"Caw caw—"
Several bird-shaped Hollows screeched as they swept across the dim yellow sky of Hueco Mundo, then tucked in their bodies and dove headfirst into the dark and silent Forest of Menos.
Startled, groups of Hollows wandering aimlessly among the underground cliffs and hills looked up and let out waves of furious roars.
"Why…"
Kaname Tōsen sat silently on a broken rock. After sensing the Forest of Menos for a while, a look of confusion appeared beneath his white mask as he thought to himself:
Why can I only sense the spiritual pressure of a few Menos? It feels like thousands of Hollows are missing from the entire forest… Where did they all go?
"Lord Tōsen!"
Ukaishō, with half of a wolf-head mask perched on his head, came running in from the underground entrance of the Forest of Menos. He shouted at Tōsen, "We've discovered traces of the Shinigami!!"
"What? Where?" Tōsen's heart tightened as he urgently asked.
"Not far from the Forest of Menos! I saw over a dozen Gillians leading thousands of Hollows in pursuit of the Shinigami' expeditionary force!!"
"So the Hollows of the Forest of Menos were lured away by the expeditionary force… Good. We'll take this chance to wipe them out in one fell swoop! All Arrancar comrades—"
Just as Tōsen was about to issue the order to attack, Ukaishō suddenly cried out in panic again, "Captain Tōsen! This is bad!!"
"What is it?"
"The Arrancar… the Arrancar army seems to have scattered throughout the Forest of Menos to hunt for food. Can't you see…"
Ukaishō abruptly fell silent, having realized that Tōsen was a blind "Visored".
"Ukaishō, the opportunity to annihilate the Shinigami is fleeting. We cannot afford the slightest delay! I order you—no matter what method you use—gather all the Arrancar immediately!" Tōsen said, suppressing his anger.
After all, he had long known that this so-called "Arrancar Army" was composed of low-level Hollows or Gillian-class Arrancar. Their intelligence was limited, and their combat power was only slightly stronger than ordinary Menos—
So the moment they arrived at the Forest of Menos, driven by the Hollows' most primitive "instinct to feed," they scattered in all directions, hunting the low-level Hollows roaming among the underground stone forests…
"Understood! I'll do it right away!"
Ukaishō leapt onto a protruding cliff and released his spiritual pressure. Then he raised his head and let out a wolf-like howl:
"Awooooo—"
"Roar—"
The scattered Arrancar throughout the Forest of Menos heard the howl and responded in kind. Abandoning their prey, they rushed toward Ukaishō one after another!
"That sound… Is an Adjuchas summoning his Arrancar companions from earlier?"
Deep within the Forest of Menos, behind a towering rock formation, a young Shinigami with short reddish-brown hair, straight brows, and a rather handsome face looked toward the direction of the exit and murmured to himself.
He wore a black Shihakushō, but over it he had draped a pine-green cloak adorned with five skulls.
Under his left arm, he carried a white mask resembling the head of an antelope, while in his right hand he tightly gripped a standard-issue asauchi from the Soul Society—
Clearly, this Shinigami belonged to one of the Gotei Thirteen. Yet it seemed he had never even released a Zanpakutō, and had instead been operating alone in the Forest of Menos under the name of the expeditionary force for nearly 300 years—
It seemed that no one in the Soul Society remembered his name anymore, nor that among the expeditionary force that once died fighting in Hueco Mundo to protect the Soul Society, there was still a lone survivor—
If the Seventh Kenpachi of the Eleventh Division, Kuruyashiki Kenpachi, were still alive, he would certainly know the origins of this young Shinigami:
His name was Ashido—a man who truly swung his blade for the faith of a Shinigami!
Around 300 years ago, Ashido and his companions, including Hashirama Fūma, mistakenly entered the Forest of Menos while pursuing an Adjuchas named Dordonii Alessandro Del Socacchio.
Because the Forest of Menos is the nest of all Gillians and lower-level Hollows, Hashirama Fūma and the others were slain one by one under the siege of countless Hollows. Only Ashido survived through sheer resilience—
"To protect human souls, and to honor the promise I made with the comrades who fought here beside me, I have continued fighting to this very day!"
Because of the promise he made with his companion Hashirama Fūma, even though Ashido knew the way to leave the Forest of Menos, he chose to remain here—simply because he steadfastly upheld the original justice of the Shinigami: to exterminate Hollows and protect humanity!
