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"Clang!"
After releasing his Shikai, Nozarashi collided head-on with the massive Sword of Victory.
The blades clashed evenly,yet the size of the men wielding them couldn't have been more different.
One towered toward the sky.The other stood planted within a shattered crater.
The sheer force of their sword strikes blasted apart even the clouds above.
And this…was nothing more than raw sword-on-sword violence. No tricks. No techniques.
"I despise fighting alongside beasts," said Byakuya Kuchiki coldly as he observed from the edge of the battlefield, "but I have to admit, the best way to deal with a monster is to send another monster to kill it."
He had voiced exactly what everyone watching was thinking.
Yes.Violence answered with violence.
That was the clearest summary of this moment,and also the simplest, most brutal, and most effective way to deal with a giant Quincy.
And Kenpachi Zaraki was the perfect choice.
"You're right," Hitsugaya Toshiro said beside him, his expression conflicted as the spreading devastation reflected in his eyes. "Against absolute savagery, size alone doesn't matter anymore…"
The enemy he'd exhausted himself just to barely freeze in placewas now being chased down by Kenpachi wielding that bizarre oversized cleaver.
Watching it happen right in front of him, even with a mind more mature than his youthful appearance suggested, Toshiro still couldn't help feeling unsettled.
"There's nothing for it. Accept reality," Byakuya replied impassively, as if he'd expected this outcome all along."Kenpachi Zaraki proves one thing. Violence really is the best solution."
At this moment, the two of them felt like commentators at a championship match, offering helpless reactions under the spotlight and making everyone watching feel the same emotions.
"Captain… looks like you're about to use Bankai," Ikkaku Madarame said excitedly inside the Eleventh Division. "We finally get to see you in your head-chopping glory again!"
Sure enough, not long after he said it,
Kenpachi released his Bankai and transformed into a demon dragged straight out of hell. His skin turned a deep crimson, grotesquely out of place against the frozen battlefield.
"Yeah. I'm looking forward to what happens after the head comes off," Kenpachi muttered, his gaze sinking as his wild grin faded. For once, he was completely focused.
By now, no matter how reckless he might be, Kenpachi understood one thing clearly.
The Miracle Man was the real star of this ranking.
Which meant that the slash he was about to unleash probably wouldn't end the fight.
There would be more twists. More reversals.
That was exactly why he was taking this so seriously.
"Here it comes!" Yumichika shouted.
On the screen, Kenpachi leapt skyward, Nozarashi in hand. His demonic figure rose until it was level with the sun.
With a roar and a single swing,Nozarashi's massive blade blotted out the blazing sun itself, plunging the scene into darkness, as if heralding the demon's judgment.
The music swelled again.
Under the expectant gaze of countless Shinigami, the chipped blade came crashing down. A dark-red slash tore through the sky, stretching hundreds of meters from top to bottom.
With brutal force, Valkyrie was split clean in two.
The same scene had already been shown once before.
But after so much buildup, after all the interruptions and unexpected turns, watching it again hit even harder.
"Hiss…"
Sharp breaths echoed across Soul Society. Everyone who saw it felt the same awe at Bankai Kenpachi's overwhelming power.
At the same time, it deepened the question gnawing at everyone's mind.
Was Valkyrie really dead?
The answer…came almost immediately.
"Aaaaaaah!"
The bisected body, flesh still connected, was suddenly bathed in holy light mid-split and miraculously regenerated, fusing back together.
And after his rebirth,
Valkyrie changed once again.
Beneath enormous angelic wings,he wielded a golden holy sword radiating divine brilliance.
Black-and-white patterns covered every inch of his body, and his face was hidden behind a golden mask, completely concealing any expression.
Before, Valkyrie had looked like a guard stationed at a city gate.
Now, he resembled a war god reborn through faith on a holy battlefield, a being that truly wielded divine authority.
"No way… he's even stronger now…"Hitsugaya's face went pale.
Under that holy radiance, the cold around him was visibly suppressed, and the temperature across the battlefield began to rise.
"…"
Byakuya fell silent.
He looked calm on the surface, but inside, his emotions were in turmoil. Even his convictions were beginning to waver.
And yet,
That wasn't the most despair-inducing part.
The next moment, Kenpachi's body gave out under the strain. His arm snapped, his demonic form collapsing as he plunged into deep unconsciousness.
"Die, Kenpachi Zaraki! You ugly demon, daring to defile a holy angel. You deserve nothing but death!"
