When Higashino Shuuichi arrived at Yhwach's palace, Yhwach was already seated on his throne, waiting in silence.
"You're here. A bit later than I expected," Yhwach said lightly, resting his head against his right hand.
There wasn't the slightest trace of grief on his face for the deaths of his Schutzstaffel.
"I planned to come straight here," Higashino Shuuichi replied with a smile, "but then I remembered there was still that slightly troublesome Gremmy Thoumeaux, so I spent a little time tracking him down.
Good thing Yhwach-sama was so thoughtful and kept him locked up—otherwise you'd have had to wait for me even longer~"
Normally, Higashino Shuuichi couldn't be bothered to waste words on an enemy.
But this time was different. The man before him was Yhwach—the infamous Quincy King. Before settling things, Higashino Shuuichi wanted to talk a little more.
"Then it seems Gremmy Thoumeaux has followed the others," Yhwach said in a low voice.
"Yeah. He went very peacefully," Higashino Shuuichi said, still smiling. "It's just that right before he died, he said some filthy things that aren't suitable to repeat. I won't dirty Yhwach-sama's ears with them~"
From behind him, he took a handkerchief from Nemu's hands, then calmly wiped the blood from his Zanpakuto right in front of Yhwach.
It was Gremmy's blood, and Higashino Shuuichi had deliberately left it there—just to provoke and humiliate him like this.
To Higashino Shuuichi, it was a crude attempt at goading.
It didn't have to work. It was effortless, a casual move that cost him no real time or focus.
If it worked, all the better—an enraged Yhwach would be more likely to slip up. If it didn't, fine. Either way, it was just a spare piece on the board.
And of course, Yhwach wasn't going to be angered by something that cheap. To Yhwach, the Schutzstaffel were nothing more than expendable chess pieces.
If Gremmy died, then he died.
What interested him far more was the Shinigami who had the audacity to bring along a second person as dead weight and storm, alone, into the absolute core of the Wandenreich—the Ice Palace itself.
"If I remember correctly," Yhwach said calmly, "I've seen that face before. Decades ago, you stood alone against all of Soul Society, and by your own power you slaughtered one of the Five Great Noble Houses into extinction—turning them into the Four Great Noble Houses of today.
More importantly, shouldn't you be imprisoned in Muken right now?
Or is it that this place of mine is connected to Muken?"
"Of course not," Higashino Shuuichi answered lazily. He tossed the handkerchief—now stained red—to the floor and flicked his Zanpakuto in the air in a neat flourish. "I just felt like coming, so I came. Yhwach-sama wouldn't seriously think a mere Muken could hold me, would you?"
"Fair enough," Yhwach chuckled. "A Shinigami who could come and go freely within my Wandenreich—why would Muken stop you?"
"From the way Yhwach-sama says that," Higashino Shuuichi narrowed his eyes, "it sounds like you're quite fond of me~"
"I am," Yhwach said. "Higashino Shuuichi— a name that has become legend in Soul Society, even a taboo.
Do you not know that even if you merely appear in Soul Society now, countless people will feel fear… and will want nothing more than to see you erased?
So follow me. Join me, and together we will trample that damned Soul Society—Hueco Mundo, and even the Human World.
Then we will ascend the Soul King Palace and reshape this world anew!"
Yhwach's confidence was absolute.
"The Soul King Palace, huh?" Higashino Shuuichi's smile deepened. "That really is a place worth reminiscing about. How did Yhwach-sama know I just came from there?
Oh—when I killed those Sternritter under you earlier, I noticed they're different from the Quincy recorded in Soul Society's old archives. They all had… unusually special abilities.
So as their king, do you have something similar too, Yhwach-sama? Like clairvoyance, or super hearing?
Or perhaps an ability that fits your status even better…"
Higashino Shuuichi paused, then slowly opened his eyes wider and stared up at the throne.
"Omniscience and omnipotence."
Yhwach's booming laughter immediately filled the entire hall.
"Hahahaha! Did one of those four brats tell you?
