"Gahh...?!"
Within their hazy vision, the Hitsugaya advance unit and the living world's spiritual power users desperately maintained consciousness.
Perhaps because their opponent was a former comrade-in-arms, Hinamori Momo, ensnared by a great evil's malice. Even witnessing spiritual pressure threatening to incinerate all the air in town, the members of the advance unit who refused to break were truly the Seireitei's finest.
However, it was also true that both their abilities and hearts were faltering. The battle with a friend that had begun without resolve was hell itself, with no hope of victory in sight.
In the midst of such wavering surroundings, the first to move was the genius scientist who had forced bitter defeats upon them countless times over the past twenty years—Urahara Kisuke. Ignoring the dazed surroundings, the former captain laid groundwork to capture the enemy with his zanpakuto.
"Binding Benihime!"
Black band-like spiritual pressure instantly coiled around Hinamori's body. But seeing her unchanged expression, Urahara immediately requested backup.
"Ms. Yoruichi! Mr. Abarai!"
"W-wait...!"
"Leave it to me, Kisuke! Sokin Tosa!"
"Damn it, Bankai!"
—Hihio Zabimaru—
Toshiro's shouts were already meaningless. Following the kido chains Yoruichi unleashed, Renji's skeletal serpent constricted around Hinamori's small frame. Triple restraints from a zanpakuto, spiritual weapon, and Bankai. Everyone thought escape would be difficult.
"There's no one there."
But suddenly, a woman's voice was heard from behind Madarame Ikkaku, who had barely been enduring the spiritual pressure.
"What—gahh!"
"Ikkaku?!"
Without even being allowed to turn around, one of the Soul Society's finest fighters bloomed with blood flowers and fell to the ground.
"Impossible...! I definitely captured her...?!"
Renji hurriedly uncoiled his serpent bones. But what his eyes saw was the girl's figure vanishing like countless scattering petals.
"A clone... you say...?"
Impossible. That had definitely been emanating Hinamori's spiritual pressure. As the surroundings reacted in shock, the former vice-captain quietly revealed her trick.
"It's a technique from the Kido Corps—condensing spiritual pressure to create a human form. Originally used as bait in capture missions to make Hollows bite, but with a little ingenuity, it can also be used as a decoy."
And then Hinamori paused with an unnaturally deliberate beat...
"Like this, you can easily get behind your opponent."
Their ally's blood once again suddenly danced through the air.
The one slashed was Ayasegawa Yumichika, who had kept the most distance while staying conscious of coordinating with Ikkaku. The way he collapsed without uttering a sound made everyone realize recovery was impossible.
The group stood in shock. Looking down at them, Hinamori clenched her fists and proudly thrust out her chest in false bravado.
"If I can't manage this much deception, I'd be unworthy as Lord Aizen's servant."
The spirited words were perhaps the girl's self-suggestion. But to those furious at seeing their comrades struck down, it didn't appear that way.
"Damn it, Hinamori, you—!"
"Stop, Renji!"
The young man, enraged by Hinamori cutting down his fellow Soul Reapers one after another, finally resolved to fight her. Shaking off Rukia's restraining hand as she still hesitated, the giant serpent bones he controlled raised their heads to punish his former classmate.
"It's fine, Abarai. Take it out on me."
"Don't you dare look down on me! Hikotsu Taiho!!"
Neither evading nor counterattacking, simply standing with her eyes cast down in melancholy, Hinamori took the maximum firepower of Renji's Hihio Zabimaru head-on.
The spiritual pressure cannonball scored a direct hit. Vision darkened with the crimson explosion, and the burned air became white smoke around them.
And beyond the clearing smoke—
"You've gotta be kidding..."
—She stood there, unchanged.
It had been his full power precisely because he understood the difference in their abilities. It should have delivered power equal to—no, greater than—when he defeated Ilfort last month since he was less exhausted, yet the opponent emerged completely unharmed.
But when the shaken Renji realized the approaching crisis, it was already over.
"What?!"
"The Legion Commander's position isn't so light that I'd fall to a technique that can barely defeat a Números."
A flash.
Immediately after searing pain shot through his torso, without even being allowed to feel frustration at his own powerlessness, Renji lost all vision as the last sensation of heat draining from his body faded.
Comrades plummeting to the ground below one after another. It all happened in the blink of an eye.
"Growl, Haineko...!"
Was it at least a matter of pride, or could the girl no longer bear to pile on more sins? Matsumoto Rangiku, barely able to stand under the spiritual pressure, made the ash of her zanpakuto—entrusted with her feelings—swirl around Hinamori.
Of course, she knew from the start it would be scattered with a single swing. Having drawn the opponent's attention, Rangiku desperately pleaded with her friend.
"Hinamori... please, stop..."
For an instant, was it a futile illusion that the girl's expressionless mask twisted?
"I'm sorry, Ms. Rangiku."
Without learning the answer, Rangiku lost consciousness before an unfamiliar kido.
—I have no choice but to do this anymore...
***
One by one, comrades disappeared, and the remaining forces had been reduced to half—five people.
But more than half of those five were already in tatters. Kurosaki Ichigo, covered in wounds from his battle with Grimmjow. Kuchiki Rukia, gasping for breath under the enemy's spiritual pressure. From the Soul Society's reinforcements, only Captain Toshiro remained combat-capable, and even he was simply in despair at the clear betrayal by the girl who had been like family. With such a pained expression, he would only become a burden now.
Ruthlessly abandoning their allies in such a devastated state, Urahara Kisuke and Shihoin Yoruichi continued to watch for an opening.
"Kisuke, what's her fusion state?"
"I don't know... I keep periodically losing track of her spiritual pressure. I hope she's just hiding it with Hakufuku..."