After all, most Hollows that appear in the Human World originate from the Forest of Menos. If the number of Hollows here decreases, then the harm they cause to the Human World will decrease as well.
But what Ashido did not know was that, at some point, the justice of the Soul Society had shifted from "protecting humans" to "protecting the nobility," and the duty of the Shinigami had changed from "guardianship" to "maintaining balance."
The so-called "Soul Burial" and "purifying Hollows" gradually became routine administrative work for the Shinigami.
The expeditionary force, once regarded by the Soul Society as "lone heroes," slowly faded into obscurity, while the stories of the Gotei Thirteen began spreading through Rukongai…
Returning to the main story—
After discovering that, over the past two days, the Gillians and Hollow hordes of the Forest of Menos had been lured away by an "unknown" force, Ashido secretly began speculating about who they might be.
However, because the number of Arrancar in Hueco Mundo had surged dramatically over the past half month, Ashido did not dare to leave the Forest of Menos rashly. He could only remain hidden in the shadows and observe—until this very dusk—
More than a thousand imperfectly evolved Arrancar suddenly arrived at the Forest of Menos under the leadership of a "Shinigami" wearing a Hollow mask. This immediately gave Ashido the ominous feeling that something unusual had happened between the Soul Society and Hueco Mundo!
Thus, he secretly trailed behind the roaming Arrancar army, trying to gather useful intelligence from their behavior—
But just then, a piercing wolf's howl rang out, summoning all the scattered Arrancar throughout the Forest of Menos and ruining Ashido's plan.
"Forgive me, Hashirama…"
Watching the Arrancar group gradually depart, Ashido murmured:
"To uncover the origins of these Arrancar, I must leave this place for a while.
I hope the outcome is not what I fear… But if I truly meet misfortune out there, my soul will always remain with you all! Now then—it's time to move—"
As soon as he finished speaking, Ashido put on the antelope mask, sheathed his Asauchi, and headed off in the distant direction the Arrancar had taken…
…
Meanwhile, Saitō Keichirō, acting as bait, saw over a dozen Gillians pursuing the expeditionary force under the escort of several thousand Hollows. The distance between them had shrunk to less than a hundred meters.
He shouted to the surrounding Shinigami:
"Everyone, listen up! Fight while retreating—lure these bastards to Terror Mountain Valley!!"
"Yes, sir!"
More than a thousand Shinigami responded in unison. They fired several Kidō spells at the Hollow horde to draw the Menos' hatred, then gradually headed toward the ambush set by Fūjin Taichi.
"ROAR—!"
The mindless Gillians seemed completely enraged by the expeditionary force's actions. Suddenly, as if they had gained intelligence, one of them threw its head back and let out a deafening howl!
Instantly, the surrounding Hollow horde split into two forces and flanked the Shinigami from both sides. In just a few breaths, the distance closed by dozens of meters.
"Don't get entangled with them here! All units, retreat immediately!!"
Seeing through the Menos' intention to use the swift lower-level Hollows to pin them down, Keichirō shouted urgently.
But before the Shinigami could respond, Keichirō suddenly sensed a massive surge of spiritual pressure behind him. Immediately afterward, a familiar and chilling voice rang out:
"Oh~ so it's you, Seventh Seat Saitō!"
"What?! You… you're Captain Tōsen— no, to be precise, I should call you criminal Kaname Tōsen! You… you're actually alive?!
And… why is there a Hollow mask on your face?? Have you truly fallen?!"
Keichirō stared in shock at Kaname Tōsen, who had suddenly appeared several meters behind the expeditionary force.
"Hmph… I already told you, Seventh Seat Saitō," said Kaname Tōsen, still in his Hollowfied state, as he slowly drew his Zanpakutō.
"What?!"
"If justice is insufficient… then I shall become that thing called 'justice' myself! And then, I will disperse all the evil in this world like clouds—
Therefore… before my justice descends, I will never fall beneath a blade that cannot even find meaning in its own swing!!
So then, in order to uphold this justice, I shall annihilate you here in a new form—"
By the time he finished speaking, Tōsen's Zanpakutō, Suzumushi, was fully drawn. Its pale blade shimmered with a chilling white light beneath the slanting rays of the setting sun.
..
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