed pair of gates. Exiting the interior, both beheld the sight of a massive pair of jaws opened just ahead of the Palace of the Sun's perimeter. Battle scarred the land around it with carved trenches and craters aplenty as far as the eye could see.
"Your Majesty," Jugram Haschwalth spoke, bowing his head as the older man cast him a glance. "The battles are still ongoing nearby. Shall I put an end to them?"
"No," He said in a neutral bass, looking ahead at sparking explosions just beneath the luminous dimension doorway. "However, they are in the way."
Taking a step forward, Yhwach shifted through space and immediately appeared to the battleground.
Yammy and Driscoll both had their hands wrapped around by the fingers, locked in a grapple of strength vs strength.
The armor about Driscoll had been halfway torn down from the helmet to his chest, cracks formed along his gauntlets and down his greaves. Bruises formed about his face, one eye swollen with blood leaking from its darkened orifice along with a broken nose with several teeth void from his jaw.
Yammy on the other hand had a variety of dents in his behemoth arms, signs of brutal battery of bludgeoning by way of the Quincy's fists. His chest is scarred and bled with a variety of surface level of injuries, but nothing that appearing to be grievous. He bled from the mouth as well, but had a grin on his face as he looked to be pushing back the Quincy.
Yet, the sudden arrival of the Quincy King, gave pause to both at the sudden intense shift of gravity that thrummed over them.
"A-Almighty!" Berci croaked out, breaking off his grip from Yammy lowering himself to take a bow.
However, before he could take a knee, Yhwach raised a hand up towards him.
"Your service to me has come to an end, Driscoll Berci," He intoned, a smile on his bearded face as a whirring glow of a five pointed star appeared in his palm. "Farewell."
A sudden flash of light overtook the enormous Quincy. Not reishi, nor reiatsu, but a sudden siphoning of pure power engulfed the monstrously strong man. Flesh shaves off to bone, hair disappearing with the armor and wings off his back.
All at once, save for the uniform that fell to the earth in a pile of ash, Driscoll Berci had been erased from the face of the Varvhelt.
"Your strength won't be forgotten, my Overkill," He mused quietly.
As he did, Yammy Llargo hissed between his teeth and took a stomping step forward. Haschwalth took his own foot to move to intercept, only for Yhwach to gesture him to halt.
"EAT THIS!"
KRAK-KOOM!
A flaring spark of crimson formed from the massive fist's impact against the King's face, a shockwave erupting beneath their feet and splitting the air in a spark of crimson lightning. A grin fashioned over Yammy's face, seeing the Quincy reel from the strike connecting with his face.
KRAK!
Stopping with a thunderous step, Yammy Llargo found his momentary triumph wilt away into dumbfounded surprise. The enemy leader has only staggered back from his attack a single step!
"Ahhhhhh," He sighed, erecting himself upright. A pair of fingers reached to his cheek where he had been struck, pulling back a faint smear of red over the tips.
Letting out a scoffing laugh, he looked up to Yammy with a smirk, "All that for a drop of blood?"
The Cero Espada sneered. He knew he hit the man dead on. Yet, he had only produced that small of a scratch?
"Tch, you just got lucky!" He bellowed out, bending his knees and lunging with both arms cocked back. Deep crimson spheres of reishi swathed his enormous fists, clenched knuckles swinging forth in a discharge of concussive force.
KRRRK-KOOOOOM!
Both arms released an immense torrent of power, tearing through the horizon with an upheaval of soil that erupted in fire. The blast had erased Driscoll's uniform, his ashes scattered to the wind; and in the midst of steaming reiatsu he discharged, Yammy saw something he couldn't believe.
Yhwach stood still, with a single arm outstretched and blocked the majority of his attack that curled around a barrier of ghostly blue, conical in shape and bearing a five pointed cross. Cracking off the edges, it petered away as the Quincy balled his raised fingers into a fist.
Driving it instantly into the Cero Espada's chest, concaving it inwards with a rupture of flesh and bluish white energy. The force rocketed through his insides, erupting the back with a blaze of fiery cobalt, howling behind in a spiral of expansive power.
He gasped out, eyes bulging irises back into being. They rolled back, his body falling backwards to the ground with a heavy thud. Yhwach walked past his hulking frame, leaving it to bleed out behind him as he walked towards the gateway's epicenter.
