The confidence that had filled Aizen Sōsuke's face finally vanished.
His eyes locked onto Uchiha Tobirama, who stood calmly in mid-air with a faint smile.
His fingers tightened around Kyōka Suigetssu.
Impossible.
According to everything he knew, anyone caught by Complete Hypnosis should already have had all five senses dominated, kneeling helplessly within an illusion while begging for mercy.
So why...
...was this man not only standing perfectly still...
...but openly laughing at him?
"What am I laughing at?"
Tobirama's smile faded.
He lowered his head slightly.
An icy arrogance erupted from his deep purple Rinnegan.
"I'm laughing at a frog trapped inside a well..."
"...who knows nothing about the true size of the sky."
"I'm laughing at your pitiful arrogance."
He slowly lifted his right hand and pointed toward the Zanpakutō in Aizen's grasp.
"You actually believe that crude tricks involving sensory distortion deserve to be called illusion techniques?"
"Complete Hypnosis?"
"Control over the five senses?"
"...With that worthless toy?"
Boom!!
The instant those words fell...
The six black tomoe inside Tobirama's Rinnegan abruptly halted.
An indescribable ocular power burst forth.
It was an authority that surpassed every law governing the world of the Shinigami.
The purple glow disappeared.
In its place bloomed an overwhelming purple-gold brilliance.
"Six-Tomoe Rinnegan..."
"Absolute Ocular Domain."
Crack!
Crack!
Crack!
The moment that purple-gold radiance illuminated the battlefield...
Aizen suddenly heard something shattering beside his ears.
His pupils contracted.
It was Kyōka Suigetsu.
The absolute hypnosis he had cultivated and perfected over more than a century...
Collapsed instantly before this incomprehensible ocular power.
A visible crack spread across the blade.
"Impossible!"
For the first time...
Aizen completely lost his composure.
"My Kyōka Suigetsu..."
"...was broken?"
This was Complete Hypnosis.
Even Captain Commander Yamamoto could not escape it.
Yet...
"It wasn't broken."
Tobirama's calm voice echoed directly within Aizen's soul.
"I simply told you from the beginning."
"Your understanding of power is hopelessly primitive."
"Today..."
"I'll show a rat hiding underground..."
"...what true ocular illusion is."
Hum—
The purple-gold radiance flashed once more.
Before Aizen could even activate Shunpo—
His vision turned completely black.
...
When he opened his eyes again...
Everything had disappeared.
The ruined Seireitei.
The shattered battlefield.
The remaining captains.
Even Tobirama himself.
Nothing remained.
Only endless silence.
"...Where is this?"
Aizen looked around.
His expression stiffened.
He discovered he was suspended upon a gigantic black cross forged from dark flames.
His body refused to move.
Above him...
There was no sun.
Instead...
A colossal purple-gold Rinnegan filled the crimson sky.
It gazed down upon him with absolute indifference.
Like a creator observing an insignificant insect.
"An illusionary realm?"
Aizen immediately realized what had happened.
Instead of panicking...
He laughed.
"So you've dragged me into an illusion."
"How naive."
"I possess Kyōka Suigetsu."
"I only need a single second—"
He closed his eyes.
Spiritual Pressure surged.
Or rather...
It should have.
One second passed.
Ten seconds passed.
Nothing happened.
The vast ocean of Spiritual Pressure that had always answered his command...
Had vanished.
Not weakened.
Not sealed.
Simply...
Gone.
"So."
Tobirama's emotionless voice echoed across the empty world.
"You've finally noticed."
"There is no reishi here."
"There are no laws belonging to the Shinigami."
"Everything within this world..."
"...space..."
"...time..."
"...matter..."
"...even reality itself..."
"...exists only according to my will."
"In the outside world..."
"...perhaps a single instant has passed."
"But here..."
"I can leave you for ten thousand years."
Aizen's heartbeat finally became unsteady.
A world stripped of every source of power.
A place where time itself belonged to someone else.
This wasn't merely illusion.
It was a completely independent reality.
"W-What do you want...?"
For the first time...
Fear entered Aizen's voice.
"I don't want anything."
"I simply wish to show you..."
"...how insignificant your so-called control over the five senses truly is."
A figure suddenly appeared before him.
Tobirama.
His expression remained perfectly calm.
In his hand rested a scalpel formed from brilliant white chakra.
"The first step."
"Vision."
The blade descended.
Aizen screamed.
Pain unlike anything he had ever imagined exploded through his consciousness.
