The fealty we swore
Belongs now to another
We fight together as brothers
Against an evil bore
From the past of our Lord
We shall reduce them to nothing
For we are the ones from before the beginning
The Zero Division
A Predator Among Us
The Hol(low)y War X
ZER0 H0UR
The Soul Palace.
The holiest of holies, once unsullied by invaders for countless ages. Once a canvas of endless blue with five dish shaped cities orbiting a cylindrical pyre that presided the throne of the Reio, now a massive expansion of land between the five floating cities; with a massive citadel of shining glass, shining like a Sun where the new Soul King resided.
In less than a day, it too became invaded by interlopers, blasphemous in their intent of tearing down the neophyte God King.
Streets of gold are aflame, blooms of orange and gold stretched out from points of contact between two superhuman beings. Their blades of steel sparking out tendrils of reishi, flames of blue and orange wafting out in hot gales with every parrying impact.
Gerald grinned, his body covered in burning cuts, the flesh sizzling beneath the roar of his battle. His majestic cape waves with his blonde hair, his feet still standing against the legendary Shinigami who fought against him.
The mustached Shinigami, who now bore a devilish smirk that matched the fiendish silhouette he bore past his fiery reiatsu, had not a single mark on him. Every time Gerald got close to landing a blow, it became countered and he would end up being the one wounded instead.
But he will not go down.
He refused to fall.
For he is his Almighty's Sword, and he will keep swinging, even in death.
"I think it's time for us to end this," Yamamoto said with a sigh, his face darkened beneath the flames lapping over his head down his jaws. "You are a fool to have crossed blades with me, Quincy."
"Ha! As if things are settled!" Gerard bellowed out a scoffing laugh, swinging his sword and shield around into a forward leaning stance. "Until I breathe my last, I'll never stop advancing!"
An upheaval of gold bricks rose from a mighty boot smashing downward. Erupting in a wave, Yamamoto's reiatsu melted the bricks as they rose up, dissolving into a gas that hissed into the air thickly.
Zooming forth in a blur, the massive man moved swiftly belying his large stature. The shield slammed into the Shinigami's front, thrusting his blade around the curve to strike the elder being's neck.
Snatch!
Gerard's smile froze, eyes wide behins the helmet. The sword was caught between a set of calloused fingers, the shield pressed against a solid chest that stood unmoved.
"You fell for it," Yamamoto rasped with a devious grin.
The Quincy, about to speak, suddenly felt heat rising up all around him. Twisting his neck back and forth, he saw flames surge up and around his physique; then completely engulfed in a rising pillar of golden fire.
"Jigoku no Shinsei," Yamamoto neutrally declared, watching the Quincy burn alive before his gaze. Flesh tore off with the skull disintegrating, the helmet falling to the ground in a fragmented impact along with the rest of his effects.
All of his remains turned to ash, save for a single Quincy pentacle lying within its center of a smoldering black hole marking the Palace streets.
"Rest in peace, misguided fool," He muttered disparagingly, turning on his heels away from the deceased Quincy.
VVVVRRRRROOOOOAAAARRR!
A howl of force erupted behind a wide eyed Shinigami. Flowing out of the crater gusted a geyser of blue flames rose up a massive shadow, its silhouette towering over the elder Shinigami and exceeding the heights of all the nearby mansions within the Soul Palace.
Dispersing the swathe of reishi with a swing of an arm, Gerard Valkyrie appeared reborn and transformed. A circlet wrapped around his blonde brow, red markings enamoring about his blank white eyes. His cape flowed bountifully behind him like a large flag, his shield and armor all glowing a bristling bluish hue.
He didn't die? I swore I destroyed him, Yamamoto thought with a surprised stare up at the shadow casting figure standing above him.
"Ahhhhh, it's been awhile," Gerard sighed, grinning broadly with a tilt of his head turned down at the smaller being. "I haven't explained earlier, but my Schrift bestowed by my Majesty is M, the Miracle. This allows me to bestow upon myself and allies miracles which give us fortune and our enemies misfortune. The fear of the people gave me immense size, and every time you cut me down I shall return even stronger!"
