Yoh Asakura gave a soft shout, and the golden light merged into his body following his movements.
In that instant, the aura of the usually lazy-looking Yoh Asakura underwent an earth-shattering transformation.
His movements became incredibly light. Facing the howling wooden sword swinging toward him, he merely shifted his toes, gliding to Wooden Sword Ryu's side in an exceptionally graceful arc.
"What?!"
Before Wooden Sword Ryu could react, Yoh had already scooped up a wooden branch from the ground to use as a sword, lightly tapping his opponent's wrist.
*Thwack!*
A sharp pain flared, and the wooden sword flew from his grasp.
"Hey! What are you spacing out for! Get him!" Wooden Sword Ryu screamed as he stumbled backward, barking orders at his subordinates.
Seeing the situation turn sour, the gang of delinquents raised their iron pipes and chains, swarming toward Yoh.
But Asuka wasn't just standing idly by.
Though his speed wasn't at its absolute peak, it was more than enough to deal with a few street thugs.
The thug charging at the very front only saw a blur before an irresistible, massive force slammed into his jaw.
*Crack!*
Asuka had delivered a vicious uppercut.
The punch lifted the man off his feet, sending him crashing heavily into a pile of rubble where he instantly passed out.
"Quick! Take out that cold-faced brat!"
Three delinquents flanked him from behind.
"A bunch of small fry," Asuka muttered in a low voice.
Lowering his body, he unleashed a sweeping kick wrapped in a spiraling current of wind that hugged the ground.
*Snap! Crack!*
The sickening sound of bones breaking echoed in quick succession.
The three thugs felt as if their legs had been rammed by a speeding train, and they collapsed to the ground, howling in agony.
On the other side, Yoh was weaving through the crowd with a light, rhythmic combat flow.
Utilizing Amidamaru's wealth of combat experience, he continuously struck down the delinquents with his wooden stick, every move exuding the calm composure of a samurai.
"Amidamaru, I think we're using a bit too much force," Yoh murmured to himself while sidestepping an iron pipe.
"But of course, Yoh! We must make these insolent fools feel pain," the samurai's voice rang directly within Yoh's mind.
In just a few short minutes, the once arrogant and domineering gang lay scattered across the clearing of Funbari Hill, their groans rising and falling in chorus.
Clutching his swollen, red wrist, Wooden Sword Ryu's face turned a livid shade of pale.
He stared at the two monsters before him.
One was a swordsmanship genius who seemed possessed by a deity, and the other was an emotionless melee weapon. His inner pride was utterly shattered.
"Damn it... You... just you wait!"
Dropping a completely hollow threat, Wooden Sword Ryu led his battered and defeated crew, scrambling down the mountain in sheer terror.
"Phew, finally some peace and quiet," Yoh sighed, releasing his Spirit Integration. Amidamaru's spirit form floated behind him once more.
Asuka stood in place, watching the samurai hovering in midair.
"So this is a Shaman's channeling..." he muttered.
He could sense that this spirit was fundamentally different from both Soul Reapers and Hollows, but he couldn't understand why such a situation existed.
"Yep. Actually, as long as your hearts are connected, any power can become your Guardian Ghost," Yoh explained with a smile.
Yoh was just about to say something else.
Without warning, the previously tranquil sky darkened.
A heavy, freezing Spiritual Pressure, reeking of absolute despair, slammed down upon Funbari Hill like a massive boulder plummeting from ten thousand meters in the sky.
The air grew thick and viscous.
The wandering souls that had been watching the fight from afar instantly let out bloodcurdling shrieks. They fled in all directions with reckless abandon, and some even dissipated directly into the air from sheer terror.
"What's going on? This feeling..." The smile vanished from Yoh's face in an instant.
He could feel Amidamaru trembling violently—it was a suppression stemming from the very depths of the soul.
"This Spiritual Pressure..."
Asuka's pupils shrank drastically as he snapped his head up to look at the sky.
Up there, the air looked as though it had been forcefully torn open by an invisible giant hand, revealing a pitch-black rift.
