"Ah—seriously…"
Cole had the sudden urge to start cursing.
He hadn't even attacked Ichibe once.
So why was this bald monk always targeting him?
Thinking that, Cole let out a breath, wrapped both arms around the sky-piercing golden pillar, and roared as he heaved with all his strength.
The moment he moved, it was like the world itself was shaken.
The entire sky trembled.
Gales dragged the clouds down from the heavens, tumbling toward the ground in a way that made everyone's heart pound, their trailing edges almost igniting from friction.
Ichibe felt a prickle of unease—
But it was already too late.
His zanpakuto's ability was "cutting names, not flesh."
As long as it made contact, he could cut away half of his opponent's power.
That was why, with just one stroke, he'd been able to send Aizen flying so easily.
Except… there was one small problem.
He hadn't actually clashed blades with Cole even once.
As Ichibe was realizing that—
The base of the golden pillar slammed straight into his Senri Tōten-shō (Thousand-Mile Heaven-Piercing Palm).
The massive hand of reiatsu that stretched across the sky—
Was blown apart in an instant by a single swing.
"Boom!"
The thunderous impact echoed through the Soul King Palace.
A torrent of blue spiritual power scattered like rain, as if the Soul King Palace had suddenly been hit by a brief downpour.
Ichibe's sense of foreboding only deepened, because the golden pillar didn't stop there.
It continued rushing downward at terrifying speed, crashing straight toward him.
"Seal! Seal! Seal!!!"
Ichibe roared, swinging his giant brush like mad.
With each character he wrote in the air, another invisible barrier formed in the sky.
But it was all pointless.
Dozens of barriers shattered in succession, and the base of the golden pillar had already descended.
"Bang!!!"
The golden pillar came down dead-center, smacking Ichibe right on the top of his shaved head, almost pounding his skull down into his neck.
With another earth-shaking boom, the golden pillar, Ichibe and all, smashed into the soil of the Zero Division Palace's grounds.
Ichibe was driven deep into the earth.
Under that strike, the Zero Division Palace trembled violently once more.
A massive crack spidered out from the point of impact, jagged and twisting, cutting across the entire floating palace in the sky—
It looked like it might split the entire structure clean in two.
Seeing this, Senjumaru's beautiful eyes shook. She bit down angrily on her silver teeth and leapt into the air.
"You brat! Hurry up and rein in that strength! Believe it or not, I'll sew your mouth shut!"
As she shouted, Senjumaru's six golden skeletal arms spread out, her needle-like zanpakuto flashing as they threaded through the air.
She really was furious.
That rotten kid—
He'd already punched a hole straight through her Zero Division Palace, and now he was about to smash the whole thing to pieces.
Was she really supposed to go sleep on his couch after this?
Rukia and the other shinigami all gasped at the sight.
Under Senjumaru's desperate work, the crumbling Zero Division Palace was actually being stitched back together bit by bit with black threads.
This wasn't cloth or plastic she was sewing.
It was the earth.
It was architecture.
Things that should have been impossible to sew.
And yet, with her six golden skeletal arms, Senjumaru looked just like a modern-day goddess patching the heavens, tirelessly mending the torn world.
Cole coughed lightly and lifted the golden pillar a little higher in his arms, easing some of the pressure.
He didn't let all that power slam down into the Palace.
Only then did Senjumaru finally sigh in relief.
Her figure flashed again and again in midair as she followed the fissures in the ground, stitching them closed all the way along their paths.
From high above, the earth looked like a giant bolt of cloth being forcibly sewn back together with black thread.
After sewing up two or three long cracks, Senjumaru finally stopped, wiped a bead of sweat from her brow, and glared fiercely at Cole.
"Brat, no more fighting here. You've practically smashed my home to bits."
In the past, her Zero Division Palace had been one of the most beautiful places to behold—
Filled with countless decorations, and the palace halls themselves lined with every kind of garment.
But now…
The whole place had been pounded into a half-collapsed ruin.
Even with her patchwork, the Palace was still in battered, broken pieces, with obvious stitches visible everywhere you looked.
"I get it, but you can't just blame me for everything, right? That big monk keeps taking swings at me first."
Cole spread his hands helplessly.
He'd come here to ask for reinforcements.
Who could have guessed that the bald monk wouldn't care about Seireitei at all, and had basically wanted to leave them down there to fend for themselves?
Just then, Cole's eyes flicked to the side, catching sight of a figure streaking away in the distance—
Aizen.