Grasping a large steeple from a mansion to his right, he hoisted it up as if it were a javelin. With a barking laugh like thunder, he hurled the projectile at the Shinigami standing apart from him.
FWHOOOSH!
"Hngh!" Gerard grimaced, his body reeling - not from the large upheaval of the golden street across a massive block in the city from his throw. No it was a sudden painful slash of heat that erupted flames as it cut deep into his right forearm.
Shaking the affected limb, Gerard saw a blur of black soar past his gaze.
A conflagration of fire came swiftly afterwards, igniting the air around his face and enveloping his whole skull in intense heat. The flames were so thick they consumed any hint of his head beyond a vague silhouette of his enormous cranium.
"You may have gained great strength and stature, Quincy," Yamamoto spoke, a smirk adorned behind his mustache as he stood upon the air level to the giant's head. "But you have no speed, nor awareness, to compensate for your increase in power."
Raising his sword over his head, Yamamoto poised to cut Quincy down the middle.
In a single stroke, a pillar of flesh swung by, narrowly missing Yamamoto through a swift Shunpo. On arriving at the opposite side, the other hand sought him out, clawing fingers into a crushing grip.
Genryusai grunted out, swiftly slashing his blade in a series of fiery strikes, dicing up fingers and scorching open the palm in a splash of boiling blood. Yet, in his maiming of the hand, golden light shined out and red painted fingers with plated knuckles formed into a clenched fist.
KOOM!
Slamming into Yamamoto in his moment of surprise. The elder Shinigami felt his whole body streak across Heaven, slicing through the nearest Palace, shattering it to pieces as if brittle glass before ending against the base of the largest structure light reflecting crystal.
Gerard's head reformed, red lines enamoring his pale flesh, eyeless sockets wide with a broad smile as he laughed heartily.
"Do you see now, the folly of your vanity, Genryusai Yamamoto?!" He bellowed out, swinging both arms out with proud proclamation. "I am the mightiest Sternritter, a being beyond anything you can muster. Your flames cannot kill me, and by any miracle you can, my body will always be renewed. You cannot win!"
In his bellowing, he felt the temperature spike around himself. Blank eyes turned with his face, seeing a fiery silhouette hissed back into view, unleashing a vast exhalation of bright golden fire. The relaxed expression of the elder Shinigami had turned hard like stone, veins throbbing past a gash formed from the brow across his left temple down to a bruised nose and split lipped mouth.
The massive man grinned, throwing an arm the size of a tower in a blur of superhuman momentum.
KRAK!
The giant raised a brow, mouth parted with an audible, "Hooo?"
Yamamoto stood still, one arm flexed and throbbing, whose hand caught the middle knuckle of his foe's gargantuan fist.
Glaring hotly, Genryusai pulled on the finger.
"HRRRR!" Gerard bellowed a grunt of surprise, his mammoth form heaved forward uncontrollably, his towering legs leaving the ground below. Throwing his other palm at Yamamoto's sword held flank as he fell forward, he beheld the fire disappeared the moment his hand touched it-
KOOM!
"GAULK!"
-following a sudden crushing force ramming into his chest, shattering the breastplate and erupting his chest cavity with fire. Thrown back by the shockwave, the reverse gripped blade of Ryuujin Jakka slashed cutting edge upwards, raking through the already maimed flesh of Gerard while engulfing it in combusting flames.
Crashing to the ground, Gerard Valkyrie gasped for air, feeling his lungs boiling away. Pupiless eyes widened at a flame in the shape of a sword rushing straight at his head.
Swinging his buckler around, the fiery missile billowed heat like water, flowing all over the rest of his undefended body. Blue veins sparked to life, strengthening his flesh while an aurora of gold flowed from his wounds and restored his body stronger than before along his chest; complete with gleaming armor of bluish-gold detailing his impressive muscular frame.
Pushing himself back to his feet, the Quincy saw Yamamoto's brimstone form stood upon a nearby tower of white, along with a wall of golden trim that remained of the adjacent damaged Palace. Gritting his teeth, he brandished his shield arm ahead of himself.