"High-order soul sublimation, eh... For synchronization to progress this far in such a short time, she has terrifying compatibility."
The two continued their analysis in low voices.
In truth, this battle was completely unexpected for Urahara, and simultaneously the greatest opportunity.
Their objective was to steal back the "source of power" embedded within this spiritual pressure monster, Hinamori Momo's soul. But without the firepower to eliminate her soul entirely, and emotionally reluctant to do so, the only means available to them were indirect tactics.
So the two waited for an opportunity. And their long patience was suddenly rewarded.
"Young lady, you're raging a bit too much."
Along with a voice suddenly cast down from above, a tremendous mass of spiritual pressure rained down. A red-black flash of light—the Hollow's trump card, Cero.
The attack unleashed from outside her consciousness struck Hinamori floating in the air directly, causing a massive explosion.
"You're late, Mr. Hirako!"
"Shut up, idiot! One more millimeter deeper and I'd be dead!"
The one who appeared clutching his blood-soaked abdomen was Hirako Shinji. Encouraged by the revival of the fighting force they'd been hoping for—thinking perhaps he could manage it—Urahara poured spiritual pressure into his zanpakuto all at once.
But there was no trace of Hinamori's spiritual pressure in the Cero's explosion.
"Don't tell me...!"
"It's a substitute, Kisuke!"
A moment of wavering. But Yoruichi, who hadn't taken her eyes off the enemy for even a blink despite Hirako's surprise attack, moved immediately.
There was no strategy yet to neutralize the vicious compound kido of Hakufuku and Kyokko. But Yoruichi's trained observational eye predicted and captured subsequent actions through minute muscle movements and shifts in center of gravity.
"You won't escape!"
"...!"
Thus, relying on an instant of dissonance, the charging warrior woman showed the enemy her epithet of "Flash Goddess."
"Captured, Hinamori Momo!"
When Urahara and the others looked toward the voice, there was Yoruichi restraining Hinamori in a full nelson, her expression mechanical. Not a spiritual pressure clone—definitely the girl's real body.
At this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity summoned by one of the Soul Society's greatest female warriors, the veteran masters pressed their attack without delay.
"Do it even if you hit me!"
"This time I'm taking it, young lady...! Grit your teeth!!"
"Leave it to me! Kirisaki Benihime!"
Not missing this opportunity that would never come again, countless spiritual power blades shot from Urahara's crimson membrane shield rushed at Hinamori all at once. From above came Hirako's second Cero. Both attacks carried destructive power on a different level than before.
And in the brief interval before the barrage struck the immobilized girl—
"I can see that setup too."
Suddenly, bright red petals danced around her. The vicious illusionary kido that Hinamori Momo had shown in the previous attack.
"Wha... ah..."
"Ms. Yoruichi!"
No matter how vigilant, there was no way to avoid it at point-blank range while restraining the person herself. Yoruichi was assailed by the terrifying sensation of her five senses being sucked into a kaleidoscope, and her consciousness was erased.
And freed from her arms, Hinamori wrapped her sword in spiritual pressure that distorted space itself... and mowed down heaven and earth.
"Baien: Kazashibi."
In that instant, buckshot of unimaginable firepower exploded from that blade.
The countless lethal sparks that burst out in a fan shape vaporized Urahara's Kirisaki Benihime and Hirako's Cero together, attacking the two with undiminished momentum.
"This is bad! Wake up, Benihime!!"
"No way... you serious...?!"
Having barely escaped Hinamori's attack, Hirako involuntarily caught his breath. If he'd taken buckshot of that spiritual pressure intensity, he would have been minced in an instant.
But his momentary lapse in vigilance while checking on Urahara's safety after taking it head-on was a mouth-watering opening for Hinamori Momo.
"Please treasure that remaining one millimeter of life."
"?! Shi—"
Immediately after Hinamori's right hand lightly touched his chest, Hirako's vision was dyed in rainbow colors. Probably the same powerful spiritual pressure disruption technique similar to Hakufuku that had defeated Yoruichi. Even the Visored couldn't resist before the violence of such turbulent, massive spiritual pressure, and Hirako Shinji collapsed with frustration in his heart.
"So this is what it means to be Aizen's favorite...!"
As for Urahara Kisuke, just before the enemy's scattered sparks shattered his Blood Mist Shield, he escaped danger at the last moment by using a portable gigai as a substitute. He desperately searched for Hinamori, whose figure and spiritual pressure had vanished at the same moment Hirako was taken down.
That vicious compound kido again. To counter this, he'd just loaded a large amount of tracking kido onto Kirisaki Benihime before shooting, but the result was failure—the opponent had noticed. The impatient Urahara seriously deliberated whether to use his trump card meant for Aizen here.
However, at the destination where he'd used shunpo to swap places with the gigai to gain distance—
"I should thank Mr. Yammy."
Urahara was trapped in a spherical barrier.
"What?!"
She'd noticed. Had she seen him use it on the Espada earlier? He wanted to curse his past self for getting excited testing the new gigai and blabbing explanations to that Yammy guy.
He tried the countermeasure for the Negación armament that the old "bookworm" had used on him as a last resort, but it had no effect. There was no way barrier analysis would work in this short time either.
All was lost. Looking up bitterly, he saw Hinamori Momo displaying what seemed like the first genuine fighting spirit in her eyes since arriving here.
"I'm sorry. I cannot show you any mercy."
And her zanpakuto, which passed through into the barrier, carried the most absurd density of spiritual pressure he'd ever seen in his life.
"Kogogu Ringen: Utayatsure."
A meteor shower twinkling in peach. That scenic view of destruction was the entirety of the world Urahara Kisuke saw last.