The next moment, a thick bolt of lightning suddenly crashed down from the densely packed storm clouds!
BOOM!
It was like a giant dragon roaring. Countless arcs of lightning slammed into the sea, exploding into bloom after bloom of spray.
The extreme heat ignited the hydrogen and oxygen split from the water, and the surrounding area instantly turned into a sea of fire.
This hell of thunder and flame lasted a full ten breaths. After it finally calmed down, the Azure Dragon hovered above the surging sea, looking down as if waiting for something.
Suddenly, it reared up high, opened its massive jaws, and released an invisible wave toward a spot in the sea. One vacuum blade after another instantly split the water's surface, making the surrounding waters churn like boiling liquid.
Whoosh!
Sure enough, it couldn't hold back anymore and burst out of the water.
But Iori did not appear within the area covered by the vacuum blades. Instead, he launched a surprise attack from the Azure Dragon's visual blind spot, created by its damaged eye.
Clang!
The jade-green longsword pierced through the scabbed dragon hide, easily penetrating flesh and blood, only stopping when it struck something hard with a sharp clang.
'Misjudged it!' Iori's gaze sharpened.
He had intended to attack directly into the dragon's skull through the eye socket, but in the end, he didn't fully understand this creature. The angle of the thrust was wrong, and the blade was unexpectedly blocked by some unknown bone.
And this seemed to become the cause of his defeat. Enduring excruciating pain, the Azure Dragon did not let this chance slip by.
Its powerful dragon claw slashed violently across him. Even though Iori tried desperately to retreat, a huge chunk of muscle was torn away, and he was almost cut clean in half at the waist.
"Ugh!"
Iori fell weakly into the sea, feeling a massive amount of blood pouring out from his waist as strength drained rapidly from his body.
But at that moment, the small jewel at the end of the Ame-no-Murakumo Sword began to emit hazy blue light.
Large amounts of water essence were drawn toward it, forcibly causing the blood near the wound to clot and not disperse, greatly slowing the bleeding in a strange way.
And with a single thought from Iori, the buoyant force from the seawater increased. His body was actually lifted back up to the surface.
Splash…
Shaking off the seawater, Iori felt as though he were lying on a denser stretch of sand. He struggled to control his body and straighten up, but in the end he truly had no strength left and could only kneel halfway on the surface of the sea.
"Roar…"
The Izumo Azure Dragon wasn't doing much better either. Although a transverse bone inside its skull had saved its life, many vital nerves and blood vessels had been severed by Iori.
The fierce sword aura had also caused secondary damage… If it were an ordinary dangerous species, it would probably already be dead.
Even though it could still move, its body was no longer fully responsive. Even its remaining intact eye was stained red by internal bleeding, making it look like a bloodthirsty beast driven into a corner.
It seemed both man and dragon had reached their limits, they stared at each other for a brief moment.
"Roar!"
Suddenly, the Azure Dragon plunged into the sea and swam toward the depths. It wasn't fleeing, but gathering strength to shatter Iori with a decisive bite.
And it also understood that Iori would not let this opportunity pass either, he would surely concentrate his last remaining power and deliver a fatal blow.
"Hah… hah…"
Iori struggled to gather what little spiritual pressure he had left. Pain protested from every part of his body, and the wound at his waist continued to steal away his life.
Yet at this moment, his heart was incredibly calm… Was this a last flash of life, or had he already accepted his fate?
["Admit it. This is your limit."]
No… at the very least, he hadn't given up hope of victory.
["With this battered body of yours, can you really kill a giant dragon with one strike?"]
'How would you know if you don't try?'
["How foolish. Risking your life for nothing. You already got the sword, why challenge it at all?"]
'Once you accept a gift, you naturally enter into a promise.'
["Ridiculous!"]
["You're not someone who keeps promises at all. You just think this is interesting and that it satisfies your desire to show off."]
["Sometimes you're overly cautious, and other times you're reckless enough to duel an evil dragon. This isn't bravery or righteousness, it's nothing but stupidity!"]
