Bleach: Reborn — Chapter 66 - Unification — The Fight Begins

SHRIEK!

The Gillians' screams of agony rose without end. Hollow Beast Mines, the Adjuchas charge, the ambush from Adjuchas hiding beneath the earth, the Gillian horde accomplished almost nothing before Wayne's forces shattered it entirely. A handful of Adjuchas may have been blasted apart by concentrated Ceros, but losses at that scale were already negligible.

CLANG!

A metallic crash rang out. Wayne's Sky-Rending Greatsword met the Sandworm Lord's tail head-on, scattering sparks into the air.

After unleashing Zero Storm, Wayne no longer needed the long recovery time he once did. Since advancing to High-level, both his concealment and spatial abilities had been pushed to a considerable height. His concealment could now form its own domain, masking every trace of Reiatsu within it. His spatial abilities could compress, tear open, and shift space in an instant. In assassination and close-quarters combat alike, Wayne had grown increasingly sure of himself.

Facing a peak High-level Adjuchas while at High-level himself, the enemy's heavy, crushing strikes put real pressure on him, but he was far from falling quickly. He had more than enough to stall this Sandworm Menos for a very long time.

While the Sandworm Menos was tied down, though, his subordinate Adjuchas were not so fortunate.

Wayne's side had more than one High-level Adjuchas.

High above the battlefield, Nel had already become the undisputed master of the Adjuchas fight. Super Acceleration paired with Lanzador Verde, Cero Doble harassment, crushing Reiatsu superiority, combined with her own healing ability and her immunity to the Hollow Beast Mine's poison, Nel had become a battlefield ravager, moving through the Northern Forest Adjuchas almost like a reaper, ending their lives in a continuous, methodical harvest.

"Damn it! Damn it! Die already!" The Sandworm Lord watched his Adjuchas plummet and fall one after another. How could he not be frantic? His Gillians had been virtually useless. His Adjuchas were being slaughtered by a High-level Nel. And he himself was pinned down by this former ant, unable to break free. He was teetering on the edge of pure, explosive rage.

"Easy there, stinking bug." Wayne was perfectly content watching this one-sided carnage. Ten years of preparation had been for exactly this kind of moment. What was the point of a hard-fought stalemate? You had to push all the way through in one breath.

"I'll take my time with you. Your subordinates' fight — let them handle it themselves." He taunted the Sandworm Lord with those words while driving his attacks harder, cutting off any attempt to disengage.

"Damn you!" Caught off guard, the Sandworm Lord took a Dimension Slash. The wound split across his massive body, crimson blood running freely from the gash. For his current level of Reiatsu, the injury itself wasn't critical. What was critical were his Adjuchas, they were dropping out of the sky like dumplings tumbling into a pot. The longer he was held here, the greater his chance of losing.

"All forces, hear me! Use Negación to cover the retreat!" The Sandworm Menos finally let out a roar. He poured everything into his tail, swept Wayne flying with one savage blow, and forcibly broke away from the fight. He flew straight toward Nel. He had to get his subordinates out fast.

WHOOSH!

At the Sandworm Lord's command, his forces rapidly peeled away from the battlefield. The Adjuchas Nel had been holding down hurriedly cast Negación on her, briefly trapping her in place, while others tangled with the nearby Hollow Beasts to buy time. To break away faster, one gravely wounded Hollow Beast even chose to self-destruct outright, buying its comrades a path out.

"Where do you think you're going?" A single Void Flash brought Wayne back directly in front of the Sandworm Lord. The Sky-Rending Greatsword cleaved straight for his face.

"You think you can outplay me when it comes to Negación? I'm your grandfather at Negación!" Wayne laughed with open contempt. "Don't forget — everything you're using right now, I'm the one who taught you."

He raised his hand. A Negación dropped and swallowed the Sandworm Lord whole.

