The location at the very bottom of the Soul King Palace, near the innermost barrier.
The upper half of the Monk's body remained here. When his men engaged in fierce fighting, Yama-jii arrived and heard the Monk's instructions. He chanted, "Ichibē Hyōsube!"
In an instant, blackness solidified, Monk the monk's entire body was reshaped. He panted heavily, letting out a sigh of relief, "I'm saved!"
Yama-jii asked coldly, "Even the Zero Division has been defeated. It's truly a matter of life and death. Can he really replace the Soul King?"
The Monk said earnestly, "No, that's why we must stop him. If he kills the Soul King, the world will be cleansed all over again."
Yama-jii paused for a moment, then asked the Monk, "Do you still have the strength to fight again?"
"I need to conserve some strength in case something really happens next."
Faced with the Monk's answer, Yama-jii fell silent again, and then he Shunpo moved towards the Soul King's Inner Palace... Immediately afterwards, a thought came, and the Monk gave Yama-jii the information about his battle with Zero.
Yama-jii certainly knew what the "most likely thing to happen" was: once the Soul King died, the Monk would use his remaining power to create a temporary Soul King...
Soul King's Inner Palace, Zero killed all the Divine Soldiers Guards. He sincerely admired these fearless Attendants.
When they finally reached the top floor, no one dared to come out and get in their way anymore... Meanwhile, the battle between the Captain and the Espada below had just begun.
The footsteps were clear and distinct in the empty hall. After passing through a curtain, Zero finally saw the true form of the Soul King; the voice that had called his true name came from here...
Within a towering crystal seal stood a figure without hands or feet, unable to move. His Four-pointed Star Pupils seemed to see through the past and the future, staring directly at Zero as he entered.
What kind of being is this? Despite being so severely injured and sealed away for an immeasurable amount of time, it is still not completely dead.
Zero asked himself, if his limbs were cut off and his internal organs were emptied, even if he could survive under the protection of the Hōgyoku, he would still collapse on his own during the long period of sealing.
"Consistent with the records in the Great Spirit Book Gallery, you were attacked by the Five Great Noble Clans ancestors and forcibly made into Pillar to stabilize the world, yet you still retain your own will... No wonder you not only do not resist my entry as a traitor, but also seem to have some anticipation."
After a brief moment of surprise, Zero regained his composure. His voice penetrated the seal, and the surviving Soul King answered directly with his thoughts:
"Traitor? Who is the real traitor? I have never intended to sit aloof in the heavens. If I had to say, Soul Reaper is the traitor, after all, those five attacked me..."
"In fact, my initial idea was to prevent the void from having an afterlife, to completely annihilate them, and for the Reishi that the void transformed into after their destruction to be reborn as human souls, so that the world would remain as it is."
"But the five people disagreed with my approach. They chose to separate the world of life and death and maintain balance in the world... It's worth mentioning that this separated world has been operating for millions of years."
Zero already knew that the claim that 'the number of souls is constant' was complete nonsense.
Because during reincarnation, countless souls accidentally drifted into the Dangai and became souls in Blanks.
However, this did not affect the total number of souls, because the missing souls had already been reborn...
From the intelligence she had previously obtained, Zero already knew that the Soul King was the progenitor of the Quincy clan: "So, is this why you chose not to resist? Willing to give up your freedom and your clan for the sake of the world's balance, and be imprisoned in this state of neither life nor death for so long, don't you resent them?"
The Soul King's thoughts remained silent for several seconds before finally resurfacing. "Resentment? Yes, but compared to this world of suffering, my pain is insignificant. Even if I don't become the Pillar, someone else will, but they may not be able to endure this long."
"Furthermore, I have already foreseen hundreds and thousands of future events. Without deliberate guidance, my time as the Soul King is limited. After it ends, I will begin a new life..."
Zero looked at the Soul King with admiration. What a saint! He saw the future but didn't resist. He chose to accept it himself so that others wouldn't have to suffer the same pain.
Zero felt a little embarrassed to devour him; he felt inferior, realizing he was merely someone seeking a higher position.
Zero, still maintaining her skeptical attitude, asked, "Why don't you choose to rebel, given your ability to see into the future? You could become a living Pillar, sitting high on the Throne to balance the Three Worlds —isn't that better than being sealed away?"
"Narrow-minded people will not allow anyone to be above them... Having said so much about my topic, let's talk about you!"
"Talking about me? What's there to say? The future you see is just me freeing you and then replacing you, isn't it? That just confirms everything you saw millions of years ago."
When the Soul King turned the topic to Zero, Zero noticed that the battle outside was getting increasingly intense. He took a few steps forward, ready to give the Soul King a quick death.
"No, I see that the person who will replace me is not you. Besides, you were not born from this world; you come from another world... You are simply incapable of replacing me!"
The Soul King's words struck Zero like a bolt from the blue, leaving him momentarily stunned: Not born from this world? Did he know I came from another world? No, more importantly, I can't replace him?
