CH 166: HUECO MUNDO
[Hueco Mundo]
Hueco Mundo, the world of Hollows was a world greatly different from Soul Society and the Human world.
An unchanging night covered the sky while an endless white desert covered the ground. Tree-like objects that looked like plants, but rather were quartz-like minerals littered the ground.
A world of death. A world of pain. That was the Hueco Mundo.
But even in such a world, while rare, some hollows who managed to regain their consciousness liked to gather and create settlements where they lived in semi-large or small groups.
—-
"Nnoitra, I do not understand. Executing the residents of this settlement…What purpose did it serve? Why go beyond our directives?"
In one of those settlements, two people stood under the moonlight. One of them, the one who complained, was a beautiful curvaceous and well-endowed adult woman with long waving green hair and hazel eyes.
She wore a customized uniform that is a tight-fitting long-sleeved shirt with shoulder pads and puffy cuffs that was entirely white aside from a thin black line going from the chest of her shirt to her hips.
The only thing that differentiated her from a normal adult woman was the white goat mask that seemed to be stuck at the top of her head.
"Fuck off, Nelliel. Nothing was said about sparing any lives."
The man she was speaking to, Nnoitra, was a very tall man with a thin and lanky body.
His black hair hung past his shoulders, concealing the left side of his face and a large white eyepatch with one exposed dark gray eye. In his hand was a weapon that looked like a spear, though rather than a pointed head, the blade was in the form of a crescent moon.
Like Nelliel, Nnoitra was clad in white from head to toe with a hint of black on his eye patch. The only problem was that his clothes and weapon were entirely covered in fresh blood. Proof of the horror that had just been committed by him.
"Aizen-sama explicitly told us to locate Vasto Lordes. I don't remember anything about causing a massacre."
Nnoitra shrugged, "You know there are still people who wish for Aizen-sama's demise. I was under the impression that this place was filled with rebels. Heh~I did Aizen-sama a favor by cleansing this place of their Kind. Beside—"
He spat on the ground and swung his weapon to get rid of the blood on it, " —The way they fought back, I doubt any of them had the potential to become Vasto Lordes. So spare me your incessant whining. Because no one's gonna miss a few hundred insignificant peons."
Nelliel's eyes narrowed as anger brewed in her. Despite her power, ever since she regained her rationality, she had always been a pacifist at heart, and what she had just seen disheartened her. She wished she could have come a little sooner to avoid this tragedy.
"You think too highly of yourself, Nnoitra. You and I are from the same origin as them. We are here only because of a fortunate set of circumstances. You would be wise to remember that."
All Arrancars, even the natural ones, were once Hollows after all.
He sneered and put his little finger in his ear, "I don't like the tone of your voice. If you got a problem with the way I do things, why don't you come here and do something about it?"
"Sigh. You amuse me… Despite joining the rank of Espada you still act like a baby sucking on his mother's teat."
Nelliel gave one last look at the settlement that has been burned to the ground and sighed regretfully at the life lost before turning to walk away.
At the end of the day, she was still a Hollow. It wasn't as if she would begin crying for their deaths.
"What the fuck did you say!?"
Her words made Nnoitra blow a fuse and even as she gave her back to him, he moved with rage evident on his face while swinging his weapon at her, well intent in killing her.
Sadly for him, Nelliel was very different from the helpless hollows he had just exterminated.
Side-stepping his attack with a sonido like it was nothing, she retaliated with a series of attacks so fast that he had no time to react. Sending him spiraling.
Not giving up, he came back again but whatever he did, he was simply beaten back to the ground again and again. The difference between the two of them was simply too high.
"Let's end it here."
Once she made sure that the blood on his clothes was his own this time, Nelliel sheathed her sword back.
'It's good that I finished it before lunch. If I am late those might start to worry.'
"Wait!"
She stopped and looked down at him,
"Neliel, I have been rather adamant about my utter disdain for you. So why are you still sparing me!?"
"Simple…Because you are weak."
"You!! Finish me off now!"
