[Haineko]
-A Gentle Breeze-type Kidō Zanpakuto.
-Shikai Ability: The blade turns into ash and smoke, turning any surrounding sand and dust into weapons.
Rayleigh can control this shit however he wants.
Wherever the dust touches, he just swings the hilt to mimic the exact same cut.
It's pretty similar to Gin Ichimaru's Kamishini no Yari and Byakuya Kuchiki's Senbonzakura.
Plus, it hit every single requirement Rayleigh was looking for.
Controlling dust was a huge perk!
It gave him wide-range, stealthy attacks that were great for scouting or just throwing up a smokescreen to fuck with his enemies.
If the dust touched you, you were in the kill zone.
With his mind made up on which Zanpakuto to forge, Rayleigh headed straight to Hephaestus.
"You're actually going to use that Skill to forge this thing?" the Goddess asked, making sure she heard him right.
She didn't look surprised at all.
Honestly, she seemed pretty hyped to see it happen.
"Yeah, I'm ready."
"Good. Follow me."
Hephaestus led Rayleigh back to her private, exclusive workshop.
"You can try it in here," she said, giving him the floor.
Rayleigh didn't turn her down.
He figured the best way to pay her back was to give her a good show and show off his forging.
He popped open his shirt, letting it hang loose at his waist.
He wasn't overly bulky, but his muscles were lean and cut like a swimmer's.
Gripping a heavy two-handed sledgehammer, his slender arms lifted the damn thing like it was nothing.
He gave it a couple of practice swings to get a feel for the weight, then set it aside.
"Wait, you're going to use that?" Hephaestus asked.
She looked worried the blade would shatter under that kind of force.
Rayleigh just nodded without bothering to explain. He pulled out the Asauchi and shoved it straight into the forge.
The insane heat turned the metal a glowing red in seconds.
As it cooked, the steel shifted into a bright, blinding gold, like it was glowing from the inside out.
'Now!'
Rayleigh swung the sledgehammer.
Clang!
Clang!
Clang!
The heavy impacts echoed through the workshop, rattling straight down to the soul.
Rayleigh got totally lost in the rhythm.
With every strike, he was hammering a piece of his own soul right into the blade.
The raw force of his willpower left even Hephaestus stunned!
This was a level of forging she had never seen before.
After forty-nine strikes, Hephaestus watched in pure shock as Rayleigh reached out and grabbed the white-hot blade with his bare hand!
She was too slow to stop him.
Hell, it wasn't just that she couldn't react fast enough, a part of her was dying to see what would happen next.
Boom!
A thick, heavy spiritual pressure wrapped around Rayleigh's body.
It raged for a few seconds before the storm finally died down.
The blade in Rayleigh's hand had transformed!
Hephaestus's eyes went wide. The blade, which had just been a hunk of metal a second ago, now had a full set of fittings and a scabbard.
"Holy... you actually forged your own soul into the blade!"
Even a Goddess from heaven was blown away.
Taking your own soul and using it as material to beat into a weapon?
Giving it a soul of its own?
A blade like this wasn't just a weapon anymore, it was the other half of his soul!
As the Goddess of Smithing, Hephaestus had forged her fair share of sentient weapons.
Every single one was a divine artifact, and she could only pull it off because she was a god.
But now, some kid from the Lower World had just made one right in front of her.
A blade she hadn't even thought was possible.
'So.. this was a Zanpakuto!'
'This was a Soul Blade that only Rayleigh could make.'
Drenched in sweat and barely standing, Rayleigh forced himself to stay on his feet.
He still needed to show the Goddess what this thing could really do.
With his eyes shining, he looked at her flame-like figure and grinned.
"This blade's name is Haineko."
"Growl...!"
As Rayleigh dropped the release command, Haineko's Shikai manifested right in front of Hephaestus's eyes.
Ash and dust gathered, whipping up into a mini hurricane.
Thud.
Still rocking a triumphant smile, Rayleigh collapsed as Haineko slipped out of his grip and hit the floor with a clatter.
The Shikai faded away, and the sword reverted back to normal.
The Goddess of Smithing stood there frozen for a minute before walking over to the kid.
She sat on the floor, tucking her legs to the side, and pulled his head onto her lap.
She just stared down at his sleeping face for a long time.
"Zanpakuto... what a power. And you're the only one who can make them."
"Someone like you... is basically poison to me."
Hephaestus brushed the hair out of his face, leaned down, and pressed a soft kiss to his forehead.
...
Who knows how much time passed before Rayleigh finally opened his eyes.
"Ah, a familiar ceiling."
He stared up at the ceiling, looking like it had that morning, before he jolted up and looked around the room.
Seeing the room empty, he let out a huge sigh of relief.
But then, he sighed again.
'Huh? Why the hell do I feel... disappointed?'
...
After waking up, Rayleigh sat up in bed.