"Damn it!" One strike wasn't enough to break through. The Sandworm Menos had no choice but to hold off and keep issuing orders. "Someone pin him down! Everyone else, move! Open a Garganta and go!"

A low, droning sound.

At the command, the Sandworm Menos's vice commander opened a Garganta and stepped in front of Wayne, casting Negación on him at the same time.

It didn't matter. As a spatial-type, Wayne didn't care about Negación in the slightest. He could shift freely through space with a Void Flash and slip right out of its hold.

WHOOSH. THUD!

He was out of the Negación before the field had time to settle. Wayne drove his blade straight through an Adjuchas, then moved on to the next target. Watching Wayne shake off Negación's restraint that easily, the Sandworm Menos grew even more frantic. He lashed his tail with full force, trying to shatter his own Negación.

But even for an Adjuchas-class Menos whose Reiatsu could crush space, breaking a Negación took time. And in that window, Wayne was already killing.

The greatsword flashed and wheeled. Adjuchas fell, slashed, crippled, or cut down outright. By the time the Sandworm Lord finally broke free, Wayne had already carved through seven or eight of them.

"Retreat! Now!" The Sandworm Lord no longer dared charge toward Wayne. Every time he got caught in another Negación, another wave of his subordinates died. Left with no other option, he fired Cero after Cero carrying corrosive properties, driving Wayne and his Adjuchas back from range, just to open enough space for his people to withdraw.

While Wayne was tearing through his forces, the vice commander had already organized an effective retreat through the open Garganta. Those Adjuchas who couldn't pull back in time, or who were too entangled to break free, became nothing more than a buffer for their comrades to escape behind.

Wayne made no move to stop it. He kept pressing, pursuing nearby enemies, coordinating with his own Adjuchas to finish off the wounded one by one.

"Wayne, you bastard!" The Sandworm Lord was beside himself. Advance, and he'd get caught in a Negación. Hold back, and he couldn't save anyone. Go after the enemy's subordinates, same result: another Negación.

There was no solution. The enemy leader was completely immune to Negación. Only his own side took the damage. And on top of that, those bizarre bombs, every detonation left Adjuchas briefly paralyzed, and in that single fleeting instant, the enemy would tear a gaping hole in his formation.

He'd tried having his subordinates detonate the Hollow Beast Mines from range, trying to redirect the effect onto the enemy Adjuchas. But the enemy commander was no fool. After it happened twice, that rat-like Hollow Beast commander ordered a direct charge into close quarters. They shoved the bombs right into their enemies' faces, detonated them point-blank, and used their comrades' Negación to cover the pullback.

One side advancing, the other retreating, the air above choked with Negacións and Ceros, the dusky yellow sky stained a violent gold.

Out of options, the Sandworm Lord fell back on ranged harassment, doing what he could to stall the enemy Adjuchas and buy time for his people.

As for the Gillians on the ground, he had no attention left to spare. He could only let them serve one final purpose: indiscriminate Ceros fired into the sky, a last desperate screen to reduce his Adjuchas' losses and give them precious seconds to flee.

Finally, after a grueling, tangled struggle, the last of the Sandworm Lord's Adjuchas pulled back. Of the two hundred or so who had marched in, roughly one hundred and twenty would never leave this ground.

"Ace Wayne. I won't forget what happened today." In the end, the Sandworm Menos stood alone at the mouth of the Garganta, blocking the entrance with his own body. His vice commander had cast Negación around him, buying time for the Garganta to close, so he could slip inside at the last possible moment.

Beyond the barrier of light, Wayne stood with his forces ranged behind him. Of the three hundred-plus Adjuchas, over two hundred and sixty remained. From start to finish, Wayne's side had lost only around fifty.

Some had been caught by concentrated Gillian Ceros. Some had been killed in losing fights against enemy Adjuchas. The rest had been dissolved by the Sandworm Lord's corrosive Ceros before their comrades could get a Negación up in time. Of those fifty, roughly thirty had belonged to the allied lords, not Wayne's direct subordinates.

