Episode 74: Chaotic Battlefield
Dumbbell stuck his head through the archway to the empty stairwell leading down into the cold Hueco Mundo desert, and tried very hard not to tremble with as much fear as he was feeling. Fear not born of hearing the constant staccato of blasts, explosions, and screams from the battle that echoed in the distance, but rather of what he and his two pals Hoops and Score were about to do. But Adagio had given her orders, and Dumbbell wasn’t about to disappoint her. He didn’t think it very odd that, not so long ago, he and his buddies had tried to kill the very Hollow they now loyally served. Things had changed. She’d proven herself not only to be top dog, but she’d kept every promise she’d given them about keeping them fed and improving their lot.
Far as Dumbbell was concerned that put Adagio on a level higher than the Espada. Because of Adagio he and his friends had a nice place to stay, and hadn’t run out of lesser Hollows to eat. Life, for the first time ever, was good. Like hell he was going to let her down now, even if what she’d asked him to do was... well not quite suicide, but definitely not an easy task.
What was weird was the way she’d given her orders.
He looked again at the slip of paper in his hand. He, Hoops, and Score had been following Adagio and Ember out to join the massing Arrancar for deployment in battle, but she’d slowed down, her tail sneaking this slip of paper out of her hair and carefully giving it to him without her looking at it. He’d opened his mouth to question, but as if sensing what he was doing Adagio had simply gestured backwards with her hand for him to be silent and look at the paper.
The paper had a crude map of some underground area drawn on it, with a few lines of instructions that had made Dumbbell’s skin turn clammy with sweat as he'd read it.
”Don’t speak. You three are to slip away from me and Ember at the first opportunity during the battle, and go to a collection of rocks south of the copse of trees we used to meet at. You’ll find a hidden entrance to Grogar’s laboratories there, which I’ve sketched this map of. His main lab is marked with the X. Go there. Search his lab for anything you can find pertaining to how he artificially creates Arrancar. Steal anything that looks important pertaining to that. Then hide in the human world until I come for you.”
Dumbbell gulped, taking the first hesitant step down the stairs that was built within the rock formation Adagio had mentioned. He half expected to hear some kind of alarm or get cut apart by some devious trap, but nothing happened and after a second he glanced back at Hoops and Score.
“O-okay, step one, complete,” he said, giving a thumbs up.
“You know, kinda thinking it’d still be safer to be fighting the Quincy right now,” Score said, nervously licking his lips as he and Hoops joined Dumbbell as the trio headed down the winding stair well.
“What? We’re just breaking into the home of an Espada,” stammered Hoops, “The one who’s got a reputation for horrible, torturous experimentation on his own kind. N-no biggie, right?”
“Relax, he’s not here right now,” said Dumbbell, trying to convince himself as much as his friends, “You saw it. He’s back in Las Noches keeping an eye on Squirk. So, uh, this place should be empty.”
“What if it’s not?” asked Hoops, and Dumbbell grimaced, sucking in a deep breath and letting it out as he rubbed his hand through his thick hair.
“Then we wing it. Like Adagio would do. She doesn’t let anything scare her, so neither will we! We just got to follow the map, find the stupid lab, and look for anything useful about making Arrancar.”
“I know how to make Arrancar and it's a lot easier and more fun than sneaking into a creepy lab,” Score said with a joking leer, and Dumbbell rolled his eyes.
“You know what Adagio means! She’s talking about how that Di Roy guy is all, like, weird and only half-Arrancar. Grogar made him that way, so it's all smart and stuff to think he’s got a way to do the rest.”
“Yeah, but how are we going to find it?” asked Hoops, “We don’t even know what to look for, do we?”
“I dunno, let’s just find the lab first. We’ll figure out the rest after that,” replied Dumbbell curtly, wincing slightly as the ground shook from some massive impact from the battle up above. He hoped Adagio was going to be okay. She was super powerful, and a Vasto Lorde to boot, but it had looked like the whole damn Quincy army was up there. And just feeling Lord Tirek start to go at it with the Quincy King had been... well, humbling wasn’t quite the term. Dumbbell had never felt more insignificant or ant-like than when those two monsters had started their duel.
Really just about everyone and everything in that battle was stronger than him and his friends. They really were the bottom of the Arrancar barrel. But... but Adagio believed in them! She didn’t think they were useless, like everyone else in Las Noches had. She treated them like they mattered. She’d given them this important job to do, and dammit they were going to do it!
Reaching the bottom of the stairs the trio exited onto a wide, dark hallway. Each had their hands grasping the hilts of their Zanpaktou, drawing them in uneasy silence as they exchanged nods and Dumbbell led the way, following the map Adagio had drawn for them. Following a dizzying set of twists and turns they came upon the hallway that would lead to the lab’s entrance.
The three skidded to a halt as they saw they weren’t alone in the hallway. The hall’s ceiling stretched high above, and was wide enough for a pair of semi-trucks to pass through it. Which made sense given the hall was being guarded by two hulking brutes that towered over Dumbbell and his friends. Each one was an Arrancar, but clearly experimented upon by Grogar, given their strangely misshapen bodies. Arms with thick bulges of artificial muscle mass hung down and long like those of a gorilla's. One had a bulbous, thick body that was almost as round as a balloon, while the other had a wide, flat body like a living brick wall. Both had faces mostly covered by thick, rounded Hollow masks bearing wide bug-like eye holes. Only the mouths were left open, and each massive giant looked down at the three Arrancar youths that had just entered the hall with clear confusion.
“Strangers...” the rounded one said, scratching its head of coarse black hair.
“Strangers in master’s place,” agreed the other, sniffing the air.
“Master says destroy all strangers.”
“Smash and mash them up, that is what master says.”
As the two massive Arrancar took long steps forward, Dumbbell, Hoops, and Score all looked at each other. Dumbbell, pushing down his fear, hardened his face with resolve and nodded at his friends.
“Okay guys, game time! Whatever it takes, we’re not gonna fail Lady Adagio!”
His words were punctuated the rounded Arrancar's massive, car-sized fist striking Dumbbell full on and sending him smashing into the far wall in an explosion of rock and dust.
Hoops and Score blinked at that, and made to run, but Dumbbell, coughing, pushed himself away from the crater his body had just made in the wall and shook himself. He was bleeding from his scalp, and wobbly on his feet, but he shot a glare at Hoops and Score, "You guys better not be thinking about running! We're doing this!"
As if to prove his own words to himself he launched himself towards the two massive, deformed Arrancar guards, slashing hard with his sword at the bulbous one that had struck him. That Arrancar raised its thick, bulging arm to block. Dumbbell's sword scored a shallow wound, drawing blood but barely getting far through the layers of heavy muscle making up the enemy's arm.
The Arrancar shook its arm and flung Dummbell off, who landed on shaky feet, but held his ground. Hesitantly Score and Hoops both gulped and stood by his side, readying their own blades as the two deformed giants charged the trio.
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Adagio suppressed an urge to sneeze that seemed to come out of nowhere, and swore under her breath at even that small distraction in the face of an opponent like the one before her. Prim Hemline had yet to make a move, and was just standing there observing Adagio, Ember, and Garble with intelligent, unblinking eyes.
She’s waiting for us to make the first move. No doubt intending to take advantage of any openings we give her, Adagio thought, still puzzling over what kind of powers this Sternritter might have. The Arrancar she’d struck with her arrows earlier were utterly unmoving, but not in the manner of those dead, but rather like paralyzed statues. Was it some kind of toxin contained in the arrows? If that was the case then Adagio couldn’t afford to get even grazed, which meant she’d have to avoid getting hit at all costs.
Regardless of how powerful she is, she’s still human, and that means she’s subject to human weaknesses.
Neither Ember or Garble were attacking yet either, remaining tensely poised during this brief standoff. Adagio wasn’t surprised Ember was smart enough not to rush in, but was a little shocked Garble hadn’t. Perhaps beating him senseless had knocked some caution into his thick skull? More likely the suggestion she’d planted in his mind with her song to protect Ember was making him hold off on charging in head first. Either way, Adagio was grateful, since it let her take the initiative.
She held her trident with both hands and swept it in an upward arc, pouring forth her reiatsu to summon a vertical wave of water that burst forward at high speed.
