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"Ikkaku Madarame."
"Yumichika Ayasegawa."
"Quit standing around and act as porters. Get Zaraki Kenpachi out of here, now. Don't interfere with my scientific experiment."
With his back to the camera, Mayuri barked orders in a supremely arrogant tone.
The moment they heard that, the two brothers of the Eleventh Division were stunned speechless.
"Huh? Wait, what… I was actually there?"
Ikkaku blinked, disbelief written all over his face.
You've got to be kidding.
That enemy was the legendary Soul King's left arm.
Was a lowly seated officer like him really supposed to be involved in a fight on that level?
"Hey… when we move Captain Zaraki, you don't think Captain Kurotsuchi might stab us in the back too, do you?"
Yumichika wiped cold sweat from his brow.
Given Mayuri's personality, nothing was impossible.
Thankfully, their worries turned out to be unnecessary.
As the camera angle shifted, Ikkaku and Yumichika appeared on screen one after the other.
Under the watchful eyes of countless viewers, the two of them safely dragged Kenpachi aside without incident, leaving the battlefield entirely to Mayuri.
Opposite them.
Clearly displeased by Mayuri's earlier words, the Soul King's left arm slowly spread its five fingers. From the eye in its palm came stiff, halting human speech.
"Unforgivable…"
"Your… actions… must be punished."
The broken syllables carried an overwhelming fury.
At the same time, crimson nerve endings writhed wildly through the air, moving in sync with the left arm's will.
"Oh my, oh my…"
"So it can imitate human speech now? The Soul King's left arm really does keep surprising me."
Ichimaru Gin wore his trademark fox-like smile, his gaze full of curiosity as he watched the grotesque being.
"Gin, why do you think Zaraki Kenpachi lost his arm?"
Aizen's calm, probing voice came from beside him.
"Well, if I had to guess, it's probably those red nerve endings. He must've touched them, and that caused his arm to sever itself against his will."
Cunning as ever, Gin saw through the ability at a glance.
And Aizen readily agreed.
"Exactly. Those spreading nerve endings appear capable of controlling both organic and inorganic matter. It's an astonishing power."
Aizen spoke with genuine admiration.
Contact, spread, control.
The Soul King's left arm clearly possessed a kind of forced execution ability, freely dominating anything it touched.
To control everything. To rule everything.
A power like that.
Even in the monster-infested world of the Soul Society, it sat firmly at the very top.
"But if that's the case, doesn't that mean Kurotsuchi has no chance at all? And yet… he looks awfully confident."
Gin asked deliberately.
"Overall, Kurotsuchi may not measure up to Urahara Kisuke, but when it comes to research, they're on equal footing. He may still have plenty of hidden tricks."
As a fellow researcher, Aizen rarely offered praise, but this time he fully acknowledged Mayuri's scientific prowess.
"Let's wait and see."
"I'm really looking forward to this fight. It's going to be very different from the ones before."
Back on the battlefield.
"Hehehe…"
"Judging by that look in your eyes, you must hate me quite a bit. You pitiful creature who can barely even speak."
The air was thick with dense, blood-red nerve endings, packed so tightly it was enough to trigger anyone's trypophobia.
And yet.
Mayuri felt nothing.
Not fear. Not hesitation.
Instead, he was ecstatic at having found the perfect experimental specimen.
That arrogant sneer of his, unsurprisingly, enraged the Soul King's left arm even further.
"RAAAAAAAHHHHH!!"
From the tiny eyeballs embedded within it came a roar that shook the heavens.
Before the horrified eyes of countless spectators, the cells of the left arm began to divide and multiply uncontrollably. Its body swelled at an explosive rate.
In just a few breaths.
It had grown to well over a hundred meters tall.
As its massive fingers moved, an enormous shadow spread across the ground.
This nightmarish sight sent another wave of shock through the gathered elites.
"What's going on? Can it grow endlessly? It feels like not just its size, but its pressure has increased dramatically too!"
They stared at the gigantic arm that nearly vanished into the clouds.
At the countless nerve endings standing upright in the wind, swaying and writhing.
Even Arrancar hardened by endless slaughter felt their scalps tingle, unable to look away.
"This is far too strange. I've never seen anything like this. It's completely different from our Hollow regeneration…"
Rubbing his forehead beneath his glasses-shaped mask, Szayelaporro's eyes were filled with disbelief.
Beyond being stunned by the Soul King's left arm's twin abilities of infinite proliferation and forced domination, what shocked him even more was this.
Mayuri Kurotsuchi, a Shinigami scientist, actually dared to face it alone.
That alone put him to shame.