"Stinking bug." Wayne's voice was perfectly calm. "Even now, you think you're just walking out of here? I don't recall saying I was going to let you go."

"Hmph. The height of arrogance. You just wait. Next time, I will bring everything I have and trample your—"

"I said." The pale-gold light ignited in Wayne's eyes. "I have no intention of letting you leave."

A violent spatial fluctuation erupted outward. The Negación around the Sandworm Lord cracked, fractured, and crushed inward under the pressure of external spatial force. In less than three seconds, the entire barrier shattered, scattering into a sky full of golden radiance.

"Dual talent. Spatial-type and concealment-type both..." The Sandworm Menos narrowed his eyes. The Wayne before him was not the weak creature he could have killed with a casual flick of his tail. This man had the full strength to contend with him. And right now, every advantage sat on Wayne's side.

"Impressive. Truly impressive, Ace Wayne. To push me — Gusderin — this far. Neither Gatmont nor Feogroy of the Southern Forest ever managed it. But don't get too pleased with yourself. Once I go back and regroup, I will come to the Central Forest and take your life personally."

"No need to announce yourself. I told you — I'm not letting you go back." The pale-gold light in Wayne's eyes blazed. "I have no interest in remembering the names of dead men."

His Reiatsu surged. He charged.

"Too late!" The Sandworm Menos wheeled and leaped. A massive clone exploded outward behind him, while he himself shot into the Garganta. At the final instant before it closed, he turned and locked eyes with Wayne, fury blazing in every line of him. "Ace Wayne. Wait for my revenge. Within two years, I will take back everything that is mine!"

The Garganta sealed shut. Gusderin, the Sandworm Lord, departed the Menos Graveyard with whatever was left of his forces.

"Hmph. You really think you're something." Wayne's contempt was quiet and total. His right hand slashed through the air. A Garganta tore open.

"Everyone, form up. The moment you see that stinking bug — blast him into nothing."

"Yes, my king!"

Wayne stepped into the Garganta. The remaining Adjuchas spread across the sky in a wide arc, forming an enormous encircling ring around the point where Wayne had vanished, and waited for their king to return.

Time passed. The air held still. But every Hollow Beast was locked in tight, focused, not daring a single moment of carelessness.

CRACK!

At last, after a long silence, a sound like splitting ice came from inside the encircled space. Fracture lines rippled outward through the air.

"Prepare to fire!" Nel's voice cut through the stillness. Every Hollow Beast began charging its Cero.

The space shattered. Fragments gleaming with eerie light scattered across the air. A massive figure came hurtling backward out of the break, Gusderin, the Sandworm Lord who had fled only minutes ago.

ROAR!

Over a hundred Ceros fired at once, swallowing him in a single, catastrophic detonation. The explosion blasted every last particle of violent, blood-red Reishi from the graveyard, leaving behind a perfect vacuum of scoured ground.

The smoke had not yet cleared when a Garganta opened beside Nel. Wayne stepped out, his body covered in wounds.

"My lord — are you all right?" Nel rushed forward, pulling out a healing flask made with her own ability and pouring it over him.

"I'm fine." Wayne exhaled slowly. "As expected. Even at High-level, going one on one against a peak High-level opponent is still a strain."

In those few minutes, Wayne had charged into the Garganta and used spatial nodes to leap into the escape corridor Gusderin and his forces were using.

Once he tracked Gusderin's Reiatsu, Wayne created a Spatial Fault, cutting the two of them off from everything else. What followed was a brutal, closed-room fight.

With nowhere to run, Gusderin had unleashed his Reiatsu at full force and held Wayne to a deadlock. His peak Adjuchas power and raw strength still gave him an edge. In the end, Wayne used Shadow Waltz to drive him back step by step, then shattered the Garganta's spatial barrier and sent them both tumbling out.

The smoke cleared.