"Not even their strongest trump card can stand against me," He said aloud with bemusement. "To think these Arrancar have managed to kill so many shows how blessed they were to be touched by the Reio."
"It won't be for much longer, Your Majesty," Haschwalth said with a dutifully melancholic tone.
"Yes, you're right," The King affirmed, looking upwards to the bright sky above them. "It'll be all over, and the new world devoid of death will be within my grasp."
Lifting off the ground, the two ascended into the sky, piercing the veil of luminous reishi that made up the doorway. The bright light streamed across, a plethora of streaks passing them by while they traveled higher and farther ahead. When they were beginning to see a break in the void of white, they'd see a vast blue sky above their heads.
Launching up, the two landed feet first onto the other side with a soft pair of taps. Raising their heads, both saw they were not alone.
A sea of white uniformed, skull headed Arrancar stood at the ready. As if triggered by his presence, they drew their swords in synchrony, a flare of purple reiatsu undulated from the mass that surrounds the gateway that shimmered behind the two.
"I see they left quite the escort for us to the throne," Haschwalth said with a condescending, half lidded stare at the enormous numbers extending past his sight. "I can't even count how many there are."
"From what I can sense, there seems to be nearly two hundred and fifty thousand of these puppets," Yhwach confirmed, his dark eyes surveying the sea of violet reiatsu overlapping the white draping them all. "They don't seem to wish us to advance. Let's clear a path, Haschwalth."
"Of course," The young man affirmed, his hand unsheathing his sword in a slow gradual motion from the scabbard.
VRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!
As he stepped forward, a massive surge of reiatsu bellowed from his body, blowing back as a powerful gale that swept out against the horde of white. The skull headed Arrancar stood their ground, raising their hands up to form a wall of reiatsu-
SHIIIIIIIIIIINK!
-only to find a massive surge of cutting pressure cleave through army. The line carved deep into the platform floor below, clean severance made piles of bodies hit sickly to the ground in a divide of blood and debris. It revealed that behind their ranks lied a stairway that led up and out of the platform to a higher elevation.
"Well done," Yhwach said, walking up to the severed line with a smile on his face. "Now I can wipe away the opposition."
The Calavera reoriented, trying to charge up as one with blades held and Cero being primed. The Quincy King merely withdrew both hands up, engulfed in a fiery blue reishi and threw them out.
VRRRRROOOOOOOOAAAAAAAARRRR!
In a single exhale, a fiery wave of azure-white unleashed in a storm across the Arrancar. Tens of thousands were awashed in the burning tongues, incinerated upon contact and wiping them off the platform in a single action that blasted the floor in a scorching breath.
Seconds later, there was no army left, not a trace of their reiatsu or a piece of their uniform.
Feeling strength rush through his aged veins gave a tingle of pleasure to the Forefather of Quincies. Smiling down at his hands, he gripped them experimentally, marveling at the rejuvenation he felt.
Yet he knew, until the promised day, this was not the whole of his strength restored.
Not till the Almighty could be reawakened.
"Your Majesty?" Haschwalth asked, noticing the King's stillness.
"Nothing, Haschwalth," He affirmed, turning to smile at the younger man. "Just letting off power feels a relief. I am used to being the one who has my subordinates do my work. It is refreshing that the sense of battle hasn't withered away over the time I've spent in isolation."
"It proves that your prime has long since been re obtained, exceeded even," Haschwalth enthused, his tone quieting in his own remembrance. "That is, except for the Almighty."
"Even that power was incomplete compared to what it can be now," He reminded, knowing even with that power of omniscience, he still fell to the mighty power of the Gotei of old.
"Yet, our enemy has changed, and forced us out of hiding," Haschwalth said with furrowed brows. "We dreamt the same dream. Fate has been twisted, and something else is trying to distort the future we had planned."
"Haschwalth, my other half, you know as well as I the future can always change," Yhwach chided with a smile. "This is but one possible future where our enemy isn't Soul Society, but the Hollows we had planned to purge. In the end, our entering of the Royal Palace is still happening, regardless of our preparation for the promised day."
