"One strike – certain death."
When Arata stopped and stood still, the massive Hollow body collapsed to the ground with a dull thud, then turned into particles of spiritual energy and scattered in the air.
The entire training ground fell silent, until Captain Yamamoto lightly cleared his throat – only then did the applause erupt like thunder.
"This is incredible!" a sixth-year student in the audience excitedly slapped the back of his chair. "I didn't know that someone like us, whose spiritual pressure is only at the level of a regular division member, could be this strong?!"
His friend sitting next to him heard these naive words and couldn't help but sneer: "Akio, you don't seriously think that as soon as your spiritual pressure reaches Professor Saito's level, you'll be able to copy his moves, do you?"
"Uh… Shinji, when you put it that way, it really makes sense." The big young man named Akio scratched his head and suddenly realized that the biggest difference between him and Professor Saito wasn't spiritual energy at all.
There was a gap between them that couldn't be bridged talent. It was a wall that separated Arata and most Shinigami.
Even if their spiritual pressure were brought to the same level, the rest would still never be able to move as effortlessly as Arata.
Because they lacked Arata's talent, they couldn't fully integrate the various knowledge and skills they had learned, let alone use them so smoothly in real combat.
At that moment.
Clack—
The pale fingers of Kurotsuchi Mayuri once again touched the control panel, and five cracks appeared in the center of the training ground floor. From them, four black metal cages slowly rose.
With the screech of metal, the gates opened one after another, and five Hollows of different shapes slowly emerged from the darkness.
"Specimens 9528 to 9532, each estimated at standard soldier-level combat strength, standard Hollow group." Kurotsuchi Mayuri's voice carried the typical excitement of a mad scientist.
"So, let's see how Professor Saito handles this…"
Five Hollows of various shapes slowly emerged from the cages.
There was a spider-like Hollow with six arms, then a porcupine-like Hollow covered in spikes, and three dog-shaped Hollows of similar appearance.
Rangiku in the stands gripped the chair arm tightly, a wave of worry rising in her heart.
Under normal circumstances, such weaklings would certainly not be a match for Arata, not to mention her, even regular soldiers under her command could easily deal with them.
However, Arata was now wearing the Soul-Sealing Bracelet, and his spiritual pressure was suppressed to the level of an ordinary soldier.
Facing five Hollows at once definitely meant tremendous pressure.
What was even more unsettling was that they seemed to possess a kind of shared consciousness as soon as they appeared, they spontaneously formed an encirclement formation.
The students in the audience unconsciously held their breath.
Even the expression on the face of Akio, the sixth-year student who had just been full of confidence, changed, the spiritual pressure generated simultaneously by the five Hollows was simply incomparable to when there was only one on the field.
But no matter what the observers thought, Arata, who stood on the field, still didn't feel any pressure.
He was someone who had once compressed and broken through the siege of a pack of Adjuchas all by himself. Even when his spiritual energy was suppressed to less than one-three-hundredth of its peak, he was not someone these scraps could overpower.
Arata's voice remained calm: "When facing multiple enemies, the first thing is... "
Before he could finish the sentence, all five Hollows leapt at once!
The spider launched its six arms like spears, the porcupine Hollow curled into a ball and rolled straight under Arata's feet, while the three dog-like Hollows surrounded him in a fan formation, cutting off all escape routes.
"to control the rhythm of the battlefield."
Arata's silhouette suddenly blurred, and in the next moment, he appeared above the spider Hollow.
His right index finger glowed with a soft blue light and precisely pointed toward the center of the enemy's eye.
"Hadō #4: Byakurai!"
Tiny lightning pierced through the spider Hollow's eye, and it let out a sharp scream, blindly waving its six arms just enough to block the path of the rolling porcupine Hollow.
The two crashed into each other, and Arata used that momentum to leap again, temporarily avoiding the danger of being surrounded.
"The second key point... " he flipped in the air, dodging the attacks of the three dog-like Hollows, "is to create chaos among the enemies."
The moment he touched the ground, Arata suddenly charged toward the dog-Hollow on the left.
The Hollow instinctively opened its jaws wide to bite, but Arata slipped under its belly, simultaneously drawing his Zanpakutō and slashing the joint of its hind leg.
Shhh!
The sound of a limb breaking rang out clearly.
The dog-like Hollow, now missing one leg, collapsed to the ground with a howl, and in doing so tripped the second dog that charged from behind.
Arata used their overlapping bodies as steps, launched himself off them, and flew toward the porcupine Hollow on the other side.
"The third point... " he concentrated his already limited spiritual pressure on his Zanpakutō and stabbed it with surgical precision into the gaps between the Hollow's armored scales, "is to eliminate the enemy that poses the greatest threat first."
