They Should Have Noticed the Problem Long Ago!

Boom!!!

A series of crisp cracks, as if space itself were collapsing, rang out one after another.

Before the other Captains had even fully steadied themselves, the Black Coffin Aizen had constructed with a full incantation shattered completely like obsidian struck by a heavy hammer.

Countless black Spirit Particle fragments fell like rain, vanishing into nothingness before they could touch the ground.

From the center of that dissipating darkness, a familiar yet unfamiliar figure slowly stepped out.

"What kind of joke is this... That Spiritual Pressure... that appearance... Jūshirō, hadn't you already turned away from that path?"

Toshiro Hitsugaya stared fixedly at the figure emerging from the smoke and dust, his pupils contracting sharply as disbelief and horror filled his face.

It was Jushiro Ukitake, yet it was far more than merely Jushiro Ukitake.

The frail Captain who had once been as gentle as polished jade now had his entire face covered by a ghastly white bone Mask. Beneath his originally pristine captain's haori, a Hollow-like hole had appeared where the Chain knot in his chest should have been.

That Spiritual Pressure was no longer gentle. It carried a deathly stillness and emptiness that made one feel as though they had fallen into an ice cellar.

"You wouldn't understand, Hitsugaya."

Fake Jūshirō's voice seemed to overlap with a second voice, low and cold:

"But Aizen, and Ross over there, you should understand. If one wished to go further, if one wished to contend against the lofty True King's Palace, then one had to break the boundary between Shinigami and Hollows and overcome that damned bottleneck."

As he spoke, Fake Jūshirō's dark green eyes casually swept across Toshiro Hitsugaya.

It was merely an instant of eye contact.

Toshiro Hitsugaya felt an oppressive, almost tangible aura of death seize his throat in