As before Prim Hemline fired a single arrow into the wave of water, which seemed to make it halt instantly and then splash down harmlessly. However Adagio had already moved with all the speed she could muster, appearing above Prim with her trident aimed downward. A heavy barrage of Aqua Bala fired out of the trident’s tips, the small spheres of condensed water and reishi impacting like a torrent of gatling gun shells.
There was a flicker of gray behind her and Adagio whirled in time to see Prim Hemline, quite unscathed, flashing into view while hanging in mid-air. Her bow was aimed at Adagio’s back and the woman had a small, smug smirk on her face as she fired the gold colored bolt. Adagio spun to try to deflect it with her trident, but knew she was going to be a hair too slow.
Ember, having already been tensed to move, managed to be faster and in a blur of Sonido appeared next to Adagio and fired a Cero straight into the arrow. The wide crimson beam was split by the arrow, but still managed to stop the golden bolt. Ember didn’t skip a beat, following up her Cero with another blast that forced Prim to dodge aside as the blood red beam cut a twenty meter wide swath of destruction across the desert, exploding in a small mushroom cloud a quarter mile away. Meanwhile Prim’s sheer speed sent her flickering upward and launching a deadly crescent array of golden arrows that flashed down at Adagio and Ember both.
With a wave of her arm Adagio sent forth a curtain of high pressurized water, trying to throw the arrows off course as she and Ember both sought to evade the lethal rain. Again Adagio noticed how her water, when it was struck by the arrows, halted immediately as if all the the momentum and pressure the water had built it simply vanished.
As she bent and twisted away from the arrows falling around her, one grazed her left leg, and she felt as if she’d slammed that leg into some kind of wall, as if the entire limb just halted in place. The result actually cartwheeled her into the ground, but Adagio recovered fast, hand springing up and away as more arrows slammed into the spot she’d just occupied. Ember was dodging just as many arrows, trying to fire back with Ceros, but never coming close to tagging Prim’s incredibly fast form.
Garble then leaped into the fray as well, trying to get in behind Prim Hemline and strike her back with his falchion. She almost casually, without even looking, fired an arrow into his gut and Garble dropped like a stone. Quite literally, as Adagio couldn’t help but notice it wasn’t that Garble had fallen like someone struck dead, but rather as if all his momentum vanished the moment the arrow hit him and he just hung cartoonishly in the air for a second before falling, stiff as a board.
“Shit! Garble!” Ember growled, drawing back one hand and then flinging it out to fire a barrage of swift, red Bala bullets at Prim.
Adagio hesitated for a second, then shouted, “Ember, can you keep her busy for a moment? I have to check something.”
“Keep her busy!? Are you cra... ugh, never mind. I got it!” Ember halted her Bala barrage just long enough to place her hand on her Zanpaktou, which became enshrouded in intense blue light as her reiatsu built up and started to shake the ground, “Eviscerate, Espina!”
The explosion of blue spirit energy engulfed Ember as she transformed into her Resurreccion state, the pyre of sapphire light swirling upwards into the black sky until it dissipated a few seconds later to reveal Ember fully changed. Her torso was now clad in segments of bone white armor, only leaving her midriff bare, while her waist was coated in a wide skirt of similar bone armor, and knee high, thick boots of bone. Two new horns swept back from her brow, joining the forward swept ones she usually had, and she now had two large draconic wings with blue membranes and white spurs of bone, tipped with thorns. Ember brought her blade to bear in its new form, that of a five foot long triangular blade with a cross-guard of two outward swept thrones.
“Whatever you’re doing, don’t take long! Not sure how long I can hold her, even like this,” Ember said, then took to the air in a magnificent burst of speed, wings flaring as she charged Prim Hemline.
The Sternritter let fly a gleaming hail of gold arrows, but with Ember’s transformation came a hefty boost to the Arrancar’s speed, and Ember’s draconic body zipped in and out of sight as a series of rapid Sonido’s brought her through the storm of gold arrows to get within melee range of Prim. Ember’s piercing blade thrust out, but Prim held out a palm and blocked the tip of Ember’s blade with just her hand alone. At Ember’s wide eyed look Prim offered a thin smile.
“Physical attacks are useless on me, unfortunately for you.”
Ember didn’t quite comprehend what had just happened. If Prim had just stopped her attack using the power of Blut Vene, then that would have made sense to her. She still would have felt the impact of her sword on the Quincy’s flesh, even with Blut Vene acting as armor against the attack. Yet just now it was as if all of the kinetic force of her thrust had simply vanished the instant the sword had made contact with Prim’s palm!
Before she could wonder the how’s and why’s of that, Ember was forced to nearly bend over backwards to avoid a streak of blue light that could have taken her head off if she hadn’t dodged in time. Acting on instinct alone she swung her thorn-shaped Zanpaktou out at a threat only her gut combat sense had perceived and she managed to deflect a follow up strike from the same source. Backing away, she saw Prim had drawn a long silver tube with a square hook on one end and an opening at the other from which extended a blade of glowing blue reishi.
“Since you’re having difficulty figuring out my Zero, I’ll keep this sporting and exercise some of my fencing skills,” Prim said, holding her bow aloft in her right hand while holding the glowing blue blade in her left, spreading her feet in the air in a fencer’s pose.
Before Ember could so much as blink Prim came at her in a blinding series of thrusts that were so quick that a single strike felt like three as Ember struggled to parry them.
Meanwhile down on the ground Adagio had run up to Garble’s body, kneeling down to check him over. He wasn’t moving a single muscle, not evening breathing. Yet his eyes were open, twitching ever so slightly, and Adagio sensed his spirit energy struggling with some foreign spirit energy that had seeped into him. He was slowly turning blue in the face, and Adagio imagined he had a few minutes, tops, before asphyxiating. Fortunately for him Adagio still had a use for him.
Focusing on the arrow planted in his gut, she aimed her trident at it. The wound itself was likely quite painful, but nowhere near fatal. She’d given him worse in their own scuffle. No, the true danger of these golden arrow was what they did to those they struck. It wasn’t poison, of that much Adagio was certain. The arrows had robbed her water of all motion, so she surmised what they were doing was somehow negating physical movement. Garble couldn’t breathe, because he couldn’t move any part of his body with that arrow stuck in him. His heart was still beating, but Adagio theorized that might be because Prim’s power could only affect things on a surface level.
Regardless she couldn’t risk touching the arrow, but an energy based attack? Prim had dodged her Aqua Bala, and Ember’s Cero. That may well mean she couldn’t affect anything comprised of raw spirit energy. Testing two theories out at once, Adagio fired an Aqua Bala straight into the arrow at point blank range. The water around the bullet of reishi instantly lost momentum and fell harmlessly to the sand, but the reishi itself smashed into the arrow and broke the glowing shaft of Quincy reishi in half. Thus broken the rest of the weapon lost cohesion and vanished from Garble’s body. He instantly sucked in a hard, desperate breath and convulsed, sitting bolt upright as he gasped for air.
“Gggaaaah! Pfffa! W-what the hell did that bitch hit me with!? Argh!” Garble clutched at his bleeding gut, wincing hard.
“Suck it up,” Adagio told him, “We don’t have a lot of time.”
As if to emphasis her words there was a blast of air from the clash of Prim and Ember’s blades as the Quincy continued to toy with the Arrancar girl, pushing her back further and further until Ember was forced to the ground, barely holding off Prim’s incredibly swift strikes. Adagio didn’t know what kind of weapon the glowing blade sprouting from that silver tube was, but she didn’t want to wait to see if Ember’s Heirro was up to deflecting it. She turned to Garble, eyes deadly serious.
“I think I have her power figured out, and a way to beat her. But I need you to do exactly as I say.”
He gave her a hesitant look, and for a second she saw his hand twitch towards one of his pants pockets. Adagio tensed, preparing for if Garble had some sort of plan to turn on her, but after one glance at Ember’s situation Garble removed the doubt from his face and he nodded, standing up. “Tell me what to do.”
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Night Light was excellent at multitasking and removing distractions from his thoughts while still maintaining a keen sense of his surroundings. He was fully aware of the viscous aerial battle the Quincy VTOLs were engaged in with the contingent of Arrancar that had come in from the south. The explosions of streaking Ceros and missile barrages alike filled the turbulent sky around him and the command VTOL, yet Night Light was neither disturbed nor distracted by the maelstrom.