'…Maybe so.'
[Then ending up like this is entirely your own fault!]
'Ending up like this? Am I really that miserable right now?'
Iori looked at his shattered reflection rippling endlessly on the water's surface, his expression relaxed.
'You're right. But the clever one is me, the foolish one is me, the brave one is me, and the cowardly one is also me, yet I won't deny my own choices. No matter whether the result is good or bad, I'll face it calmly and see my beliefs through to the end.'
["Beliefs? What exactly are your beliefs?"]
"That would be…"
Suddenly, countless fragments on the water's surface merged into a single face. Looking at that familiar visage, the boy smiled brightly. He didn't answer the question, but instead said something completely unrelated.
"Honestly, this face just gets more handsome the more I look at it!"
Buzz!
A streak of radiant light swept past. The emerald sword blade suddenly transformed, taking on a mercury-like sheen, its patterns subtly changing. A mysterious fluctuation followed, enveloping Iori.
Like flowing light and fleeting shadows, countless secrets naturally appeared in Iori's mind, as if they had been his from birth. With no resistance at all, he grasped them completely.
"So that's how it is… Storm!"
"ROAR!!!"
From the unfathomable depths of the sea, the majestic Dragon King burst through the surface wrapped in lightning. Its sharp dragon claw slashed down from Iori's left shoulder, nearly carving away half his body.
Yet there was no scene of blood exploding as one might expect. For some reason, the surface of the wound turned into a blurry, chaotic phantom, lingering like mist. Iori looked somewhat dazed, but he didn't seem to be in pain.
Next, the surging lightning engulfed him. But Iori as a whole seemed shrouded in a hazy veil of water, swaying unsteadily like a reflection on the surface even under such a ferocious assault.
"Roar!"
The dragon swept past and coiled in the air.
Iori, meanwhile, knelt halfway on the sea. His once-blurred body returned to clarity, and strangely enough, his left shoulder was back where it belonged. Only the wound at his waist remained unchanged, still unhealed.
Having failed to land a decisive blow, the dragon was shocked but did not stop attacking. Gathering all its strength, it dove down again from above, intending to crush Iori with sheer brute force like a falling mountain.
At the critical moment, Iori quietly leveled his blade and watched as a single droplet of water slid down the spine of the sword, fell from the tip, and rippled faintly across the sea's surface.
"Calm."
Whoosh!
That seemingly insignificant ripple instantly spread outward, completely pacifying the violently surging waves. In the blink of an eye, the sea became smooth and clean, like a vast mirror.
Upon this enormous mirror, the reflections of Iori, the sky, and the Dragon King were clearly visible.
Within the mirror, one could see that in the briefest instant, the dragon had already crossed the distance between sea and sky and was about to devour and crush Iori at any moment.
So he brought down his sword, but not at the dragon in the sky, but at the "other dragon" beneath his feet, within the mirrored surface.
Clang!
A crescent-shaped sword pressure swept across the mirror, carving a straight cut through it and slicing the winding giant dragon into several segments.
Huff…
Iori lowered his sword. The fierce wind above pressed his clothes down into the water, yet he spoke calmly and lightly, "Clear."
Crack!!!!
The mirror shattered into countless fragments, and all reflections vanished at once. Just before the Azure Dragon could tear Iori apart, a straight sword scar suddenly swept across its massive body.
At that instant, its hardened scales and bones lost all meaning. The towering body that had endured thousands of years of wind and frost was cut into multiple sections, and a torrential rain of blood poured down.
Iori stood up and leapt aside as the dragon's head crashed into the sea, sending up blood-stained waves…
The boy stood upon the crimson sea, his gaze resting on the transformed longsword as he softly declared, "You shall be called… Clear Mirror, Still Water!"
After Shikai is released, any part of the wielder's body struck by the enemy will temporarily transform into a free spiritual particle state, then restore itself to a spiritual body, thereby avoiding physical damage.
