Bleach: Awakened — Chapter 117 - Don't Disappoint Me, Aizen
"The power of a Quincy... coexisting with a Hollow?!"
The sight before him defied all reason, overturning everything Sosuke Aizen understood. These were two completely opposite, mutually antagonistic existences.
If things were as before, the Soul Reaper framework as the base, with Quincy and Hollow powers channeled through a Zanpakuto, Aizen could still make sense of it. But right now, he couldn't sense even a trace of Soul Reaper power coming from Ichigo's body.
"What on earth happened to you?!" Aizen couldn't hold back the roar. "Without Soul Reaper power to mediate, how can Quincy power and Hollow power be perfectly compatible?!"
"Answer me! Ichigo Kurosaki!"
"Can't figure it out?"
The voice was low, slightly hoarse, like something processed through a vocal filter. Ichigo, mask in place, spoke with a strangely detached, uncanny quality.
"If you can't figure it out, it only means your evolution hasn't gone far enough."
"Ugh!"
He squeezed hard. The wrist deformed instantly. Aizen couldn't suppress a grunt, and the blade fused with his right hand swung out with force.
"I get the feeling your evolution has gone off course."
"?!"
All three eyes contracted sharply. Aizen had already climbed further beyond the Transcendent threshold, that slash was one capable of killing any Soul Reaper, and Ichigo caught it bare-handed.
"You're gradually losing your human form." Ichigo said flatly. "Is this what evolution is? Turning into some hideous monster?"
"Is this the form you were hoping for, Aizen?"
"Uwaaaaaah!"
Roaring, Aizen's spiritual pressure surged again. The Hogyoku within him blazed with what seemed like boundless light.
CRACK,
The blade wrenched free from Ichigo's palm. Without hesitation, Aizen severed his own left arm. The butterfly wings at his back beat once, and his entire body became a streak of light, reappearing a hundred meters away as if by teleportation.
"Weren't you just trying to shove my face in?" A mocking smile pulled at the corner of Ichigo's lips beneath the mask. "How is it you're the one putting distance between us now?"
"Are you that afraid of me?"
"...I acknowledge it, Ichigo Kurosaki." Aizen lowered his head slightly. His brown hair, grown a little longer with each evolution, fell across his face, hiding his expression. "That nameless spatial anomaly ten days ago drove you even further along the path of the Transcendent."
"But I now possess true immortality!"
His face had turned black. Three holes had torn open across his upper body. The Hogyoku was fully embedded within him. Skulls had sprouted from the spinal ridges of the butterfly wings at his back. Having evolved once more, Aizen had transformed completely into something alien, something monstrous.
"Regret it, Ichigo Kurosaki." The blade pointed directly forward. Aizen raised his chin. "Regret not using every means at your disposal to kill me the moment we first met."
"Now I possess the most supreme power!"
"Still haven't understood, have you, Aizen?"
The words barely landed before the orange-haired figure vanished from sight. In the same instant, a crushing wave of pressure bore down from behind.
His brain had no time to react. Whether it was the body's own instinct or the Hogyoku's forewarning, Aizen swung his blade backward in the next moment.
CLANG,
Sparks scattered in every direction. Most of the force was absorbed by both blades, but the terrifying residual energy still made the surrounding space tremble.
"All to avoid being cut down in a single stroke, and all you've done is chase after some so-called immortality."
Ichigo raised his left hand. Black spiritual pressure condensed, dark gold light threading into it as the spirit particles in the air were continuously compressed and drawn inward. There was only one thing in his gaze.
Pity.
"No matter how far you evolve, a monster like you has no right to witness my full strength."
SIZZLE,
Space warped continuously. A sphere black as ink devoured all light. Everything around it became fuel for this Cero.
"Get yourself sorted out. Then keep evolving."
"Ichigo... Kurosaki!"
The terrifying Cero swallowed Aizen whole. The surrounding space screamed without ceasing, his voice echoing out across the sky.
"...Still not dead?" Ichigo's brow furrowed slightly. "The Hogyoku... the power of the Soul King. It's even greater than I imagined."
"Just how did such a powerful existence end up mutilated, turned into a wedge?"
As his own power kept growing, Ichigo's understanding of the Soul King grew clearer with it. If the Soul King's condition was truly as Aizen had described, he genuinely couldn't work out what the Soul King really was.
"Ichigo... Kurosaki!"
A roar capable of shaking all Three Realms rang through the heavens. Aizen's figure reappeared, by this point, only a head and part of a torso remained.
HISS,
The Hogyoku kept working. Aizen's devastated body rapidly regrew, and in the blink of an eye it had fully restored itself.
"Even that wasn't enough to finish it." Ichigo murmured, then asked, "Aizen—the Hogyoku as it stands now, how much of the Soul King's essence does it hold?"
"Just give me a rough idea."
"Heh... you've set your sights on the Soul King's power too?" Aizen said mockingly. "That really doesn't seem like you, Ichigo Kurosaki."
"If you want to know, then defeat me completely—though of course, that's an impossibility."
"Heh. The Hogyoku is ultimately nothing more than a fragment of the Soul King." Ichigo returned the mockery. "By your own account, the Soul King is already in that state, so just how far do you think you can actually reach?"
"If this is as far as it goes, I don't need to know anyway."
"Heh... I told you—my evolution has no end!"
Hairline cracks spread along the blade in his hand. Aizen's spiritual pressure surged again, and blinding radiance gathered across all six skulls at his back.
BOOM!
Six terrifying beams screamed outward. Ichigo's expression didn't change. Black light rose along his blade, then rapidly converged toward the edge.
"Getsuga Tensho."
BOOM!
A black crescent blazed into existence, colliding with the six beams and detonating with a world-shaking roar. The sound reached every ear in Soul Society, even a certain someone peering down from high above the heavens felt a sharp pang of dread in their chest.
"Still not enough, Aizen."
"?!"
The black figure vanished once more. Even after evolving again, Aizen still could not track Ichigo's movements.
But Aizen had begun to see something of it. It wasn't like his own light-form movement. It was a fusion of three footwork arts, Hirenkyaku, Shunpo, and Sonído, woven into one.
"This level of power barely scrapes the baseline of Transcendent. Nothing more."
The calm voice came from behind. Aizen's pupils contracted sharply. Even with a premonition, he couldn't react in time.
Rip,
"Uwaaaaaah!"
The hand moved, the blade fell. All six skulls were severed at the root, and Aizen's cry of pain tore through the air.
"Keep evolving, Aizen."
The black blade cut through everything, splitting Aizen's body clean in two. The Hogyoku was knocked free from his chest. The terrifying residual force ripped the ground open into a fissure of unfathomable depth.
"Force out my full strength."
Orange hair drifted in the wind. The expression beneath the mask was blank, indifferent. Ichigo looked upon Aizen, that monster standing before him, with nothing but contempt.
"I've been waiting a long time for this. Don't disappoint me, Aizen."
➤ Next: The Deepest Part of the Soul