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"Captain Su Li!" came the frantic shout, prompting him to stride toward the voice. The young Shinigami's eyes widened with a mix of awe and relief, heart thundering as Su Li approached—his presence beneath the sun radiant and commanding, as though he carried the heavens on his shoulders.
"How bad is the injury?" Su Li asked, a lingering chill edging his voice as he knelt beside the bloodied soldier. "Ah... I won't die anytime soon," the boy replied with a strained laugh, though the deep lines of pain carved into his face said otherwise. "But I can't move." Su Li scanned him with sharp eyes; the bleeding was heavy, the wounds deep, but nothing vital had been hit. Without pause, he pulled out his communicator and keyed in quickly. "Rangiku, get here. Location marked. Bring medics. One rookie's badly injured." Ending the call, he looked down and said evenly, "Hold on. Help's coming."
A faint smile tugged at the Shinigami's lips, pale and smeared with blood. "Don't worry, Captain Su Li. The Shimizu family doesn't go down that easily." Su Li blinked. The name stirred something faint in the back of his mind. "My father—Shimizu Ken—is your subordinate. Sixth seat, Second Division." Ah. That guy. Su Li nodded slightly, expression shifting with subtle recognition. "Didn't expect he had such a brave son."
"I'm Shimizu Jō. I wanted to join the Second Division too... but I wasn't strong enough. They stuck me in Squad Nine," he admitted with a breathy cough, red staining his lips. "I guess I didn't live up to my father's expectations." Su Li, expression calm but voice resolute, replied, "Don't underestimate yourself. You did well. When you're back on your feet, submit a transfer request. I'll handle the rest." The boy's eyes lit up with unshed emotion. "Yes, sir!" But Su Li, already rising, cut the moment short. "Save your breath. Survive first—then talk about transfers." "Yes, Captain Su Li..." Jō whispered, his voice fading, but his gaze stayed firmly locked on the captain with unmistakable reverence.
Su Li turned his attention toward the Hollow sprawled across the rubble, its massive body barely moving. It wasn't dead. That was intentional. A Hollow purified through any means other than a Zanpakutō would disrupt the balance between the Human World and Soul Society. It had to be finished properly.
He stepped forward and drew his blade.
The Hollow twitched, its cracked mask spasming as wide, bloodshot eyes bulged with primal panic. Moments earlier, the rookie's sword hadn't even scratched it. Now, this boy—this child wearing a captain's cloak—had erased half its body with a single, unassuming kick. It had never known fear like this. Never tasted it.
"P-please... my lord... have mercy... I won't do it again..." The plea was broken, desperate, but Su Li gave no answer. He simply stood there, silent and still, eyes narrowing at his Zanpakutō. Was the blade up to the task? Killing wasn't the issue—he questioned whether the sword would survive the act. The adhesive still holding the handle together was... questionable.
Drawing a steady breath, Su Li unsheathed it slowly, each movement deliberate and composed, each breath measured as if he were enacting a sacred rite. From the ground, Shimizu Jō watched in wonder, eyes gleaming. "Captain Su Li's sword draw... so elegant," he murmured. Even the Hollow, paralyzed and half-gone, trembled like a cicada caught beneath the first frost of winter.
Once fully drawn, the blade gleamed with an icy glint. Su Li exhaled, lowering it until the edge kissed the Hollow's thick neck. The creature flinched, the chill of steel igniting its instincts, and it lunged one final time with a desperate scream.
But Su Li didn't move.
His hand rose, caught the claw mid-swing, and snapped it clean at the joint with a gentle twist. The Hollow howled. Su Li responded by stomping on its leg with surgical indifference, crushing it into red mist beneath his sandal. As if resetting a ritual, he calmly repositioned the blade at its throat.
The Hollow froze, trembling. All resistance had left it. There was no pride left, no fight—just raw, shivering terror, as though it already sensed its soul was slipping.
"You can do this. Just one clean strike," Su Li whispered to himself, beads of sweat forming at his temples. The Hollow blinked rapidly, confused at the strange sight of its executioner appearing more anxious than it was.
The Zanpakutō trembled in his grip, hairline cracks stretching down its edge. "Not good," he muttered under his breath. Too unstable. A full-force slash could destroy it on contact. Yet he lifted it anyway.
The Hollow clenched its eyes. So did the children. Even Shimizu turned his head away.
Whoosh—
The blade came down and stopped where it had started.
Nothing.
The Hollow peeked one eye open. The children stared. Shimizu's brows furrowed. Even the Hollow tilted its head in confusion.
Su Li, face slick with sweat, wiped his cheek and swallowed hard. The blade held—barely. He raised it again.
Another whoosh. Another halt. Again, nothing.
The tension twisted tighter.
Was he mocking it? Some kind of warped Soul Society ritual? The Hollow's eyes darted, panic escalating into hysteria.
Meanwhile, Su Li stood still in the suffocating silence, fully aware of the dozen eyes locked onto him. They didn't understand. This wasn't performance. This was necessity. His Zanpakutō was fragile, and one wrong strike could reduce it to shards—right in front of a rookie, in front of Shimizu Jō, in front of the son of a seated officer.
That shame couldn't be recovered. He couldn't let Shimizu Jō go home and ask his father to resign out of sheer embarrassment.
So Su Li made a choice.
He pinched the blade's tip between two fingers and carefully began to stab downward, easing it into the Hollow's body inch by inch. The observers blinked. What was this? Was he... carving it?
Each movement was slow, surgical, deliberate. The blade barely sank in with every push, but he repeated the process—insert, pull, adjust, press. There was no grace. No finale. Just clinical repetition.
To those watching, it resembled a butcher at work—cold, methodical, practiced. The Hollow jolted with each cut, a dawning horror stretching across its cracked face. Pain surged through it not in a wave, but a creeping tide, slow and inevitable. For the first time, it realized what it had done to its victims—bit by bit, not instant, but unrelenting.
And now that same terror was being returned. It wasn't dying. It was being dissected. One careful stroke at a time.
What kind of monster is this?! Why is there a pervert more perverted than me?!
Su Li, calm and silent, continued the grim ballet.
To Soul Society, this act bordered on heresy.
To Su Li, it was precision. It was art.
From another life—one he didn't speak of—this method had a name. Lingchi. Death by a Thousand Cuts.
That was the rhythm his Zanpakutō danced to today.
And as the Hollow's mask finally cracked and its form dissolved into shimmering soul particles, the sky above lit with drifting fragments, like fireflies breaking free from a jar. The purification was complete. The Hollow—cleansed, scattered, ended—was gone.
Su Li sheathed his blade with a breath of finality. His uniform clung to him, drenched. His chest rose and fell with exhaustion, but his gaze remained fixed on the stars above, following the soul's ascent into the wind.
Then he heard it.
A soft, high-pitched tone—too pure for metal, too alive to be a mere sound—rang from his Zanpakutō. A cry. Like a newborn's first breath. Like a chick pecking through its shell.
Su Li froze, heart slamming to a halt as his breath caught.
His eyes widened.
And everything changed.
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