Bleach: Reborn — Chapter 170 - Two of Them

BOOM!

The Adjuchas-class Menos hurled Rangiku like a stone. Wayne launched forward on Shunpo and caught her mid-flight, but the force was too much, he couldn't hold his footing. He was carried backward along with her and only stopped when they crashed into a large tree. Up close now, he could see the full extent of her injuries.

Broken bones. Bruising across her entire body. Burns in several places. Blunt force from something enormous, combined with the scorching of a Cero.

"Mid-Class Mid-Rank Adjuchas. Massive frame, power-type." Wayne had its strength pegged.

Beating this thing was going to cost him. A lot. This was a Hollow beast that could trade blows with a captain. Even going all-out with his Reiatsu, he couldn't suppress it outright. He set Rangiku and Yagami side by side on the ground and pushed himself upright. The enemy came first. Even if Yagami's Hollowfication worsened in the meantime, the enemy still came first.

He crushed what was left of Yagami's Hollow Mask one final time and shoved a large shard into his mouth. Instantly, the Hollow beast's Reiatsu and his own spiritual power slammed into each other inside him, a violent, churning conflict he had to force down through sheer will. He needed to stall the Adjuchas. At least this one was a power-type. Anything faster, and getting away might not even be an option.

Wayne stepped in on Shunpo and threw out a casual Sword Gleam, just enough to catch its attention.

The Adjuchas swatted it to pieces with a single palm. It roared at Wayne and charged. Wayne used Shunpo to reposition, drawing the fight as far from Rangiku and China as he could. He couldn't let them get caught in the crossfire. But he couldn't go too far, either. The Hollowfication Seed inside China wasn't fully erased yet. He had to keep her in range.

SKREEE-OONG!

The Adjuchas bore down on him, its massive arm swinging in a flash.

Even that single sweep was fast enough to demand respect. Fortunately Wayne had already moved, Shunpo, out of range, counter-harassing with Sword Gleams. Against a beast like this, only one thing would actually open it up: a hit that dealt real, crippling damage.

The Adjuchas-class Menos showed no signs of intelligence. Start to finish, it hadn't said a single word. Probably one of Aizen's test subjects, some mindless Hollow beast that had been forced to absorb Reiatsu until it jumped stages, all without regaining any semblance of awareness.

That kind of test subject had one advantage. Obedience. Absolute, unconditional compliance. Pair that with the raw combat power of an Adjuchas and, if Aizen could mass-produce them, the destructive potential would be staggering.

Wayne kept dodging and kept watching. He scanned for weak points, looking for exposed joints, anything that would let him land a hit that actually mattered. It didn't take long. The flesh and bone connecting the Adjuchas's shoulder to its arm was significantly thinner than the arm itself. That was his opening.

Decision made. He went in.

After slipping past one wide sweep of that giant arm, Wayne chained Shunpo into Shadow Step, three consecutive bursts, back to back, and came out directly behind the Adjuchas's shoulder.

"Void — Slash!"

He gathered everything into it. A full-loaded iai draw, Reiatsu surging through the blade in a massive ribbon of spiritual force, and he drove the cut straight down into the Hollow beast's shoulder. A low, resonant hum rang through the air. The Sword Gleam punched through the arm and kept going, tearing through the deadwood forest behind it, slicing down tree after tree in a single line.

SPLAT!

Crimson sprayed from the Adjuchas's shoulder. The severed arm toppled over like a great conifer crashing down.

Void Slash was a technique Wayne had ground out during his fight against Saros, the Vasto Lorde-class Menos. One of his killing moves. He had avoided using it this entire time, his Reiatsu and raw strength had never been enough, and his old blades couldn't take the strain. But with a Zanpakuto in hand and lieutenant-level Reiatsu behind it, he could at least use a rough version. The cost was real, though. His entire left arm had gone completely numb. If his right hand weren't locked around the hilt, the Zanpakuto would be on the ground.