He directed the army of His Majesty as only he could. Even if engagements of this size were a rarity in the war, Night Light had trained for this his whole life and sharpened his skills on numerous smaller battles. He had honed his familiarity and connection to his Schrift through uncounted hours of use, the Command as thoroughly a part of him as his ability to breathe or walk. In Night Light’s mind he saw the battle like a series of moving tapestries, each a window into a different slice of the chaos. Information was processed in his mind at breakneck speed, and with each moment he sent his mental commands to dozens across the battlefield, ranging from warning a simple soldat squad of an incoming group of Adjuchas-class Hollows and redirecting their fire to counter the move, to warning Fleur De Lis and the contingent guarding the cadets that one of the Espada was heading their way.
That concern, the fear for his daughter’s life, trembled across the void of his concentration, but Night Light let the feeling pass through him. He was His Majesty’s General now, Sternritter C, the Command. He had to manage the entire battle, not allow his focus to slip to one portion of the fight. It was just one Espada, plus around twenty to thirty lesser Arrancar. Fleur, Soarin, and Fleetfoot ought to be able to handle that. Especially considering the Sternritter had yet to reveal their trump card.
Sombra had been specified in his instructions. The Vollstandig was to be reserved until they could confirm the majority of the Espada were engaged and that Tirek had no significant reinforcements left to throw at them.
Which meant it was time to enact phase two of the plan.
Spitfire, it’s time. Move in.
Night Light’s words reached out instantly to where he could sense Spitfire’s presence, along with a whole battalion of Quincy that had hung back from the battle, maintaining a low flight pattern half a mile away on the west flank of Las Noches. Spitfire, along with Lightning Dust and Hoity Toity, would lead that battalion in a flanking maneuver that should draw out the remaining Espada.
Then the Strafbattalion and Wind Rider would be ready to launch a surprise attack with the armored corps.
Night Light sensed them moving, Spitfire giving a curt, mental ”Affirmative!” over the Command’s link.
That done, Night Light’s attention shifted to the clashes between Sternritter that had found Espada opponents. He sensed Rutherford was having difficulty targeting his foes. His massive form, courtesy of his Schrift, the Giant, was allowing the titanic man to stomp and scatter the masses of deformed Arrancar on the ground, but a cloud of thick purple fog was not only obscuring Rutherford’s vision but was having a corrosive effect. So far Rutherford’s raw durability, enhanced by the power of the Giant, was keeping him relatively protected, but Night Light sensed that the burly Sternritter’s foe was going to try to run his endurance out rather than fight directly.
Hydia was being clever. A bad matchup to Rutherford, but Night Light wasn’t going to count the big guy out yet.
Jet Set on the other hand? Night Light saw the relatively weaker and inexperienced Sternritter had cleary bitten off more than he could chew with this Espada named Lament. Shining Armor was too busy handling Torch to provide Jet Set any support, but that was acceptable. Night Light had already sent Harshwhinny and Jet Set’s wife Upper Crust to go help the hapless Kraken. If Jet Set could survive for a minute or two his desperate fight would become a more manageable three on one affair.
Night Light wasn’t terribly concerned about his son’s ability to fight Torch. While young, the boy was almost as much a prodigy as his sister was, and he had far more experience than Twilight did.
That just left the curious affair of Prim Hemline’s opponents. Night Light couldn’t fathom what was taking Prim so long to deal with two non-Espada level Arrancar and a single Vasto Lorde. Granted the Vasto Lord appeared the strongest of the three foes Prim faced, but Prim should have been able to dispatch the three quickly with the power of the Zero. Night Light felt a stab of annoyance, seeing Prim fencing with a Seele Schneider.
Prim, stop toying with them and kill those Hollows quickly. Rutherford is going to need support soon, and Spitfire is already moving in to draw out the other Espada. You don’t have time for playing games.
His mental command was pointed and sharp. Prim’s response was quick and filled with a understanding resignation.
Yes, you’re right of course, Night Light. Improper of me to let myself get carried away, but how often do I get the opportunity to stretch my legs? No need to repeat yourself. I’ll take this seriously now. A shame, I rather like this Ember’s spunk.
Night Light didn’t care what Prim liked, as long as she stopped playing around and finished her opponents off.
Turning his attention to the west, he watched as the sky filled with the silver lights and blazing contrails of the approaching VTOLs from Spitfire’s battalion, sweeping in on Hydia’s forces like a storm of avenging valkyries as they cut loose with a swarm of missiles.
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“Here they come!”
The terrified shout came from one of the cadets that Twilight couldn’t see, but she shared in their feelings, cold sweat beading her forehead as she saw the Arrancar swooping in like a flock of deadly hawks. They came from the west, moving with such speed as they stepped across the air that they looked like a streak of phantom raptors. She heard the Arrancar’s shrieking, whooping war cries, filled with bloodlust, and her mind flashed back to the burning forest of the Academy exercise and the smell of human blood filling her nostrils. She saw the images of torn apart Quincy cadets in her mind’s eye, and felt a cold fire course up from inside her as she looked at the fearful looks on the faces of her comrades.
No. I won’t let it happen to them!, she thought, and there was a sinister chuckle inside her mind that answered that thought.
Then let’s tear our enemies apart first. Show me, Twilight Sparkle. Show me what we can do together.
She could feel the magic welling up inside her, a wild flame that tugged at the leash. Warmth and cold both mixed around her insides, and she could see trails of blue witchfire dancing around her left arm, filing the edges of the Hexenfaust before she even activated the armored glove.
Seeing as how the rest of the cadets were quickly summoning their own bows, Twilight saw no reason to wait any longer herself. Taking a deep breath to steady herself she closed her eyes and focused on her internal reishi, letting the spirit energy flow into her arm. She carefully allowed the trickle of magic at her core to join that reishi, building like water behind a dam along the length of her arm. She then let that power out, and the Hexenfaust responded to her outpouring of reishi.
The amethyst gems along the glove’s length flared with circles of pale blue witchfire and brighter blue motes of Quincy reishi, and the combined energies expanded outward and elongated to take a solid shape. She kept the shape clear in her mind, focused with intent on the bow’s structure and purpose, allowing the Hexenfaust itself to complete the task of forming the bow’s energies while she kept her mind clearly picturing the bow in her mind.
It was very similar in design to what she’d accidentally summoned before when Cadence had used the Lust on her. The long and curved spurs of the bow were made from a deep purple colored, metallic substance, shot through with pale blue lines that conducted the flame-like energy of her magic like small rivers. The center portion of the bow consisted of a handle mounted between two long, beak-like protrusions on either side of the handle, extending out a foot in length. Unlike the previous bow, this one mounted twin, large amethyst gems that glowed brightly directly above and below the handle area, and two smaller such gems appeared near the tips of the spurs, which in turn formed a long, flickering blue string of pale energy.
Exhilaration now battled Twilight’s fear like warm sunlight on frozen snow. While the terror of the sight of dozens of powerful Hollows rushing her and her fellow cadet’s position still quavered inside her, she just couldn’t help but feel a sensation of simple awe and satisfaction at the beautiful yet precise and functional creation in her hands. Magic and spirit particles were fused together in her bow, the object so much more than its mere appearance suggested. She could feel its power ready to be unleashed.
She just hoped it would be enough.
Beside her, Sugarcoat gave her a look with an appreciative quirk of her lips and an acknowledging nod. Even with just the flat visor covering her face, Sugarcoat still managed to look impressed, although Twilight thought Sugarcoat’s own bow was now less impressive. The short, compact pear bow was so simple and efficient in its form that Twilight highly approved of it.
A smattering of reishi arrows were being fired by other cadets, but the Arrancar were only just now entering effective range, and were moving so fast that they easily dodged such volleys. Twilight intended to hold fire until she could be more sure of a hit, but she wondered if the Sternritter would even allow for the Arrancar to get that close?
Her answer came in the form of a colossal whirlwind that whipped around the cadets, causing many to cry out in alarm as they ducked down. This was followed by the sight of Fleur De Lis launching herself into the air on a swirling tornado of air that bore her straight towards the advancing Arrancar, her composite bow held in front of her.
She was joined by both Soarin and Fleetfoot, who were only a sliver behind Fleur and leaping into the sky. Soarin held out his hand, a trail of cerulean reishi extending from his palm to take the shape of a bow with spurs shaped like long, outward curved wings forged from blue steel. Fleetfoot balled her hands into fists and both the fists and her feet glowed with soft yellow light, her own reishi forming what looked like deeply curved, fin-like crescents on the backs of her hands and on the top of her booted feet.
