BLEACH: UNOHANA RETSU IS MY WIFE

"Your Majesty Baraggan, we've discovered the source of that voice in the Hollow Forest. The speaker appears to be a pale-white Hollow. Based on our assessment, it's just a mid-tier Hollow... but we don't understand how it grew so massive!"

Several Adjuchas-class Hollows with insectoid features—like katydids and crickets—reported respectfully to Baraggan Louisenbairn, seated imposingly on his obsidian throne.

"You imbeciles! After thousands of years being indoctrinated by those feeble Soul Reapers, you still haven't learned proper decorum?"

Baraggan's thunderous rage shook the very air. His hatred—long festering—toward the Hollow named Jijiba flared anew.

"Ugh..."

The gathered Hollows at the Kyouya Palace Square, sworn vassals of Baraggan, instinctively retreated several paces. Yet even in retreat, some were overtaken by the rotting aura emanating from their king's wrath—disintegrating into dust and bone.

Legend holds that the sand covering Kyouya Palace's floor was never natural. It is the calcified remains of countless Hollows slain by Baraggan—ambitious rivals crushed under his rule, and loyal subordinates turned to ash by his unchecked fury.

"Your Majesty, please calm yourself!" cried one of the survivors, kneeling low. "Your most devoted general, Suez Dean, has led a vanguard to crush that insolent mid-tier Hollow. Surely, he shall return shortly—with its head in hand."

"Fools! Absolute fools!" Baraggan growled as he rose from his throne.

"Indeed, Your Majesty! That reckless Hollow dares challenge your authority—it is but a fool!"

"IDIOTS!" Baraggan bellowed. "I'm not calling it foolish—I'm calling you that! Even if you lack the ability to sense reiatsu, can't you see with your eyes?! From that one's sheer size alone, you should understand—it's no mere mid-tier Hollow!"

He pointed a decaying finger at their faces, fury palpable.

"Uhh..."

The Hollows were stunned into silence, glancing between one another, unable to form a response.

"This palace is hopeless... Not a single brain among you!"

Baraggan sighed, voice filled with ancient disdain. "No matter. I'll go myself. It's been a thousand years... Let's see how much he's grown."

In the Forest of Hollows...

"Crack, crack..."

Jijiba had forgotten how long it had been since he'd feasted so gluttonously. Once, he was among Hueco Mundo's most terrifying predators. His dominion was a banquet—he could devour anything at will.

When his power overflowed and his evolution stagnated, he charged into the Soul Society and even assaulted the Soul King's Palace.

But his glory was short-lived.

Before he could take another bite, he was defeated—by the Sword God and the Monk. Ōetsu Nimaiya forged a Zanpakutō out of him. Yet due to Jijiba's nature as a peerless evil spirit, any Shinigami who wielded the blade would eventually be consumed. Thus, he was sealed. Unable to find a compatible wielder, Nimaiya tossed Jijiba into the Sea of Reishi—leaving him to fester for centuries in salt, rust, and solitude.

Honestly, Jijiba now felt pickled.

"Gulp~"

Jijiba devoured Hollows like a beast uncaged. He didn't count how many Gillians he had swallowed, only that his strength was finally beginning to return.

"Bah... these weaklings are no longer enough!"

He casually tossed aside the half-devoured Gillian in his hand. The pitiful Hollow let out a death cry before Jijiba slammed it into a puddle of flesh.

Slowly rising, his orange eyes gleamed like searchlights as they pierced the darkness.

It was time to move—deeper into Hueco Mundo, where stronger prey awaited.

"YOU! Are you the one who dared insult His Majesty?!"

A harsh, hoarse voice called out.

"Hm?" Jijiba tilted his head, his massive body—akin to a moving mountain—turning toward a cluster of approaching Hollows.

Drool formed at the corners of his jagged maw.

At their lead stood a Hollow on the cusp of Vasto Lorde. Its upper half had taken on a humanoid shape, while its lower half remained a segmented centipede, bristling with twitching ventral legs.

"Do I know you?" Jijiba asked politely, his tone curiously civil.

"Fool! Are you trembling in fear now? Pathetic! You dare grovel before me after mocking His Majesty? Too late! The moment you disgraced King Baraggan, your death was sealed!"

The Hollow raised a three-pronged fork.

"I am Suez Dean, top general of Baraggan Louisenbairn! I've come to punish you, worm!"

"Kill! Kill! Kill!" the crowd of Adjuchas behind him chanted in unison, their cries echoing with bloodlust.

BOOM!

Before the mob could act—Jijiba moved.

Not sluggish. Not ponderous.

He blitzed forward in a blur.

Faster than they could react, the towering Hollow grabbed Suez Dean by the throat.

"You call yourself Baraggan's top general?" Jijiba sneered.

Suez Dean's composure shattered. The moment Jijiba moved, he understood. The difference in power... it was immeasurable.

He felt as though he were standing before Baraggan himself—this was no mid-tier Hollow.

