"???"
"This voice… it really is His Majesty!"
"But… why… isn't this Ichigo Kurosaki's inner world?"
"How could His Majesty possibly… show up here?!"
The ones who were the most shaken,
were of course the pure-blood Quincies of the Wandenreich.
Right now,
every single one of them was frozen on the spot,
like stone statues that had been nailed in place, not moving an inch, their faces completely blank.
It was as if someone had glued their joints together.
Apart from desperately swallowing,
their throats couldn't make a single sound!
They were too shocked…
Just at the end of the previous countdown clip,
they had personally witnessed Yhwach become the new Soul King!
And that kind of invincible existence who was about to seize control of the entire Soul Reaper world…
had actually…
for some reason they couldn't even begin to understand,
run off into Ichigo Kurosaki's body.
On top of that, even his tone when he spoke
was full of concern, almost… affectionate!
That was what truly blew the minds of the Wandenreich elites!!!
Damn…
Had His Majesty developed a split personality?
Not long ago he'd almost been cut down by Ichigo Kurosaki!
How did it turn into this—
turning around and talking to the same guy again…
and his tone could actually sound this gentle?!
Had the plot gone completely off the rails already?
In that instant…
Haschwalth, Valkyrie, Lille Barro… and the rest of the Sternritter elites,
all stood there in a daze.
They felt half out of their minds, like they were questioning their entire existence.
And when they looked back at Ichigo Kurosaki on the screen,
every one of their gazes was extremely complicated.
Their hostility dropped by half in an instant.
Ichigo Kurosaki…
Fine, we admit it, we were a bit too harsh with our words before.
If even His Majesty is sheltering you…
Then you really are
the crown prince of the Soul Reaper world, huh?!!
————
On the other side,
over in Soul Society,
the Soul Reapers' mental states weren't any better.
"Huh?"
"Yhwach? Him again!!"
They had only just relaxed a little,
barely catching their breath after the decisive battle around the Soul King.
The captains had been hoping to sit back and quietly enjoy Ichigo Kurosaki's cheat-code-life highlight reel.
But who would've thought…
The damn countdown had just begun,
and Yhwach's shadowy presence was already about to pop up again!
So he really was going to keep hunting them down forever, huh?
Never planning to let them off?
They were tired…
Even as they were shocked,
fear and exhaustion flickered in the captains' eyes.
At the same time…
everyone couldn't help but wonder:
Just what exactly was the relationship between Ichigo Kurosaki and Yhwach?
There was no denying it—
the fact that he possessed Quincy power inherited from his mother, Masaki Kurosaki,
was already common knowledge to the audience.
But that still didn't explain why
there would be a Yhwach living inside every single Quincy!
Seriously?!
Did they think the Quincy King was some mass-produced toy being sold wholesale on the roadside, one per person?
That was way too ridiculous!!!
"Old man… what do you think?"
Shunsui Kyōraku was the first to break the silence, looking up at the figure in the chief's seat.
"Hmm…"
The old man shook his head.
Even though he loathed the voice of his mortal enemy,
he still answered honestly:
"Perhaps it is merely that this old man's vision is too narrow. In over two thousand years, I have never heard of such a bizarre thing…"
The Captain-Commander was baffled as well.
They'd opened this countdown with a royal straight flush—
Ichigo Kurosaki had just lobbed a thunderbolt into the room and blown everyone's minds.
If, from here on out,
they couldn't make sense of his connection with Yhwach…
then for the next few years,
the old man could forget about ever getting a peaceful night's sleep.
A savior.
A final boss.
And now there was the possibility
that the two of them might actually be on the same side?
Who could understand this…
Turns out the clowns were us Soul Reapers all along!!!
————
Meanwhile,
inside Urahara's little shop,
Kisuke Urahara and the others were just as stunned.
"Kisuke Urahara…"
"Hurry up! Use that brain of yours and explain what in the world is going on here!"
Isshin Kurosaki was panicking.
He grabbed Urahara's shoulders, shaking him as he spoke.
He wasn't just shocked that
Yhwach might have run into Ichigo's body.
It was also because…
Just now,
the way Yhwach had called Ichigo's name—
had triggered a primal sense of crisis in him as Ichigo's father!!!
He wasn't afraid of being cuckolded.
What terrified him was that someone might snatch away even the title of "Dad"!
Could it be that this bastard Yhwach
wanted to acknowledge Ichigo as his son too?
"Mr. Isshin…"
"Please calm down first!"
Being pinned down so hard,
Urahara felt like his shoulders were about to pop out of their sockets.
He could only reply helplessly:
"I understand how you feel, but…"
"When it comes to something like this, I really can't explain it right away!!!"
He pulled a wry face.
Kisuke Urahara was telling the truth.
