Well, then what do I do next? Hm…
Responding to Ginjo’s powers, Tokinada was deciding which zanpaku-to ability he would pull out next when he realized that Aura’s spiritual pressure had started to disappear.
“Oops. It won’t be any fun if I kill you by weakening you.”
He took his distance from Ginjo temporarily and used Tsuchinamazu and Senbon Zakura to keep the man in check as he turned his attention to the sky.
Hikone! Leave him! Come kill Aura first!
Tokinada attempted to shout that…
“Hiko…”
But at that moment he was assaulted by the sensation of a gust of wind passing through part of his body.
“Huh?”
Before he could comprehend where it came from, Tokinada saw it.
His right arm, which was still holding his zanpaku-to, turned gently as it fluttered in the air.
“What…?”
Then, a moment before the pain was transmitted to his brain, Kazeshini’s chain, which had been sent flying, wrapped around that arm and pulled it far, far away from his own body in barely a single breath.
“Impo…ssible…?”
The pain of losing his right arm dominated his whole body. However, the alarm that rose up in him forced that pain back down. The one who was standing in front of him and pinning him with a direct and powerful glare was Shuhei Hisagi.
“You…I’m sure I had used Complete Hypnosis on you…”
Though the shikai had been sealed by Aura, the Complete Hypnosis that he used on Kyoraku and the others had not been undone. Hisagi, who was shown the shikai before it was sealed, should have been put under the power of a very deliberate and strong Complete Hypnosis.
The scene playing out before his eyes, the slight amount of spiritual pressure of inorganic substances, and even the rustle of the wind should have been completely misconceived by him, and he should have been so deep in the dark that he wouldn’t be able to move or even think.
However, Hisagi was clearly looking at him.
Since his hearing, smell, and spiritual pressure perceptions were all being misled, it should have been impossible for him to know Tokinada’s position accurately through Aura and Ginjo’s conversation. Unless he undid the hypnosis by force, using spiritual pressure at Aizen’s level, Hisagi shouldn’t have even been able to attack him.
In addition, there was something else entirely unforeseen that had been thrust before Tokinada. Something like a cloth that hung between him and Hisagi had been torn to pieces and sent flying. It was the spiritual pressure interception cloak he had been wearing and had just abandoned.
Did he wrap Kazeshini in that and throw it?
Was that why I didn’t sense his spiritual pressure? Just before he started letting it rotate…
He sliced through the cloak and my arm…
Tokinada immediately realized what had happened. However, he wasn’t able to understand what had led to it. He was sure he had made those around him mistake the cloak itself for sand, just in case. He considered the possibility that Hisagi hadn’t seen Kyoka Suigetsu’s shikai, but he was sure Hisagi’s eyes had been open. It had been clear from Hisagi’s surprised expression and his confusion after that.
Confusion?
It was just a second after he held back the pain that was about to assault him that Tokinada arrived upon an idea and turned his eyes to a certain Soul Reaper.
It was Hirako, who had been continually defending against the attacks and had finally gone down on one knee from exhaustion. Regardless of that situation, Shinji Hirako gave Tokinada a smile that was filled with mean-spirited satisfaction.
“I was actually thinking of using that when Aizen tried to show Ichigo his shikai. I really was annoyed when he said he wouldn’t use Kyoka Suigetsu on Ichigo.”
“Maybe he was already cautious of that happening,” Kyoraku said in response to Hirako. At some point, he had come to stand next to Hirako with Nanao and was picking up Enra Kyoten’s hilt, which had dropped to the ground. “What a lifesaver that you realized my intention, Captain Hirako. Especially since I didn’t tell that to Assistant Captain Hisagi himself.”
“Well, had it been Aizen, he probably would have easily seen through that sort of trap.”
Hirako’s Sakanade in shikai form swung in Hirako’s hand. However, Tokinada did not remember feeling as though his vision or senses had been reversed.
In that case, who had he used that power on?
Tokinada arrived at the answer to that, and as his eyes widened, Hirako rotated Sakanade instead of revealing his tricks, and he repeated the word that Tokinada had used for his companions just earlier. “What a help that you’re such a simpleton.”
Hirako hadn’t used Sakanade’s activated power on Tokinada, but on Hisagi, the moment that Kyoka Suigetsu was revealed to him. In other words, Shuhei Hisagi, who was seeing front and back in reverse, hadn’t seen Kyoka Suigetsu being invoked. The reason Hisagi’s eyes had been full of shock and confusion was because his vision in front, to the back, to either side, and even up and down had all been reversed.
After realizing this, Tokinada turned his eyes in order to steal back the zanpaku-to that Kyoraku had in hand, but…
At some point, that hilt had disappeared from Kyoraku’s hand, and it was nowhere to be found.
“Sorry. Your zanpaku-to’s already been hidden by Okyo.”
When Kyoraku uttered those curious words, Tokinada tried to raise his voice, but…
“Turning the other way, huh? You’ve really underestimated me.”
He heard that voice from behind him, and it was already too late by the time he remembered the circumstances.
Ginjo’s Getsuga Tensho, which had been released to the side and below him, cut upward and once again tore across Tokinada’s body.
The fresh bloom of blood scattered high, high into the sky of the Kyogoku.