Clearing her mind and regaining her composure, Zero quickly regained her composure and asked calmly, "You know I'm a soul from another world? It seems you can see not only the future but also the past. But if you say I can't replace you, what makes you say that?"
The Soul King said softly, "The number of souls within the Three Worlds may change, with some more and some less, but the total amount of Reishi across the Three Worlds will not change."
"Every soul is formed from Reishi. A powerful Soul Reaper or Hollow, upon death, may have its Reishi differentiate into hundreds of human souls."
"Souls born from this world bear its mark, much like the Blanks have fallen into the Dangai. Even though they have fallen into nothingness, they are still drawn in and cannot escape further. They simply wait nearby to be guided by this world back here..."
Zero tilted his head and smiled, "So you mean I disrupted the balance a little, plundered the Reishi of this world to achieve my own power, but I don't belong here, I don't have the imprint of this world, so I can't become the Soul King, is that correct?"
"More or less, but I wasn't quite right. If you want to forcibly devour me with the Hōgyoku Power, that's fine, but your time as Soul King will be very short, and you'll gradually lose yourself..."
The Soul King remained motionless, but his eyes within the crystal seemed to flicker. Zero was instantly pulled into a space that appeared to be in outer space, filled with dazzling starlight. As soon as Zero turned his head, he saw a Red-haired Monster opening its mouth to bite him...
Shocked, Zero immediately unleashed his Reiatsu, a materialized Reiatsu rushing towards the Red-haired Big-mouthed Monster in front of him, but it passed right through it the instant it touched it... It was an illusion.
Moreover, no matter how rampant the Reiatsu was within this space, everything remained unchanged, as if Zero were unleashing Reiatsu in a void.
That Red-haired Monster wasn't real; it was just a figment of imagination. However, it felt so real that Zero instinctively retaliated...
"A virtual scene? Where exactly is this?" Zero finally realized as he calmed down.
"This is my Consciousness Space; it's one of the futures I see of you... and there are others."
The Soul King replied to him and appeared beside Zero. At this moment, he had all four limbs intact, was tall, and had the same appearance as in the crystal, with a very indifferent expression.
'This guy can instantly imprison my consciousness and prevent me from breaking free, just as the records say, he simply doesn't want to resist...'
Zero glanced at him in surprise, then turned to look at the 'future scene' and exclaimed in astonishment, "My future?"
The Red-haired Monster was indeed humanoid; the red hair was its long, flowing hair. Upon closer inspection, Zero could see that the area above the nose resembled his own, but its mouth was stretched all the way to its ears, with bloody teeth dripping saliva.
He is wreaking havoc on a World of the Living city. Compared to World of the Living buildings, those twenty-story residential buildings only reach his waist, and he is conservatively estimated to be at least two hundred meters tall.
A fire caused by a short circuit in the city's electrical wiring is raging, and people who don't know what's happening are crying out and fleeing in all directions.
But it all seemed to be in vain. He opened his mouth and inhaled (just like when Yammy first arrived in the World of the Living), and countless souls gathered in his mouth, and the wailing instantly disappeared...
"Before you decide to devour me, take a look. There are many futures, but only one outcome..."
With a wave of his hand, the Soul King summoned hundreds of screen-like images that surrounded the two, continuously playing a picture of Zero's future.
In one scene, the colossal monster Zero is engaged in a fierce battle with the Monsters Guarding Hell. He has devoured the entire human world and has already taken his flesh to Hell...
In a nearby scene, Monster Zero is devouring Hueco Mundo, where the desert disappears, the moon is revealed in the Menos Grande Forest, and thousands of Ragged Hollows to particles in a surging torrent of Reishi. Even the Arrancars at the Top of the Food Chain can only hold out a little longer...
In another scene, the World of the Living is full of ruins and Garganta everywhere. The clouds floating Heavenly Heights only reach up to the thigh of the monster Zero, who is reaching into a super large Garganta to take out the Valley of Screams Space.
The vast Valley of Screams thousands of square kilometers, was like an egg in his hands; he devoured it one bite at a time...
Finally, all the scenes played in unison: a world devoid of life, with only Zero wandering about. In the end, Zero couldn't hold on any longer and exploded, causing a rain of red Reishi to fall across the world, and all things began to revive.
After seeing countless futures, Zero said in a deep voice, "Are you threatening me?"
"This is not a threat; this is the truth. I'm showing this to you for the sake of the world."
The Soul King remained calm. "You now have three choices. First, devour me, as foreshadowed in the future; second, abandon the devouring and return to Hueco Mundo."
"Third, you will remain in the Soul King Palace, replacing the Zero Division as the new Guards, but the rules will be changed, and you will become the actual controller..."
Zero fell silent. He wasn't sure if the Soul King was telling the truth or not. Perhaps the other party had been deceiving him with illusions all along, just like Aizen's Kyōka Suigetsu.