Before the despairing eyes of Big White and Little White,the massive holy sword, wrapped in tangible divine reishi, came crashing down onto the fallen demon.
Boom!
The blow shattered the earth itself.
A pitch-black chasm with no visible end tore open, swallowing Kenpachi whole.
The man who had once become a demon was eliminated just like that.
"Captain… you're out too…"
Holding their heads, Ikkaku and Yumichika looked crushed.
There was no denying it. Bankai Kenpachi was terrifying. But his ferocity burned like a firework, blazing brilliantly for an instant before fading into ash.
"You two don't need to look so depressed," Kenpachi said with a wide grin, completely unfazed. "Wasn't this outcome obvious from the start? Besides, falling into a crack in the ground doesn't mean I'm dead."
Death meant nothing to him.
Kenpachi had always treated life and death lightly. There wasn't a trace of sorrow in his heart, only satisfaction at having witnessed his own invincible Bankai in action.
"But if even Little Ken couldn't hold out, then A-Bai and A-Ro are in real danger now…" Yachiru's worried voice chimed in from the side.
At that moment,
After dispatching Kenpachi with a single strike, Valkyrie, like a god descending from the heavens, turned his gaze back toward the two whites.
Under the vertical pupils behind that golden mask, Hitsugaya swallowed hard and instinctively tightened his grip on his ice blade.
Byakuya, however, remained as calm as ever.
In fact… his eyes began to burn with intensity.
"Hitsugaya," Byakuya said suddenly, "I need you to hold him back with everything you've got. Even a momentary freeze will be enough. Can you do that?"
"What?" Hitsugaya's eyes widened. "What do you mean? Do you still have another move?"
His gaze carried a trace of doubt as it drifted past Kuchiki Byakuya, toward the dazzling pink cherry blossoms swirling behind him.
What was going on?
Hadn't Senbonzakura already entered Bankai long ago?
Don't tell me… it still had a hidden ultimate technique, like Hyorinmaru?!
That question was answered almost immediately.
Kuchiki Byakuya nodded and replied calmly, with absolute certainty, "That's right. During my training at the Soul King Palace, the bond between Senbonzakura and myself deepened even further. Because of that, its final secret technique awakened."
When those plain yet confident words were broadcast through the ranking video, the entire Gotei Thirteen erupted once again.
"What the hell?! He was still hiding a trump card?!"
"I knew it! Captain Kuchiki barely did anything the whole time. He was obviously charging up something huge!"
"After Captain Hitsugaya and Captain Zaraki showed off Bankai that ridiculous, there's no way Senbonzakura's ultimate move would disappoint, right?"
…
Countless Shinigami leaned forward in anticipation, hoping to witness another miracle.
Meanwhile, inside the Sixth Division barracks, Kuchiki Byakuya himself was trembling with excitement.
"So even Senbonzakura's Bankai has a final technique…"
"Captain! You can tell right away. Your future self is insanely confident!" Abarai Renji said, barely containing his excitement.
At this moment,
Hitsugaya Toshiro had already put his plan into motion.
Under his relentless harassment, the Valkyrie was provoked once more, swinging its holy angelic sword in a wild frenzy.
Kuchiki Byakuya stood at the highest point of the battlefield, slowly bringing his hands together in front of him.
As Hitsugaya pushed himself to the limit and deployed the four-directional ice barrier once again—
"Crack!!!"
A surge of freezing air exploded outward.
Blinding white ice engulfed the Valkyrie's body in an instant.
Seizing that opening, Kuchiki Byakuya's eyes sharpened. His captain's haori fluttered violently under the pressure of his immense spiritual power.
At the same time, the words of his Bankai technique left his lips.
"Shikei… Senbonzakura Kageyoshi."
After that cold, murderous voice faded,
the camera captured the sky above the battlefield, where countless cherry blossom blades stood upright in perfect alignment.
They formed a colossal sword array, vast enough to rival Seireitei itself.
Then—
"Ultimate technique. Ikkō Senjinka."
The moment Kuchiki Byakuya swung his hand,
hundreds of millions of blades surged forward amid a storm of falling petals, as if staking the thousand-year honor of the Kuchiki clan on this single strike, all piercing toward the Valkyrie's head at once.
The spectacle was nothing short of apocalyptic.
Like the twilight of the gods.
The final blow meant to slay a god.
"..."
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