Omniscience and omnipotence—yes. That is my power. As long as I wish to know it, whether past, present, or future, there is nothing I cannot know.
And as long as I wish to change it… there is nothing I cannot change!"
"Heh… 'omniscience and omnipotence,'" Higashino Shuuichi snorted.
He truly wanted to throw it back in Yhwach's face—tell him to stop bragging, that it might fool ignorant fools but not him. Past, present, future? Please. If that power were truly "all-knowing," then why was it limited the way it was?
But Higashino Shuuichi didn't say that out loud. Instead, he asked with a smile that didn't reach his eyes:
"Then may I ask, Yhwach-sama—do you know my real name?"
"What are you implying?" Yhwach's brow furrowed.
"Nothing much. Another question, then," Higashino Shuuichi continued smoothly. "Can you change the fact that a thousand years ago, you were nearly killed by the current Captain-Commander of the Gotei 13, Yamamoto Genryūsai Shigekuni?"
This time, Yhwach's right hand tightened around the armrest.
Because Higashino Shuuichi had just pressed on the wound he could never forget—the crushing defeat from a thousand years ago, a scar that still burned in his heart to this day.
"Looks like even Yhwach-sama can't change that~" Higashino Shuuichi said coldly. "Then in my opinion, your power isn't all that impressive after all~
And the fact that my words just stirred your heart… suggests you didn't see this future beforehand, either.
Is it because you trust me that much? Or because you're so confident you believe I can't possibly threaten you?
Or is it that, right now… Yhwach-sama doesn't have that so-called omniscience and omnipotence at all?"
Yhwach understood instantly. His gaze shifted to the high windows along the hall's wall.
Outside, the moon had only just climbed above the treetops.
Higashino Shuuichi hadn't only put in work when dealing with the Schutzstaffel—he had studied the timing as well.
Ever since Yhwach awakened ahead of schedule, his body had been abnormally weak. Even after performing Auswählen on every pure-blood Quincy in the Human World, he still hadn't recovered.
So he split each day in two.
By day, he reclaimed his power and handled affairs. By night, he exchanged his power with Jugram Haschwalth, letting Haschwalth act in his place using that "omniscience and omnipotence."
And today, the time Higashino Shuuichi chose to move was precisely the moment Yhwach was about to exchange power with Haschwalth.
At that time, Yhwach had still been thinking of subduing Kabuno Takuya—Higashino Shuuichi's disguise—and had never imagined Higashino Shuuichi would dare attack the Ice Palace.
So he hadn't forced his weakened body to continuously maintain that "omniscience and omnipotence" to monitor the future at all times.
And even if Haschwalth wished to use that power, he still had to wait until the boundary between day and night—until Yhwach handed it over.
Higashino Shuuichi had seized that gap and come before Yhwach to catch him off guard.
"Heh… while I was still sleeping," Yhwach said as if recalling the distant past, "I often heard voices from Soul Society.
They said the Fourth Division Vice-Captain, Higashino Shuuichi, was a Shinigami exceptionally skilled in battle.
They said the Eleventh Division Vice-Captain, Higashino Shuuichi, possessed astonishing cunning.
They said the Grand Blade-Hunting Chief of the Katana-gari-shū, Higashino Shuuichi, was a genius beyond measure…
Now that I see you, it seems they were right."
"Yes," Higashino Shuuichi replied. "Then surely someone as intelligent as Yhwach-sama can guess why I went through all this trouble and stood before you."
He straightened, blade in hand, and at last there was a sharp, vicious edge in his eyes.
He'd talked enough. He'd had his fill.
The Yhwach before him felt just like Aizen Sōsuke once had.
Before facing them, he couldn't help but put a filter over them—some lingering halo from a previous life's impressions.
But once he stood before them, Higashino Shuuichi realized they weren't fundamentally different from most people he'd met.
Only stronger. Only smarter. That was all.
"Kill me?" Yhwach said quietly.
"From your standpoint, you shouldn't.