"But, to face the new Reio without the Almighty-"
"I know," He said, confidence ebbing from him as he turned to walk up the stairs scorched black from fire. "But even with my eyes sealed, I can still see that my future won't end here. You've seen it yourself. Our victory will come from the height of their confidence will bring their own ruin. And when they have all but obtained their wishes, I shall grasp them by the throat and tell them:
"My name is Yhwach, the one who shall take everything from you," He finished, as he caught sight of the top of the stairs.
Clang!
Seeing a cutlass shaped saber clang to the ground with a sparking crack, two armored hands placed over atop its handle.
"Nice speech, Quincy," A fiery haired woman, brandishing a devilish smile with red eyes glaring at his ascending person approaching her. "But I got a rebuttal to that thesis of yours."
A scarlet colored light ignited from the blade to the ground, rising up with her red cape and sweeping her white uniform up in a massive torrent of spiritual pressure.
"I am Rana Zolinder, Queen of Hueco Mundo," She began, picking up her blade in a line of fiery reishi that clung to the blade's edge - harmonized with the glowing embers within her irises. "Now bow!"
Cero Espada!
A howling conflagration of reiatsu borne reishi, filling the horizon in a single cutting stroke. The the blast collided into the front of the King as his foot hit the top stair, curling about the point of contact and then erupted into a rebound of bluish white energy. The curved blade sparked on contact, making the smallest of incisions over the black cuffs of the man's uniform with boiling drops of blood hitting the ground with hissing pitter patterns.
"You're welcome to make me, Arrancar," Yhwach refuted, smiling at her with a gleam in his own dark eyes. "But a King can never bow to one without authority."
Rana snarled, stepping forward to throw a Bala infused fist at Yhwach's face. Blasting over the shoulder of the taller man, a hand batted aside the offensive limb.
Then grasped the Arrancar by her face.
Hurtling her into the ground off her feet, a massive collision with the floor shuddered about her cranium. Her let's spasmed, her blade dropping down to the ground next to her. Yhwach drew a black sword from a flick of a wrist, hoisting it up to stab her.
Grasping the wrist that helped pin her head down, she flung her legs up to scissor around his arm and cross his neck. Slapping the earth beside her, she lifted him as he thrust down - narrowly missing as it cut her cheek - and hurtled him up and over his heels to land into the ground with his own head.
Releasing her head, he split the hold and somersaulted forward, spinning around back on his feet. Leaping up to her feet, Rana kicked her sword back into her grip, swinging it about in a brandishing flourish.
Turning to face him again, the pair stared at one another with an intense pressure exchanged between them. The sudden sound of another pair of feet touching down behind Rana alerted her to another enemy.
Swinging around to cut his head down, he ducked.
And swung his sword up in a shear of gleaming metal.
Clang!
"...!" Haschwalth widened his eyes in surprise. His blade had indeed bit into her chest, just below her scar about her concealed spot where the Hollow hole is. It passed partway into the chest only to discover a hand grasped it in a spray of sparks, clenching it tightly with only a small trickle of blood sliding off the flat of the sword.
"If you're going to attack me from behind, beanpole," Rana sneered with a grin, throwing her foot into the man's chest with a booted kick that sent him sprawling back down the scorched steps, "At least aim for the neck!"
Feeling Yhwach behind her, Rana twirled around and clashed her blade against his. Their curved swords sparked, reiatsu sparking off their capes and long maned heads.
Clashing mightily, the pair of blades crossed one another again and again, each time thunderous sound filling the air with gusts of violence borne wind. To any observer, it would seem both were evenly matched and exchanging blows at an equal level.
The Quincy King smiled at the jeering Arrancar, his sword swerving about to hit the guard before she could make a full stroke.
KRAK!
"Keh!" She gasped, finding herself reeling backwards.
Leaving her open to a horizontal stroke. Eyes widened, a spray of blood gushing out of her midsection, the bite of the blade effortlessly passing through her Hierro as if it didn't exist.
Clenching her teeth, she stomped her feet to regain balance and swung her sword down, taking advantage of his blade being away to protect his unarmed side.
Her hand became ensnared by the Quincy's own weaponless hand, stopped by sheer force of his own strength. She narrowly saw a thrust of black propelled towards her chest, leaving her with only a moment to react.
The back of her cape is pierced, mere inches away from the center of the torso. Her own hand split open in a vain effort to derail its course, sinking into the scarred tissue just below where her filled Hollow hole lay. Blood seeped out of her mouth, eyes bulging in agony from the sensation of the sword passing through her chest.