"I see you have yet to see the gap between us," Gerard spat, his right hand grasping the edge of his shield, pulling out a colossal blade that shines brilliantly in the air. "Hofgnung will show you the futility of your struggling!"
Yamamoto's eyes narrowed at the giant sword. It looked immaculate, held a density of reiatsu that seemed to vibrate the air around it, giving it a dangerous feeling that he could sense even from a distance. He had not seen a weapon like it, not even Yhwach's Saubern.
Gerard stomped forward and made the next move in a swift, powerful stroke. Yamamoto's person shaved through space, the spot he had once stood on shattered and the rest of the Palace wall eradicated into a blast of dust and flotsam.
Twisting his hips, the cape flowed bountifully from the Quincy as he turned to Yamamoto, swinging his hill sized sword at him across the air. The Shinigami tensed, grasping his sword with both hands and parried the massive weapon.
A thunderous clang, filled the air, warping space and quaking the ground below.Fire and reishi gushed out from both weapons, a crack of lightning discharged off of reiatsu from sheer contact of impressive weapons.
Pulling back the blade, it was visible that a gash of scorched metal was left behind where Ryuujin Jakka had made contact. Genryusai raised a brow as Gerard grinned broadly.
"My Hofgnung has been chipped!" He yelled with glee, brandishing his sword up as if to boast it to his enemy. "Now the price shall be paid in blood!"
Before the elder Shinigami could voice a question, a sudden eruption of blood tore from his chest. Blanching, he palmed at his wound, looking down in shock at the injury that felt as if came from his enemy's sword.
But he didn't sense it. Not even a flicker of reiatsu from what just transpired. What had just happened?
"Allow me to elucidate you for the benefit of instilling despair," Gerard jeered mockingly, holding his blade in a presenting fashion horizontally. "There is a special condition that is fulfilled the moment you damage Hofgnung. For every chip, dent or mar you make of it, your body shall be wounded accordingly."
Pulling the blade back, Gerard jeered as he swung his sword at the Shinigami. Shunpo filled the sky, following a series of wind rupturing sword strokes. Metal sought him out, each time getting within a hair's breadth of him.
Stopping short, Gerard threw a fist at Yamamoto's left flank, forcing his attention away for a split second-
CLANG!
-allowing an overhead pendulum of steel to crash into a rising guard of his Zanpakuto. Blocking the fist with an outstretched arm, another burst of injury came from his chest, blood spouting out despite tending his body in readiness of such a wound.
"This blade in all of its majesty will cut you, regardless if you parry it," Gerard spoke to Yamamoto cooly, grinning as he raised his blade, "just as assuredly as my body will always return from any fiery Hell you send it!"
As he brought the blade down, something shifted in the air. Not a simple flux of heat but a sudden sense of change in the atmosphere. Everything became brighter, the clouds ominously storming above parted and a sudden blistering sense crawled up and down his body.
Hofgnung, before Gerard's gaze, evaporated in the line of which it made contact with the smaller figure he poised to crush as much as cut. The forward edge collided into the ground, hissing with steam where it was dissolved; dust ebbing from the larger back half that the Quincy held in disbelief.
"What…did you…do?" He asked, almost quietly with swelling fear rising up his chest as he eyed the unmoved Shinigami.
"I didn't want to use this, in the most holy place such as this," Genryusai grunted, his aura snuffed out and the flames no longer wafting off his body nor his sword. Instead a charcoal black tinge covered the Zanpakuto, showing an underwhelming impression of the most powerful Zanpakuto of all the Seireitei.
"Zanka no Tachi," Yamamoto growled out, raising his sword up to point at the Quincy's face. "With this Bankai I shall ensure not a single speck of dust is left behind. You won't be joining your brothers in the next life, nor will you be in Hell. You shall experience only oblivion. Prepare yourself, Quincy!"
Askin's throat clenched. A noxious feeling of heat wafted over him along with a sudden sensation of dread.