From the head of the flock of Arrancar charging towards them, one pulled ahead with such speed that the air cracked from multiple sonic booms, and Fleur rushed to meet this foe. Twilight could see this man was a leanly muscular an of darkly tanned skin, sporting a sharp nose and aquiline features, bearing a prominent “6” tattooed around his eye. She felt her mouth go dry as the Sixth Espada went headlong for Fleur De Lis, his scimitar-like Zanpaktou slicing for her flesh. Fleur countered with a point blank blast of slicing air from her hand, clashing with the Espada’s blade with a deafening clash.
Soarin and Fleetfoot split up, Soarin heading to the right while Fleetfoot went left, both seeking to head off the charging Arrancar squadron. In seconds Twilight saw Soarin fire compact, short bolts from his wing shaped bow, bolts that vibrated in the air and exploded among the charging Arrancar with what looked like sonic emissions that shook the very air and made it ripple. Several Arrancar clutched at their suddenly bleeding ears, screaming as they tumbled from the air.
Fleetfoot was brutally direct in her attack, and Twilight at first wasn’t sure what to make of it. Instead of firing arrows out of the small crescent shaped ‘bows’ on her hands and feet, Fleetfoot fired what looked like hooks that shot out on strings of yellow reishi. These hooks snagged an Arrancar apiece, and suddenly with seemingly incredibly power the four Hollows were reeled in towards Fleetfoot, who proceeded to deliver earth shattering punches and kicks that rocketed her targets into the ground in geysers of sand.
Twilight winced, seeing at least one of those Arrancar had been hit hard enough to bend their head at an impossibly twisted angle.
Fleur and the Espada still clashed in the sky, Fleur becoming a pink and white blur of motion as she zipped around her foe and fired arrows that created shockwaves of wind with each shot. With a regal poise and arrogant grin plastering his features the Espada spun his blade in an elaborate dance that turned aside Fleur's arrows with apparent ease, yet the moment he tried to go on the offensive, streaking towards Fleur in a burst of Sonido, the Sternritter matched his speed and slammed a claw of wind into him, pushing him back.
Twilight wasn’t sure which of the two was stronger. Fleur and the Espada’s reiatsu clashed against each other with equal fury to Twilight’s senses, but she had a sneaking suspicion both were holding back, probing each other’s defenses and warming up to the fight.
On one hand that at least meant that the most dangerous foe in the vicinity was being handled for the moment. On the other that meant Fleur was so occupied with the Espada that Soarin and Fleetfoot were stuck trying to deal with the rest of the Arrancar that had attacked, and while it was clear both of them were powerful enough to take on many at once, that wasn’t enough to get all of the Arrancar.
“This is going to suck so much,” Sour Sweet seethed under her breath as she fired first, her large sniper-pattern crossbow unleashing a powerful arrow that streaked out and actually managed to tag one of the Arrancar that had gotten past the Sternritters and was now rushing the cadets. The blow spun the Arrancar around, but the woman kept coming on, whooping like a madwoman all the way.
“Just focus on one at a time and take them down!” Sugarcoat said past clenched teeth, and as if her words were a command that spread through the rest of the cadets, arrows started to fill the sky. The soldats with the cadets joined in the shooting as well, reishi arrows launching out in sweeping volleys.
Twilight took aim as well, taking a deep breath, remembering how Shining Armor and Cadence had taught her to still her heart and mind. She sought a target, seeing a burly, flaxen haired Arrancar she picked out of the group still heading for the cadets. She ignored her fears welling inside her, pushed aside the anger at the Hollows that might hurt or kill her friends. She let her mind connect to the target, seeing the Arrancar’s features like through a microscope lens.
In essence this was just science. Trajectories, wind speed, distance, timing, velocity, acceleration. All the calculations passed through her mind in a nanosecond, an her bow responded. It was designed to respond, projecting her shot and calculations in her vision like a holographic display. She knew she wouldn't miss before she even pulled back on the string of her bow, a flickering arrow of pale blue witchfire and reishi taking form.
When she loosed the arrow it streaked out like a ghostly comet, perfectly aimed to catch her charging opponent square in the chest.
The magic enhanced reishi arrow burst upon the Arrancar like a missile, halting him in mid-air, scorching even his Hierro hardened skin, and causing him to flip end over end into the sand. Twilight blinked, surprised at the effectiveness of her own shot. She felt a rising heat from her Hexenfaust glove, and a titter of laughter in her head.
That felt good. Tell me you didn’t think that felt good, Twilight? Do it again.
As she was blinking at her own handiwork, her squadmates were also opening fire.
Lemon Zest raised her strangely shaped bow consisting of two hexagon shaped protrusions at either end of an awkwardly bent pair of struts and fired a cascade of dozens of arrows that flew out at odd angles and changed direction on the fly, like a swarm of drunk hummingbirds. Arrancar blurred through the swarm with Sonido, but one or two did get struck by the haphazard arrow storm, wounded by still charging in.
Stormy bolts of lighting shaped arrows from Indigo Zap’s bow joined the focused, straight and powerful arrows that Sugarcoat fired, the pair of them focusing fire on the Arrancar Sour Sweet had wounded, slowing that one down even further.
Meanwhile Sunny Flare worked alongside the McColt girls and Cotton Barrel, all focusing on another Arrancar that was coming in from a higher angle. Sunny Flare’s dart guns made an elegant, lady-like zapping noise with each small reishi dart fired, but the Arrancar she was firing at was easily dodging the barrage. Buzzsaw was living up to her namesake, her ‘bow’ taking the shape of a flat, rifle-like weapon with a wide barrel that fired spinning, buzzing discs of reishi. Hacksaw used a bow shaped like a thin, serrated band of metal similar to her own namesake as well, which when drawn back and fired sent out compact, sawtooth waves of reishi.
The Arrancar they were targeting, a female with dusky skin, white hair tipped purple, and a unusually muscular physique, was batting aside the McColt girl’s attacks like an adult knocking aside the flailing jabs of children. So far only Cotton Barrel Hooffiled hadn’t opened fire, but Twilight could see that the girl had her own bow out, an arbalest shaped weapon of white wood and a ashen colored wheel on top that she was cranking with a handle that seemed to condense more and more reishi into the weapon with each turn of the wheel.
Cotton Barrel didn’t have time to finish charging up her weapon, however, as the female Arrancar rushed down in a burst of speed, plunging into the ground between the cadets like a descending meteor. The resulting shockwave as the Arrancar smashed her fist into the ground sent Cotton Barrel, Buzzsaw, Hacksaw, and Sunny Flare all flying like flipping crash test dummies.
Twilight instantly used Hirenkyaku, flying into the air to catch the nearest girl, which turned out to be Cotton Barrel, and landed safely with her. Sunny Flare managed to recover in mid-air, managing a somewhat graceful flip and landing, skidding along the sands. Buzzsaw hit the ground hard and tumbled for near twenty meters before stopping, spitting out sand as she staggered to her feet. Hacksaw went further, landing in the dark lack behind the dunes the cadets had been using for cover.
“Hack!” Buzzsaw shouted, turning and rushing towards the water to rescue her potentially drowning sister.
The Arrancar woman, smiling viscously, vanished in a burst of Sonido and appeared behind Buzzsaw, blade poised to impale the girl from behind.
Cotton Barrel shook off her daze and fired her arbalest, sending a spinning, drill-like bolt flying at the Arrancar. The heavily muscled woman spun and caught the drill bolt with her free hand while turning her thrust with her sword into a side slash. Buzzsaw was struck, but Cotton Barrel’s shot had distracted the Arrancar just enough that a blow that could have cut her in half was reduced to a terrible gouge through her hip that still caused the girl to collapse in a heap.
Twilight aimed her bow, quickly saying to Cotton Barrel, “Help them! I’ll keep her busy!”
She didn’t wait for a response, nor did she have time to see how the rest of her squad was doing. The air was now filled with the sound of shouts, screams, and explosions. Twilight could see flashes of red light and hear the horrible sound of Ceros firing behind her, Arrancar now launching destructive beams into the ranks of cadets.
