Bleach: Awakened — Chapter 89 - The Espada (Part 1)
"NO.1 Espada, Coyote Starrk."
"NO.3 Espada, Tier Harribel."
"NO.4 Espada, Ulquiorra Cifer."
"NO.7 Espada, Zommari Rureaux."
"NO.8 Espada, Szayelaporro Granz."
"NO.9 Espada, Aaroniero Arruruerie."
"NO.10 Espada, Yammy Llargo."
"Now that the introductions are out of the way, let's not waste any more time."
Ichigo drew the twin blades slowly. It was the first time he had unsheathed them since arriving in Hueco Mundo, and if Sosuke Aizen and the others had still been present, they might have noticed that the black running along those blades had grown deeper than before.
"Hunt him down, Los Lobos!" NO.1, an ordinary-looking middle-aged man, took on the shape of a hunter after Resurrección.
"Conquer him, Tiburón!" NO.3, a scantily clad blonde, gripped a massive sword in one hand after Resurrección.
"Seal him away, Murciélago." NO.4, pale-faced and expressionless, spread a pair of enormous black wings from the back after Resurrección.
"Be still, Brujería!" NO.7, a tall, dark-skinned figure, the lower half of the body twisting into a peach-colored pumpkin-like shape after Resurrección.
"Drink deep, Fornicarás!" NO.8, tall and slender, pink-haired, the lower half of the body becoming a mass of writhing tentacles after Resurrección.
"Devour him, Glotonería!" NO.9, originally human in appearance with a glass tank for a head, kept the upper half unchanged after Resurrección while the lower half became a massive octopus form.
"Fly into a rage, Ira!" NO.10 was already a hulking, ferocious-looking brute to begin with. After Resurrección the body swelled even larger, and twelve legs sprouted from it.
"Wooow." Ichigo gave a completely flat word of appreciation, glancing toward where Nelliel Tu Odelschwanck and the others were. "Pretty cool, all of you. I hope you can hold on and not die too fast."
"Let's take this outside. If you're going to swarm me, there isn't enough space in here for any of you to move properly."
With that, Ichigo stamped hard against the ground and launched himself into the sky, passing through the ceiling that had already been blasted open by the earlier Cero and emerging outside Las Noches. He looked down at the palace for a moment, then thought it over and moved even further away.
The Espada glanced at one another. They wanted to follow, but there was a flicker of hesitation in each of them. In the end it was Ulquiorra Cifer, NO.4, who moved first, and the rest of the Espada fell in after.
"I was starting to think you'd all lost your nerve."
Standing on the white sand, Ichigo rolled his neck and watched the Espada land one by one. He swung the twin blades in a sharp arc, and the surrounding space seemed to groan in protest as white sand billowed up around him.
"Come on then, Espada." A faint smile pulled at the corner of his mouth. "I hope you can give me a reason to change my opinion of Hollows as a species."
No one spoke.
But in Ulquiorra Cifer's hand, blue light flickered into being. A weapon resembling a lance materialized, crackling with that cold radiance. The black wings on Ulquiorra's back beat once, and then Ulquiorra was already in front of Ichigo, closing the gap in an instant.
"Fourth, huh..." Ichigo still had the number in mind, but shook his head anyway. "Your spiritual pressure is on a whole different level from the ones before you."
"But it's still not enough."
He pushed off the ground and charged. The moment they met, Ichigo's long blade swept out and clashed against the lance of light.
CRACK.
The instant of collision, Ulquiorra Cifer's pupils shrank. The lance of light was sliced clean through like it was made of nothing. There was no time to think: the black wings beat violently and Ulquiorra exploded backward, but the sword tip still caught the chest on the way past, tearing through white cloth and drawing thin lines of blood that exposed the Hollow hole at the center of the chest.
"Don't run."
Ichigo raised the shorter blade high. Golden spiritual pressure gathered along the length of the steel, then flowed and converged toward the tip, a Getsuga Tensho coiling, ready to drop.
"Ha!"
But in the instant before he brought it down, a gold flash cut across the edge of his vision. Tier Harribel charged from the side, driving the longsword straight at Ichigo's flank.
"Good timing."
CLANG.
The blade hit Ichigo's side and sent sparks scattering. Tier Harribel's pupils snapped tight. The spiritual pressure surging beneath that skin, that was the power of Blut. But the sensation was wrong. Something else was there beneath it, layered over it: the Hierro of a Hollow.
"But not enough force."
Because of Tier Harribel's charge, the shorter blade hung in the air for just a beat. Then the massive crescent slash released from the tip.
Getsuga Tensho—its first appearance in Hueco Mundo.
BOOM,
As if by spatial displacement, Ulquiorra Cifer used Sonído at the very last moment, Tier Harribel's interference had bought just enough time, and escaped the range of the slash.
HISS,
Wherever the crescent passed, space itself let out a wail. It tore straight toward the heavens, bright enough that for a moment it looked like it would light up all of Hueco Mundo.
"Cero Metralleta."
Deep blue radiance bloomed. Coyote Starrk raised the twin guns, and countless blue cero erupted all at once, overwhelming in scale and terrifying in speed.
"Plenty of speed and numbers. Not enough power."
The left hand gripping the shorter blade extended one finger. Ichigo concentrated spiritual pressure at the fingertip, aimed it at that wall of incoming cero, and Gran Rey Cero ignited once more.
BOOM,
The blue cero hit first. A violent explosion tore through the air, and more cero followed, crashing in one after another.
BOOM!
But the next instant, black surged out of the detonation like something that wanted to swallow the world whole. The terrifying black Cero consumed the torrent of blue in a single breath and drove straight toward Starrk.
Both eyes went wide. Seeing the Gran Rey Cero about to consume the NO.1 Espada, Starrk scrambled to use Sonído, but couldn't get clear in time. The left shoulder took a graze, and blood ran freely.
"You three... plus that skeleton from earlier. All four of you are Vasto Lorde, aren't you."
Ichigo swept his gaze around. Judging from who had actually dared to step forward and from the spiritual pressure readings, the top four Espada were a clear dividing line. Numbers Five and Six, already knocked down earlier, fell on that side too. The gap between Seven and Eight versus Nine and Ten wasn't particularly large.
By the ranking system Ichigo had put together himself, the top four all had spiritual pressure extremely close to a high-ranking Captain, First-Class Spiritual Rank. Number Two especially had an ability that even a high-ranking Captain would struggle to handle once caught by it.
Five and Six were roughly on the same level as Byakuya Kuchiki and Kenpachi Zaraki, strong among the mid-tier Captains. Seven and Eight were ordinary mid-tier Captain level, both sitting at Second-Class Reii. Nine and Ten were worse: entry-level Captain tier, Third-class Reii. Renji Abarai could probably put up a decent fight against either of them.
Strong, in a sense. Not that strong, in another. If this group ever clashed with the Soul Reapers of Soul Society, even without Genryusai Shigekuni Yamamoto stepping in, Ichigo figured these ten would more than likely never come back from a fight against the Captains.
"Not coming at me?" He finished the mental tally and spoke lightly. "Then I'll come to you."
BOOM,
Spiritual pressure surged underfoot. Ichigo flickered out of existence like a spatial cut and reappeared directly behind NO.9 and NO.10. Terrifying golden radiance flared, pouring down toward the tip of the blade.
"Let me take care of one of you first. If you survive, consider yourself lucky."
The massive crescent slash appeared once more. Before the Espada's horrified eyes, it swallowed Aaroniero Arruruerie whole, and without even a single scream, Aaroniero crumbled to ash and scattered into the air.
"Getsuga Tensho."
➤ Next: The Espada (Part Two)