NOVEL NEXT Chapter 307: vs Ywhach
(Ryoto's pov)
Ywhach and I crossed blades for a few moments, which allowed me to evaluate the situation better. It seems that neither Shunsui-senpai nor Jushiro-senpai is nearby. I could still feel their Reiatsu, and they were both in combat. I looked behind Ywhach to see his right-hand man being there, but he didn't look like he planned on moving for now.
That's fine by me. Not to mention all the rain, which gives me an advantage, but I plan on starting this round 2 with something completely different, so I pulled my head back as I gathered energy in my forehead.
"Megaton Head!"
A blue hand made of energy materialized behind me, and with a headbutt motion, it flew towards Ywhach, who was forced to block. He seemed shocked at the move I made, which made me smirk.
"Not bad for a first attempt. Don't you think so?"
At my brazen attempt at provocation, the Quincy King narrowed his eyes.
"You are being arrogant, Ryoto Yuuki. I admit that you are unpredictable to an annoying degree, but you are not stronger than Yamamoto Genryusai. If you believe that, you are being delusional, which doesn't suit what we know about you."
He wasn't exactly wrong.
"You may be right. I'm not stronger than my teacher. After all, he is a monster among monsters. But here's a difference. You know about Yama-jii a lot, to the point you could manipulate him to use all his strength. You can't do this with me. You don't know what I'm capable of and what I would do if you ticked me off too much. Not to mention, I am capable of something Yama-jii isn't, which is killing you. Also, you are surrounded."
That last statement confused him. I was here alone, so I believed a demonstration was in order. I put my Zanpakuto in my mouth to free my sole arm, and with it and with some precise motions, I pulled a lot of drops of water together in a body of water the size of an arm. With that, I moved it towards my amputated limb to create a prosthetic limb of sorts. The whole process didn't take a long time in total, but it wasn't easy by any means. Moving the water arm alone would take some effort, but at least I'll have both arms in this fight.
I 'flexed' my new arm to test it a few times. It's fairly challenging to make water in the shape of an arm and keep it for a prolonged period of time, but not impossible. A powerful waterbender is able to control multiple water tentacles at the same time and what fingers are, if not small and short tentacles. The shape is pretty rough, but I won't complain.
I stretched out my newly formed arm towards Ywhach to grab him, but as soon as the water was in his range, a sword appeared in his hand, and he effortlessly cut it in half.
Seeing how my attack was stopped so easily, I was shocked... not.
The two halves of water encircled the man in black, and I tried to crush him, but it was for naught, as he broke off of it quite easily. It wasn't really a problem since I wasn't expecting it to work. The water flew in all directions until it suddenly stopped, quickly turning into ice mid-air and flying back at Yhwach with a vengeance.
This attack, as I expected, didn't do much as Ywhach simply swung his sword to deflect all projectiles. This attack bought me enough time to reform my arm, but, at the same time, it wasn't all. It was raining, so obviously everyone was wet, so why not use it to my advantage.
I used Shunpo to close the distance between us and blew a wave of cold air, which wouldn't do much in itself, but with all the water on, Ywhach started freezing. It wasn't a thick layer of ice, and the mustache man could easily break through it. Still, it wasn't supposed to stop him as I did a dropkick and created a double stream of fire coming from the bottom of my feet, creating thermal shock and, at the same time, repelling me away from my opponents and creating some distance.
It was the correct choice, as only moments later, a blade appeared where I was standing. However, it didn't end there. Knowing that he missed, Ywhach pointed a finger at me. At the tip of his finger, a bluish ball of energy started glowing, and it shot forward towards me.
It wasn't strong enough to be dangerous to me, so I effortlessly cut through it with Tensa Zangetsu. It seemed just like I was making attacks as a distraction to attempt an even more devastating strike, so was Ywhach. The moment I cut Ywhach's Heilig Pfeil (Holy Arrow), I was surrounded by multiple Reishi bows and arrows.
"Qualkreis." Ywhach announced. It seemed that it was some type of Quincy spell that was similar to Kido in the way it was made.
I merely observed all of the bows with curiosity. They weren't a threat to me. I just felt... powerful. Not like I was weak before, but there were always monsters around me. Be it my teacher Yamamoto, my own Senpai, Shunsui, and Jushiro, Aizen is always there, and even Urahara and Unohana could be classified as such. Maybe even Yoruichi. But now I was feeling confident for the first time in forever, and it was against a monster that was planning to face Squad 0, the monsters above monsters.
I wasn't stronger physically, mentally, or anything like that, but I felt... more whole, for lack of a better word. And I don't even need to mention the options. Holy mother, having all my options back is wonderful. So, as all the arrows shot towards me and my 'inevitable' demise, I made a switch with Switcheroo, but it wasn't with Ywhach. No, I decided to volunteer the right hand of the King as I used 'Substitute Jutsu'.
