"A-Are you kidding me?"
Staring at the waves of silver sand surging into the sky, the deer-like Apacci broke out in a cold sweat. The despair in her heart continuously magnified and expanded, threatening to swallow her heart whole.
She had personally witnessed that massive guy named Yammy use brute force to rip the head and spine right out of an Adjuchas of the same level as her.
It was as effortless as pulling up a radish.
Even Lady Harribel had to be cautious and careful when facing Yammy.
Yet, in front of this Soul Reaper, that guy was as weak and powerless as a lower-class Hollow.
*'Just what kind of power is this?!'*
*'Can we really defeat a monster like this?'*
It wasn't just her; Sung-Sun and Mila Rose beside her shared the exact same thoughts, unable to hide the terrified expressions on their faces.
If Harribel hadn't still been standing at the front, they would have already turned tail and run.
"Damn it."
Harribel felt increasingly powerless, realizing that this operation was an absolute failure.
The opponent was far too strong; even if she fought with everything she had, victory was impossible.
It was just a pity that she had dragged Sung-Sun and the others into this...
Just as she was filled with regret, Yammy, who had been kicked away by Naraku Sora in the distance, suddenly underwent a transformation. An incredibly heavy Reiatsu suddenly erupted, sweeping out like a hurricane and causing the silver sand to howl and vibrate.
A crimson pillar of light shot straight into the sky, looking as if it wanted to devour the moon of Hueco Mundo.
Ten meters.
Within the massive crater, the behemoth, several meters tall, struggled to its feet. His sturdy body was caved in from the violent impact.
However, under the effect of his materialized Reiatsu, his injuries were healing at a visible rate.
Countless blood vessels filled his eyes; at this moment, all of Yammy's other emotions had been completely swallowed by rage.
*Bang!*
His body suddenly expanded, his bones emitting deafening cracks. His muscle fibers wildly stretched and grew, and in an instant, he shot up to several dozen meters tall.
His knotted muscles bulged as if cast from steel, veins popping out. His mountain-like body made the earth let out an overwhelmed groan.
The desert trembled violently, silver sand splashing in all directions.
*Thud! Thud!*
Heavy footsteps rang out. Every time his hooved feet slammed down, they stamped out a massive crater in the sand. The enraged Yammy continuously closed in on Naraku Sora.
Right now, there was only one thought in his mind: kill that Soul Reaper!
As a dark shadow loomed over him, Naraku Sora raised his gaze, looking at the giant monster before him without a trace of fear.
"So he had already mastered this ability even before becoming an Arrancar?"
Yammy didn't answer, his crimson eyes glaring fixedly at the figure below.
He suddenly raised his right arm, his muscles instantly expanding. Materialized Reiatsu wrapped around his arm as a terrifying power continuously built up.
Naraku Sora grinned and assumed the exact same stance, golden arcs of lightning and crimson explosive flames covering his arm.
His muscles pulsed, emitting a sound like a tightening bowstring. A ferocious, demon-like smile reflected in Yammy's pupils.
"Eat my—"
"Haymaker!"
As Yammy's house-sized fist descended, an equally unreserved punch blasted upward from below.
A terrifyingly violent, ring-shaped shockwave swept out, instantly churning up the entire desert within sight and crushing the sand into even finer dust.
The deafening roar of the explosion drowned out everything, instantly enveloping the entire battlefield.
From the sky downward, a fearsome impact erupted in the desert, instantly destroying everything within a radius of several kilometers and causing violent tremors wherever it passed.
The moment they collided, Yammy felt as if his fist had struck an immovable mountain. His bones let out a series of explosive cracks, and his flesh and blood wildly collapsed.
In just a split second, half of his body exploded into a mist of blood.
The remaining half flew backward like a kite with a snapped string, smashing viciously into the quartz forest at the edge of sight. It plowed an abyss-like trench along the way before finally embedding into the desert, creating a bottomless crater!
"Looks like it was just for show."
Naraku Sora blew the rising smoke off his fist. Standing in place and looking at the collapsed crater, he said with some disappointment,
"In a fit of rage..."
"...he really just raged for a bit."
Yammy's ability used anger as a source of power. As his rage surged, his strength and size would rise in tandem.
It seemed there was absolutely no upper limit.
But in reality, the emotion of anger inherently had a threshold due to reason.
When reason was completely lost and the body was driven entirely by instinct, there was no longer any so-called anger.
Moreover, after growing larger, Yammy's agility decreased far too much. Even his Sonído became incredibly sluggish, leaving him only able to hit stationary targets or act as a living target himself.
Judging from the actual results, it was hard to say whether his strength had actually increased or decreased.
After completely shattering Yammy's pitiful pride, Naraku Sora used Sonído to appear in front of Harribel, raising his fist to treat her to a ruthless strike.
But right at that moment, Harribel suddenly lowered her bone sword and said seriously in a deep voice,
"Soul Reaper, if I surrender, can you let Sung-Sun and the others go?"
At this point, she no longer expected the Hueco Mundo side to represent justice and defeat this evil Soul Reaper.
Judging from their performances, the strength of the two sides wasn't even on the same level.
The opponent had been fighting them with a playful mindset from the very beginning. If he had taken it even slightly seriously, they would have probably been wiped out long ago.
"Foolish!"
Naraku Sora revealed a smile typical of a righteous hero.
