Crows x Souls

“Why is it that the Uchiha clan is known by all, and feared by all?” — Itachi Uchiha. 

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“Get the fuck away from me! Damned weaklings!” Kenpachi’s furious yell echoed through buildings as he cut his way through Hollows weak Hollows as if they were nothing. 

The weaker ones of the lot died under the brunt of his wild Reiatsu while the ones that could still move were cut clean through by his jagged blade with little to no resistance. 

“Oi Yachiru, are you slacking off?” His mouth twisted close with an unhappy huff from Yachiru’s smack to the back of his head. 

She hit his head a couple of times with both her hands with an unhappy pout on her face before pointing in another direction. 

“I told you we were going the wrong way.” She said with rising indignation at Kenpachi’s blockheadedness. 

Kenpachi snorted unapologetically and pointed his blade forward. “I told you I sensed something strong in this direction. Did I accidentally kill it?”

Yachiru ignored his musings and turned his head towards the direction she was urging him to run in. “Come on, Kenny! If we’re late, Shun-shun or Tachi-tachi will kill the super strong Hollow and leave you with nothing.”

At the mention of the super strong Hollow, Kenpachi remembered the pressure it emitted as well as the reason he was hacking away at weaker Hollows. 

“Then what the hell are you waiting for? Yachiru, point out the way! I’ll run towards it in an instant!”

“Yeah!” 

Following the directions of his trusty companion, Kenpachi mowed through the Hollows unimpeded and quickly made their way towards Baraggan. 

SCREEEECH! 

A Menos Grande took notice of Kenpachi from halfway through the Garganta and forced his way through the clogged dimensional gateway and managed to push out the entirety of it’s ridiculous huge body, and even coincidentally falling directly in Kenpachi’s direction. 

Shinigami from all over the Seireitei watched disbelievingly as the descending titanic Hollow started charging up the largest Cero most of them had ever seen. 

“… are we doomed?”

“By the spirits… how can we fight that?”

Despairing whispers traveled along the mouths of the weakhearted Shinigami as the Cero took its form and glowed an ominous crimson as if foreshadowing their end. 

“Watch me, Yachiru! Nothing will get in my way!” Kenpachi’s crazed ecstatic shout along with his Lieutenant’s tiny voice of cheerful support entered the ears of the watching Shinigami. All eyes searching for the figure behind the bludgeoning waves of Reiatsu. 

And moments later, a scene straight from the pictures of a storybook played out in front of their eyes. 

Riding the high of his battlelust, Kenpachi broke off into a sprint, with his long blade scraping the ground behind him, and jumped off the cratered ground with a minimal force towards the falling Hollow. 

“RARGHH!” 

With a great shout he swung his blade upwards with such ferocious strength that the Reiatsu over his blade grew larger as it traveled the short distance and cleaved straight through the Menos Grande and the Cero it had wanted to fire. 

His descent created a bigger crater than shook the nearby Shinigami to lose their balance. 

“What are you all moping around for? Clean up these insects so I kill the big one in peace. I’ll lop off your head myself if I see you hiding pitifully.”

“Kenny, Kenny, come on!” Yachiru impatiently urged him further on. 

Like an infection, a gleam of determination and courage slowly grew widespread in the hearts of the spectating Shinigami after Kenpachi and Yachiru left. 

“Hell yeah! Let’s slaughter these maggots!”

“Arrogant. Too arrogant, these ignorant Hollows. Attacking us inside the Seireitei with such weak strength? Oh, so ignorantly courting death.”

The chaos escalated as frenzied Shinigami jumped into the fray, giving no thought to the possibility of death. 

….. 

In another part of the Seireitei, Kyōraku and Jūshirō stood with blades drawn out as they barred Baraggan’s advance. 

“Feeling skittish? I don’t mind you sitting this one out if you’ve got a bad stomach ache.” Kyōraku joked in a bored accent. 

Jūshirō chuckled but looked otherwise serious. “I don’t see how I can. It’s not like we can just leave him to walk freely around the Seireitei either.”

Kyōraku made his displeasure evident in his extra loud sigh. “So either we do it ourselves or leave it to the Old Man? Talk about hard choices.”

“So this is the city of Shinigami. How drool.” Baraggan said with an air of superiority. “Both of you are Captains, right? Restraining most of your Reiatsu will do nothing in your favor.”

“Answer me this; what dictates change in the life of living things? And what is the constant all things meet, and none can escape?”

The two Shinigami Captains frowned and shared a brief glance at each other. 

