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He remained bent forward, sword embedded deep in the earth.
Meeting Yhwach's stiff gaze and forced smile, the Captain-Commander slowly drove the iron-like blade even deeper into the ground.
Behind him, the solar mantle burned itself out in violent bursts, yet from his mouth came words completely opposed to light.
"Souls of the dead…"
"Ashes of those who were scattered by my flames…"
"Lend me your strength. Come, and savor the pleasure of this battlefield alongside me."
…
That low voice seemed to pierce through millennia of time.
It dragged the world back to that ancient blood-soaked war, calling forth the spirits of those who had fallen to Zanka no Tachi.
Yes.
Just as the Captain-Commander had declared in his rage moments earlier.
"If Yhwach cannot comprehend despair…"
"Then let the dead awaken from hell itself and teach him the answer."
This was…
"Zanka no Tachi: South!"
"Great Burial Rites of Ten Trillion Flames!"
"No way…"
"The old man can even summon the dead?!"
As the incantation ended, the once brilliant scene suddenly grew dim and oppressive.
Shunsui Kyōraku instinctively curled in on himself, a bead of cold sweat sliding down his cheek.
This was too unsettling.
Summoning the dead was supposed to be a forbidden art, something only necromancers were rumored to possess.
Even if no such race existed in Soul Society…
Considering what it meant for a Shinigami to wield such a power, Shunsui's expression grew more and more uneasy.
"According to what the old man said, everyone who ever died under Ryūjin Jakka's Bankai would be summoned back into this world," Shunsui muttered. "So can we… boldly assume that…"
"A thousand years ago, could some of our own allies have been caught in it and killed as well?"
Jūshirō Ukitake's eyes flickered violently as he voiced the thought with great difficulty.
Even with just its eastern and western aspects, Zanka no Tachi had already demonstrated overwhelming, god-defying destructive power.
And back then, a thousand years ago, the old man had been far more ruthless and ferocious than he was now.
That meant…
During that ancient war, Zanka no Tachi's power was likely no weaker than it was today.
So accidental friendly fire would not have been surprising at all.
What Ukitake was really wondering was whether, within the Ten Trillion Souls Burial Array, they might soon see the legendary faces of the original Gotei Thirteen.
"Huh?! Ukitake, are you saying… the old man might've killed his own people back then?!"
Shunsui's eyes went wide as he broke out in a cold sweat.
He shot his longtime friend a sharp look, silently begging him to stop talking.
Hey, buddy.
You can mess around with food all you want, but you cannot mess around with words like that.
Good thing there are only the three of us here in the squad room right now.
If anyone else heard this and it spread, the old man's reputation would be completely ruined.
As his students, you wouldn't want his lifelong honor destroyed by your mouth, would you?
Shunsui sighed and rolled his eyes.
But what happened next left him utterly speechless.
The summoning ritual was complete.
Within the darkened, oppressive scene, the Ten Trillion Souls Burial Array fully took shape.
Crack!
Crack!
Crack!
Under countless horrified gazes, endless streams of black death-energy erupted from the dark sigils, transforming into one terrifying black skeleton after another.
Billions upon billions of skeletons burst from the ground.
They piled up and swarmed like an endless sea of humanity.
Dense, suffocating, filling the entire field of view.
In an instant, the once crimson world of flames was transformed into a nightmarish underworld, like hell itself.
"Gulp…"
Even with their throats completely dry from fear, swallowing sounds echoed nonstop throughout the World of the Living.
Staring at the skin-crawling scene on the screen, many people with weaker nerves broke down and screamed on the spot.
Even the Arrancar, who had grown up amidst slaughter and mountains of corpses, were struck dumb by the sight, unable to utter a single word.
"This old man… he's a monster."
"As the head of the Gotei Thirteen, he's harvested billions of souls. That's truly terrifying."
"Figures. You can never judge someone by their appearance."
Thinking back to the very beginning of the battle.
Captain-Commander Yamamoto's face, so gentle and kindly despite his age.
He looked like nothing more than a harmless old man, the kind who couldn't possibly stir up anyone's will to fight.
And yet, who could have imagined…
That he would be this brutal.
At that moment, just as the Arrancar were collectively scared out of their wits, chaos erupted within the video.
"Shing—!!!"
As the Captain-Commander swung Ryūjin Jakka,
At his command, countless skeletal remains surged together like a black tide, charging recklessly toward Yhwach's position!
"This…"
"What on earth is going on?!"
As far as the eye could see, everything was swallowed by endless black.
Yhwach froze in place. The ferocity vanished from his crimson eyes, replaced by something far more primal. Fear. Raw, human terror.
"Still don't get it?"
"The billions of dead souls before you are the remains of those who were once slain by the scorching blade of Ryūjin Jakka. Reduced to ashes, then gathered together again."
"Summoned by my will and awakened, they are now my limbs and my claws. Every enemy I deem worthy of death will be erased by their hands!"
As he spoke, the Captain-Commander slowly pulled Ryūjin Jakka out of the ground.
Where his gaze fell, the wailing undead had already spread across the ground, surrounding Yhwach from every direction.
Encircled by a dense army of the dead,
The so-called King of the Quincy no longer radiated authority. Instead, he looked small, pitifully weak.
And then, unwilling to accept it, he roared in rage.
"Yamamoto Genryūsai! You're the Captain-Commander of the Gotei Thirteen, the very head of the Shinigami, and yet you openly summon the dead!"
"Don't you feel any shame at all for doing something so vile and disgraceful?!"
As he shouted, he drew his sword.
Yhwach's eyes were completely consumed by fury.
He threw himself forward, swinging wildly, cutting down every blackened corpse that came near him, utterly lost in bloodlust.
But it was pointless.
There were simply too many of them.
Each swing of his spirit-forged greatsword was like trying to empty the ocean with a cup.
And what truly drove Yhwach into despair—
Among the oncoming corpses, he recognized several familiar faces.
"Ah… Sædelitz…"
"Elgra… and… Hubert!"
"You…"
Seeing those loyal Quincy subordinates who had died before his eyes a thousand years ago,
Yhwach's composure shattered completely.
"Finally starting to feel despair? Good."
Watching Yhwach sink deeper into the sea of blackened corpses,
There was a note of grim satisfaction in the Captain-Commander's heavy voice.
But then—
What Yhwach said next twisted the mood of the battlefield into something strange and unsettling.
"Yanagihara Kinrō…"
"Shijima Chigiri…"
"Saitō Nobutsuna…"
"Hahahahahahaha!!!"
…
From within the pile of corpses came Yhwach's hysterical laughter.
"Yamamoto Genryūsai, you said it yourself just now. Every one of these dead souls died by Ryūjin Jakka's blade, didn't they?"
"Then how do you explain this?"
"The people I just named… the first-generation captains of the Gotei Thirteen!"
"They too became undead. Why?!"
When those words echoed through the playback video,
The entire world of the Shinigami, especially the Gotei Thirteen, was hit like a magnitude-ten earthquake.
Shinigami everywhere cried out in disbelief.
"What?!"
"A thousand years ago… the Captain-Commander killed his own people?"
"Has that old man completely lost his mind?!"
"..."
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