But none of that matters now. This battle between us… it seems there's no avoiding it."
As he spoke, Yhwach rose from his throne.
With that motion, the reishi within the palace stirred—as if on pilgrimage—gathering around him, submitting to him.
"Yhwach-sama," Higashino Shuuichi suddenly asked, "have you ever heard the line: 'An immortal strokes my crown'?"
Yhwach's face filled with question marks.
What nonsense was this Shinigami spouting?
But in the next instant, he understood.
A memory carved into the deepest part of his heart—one that might never fade.
Nadegiri (Soothing Slash).
Yamamoto Genryūsai Shigekuni's Nadegiri.
In that moment, Yhwach felt as if he had returned to a thousand years ago—back when he was a young, hot-blooded Quincy King.
Higashino Shuuichi was no longer Higashino Shuuichi, but the younger Yamamoto Genryūsai Shigekuni.
That audacious Yamamoto had opened against him with Nadegiri.
Back then, that single stroke had nearly shaved off one of Yhwach's ears.
And now Higashino Shuuichi used that same Nadegiri—slicing a strand of hair from the top of Yhwach's head.
"Ha… hahahahaha!"
Yhwach laughed loudly.
Just now, he hadn't moved a single step—because he could see that Higashino Shuuichi's cut wasn't meant to take his life.
It was a declaration.
Higashino Shuuichi was telling him: today's outcome would echo the past.
What confidence.
What arrogance—Higashino Shuuichi's arrogance.
"In that case," Yhwach's eyes sharpened, "today, Higashino Shuuichi… I will accept your life!"
With a casual sweep of his hand, countless brilliant, holy Quincy arrows bloomed throughout the hall.
Like meteors, they streaked toward Higashino Shuuichi—and toward Nemu behind him.
There were so many, it seemed endless.
With Yhwach's current body, he should never have been able to squander power like this.
But this was the Ice Palace—his carefully prepared place of long slumber. Here, he could borrow the palace's power to unleash such attacks.
And that, too, was within Higashino Shuuichi's expectations.
Through Askin Nakk Le Vaar's mouth earlier, he already knew everything about this palace.
So in this moment, Higashino Shuuichi only needed to say:
"Bankai, Shinki Mosoku."
His spiritual pressure spilled outward. The instant those holy arrows touched it, they scattered like frightened birds and beasts.
More than that—when Yhwach pointed at Higashino Shuuichi, intending to invoke the power currently housed within him, the power of "world balance" borrowed from Haschwalth, to impose misfortune upon Higashino Shuuichi—
Yhwach discovered that Haschwalth's power had failed.
Just like it had for those Sternritter Schutzstaffel members who had died before Higashino Shuuichi.
This was something Higashino Shuuichi could not have done before he went to the Soul King Palace.
Back then, the condition for his Bankai to function was that he had to completely understand all of an enemy's abilities—and the enemy could not acquire new abilities mid-battle.
But after fully liberating his Zanpakuto within the Soul King Palace, Higashino Shuuichi's Bankai no longer required complete understanding.
Now, he could have his Zanpakuto transform targeted abilities based on partial information about the enemy.
And Haschwalth's ability was something Higashino Shuuichi understood perfectly.
It was one of the few advantages he still retained as a transmigrator.
In Soul Society, he had already personally changed so much that this advantage had nearly been erased.
But before the Quincy still in their "original state" under Yhwach's rule, Higashino Shuuichi still held a decisive edge.
Another single slash—
If Yhwach hadn't retreated in time, Higashino Shuuichi would have ended him with that one strike.
At the same time, Haschwalth—who had activated that "omniscience and omnipotence" and was rushing back from outside with all his might—suddenly saw his own future.
A future that had been abruptly changed for reasons he couldn't understand.
His Majesty… had used Auswählen on him, to reclaim the power!
"Was I still… one step too late?"
Haschwalth no longer had time to look further ahead. But as the pillar of light descended from the heavens, he had only one choice now:
To accept it.
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