It reminded her of that day, over a hundred years ago, when Nelliel crushed her chest in a single move.
"You may call yourself a Queen, Arrancar, but all I see is a bitter warlord trying to reclaim that is out of her grasp," Yhwach berated, his eyes narrowing at her with a scowl. "A shadow clinging to the ground can never reach the heavens. I shall leave you here, as dust to the wind."
A hand wrapped around his collar, and a head slammed into his face.
"Hngh!" He grunted, his head reeling back, a successive crash of her blade's pommel against his cheek, forcing him to stagger back a step. A punch sent the man pushed back another foot, a snap kick thrown straight to his stomach-
Snatch!
Only to be caught by Yhwach's hand, halting the leg's momentum.
The Quincy King grinned mockingly, Rana's eyes going wide as he pulled his sword from her chest in a line of red.
Lifting up off the ground in a twirl of her hair and cape, she kicked away the blade that sought to sever her foot. Swinging her blade around at the man's face, he bent back, twisting on his heels and throwing her across the vast platform.
Grunting as she landed with a sparking landing across the floor. She clutched her midsection, the two wounds nearly intersecting with how grievous of injuries they were. Compared to the small cut in one palm and gash from the blonde warrior, they were scratches compared to this foe's strikes.
This isn't like Aizen. Even with my increase in power, casting aside regeneration for more strength, he's easily exceeding me I every way, She realized, breathing heavily with sweat sloughing down her tanned skin.
Focusing reiatsu in her hand, she hissed as she burned her skin, sealing the wounds closed with forced cauterization. She reached to her back and did the same, she let out a stifled scream as that wound also funneled closed.
"Impressive," Haschwalth said behind her, sending a chill down her spine. She looked around her shoulder, still sweating from the pain and loss of blood, looking at the Sternritter with a thin lipped grimace. "You managed to staunch the bleeding without instant regeneration. To endure attacks from His Majesty and still remain standing is worthy of praise. The Reio has truly blessed you."
"Cut…the shit!" She spat, turning halfway, keeping an eye at the approaching Yhwach and the still Haschwalth, glancing warily at either one. "She may be strong as Hell, but I'll never give her credit to say I'm blessed. This body I have isn't even mine," she clenched her hand over her blade, rattling in a white knuckled grip as her face gritted his teeth tightly as she hissed out, "I am cursed to do her bidding. But if I am going to die, it'll be on my own terms, fighting the strongest there is."
Forcing a smile to look Yhwach's way, she raised her blade to point at the Quincy King, "I will always be the Primera Espada, the Queen of Hueco Mundo. Your words are as empty as my body. But my spirit will never yield to anyone, let alone a human scum fuck like you!"
Yhwach stopped, looking at her for a long few seconds then looking left and then right. At first, Rana Zolinder appeared confused, wondering what caught his eyes.
Then, he spoke.
"Where are we?" He asked, eyes staring at her with a sense of knowing despite inquiring. "This place isn't the Royal Palace, yet I don't see or sense Soul Society."
Haschwalth himself arched a brow, looking around the empty blue space and the lack of clouds. The air felt light, yet, something seemed stifling. Like everything is being wrapped over and around the immediate vicinity.
I wonder…
Turning around, he swung his sword in a powerful stroke to the distant edge of the platform.
Riiiiiiiiiip!
"Fabric?" Haschwalth asked, his eyes beholding the sky down to the platform tearing away as if woven tapestry. The tear split open up and over their heads, dipping the entire scenery into a pitch black dome of thickly woven threads.
"Heh, so you caught on," Rana said with a smirk, pointing at the ceiling of the dome. "This isn't the Palace. We're actually somewhere between the firmament of seventy two barriers formed by the Royal Guard, above the Seireitei and below the Palace. You got sent here where we had planned on you being when you tried to use the Mandíbulas de Luz.
"In other words," She finished with a turn of her back to Haschwalth, lowering her sword to the ground with a sense of confidence restored. "Even if you manage to get past me, you can't escape this place. This platform will become your tomb!"
Bending down, she flung herself towards the Quincy King. Turning around in a curling arc, the blade brought around in a diagonal stroke towards Yhwach's right shoulder.