Amidst his flight from his foe he had been subjected to the sudden results of his comrade battling the former Captain Commander of the Gotei 13. This force that shook the ground of Heaven and split open the dark firmament brought unease.
What the Hell…is this power?
The shrouded figure of Pernida Parknjas swayed back and forth, moaning horribly in a guttural tongue. Something liquid ebbed out of the cowl, dissolving into vapor that vanished in an instant. Trembling in place it let out a wail of pain from the miasma of heat it felt plunged into.
Lille Barro glared one eye from atop a steeple of a half ruined palace. He could see even from kilometers away that the atmosphere had been shifted into a different biome. Even at the distance he was in, such intense heat was stifling, making it difficult for him to focus on his surroundings.
Yet, Gerard scoffed with a jeering grin.
"Oblivion? I'm not so sure about that," He said with a growl, shaking the air like thunder. "You think just because you raised the heat on me, and cut my sword without harm makes you stronger than I? FOOLISHNESS!"
The giant Quincy swung his sword in a brandishing flourish, a coat of reishi extending from where the blade was absent. Pulling back the monstrous sword, he whirled around in a destructive arc towards the still Genryusai.
Slicing through the body, fading away like a mirage, the Quincy lost sight of his foe in an instant.
"Behind you."
Gerard Valkyrie snarled, turning around to smash his shield brandishing limb to club the Captain Commander. Raising the charred blade, its tip pointing up at the blurring elbow poised to strike.
A second later, the Quincy felt nothing. From the shoulder down to the buckler on a disembodied wrist, a void lay where his rapidly moving, empowered arm was. The hand flew like a cannonball, careening across the city of palaces, smashing into a distant citadel face with a powerful shockwave.
Blood gushed out of his stump as Gerard felt reishi rush out to restore the missing limb. His eyes wide, he finished twisting his massive form around to swing his reishi extended broadsword at his foe.
VZzzzzt!
"What?!" Gerard gawked, seeing Hofgnung explode in a fiery shower of reishi and metal over where it should have pulverized the smaller Shinigami.
Chills ran down his spine, his body shaking in place.
This…is beyond me! He's a monster…!
Smiling maliciously, the Captain Commander walked across the skyline towards him.
"You cannot harm me, Gerard Valkyrie," Yamamoto graveled out, eyes staring ahead at the blank whites reflecting a fiery inferno that combusted from his black robes form. "Zanka no Tachi gives me the power of the Sun, for defense and offense. I'd explain further but you won't be alive for much longer," stepping back, he gripped the burning black blade tightly in his hand, pulling it back till its back was parallel to his glaring brow.
"Zanka no Tachi, North…"
The Sky split down, an empty blue canvas sheared by a line of white that shrieked into being. The flooring burst open like a bubble, geysering paved gold along with gore that showers the air; mingling from a perfect bifurcated giant.
Gerard's eyes wide, pupils emerging with a state of shock, a split open mouth agape producing no sound. The brain, split in half along with a single pentacle cross. Cut in twain, a twinkling light dispersing.
Both halves of flesh fell, roaring down to crash on either side of the massive gouge in the ground below that led up to the highest expanse of Heaven. Surrounded by the vacant flesh of the invincible soldier, Genryusai grunted out a sigh.
"I wish I could have fought you in life, before this false living death I exist in," Yamamoto said, his Bankai sizzling about him as he deactivated Zanka no Tachi East and slowly began to cool his Bankai. "Farewell, Gerard Valkyrie. May we meet again in another life."
BANG!
The Captain Commander widened his eyes, hearing the palpable sound before his Bankai even ignited in response. Turning on his heels, he began to swing his sword only to find himself stumbling about.
Wait…why can't I…feel my body?
He questioned this as blood splattered out of his skull, a perfect hole drilled through from one end to the back. Eyes whitened out, mouth ajar and the whole of his body landing with a meaty thud as his Bankai dispelled in a wave of all-consuming flame.
Leaving nothing behind but ash.
"Hm, did he burn himself up after death, or did the Reio do that?" Lille Barro asks aloud to himself, lowering his rifle while kneeling upon the top of a distant Palace.