He screamed like a wounded beast. The wound her words made to his pride was far more painful than the wound she inflicted on his body with her sword. In his opinion, death was better than such a humiliation. Sadly for him,
"I refuse."
Nelliel's answer was merciless.
"There was a time, we ceased to be human and became beasts. Now though, as Arrancars, we have regained our sense of reason."
She shook her head sending him a look full of pity as if looking at a stupid child, "Beings with reason need a true reason to fight one another and this is something you lack."
Nnoitra screamed, "Well I have one! You piss the fuck out of me!"
Even then, she did not break her stern facade, treating him as the child she saw him as, "That is not a purpose. It's nothing but instinct."
She looked up at the sky, her mind full of thoughts only she could know, before walking away and giving one last sentence, "You are a beast. I do not acknowledge you as a fellow warrior and thus, I do not feel like burdening myself with the life of one who is not a warrior."
Looking at her departing back, powerless to stop her, Nnoitra gritted his teeth, his eye filled with hatred and determination,
"I swear that I will make you regret this."
He growled under his breath but suddenly
'What!?'
His mouth clamped shut and his head swiveled to the side and he looked at a direction opposite to that of Nelliel. Beads of sweat formed on his face as he felt the wall of the dimension break and open in a place not far away from where they were.
This sensation was followed by a dreadful feeling of pressure the like he had never felt.
'What the hell!?'
Nnoitra wasn't the only one to have felt this since Nelliel also stopped and looked in the same direction as Nnoitra.
Her expression grew cloudy when she remembered the orders the Espada had received about an incoming invasion.
Putting a hand to her sword, she moved and appeared next to Nnoitra,
"Go warn Aizen-sama and the others. I am going to scout the situation."
And with those words, she was off.
—
Of course, Nnoitra and Nelliel weren't the only ones who felt this pressure.
Somewhere not far from the place in a castle,
A tall muscular man with blue spiky hair wearing a ragged white jacket and white pants was drowning himself in alcohol when he felt it.
But unlike Nnoitra and Nelliel, he recognized this Reiatsu and this brought a shudder from the very depth of his soul.
'That man is here!'
Images of the day all his friends were exterminated like bugs flashed in his mind, causing his body to begin trembling.
Ever since the day he nearly died at the hand of the silver white-haired devil as he called him in his mind, Grimmjow had always been tormented[1].
In the end, though, one thought kept him from shutting down because of the fear,
'I am Grimmjow! I am a King! and I will fight for my companions.'
He was stronger now. Thanks to the Hogyoku, he had evolved and cast his hollow shell to become an Arrancar and he was now the #5 Espada. There was no need to feel fear anymore.
He forcibly stopped his trembling and gritted his teeth.
Today was the day of reckoning.
—-
Meanwhile, the source of the flurry of activity, a silver white-haired young man, looked at Hueco Mundo with wonder in his eyes.
"So this is Hueco Mundo."
A grin formed on his face as his eyes began to analyze the structure of the world and he knew then and there that he would finally complete Limitless in this world.
"Hehe ~this will be fun."
The others who stood behind him could only give a wry smile at this declaration.
[1] Remember what happened when Gojo activated his Bankai for the first time.
(AN: The espada arc in Bleach had much-hidden information. Mainly about who came first and so on. I do know that Barragan was one of the first and I know the timeline for a few others but yeah. Anyway, my story has taken a very different turn from Canon. So the Espada of Aizen will be a little different from the Original. As such, the Number of some of the Espada Members will be different. For example, Ulquiorra is #2 (Rather than #4) here since Aizen has yet to find Stark. Thus making Grimmjaw #5 rather than #6 also there will be a mix of Primera Espada and Espada since some of the Primera has yet to be expelled.)
ESPADA:
Baraggan Louisenbairn #1
Ulquiorra Cifer #2
Nelliel Tu Odelschwanck #3
Nnoitra Gilga #4
Grimmjow Jaegerjaquez #5
Zommari Rureaux #6
Dordoni Alessandro Del Socaccio #7
Szayelaporro Granz #8
Cirucci Sanderwicci #9
Yammy Llargo #10