Unsettling red lightning crackled along the edges of the rift. An oppressive presence, far exceeding any Hollow Asuka had ever encountered, spilled out from the depths of that darkness.
A massive, elongated nose wearing a white bone mask slowly poked out from the tear.
Following it was a colossal body, tens of meters tall and as pitch-black as ink.
Its gigantic, hollow eyes peered downward, and every breath it took stirred up bursts of ear-piercing shrieks.
"A... Menos?"
Asuka clenched his fists.
He had seen descriptions of this thing in the files at the Urahara Shop.
It was the product of countless Hollows devouring and fusing with one another, possessing the strength of roughly a hundred ordinary Hollows!
It was a true symbol of terror in this world.
At the same time, Yoh was completely stunned.
In his career as a Shaman, he had seen powerful good spirits, vicious evil spirits, and even certain ancient nature spirits.
But he had never seen a monster like the one before him.
This thing possessed no so-called Furyoku, nor did it have the soul fluctuations a spirit body should have.
It was like a black hole—a pure void that existed only to endlessly devour all surrounding energy.
"Yoh, get back!"
Asuka shouted in a low voice, quickly dashing over to his baseball bag.
Without hesitation, under Yoh's shocked gaze, he drew his Zanpakuto from within.
The blade gleamed with a cold light. Even without any spiritual power flowing through it, it was still sharp enough to split a hair on the breeze.
He could feel his unhealed ribs screaming in protest under the sudden, crushing pressure, but he did not back down.
On the contrary, forced by this extreme pressure, the energy within his body actually began to flow at an eerily accelerated pace.
It seemed the seal on his Spiritual Pressure was loosening.
"What kind of monster... is this thing?" Yoh muttered, tightly gripping the broken wooden stick he had picked up from the graveyard.
"It's the nightmare of this world," Asuka replied.
Meanwhile, in the Soul Society.
The Seireitei, the area surrounded year-round by white stone walls, was currently gripped by a subtle sense of tension.
Atop a high tower within the Twelfth Division's jurisdiction, massive Reishi antennas were spinning frantically, monitoring the Spiritual Pressure fluctuations in the World of the Living.
This was the core of the Department of Research and Development. Countless flickering fluorescent screens and an intricate maze of pipes formed a cold, hyper-rational world.
*Beep— Beep— Beep—*
A rapid alarm shattered the silence of the laboratory.
"What's going on? This fluctuation wavelength..."
A researcher wearing the Twelfth Division uniform was frantically typing on a keyboard.
He stared at the red dot displayed on the screen, his tone filled with disbelief.
"Report! An abnormal Spiritual Pressure reaction has appeared at the coordinates of Funbari Hill in the eastern district of Karakura Town in the World of the Living!"
"The energy level is climbing rapidly and has already surpassed the threshold of a Gillian-class Menos!"
"What is there to make such a fuss about?"
A gloomy, hoarse voice, sounding like a venomous snake slithering, echoed from the shadows deep within the laboratory.
Accompanied by heavy footsteps, an incredibly bizarrely dressed figure slowly walked out.
His face was painted in black and white, a massive ring-shaped ornament sat atop his head, and his hands were hidden within wide sleeves.
Those golden eyes, brimming with neurotic madness, gleamed with a chilling light.
"Karakura Town is already a Jureichi. Why panic over an abnormal reaction?"
The Captain of the Twelfth Division and the second President of the Department of Research and Development—Mayuri Kurotsuchi.
He irritably shoved aside the researcher blocking his way and stared nonchalantly at the jumping wavelengths on the screen.
"President, it's not just Karakura Town." The Third Seat of the Department of Research and Development, Akon, walked over with a grim expression.
He handed over the latest Spiritual Pressure monitoring report. "A month ago, unexplained Reishi chaos began appearing in Fuyuki City... Last week, a brief Spiritual Pressure fault line occurred in the Shibuya area..."
"And now, a similar situation has unexpectedly occurred at Funbari Hill!"
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