Over a hundred Ceros, and Gusderin still wasn't dead. But his body, once dozens of meters long, had been reduced to barely ten. Everything from his midsection to his tail had been blasted apart. Crimson blood poured freely toward the ground. His Hollow Mask had cracked apart, leaving half a hideously mangled face exposed beneath.

"AAAAAHHH!"

Gusderin's howl tore through the air, raw, defiant, and full of unwilling rage. He twisted his broken body and lunged at Wayne. "Bastard! I'll take you down with me!" Knowing he would not survive, he launched his final attack.

White light began bleeding from his body. His Reiatsu thrashed and surged. The self-destruction of a peak Adjuchas, if it went off, fewer than one in ten of the Hollow Beasts present would walk away.

Wayne had never been afraid of this kind of attack.

A Negación dropped over the Sandworm Menos, trapping him inside. Cast by Wayne himself, just as it had been ten years ago. The same method. The same type of enemy, throwing everything at him for one last fatal blow.

But everything else had changed. Back then, Wayne could only run. Now he stood before his enemy without a trace of concern, watching him the way you watch a frog at the bottom of a well.

"Goodbye, stinking bug. My apologies — even at the very end, I never managed to remember your name. But your Northern Forest? Starting today, it carries the name Ace."

A final wave toward the thrashing figure inside the Negación.

"ACE WAYNE! I WANT YOU DEAD! DEAD!"

Gusderin's last words didn't reach him.

The enormous body detonated. White light slammed outward and warped the Negación under the pressure, but it held. It never broke. This was a Negación imbued with Wayne's spatial ability. There was no comparison to an ordinary one.

"Disperse! Clean up the battlefield!"

At Wayne's order, the two hundred-plus remaining Adjuchas scattered in every direction. Over ten thousand Gillians and more than a hundred Adjuchas waited here to be consumed.

The Hollows spread outward. Wayne stayed where he was, standing quietly before the Negación, watching the explosion inside slowly burn itself out. Whatever he was thinking, he kept it to himself.

"My lord, we won." Nel hadn't gone to feed either. She stood at his side.

"Yes." Wayne answered evenly. "We won."

"My lord, you defeated your enemy. Aren't you happy?" She could feel something was off. She stepped closer.

"I am." His tone carried no particular rise or fall. "I was just thinking about something from a long time ago. When I was still a Gillian, I came into this graveyard to grow stronger. It was right here that I watched that stinking bug lead his Hollow Beasts into battle and push back the Southern Forest's lord. But at the very end, the Southern Forest Lord's vice commander stepped out alone in front of dozens of Adjuchas, to cover his lord's retreat."

"Hm?" Nel tilted her head. "Why would that make you think of back then, my lord?"

"It's nothing. That kind of loyalty just reminded me of the companions I knew when I was still with Jekain. There was one among them, a Hollow Beast named Inola. She evolved into a Gillian and lost her consciousness. Before it happened, she told me that if she lost herself, I should consume her. She said she wanted to see a farther world from inside me.

I just wanted to tell her, I did it. And that I'm proud to have once had subordinates like her."

"If Lord Wayne ever needs it," Nel's small voice came from beside his ear, "Nel can do that too."

"Ha, you silly girl. I was just saying what I felt. I'm not going to eat you." Wayne gave a tired, wry smile and knocked lightly on the top of her head.

Setting aside whether consuming a companion would even help him evolve, Nel's loyalty alone was reason enough that he would never do such a thing.

Nel was, outside of Jekain, the only person Wayne felt genuinely close to. Not simply a king and his subordinate.

"Let's go. Back to the stronghold first. Once the battlefield is cleaned up, we move on the Northern Forest."

"Hee hee, yes, my lord~ And Nel can treat your injuries on the way."

The cleanup moved fast. Over two hundred Adjuchas feeding at full pace made short work of it. Even with ten thousand Gillians, it didn't take long.

