"Soul King, wait for me!"
Yhwach stood quietly atop the ruins, his gaze fixed on the Soul King Palace hanging in the sky above Soul Society.
As the great Son of the Soul King, Yhwach had never forgotten his mission. He had been born to "replace" the Soul King and become the new "true god" of the Three Worlds!
And once he ascended to the Soul King Palace and absorbed the lingering power of his father, becoming a true "god," he would accomplish what even the great Soul King had failed to achieve! It was what the Soul King had intended before those five despicable traitors turned him into the "keystone" that sustained the Three Worlds.
Unfortunately, the invincible Yhwach had ultimately misunderstood the Soul King's meaning. He never imagined that the "replacement" he understood was not the same as the "replacement" the Soul King understood...
Seireitei East Gate—Seiryū!
After Chōjirō Sasakibe's Tenteikūra resounded in the hearts of every captain of the Gotei 13, the captains began moving on their own...
"Huh? After Araki, even Captain-Commander Yamamoto, who set out later than us, has already finished clearing out the enemy forces in the area assigned to the 1st Division?!"
"Damn it! It looks like our Sixth Division has fallen far behind! Forget making a name for ourselves in this war as planned—even avoiding a scolding from Old Man Yama once the war ends would be a blessing!"
After receiving Chōjirō Sasakibe's Tenteikūra, Saito Furofushi casually fussed with her twin tails in front of countless enemies and shouted in apparent "anxiety."
"Hey, hey! Is this girl really okay?"
"Someone like her can be a captain of the Gotei 13? Looks like so-called captain-class Soul Reapers aren't all that impressive after all~"
As the Quincy watched Saito Furofushi, who was clearly mentally unstable and wore the white Captain's Haori that symbolized her rank, they grew suspicious. Still, they drew their bowstrings. Whether Saito was truly mad or merely pretending, one arrow would reveal the answer.
Whoosh!
Before the Quincy, all "ready" and "raring to go," could fire their arrows at Saito Furofushi...
A bleak, icy flash streaked before their eyes first!
Amid the spray of blood, the Quincy who had drawn their bows at Saito Furofushi suddenly discovered that the hands they used to pull their bowstrings were already flying through the air.
"Ah! My hand! The hand I use to draw my bow!"
For a time, shrill screams echoed across the battlefield.
"Bastards! It's because there are so many of you, like cockroaches that can never be completely killed off, that I fell behind Araki and Captain-Commander Yamamoto! Hurry up and die, die, die!!"
Before the Quincy could think further, Saito Furofushi, Zanpakuto in hand, complained as she swung her blade. Like a bolt of purple lightning, she drifted through the Quincy in an instant...
In the blink of an eye, one Quincy head after another flew into the sky like paper lanterns! As blood scattered through the air, the headless Quincy corpses immediately toppled backward, hitting the ground with a thud as life left them.
"Not enough! Not enough! I need to be faster..."
Along with Saito Furofushi's grumbling, her speed grew faster and faster, and so did her blade!
A few minutes later...
Blood had unknowingly dyed the white haori draped over Saito crimson. Even Saito herself no longer remembered how many Quincy lives the sword in her hand had claimed.
Saito could not be bothered to count how many Quincy she had slaughtered, because it was meaningless. No one would care how many little bread rolls they had eaten that morning. As long as they had not all been killed, she would keep killing...
"Ah! This is getting irritating! Give me a number—how many of you are left?!"
More icy flashes streaked past, and even more Quincy sank into eternal sleep upon Seireitei's soil...
Standing atop Quincy corpses that seemed to carpet the floor of Seireitei, Saito asked the Quincy who were still alive how many men their army had left! Yet no one answered her question...
The Quincy would not answer a question asked by a murderous madwoman whose Zanpakuto was still dripping blood. Yes, in the eyes of the Quincy, Saito was no different from a demon of hell!
"Die, you damned lunatic!"
Just as Saito Furofushi stood bathed in blood, her absentminded expression alone sending chills down the Quincy's spines!
A Quincy clad in a white knight's uniform gripped a Quincy blade tightly and charged toward Saito Furofushi.
"Looking to die?!"
Saito licked her lips as she looked at the newcomer, raising her blade to slash at the shouting man.
Smack~
Before Saito could make a move...
A pitch-black shadow appeared at Saito's side and attacked the Quincy before she could!
With a soft sound, the shadow revealed his full form. He was a man with short dark-purple hair, dusky skin, and the same white Captain's Haori as Saito!
The man did not release his Zanpakuto against the Quincy, nor did he use any flashy Kidō. Instead, he chose Hakuda, snapping the Quincy's neck with a single kick.
"Shihoin Sennichi? You're here..."
Saito pursed her lips in displeasure as she looked at the newcomer.
"What? You don't seem very happy to see that it's me~"
The newcomer was naturally Shihoin Sennichi, captain of the 2nd Division! He first shook the blood from his foot before turning to Saito with a helpless shrug.
"Tch~" Saito clicked her tongue quietly, then continued asking Shihoin Sennichi, "Something this serious happened in Seireitei, and you're still running around everywhere as the head of the Shihoin Clan. Is that really okay?!"
"I dumped the Shihoin Clan's affairs on my younger brother! I'm only the acting head now, so I'm light as a feather~"
Shihoin Sennichi gave Saito a cheerful smile.
It had to be said that Shihoin Sennichi's habit of doing whatever he pleased and dumping all his responsibilities onto his younger brother whenever trouble arose was exactly like the later Shihoin Yoruichi.
"You two, save the chatter! The Captain-Commander is summoning us."
As Shihoin Sennichi and Saito chatted, a crisp voice rang out. Several icy flashes streaked past them, and a young woman whose sexy figure made her the center of attention merely by standing there held a sharp naginata. Expressionless, she casually took the lives of several Quincy.
In the young woman's eyes, killing Quincy was as easy as crushing a few ants.
"Katori Bakuunsai, even you're here?"
Saito frowned slightly at the newcomer. More and more hunters were competing with her for "merits." It seemed she needed to act quickly.
"Time is short. You take the left, I'll take the right!"
"Fine!"
Shihoin Sennichi and Saito quickly reached an agreement!
The next second, two streaks of light flashed across the battlefield like twin scythes of death, endlessly harvesting Quincy lives one after another!
In an instant, more and more Quincy were slaughtered without mercy. Soon, their corpses had piled into towering mountains! The endless stench of blood scattered across the battlefield on the mournful autumn wind.
"These people are complete lunatics!"
"They don't care about anyone else's lives! They don't even care about their comrades' lives!"
"They're butchers! Executioners! Murderers! The worst kind of villains!"
For a time, the remaining Quincy before Seiryūmon stared in despair at Saito Furofushi, dancing with blood atop a "hill of corpses"; Shihoin Sennichi, the dark-skinned corpse-shredder whose punches landed with brutal force; and Katori Bakuunsai, the busty, blank-faced killer whose every strike sent limbs flying.
But how could humans like them possibly defeat demons born in "hell"?
Before you continue