“Quite the ominous question there, Hollow.” Jūshirō remarked dryly. 

Kyōraku however answered, purely out of curiosity. “Time and death. I can’t help but feel like I just raised some glowing red flags.” His ending comment brought wry smiles to the faces of both Captains. 

“Good.” Baraggan hummed appreciatively. “And with the herald of my coming, your time to die has arrived.” 

They had all been informed of the essence of Baraggan’s abilities from Itachi, but Jūshirō inwardly admitted to himself that it was a lot scarier to witness in such close proximity than simply hearing about it. 

Jūshirō’s presence here wasn’t a fluke but intentional due to the nature of Baraggan’s ability. Both his and Kyōraku’s Shikai were in the their released state – his being two sleek swords connected to each other by a red rope from their hits with five charms dangling along it, whereas Kyōraku’s Shikai was a pair of huge black heavily curved scimitars – with him at the front to counter Baraggan’s abilities and Kyōraku behind to make the insta-counter play. 

He dodged the death beam and twisted one of his swords in a casual motion. 

“Hadō #88. Hiryū Gekizoku Shinten Raihō.”

Baraggan covered himself in a dark barrier of his Rot for the incredibly powerful and chantless Hadō to harmlessly crash against it. 

Kyōraku whistled at the impressive(frightening) effect of Baraggan’s Rot. “Well, only a few special Bakudō comes to mind that might hold him down. That’s if he doesn’t just disintegrates it just as easily.”

Baraggan attacked again but while Jūshirō made sure to dodge, Kyōraku defended against it with a strong enough Bakudō, only to retreat when he saw it cracking and dissolving. 

They inadvertently pulled Baraggan into a game of cat and mouse as he tried to hit them but they were too quick to react. Unlike Baraggan, Kyōraku and Jūshirō were perfectly fine stalling Baraggan until he retreated or they found a relatively safe instant to kill him. 

“You can afford to act so frivolous in the face of death?” Baraggan couldn’t help but curiously ask Kyōraku from where he stood, given how relaxed the Captain looked this whole time. 

Kyōraku shrugged. “Ladies don’t find the all too serious look that attractive. It's a matter of preferences.”

“Hmph! A foolish jester for a Captain. Die away.” He left his comfortable position of attacking from a distance and used Sonído, a Hollow’s movement technique acquired at their highest evolution, to close the distance between him and Kyōraku. 

A blanket of Rot formed above Baraggan, one he brought down when he got near Kyōraku only for Kyōraku to be abruptly swapped with Jūshirō at the last second, who’s sword calmly took Baraggan’s attack head-on. 

Jūshirō’s Shikai, Sōgyo no Kotowari, gave him the ability to absorb any energy attack with one of his blades and release it through the second blade at multiple times the speed and intensity in an instant, making the counter quite hard to dodge. 

Jūshirō’s unexpected counter revealed a major weakness of Baraggan’s Rot – he too wasn’t immune to its effects. In other words, he would disintegrate just as easily if his own Rot touched his body. 

And that fact was proven by the image of Baraggan in front of them with the entirety of his left side gone. 

The self-proclaimed God-king of Hueco Mundo didn’t scream out in pain but the pain and shame he was currently feeling could be felt in his Reiatsu that suddenly started thrashing around uncontrollably. 

“Nice save, Jūshirō. He almost got me there.” Kyōraku tilted down his straw hat to further hide his embarrassment from his friend. 

Jūshirō could also sigh in exasperation at his best friend’s frivolous and flippant attitude at what would have otherwise been a fatal mistake. 

“Can you at least act serious for now?” He outright pleaded. 

“Hear yourself, Jūshirō. What image does three serious looking men staring at each other send to the young ladies down below?” 

He looked past the seething Baraggan and an unnoticeable cold look flashed past his eyes in an instant. 

Kenpachi was doing a good job trimming down the Hollows as he went on his little rampage. The only problem were the few remaining Adjuchas and Menos Grande, especially the Adjuchas. 

‘Aizen and Itachi’s whereabouts are still unknown. Mayuri, Isshin, Byakuya are stretched too thin. We need to end this fast.’ These were his inner thoughts. 

“You could have sent a good looking female Hollow to get me more invested in this fight… but considering how they would look… Ah, it’s really hard being a man.” These were the words that came out. 

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A/N: School's been a real pain in the hide since last week but I've finally got enough breathing room to feel comfortable posting. Hopefully it stays this way for the next few weeks. (That's not raising a flag right?) 

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