His pale form rushed straight toward the Soul King's inner palace, like a white moth drawn to a sacred blue flame.
"Stop!!!"
A furious roar echoed from above.
The next moment, Ichibe—with a huge swelling on his head—shot forward, brandishing his giant brush as he charged after Aizen.
In his anxiety, he completely forgot about Cole's existence.
"Cole, aren't you going to go stop him?"
Shunsui couldn't help asking.
Cole smiled, raising his gaze to the holy structure floating in midair—the Soul King's inner palace—and the corners of his mouth curled up slightly.
"Shunsui-san, to be honest, I'm pretty interested in this so-called Soul King myself right now."
According to the original story's plot, the Soul King had created the three worlds, wielding power that bordered on omnipotence.
Even in his current state, he was still said to possess abilities surpassing omniscience and omnipotence.
In Cole's previous life, plenty of readers had theorized that everything that happened in the story had already been predicted by the Soul King.
So now, Cole was extremely curious.
Could that supposedly all-knowing, all-seeing Soul King foresee the existence of a transmigrator like him?
And when faced with Aizen as a threat, what kind of decision would he make?
Would things turn out any differently?
With those thoughts, Cole exhaled softly.
The power of the hollow he'd been drawing in surged back through his body.
His form shifted again into a hollowfied state—
His heart became hollow, and that sinister black-and-red spiritual pressure erupted outward as his silhouette vanished from where he stood.
"This brat's… faster than me now…"
Far off in the distance, a certain newly arrived "black cat" gritted her silver teeth and sprinted forward on all fours.
The others quickly followed suit.
"Aizen! I won't let you get any closer! Be dyed black right here and fall into hell!!!"
Ichibe roared in rage.
Staring at Aizen's back, he swung his giant brush, his deep, resonant voice chanting with a strange rhythm:
"Dark of night, eternal night—
Come forth. Meet everyone, and drink it down.
Drink, and life will drift away.
The road to Yomi is the same—
A hundred flowers bloom along it.
Where is the feast?
Be dyed pitch black, split into eight.
With pitch-black flames, burn it all to black.
Devour it quickly—
Let only white bones remain.
Raise a grave for him. Mourn him.
So that he can never again be reborn—
So that he can never again become our sacrifice."
This profound, esoteric incantation rolled on and on.
As his chant continued, a black darker than darkness itself spread outward.
The brush in Ichibe's hand seemed to turn into a bottle of ink.
Its effect was like a single drop of ink falling into clear water—
The surrounding space, buildings, trees, rubble…
Everything was dyed the deepest shade of black.
Cole, Senjumaru, Oetsu, Kirio, Shunsui, Byakuya…
All of them were startled by the sudden change and instinctively came to a halt.
"What is this? Everything's turned black…"
Shunsui stared in shock at the scene before him.
This wasn't the darkness of night.
This was pure black—
A black that turned all things into the deepest void, leaving only black.
You couldn't see objects.
You couldn't see buildings.
There was only black.
It was like the world ahead had become a realm of nothing but darkness.
Cole was just about to say something when a chill ran down his spine.
He quickly reached out and grabbed Yoruichi around the waist.
"Hold it. What are you doing here? Where's Soi fong? The darkness ahead is way too weird. Don't you dare fool around at a time like this."
If he hadn't reacted fast enough, this little black cat would've already dashed into the darkness.
Yoruichi kicked and struggled wildly, her little legs flailing as she glared up at Cole.
"Let me go! We can settle the Soi fong thing later—I have business! I'm the head of the Shihōin clan, I absolutely won't allow Aizen to harm the Soul King! Let me go!"
She had spent enormous effort coaxing Soi fong into a dazed, half-asleep state.
Only when that rebellious subordinate let her go to "rest" had she finally managed to slip away from Cole's villa.
She had barely made it back to Seireitei—
Only to see the Soul King Palace knocked out of the sky at first glance.
No matter how much she protested, Cole simply refused to loosen his grip.
"At least calm down, will you? That darkness is obviously the big monk's ability. For all we know, it might not distinguish between friend and foe…"
As he said that, Cole suddenly blinked in surprise.
"Yoruichi, your skin's pretty nice. Soft and smooth—what do you use for skincare? Got any cosmetics you can recommend?"
His hands were wrapped around Yoruichi's slender waist, gripping what felt like a block of soft tofu.
It made him want to keep touching it.
Yoruichi was absolutely furious.
Lightning flared across her body as she sank her teeth hard into Cole's chest.
"Stop putting your hands all over me!"
