"Devoured over thirty thousand Gillian…"
Rukia stared at Aaroniero in shock.
She knew that if Hollows wanted to evolve, they had to devour souls—or the bodies of their own kind—as nourishment.
Normally speaking…
Once a Hollow reached the Gillian-class, they wouldn't just go on a mad spree devouring their own kind.
Even if they did eat their fellow Gillian, they only needed a handful to evolve into an Adjuchas-class.
But this Arrancar—a grotesque brain floating in a glass tank—was claiming he'd devoured over thirty thousand of his own kind.
And his ability happened to complement that devouring perfectly.
The strength of thirty thousand Gillian… no wonder that one tentacle had felt so terrifying.
Cole's expression, however, turned a little strange.
"Did you eat so much you fried your own brain? Who gave you the courage to brag like that in front of me?"
Listening to Aaroniero talk, someone who didn't know better might've thought he was the Primera Espada.
Aaroniero flew into a rage. From the massive purple octopus lower body, two tentacles lashed out like whips toward Cole.
"Looks like the sickness is pretty far gone…"
Cole gave him a look of pity and raised his index finger.
"Hadō no Yon: Byakurai (Way of Destruction #4: White Lightning)."
Whoosh.
Whoosh.
Two glaring white beams flashed past.
In the sky, the purple tentacles—suckers spread wide like some nightmare monster—vanished in the sunlight, turning to ash on the spot.
The light of Byakurai even had power to spare, blasting two enormous craters out of the ground.
Billowing dust swallowed up the scene.
"AAAAAHHHH!!!"
Aaroniero howled in agony. The two brains inside the glass tank smashed themselves against the inner wall, banging again and again.
In his Resurrección form, those octopus tentacles were essentially his limbs.
Losing two tentacles was like having both arms and legs struck by lightning. The pain was enough to drive a man insane.
That one strike seemed to knock some reason back into him. Aaroniero stared at Cole, trembling.
"Monster…"
All the remaining tentacles below him writhed at once, spinning him forward like a wheel as he bolted desperately away.
Even if you gathered thirty thousand Gillian…
This terrifying man could blow them all to pieces.
To fight him was certain death.
Despair flashed in Aaroniero's eyes. He had no idea if there was anyone in all of Hueco Mundo who could save him now.
Suddenly, the path in front of him flared with cold.
Rukia rushed in with Sode no Shirayuki in hand, murderous intent in her eyes.
"I won't let you escape."
Aaroniero's eyes lit up.
He couldn't do anything about that monster.
But if he took this woman hostage, wouldn't that solve everything?
Based on Shiba Kaien's memories, a hundred years ago, this woman had been nothing but a panicked, helpless little girl.
It had only been about a century.
No matter how much she'd changed, it couldn't be that drastic.
Thinking that, Aaroniero once again took on Kaien's form. While speaking softly, he swung the trident Nejibana.
"Suiten Gyakumaki (Water and Heaven Swirl)!!!"
The trident raised a raging torrent—water surging like dragons, roaring as they crashed forward.
Each of those water dragons…
Carried power greater than a Cero fired by ten Gillian.
Rukia's first instinct was to retreat—but right then, Cole appeared behind her without her even noticing.
"Rukia, I'm here. Go all out."
After all, this was a released Arrancar.
If a Shinigami didn't use their bankai, even a captain would have a hard time taking him down.
With that one line, the bottomless pressure in Rukia's chest vanished.
In her bankai form, her offensive power had reached a terrifying extreme—but Absolute Zero made her own body incredibly fragile.
But with Cole here…
She didn't believe anyone could hurt her.
"Bankai (Final Release)!"
"Hakka no Togame (White Haze Punishment)!"
The moment Rukia's voice rang out, the temperature around them plummeted at a speed visible to the naked eye.
Those torrents Aaroniero had created with his zanpakuto didn't even have time to seep into the ground before the surface froze over into crystal-clear ice.
"Minus… eighteen degrees."
Rukia spoke slowly.
Her shihakusho transformed into a white, frost-like coat. She was like a snow woman descending from the peak of an icy mountain, silver-white blade in hand as she walked toward Aaroniero.