"First there was that freakish body that couldn't be killed no matter what. Now this left arm that can forcibly control everything…"
"Just how many absurd abilities are pure-blood Quincy hiding?"
Nnoitra stared blankly ahead.
It was as if his soul had been stripped away, leaving behind nothing but an empty shell.
Looking back, his once-proud 'strongest Hierro' felt utterly worthless in the face of these monstrous powers.
The gap in strength was so vast it crushed his pride beneath its heel.
By now.
The Soul King's left arm had finished expanding.
At the center of its colossal body, two furious eyes locked onto Mayuri.
"Kill you!"
"Fuse with your body and become… a puppet of the Quincy!"
This time was different.
After its savage growth, its speech had become far smoother, its words far clearer.
At the same time.
Driven by its will.
Tens of thousands of nerve endings lashed out like vines, surging toward Mayuri.
"You want to dominate my body? Heh…"
His gaze darkened.
As if offended that a mere "test subject" would dare speak with such arrogance, Mayuri let out a cold, chilling laugh."Talk again once you're actually capable of touching me."
Boom!
Everywhere the crimson nerves spread, the ground responded.
Rocky surfaces erupted with blood-vessel-like red patterns, stacking and merging at terrifying speed.
Then—
A gigantic stone hand formed, blotting out the sky.
And immediately after that—
It slammed down toward Mayuri with overwhelming force!
"Crap!"
"Captain Mayuri, get out of the way!"
Voices rang out from behind. Ikkaku Madarame and Yumichika Ayasegawa shouted in alarm.
Worried about being caught by the spreading nerve endings, they had already dragged Kenpachi Zaraki's sedated body back to what they thought was a safe distance.
But just as Mayuri prepared to dodge—
From both his left and right, two more massive stone arms suddenly took shape!
"Shi…ni…ga…mi…"
In stiff, halting human speech, the voice continued, as if delivering a death sentence.
"Pernida Parnkgjas. That is my name. Remember it… as you die."
Surrounded by countless nerve endings, every possible escape route was sealed off.
Three colossal stone arms crashed down from different directions at once.
"BOOOOM!!!"
In a deafening explosion, Mayuri's figure was completely swallowed by smoke and debris, vanishing from sight.
"Is it over?"
The thick smoke obscured the view, making it impossible to see what was happening on the battlefield.
Isshin Shiba stood rigid, every nerve in his body stretched taut. He barely dared to breathe.
That exchange had been far too dangerous.
They couldn't touch the red nerve endings, and at the same time they had to fend off endless inorganic monsters attacking from all sides.
In a situation like this, the longer it dragged on, the more advantageous it became for the Soul King's Left Arm.
Unless its growth and evolution could be stopped, the nerves would eventually spread across the entire land.
And when that happened—
It wouldn't just be this battlefield.
The whole True World City, everything organic and inorganic within this space, would fall under the Left Arm's control.
"Seeing this, I can't help but feel relieved," Urahara Kisuke muttered."Thank goodness my opponent was just that poison freak. At least Benihime lets me hold my own."
"If I ever ran into the Soul King's Left Arm… even Benihime might get forcibly taken over."
Cold sweat soaked his back.
He knew his own technological arsenal might rival Mayuri's, but without extensive preparation, facing the Left Arm under any circumstances would end in disaster.
Slowly, the smoke on the screen began to clear.
What the audience saw first was a battlefield completely carpeted with dark red nerve endings, filling nearly every inch of the area.
In other words—
Even if Mayuri hadn't been crushed to paste, there was nowhere left for him to stand.
"It's over…"
"Don't tell me Mayuri's actually dead?" Tetsuzaemon Iba muttered anxiously, his eyes locked on the last lingering cloud of smoke.
Then—
A miracle happened.
"Tch…"
"If I hadn't disengaged my reactive armor in time, that slap really might've killed me," a familiar voice scoffed."Soul King's Left Arm."
To everyone's shock, fragments of shattered white armor fell from the thinning smoke, clattering to the ground.
And then—
Mayuri Kurotsuchi emerged, completely unharmed.
"Yes! Captain Mayuri's alive!" Ikkaku shouted in relief from the distance.
"Wait… look at his feet!" Yumichika's eyes widened."What are those halos?!"
Mayuri wasn't falling.
He was standing steadily in midair, supported by two glowing clusters of reishi beneath his feet.
"That's… a Quincy technique! Hirenkyaku!"
Watching Mayuri expertly maneuver atop the reishi platforms sent a wave of outrage through more than just the Soul King's Left Arm.
Deep within Silbern, every member of the Sternritter watching the feed felt deeply insulted.
None of them had imagined that the sly, treacherous Mayuri would steal their abilities as well.
"..."
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