The blonde Quincy was surprised by the sudden change of location, and I don't see why he should be. They were both aware that I could do something like that. I literally showed them this ability at the beginning. But standing motionlessly wasn't in the plan, so I released Getsuga Tensho at Yhwach combined with Cero.
The Cero could be more powerful if I used the mask, but there is one thing that makes using my mask not optimal. It didn't have a mouth hole, and I needed my mouth. At this point, I didn't care if anyone discovered my secret since I'd be leaving soon anyway, and fighting the Quincy King with 'cursed' powers would give me hopefully enough goodwill for Central 46 to not do anything to my family. Otherwise, I'll just finish Aizen's job for him. I'm joking because it would probably make things worse, but there is always taking my family back with me. It, of course, wouldn't be instantaneous, but I'm not leaving my family in trouble that would be caused by me.
Ywhach didn't just wait for my attacks to arrive. He yelled "Blut Vene Anhaben" to create a field shield made out of his Blut that stopped my attack. Immediately after that, my arm hair stood up suddenly.
*~~ *
Not to mention, I could feel a familiar but, at this point, nostalgic tingle. I moved my head to the right, which was, of course, the correct move, as the blade pierced the space where my head was. I allowed my instincts to take over for a moment and did a spinning kick powered up by fire bending, which did its job by sending my opponent flying.
I took a quick look, and it was Haschwalt. It seems that my small 'prank' wasn't that funny to him and caused him to join the fight. To be honest, it was more preferable to have to fight him and Ywhach at the same time. If I fought only Ywhach and Haschwalt were standing there at the side, I could unintentionally hyper-focus on him, and then the blonde Quincy could attack me by surprise. The chances may be low, but not zero.
Time to change my fighting style then.
I sealed back my Banaki and changed to Gyaku Hansha. Holding one of the blades of Gyaku with my water prosthetic was strange, but it was usable, and that was enough for me right now. Haschwalt bounced back and rushed back at me as fast as he could, and I blocked it.
"You've been having a lot of good fortune to avoid any injuries until this point and acquiring new powers."
Saying these words, something shifted. I don't know what, but it did, and suddenly, I slipped as I lost my footing, and my foe capitalized on this chance and pierced my shoulder. Even protecting it with Haki was not enough to stop the injury, and what's worse, it was on my better side. He didn't take his blade out of me, pushed me to the ground, and pinned me down. My blood started to slowly eat away at the blade, which only made the broadsword seem even more impressive, but I shouldn't be too surprised since it was the same sword that broke Ichigo's Bankai in Canon.
At the same time, I could see a giant Reishi bow above me, and it started to draw an arrow. My spider sense flared up as it conveyed to me the incoming danger.
I tried to free myself and struggled using my uninjured side, but I was quickly subdued by slamming a shield there. Learning from his mistake, he didn't break through my skin this time, so he wouldn't risk touching my blood. Time was ticking as I was restrained, and my blood wouldn't be fast enough to destroy the sword that was holding me down. However, it was doing its job as Haschwalt's sword seemed to slowly go deeper and deeper into me, but it was merely an optical illusion because the sword was getting shorter and shorter and was pushed deeper and deeper to keep me down. Not having a lot of options, I activated Shunko, and a fiery aura exploded, pushing Haschwalth back and giving me enough space to dodge just in time.
That was dangerous, so trying to buy myself some time, I changed all the water around into thick mist that would obstruct their vision while I would still be able to move just as well as I was before, thanks to both Haki and my eyes.
I distanced myself as far as I could because what I was planning on doing would be flashy. I started doing wide and slow motions to gather lighting. I needed to hurry because I didn't have a doubt in my mind that they would notice it. It was a very flashy technique, after all, and thankfully, despite lack of practice, I created lightning in record time. I then pointed two fingers at one of my enemies, and the lightning shot out of them at blinding speed.
The attack hit its target... I was honestly expecting it to miss or be blocked, but I'm not going to look a gifted horse in the mouth, so I rushed in to finish the job. By the Aura signature, I managed to hit Haschwalth, and as I used Shunpo and brought my Zanpakuto above my head, my spider sense started tingling, so believing in it, I backed off, and once again, this decision saved my life because the place where I was attacked and destroyed.
From my experience, Ywhach was somehow weaker than he should be. I don't believe that I would have stood a chance if that was the case, and Haschwalt joining the fight only confirmed this theory even more. However, it seems that playtime is over because Ywhach took out a Medallion. It was the same one that Quincy used to steal Bankai from Shinigami.
"Because of you, we were forced to move our plans up in the timeline, but we were able to create this prototype. We managed to make only one such Medallion. Do you wish to guess what it does?"
Not waiting for the answer to this rhetorical question, I tried to use the surrounding water to stop him from using it because it would be really bad for me, but no matter how hard I tried to restrain him and prevent him from talking by using water, I didn't succeed.
"Bankai... Zanka no Tachi."
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END
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