Bleach: Reborn — Chapter 168 - Hollow Attack — The Turning Point

"Tsukishiro-kun?" Isshin Shiba frowned at Mizusue's words. "He's a student. What we're about to face could easily be Adjuchas-class or higher. He'll get himself killed."

"Captain Shiba." Wayne rose to his feet. "I agree with Mizusue-sama. Take me with you. Trust me — I can help. Zanjutsu, Kaidō, either one. The Fourth Division isn't fully mobilized yet, right? I can serve as a temporary medic and help those students."

"Hmm." Isshin Shiba hesitated. He knew this student's Reiatsu already matched his own squad's Fifth Seat or better. But the kid was also his family's retainer now. If they lost him, the damage would be personal.

"Captain. I know people in that exam. I want to go find them." Wayne spoke again.

Isshin Shiba looked at Otsuka's blood on Wayne's hands, then at the bouquet set aside nearby. He remembered, the kid was close with the Yagami girl.

"Captain Shiba." Aizen spoke up. "Since Tsukishiro Hinamori-kun has decent Kaidō skills, why not let him go? We need intelligence from Hueco Mundo as quickly as possible. Whoever gets treated first may well be the one who can tell us what happened."

"But—" Isshin Shiba was still worried. The internal briefing had made one thing clear: this attack might involve a Vasto Lorde-class Menos. If that were true, no one below captain or lieutenant rank could last three moves against it.

"Captain." Wayne stepped forward and grabbed Isshin Shiba's sleeve. His face was dead serious. "I want to go find her."

That single, simple sentence struck something in Isshin Shiba's chest.

"...Fine. But promise me — if you run into an enemy you can't handle, you run. First chance you get. You students are the Seireitei's future. I won't let you get buried in Hueco Mundo."

"Understood. I'll stay within my limits." Wayne nodded, grave. "I'll join the Hueco Mundo expedition as a retainer of the Shiba family."

"Mm." Isshin Shiba nodded. That identity would protect them both, if anything happened to Wayne out there, no one could fault him for dragging a student into it.

"Move out!"

A wave of his hand, and the Soul Reapers entered the Senkaimon with Wayne in tow.

Through the Dangai and into Hueco Mundo. The moment his feet touched his old homeland, the air jolted through him. He buried the reaction fast.

This was the place. The scent he knew. Barren, broken, but familiar. His battlefield.

The Soul Reapers touched down and scanned their surroundings.

Bones and bodies everywhere. Splashes of crimson had bloomed across the white sands like blood-red roses. Bodies severed, bodies mangled. In every direction the Reiatsu of Hollow beasts still roiled unchecked.

"Situation's grim. Not a single survivor in sight." Isshin Shiba scratched his head, worry written all over his face. "Captain Aizen, how do you want to run the search?"

"I sense no familiar Reiatsu here. I'll need to search elsewhere — spatial distortions, traces of his presence. Let's split up. I'll take south, you take north. We regroup here afterward and wait for the medical squad and Captain Zaraki's team."

"Eight-hour window. After that, we come back no matter what."

"Acceptable." Aizen nodded. "Gin, let's go."

"Yes, Aizen-sama."

Aizen left with Ichimaru. Isshin Shiba stayed behind with his squad and Wayne.

"Tsukishiro-kun. Can you sense anyone you know?"

Wayne pushed his perception to its limit, straining to pick up anything. Nothing. He shook his head.

"This is the exam's core zone. If there's no fighting nearby, the teams probably scattered, drew the Hollows off in different directions." Isshin Shiba thought for a moment, then issued his orders. "From this point, spread north in a wave formation. Three to a team. Search and rescue."

"Yes, sir!" The squad members acknowledged and fanned out.

"We'll go too." Isshin Shiba gestured. "I'll take right. Tsukishiro-kun, go with Matsumoto to the left, watch each other's backs." He shot Rangiku a look: keep the kid safe, don't let some stupid accident cost them another genius.

Rangiku understood perfectly. She nodded with full seriousness and Shunpo'd left with Wayne.

Isshin Shiba swept the area one last time, found nothing missed, and headed southeast.

Several minutes passed. Then, in that same spot, Aizen and Ichimaru reappeared.

"Ara, ara. One person in the crowd who isn't under your hypnosis, and now we have to double back. Such a bother." Gin Ichimaru scratched the back of his neck. "Master, shall I go kill him?"

"Patience, Gin." Aizen's expression didn't shift. "Our objective this time is to observe the test subjects and find openings for the Hōgyoku to absorb more soul power. Nothing else matters."

"Is that so..." Ichimaru tilted his head, faintly puzzled. "That battle really did drain it. The Hōgyoku still hasn't fully recovered its strength, the cost back then must have been enormous. Still, the direction that child went is exactly where we released the Adjuchas-class beasts. Looks like we won't need to lift a finger after all."

"Ah." Aizen saw no issue with a stepping stone dying. "I trust Vice-Captain Matsumoto can stall things for him. Come, Gin, our test subject is about to run into Isshin Shiba."

"Understood, Master."

The two vanished from the air. From that moment on, aside from Wayne, heading southwest, no one else present could walk free of Aizen's hypnosis.

Wayne and Rangiku moved fast across the desert. Here and there, streaks of scarlet blood. They followed the trails to their ends, severed limbs, incomplete corpses. In some places, only Shihakushō and student uniforms remained. The people were gone.

"Why just the clothes? Do Hollows undress their food before eating?" Rangiku's brows knitted together.

Wayne said nothing and kept moving. He knew exactly what it meant. Along the way he'd asked Rangiku about the meeting, the decisions, the details. Drinking buddies, so she told him freely. By the time she finished, he had the whole picture.

Another one of Aizen's traps.

