Bleach: Awakened — Chapter 47 - Be Proud of Yourself, Byakuya Kuchiki

"That's true."

No matter how many there were, scattered attacks were still scattered attacks. With a little preparation, Ichigo was confident he could block them all without even touching Blut. But now that the blades had been compressed and reforged into a thousand swords, that was a different story. The threat level had genuinely gone up.

"Enough running your mouth!"

Kenpachi came charging back without a second thought, sword raised high, and brought it crashing down toward Ichigo.

"Don't get ahead of yourself."

Golden light bloomed along the long sword's blade. Ichigo swung hard, and a massive wave of sword pressure surged outward, not Getsuga Tensho, just raw sword pressure, nothing more.

"Unh!"

The sword in Kenpachi's hand trembled nonstop. His eyes went wide, and he set himself to take it head-on, wrenching deeper layers of spiritual pressure out of himself to weather the blow.

"WAAAAAAAAH!"

He roared and was steadily pushed back, but by the time he stopped, the sword pressure had been ground away entirely. Kenpachi sucked in great heaving breaths and worked to steady himself.

SWOOSH!

In the very same instant Ichigo swung out that sword pressure, Byakuya activated Shunpo and appeared in front of him, swinging the white sword formed from a hundred thousand blades in a single clean stroke.

CLANG!

White blade met black sword. Sparks flew. Clear nicks appeared along the white blade's edge, tiny fragments of steel spinning off into the air.

Byakuya's brow furrowed. With a single thought, another sword flew out from the surrounding thousand, and in the next instant a hundred more blades dissolved and poured into that one white sword.

At the same time, the encircling ring tightened sharply. Sword after sword fused back together, and the thousand blades became a hundred.

"Can you refine it even further?" Ichigo brought his long sword down. "When it becomes just one—is that your strongest attack?"

"You'll find out."

The nicked sword dissolved back into blades, drifted for a moment, then flowed back into the hundred surrounding them.

"Hado #4: Byakurai!"

Byakuya extended his index finger. Spiritual pressure gathered at the tip, and a thick bolt of white lightning discharged, shooting straight for Ichigo.

"Too weak."

A casual flick of the short blade knocked it aside. Ichigo activated Shunpo, and at the same moment the patterns in his veins shifted quietly, Blut transitioning from Blut Vene to Blut Arterie.

"So fast!"

Byakuya's pupils contracted sharply. Ichigo was in front of him in an instant. Without hesitation, Byakuya brought his sword crashing down.

It did nothing. Ichigo had already raised his long sword overhead a beat earlier, and as the white blade fell, he flicked his wrist and lightly batted it away, while the short blade in his other hand came down.

Shlick—

Too shallow...

Blood sprayed, but not much. Before the white blade had even landed, Byakuya had stepped half a pace back. That half-step saved him.

"Sharp instincts." Ichigo said approvingly. "Otherwise that slash would have crippled you."

"..." No words. Byakuya opened his palm. "Hado #54: Haien!"

A disc of flame released from his palm. Ichigo didn't even blink, whatever the range, Kido at this level did nothing to him.

"Bakudo #61: Rikujokoro!"

Six rods of golden light locked around his frame. In the next instant, one shift of Ichigo's body and they shattered. The flames arrived a moment later, only to be smashed apart by the short blade.

"Parlor tricks."

"UOOOOOOOOO!"

The words had barely left his mouth when Kenpachi came charging back, sword in hand. Both his fighting spirit and his spiritual pressure were higher than before.

"Unconsciously unsealing under overwhelming pressure." The corner of Ichigo's mouth curved, and he pushed forward. "Let me see just how far you can go with part of yourself unsealed!"

Blades clashed. Even one-handed, Ichigo's black sword overpowered Kenpachi holding his with two. Kenpachi bit down and kept grinding out spiritual pressure, trying to force his way through.

"Still not enough!"

Shlick!

The short blade carved a long gash across Kenpachi's chest. His eyes went vacant. He teetered on the edge of going under.

But the next moment, like a wildfire that refuses to die, the spiritual pressure inside him rose by a fraction. Consciousness flooded back. He grabbed Ichigo's left hand with a grip of iron, his sword still locked against the long sword.

"Got you!"

"Hmm..." Ichigo's gaze sharpened. "You call this 'got me'?"

"Absolutely."

Sometime in the last few seconds, the hundred surrounding swords had all vanished. Only the sword in Byakuya's hand still radiated light, light that spread like a pair of white wings, breathtaking and brilliant.

"Final Form—White Imperial Sword!"

He murmured the name. No Shunpo. He charged toward Ichigo in quick, deliberate strides, every last drop of his spiritual pressure poured into this sword of a hundred million blades.

His strongest strike.

"This spiritual pressure... I acknowledge it!"

An excited grin spread across Ichigo's face. He watched Byakuya coming and kicked Kenpachi away with one foot. At that same moment, the White Imperial Sword arrived.

BOOM!

White light swallowed everything. The strike condensing all of Byakuya's spiritual pressure and every last blade landed squarely on Ichigo. The sword reverted to an ordinary Zanpakuto, he had nothing left to maintain Bankai. This was the final blow.

"That attack has just barely crossed the threshold from mid-tier into the entry level of high-tier."

Blood seeped slowly from his abdomen. A chunk of flesh was missing from Ichigo's left side. Even with Blut Vene's defense, taking that strike with nothing but his body had still done this much, even to him.

"Is that all it is..."

Byakuya sank to one knee, steadying his breath. The White Imperial Sword had been the strongest strike he could deliver at full power. Once used, if it didn't cut the enemy down, the loss was his.

"You have every right to be proud, Byakuya Kuchiki." Blut Vene steadied the wound, and Ichigo pressed a hand to his abdomen. "It's been a very, very long time since I took an injury like this."

Of course, it was also on purpose.

He kept that thought to himself. In the moment Byakuya had charged, he had been fully capable of reacting. Sparring with the Visored had drilled this kind of multi-front fighting into him, never mind two opponents, add two more Captains at the same level and Ichigo going all out would have handled it without trouble.

It was simple, really. The White Imperial Sword was just too breathtaking. Cutting it down before it could land felt like a genuine waste. The worst that could happen was losing a chunk of flesh, and he'd lost plenty of that as a kid under Kisuke Urahara and Yoruichi anyway. No big deal. If it comes to it, take the hit.

"UOOOOOOOOOO!"

"Quit howling!"

➤ Next: The Eve of What Is Coming