Then, it curved. Moving too fast to course correct, she curved with it, the swing twisting around with her body. Hitting the ground behind the Quincy, the blade embedding into the floor, she is left agape as to what happened.
I should have hit him dead on! What did he just do?! She thought angrily.
"I see, so we're still halfway there," Yhwach said, dismissing his blade with a swish of his wrist. "That makes things easier. The only problem is the barriers. They are quite resilient, and it's not entirely a straight line."
"My Lord," Haschwalth spoke up, walking towards him as Rana turned around and slashed at his back only to tumble forward with a bewildered expression. "I can tear this barrier down without difficulty. But unless I can see it, it'll prove difficult to use the Key to navigate through it."
"Not at all," Yhwach gestured with emphasis, Rana stepped up and swung down, around, and thrust into the King as he explained to his right hand man. "I can dispel these barriers since we're already this far up. My reikaku can pick it up, so just follow my lead."
"Of course," He bowed his head. "I shall begin the preparations."
Yhwach gave a passing glance at Rana, seeing her relentlessly swinging her blade at him, trying with all her might to hit him. Looking away, a sudden spiraling Heilig Pfeil fired from the shadow of the King.
Stepping back, she slashed at it. The edge of her sword twisted around, contorting about the corkscrew of energy; enabling the bolt to strike her arm, twisting around with the path of the arrow and popping off in a gory spray of blood.
"FUCK!" She swore aloud, her sword holding arm clinging to the stump where it bled profusely as she staggered back. "The Hell just happened…?!"
"I'm thowwy about thwat," A long haired man rose up from the shadows, a pair of tongues lolling out of his mouth, eyes staring in different directions as he emerged like a weed from the floor. "I wathn't givn' permthin untwil juth now. Bth yuth oppotenth ith now meth, Sternthritther Nyanzel Wizel, W, the Wind."
"You gotta be fucking with me," Rana sneered, clenching her wound with visibly grimacing eyes as her face sweated from anguish; just beneath veins that throbbing over her brows as she screamed in outrage. "Why did I get stuck with this asshole?!"
"Seriously, why am I stuck with this asshole?" Grimmjow swore angrily, his claws parrying Giselle's skeletal digits in a shower of red and blue sparks in the air. The ghoulish winged specter grinned, aloof to the Tres Espada's complaints as he continued hacking his hands in a flurry of speed comparable to his own.
Their reiatsu booms across the heavens, their bodies barely leaving an echo tangible enough to be witnessed by any unlucky person able to withstand their crushing reiatsu weighing down across the Varvhelt. At the level they were, it seemed unlikely anyone could interfere with the fight taking place now.
Having been so focused against the effeminate Sternritter, he didn't notice when Yammy's reiatsu ceased being emitted. The only thing he noticed is that something smothered the pair of his colleagues' reiryoku.
Was it a barrier? Are they dead?
The latter seemed unlikely. Their power rivaled and perhaps exceeded his own in some respects. It being a barrier meant any chance of reinforcements is next to null.
But when did he ever want help?
His mind briefly flashed to the back of Ichigo, deflecting a killing blow by Nnoitra Gilga.
His brow knitted down, and he angrily shouted out, "Screw that!"
Giselle grinned, backpedaled away and avoided a whiffing strike. Kicking into an arm that braced in front of his chin, a crack slamming straight through into his skull.
Rearing back, he stomped forward and slashed into a bone latticed arms, sparking reishi appearing on contact. Gritting his teeth he threw his leg around, hissing as he saw Giselle bow with it, laughing as she's thrown in a comical spin across the palace rooftop.
Zooming in as she bounced, she finds her chest split open in a shower of blood, torso separating from the lower half.
"My power has increased, but you definitely exceed me in speed," She said, her head turning to look slyly at Grimmjow's two-tailed back, fire alight with burning reishi off his hair and appendages. "I thought I could beat you if I got enough reishi…but you're on a whole other level, aren't you?"
"Cut the shit," The Tres Espada sneered, turning to look back at her. "You're matching everything I have to throw at you. Speed is the only thing I have. Your bullshit Quincy powers made strength a moot point."
"I mean, it's more unfair you have a literal God on your side," Giselle replied, her torso sealing back in place with reishi armor renewed as energy is pulled off the Silbern roofing and the air around her. "I need all the help I can get. And even this power boost from the blood I drank won't last for too much longer."