I already finished off my opponent, so it doesn't matter either way, he reasoned internally. I'll pick the others off as they let their guard down, one after the other. With my X-Factor active, there isn't a single target I can't kill.
The Quincy stopped still, a black bodied silver edged scimitar erupting out of his chest. His left eye opened, for a moment, at the point of happening as he whirled around while backing away.
Nothing.
Not a single thing lied where he had been struck.
"Where-?"
Barely able to get out the thought of confusion, a blade drove itself past his left temple and out the other side in a single blur of grayish silver. Lille distorts, blipping across the sky with a pair of angelic wings sprouting from his back while taking aim at the spot he had sensed his attack came from.
"Fascinating," A deep timbre voice spoke behind the Quincy. "Every attack I land is passing through you."
Lille twisted around in a blur, his rifle lashing out like a club to impact the figure. Crushing a hooded skull, the white robes being staggered backwards from the swift blow; leaving it open for a swift shot to the chest in a burst of light.
A dark hand manifesting in Lille's line of sight, brought his awareness towards an identical hooded figure warping into his vicinity. Yet, to his impeccable senses, it's the exact same as the one he slew.
The very figure who disappeared as if it never existed.
Snatched into its grasp, Lille swung a foot around to kick his attacker only for it to be blocked by the figure's forearm.
"I can grab hold of your weapon just fine," It said, raising its shadowed visage, revealing an oval-shaped masculine face with piercings lining his nose, lower lip and spiked shaved hair upon a mostly bald head. Yellow eyes stared impassively at the Quincy, and with just a glance, Lille knew what he was. "And if you strike at me, I seem to not pass through like before."
"An Arrancar?" Lille asked, creasing his brow as his right eye widened with confusion at him. "I thought the Espada were laying siege to the Sun Palace! Why are you here?"
"You underestimate our Lord's plans," Zommari Roureaux said in a monotone. "We knew you would be here, the secret weapon of the Quincy Elite. That's why I am among the chosen here as insurance for the Shinigami inevitably failing to destroy you."
"Is that so?" Lille huffed, smirking at hearing this. "Your speed may be impressive, but it's not quick enough. If you don't want to die horribly I suggest you surrender to a quick demise; provoking me further only ensures a painful end."
A crescendo of booms fill the sky, the Quincy detected four Zommari Sonido Clones, all rushing in to impale him. Dispelling his Heilig Bogen, Zommari stumbled and was kicked back with a powerful Blut Arterie enhanced strike. Leaping up and over the Zommari doubles, he reformed his rifle, taking aim and firing four shots that pierced all of their heads in streaks of light.
"And now," he murmured, turning his rifle at the staggered Zommari he struck first. "For the original!"
SHINK!
Lille gaped, his head pierced by a sword from the top of his head through his mouth down the chin. Inverted above is another Zommari his wakizashi splitting the furred hat with a smile on his face.
"Did I say I was limited to four clones? I can make up to six," He mocked with a sneer. "Not that it matters anymore."
The end of a barrel hefted up, firing a hole through the Zommari's head, causing it to falter and dissipate in a mist of reishi.
"Even attacking unaware didn't work!" Zommari sneered aloud.
"You're good, Arrancar," Lille said, his left eye opened wide and releasing a luminous cross-shaped pentacle from its orifice. "But it's too late to repent. For you made me open my left eye three times. The mercy of a quick death given to my enemies shall be cast aside. Now, behold, my Vollstandig!"
Ziliel!
The Arrancar's eyes widened, seeing the pentacle sweep the whole of Lille's body, erupting with a divine light of pure gold. The pillar of reishi surged up high into the empty canvas of blue, turning gold from the output of reishi from the Quincy. Cracking like glass it shattered away, revealing a six winged figure, enamored with holes dotting them. Enraptured in a strange binding cloak hiding most of his body, save for the upper half of his head, strange tattoos running over both blank eyes over his bald scalp.
His reiatsu is immense…is this what it means to be one of the Quincy's elites?