And with every step she took…
Her body temperature dropped sharply.
As this was happening, Cole seemed to sense something. A smile tugged at his lips as he waved at Rukia's back.
"I missed you too, Sode no Shirayuki!"
While the temperature in the area crashed downward, the space around him alone alternated between cold and warm.
It was obvious Sode no Shirayuki was greeting him.
"You little brat… so you still remember me."
In Rukia's inner world, Sode no Shirayuki sat in an endless field of snow, lightly swinging her feet as a small smile appeared on her face.
Thinking of that, she lay back into the snow, rolling around with abandon.
"I want to go see Cole so badly!!"
In the real world, Rukia suddenly stopped walking.
Her face darkened as she glanced at her zanpakuto… and then at Cole.
"You two… can you please behave yourselves?"
It was bad enough having a troublemaker watching from the sidelines.
Now there was also a pure, saintly snow maiden inside her who was pining after a man.
How was she supposed to fight like this?
She took a moment to steady herself.
Then Rukia tightened her grip on Hakka no Togame, turning into a streak of icy light as she threw herself fiercely into battle with Aaroniero.
He still wore Shiba Kaien's face, brandishing the trident Nejibana and sending wave after wave of water surging toward her.
But whenever those lethal currents drew near and her blade cut through them…
They froze instantly into pure white ice.
One fought with water.
The other with ice.
As their battle raged on, strange icebergs sprang up one after another from nowhere.
Looking at that sight, Aaroniero nearly ground his teeth to dust.
"That damn woman…"
In Shiba Kaien's memories, Rukia's strength had never been anywhere near this level. Even her talent hadn't been anything special.
Yet in little more than a hundred years…
This former little brat had become a Shinigami who could wield bankai.
And Sode no Shirayuki's ice attribute…
Was practically a perfect counter to Kaien's water element.
While he was still grappling with that realization, Rukia came at him again.
The cold air around her was even more intense than before.
Their blades clashed.
Aaroniero could feel that bone-gnawing chill through the metal, and he gritted his teeth.
"Shinigami, what exactly is your bankai's ability?"
Normally, a Shinigami's bankai wasn't much different from an Arrancar's Resurrección. The only difference was that Shinigami strengthened their zanpakuto, while Hollows empowered their transformed bodies.
But he'd been watching this whole time…
And he still couldn't see what had changed about Rukia's blade.
Facing that familiar "Kaien" face as it spoke to her, Rukia clenched her fist and ground out:
"Minus… fifty degrees."
"Minus… one hundred degrees."
"Minus… one hundred and fifty degrees."
As they clashed again and again, Rukia's body temperature kept plummeting, plunging far below any ordinary concept of freezing.
Clang!
Sode no Shirayuki and Nejibana collided once more.
By then, Sode no Shirayuki's temperature had reached a terrifying minus one hundred and sixty degrees. The water that had once flowed from Nejibana froze solid in an instant.
Not only could the currents no longer attack—
Even the trident-shaped blade of Nejibana itself was sealed within the ice.
In the struggle between water and cold…
The water lost completely.
As Nejibana's master, Aaroniero tried to pull back, but a layer of frost still coated his entire body.
He stared at Rukia in utter disbelief.
"Rukia Kuchiki, you…"
When Rukia activated her bankai, her zanpakuto hadn't changed form.
Instead, her clothing had transformed, and her own body temperature had plummeted—like she herself was the true bankai.
"Don't talk to me with Captain Kaien's face."
Rukia's eyes were like ice as she spoke.
She swung Hakka no Togame in one fierce stroke—and an ultimate shock of cold exploded outward.
The frozen Nejibana, still trapped in solid ice, erupted with cracks from its trident tip all the way down.
With a sharp snap, it shattered completely.
By then, Rukia's skin temperature had fallen to a staggering—over two hundred degrees below zero.
"-273.15°C—Zettai Reido (Absolute Zero)!"
Pure white chill spread like a tidal wave.
Rukia stood in the midst of the swirling frost, like a snow goddess upon a sacred mountain—holy, untouchable, impossible to profane.