She wanted so badly to turn, to see if her friends were okay, but she didn’t dare take her eyes off this foe. This Arrancar girl was generating more reiatsu than any other Hollow nearby save for the Espada himself. It was like a sickening, hot gust of wind on Twilight’s face, filled with murderous intent. She didn’t hesitate, her mind calculating her shot instantly and honing in on the Arrancar who’d turned to face her.
Her first bolt flew in, and the Arrancar turned it aside with her sword without batting an eyelash, but Twilight had expected that and had fired a second bolt right after the first at a slightly off angle. That bolt then altered its course, using small bursts of magic to change its trajectory at a near right angle to slam into the Arrancar from the side.
The explosion of brilliant teal fire made the Arrancar stumble a bit, but she took the blow like a brick wall, sliding to the side and sporting a few burn marks on her shoulder, but otherwise was left unharmed by the solid hit. Twilight couldn't help but gulp, struggling to maintain her calm, focused composure.
Meanwhile Cotton Barrel hesitated, a look of distaste twisting her lips as the Hooffield girl looked at Buzzsaw’s fallen form and then at the lack where Hacksaw had fallen. Then with a resigned growl she nodded to Twilight and jumped into the air, using Hirenkyaku to leap across the sky towards the lack, clearly intending to go try and rescue Hacksaw first before the poor girl drowned.
The Arrancar saw that and sneered, aiming a palm up and charging a deadly red Cero, but Twilight shouted, “No!” and burst into action. Pushing her speed as high as she could, the red lines of Blut Vene covering her body as she took the heavy G-forces of the high speed movement. She appeared around the Arrancar in multiple places, moving so fast her form blurred into multiple images. This was, honestly, faster than she’d expected to move, and she could feel the welling magic inside her struggling to burst out. The Hexenfaust glowed with a blaze of teal fire, and she felt her eyes sting with the edges of magic energy slowly pouring from them.
She tried to ignore it, focusing on calculating her attack. In her mind’s eye a complex series of shifting trajectory lines entrapped the Arrancar in an inescapable trap of arrows. She fired one arrow after another, eight, nine, ten, each one zipping in at rapidly shifting angles until they all started to impact upon their target. The Arrancar woman had moved with shocking speed and grace herself, despite her bulging muscles that didn’t seem to slow her down in the least. Easily half of Twilight’s arrows were knocked aside before the rest managed to break through the Arrancar’s guard and explode upon her in a growing set of blazing pale blue balls of magical fire and reishi.
As Twilight paused, catching her breath, she saw Cotton Barrel managed to dive into the black waters of the lake. She hoped the Hooffield girl would find Hacksaw in those cold depths before it was too late.
However before she could think about going to help, she heard a deep, gruf female voice laughing and Twilight paled as she saw the Arrancar woman step out of the flickering fires left by her arrows. Though sporting some more burns and bruises, the Arrancar still didn’t look terribly harmed by Twilight’s barrage, and was brushing a few embers off herself as she chuckled and looked at Twilight with fierce golden eyes.
“Not bad for a four-eyed dweeb. Here I was thinking Guto was going to have all the fun, but looks like I found myself a halfway decent punching bag to keep me entertained. What do you call yourself, four-eyes?”
“T...Twilight Sparkle.”
“Pfft, okay, not exactly the badass name I was hoping my opponent would have, but whatevs. Names Gilda. Pleasure to kill your acquaintance.”
“I don’t think that’s how that turn of phrase wor-” Twilight began to say, but Gilda vanished in a flash of Sonido and instantly appeared in front of Twilight, ramming a knee into Twilight’s gut. She managed to concentrate her Blut Vene in her abdomen in time to absorb the blow, but she was still rocked back a dozen meters and nearly lost her breakfast from the painful blow to her stomach.
Coughing, she raised her bow and took careful aim while Gilda laughed again.
“Ha! Good! You don’t die fast. I like that! Let’s have some fun!”
As Twilight unleashed another arrow at Gilda, all of her focus now on this powerful foe, she didn’t notice that amid the chaos of battle among the cadets behind her one of the Quincy soldats had broken off from the fight, and was slowly taking aim at Twilight’s back with their own bow.
----------
The squadron of VTOLs had been keeping low to the surface of Hueco Mundo’s desert, hovering in place while waiting for the signal to move. Now, at Spitfire’s sharply barked orders, the engines of the VTOLs erupted to life, sending jets of sand blasting out around them as they rapidly climbed into the air and began a headlong charge towards the battle’s western flank.
Missiles belched out of weapon pods, streaking well ahead of the VTOLs to impact in blossoms of fire amid a wide bank of violet fog that coated the west end of the battle. Spitfire, riding atop the nose of the lead VTOL, narrowed her eyes at the sight of Rutherford’s giant form stamping and smashing amid that purple cloud.
“Idiot can’t even see what he’s trying to step on!” Lightning Dust laughed, shaking her head, “Doesn’t he get that the Giant slows him down as much as it makes him strong?”
Spitfire shot a hard glare towards the younger woman, “He’s not as stupid as you think, and you’re not one to talk, miss ‘I babble my powers to my enemies’. Stay frosty. We’re expecting an ambush to our little charge here.”
Lightning Dust frowned, face reddening, but she nodded and clamped her mouth shut, eyes focused ahead. Behind them both a tall man with bluish gray skin and a well groomed head of white hair idly rubbing his chin as he peered at the upcoming fight behind dark rimmed, purple glasses.
“I just hope it really will be Chrysalis who comes out to greet us. That’d be quite the feather in our caps to take out the Espada’s number two, don’t you think?”
“What I think, Hoity Toity, is that we can’t drop our guards,” Spitfire said, her eyes narrowing as she sensed a disturbance of spirit energy appearing in front of her battalion's advance.
She’d been hoping she might be able to engage Hydia to provide Rutherford a bit of support before Tirek’s forces made their countermove, but just as His Majesty had predicted the Hollows were ready for Spitfire’s flanking move.
Akin to wounds in the sky, the cavernous black openings of Garganta portals opened up several hundred meters ahead of Spitfire’s VTOLs. From one of these portals a small fuzzy horde of white puffball creatures boiled out in a leaping swarm. Spitfire would’ve thought these small furry Hollows were ridiculous with their beady red eyes hidden behind fuzzball faces, but each one bristled with harsh spikes and razor-like claws that sprouted from their puffy bodies, and many opened watermelon sized mouths lined with teeth as they emitted ear piercing howls as they charged the VTOLs. Behind this fuzzy tide of death Catrina emerged lounging upon her gilded palanquin born aloft by a number of larger puffball Hollow servants.
From another portal a haphazard horde of Arrancar clad entirely in neck high, large collared cloaks emerged, all wearing plain white masks that hid their faces. Following this crowd of Arrancar was a gangly, tall specimen whose unusually elongated, oblong face was similarly hidden by a mask. His whole body, in fact, was clad in a tight white jumpsuit and rubber-like gloves and boots. Smooze, Spitfire identified the Espada from intelligence briefings on the known Espada. His servants, clad so similarly to Smooze himself, formed into a rough semi-circle formation and started to join Catrina’s fuzzy servants in advancing on Spitfire’s VTOL squadron.
Both these things were concerning, but nowhere near as arresting as the simple sight of the portals that had opened up above Cantrina and Smoozes, from which poured out the largest and most intimidating Hollow horde of all.
These dark Arrancar began to cover the sky, their black chitin-like skin blending in with Hueco Mundo’s inky atmosphere. Through largely human in appearance, these Arrancar were disturbingly uniform and androgynous, making it hard to tell male from female. All had pale blue or green gem-like eyes, although their hairstyles and colors were more varied. Spitfire stopped counting their numbers after the first few hundred. By regular Hollow standards that might not have been many, but by Arrancar standards this was likely the largest concentration of enemy forces on the field. And Spitfire had it all to herself. Well, until she signaled Wind Rider. But she had to make sure these enemies had their attention entirely on her unit for the Strafbattalion’s counter-ambush to work.
Fortunately she and her fellow Sternritter did have one ace in the hole to use, and the time to use it was nearly upon them.
At the head of the dark horde of onyx skinned Arrancar three stood out. One was a rather feminine looking fellow with green hair, who stood with an air of lazy amusement. Next to this man was his polar opposite, a mountain of obsidian skin over taut, toned muscle with a ruggedly masculine face with a strong jaw, prominent brow, and long mohawk of blood red hair that complimented keen purple eyes. Both already carried drawn Zanpaktou, the more feminine man twirling a cutlass while the muscular man at his side carried a large bladed glaive.