Grimmjow raised a hand, a sphere of darkness suddenly revving up with an enormous pool of power within. Seeing this, Giselle's eyes widened and her mouth contracted into a surprised o.
She raised a hand to her halo, watching the blackness fire out towards her. Breaking the mass of reishi down brought a chill down her spine, a giggle leaving her mouth as she became cradled in darkness folds over her skeletal armor and wings.
Yet, amidst the high, Grimmjow slammed a hand into her head, a Bala infused punch that cracked the armor and split her head open. An eye liquidated, face split open, Giselle staggered back with surprise.
What?
"You slowed down when you siphoned my Cero," He mused, his eyes narrowing at her. "You're not all that skilled in combat, are you?"
"Ah, you're so clever," She snidely replied, her face half mutilated and half covered by a deranged expression on a fair face. "What, you want a cookie? You can't kill me-"
"Watch me!" He roared out, flickering out of view, her neck separating from her head.
A tendril of blood lassoed the detached skull pulled back with a sickly squelch. Twisting around, she unleashed a salvo of arrows at the Arrancar, watching him catch them with a single hand.
"You're not going to win at this rate," The Tres Espada said coolly.
"Maybe you're right," Giselle intoned, turning around to look his way, gesturing to the blackness already receding. "I've had to burn a lot of reishi just to keep up with you. The power gap is widening. You might as well finish me off now."
Grimmjow's eyes glared, his power contorting the environment, space fluctuating with an immense reiatsu. Hair rising up and Grimmjow baring his teeth as he raised his hand, preparing to unleash an attack.
C-C-C-Craaaaaaaack!
The ground?! Grimmjow realized, leaping back from a blur erupting in shadow, the Espada felt it moved faster than he thought it should be.
Another one rose up behind, he swung around to hit it-
Snatch!
He gasped, seeing a white gloved hand catch his wrist before it finished its slash over her face. What looked to be the head of a dainty princess like a curved young woman, a fist thrown his way struck his chest.
KOOM!
Slamming him into the roof with a loud crash, the floor shattered in a blast of smoke and shook the building to its foundations. Arrancars far down below and Quincies looked up in shock at the intense reverberations coming from above.
Wincing, he clutched the bruised chest, seeing cracks and blood leak around the affected area.
"You're quite tough," A strawberry pink haired woman with curls at the edge of her shoulders, with a frilled skirt, puffy shoulders and opera gloves covering her arms with white stockings slipped into a pair of dress shoes. The hat on her head is slid to the side, matching in size rather than Giselle's smaller quaint officer hat. "I expected you to go splash with that punch."
"And you're fast too," A blonde, slender and small Sternritter rose up. A sleeveless uniform with thigh long boots with a pair of forearm fingerless gloves. With a bowl cut style haircut with a officer hat resting over her head, she smirked over at Grimmjow's hunched over form. "Not that it'll save you."
"What do you-?"
KRAAAK-KOOM!
Grimmjow felt his whole body ignited in agony. A massive surge of lightning erupts around him, rising up from the ceiling into the sky. He hoarsely rasped out, reeling about as he looked for the source; only to see a ball of reishi fly towards his face. Slashing at it, he found himself surprised as a massive explosion throttled him away, bouncing about and grinding to a halt under his claws.
"Damn, you're tougher than you look," A green haired, short shorts and sleeveless top teenaged appearing girl. Next to her dressed more conservatively is a long black haired shorter girl, with a cloak over her white uniform with long pants and heeled boots with a small uniform skirt around her thighs.
"Bambi, you clearly held back at that last explosion," Candice said with a cheeky grin. "I clearly did more damage than you."
"You keep that up, and I'll show you how strong they can be, Candice," Bambietta replied back with a low growl.
"It doesn't matter," Giselle spoke, dropping among the four girls, her Vollstandig returning to its standard white appearance, her face restored to a sly grin at Grimmjow. "Now all five of us are here, he won't stand a chance."
VMMMMMMMMMMM!
"Is that what you think?!" Grimmjow roared out, swinging his arms back, claws raised and teeth bared. "I don't care how many of you there are! Come at me all at once! At the end of the day, victory will be mine!"