The Adjuchas shrieked in pain, wheeled around, and spat a Cero at close range. Wayne got out on Shunpo, barely. He landed beneath a dead tree, breathing hard. "Still," he muttered, working his numb left arm. "Trading a finishing move for an arm. That's probably a fair trade." Recovery was going to take a minute.

"SKREEE-OONG!" The miss sent it into a frenzy. Its mouth opened and several red spheres erupted outward.

Bala.

The Adjuchas swung its one remaining arm and launched everything in a scattered volley. The Bala spread wide, far faster than a Cero, closing off Wayne's angles.

"Damn it!" He whipped his Zanpakuto around with his right arm, trying to bat them down. But he was running on empty, old strength spent, new strength not yet there. Just deflecting them was nearly beyond him. The Adjuchas didn't stop. Wave after wave of Bala hammered in, pounding Wayne's position and everything around him, explosion after explosion chaining together.

He didn't stop them all.

One dark-red sphere smashed the blade out of his sword hand. In that same instant, a second Bala hit him square in the abdomen. The impact launched him off the tree and he hit the ground hard.

"Ugh..." Wayne forced himself up and kept moving. He couldn't give it another opening. But the Adjuchas-class Menos, one arm gone, had not lost a single trace of Reiatsu.

"Why hasn't it dropped?" He pressed his free hand against his abdomen and watched the beast. "Losing an arm, Reiatsu should fall at least somewhat from that. Why is it completely unaffected?" He turned it over and over, and one answer kept surfacing.

"This thing... what if its ability is that its Reiatsu doesn't drop during combat?"

The evidence was there. He'd used a major technique to take an arm. The thing had been throwing Bala and Cero continuously since then. That kind of sustained output should have drained something. But the pressure coming off it hadn't moved at all.

"What kind of broken ability is that." Wayne's brow tightened. He put distance between them and started working out how to break off the engagement.

The Adjuchas saw him pulling back and broke into a full run. Which told Wayne his read was right. Its ability was probably time-locked, Reiatsu held steady for a fixed window, and once that window closed, the drop would be steep. So the play was simple: stall. Run the clock and let it exhaust itself.

The problem was China. The longer this dragged out, the worse things got on her end. He needed a solution that covered both.

The Adjuchas chased him for a while and got nowhere. Apparently it figured out what he was doing. It let out a roar, fired one last Cero at him, then turned and ran.

The wrong direction.

Wayne's expression locked up. It was heading straight for where China and Rangiku were lying.

"Damn." He cursed under his breath. This was still an Adjuchas. No language, no intellect, but still an Adjuchas. Instinctive combat sense was absolutely part of the package. He had let himself forget that. Too long since he'd fought actual Hollow beasts, maybe. Or too many weak opponents lately, softening his edge for what a real threat could do.

He went after it on Shunpo, harassing it with Sword Gleams the whole way. The Adjuchas-class Menos didn't even look back. Those strikes had no real power behind them, hitting its back didn't leave so much as a scratch.

Wayne pushed in closer, Shunpo closing the gap he'd just opened. When he got within range, the beast sensed the Reiatsu and threw a backhand without turning. Wayne was ready for it. He slipped past the swing and, on the way through, drove his blade straight down onto the Adjuchas-class Menos's mask.

CLANG!

Both arms rang with the impact, and Wayne was flung back. An Adjuchas-class mask was not Yagami China's. That full-force strike had left nothing but a hairline crack.

"ROOAARRR!"

The mask damage sent it over the edge. Its remaining arm thrashed wild and wide. Cero and Bala sprayed from its mouth in every direction, indiscriminate. Wayne, still airborne from the recoil, twisted and dodged as best he could, but a handful of Bala clipped him. He dragged himself upright, looking for cover. And he saw it.

The berserk Adjuchas was getting closer to Yagami China and Rangiku Matsumoto by the second.

"No—!" He threw himself toward them, everything else pushed aside.

The injured Adjuchas-class Menos wasn't tracking Wayne anymore. It just wanted to destroy whatever was in front of it.

But before he could reach them, a second Reiatsu detonated from somewhere nearby, Adjuchas-level, unmistakably. It slammed toward him like a shockwave. By the time he registered it, a Hollow beast barely taller than a grown man had already closed on him, bone-spike hands raised, stabbing for him at blinding speed.