Between the two men stood a woman whose presence demanded attention and seemed to make the rest of the Arrancar horde seem small and insignificant by comparison. She wasn’t hiding her reiatsu, which while still not on the crushing level Tirek’s had been still marked her as the strongest of the Espada besides the Primera.
Chrysalis looked upon the Quincy with the eyes of a cat about to pounce upon the mice. She licked her lips, hands dancing with delighted eagerness over the hilt of her long, curved Zanpaktou as she drew the blade forth. She cast a glance at the two men who stood at either side of her, like male reflections of her own primal beauty, despite how opposite the two males were from each other.
“I trust you boys know what to do?” Chrysalis cooed, running a slim finger under Thorax’s chin, then tracing a similar long across the other man’s shoulder, “Thorax, Pharynx, I know neither of you will disappoint me, will you?”
Thorax let out a light, musical laugh, gesturing at the oncoming squadron of Quincy VTOLs, “Entertaining party guests is one of my greatest pleasures, mother. You didn’t need to bring Pharynx along, really.”
The well muscled man, Pharynx, rolled his eyes and huffed out a snort, his voice a gruff and grumbling mirror to Thorax’s musical tones, “I’m here to make sure you don’t get into trouble, and don’t you forget it, ‘brother’. Bad enough we’re taking you into battle, I have to keep an eye on you while testing... this thing out.”
Pharynx frowned deeply while scratching at a spot on his left bicep, pulling back the cloth of the long sleeved white shirt he wore to show his Hollow hole there on the left side of his chest. A small red gem was suspended there and held in place by a complex looking circular device with metal prongs that were planted into his flesh. The gem pulsed with small flickers of light, like a miniature heartbeat. Chrysalis bobbed Pharyn’s nose in an affectionate gesture.
“Quite picking at it. Just kill a few Quincy and see if the gem works as advertised. If you sense any unusual fluctuations, just fall back from the fight.”
Pharynx sighed and gripped his gliave tighter, “Yes, mother. Shall I commence the charge? Catrina and Smooze’s forces are already getting ahead start on on us.”
“By all means, let’s go enjoy ourselves, my children. Tear and gorge yourselves on Quincy souls. Indulge in every violent whim. This is not a battle, it's a celebration. An orgy of death. Let’s show the Quincy how to have a good time.”
At Chrysalis’ proclamation her horde exploded into motion, Thorax and Pharynx taking the lead alongside her as the hundreds of Arrancar joined their fellow Espada’s hordes in a headlong charge at Spitfire’s formation.
“My my my, we really did get the most interesting task, didn’t we?” Hoity Toity said, “Shall I, Spitfire?”
“Not yet. Wait until they’re closer...” Spitfire said, drawing out her bow. The four bars of intense orange, fiery beams formed around her hands and as the VTOLs flew onward, disgorging missiles and now cannon fire in equal measure, she added her fire to the mix. Beams of piercing orange energy flew out from her four pronged bow, piercing dozens of the fuzzy Hollows of Catrina's horde and cutting several of Smooze’s forces in half. She felt a sick feeling in her stomach as she saw those particular Arrancar didn’t so much seem to bleed as they burst into bubbling splashes of dark filth, as if Smooze’s Arrancar weren’t made of flesh and blood so much as some horrible, sewage-like dark fluid.
The doors on either side and behind each VTOL opened, and Quincy soldats leaped out, taking to the air using Hirenkyaku. Keeping in tight squad formations these soldats immediately opened fire on the oncoming Arrancar forces, adding their own reishi arrows to the thunderous combination of missile explosions and gunfire that was slowing the Arrancar tide, but hardly stopping it.
Then they enemy was close enough that Spitfire and Lightning Dust knew it was time to move.
“Hoity, give it sixty seconds, then do your thing. Dust, deal with Smooze. I’ll take on Catrina.”
Lightning Dust grit her teeth, clearly having wanted to take on Catrina again in a rematch, but dutifully nodding her head and summoning her own ‘bow’, the boomerang appearing in a flash of light as she leaped off the VTOL and flew towards Smooze’s forces. Spitfire, glanced once at Chrysalis’ horde, specifically at Chrysalis herself, and resisted the urge to charge at the Second Espada.
That wasn’t her job. His Majesty had designated others to deal with that one, so Spitfire followed orders like the loyal soldier she was, and jumped off the VTOL as well, streaking towards the onrushing force of Catrina’s strange, furry Hollows.
Meanwhile Hoity Toity checked his gold plated watch, and as the Quincy forces and Arrancar smashed into each other in a firestorm of destruction, he calmly vanished.
----------
Wind Rider lowered his high-tech binoculars, grimacing sourly at the insane melee that broke out in the western sky. He stood atop one of the quietly rumbling Quincy tanks. To either side of him scores of the tanks sat waiting, several ranks deep, their cannons aimed skyward. Most of them were manned by McColt loyal crews, but waiting upon or between the tanks were the black cloaked members of the Strafbattalion. His troops wore the same white uniforms of normal Quincy soldats, but their mantles were colored black with silver edges, a mark of their shame as a penal unit. Each and every one of them had disgraced the Quincy in some way. Perhaps through cowardice in battle, or assaulting a fellow Quincy. Some had committed fairly mundane crimes, theft or dealing in drugs, while others had committed acts of greater severity.
Each one, however, was spared death by His Majesty and instead sent to Wind Rider’s unit. In a twisted, ironic way, he was proud of his Strafbattalion. The dregs of the Quincy were his to command, yet he gave them discipline, and purpose. They followed him, and for being a disgraced commander himself Wind Rider was strangely content in his role, even if he always carried a sense of bitter jealousy towards those like Night Light and Spitfire who rose to glory while he remained in the shadows.
“We’re out of time.”
The voice beside him made Wind Rider turn to look at the woman who stood respectfully a little behind where he stood. Her skin was a similar light blue tone to his, perhaps a shade lighter. Her hair as always was done up in a perfectly maintained bun, bearing multiple shades of violet, pink, and purple. A sharp angled face bore a perched pair of thin glasses, which the woman adjusted as she held up a small device with a screen on it as she gave him a pointed look.
Wind Rider gave her a hard look, “You sure you want to do this? His Majesty isn’t going to be forgiving twice.”
Cinch let out a tired, dismissive laugh, “I don’t make the same mistakes twice, as I hope I’ve demonstrated sufficient to you by now. If I don’t do this now, there won’t be another opportunity.”
“I won’t cover for you if you screw this up,” he said, then frowned, “It’d be safer to just stick with me, you know.”
“Spare me the concern. I’m a grown woman,” Cinch gave him a slightly sardonic smirk, “As I thought you’d noticed by now. Now there’s no time. Are you going to let me do this, or are you going to get in my way.”
Wind Rider actually laughed then, shaking his head, “As if I could get in your way, even if I wanted to. Go for it, Cinch. Just don’t get that pretty little butt of yours killed out there.”
Still wearing that smug smirk, Cinch gave him a brief salute, then affixed a soldats mask over her face and vanished at high speed. He knew where she was going, but he couldn’t afford to join her or send any assistance. A part of him wondered if he should have stopped her. Or told His Majesty. But there was no proof of what Cinch had told him, only her suspicions and her overriding need to somehow prove herself right. Really Wind Rider couldn’t grasp why Cinch was so obsessed with that Sparkle girl.
But that obsession, that passion, was part of why he’d become so... involved with her. He just hoped she didn’t get herself killed. Then again, given the nature of this battle, he wasn’t expecting a high rate of survival for himself or the Strafbattalion either.
Where was Hoity Toity anyway?
“Having fun, Wind Rider?”
He tried not to jump at Hoity Toity’s sudden appearance, gritting his teeth and turning to salute the Sternritter, “No. This isn’t my idea of fun at all. You ready to do this?”
The flashy Sternritter bowed with a flourish, “Of course! Let’s draw the curtain on this most fabulous of military maneuvers and I can admire all this fine McColt hardware in action. Nothing so gloriously flash as a full artillery barrage, is there?”
Wind Rider refrained from commenting on Hoity Toity’s priorities and instead called out to his troops, “Its time, Strafbattalion! Time to prove again that we’re worth His Majesty’s mercy and faith! Prepare to fire on my mark!”