Just as Zommari pondered this, he felt a sudden sense of paralysis wash over him. Alarmed, light glowed from the upper pair of wings-
SPLLLRRT!
-penetrating his arms, chest and legs in a barrage of instantaneous bolts of light.
"So quick…" He gasped, stumbling back.
Another shot pierced his skull, cleanly passing through the other side as his eyes became blank and his mouth went slack.
"Hmmm?" Lille hummed curiously, seeing the hooded Arrancar dissipate into reishi before his gaze. "I see, so that's the sixth clone. You were hiding from me this whole time, waiting to see my true form."
A sudden wave of reiatsu erupted from the Palace nearest to him. A cross of white surges up into the sky, challenging the glare of gold that Lille himself displayed with his own Vollstandig. Violet-white light burst from the seams, unveiling a floating specter to rise up to Lille's altitude.
A large pink flower unfurls from the top of a black, golden sparkling stalk, unveiling the upper half of Zommari's body. Golden eyes enamored his body in various angles, leading up to a glowing necklace of purple along with a burning violet crown of bone spiking from his skull. Four arms with eyes staring from parts of bulging muscles, the Espada emanating a powerful presence
Most curiously are four floating heads, black and shrunken, with empty sockets for eyes and teeth exposed, glowing a dull purple from their seams.
"Brujeria de Dios," Zommari said ominously, staring at Lille's floating form. "Have you said your prayers? It's time for you to perish."
"You cannot kill me, let alone touch me," Lille scoffed. Brandishing his wings, all of them aglow within their hollow spaces, he readied to annihilate his adversary's grotesque form.
Four flashes of purple came from Zommari, ceasing the immediate attack.
"W-What??!" Lille cried out, finding his wings unable to move. He looked at the four appendages, seeing black eye marks on the center of each limb. "My wings! Why did you do?!"
"I noticed from before, that as long as it isn't an attack, your body doesn't permeate through it. My Amor isn't an attack but a spell, a binding one at that. I thought a Quincy like you would be able to escape its effects but in my current state you cannot even hope to dispel it. Once my eye fires an Amor, it will remain there till I wish it gone."
The wings turned, their glaring holes poised over Lille's head.
"No! This can't be! I am divine! I cannot di-"
An overwhelming discharge of light eviscerates the skull of the Quincy. A shower of blood, follows a dispelling of reishi and his headless body falls to the ground in a meaty thud below.
The First Quincy has fallen.
"It seems the only power he couldn't escape from was his own," Zommari deduced. His eyes beheld the corpse engulf in bluish flames of its own accord, as if self destruction was an instinct of being slain.
No doubt to keep Hollows from consuming his spirit, Zommari speculated.
Clap-clap-clap!
"Who?" Zommari turned his head, yet saw nothing, hearing only the echoes of slow applause.
Clap-clap-clap!
"Where is that coming from?" Zommari sneered, his many eyes granting him a near panoramic field of vision yet couldn't see the source of the claps.
"Wonderfully done, Septima Espada," A voice called out from the shadows, his hands continuing to clap as he spoke. "I got the tail end of this fight, and from what I saw, you made quick work of Lille. And right after the old ex-commander killed Gerard, too. Never did I think our two immortal Schutstaffel would ever fall so quickly. But, they tend to get carried away and never consider the possibility of death is even a believable outcome. Reminds me of Gremmy, really."
"Hmph, you underestimate the powers of us Espada," Zommari rebuked, eyeing the shadow of the half collapsed Palace roof. "But if you would like to try your hand at defeating me, you'll find I am not like the Shinigami you bested."
"You're right, I'm quivering in my boots here," The mysterious being said. "But, I have a question for you. Is that large stem you're connected to a part of your body?"
Whirring to life, a multitude of deep purple-black Cero Oscuras formed in front of Zommari's eyes. Discharging in a shriek, the Palace around his body became consumed by a wrathful light. Pillars of flame wafted upwards, gold melting in a thick pile of flotsam with crumbling marble sinking beneath the oozing debris.
A cloak of white lies amidst the flames, burning up, with the pentacle being last to be turned into ashes.