Aaroniero, who had just been fighting her moments ago, suddenly felt like he'd been plunged into an ice cellar.
Cold.
It was too cold.
It felt like every part of his body was freezing solid.
He was a Gillian-class Arrancar, strengthened countless times over by devouring his own kind.
And yet this blizzard of white was still affecting him.
Just how cold was this power?
"It's over, Hollow."
Rukia's gaze was utterly calm as it settled on him.
She walked forward step by step, bringing the pure-white blade down in a smooth, downward stroke.
"AAAH!"
A trail of ice spread outward for nearly eight hundred meters.
With a desperate scream, Aaroniero stared in horror at his lower body—frozen solid into a single block of ice.
He reached down to touch it.
All he could feel was the ultimate cold.
No pain.
In that frozen state, even pain couldn't reach him.
"Wait, Rukia, it's me! Shiba Kaien! I'm really me—I'm right here! Don't kill me…"
Driven to desperation, Aaroniero started grabbing at anything he could.
He even begged for his life with Shiba Kaien's face.
He didn't understand…
That this only made Rukia's hatred burn even hotter.
A white figure swept lightly past him, like a passing gust of winter wind that carried the snow of the world with it.
Aaroniero collapsed to his knees, snot and tears running down his face as he tried to keep pleading.
But soon…
He could no longer force out a single word.
Because from the tentacles at his feet to the very top of his head, in that one instant, he was frozen completely solid.
His entire body became an ice statue kneeling on the ground.
And his soul remained sealed inside the sculpture, forced to endure a merciless eternal winter.
All of this looked slow.
In truth, it had taken less than two seconds. By the time the third second arrived, Rukia had already released Absolute Zero, and her body temperature was slowly rising again.
Cole walked over with a grin.
"Rukia, isn't that perfect? You've completely mastered your bankai form now."
As long as she ended Absolute Zero within four seconds, Rukia herself wouldn't be harmed.
A mischievous glint flashed in Rukia's eyes.
She suddenly threw herself into Cole's arms.
"Four seconds is still too short. If my reiatsu were a bit stronger, I could definitely extend the duration of Absolute Zero…"
In her Absolute Zero state, she almost feared no Shinigami in the entire Soul Society.
Even if all the members of Squad Zero showed up together.
It wasn't arrogance.
It was confidence.
In a real sense, Hakka no Togame's true bankai was only Absolute Zero.
Those earlier states—minus eighteen, minus fifty—were nothing but transitional body temperatures on the way to Absolute Zero. They didn't count as separate bankai techniques.
Only Zettai Reido (Absolute Zero) was the real bankai.
And it could only last four seconds.
A bankai that existed for just four seconds—
That alone proved how terrifying Absolute Zero was.
It could even bring time itself to a halt.
Rukia pulled her drifting thoughts back and looked at the frozen statue that had been Aaroniero.
A cold light flashed through her eyes.
With a single thought—
The half-human, half-Hollow ice sculpture shattered into fragments.
No blood.
Only ice.
It was as if even the very substance of his body had been turned entirely into frozen matter.
Watching the scene, Cole couldn't help trembling—literally.
He sucked in a sharp breath.
"Rukia, I'm going to freeze to death!!"
With an ice-sculpture beauty like this crashing into his arms, he felt himself shivering uncontrollably, like he'd been carved into an ice statue from the waist up.
Rukia spoke proudly.
"That's your punishment. Serves you right for fooling around with Captain Unohana."
Even after releasing the Absolute Zero state, her temperature was still over two hundred degrees below zero—but it was no longer an instantly lethal chill.
Frost clung to Cole's eyelashes and eyebrows, but he barely noticed it.
He only stared at Rukia with a guilty look in his eyes.
"Nel told you!?"
Rukia's teeth clenched.
She bit down hard on Cole's hand.
"Damn you, Cole, so you really did fool around."
Elsewhere.
The moment Aaroniero Arruruerie died, hundreds—thousands—tens of thousands of Gillian let out crazed roars and charged this way.
Their eyes were full of frantic greed and longing for evolution.
(End of Chapter)
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