Three days. Every Adjuchas had returned to Wayne's stronghold and assembled. Three days of rest. Wayne's wounds had fully healed. He was back at his peak.

"Comrades-in-arms. The Lord of the Northern Forest has fallen. It's time to sound the charge."

"ROAR!"

Beneath the stronghold's high walls, every Hollow Beast answered. Including the former lords. One battle alongside Wayne had been enough. His ability and the weight of his presence, it was the kind of thing that made you want to follow without being asked.

What should have been a brutal engagement with losses over half, through Wayne's Hollow Beast Mines, healing flasks, strategic tools, Negación tactics, and the full shape of his planning, had ended with fewer than fifty Adjuchas lost.

That was a decisive victory by any measure.

The only regret, for some of them, was that they hadn't joined Wayne's side sooner. But then they thought about the future, the Central Forest belonging entirely to them, no outsiders cutting in for a share, and that regret settled into something easier to carry.

"Fellow lords. Wayne is moving to retake the Northern Forest. Per our agreement, our alliance ends here. I thank each of you for your help. My vengeance is settled, and my gratitude runs deep. The Central Forest, I leave it in your hands.

That said, Wayne has no objection to any of you coming with me. I believe that once we take the Northern Forest, with the two forests standing together, the Southern Forest becomes within reach as well."

The lords exchanged glances and began talking among themselves. This was a question that would define what came next.

"Lord Wayne. We will go with you to the Northern Forest. From here on, we follow your command."

"My lord. We wish to return to the Central Forest and rebuild. We hope to continue working with you in the future."

Those who could still evolve and those who had already hit the ceiling of their potential split into two groups, not a question of loyalty, but of what each Hollow Beast needed.

"That's fine. Wayne respects each lord's choice. Those returning to the Central Forest, go safely. May the coming holy war bring us shared resources rather than bloodshed between us. The Southern Forest will be our target in time."

"Lord Wayne, take care. We part here." The allied lords had arrived with eighty Adjuchas. Fewer than fifty had survived the battle. Of those, fewer than thirty chose to return.

They would build the Central Forest up from what remained.

"Until we meet again." Wayne nodded, watching as the lords led their Adjuchas into Gargantas and departed the Menos Graveyard. Then he turned, tore open a Garganta of his own, and raised his voice to the forces at his back.

"Comrades-in-arms. This is the last campaign. The enemy has nothing left to fight with. We go to take what's ours, claim the Northern Forest and make it our home."

"WE OBEY OUR KING'S COMMAND!"

They knelt. Then they followed Wayne through the Garganta.

The Menos Graveyard to the Northern Forest, over half a month's travel. Wayne used the time well. He ordered Timd to keep producing Hollow Beast Mines, and left the movement itself to several of the larger Hollow Beasts to manage. By the time they arrived, they would have over a thousand mines ready.

Half a month was enough for the survivors who had fled to carry the news home. The Northern Forest knew they were coming. Some would be waiting for their king's return. Others would be waiting to make their last stand.

Reality gave them no room for either kind of hope.

When Wayne descended on the Northern Forest, the Adjuchas who had been watching the horizon all wore the same expression.

Despair.

"All Adjuchas, hear me. Organize your units and advance with Hollow Beast Mines. Any enemy Adjuchas who fought in the holy war, kill. Those who resist, kill. Those who attempt to flee, kill. Those willing to surrender, lay down your arms immediately, and your lives will be spared. When every last enemy Adjuchas has been cleared, the Gillian-class resources are yours to take freely. Ten days from now, all Adjuchas reassemble at the core of the Northern Forest. Disperse!"

ROAR!

Wayne's decree fell. A hundred-plus Adjuchas erupted out of the Garganta and tore off in every direction. In moments, violet poison mist began seeping through the entire forest. The Adjuchas of the Northern Forest began to howl.

The Northern Forest, in that instant, became a violet-red hell.

➤ Next: The March Begins