Bows and tank cannons raised as one, and with a happy chuckle Hoity Toity jumped up into the air and reached out with his hands. Strands of light flowed from his fingers like the strings of a puppeteer, and those strings of reishi hooked upon the air in front of the tank formations like fishing lines. A space nearly two city blocks wide suddenly shimmered and morphed as Hoity Toity, Sternritter X, the Xenomorph, used his power to alter the composition of the air. Where once was a mirror like cloak that obscured the Quincy tanks and Strafbattalion from view now was an opening like a literal curtain being pulled back.
Hoity Toity’s power always unnerved Wind Rider a bit. It wasn’t simple illusions. The Xenomorph changed how certain forms of matter worked. It wasn’t like Filthy Rich’s Mason, which rebuilt from already present reishi to construct new objects. Rather the Xenomorph changed what the composition of an object or space was, so that even the air could be altered to not reflect light. Thankfully, by Wind Rider’s reckoning at least, Hoity Toity couldn’t forcibly alter the composition of a person. He could do it to himself, or a willing subject, but he couldn’t force it on another. Which far as Wind Rider was concerned was a good thing because given Hoity Toity’s tastes Wind Rider shuddered to think how he might alter other people if given the chance.
And at least in this case the power had been used in a simple manner to hide Strafbattalion and the tanks so that now when they appeared, the Arrancar hordes engaging Spitfire’s forces never saw it coming.
With a device wave of his hand, Wind Rider shouted, “OPEN FIRE!”
And Hueco Mundo was filled with the hammering roar of over a hundred tanks firing at once.
----------
Prim Hemline had tested Ember enough and was growing bored. The Arrancar girl was strong and fast, perhaps even powerful enough that had a weaker Sternritter faced her then it would have been a more even fight. As it was Prim might not have been ranked among the Sternritter “elite” but she was more experienced than most and her Schrift, the Zero, was deceptively powerful when used properly.
She imagined she could end this fight at any time, and now that she sensed the battle was becoming more intense elsewhere it was time to finish these Hollows off and go see where else she might be needed. Besides she didn’t want to get yelled at by Night Light again.
With a deft twist of her wrist and side step she reached past Ember’s guard and thrust her Seele Schneider towards the girl’s throat. Ember surprised Prim by sacrificing her left hand to block the sharp blade of glowing reishi, literally grabbing the blade with her palm to halt it while suffering a grievous cut in her palm that sent blood trickling down her arm.
Ember tried to capitalize on this by raising her large five-foot long blade and slamming it down onto Prim’s shoulder. The blow would normally have cut a person from neck to hip easily, but Ember’s Espina was halted instantly, all kinetic force lost from the blow the moment it made contact with Prim’s skin. Only Prim’s uniform was cut, which annoyed her enough, since she hated have to get fitted for another. Such a hassle.
“I told you, physical attacks are pointless,” she said yanking her Seele Schneider back. Ember let go of it, jumping away from Prim, gripping her wounded palm tightly.
“Bullshit,” Ember spat, “There’s got to be a limit on how much you can take. Nothing is invincible!”
“Technically true, with the exception of His Majesty, I imagine. However even his blade couldn’t cut me if he relied solely on physical force. That is why I am Sternritter Z, child. The Zero... oh, I was about to do Lightning Dust’s thing. No more explanations. It's time for you to enter oblivion.”
”Explode, Despecho!”
A wash of Hollow reiatsu followed by a blast of hot air behind her told Prim the other Arrancar had somehow broken free of her paralyzing arrow and had released his Zanpaktou. Looking back, Prim saw Garble transforming into his bulky, long clawed Resurreccion form, and she cast him an unimpressed snort. He was weaker than Ember, and transformation or not, he wouldn’t be a problem. As to how he’d escaped her arrow, she saw the Vasto Lorde Adagio rushing to the side away from Garble, and surmised Adagio had broken the arrow. That was an unfortunate weakness to the Zero, she had to either be in contact with her target or her arrows did. Destroying an arrow ended the Zero’s effects. Still, as long as she tagged all three of these Hollows at once there wouldn’t be any problems.
She turned to fire at Adagio, but found Garble rushing towards her. Finding nothing but contempt for the brute’s idiotic tactics, not learning from experience at all, she turned her arrow towards him, intending to just piercing him through the head. However just as she fired Garble cut loose a Cero blast straight down at the ground, launching himself into the air and above her arrow. Annoying, but Prim just aimed again, while easily dodging a Bala that Ember fired at her back. She could handle both Arrancar at once. She fired at Garble, and frowned in irritation as he fired another Cero, this time at her arrow. The arrow still easily cut through beam, its strength relatively weak compared to the potency of Prim’s arrows, but Garble used the obscuring nature of the wide red beam to change direction again. Now he used Sonido to get close to her, slashing with the one large claw he had. Prim didn’t bother to block it, letting the claw lose all its kinetic force a it hit her, but rather than stay put so she could lop the arm off with her Seele Schnicer, Garble backed off and fired anther Cero, this time at Prim’s feet.
She leapt above the blast without trouble, and then side stepped with similar ease as Ember joined in with a Cero beam of her own.
Huffing out a sigh of pure agitation, Prim upped her speed, firing rapid arrows back and forth at both Garble and Ember, forcing both Arrancar to focus solely on evading themselves. It was starting to seriously get under Prim’s skin that she wasn’t landing any solid hits yet, but even with her speed advantage it was difficult to hit an opponent who seemed determined to just dodge and only throw half hearted attacks. She’d noticed a look pass between Garble and Ember, almost as if they knew what tactic they were using without having to communicate with each other. Probably a result of being part of the same horde of Hollows. But if their plan was just to dodge and try to tire Prim out then they’d be sorely disappointed...
Wait... where had that Vasto Lorde gone?
Prim stopped paying attention to Garble and Ember, instead looking around for Adagio. What she found was from above her an entire swarm of compacted water spheres had formed, Adagio flitting about the sky, creating the balls of water with sweeps of her trident. Then with a gesture the spheres descended towards Prim in a rush. Prim smiled, but shook her head. A fine enough distraction tactic, but the water spheres, no matter how much force they contained, were easy enough to stop with her arrows. She wouldn’t let them hit her, of course, because if she let that water surround her then the pressure alone, not to mention the inability to breathe, would be a problem, but a few arrows would rob the spheres of their kinetic force.
She fired her volley of golden arrows in a streaking curtain of golden pin pricks. Each one expertly aimed to pierce a water sphere to make it lose all momentum, and hence fall usellely around her.
Only the very last sphere, when Prim’s arrow hit it, revealed a gleaming crimson sphere suspended within that had been hidden until the water lost its momentum.
Taken off guard, Prim dodged a shade too slow as the ball of destructive energy that Adagio had placed in her last water sphere kept going and exploded less than a meter from Prim Hemline. It wasn’t quite a Cero, rather that Adagio had taken a portion of a Cero’s power and kept it contained in one of her water spheres. She’d seen how physical attacks did nothing to Prim and had guessed that the Sternritter’s power somehow halted kinetic forces.
But that didn’t mean a thing to attacks made of pure spirit energy.
The explosion hit Prim and sent her crashing to the ground. Adagio didn’t waste a second, diving down and enacting the second part of her plan. All of the water from the spheres that had lost their momentum now leapt to her command, swirling together into one large sphere, encasing the stunned Prim Hemline. Adagio had figured her little partial-Cero bomb wouldn’t do much damage, but as she’d guessed it had dazed Prim just long enough for Adagio to surround the Sternritter with her water, which had fallen around the Quincy at just the right moment.
Now Prim Hemline found herself being encircled and crushed by a heavily pressured sphere of water, and Adagio, landing on the ground next to the sphere, placed her trident inside it and summoned even more water, making the sphere larger, making its pressure more intense. Prim might have been immune to attacks that relied on raw kinetic power, but the pressure on her now was from the weight of the water alone.
Adagio was willing to bet the lack of air was also a problem.
“Arrogant,” Adagio laughed, “I love having arrogant opponents. You could have killed all three of us right from the start, but you just had to toy with us. Now... let’s see how long you can hold your breath.”
“Screw that noise,” said Ember, approaching the water sphere, “Garble get your ass over here and let’s fry this Quincy! Just keep her still for a few seconds Adagio. Then we’ll hit her with Ceros all at once. No way she’s surviving that.”