A piece of paper on the bedside table caught his eye.
'If I remember right,' he thought, 'this is the same kind of paper Hephaestus used to imprint my status when I got a Falna.'
'Could it be...'
Rayleigh unfolded the paper.
"Fucking knew it... Hephaestus must have updated my stats while I was knocked out."
[Status Update]
Name: Rayleigh
Level: Lv. 1
[Abilities]
Strength: I0 → 42 |
Endurance: I0 → 15 |
Dexterity: I0 → 22 |
Agility: I0 → 39 |
Magic: I0 → 28
[Magic]
[Hado (Destructive Path)]
Offensive Magic | Rapid-Cast Magic | Area-of-Effect Magic
Can use Hadō spells #1–99.
[Bakudō (Binding Path)]
Suppression Magic | Defensive Magic | Barrier Magic
Can use Bakudō spells #1–99.
[Kaidō (Healing Path)]
Healing Magic | Regeneration Magic | Purification Magic
Can use Kaidō spells.
[Skills]
[Soul Blade (Zanpakuto)]
Can forge Zanpakuto.
Can name Zanpakuto.
Gains Excellia when a Zanpakuto achieves a great feat.
...
"A total Excellia increase of about 150 points... That's pretty pathetic," he muttered.
After all, he had only fought Goblins and Dungeon Lizards—absolute garbage-tier monsters when it came to experience.
'My Strength went up so much because I forged Haineko. Just looking at these stats, it's pretty obvious what I've been doing lately.'
...
Armed with his Asauchi and Haineko, Rayleigh left the base and headed straight for the Dungeon.
With his previous run under his belt, he wasn't sweating it at all.
He cruised through the first two floors, one-shotting any monster dumb enough to get in his way.
Pretty soon, he hit the fifth floor.
His promise to Hephaestus only applied to his first trip into the Dungeon.
This was his second.
'She probably won't chew me out for going a little deeper, right?'
Thanks to Haineko, Rayleigh was feeling pretty cocky.
By his math, no monster in the Upper Floors—aside from a few boss-level exceptions—was going to be a threat to him.
Walking through the fifth floor, Rayleigh gripped Haineko's hilt.
The blade itself had long since turned to ash after its Shikai release.
While walking, he would randomly stop and swing the bare hilt through the empty air.
"Guess this is the limit of its range," he muttered after heading deeper in.
He raised Haineko's hilt, and the surrounding dust started vibrating.
Clumps of ash, totally under his control, dragged monster Magic Stones right to his feet.
In less than a minute, over thirty Magic Stones were piled up in front of him.
"Perfect," he said with a smirk. "This is too convenient."
He used the ash cloud to scout for enemies. Once he spotted a monster, he just controlled the dust to slash them.
For the monsters, it was like getting hit in their vitals out of nowhere!
They dropped dead, leaving only their Magic Stones behind.
Then, when he deactivated his Shikai, the dust flying back to the hilt would drag the loot right back to him.
This was his new strategy!
Out-of-sight sniping and assassination!
He could wipe out monsters with zero risk and just scoop up their Magic Stones.
It was way more efficient than fighting the normal way.
After checking how much room he had left in his bag, Rayleigh said screw it and pushed down to the sixth floor.
"Growl, Haineko."
The second he stepped onto the floor, Rayleigh released his Zanpakuto's Shikai.
Better safe than sorry.
From this floor on, the so-called "Rookie Killers" started showing up.
In the Upper Floors, things like Goblins, Kobolds, and Dungeon Lizards were just cannon fodder.
But there were definitely monsters that fresh Adventurers couldn't handle.
Like the War Shadows.
These things were pitch-black, looking like human silhouettes but with weird cross-shaped faces.
They stood around 1.6 meters tall and used the nasty claws on their hands as weapons.
Their speed and attack power were no joke.
And then there was the numbers game.
Monsters in the Dungeon usually followed a rule: the weak ones swarmed you, while the strong ones hunted in small packs or alone.
War Shadows always showed up in groups of four or more.
Pretty soon, Rayleigh ran into a pack of five War Shadows sticking together.
'Gotta strike first.'
Swish!
In the dark, a slash tore through one of the War Shadows, dropping it dead.
The other four scattered like startled birds, throwing the whole area into chaos.
But the dumb monster didn't notice the dust forming a circle right at their feet.
A tornado whipped up by Haineko trapped the four War Shadows inside!
Blinded and disoriented, they panicked, roaring helplessly in place, too scared to take a step.
'Time to end this.'
Sped up by the swirling ash, the grit inside the tornado turned into deadly projectiles.
Rayleigh commanded Haineko to tighten the vortex.
The high-speed dust shredded through the War Shadows' bodies, tearing them apart on the spot!
Blood sprayed from their wounds and mixed into the whirlwind, turning the whole scene into a gory meat grinder.