Crackling thunder echoed.
The attack didn't hurt Cole at all, but it did successfully blast his hair into a full-on explosion.
Cole's mouth twitched as he literally blackened with irritation, then he rapped Yoruichi lightly on the head with a fist.
"Little black cat, I'm warning you—
If you don't behave, I'll tie you up and let Soi fong 'take care' of you for a few decades. I'm pretty sure that yandere lily of a girl wouldn't turn that down."
At his words, Yoruichi's face flushed bright red.
Even her body softened noticeably.
Before this, Cole had always teased her that Soi fong was a yandere, a lily in full bloom.
She hadn't really understood what he meant then.
It wasn't until this time that she finally realized just how twisted Soi fong's love really was.
That rebellious disciple…
Thinking back to what had just happened, Yoruichi's cheeks burned hot.
Her thighs rubbed together unconsciously.
That damn subordinate had dared to overturn the master-servant order—
And had pushed her so far that she'd been begging for mercy again and again before being allowed to rest.
The strangest thing was…
She'd never heard of Soi fong ever having a boyfriend, so how was her "technique" that good?
Once she finally managed to calm down, Yoruichi's tone softened as well.
She looked up at Cole with pitiful eyes.
"Okay, okay, I get it. I won't go. You don't have to be so mean about it…"
On the other side, everything was still moving forward without them.
Starrk, for once, actually seemed interested.
He let Lilynette transform into a rifle and raised her toward the darkness.
"What kind of space is that? All I can feel from it is a dead, empty void."
"Wait—"
Shunsui had just opened his mouth to stop him when Starrk pulled the trigger.
In an instant, thousands of blue Cero (Hollow Flash) streaked into the darkness like a shower of azure meteors.
The next second, something happened that left everyone stunned.
Those glowing blasts, each packing terrifying destructive power, were dyed black the instant they crossed into the darkness.
Pure black.
They vanished within the void.
There was no light spilling out.
There wasn't even a sound.
It was as if the Cero had simply disappeared without a trace.
As if the darkness ahead was a black hole—
Or something even darker than a black hole.
The uncanny sight gave everyone the eerie feeling that they were looking at something they were never meant to see.
"What… in the world is that…"
Shunsui's unease deepened sharply.
Unable to hold back, he launched a Shakkahō (Red Fire Cannon) into the darkness.
But just like the Cero, his flaming blast didn't illuminate anything.
Instead, it was dyed black by the darkness and snuffed out without a single sound.
This time, everyone was completely rattled.
The darkness in front of them felt like a devouring abyss, hungry for everything.
They exchanged looks, and none of them dared take another step into it.
No one knew what was inside.
Yoruichi watched all this with cold sweat trickling down her forehead.
"Cole… thanks for stopping me back there."
She might be a woman and a shinigami, and she wasn't exactly afraid of the dark—
But this kind of darkness was something else.
This was a darkness that not only swallowed light, but even sound.
If you stepped into it…
It really was no different from being thrown into Muken itself.
A place where you'd experience the deepest terror, where in absolute darkness and silence, your mind would eventually break and collapse.
She even started to wonder whether Seireitei's Muken had been modeled after this kind of pure darkness.
Just as everyone was agonizing over what to do, Gin's expression suddenly changed.
"Fall back! The darkness is spreading. It's turning everything around us black. I don't know what happens if we're caught in it, but it definitely won't be anything good."
The faces of the gathered shinigami and arrancar all changed as they stared at the approaching edge of the dark field.
Space, ground, everything was being dyed black, and it was spreading outward, trying to swallow the entire Soul King Palace.
They retreated as quickly as they could—
But they very soon realized something was wrong.
The darkness was moving too fast.
It was faster than they were.
Everything behind them—
Every object—was already being turned black.
"Ah!"
Nanao cried out.
Her right foot had been overtaken by the darkness and dyed black.
And in the instant she turned her head—
Her face was dyed black as well.
"Nanao…"
Shunsui stopped in his tracks in panic, wanting to rush back to save his niece.
But he didn't dare touch that pure blackness, either.
He could feel that even his zanpakuto would be dyed black if he made contact.
At that moment of panic, Cole appeared at his side.
He swung his golden staff up and aimed it straight at the advancing darkness.
"Teikai (Calm the Seas)!"
As the golden staff struck the ground, invisible ripples burst outward.
Brilliant golden light poured over heaven and earth—
And the encroaching darkness was forcibly halted in its tracks.
(End of Chapter)
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