The white figure rose slowly from the radiant beam, wings of a grotesque butterfly spreading wide, each limb ending in bone-like growths that resembled a skull's grimacing edge. His face was split cleanly down the middle, half-torn to reveal a blackened visage beneath, and along his torso three cavernous hollows were aligned in sequence, with the Hōgyoku glimmering deep inside the uppermost cavity at the chest.
At this stage Aizen seemed no longer a Shinigami who had transcended Hollow. He was more Hollow than Shinigami—an evolution layered atop evolution.
"Evolution is always shadowed by fear… the fear of being reduced to ash," Aizen murmured, his overlapping voices echoing through the broken skies of Karakura Town. The ruined city lay drowned beneath his words, already buried beneath collapsed stone and twisted rebar.
"I must thank you, Moyu. Because of you, I understood this truth. Surpassing Shinigami and Hollow was not the end… but the foundation for evolving again." He raised a hand, pale and alien, and in an instant an immense lavender radiance flared in his palm. "To honor you, I will grant the most solemn death. Accept your fate."
The light erupted.
Boom—
The world ignited in searing brilliance as matter vaporized into void. The beam evaporated everything it touched, space itself seeming to blister and peel away, while a crushing weight of spiritual pressure descended over all. The captains staggered, reishi refusing to heed their calls. Even their footing failed as if Aizen had stripped them of dominion over the very building blocks of existence.
He stood like a god, and the world yielded.
Yet Moyu did not yield. His hand tightened around Lan Yin, blade rising horizontally before his body, and in an instant hundreds of barriers of wind assembled, layer upon layer, holding fast against the roaring tide of violet energy. The ground, the sky, even the clouds scorched away into blackened nothingness, as if reality itself were cracking.
[Your Zanpakutō Lan Yin has endured the strike of power beyond the limit. Comprehension has deepened. The essence of destruction has been refined. Breakthrough achieved—Bankai.]
The system's voice fell, and strange markings crawled across Lan Yin's steel, releasing an overwhelming black radiance. Power surged like a breaking dam. The sword cleaved into the purple torrent, splitting the beam in two and scattering its fury to either side of Karakura Town.
Aizen's gaze flickered. He had expected Moyu's obliteration; instead, what rose was new power.
"You never disappoint," he said at last. His torn, blackened visage curved into a smile as strange as it was cold. "So far, among all who have stood before me, you alone deserve the name of strongest. Not even Yamamoto Genryūsai, hailed as the greatest Shinigami, ever drew such appreciation. But you—your reiatsu, your soul—your very existence feels like God's perfect design. In this world, you should be the true protagonist."
But Moyu's eyes remained indifferent. He knew what lay behind Aizen's words: praise offered only to frame his own supremacy. The last exchange had shown clearly that Aizen believed victory already his.
"Yet it is a pity," Aizen continued, voice dropping to a whisper like judgment. "You lack the decisive mind." His arm lifted, a finger pointing toward Moyu. "Our battle has dragged on too long. Next, I will end it in my strongest form. I will forge the Ōken here and open the path to the Spirit King's Palace. In contrast, Kuro Yūjun… reveal your Bankai. Let there be no regret."
Moyu's eyes lowered. Lan Yin lifted slowly in his right hand, the wind quivering as if kneeling in anticipation.
"If that is your demand… then so be it."
The world fell silent. Wind itself seemed to hold its breath.
Lan Yin rose across Moyu's chest. His reiatsu surged, markings converging on his forehead until they gathered at the center as an eye-like sigil. In the depths of his gaze, pale white light flickered into being, the first glow of creation itself, illuminating all.
The instant that light appeared, the wind stirred anew.
The captains stared, unable to comprehend, for the gales that swirled around Moyu carried not only destruction but also joy, as though the element itself had gained will and exalted in its master's awakening.
Even Aizen's expression tightened. He had anticipated much, but when he saw the spectacle before him, genuine unease stirred. Storm-wrought wings unfurled behind Moyu, wind condensed into form, and his reiatsu multiplied, crashing down like a collapsing sky.
The storm swept Karakura, devouring all in its path. Black jade reiatsu engulfed the air, vast enough to swallow the horizon. Even the butterfly-winged Aizen straightened, eyes narrowing, compelled to regard Moyu with true gravity.
A voice, deep and resonant, cut through the howling wind.
"Bankai…"
Boom—
The word alone shattered the heavens.
Dark clouds surged in an instant, smothering the blue sky, plunging Karakura into a twilight apocalypse. Thunder raged across the heavens, arcs of violet lightning slashing against the storm. The winds twisted, dragging the darkness into a colossal vortex that spanned the town entire.
And at the heart of that maelstrom, Moyu stood upon the air like a crowned emperor descending upon his realm.
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