"This strength... impossible!"

"Tell me," Jijiba asked coldly, "did Baraggan never speak of me?"

Suez Dean and his army were silent.

They had no idea who Jijiba was.

"No?" Jijiba sighed, eyes dimming. "Then I suppose he's still afraid."

Without another word, Jijiba sank his jaws into Suez Dean's skull—ripping it off cleanly.

Blood burst like a geyser.

"Slurp~"

With a series of gulping sounds, Suez's body quickly collapsed into a thin membrane. Then, with a look of unsatisfied satisfaction, Jijiba stuffed it into his mouth. Yes—Jijiba loved devouring mid-level Hollows teetering on the edge of evolution. The taste was divine.

"Ah..."

As Suez vanished down Jijiba's gullet, the group of mid-level Hollows who had accompanied him froze. They stared at the behemoth before them, too stunned to even think of fleeing.

"Run…"

By the time they remembered to escape, it was already too late.

A rustling sound echoed from above. The cold, white light of the moon—the only source of illumination in the Hollow Night—had dimmed. It had vanished from the sky without anyone noticing, no longer shining down on the mid-level Hollows.

"What's happening?!"

Sensing something wrong, the Hollows instinctively looked up—and were stunned by what they saw.

A snow-white face blanketed the entire sky. The rustling wasn't wind over the sand—it was the grinding of mountainous teeth.

"Ah!!"

The Hollows shrieked at the heavens, mouths gathering crimson light. In desperation, they fired their Ceros—Void Flashes—toward the sky.

"ROAR!"

But a storm of dust erupted as the colossal face finally opened its bloody maw. It was so massive it eclipsed the sky, and its throat stretched into a gaping, unfathomable abyss.

"LONG LIVE HIS MAJESTY Baraggan!!"

Faced with the impossible, the Hollows abandoned resistance. Crying out their final allegiance, they vanished into the behemoth's mouth with a thunderous roar.

Jijiba slowly lifted his head. The once-smooth desert beneath him had been chewed into a pit so deep it seemed to reach the foundations of Hueco Mundo itself.

Crunch, crunch.

Gulp.

With a burst of chewing, the mid-level Hollows were ground into spirit particles and devoured.

"Still not enough…"

Jijiba gently stroked his abdomen. A few mid-level Hollows couldn't satisfy his bottomless hunger.

"As expected… I must continue forward."

Once he had fully digested the spirit particles, converting them into his own Reiryoku, Jijiba turned his gaze toward the deepest part of Hueco Mundo.

"You bastard! What have you done to my men?!"

Just as Jijiba was about to move, a skeletal humanoid cloaked in black, wearing a crown like obsidian fire, appeared and blocked his path with a chilling shout.

Though dwarfed in size by Jijiba, the Hollow's spiritual pressure weighed like an entire dimension crashing down. This was no ordinary Hollow—this was a Vasto Lorde, the highest class of Hollow, standing at the pinnacle of Hueco Mundo.

Behind him stood a line of Achukas-class Hollows, each lowering their heads in deference to their master.

"Long time no see, Baraggan. You became King of Hueco Mundo while I was gone?"

Jijiba smiled at the skeletal figure's ferocious glare.

"What do you mean became King of Hueco Mundo while you were away?! You beast, watch your tongue! You're insulting me!"

Baraggan's eyes flared.

"Even while you were here, I was King. That truth doesn't change—whether you're present or rotting in the Soul King's dungeon."

"Ridiculous… utterly ridiculous."

Jijiba chuckled. "I didn't expect you, Baraggan, to dress in a Shinigami's black robes and even mimic their pompous speech. Hilarious. Truly hilarious!"

"Silence!!"

As if struck in a nerve, Baraggan let out a roar. A pitch-black aura exploded from his body and surged toward Jijiba like a wave of inevitable death.

"You know your ability doesn't work on me!"

Jijiba sneered. His body morphed into writhing tentacles, intercepting the deathly aura. But the moment they touched it, the tentacles aged, withered, and crumbled into dust.

"You've weakened, Beast."

Baraggan's eyes shimmered, his voice laced with condescension.

"Hmph…"

Jijiba grunted coldly, his body erupting with even more tentacles. Their number quickly overwhelmed Baraggan's aura.

Forced to evade, the King of Hueco Mundo leapt backward as the tentacles slammed into the sand, stirring up a storm of dust.

"Back off, Baraggan."

Jijiba's voice echoed coldly as he glared at his old rival.

"Hmph."

Baraggan snorted in return.

Jijiba and Baraggan.

One, a primitive Hollow imprisoned in the Soul King's Palace for countless millennia, now returned—his power sealed and degraded.

The other, the self-proclaimed King of Hueco Mundo, wielding the terrifying authority of aging. But in his reign of peace, he had grown soft—untested for ages.

And now, two sovereigns—one white, one black—stood at the edge of the Great Hollow Forest. And there, they began a clash destined to shake the very foundation of Hueco Mundo.

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