In theory, inside a person's inner world,
there shouldn't be any outsiders intruding at all!
"Unless…"
Urahara's expression suddenly changed.
A flash of inspiration hit him—
he'd thought of an even more outrageous possibility.
He swallowed once, then said in shock:
"The only thing that's directly tied to a Soul Reaper's power… is the spirit of their Zanpakutō!!"
Hearing that,
the people around him—Yoruichi, Tessai Tsukabishi, and Isshin Kurosaki—
all jumped in fright.
They sprang up like compressed springs,
kicking over the low table as they cried out in unison:
"Wha…at?!"
"You're saying…
that the spirit of Ichigo's Zanpakutō, 'Zangetsu,' is actually a king-class being?!"
They were dumbfounded.
Under such a huge impact,
everyone's minds went completely blank. Their jaws all dropped.
As powerhouses who had once held captain-class rank,
how could Yoruichi and the others not understand what a sword spirit was?
Simply put,
it was the independent entity with its own form and will
that resided inside a Zanpakutō.
It was the concrete embodiment of a Soul Reaper's power!!!
And for every single Zanpakutō,
its sword spirit was unique,
with an extremely high degree of compatibility with its wielder.
For example:
Shunsui Kyōraku was a lecherous drunk.
So the spirit of Katen Kyōkotsu
took the form of a seductive beauty.
As for Soi Fon's Zanpakutō, Suzumebachi—
its spirit was just as tiny and fierce as her,
three little loli girls shaped like bees…
And that…
meant that the Yhwach who was about to appear
inside Ichigo Kurosaki's inner world…
was actually the sword spirit of "Zangetsu"!!!
At least,
at this very moment,
with the knowledge he possessed, this was the only interpretation
Kisuke Urahara could accept by instinct.
Otherwise,
no one could explain
how, for no reason at all,
three different Zanpakutō
could all end up connected to that evil Yhwach!
————
At the same time,
under the stunned stares of viewers all over the world,
inside the video—
when Ichigo Kurosaki heard the voice calling him and turned around,
the camera followed.
It shifted along his line of sight, turning toward the opposite side.
And sure enough—
it confirmed that the audience hadn't misheard anything.
Because…
off in the distance,
a familiar figure appeared.
He was still wearing that dark red cloak-like coat.
His long black hair fluttered, and there were three eerie eyes visible on his face.
All in all,
aside from looking a little less weathered, a bit younger, and not quite as vicious—
plus the lack of that big thick beard—
the Yhwach appearing in the scene now
was at least ninety percent identical
to the Wandenreich Emperor they'd seen earlier!!!
When this frame froze and it became clear
that Ichigo Kurosaki's inner world
really did contain a Yhwach—
never mind whether he looked younger or not,
just the visual impact alone
was enough to—
in the very next instant,
set off a second wave of shock
throughout the entire Bleach world!
The audience was completely flipped upside down!!!
"This is insane…"
"I finally understand why Ichigo Kurosaki's Zanpakutō ranked number one!"
"Damn it, when even the sword spirit is the Quincy King, what else is there to say…"
"This kid is running full hacks from level one, there's no sportsmanship at all!!!"
They were both stunned
and utterly speechless.
The audience suddenly realized—
this round of ranking was probably going to be nothing like the previous ones.
The word "cheat"
was guaranteed to run through the entire thing!!!
————
"This is…"
"Why does he look so familiar…"
Inside First Division,
the Captain-Commander leaned on his wooden staff, hunching forward toward the screen.
He squinted for a moment,
then quickly rummaged through his memories.
"This old man remembers now!"
"That is Yhwach from a thousand years ago!!!"
"Back then, when he led his forces to invade Soul Society, this was exactly what he looked like!!!"
His tone was absolutely certain.
Even if that thorn in his side were burned to ash,
the old man could recognize him with a single glance.
"Huh?"
"A thousand years ago?!"
Shunsui Kyōraku's eyes went wide.
"Wait… this is getting more and more outrageous the longer I listen!"
"A Yhwach from a thousand years ago should be even less likely to have any relationship with Ichigo Kurosaki, right?!"
"Exactly…"
Jūshirō Ukitake found it just as bizarre.
"In terms of age, forget Ichigo Kurosaki—
even his mother, that Quincy girl…"
"Even if she were still alive now, she'd only be a middle-aged woman at best. That's not even a fraction of a thousand years!"
"How could there possibly be any connection?"
Below them,
it wasn't just the two of them.
The other captains were all shaking their heads as well.
They scratched their heads raw and still couldn't figure it out—
how a youthful version of Yhwach could mysteriously end up
inside a human's soul,
and that human just so happened to be Ichigo Kurosaki,
the one and only protagonist who would clash blades with the middle-aged Yhwach in the future!