It cannot heal injuries received before Shikai activation. Additionally, when dealing with energy-based attacks, it consumes extra spiritual pressure, affecting endurance.
Calm
Expands a domain within a certain range that reflects all things and pierces illusions. Enemies within the capture range will passively be drawn into it.
Within the domain, the wielder can perceive every minute movement of the enemy, including heartbeat and breathing.
With sufficient focus, even the flow of spiritual pressure can be grasped, allowing for near "short-term future sight" pre-reading combat (requires specialized training).
First deploy "Calm" to reflect the enemy's image within the Clear Mirror domain. Then slash the image within the domain. When the domain is released, the damage inflicted on the image is equally fed back onto the enemy.
Slashing the image can be considered the reversed effect of "Storm." The struck wound will collapse into free spiritual particles, but without any restoration process.
Generally speaking, the higher the spiritual pressure density, the greater the resistance to "Clear." However, if the enemy's spiritual pressure is merely close to the wielder's, the resistance is almost nonexistent.
Additionally, "Calm" consumes an enormous amount of spiritual pressure. Based on natural recovery speed, it cannot be deployed again within one day after the domain shatters.
Therefore, "Clear" can be regarded as a once-per-day finishing move.
On the day the battle ended, a torrential rain poured down over the sea, and even the island was shrouded in dark clouds, as if heaven and earth were weeping for their child.
Iori did not skin the corpse or extract tendons from the Izumo Azure Dragon. Although, in theory, its entire body was valuable, he didn't want to disturb its peace after death.
He let its flesh return to the sea that had nurtured it, becoming part of the natural cycle once more.
…Of course, to a large extent, it was also because Iori simply didn't have the strength left.
Calling out the name of his Zanpakuto broke the original shackles binding Iori, increasing his spiritual pressure cap beyond the boost provided by "art style value" and greatly excavating his potential. That was precisely why he could deliver the final blow to the Azure Dragon.
But such an outburst was destined to leave him weak for a long time afterward. Iori was no exception, in fact, at the time, he was barely able to retain mobility at all.
He himself didn't do much. Instead, after the Shikai state was released, the sword blank that returned to its original form, [Ame no Murakumo Sword], unexpectedly began to actively absorb the dragon blood permeating the sea.
By doing so, it gathered a vast amount of vital essence, causing the entire sword's material to undergo a transformation.
When held up to the light, it appeared as clear and pure as a gemstone, while the jewel at the end of the hilt naturally accumulated a large amount of "divine energy."
This sword had already surpassed the Shikai of many Zanpakutos. Now that it also housed [Clear Mirror, Still Water], greater strength was naturally better, and Iori was delighted by this outcome.
After that, considering his physical condition, and the fact that Ame-no-Murakumo couldn't be taken directly back to Soul Society, he used "Shambhala" to transfer to a predetermined location.
He temporarily placed the Ame-no-Murakumo Sword into a spiritual particle conversion device, hid it in a secure spot, and then returned directly to Bleach.
He wasn't worried about losing it. Not only was the location sufficiently hidden, but the sword was also bound to his soul. As long as it was within Akame ga Kill, he would definitely be able to find it.
After all, a Zanpakuto has its own will. It wouldn't be taken and used against its owner, at least, no one in Akame ga Kill could do that.
After adjusting the flow of time and resting briefly, the first thing he did was go to the Fourth Division's clinic to treat his injuries.
Throughout the entire treatment process, no one asked about the cause of Iori's injuries. That was what pleased him the most.
Of course, there was a price for that. Injuries sustained on official duty are treated for free, but if you don't explain the circumstances, it's considered a personal issue, and that costs extra~
Still, totally worth it.
Compared to what Iori gained this time, what did a little medicine fee matter? You should know that on this trip, he not only obtained the Ame no Murakumo Sword and [Clear Mirror, Still Water], raised his spiritual pressure cap through Shikai, but also gained two art-style CGs.