The sixth-year exam should have been held in the World of the Living, supervised by the Gotei 13. But Aizen's hypnosis had shifted the venue to Hueco Mundo, with the Fifth Division in full control. Convenient. He used the opportunity to run Hollowfication experiments and feed souls to the Hōgyoku, Soul Reaper souls, Hollow souls, all harvested together.

And ever since his battle with Wayne, Aizen had dragged his broken body back to the Seireitei and filed his report on "Ace Wayne." He painted himself as having faced a savage Hollow beast with stealth and spatial abilities, a perfect cover for the mess his experiments had left behind. The mass deaths of Soul Reapers. The interference with Twelfth Division's Reiatsu monitoring. The vanishing Hollow Reiatsu signatures. All of it pinned on Wayne. And Wayne was dead and beyond all proof. Aizen could spin whatever story he liked.

"Aizen, you magnificent bastard." Wayne ground his teeth. But he was Soul Society's man now, and far too weak to wrestle Aizen for it. He could only let the lies stand. Besides, he had his own reasons for coming to Hueco Mundo: find traces of his subordinates, learn who if anyone had survived that final battle, discover whether Nel was still alive, and quietly dig for clues about the Hollowfication experiments.

They traveled together for a long stretch. Finally, deep in a deadwood forest, Wayne caught a familiar presence.

"Rangiku-san. I've got a Reiatsu I know. Kitagawa Sawa." He stopped short and pointed down into the trees.

"Let's check it out."

They descended together. Wayne found him fast, Kitagawa Sawa, slumped against a dead tree, gasping for air. He was drenched in blood. His Zanpakuto had reverted to its Asauchi form; his Reiatsu was nearly spent. Around him lay torn-apart bodies in student uniforms. He'd fought a bloody battle in this forest.

"Kitagawa!" Wayne rushed over.

"Hah... hah... Tsuki... shiro? Cough,!" Two words and Kitagawa hacked up blood. That was when Wayne saw it, a massive hole punched through his chest, as if something sharp had driven clean through. It had hit a lung.

"Don't talk." Pale green light rippled across Wayne's hands. He started healing. Rangiku drew her Zanpakuto and swept the perimeter.

About half an hour later, Kitagawa's Reiatsu had steadied. Color crept back into his face. The lung wound had sealed enough to stop the bleeding.

"How is it? Better?" Wayne kept his hands working.

"Ah... saved." Kitagawa exhaled long and slow, the bloody froth finally gone from his breathing.

"What happened?"

"Hah..." Kitagawa gathered himself. "We were attacked by over a hundred Hollow beasts."

"Over a hundred?!" Rangiku's eyes went wide. "Was it that Hollow, Ace Wayne? Did he lead his subordinates and use stealth to ambush you?"

"Ace Wayne?" Kitagawa looked confused. "Who's that?"

"A Vasto Lorde-class Menos. Dual stealth and spatial abilities. He attacked the former Fifth Division captain, Shinji Hirako, and the current one, Captain Aizen. The Seireitei has flagged him as one of the most dangerous Hollow beasts alive."

"That... probably wasn't him." Kitagawa shook his head. "If it had been, I'd be dead already. What hit us was a Gillian legion, seven or eight Adjuchas-class Hollows leading it, over twenty Gillian-class Menos, and the rest were sub-Menos beasts."

"Only seven Adjuchas?" Rangiku's brow furrowed. Seven Adjuchas-class Hollows shouldn't have been enough to wipe out an entire team without a single messenger getting through.

"That's exactly the problem." Kitagawa's jaw tightened. "During the fighting, for reasons I still don't understand, some of the supervising teachers and some of the students just started collapsing. Vomiting up this white Reishi matter. Their Reiatsu went chaotic, violent. And then..."

"What?"

Kitagawa swallowed. "Then the white matter started covering their faces. Their bodies. It transformed them, step by step, into Hollows."

"What?!" Rangiku went pale. An incident like this, it had happened years ago. The soul disappearance cases. Soul Reapers eroded by Hollow Reiatsu. Was it happening again?

"After that, the ones who'd turned attacked us alongside the Hollow beasts. Nobody saw it coming. Classmates in Hollow Masks ambushing us from every direction. I took a bad hit in that fight. But the teacher, and my teammates Otsuka Oyaetsu and Yagami Kina, we fought our way out together, killed one Adjuchas, and fled here. I thought we'd made it. I never imagined..."

"What happened?" Wayne's eyes narrowed. He already suspected the answer.

Kitagawa looked at him for a long moment. Then he spoke.

"Yagami... Yagami Kina was infected too. Just as the teacher opened the Senkaimon, she Hollowfied."

Wayne's face went dark and still. The answer he'd dreaded most.

"After Hollowfying, her combat strength shot up instantly, lieutenant-class Reiatsu, just like that. She ambushed us and caught us completely off guard. At the same moment, another Adjuchas appeared. The teacher died on the spot. Otsuka was bitten, a Hollow came out of nowhere and took a chunk out of him. To get the intel out, I used my Zanpakuto's ability to hold down Yagami Kina and that Adjuchas just long enough for Otsuka to escape back through the Senkaimon. Then I closed it behind him and ran. All the way here."

"So right now," Rangiku said, voice tight, "besides the Hollowfied Yagami Kina, there's still at least one Adjuchas-class Menos somewhere nearby."

She'd already caught the scent of danger.

Too late.

SKREEE-ONG!

The shriek tore through the air, hideous and piercing. It stood on two legs, its arms thick as pillars, its frame towering dozens of meters high, a Hollow beast built for sheer, overwhelming size.

And beside it, Wayne saw the flash of orange-red hair. That face, once bright, once lovely, now wore a Hollow Mask twisted into something ferocious.

➤ Next: Crisis