The agony seemed to pierce directly into his soul itself.
The sensation had been magnified beyond all comprehension.
He struggled violently against the burning cross.
"My eyes!"
"My eyes!!"
"Relax."
"This is only the beginning."
More figures appeared.
Ten.
One hundred.
Thousands.
Each held a different instrument.
Knives.
Needles.
Hammers.
Blades.
"The next lesson."
"Hearing."
"Smell."
"Taste."
"And then..."
"...the experience of dying over and over."
"Begin."
...
Time lost all meaning.
Again.
Again.
Again.
Every injury vanished before the next began.
Each time his body was restored completely.
Each cycle felt even longer than the last.
The torment never stopped.
His confidence disappeared.
His pride shattered.
His ambition crumbled.
Eventually...
The man who once declared he would stand above Heaven...
Could no longer remember why he had wanted power at all.
"Please..."
"...kill me..."
"I was wrong..."
"I won't..."
"...never again..."
"I'm worthless..."
"I'm nothing..."
"Please..."
"...let me go..."
His mind finally collapsed.
Everything that made Aizen Sōsuke who he was...
Broke apart.
...
Reality.
Only an instant had passed.
Clang.
The cracked Kyōka Suigetsu slipped from Aizen's trembling hand and struck the shattered stone below.
Then—
Thud.
His knees slammed heavily into the ruins.
"Captain Aizen?!"
Kyōraku and Hitsugaya stared in complete disbelief.
Neither of them had seen the two exchange a single physical attack.
Tobirama had merely looked at him.
Yet...
Aizen had fallen to his knees.
Not only that—
He suddenly clutched his head.
His body convulsed violently.
He collapsed onto the ground.
His breathing became ragged.
"No..."
"My eyes..."
"It hurts..."
"Please..."
"...stop..."
He rolled across the broken earth.
His elegant appearance disappeared completely.
His composure was gone.
The once-proud captain now resembled a man whose mind had been utterly shattered.
The surrounding captains could only stare in horror.
What kind of power...
Could reduce someone like Aizen to this state without even touching him?
In the air above them...
Tobirama calmly took another puff from his cigar.
Still holding Matsumoto Rangiku in one arm...
He looked down at the trembling Aizen as though observing a broken toy.
"So."
"This is the Soul Society's greatest strategist?"
"What a disappointment."
"He couldn't even endure a fraction of my illusion."
"How boring."
He shook his head with obvious disappointment.
Below...
Aizen gradually regained a trace of awareness.
The pain remained.
Even though he had returned to reality...
The memory of that endless torment had been carved permanently into his soul.
Fear consumed him completely.
"I'll die..."
"I'll really die..."
"That thing..."
"...isn't a Shinigami."
"...or a Hollow."
"...it's something beyond comprehension."
His body trembled uncontrollably.
Kyōka Suigetsu had failed.
His intelligence had become meaningless.
Everything he had relied upon...
Had been crushed.
Yet...
His obsession refused to disappear.
"No..."
"I can't die here..."
"I still have to reach the top..."
His trembling hand reached into his robes.
Then...
He pulled out a mysterious orb radiating an eerie blue-violet light.
The Hōgyoku.
The object he had pursued for more than a century.
His final hope.
His eyes became filled with desperate fanaticism.
"As long as I transcend the limits of a Shinigami..."
"As long as I continue evolving..."
"I can still surpass you!"
Without hesitation—
He thrust the orb into his own chest.
Light exploded outward.
His Spiritual Pressure surged wildly.
The heavens darkened.
A pillar of brilliant white radiance engulfed his entire body.
Within that cocoon of light...
His form began to transform.
"Hahaha!"
"So this is it!"
"This power..."
"It never ends!"
He laughed wildly from inside the cocoon.
"Watch carefully!"
"I am surpassing both Shinigami and Hollow!"
"I am evolving into something greater!"
"When I emerge..."
"...your death will follow!"
Even now...
Faced with this overwhelming transformation...
Tobirama remained completely still.
He neither interrupted...
Nor attacked.
Instead...
He simply watched.
A slow smile spread across his face.
"A god?"
He laughed softly.
"You stuffed a glowing stone into your chest..."
"...and now you think you've become a creator?"
He slowly removed both hands from his pockets.
His knuckles cracked one by one.
"Go ahead."
"Keep evolving."
"Do your best to become a little tougher."
"Otherwise..."
"...when I erase you later..."
"...it won't even be entertaining."