Ikomikidomoe had turned into a monster and was battling the Arrancars while Liltotto and the Quincies faced Hikone Ubuginu overhead. The spiritual pressure Hikone contained was astonishing as the child rapidly fired an endless stream of arrows with enough power to kill a Quincy with one hit. On the other hand, when the Quincies attacked, Hikone used a combination of Hierro and Blut Vene to mitigate almost the entire attack. Liltotto clucked her tongue at their immeasurable opponent.
“This is getting close. This kid isn’t as bad as Ichigo Kurosaki, but they’re pretty big trouble.”
“Since they’re trying to actually kill us, we might be the ones in more danger. That is scary….” Giselle spoke as though she were talking about someone else while she fired several arrows from her Heilig Bogen. “There we go.”
When Hikone swept all of those aside with one arm, Candice tried to strike the child with a thunderbolt.
“Was that lightning?! It’s so tingly and fun!”
With those short words, the matter was settled, and Hikone easily dispersed the electricity.
Meninas McAllon took that momentary opening to bring down her fist with full power, however…
Although Hikone dropped toward the ground several dozen meters after taking that hit on the elbow, they fixed the reishi under them in place and held steady while a scraping sound rang out in the sky.
“You’re built pretty solid.”
Though she had been the one doing the punching, Meninas’s fist was warped and crushed with several broken fingers.
Hikone turned their eyes upward toward the Quincies after receiving the blow from the woman whose specialty was brute strength and saw that there were several reishi clumps around them.
“Huh!”
These were reishi bombs made by the zombified Bambietta. When Hikone touched them, the child was caught up in a chain explosion.
The explosive fire brilliantly lit the sky, but not a single one of the Quincies let their guard down. They knew the power of Bambietta’s blasts, but based on the sense they had gotten thus far, they didn’t believe they had killed Hikone.
In fact, once the smoke cleared Hikone appeared, merely sooty.
Bambietta’s power turned the reishi of the parts it touched into bombs. A person on the receiving end would experience their skin itself turning into an explosive, but perhaps because Hikone’s recovery abilities were similar to a Hollow’s, Hikone’s skin seemed to undergo the same superfast regeneration. In addition, it seemed that Hikone had defended against most of the damage from the blast itself, and it didn’t appear as though their actions had been impeded.
“That’s nice. I’d like to make that kid into a zombie. I think then we’d be invincible too.”
“The kid’s got Hollow spiritual pressure mixed in them. Nothing good’s going to come of that.”
Liltotto scolded Giselle for coveting Hikone’s power. Though at first glance it appeared as though they were self-assured, in actuality, they were toeing a fine line. The “Cero arrows” that Hikone sometimes fired as a counterattack were rather strong, and in addition, Hikone could feint using Bara between attacks.
At present, the five of them were able to attack and retreat, but with their fatigue accumulating, that balance would eventually collapse. If even one of them made a mistake, the battlefront would crumble in the blink of an eye. Since Liltotto had made that assessment, she hoped to settle things promptly.
However, Hikone, who had fought and defended in silence until then, smiled and piped up, “I’ve learned how you attack now.”
“What?”
In the next moment, Hikone’s movements clearly changed. While earlier Hikone had been fending off Heilig Pfeil directly from the Quincy, they started to intercept those with their own arrows.
In the time that five of the Quincies fired arrows, Hikone fired the same number in the same amount of time. On top of that, Hikone’s rapid fire showed no sign of abating, and their deflection shots seemed to anticipate the Quincies’ Hiren Kyaku movements, following Liltotto and the others like guided missiles.
“…This is close.”
At the same time, Liltotto realized something. Though the Quincies had been dispersed while attacking Hikone, now the child was herding them into one location.
In the next moment, just as she feared, she realized an extraordinary amount of spiritual pressure, different from any before, was gathering in Hikone’s right hand.
The timing was such that it would be impossible to evade.
Determining that, Liltotto activated her own ability and, just as she had earlier, attempted to eat the reishi of the Cero.
Oh, this thing might make my stomach explode.
Feeling as though the surrounding space itself was being condensed into Hikone’s hand, Liltotto imagined her body scattering in all four directions.
However…
Something that exceeded that spiritual pressure, creating a chill that seemed to freeze them on the spot, ran through the sky of the Kyogoku.
“…Oh!”
Hikone stopped, with the spiritual pressure they were going to release for the Cero still pent up in their hand, and slowly turned around. Death itself in human form stood before them.
“I only got to see a little of it, but…you’re the strongest here, aren’t you, kid?”
Kenpachi Zaraki looked at Hikone and grinned.
An expansive amount of spiritual pressure overflowed from within the man. The additional spiritual pressure that he pressed together into a foothold was unable to withstand the spiritual pressure coming from Kenpachi himself and would crumble as soon as it solidified.
Since he had never learned proper Hoho, the way he fixed reishi in place was haphazard, but he was able to continue standing in the air regardless, likely due to the many years of battle experience he had cultivated.
“…”
Rather than answering Kenpachi, Hikone turned the Cero stopped in their hand at Kenpachi and shot it. The twisted Cero, which contained black undulations within bluish white light, warped the space around it as it assaulted Kenpachi. However, Kenpachi mowed it down with a single swing of his zanpaku-to that was not even in shikai form, and the pressure from his blade was enough to disperse the Cero’s light.
A portion of the scattered light pierced the earth, and the affected area burst as though a meteorite had struck.
Witnessing that, Candice groaned and said to herself, “What is with that guy? He’s literally a monster.”
“’Course he is. He’s the guy even Gremmy couldn’t kill.” Liltotto, who had been saved by a hair’s breadth, spoke impassively while experiencing complex emotions.
Yumichika appeared behind them then and, as though voicing Liltotto’s thoughts, said, “That’s irony for you. The fact that he couldn’t kill the captain ended up being your salvation.”
“To be honest, we were ready to assume you might stab us in the back.”
Connections ran deep between the Quincies and the Eleventh Company. Half a year ago, during the war, Liltotto and the others had assaulted Kenpachi after he was wounded in the battle against Gremmy and, at that time, had injured and killed a large number of the Eleventh Company.
Though Yumichika hadn’t witnessed that scene directly, he had heard about it from the surviving members of the Eleventh Company after the war. He had already seen the zombies of his friends that Giselle had created en masse during the war.
“I wouldn’t do something as ugly as that—I’m not like you.”
“Is that supposed to be pride? That’s sure kind of you.”
In the past, when she had partnered with the Soul Reapers to defeat Yhwach, Liltotto had been just as cautious, but in the end, she hadn’t been stabbed in the back while working.
Then again, Kenpachi and the others had been in the bathroom when they had gone through the gate and disappeared partway through, so they actually hadn’t ended up working together.
“According to the captain, he was most unable to forgive himself for ‘not being able to stand after an attack like that.’” In a matter-of-fact tone, Yumichika continued, “I’ll just say this, but don’t think it extends to us too. Especially when it comes to that zombie tamer, after she toyed with everyone in the company. I don’t think anyone’s feelings about her will change no matter how many times they cut her down. I don’t know how long the agreement is going to be valid for, but you better be thankful the Captain General compromised with you.”