The porcupine Hollow, struck in its weak spot, bent in pain, and the spikes on its body shot in all directions like a rain of arrows.
However, Arata seemed to have anticipated all this in advance and instantly appeared behind the spider Hollow, using it as a natural shield.
Puff, puff, puff—!
Dozens of spikes pierced the spider Hollow's body. It let out a ghastly scream and began frantically pounding the ground with its arms.
Tōshirō's eyes lit up in the stands: "So this is possible too!"
"Amazing!" Kusanagi Sojirō couldn't help but rise to his feet. "Saito-sensei is making the Hollows fight each other, not wasting even a speck of Reiatsu!"
Arata on the field was already standing in front of the third dog-Hollow.
The Zanpakutō in his hand merely grazed the edge of the Hollow's mask.
"The final point, and the most important of all," he said, his voice remaining clear even at high speed, "is not to let your current advantage go to your head. Always maintain a calm mind."
The moment the third dog-Hollow collapsed to the ground, Arata was already in front of the porcupine Hollow.
Just as the porcupine Hollow stretched out from its curled position, the tip of its nose was struck by a precise Byakurai.
"Hadō #4: Byakurai." Arata spoke calmly, as if killing an insignificant fish.
This time, the lightning was slightly thicker than before and directly pierced the porcupine Hollow's mask.
Its huge body stiffened for a moment, then collapsed backward, turning into spirit particles and dispersing.
At that moment, only three Hollows remained on the field: the spider Hollow with an injured eye, the dog-Hollow with a broken leg, and one completely unharmed dog-Hollow.
After a brief battle – or rather, after a one-sided game and complete domination – even they seemed to realize how terrifying and dangerous the Shinigami before them was, and they even began to retreat together.
"See, even they are afraid." Arata briefly paused and pointed out the detail to the students in the stands. "Hollows are not entirely devoid of reason. They too know fear of the stronger."
With light steps, he approached the spider Hollow, and the six-armed monster actually began crawling back toward the cage, trembling.
"But as Shinigami, we mustn't be sentimental." Arata's voice suddenly turned cold. "Every time we let a Hollow escape, it could mean an innocent soul will perish."
His figure blurred in an instant, and in the next moment he was beside the spider Hollow, pulled his blade, and sliced through its mask in one stroke.
Another one fell.
Then, without turning, he released a white lightning bolt; Byakurai shot like a bullet and pierced the unharmed dog-Hollow, ending the battle cleanly and neatly.
In the end, the dog-Hollow with the broken leg was whining on the ground, but surprisingly, Arata didn't immediately finish it off.
"When the situation is safe... " he crouched beside it, gently touching the broken limb with his fingers, "we can also try to understand the enemy."
Reiatsu with Kaidō properties flowed through the wound, and the whining of the dog-like Hollow gradually faded.
Arata carefully observed its reaction and suddenly frowned.
"Just as I thought." He stood up. "This Hollow's Reiatsu is abnormal, it has slight regenerative abilities. It probably mutated due to prolonged exposure to high-density Hueco Mundo dust."
Kurotsuchi Mayuri in the stands suddenly became visibly more interested. "Oh? Professor Saito knows about that too?"
"I know a little." Arata modestly replied, and at the same time, with a clean movement, ended the life of the last Hollow.
He turned to the students in the audience and said: "That's why, remember well – every detail on the battlefield can become the key to survival and victory."
"Know your enemy, so you can defeat them better."
When even the last Hollow turned to spirit particles and vanished, thunderous applause once again echoed through the combat arena.
Even Yamamoto Genryūsai, who always had the strictest standards, nodded slightly, a note of recognition appearing in his gaze.
"Truly an outstanding combat demonstration." Captain Yamamoto leaned on his staff and stood up, his voice full of praise.
"In this battle, Professor Saito has proven one truth: true strength does not lie in how much spiritual energy you possess, but in how you use every drop of it."
Arata removed the Soul-Sealing Bracelet, and the surging spiritual pressure within his body returned like a tide.
He bowed deeply to the captain, smiled modestly, and said: "Thank you for the praise, Captain. It's all thanks to the excellent teaching at the Shinō Spiritual Arts Academy."
In truth, Yamamoto disagreed with that last statement.
True power is when you can crush your opponent to death with spiritual pressure alone.
"Don't give me that crap," Shiba Isshin cursed under his breath in the stands, "this kid's bootlicking gets better by the day…"
In the cheerful atmosphere, Rangiku quietly let out a sigh of relief.
Only she knew how much she had worried about her man just now, but thankfully, nothing unexpected happened, and instead he delivered a performance so perfect that no one could find a single flaw.