"You're all mine!" Bazz Bee crowed out, brandishing his crossbow, firing off a slew of reishi bolts at his foe.
Tier evaded the bolts with ease, her head weaving in and out of range while approaching her enemy. Swinging her broadsword around in an arc of yellow, Bazz Bee swung his own hand to whip a crescent scythe of molten flames.
BOOM!
Light and fire collided, a pyrotechnic blast blasted away both combatants from ground zero. Within their surroundings similar scorched marks pocked the floor, ceiling and walls. The area itself seemed reminiscing of her own dojo hall, though this felt marginally spartan in comparison to her Roaring Seas Palace.
"You're a tough monster, you know that?" The Mohawk Quincy remarked with a jeering grin.
"And you're remarkably stubborn," Tier murmured through her mask fragment. "The fact you can resist being cut by Ola Azur speaks volumes of your power. I commend you for standing on even footing with me."
"Ha! You talk as if you're in control of this fight,* He barked, gesturing a smoking finger at her position. "You could've pressed the initiative at any point, but you pull back when I crank up the heat."
He laughed, waving his arms about emphatically, "What's the matter? Not a fan of the room temperature?"
"I've seen hotter," She rebuked, pulling back her broadsword till it was parallel with her buoyant chest and tooth covered jawline.
"What, that move again?" Crowed the Sternritter, already curling his forefingers back in readiness.
But, instead of the Ola Azur, it came out in a thinner yet swifter discharge. Bazz's eyes bulged, his body throttled back by the blade shaped Bala that rammed into his shoulder and smashed him into the wall.
Dashing in a blur, she thrust her blade to impale his affected shoulder.
Clang!
The wall behind cracked as the weapon sparks off over the torn uniform jacket. Before her eyes, she'd see light blue veins pulsing about, with a sizzling coat of fire that defused the reishi that came off her weapon.
Not only that, but his right arm slid through the gap of her Zanpakutō's flat, catching the top rim and halting it dead in a vice grip. Bazz-Bee reacted to her surprise with a boot stomping onto her foot, yanking the blade away and throwing a haymaker with his left hand.
KRAK-KOOM!
"Burner Fist!" He yelled out, a fireball swathed over the body of the Espada he punched with a thunderous impact.
Thrown across the large empty room, heels dug into the floor and the flames ebbed off in dispersal off her. Hissing smoke flowed up off the Primera, some of her body devoid of the beautiful garments and now only showing a bare path of mask fragment latched over her breasts. Her own gloved hand dropped the eroded material, revealing her catching the punch and with nary a scratch upon it.
"Heh, you got a tough Hierro, I'll give you that," He mused dusting himself off as he eyed his torn shirt. Thumbing it, he shook his head with humor. "You ruined my jacket. Not cool, lady."
"Burning my garments happened first," She retorted evenly back, coolly staring at the Sternritter appraisingly. "You're strong. Stronger than I expected. It seems conventional means won't put a mark on you."
"Does that mean you're scared?" He jeered.
"No, it means I can't afford to hold back," She replied, flipping her sword into an inverted angle.
Destroy, Tìburon!
In a calm declaration, her body erupted in a geyser of reiatsu. Yellow light swiftly became a vortex of water, forming the jaws of a shark behind herself. Clamped down over her, the engulfed Arrancar transformed within the highly rotating vortex.
Dispelled in a shuddering pressure of immense gravity, Tier Harribel is unveiled with a slight change in appearance.
Her sword replaced by a three pronged finned engraved pata, broad in diameter as it was in length, easily exceeding her own height. Spiked blonde hair frayed out, resting over her shoulders and the back of her neck, blue triangular tattoos lied over her now visible, soft sharp visage. Her breasts remains mostly exposed, as did most of her body, save for bracers of white wrapped around her forearms with black gloved over each hand, knee high armored boots with heels down below and a series of white jutting skirt covering her pelvis region.
Her hole at her waist is filled by a white cross in a black backdrop, signifying her allegiance as much as who she owes her new life to.
"Ha! Impressive reiatsu!" Bazz-Bee yelled out with excitement, flames rushing off him with emphasis. "I guess this means you're going all the way! Let's do this!"
Tier raised her pata.
And then swung it down.
Bazz's eyes bulged, his arms crossed and then the whole world became pain.
A/N: Here it is!