Good grief…
Even the creepiest ghost story couldn't top this!!!
"Grr…"
"Who cares about the details…"
Among the crowd,
Kenpachi Zaraki was the only one getting more excited, grinning savagely as he said:
"Whether he's a sword spirit or not, at the very least this scene already proves that Ichigo Kurosaki's Zanpakutō…"
"Deserves it! It really has what it takes to be number one!!!"
Kenpachi grew more and more fired up.
As someone who'd already marked Ichigo as his prey,
the higher Ichigo and "Zangetsu" showed their potential,
the more it tickled the nerves of the king of raw sword swings.
Beating up ordinary opponents
or chopping apart some run-of-the-mill Zanpakutō
couldn't give Zaraki any joy or satisfaction at all.
But to cleave apart
a Zanpakutō whose spirit was the pure Quincy King—
there was probably nothing
more fun or more satisfying than that, was there?
————
Back to the video.
High up in midair,
the blood-red cloak whipped around like a swirling vortex.
Yhwach was floating there,
asking once again:
"Ichigo…"
"Can you hear my voice?"
However,
just as Yhwach was about to reveal his trump card,
it was as if some kind of restriction kicked in—
he couldn't say the name "Zangetsu."
The word was blocked in his throat, unable to come out.
After that,
through a brief exchange,
Ichigo Kurosaki was told that if he didn't want his inner world to collapse,
to be corroded and fall completely, becoming a true Hollow…
then within a limited time,
he had to pick out, from countless white boxes crashing down as the skyscrapers collapsed,
the one box that contained
the Shinigami power that had been hidden in his soul all along!!!
"Boom!!!"
In the next instant,
the entire scene was filled with endless white boxes.
They were packed densely into every corner of the space.
It was a staggering sight.
"Huh?"
"There are that many?!"
"And he only gets to find the one correct one? This drop rate is way too low!"
"It's worse than the gacha in that mobile game I was playing with Zhixi the other day…"
Out in the outskirts of Karakura Town,
inside an abandoned warehouse,
Shinji Hirako dug in his ear, speaking lazily.
He couldn't help but complain.
Whether that "Uncle Zangetsu"—this younger Yhwach—
was faking it,
or really was who he claimed to be…
"Rock said it before: a Soul Reaper's spiritual power is red in color!!!"
And just like that,
a flash of inspiration hit Ichigo.
It didn't even take him thirty seconds.
He instantly pulled off a move
only a VIP level-10 player would use—
and easily picked out
the one box containing his Shinigami power!!!
At last,
that sequence came to an end.
The camera followed Ichigo Kurosaki's consciousness
back to the present world.
He pulled out of his inner world
just before it collapsed, putting a stop to the Hollowfication that was about to complete.
"Boom—!!!"
His body landed,
kicking up a massive shockwave of air.
Ichigo stepped out from within it,
and under the camera's close-up,
he showed off yet another resurrected, brand-new form!
His black shihakushō billowed in the wind.
On his back was his Zanpakutō, appearing once more as if it had never been broken.
But the most eye-catching part
was the Hollow mask covering his face—
made of bone-white material,
with three vertical red streaks running down it!
This form that perfectly fused Soul Reaper and Hollow power into one—
the moment it appeared, it detonated the fanbase.
The audience was instantly reminded:
On top of his Soul Reaper power
and his inherited pure Quincy power…
Ichigo Kurosaki also had that old "White" Hollow inside him!!!
A monstrous factor created from Soul Reaper souls—
the source of the Hollowfication power left in his body!!!
Among all viewers,
the ones who were the most shocked
and also the most excited,
were the Visored who had just been complaining.
"?!"
"That mask…"
"Isn't that the same as ours?"
Shinji Hirako stiffened for a moment,
then frowned, feeling a deep familiarity.
"It's practically identical to our masks—
it's like Ichigo has already merged with us!"
"Right…"
Kensei Muguruma clenched his fist.
"To be honest, even though we've never actually met Ichigo Kurosaki—"
"Seeing him like this, it doesn't feel like we're looking at a stranger at all!"
Off to the side,
Lisa Yadōmaru pushed her glasses up, following Kensei's words with hopeful eyes:
"There's a real chance here…"
"Isn't it possible, as fellow mask-bearers,
that Ichigo Kurosaki will actually join us in the future?"
"After all…"
"If he didn't, then in that future, there's no way our presence would be this low!!!"
In that moment,
the Visored collectively decided:
the appearance of that Hollow mask definitely wasn't a coincidence—
it was a huge, flashing hint.
And that "White" lurking inside Ichigo,
an Adjuchas-class monster more terrifying than any captain-killing Hollow—
when would it show itself onscreen,
and smack them all in the face three times over?
Everyone waited with bated breath…
(End of Chapter)
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