Wayne wrenched his body to the side. What should have punched straight through his waist instead raked across his flank, and tore out a sizable chunk of flesh on the way past. The impact hurled him completely off his feet. He crashed into a dead tree near where China and Rangiku lay and dropped to the ground.

He looked up.

The new arrival stood roughly two meters tall. Its face was like something out of a nightmare, elongated, alien geometry. Long tail. Both arms replaced by long, sharp bone spikes. This was the thing that had nearly ended him in a single ambush.

The long fight had drawn in a second Adjuchas without him noticing.

Wayne watched both of them close in, the larger one, the smaller one, and felt his stomach bottom out.

Of course. He was an unpredictable variable. Why would Aizen send only one Adjuchas? Two of them. He might actually be done here.

He pressed a hand against the wound on his flank and hauled himself upright. Panting, he channeled what he had left into Kaido, trying to close as much of the damage as he could. It helped, but his Reiatsu was nearly gone. Two Adjuchas-class Menos in front of him. His thoughts turned fast, searching for any angle that worked. Against this much raw power, there wasn't one.

"Am I really dying here?"

He frowned. The Adjuchas crept closer. He had nothing.

The smaller one raised its bone spikes.

Wayne decided. Take one out before this ended.

He launched himself off the ground and threw a second Void Slash at the larger Adjuchas, still rampaging nearby. The massive wave of energy screamed toward its mask.

The beast's instincts kicked in. It raised its arm to block.

The slash took half the arm off. The remaining energy crashed into the mask and shattered it. The mask split apart. The Adjuchas collapsed, howling. Its Reiatsu hemorrhaged outward in a great, uncontrolled flood. It wouldn't be long before it dropped back down to an ordinary Hollow beast entirely.

"Ha — gah!"

One enemy down. Wayne tried to breathe.

He never got the chance.

The smaller Adjuchas had already used Sonído. It was behind him before he could sense it. A bone spike drove into his body.

It punched straight through his chest. The Adjuchas wrenched its arm sideways and sent Wayne flying. He landed near China and Rangiku, close, maybe deliberate, maybe not.

"Pfft..." He coughed up blood.

The wound was almost identical to what Kitagawa Sawa had described. Maybe the Hollow beast Kitagawa had mentioned back then wasn't the big one at all. Maybe it was this one.

"Got careless."

Wayne pushed himself into a half-sitting position. He watched the Hollow beast approach one step at a time. He had nothing left to throw at it.

Void Slash had burned the last of his spiritual power. His left arm was done, completely. The chest wound was still bleeding. Even Kaido could barely slow it down anymore.

"SKREEE-OONG!"

The Adjuchas threw its head back and roared, a sound like a victory announcement. Then it raised its bone spike, Reiatsu crackling cold along its edge, and charged for the final blow.

"Tch..."

Wayne clicked his tongue. He shoved himself upright. Lifted his Zanpakuto.

He wasn't going to dodge. He was going to take the hit and put his blade through it at the same time. Buy China and Rangiku whatever seconds he still had to give.

"You want me dead — you're paying for it."

He held the Zanpakuto straight up. Poured every last trace of his remaining Reiatsu into the blade. Dropped every defense he had.

And then,

THUD!

The wet sound of steel through flesh.

An orange-red figure appeared between him and the spike.

The bone spike had punched clean through her.

The Hollow Mask had grown while she was unconscious, creeping up to cover two-thirds of Yagami China's face, swallowing most of her features. But the eyes above the edge of it were still clear. Still sharp. Still her.

Yagami China had woken up at some point without him noticing. She had pushed herself to her feet. And she had stepped in front of the strike meant to kill him.

"...Ya... Yagami—"

"...Idiot." The corner of her mouth curved up. "I've said it so many times. Just call me China."

The mask shattered.

Her Reiatsu fell to nothing in an instant.

Her face, her whole face, came into view. And those clear, flawless eyes that had just looked at him with a smile.

They went dark.

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