"If you had laid down your arms and surrendered politely before the battle even began, you wouldn't have lost your position as an Espada of Las Noches."
"But now, realizing you can't win and trying to move your enemy through self-sacrifice is truly a stupid act."
"Let me tell you the truth: whether you surrender or not, they are all mine."
"Harribel, I want you all to help me train!"
Hearing this, Harribel froze for a few seconds. Soon after, her eyes turned as cold as ice, and her undisguised hostility locked onto the Soul Reaper before her once again.
Although it sounded a bit weird, if the opponent was determined not to let Sung-Sun and the others go, then she had no choice but to fight to the bitter end.
Her bone sword cleaved down like a heavy hammer. The speed of the slash was average, but its power was not inferior to any Vasto Lorde.
It was just a pity that Vasto Lordes were already behind the current meta.
Back when he first debuted, Naraku Sora was already fighting self-made Arrancar Vasto Lordes.
The only reason he had entertained Harribel in battle up to this point was because Aizen had instructed him before departure to slow down the pace of the fight and erase their hope bit by bit.
Only when they were completely plunged into despair could this group of Hollows be used by them and become the core strength of Las Noches.
*Bang!*
A muffled sound of a heavy impact rang out in front of her, causing Harribel's gaze to freeze before horror surfaced in her eyes.
Her always unstoppable heavy strike had actually been casually caught in the opponent's hand.
*Crack!*
As his five fingers exerted force, the bone sword let out an overwhelmed groan. Golden arcs of lightning flickered and leaped as cracks appeared all over the blade.
Cero!
After a brief moment of shock, Harribel immediately reacted. A crimson sphere of light condensed in front of her, and countless Reishi madly poured into it, radiating a dazzling light.
*Snap—*
The powerful beam of light was blocked by an open palm and forcefully crushed as if it were fragile glass.
"Harribel, sacrifice is utterly meaningless."
Naraku Sora curled his lips into a grin and solemnly raised his right hand. With a forceful clench, the air let out a wail as lightning arcs and scorching flames intertwined, forming a dazzling brilliance.
The moment his fist swung out, sound seemed to be erased for a split second.
Immediately after, an irresistible impact exploded from Harribel's back. Her sturdy bone armor suddenly shattered, turning into countless tiny fragments that danced in the air.
Seeing this scene, Sung-Sun and the other Hollows instantly grew anxious. Tossing Harribel's previous instructions to the back of their minds, they charged madly toward Naraku Sora.
"Bastard Soul Reaper, let go of Lady Harribel right now, or I'll definitely constrict you to death!"
"You hateful bastard, you're dead!"
"I'll ram you to death, you jerk!"
Naraku Sora casually tossed aside the unconscious Harribel. He looked up at the three Menos Grandes rolling up clouds of silver sand and grinned.
What followed was an unpretentious, one-sided beatdown.
When the gap in strength between two sides was too massive, no amount of world-shocking intellect could make up for it.
At this moment, Naraku Sora finally experienced Yamamoto's joy.
One punch each, and the trio of Hollows hit the dirt.
After finishing all this, he arrived in front of the final Menos Grande.
Its entire body was white, with bat wings growing from its back. Its Reiatsu was hidden, but judging from its half-broken mask, it had likely already completed a partial Arrancarization.
Therefore, this guy in front of him was the strongest among this group of Hollows.
While Naraku Sora was sizing him up, the other party was also sizing him up.
Through the course of the battle just now, Ulquiorra realized that this Soul Reaper was a completely different concept from the Soul Reapers he knew of.
Or rather, the two didn't even belong to the same species.
Therefore, he grew suspicious of his identity.
"Before we fight, I have a question I hope you can answer."
"Speak."
"Are you really a Soul Reaper?"
"?"
Naraku Sora raised an eyebrow and said in a booming voice,
"What kind of talk is that?"
"There is no Soul Reaper more of a Soul Reaper than me. Look at this Shihakushō, it auto-heals. Look at this haori..."
Suddenly realizing that his haori had been corroded to ash by Harribel's high-temperature water mist, a certain someone decisively changed the subject.
"In terms of position, I am on equal footing with the Head Captain of the Gotei 13. In terms of strength, I am equally uninferior."
"If it weren't for the fact that he's a few years older, that seat would rightfully be mine!"
Ulquiorra looked thoughtful.
Judging from his expression, the other party seemed to be telling the truth.
He knew of the Gotei 13; it was the violent organization in the Soul Society that gathered the most powerful Soul Reapers.
Since the Soul Reaper before him could stand on equal footing with that Head Captain, he must know a great deal.
"Actually, I only followed them to Las Noches to find the answer to a question."
"As an outstanding figure among Soul Reapers, you must know what the meaning of survival is, right?"
Hearing this, Naraku Sora let out a hearty laugh.
"You've asked the right person. Looking across the entire Soul Society, who doesn't know that my wisdom is world-shocking?"
"Listen well."
Ulquiorra assumed the posture of an obedient student, listening attentively.
Naraku Sora cleared his throat, his smile fading.
"As the saying goes, bystanders see things more clearly than those involved."
"In truth, survival inherently has no meaning. It is nothing more than setting a goal for oneself to keep living."
"And for you, the process of seeking the answer to your question is, in essence, the very meaning of survival."
Ulquiorra fell silent, pondering the meaning of these words. As his thoughts deepened, his eyes grew increasingly bright, and finally, he nodded forcefully.
"I understand!"