"Hmph, and another falls," He says to himself.
Blood gushed from his mouth, and the Arrancar widened his eyes with shock.
"W-What is this-?" He hacked up, coughing and feeling incredibly weak, a wave of incredible sickness wafting over his whole body.
"That would be my Gift Ground at work," The Sternritter said, a blackened body of charred flesh heaving himself out of marble and stone slabs. His skin mended itself in seconds, his vitality returned with a slim yet toned musculature over his tall frame that stood upright. "I laid down a barrier on the ground that, once attacked, releases a bunch of poison into the air. And with the fire pushing the poison upwards, it got pulled into your tall body, stem and all."
"N-No!" Zommari croaked out, his eyes bubbling with expulsions of gore and his skin paling. "You ca-nnot poison me! M-my reiatsu s-should p-purge it!"
"Oh yeah, that normally would be the case with ordinary poison," The Quincy said with a smirk, pointing a finger at his own mouth. "But, I ate your reiatsu and decided that's what you should be poisoned by. Your own power is going to kill you."
"Urrrk!" Zommari heaved, his mouth gushing blood and his eyes popping with viscous bursts. The stem cracked, shattering and falling apart with Zommari's body falling with a meaty thud. His mouth gaped, tongue hanging out and eyes rolled back, the Arrancar lay back in a pool of blood and pus.
"Guess that's that," Askin Nak Levarr sighs, combing his hair back with a smile adorned on his face. "Your power was a troubling one to have on the battlefield. If you were left to your own devices, all of us Schutstaffel would have been wiped out. Too bad you showed your hand a little too early, Zommari Roureaux."
Turning on his heels, placing both hands in his pockets, the lanky Sternritter began to wake away. As far as his reikaku could sense, the only other member of the Schutstaffel left is Pernida, a true wild card he didn't want to get in the way of
I'm not that worried about that thing losing. After all, isn't it supposed to be the Left Hand of the Reio?
KRAK-KOOM!
The Sternritter turned, seeing a distant explosion of reishi. Amidst it were piles of dissolving flesh, disintegrating around the vast Soul Palace. To the lanky Sternritter's surprise, one of bits looked to be a familiar pair of eyes within a gruesomely gored palm.
"H-huuuurrrts-" Pernida barely managed to get out, crumbling into reishi borne dust that fluttered into the air.
"Well, that took some effort," A feminine voice declared ahead of Askin, walking casually ahead with a blood soaked sword in hand. The buxom pink haired Shinigami grinned maliciously, eyes gleaming with a sadism belying her lovely appearance. Her reiatsu radiating off her didn't match with her person, managing to make Askin blow an impressed whistle.
"Are you the only one left?" She asked.
"Guess I am," Askin said with a shrug. "I see you took out Pernida. Didn't think that was possible. Then again, I didn't think the other two guys were going to die either, so today's full of surprises."
"Yet, you don't seem all that concerned," She noted with a thin smirk. "Does that mean you have a unique ability?"
"You could say that," He replied.
"Why not show me?" She asked with a narrow stare.
A thunderous explosion quaked the whole of the Soul Palace, tendrils of reishi snaking across Heaven like lightning. Both Askin and the Royal Shinigami turn, both eyes wide at the source.
The glass citadel, the Reio's personal palace, has shattered in a storm of blue fiery shards!
—
A/N: Hello everyone! Bleach hype is still running high and this chapter finally got done. This is one of those chapters where I had to cut down some of the fat, otherwise it'd get too large to read comfortably. Yet, I feel content, knowing I got these fights done at least logically within their own rights.
Szayel seemed like someone with the body he has to be able to defeat Pernida and I might reference the battle like I did with Kirio if I feel inclined (Pernida was among my favorite Sternritter due to how absurd it was), just like I think Zommari is the best suited of all the opponents to defeat Lille. Naturally, I did have to offscreen the Zero Division, but I feel like I already did them justice for the most part when they fought Aaroniero.
Come back for the next update, as I wrap up the Arrancar vs Quincy War in a bombastic clash between Kings! See you all there!