Adagio considered this proposition, found no fault in Ember’s logic to end this matter quickly, and nodded, “A fine idea, Ember. We’ve got a schedule to keep.”
As Ember approached the sphere where Prim was trapped and started charging up a Cero in her hand, Garble did the same on the other side, although Adagio noticed that before he did so he gave a pat at the pocket of the torn pants he wore and she heard him mutter, “Still got this...”
Adagio raised an eyebrow, wondering what he was talking about, but shrugged. It didn’t matter, as long as he kept following her orders. She’d just keep an extra eye on him, just in case. As her two Arrancar companions charged their Ceros, Adagio started to do the same. Prim remained trapped inside the sphere, unable to move, unable to fire any arrows, and slowly drowning.
----------
The interior space of the sub-dimension that Sombra had created shook with the shockwaves of titanic clashing forces. Though the ‘walls’ of this space were essentially barriers of distorted sub-space, the sheer spiritual energy that they were trying to contain as the two Kings battled was starting to destabilize and crack the foundations of this dimensional prison.
Sombra’s form never stayed in the same place for more than a partial second, darkness cloaking him as he moved. The arrows his shining bow of silver and blue unleashed were spears of void that pulsed with unnatural silver light within the dark cores, each shot exploding in a distortion of space like a miniature singularity.
Tirek had nearly gotten caught by such detonations dozens of times in this short skirmish, reminding the Hollow King just how deadly a foe Sombra was, for even his supreme Hierro could not guard against the way Sombra’s weapons tore at the very fabric of space itself. Yet Tirek felt no fear, only exaltation as he roared his joy at the battle, his horn disgorging an endless stream of unparalleled Ceros that tore across the starless space they fought across, each one detonating upon the distant barriers of the prison like miniature nukes.
He pressed Sombra relentlessly, a red blur of motion beyond the speed of sound, his massive sword little more than a metallic streak that sought Sombra’s flesh. In response Sombra did the impossible, breaking his bow into twin swords to deflect Tirek’s colossal rain of blows and reassembling the blow within the same motions, firing and striking, firing and parrying, all without pause, so fast he may as well have had eight arms instead of two.
Neither monarch was unwounded. Near misses from Sombra’s distortion arrows had caused ripples in space that could cut Tirek’s flesh, leaving several warped lacerations that stained his red skin even darker crimson. Yet Sombra was not unscathed from Triek’s assault, close calls with Tirek’s Cero beams, like brushing against a solar flare, had scorched at Sombra’s flesh and burned his armor, even as the darkness surrounding the man had deflected much of the harm.
That darkness was no mere shadow, Tirek knew. It was the manifestation of Sombra’s personal Schrift, the strongest of the powers the Quincy King could dispense to others, yet kept for himself. ‘A’, the Absolute. And Tirek knew Sombra wasn’t close to using that power to its full extent yet, but that was fair enough, Tirek hadn’t even released his Zanpaktou yet. Sombra wasn’t going to take this seriously until then, but Tirek was in no rush. This dimensional prison wouldn’t survive their clash forever, and he knew his Espada wouldn’t fall easily to Sombra’s Sternritter.
He could take his time to enjoy this.
With immense speed and force he appeared behind Sombra and delivered a overhead chop that would’ve diced a skyscraper in half. Sombra didn’t block the blow but rather flickered in and out of his shadows, the Absolute distorting space so that Sombra instantly appeared several meters away, whereupon he raised his bow and fired a cloud-burst of a hundred arrows at point blank range. Tirek flew backwards, swinging his blade to deflect the storm of dark arrows, weathering their ripples of tearing space that shook his body like the winds of a typhoon trying to batter a mountain. Grinning, Tirek let his supreme Hollow reiatsu pour into his blade and lashed out, sending out a orange and black crackling shockwave that ripped apart the last of the cloud of arrows, causing a cascade of expositions that rocked the sub-dimension.
“We could do this for days, but you know your fragile servants don’t have the endurance for a prolonged battle like this,” Tirek said with a knowing smirk, his words not distracting him or slowing him down as he rocketed across the void and delivered a hurricane-force slash. Sombra coiled distorted shadows around his arm to block the blow, the null-space absorbing the monstrous strength of Triek’s blow, yet the First Espada’s strike still carried enough force to propel Sombra back.
Rather than crash into the side of the dimensional prison, Sombra instantly flowed into the warped space of the darkness that enveloped him and appeared above Tirek, extending one hand towards the Espada. Coiling lances of darkness, each one a rip in space that would pierce nearly any conventional material, sprang down and tried to impale Tirek.
“I’m aware of my people’s limitations. I did not bring them here just sacrifice them without purpose,” Sombra said, his eyes narrowing as Tirek vanished at high speed, escaping the stabbing rain of attacks his distorted space was creating.
“Sacrifice. What an interesting turn of phrase,” Tirek rumbled a laugh, his body exploding with a wave of reiatsu that pushed back against the grasping spears of darkness as he started to more casually walk towards Sombra, sword aimed at the Quincy King as a large ball of converging energy gathered at the tip, “How many of them are aware of what happens to their souls, once they’ve ‘sacrificed’ them to your cause?”
A gargantuan wave of a Cero fired from the tip of Tirek’s sword, and while Sombra warped into his own shadows to evade it, the massive beam of roaring orange energies collided with the walls of the sub-dimension and started to cause fractures of white light to appear across the void-like space. Sombra appeared a few dozen meters behind Tirek, face bearing a heavy look.
“Every Quincy who bears the title of Sternritter knows of my true nature. I wouldn’t trust their loyalty if they didn’t.”
“And you still hate us Hollows? For what? Being soul devouring monsters?” Tirek scoffed, and when he rushed Sombra again his sword strike was even faster and harder, yet when Sombra moved to block it Tirek took one hand off the sword and with a punch beyond super-sonic speeds delivered a haymaker blow to the Quincy King, catching him straight across the face and knocking him backwards hundreds of feet.
“You’re such a hypocrite.”
Sombra recovered with a flip, then rubbed his chin where a small trickle of blood pooled down from his cracked lip. He closed his eyes with a sad smile, “Perhaps I am. That will be for my people to judge, on another day. Today, they fight to show your people that atrocities like the attack on the Academy will not be tolerated. The world of the living does not belong to Hollows.”
A roar of laughter came from Tirek, “Your rhetoric is boring me, boy! At the end of the day your army of toy soldiers will be broken. Even the fancy powers you’ve granted your Sternritter barely makes them a match two on one with my Espada. You should have stuck to your guerrilla tactics in the living world and kept your army far away from my domain.”
“Do you honestly think I’d have brought them here if I thought I was leading my people to slaughter?” Sombra asked, “You’ve always been overconfident Tirek. That’s why you continue to fail, and you’ve passed that error on to those who follow you.”
All the while during this ongoing duel with Tirek, Sombra had a small part of his mind focused elsewhere. While the sub-space prison of the ‘Heiliges Heiligtum’ was an ironclad pocket of reality that separated itself from all other realms, mimicking a formerly unique Hollow power known as Negacion, Sombra had designed this particular prison with one microscopic hole in its construction. This hole would be imperceptible to Tirek, but it’d allow just a fraction of reishi through from Hueco Mundo that would allow Sombra to remain connected to Night Light’s power of the Command.
So he’d been able to continuously keep updated on the progress of the battle via reports from Night Light. And now Night Light’s words once again reached Sombra with crystal clarity.
My King, the Espadas Chrysalis, Catrina, and Smooze are now on the battlefield and are engaging Spitfire’s forces. The Strafbattalion has begun its counter attack.
There was a moment of hesitance in Night Light’s voice, The cadets are under attack by the Sixth Espada, Guto. Fleur De Lis, Fleetfoot, and Soarin have engaged the enemy there, but the cadets won’t last long.
Sombra could sense Night Light’s fear for his daughter, even past the general’s otherwise ice smooth and coldly detached voice. Well, Sombra wasn’t going to leave the man hanging in fear any longer. Now that the majority of the Espada had come out to fight, it was time.
“I know how strong Hollows are compared to humans, Tirek. That’s why I’ve spared no effort in closing the gap that existed between your Espada and my Sternritter until now.”
While Tirek raised his eyebrow at those cryptic words, Sombra responded to Night Light with a wide, almost mad smile.
Relay this order to all Sternritter, Night Light. Reveal your holy wings and bring ruin upon the souls of evil. Activate Vollstandig.