Twelfth Division barracks, deep underground research workshop.
The air held a jumble of smells. Acrid Reishi-setting solvent and scorched metal powder mingled with a heavy chill that swept back and forth through the narrow corridor.
Click.
With a sharp snap, the glaring white light above the central testing table went out. Only a few dim yellow emergency lamps in the corners barely illuminated the cluttered work surface.
A full six inches thick, the experiment log slammed shut beneath a strong, full-fleshed hand, stirring up a faint cloud of Reishi dust.
Kirio Hikifune took the monocular lens from her eye and rubbed her aching temples. She had tossed her loose Twelfth Division Captain's Haori over the back of a chair.
Before her, three mimetic shells pieced together from Reishi clay and imitation Spirit Networks hung limply in transparent columns of solidified spirit fluid. Dissection had left them riddled with holes.
The Substitute Soul Project had failed completely.
Years ago, when Central 46 had greedily pressured her to produce something like the Yushima Ouko Puppet Army, Kirio Hikifune had seized the opportunity to propose a plan: forcibly take control of a Soul Reaper's body after they lost consciousness and keep it fighting.
But after countless experiments grafting living Spirit Networks and infusing mimetic souls over several years, she had run into an insurmountable wall:
A Soul Reaper's soul and the Spirit Network systems of their Shikai and Bankai formed a single, indivisible whole.
Forcing in a preset combat soul that lacked resonance with the original soul could not draw out the power of the Soul Reaper's Zanpakutō. Worse, severe rejection within the Reiatsu pathways had repeatedly caused the body's Spirit Networks to explode and its Reishi to collapse during combat.
She could not create a force capable of turning the tide of