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Matsumoto Rangiku lifted herself off Moyu's chest and cleared her throat with two quick coughs, a transparent attempt to conceal the awkward tension still prickling at her skin like static electricity.
"What's the matter?" she asked, managing to keep her voice level and her expression composed, though the faint blush warming Moyu's neck made it painfully obvious that despite his stoic exterior, some internal embarrassment still lingered—an admission she wasn't about to call out loud.
For all her exaggerated confidence and sultry airs, it was clear now that this brazen woman, so often unshakable in public, wasn't nearly as impervious as she pretended to be.
The Shinigami who had just entered stood momentarily frozen, blinking rapidly as though trying to shake off a trance. His voice cracked slightly as he spoke.
"Reiatsu detection," he reported, eyes still slightly wide. "The Technology Development Bureau has picked up unfamiliar spiritual pressure near Seireitei. They've asked for your cooperation in verifying the source."
He still hadn't recovered from whatever scene he'd witnessed just moments earlier; his words stammered, his tone awkward, as if part of his mind remained caught in it.
"I understand," Moyu replied, tone flat and unhurried. "You're dismissed."
The instant the order was spoken, the Shinigami vanished in a blur of Shunpo so swift it left nothing but a whisper of wind in his wake. Rangiku watched the movement with a flicker of interest, briefly wondering whether even she could have matched that level of speed.
"Want to come along?" Moyu asked, voice even, unaffected, as if nothing unusual had occurred between them moments ago—an infuriating calm that made it impossible to tell if he was intentionally ignoring the tension or genuinely oblivious.
Rangiku's gaze flickered briefly, betraying a trace of disappointment that passed through her eyes like a shadow across glass, but it was gone in the next breath, replaced by the familiar teasing tone she wielded like armor.
"Hah! Who in their right mind would want to go anywhere with a shameless pervert like you?" she snapped, tossing her hair as if dismissing the entire conversation. "I'm going to get some rest now that my duties are finally done. Sleep, that's what I need."
Moyu nodded simply. "Understood."
Without hesitation, he reached out and let his fingers rest lightly on her golden waves, brushing through them once with a gentleness that made the moment linger. His voice followed, soft and sincere, with just a trace of mischief.
"Rest well."
The kindness in that casual phrase caught Rangiku off guard, and for a second, she was frozen, unable to find any words or reactions. By the time her thoughts reassembled, Moyu was already halfway across the room, Nilu still draped lazily over his shoulder as he disappeared through the barracks entrance.
Left behind, Rangiku stared after him, eyes dimmed with something too complicated to name.
"You do care," she whispered, as though admitting it out loud gave it weight.
---
The Technology Development Bureau stood isolated at Seireitei's furthest edge, its distance from the city's heart less a matter of convenience and more a precaution born of necessity. With its stockpile of volatile inventions, unstable prototypes, and unorthodox experiments bordering on illegal, it had long been exiled to this remote corner like an unsupervised child with a matchbox.
From the moment Moyu crossed its spiritual boundary, he sensed the difference. The clean, ordered aura of Seireitei gave way to something more erratic—chaotic even—as if the very air vibrated with tension and suppressed explosions. Towering steel structures loomed above like twisted monuments to curiosity. High-frequency hums poured out of unknown machines. Spiritual monitors blinked with unreadable data, and Shinigami in modified lab coats darted through the halls, carrying clipboards and strange devices with manic energy.
Yet none of that drew Moyu's attention the way the Bureau's personnel did.
It wasn't just that they looked different—it was that most of them didn't look human anymore. Deformed by self-imposed experiments, many bore grotesque changes: amphibian-like heads with slick, reflective skin; bulging ocular implants that shifted independently of one another; additional limbs, eyes, or metallic growths fused into their limbs as though their bodies were nothing more than canvases for invasive science.
Moyu scanned the area with mild detachment, counting perhaps fewer than five individuals who hadn't been mutilated in some way. It was less a division and more a biological art gallery curated by madness.
A shrill, grating voice suddenly squawked from his left, snapping through the air like a cracked horn.
"Ah! Captain Moyu! You're finally here!"
Turning, Moyu faced a Shinigami with skin the color of algae, eyes so bulbous they looked ready to fall from their sockets, and a wide, lipless mouth filled with too many teeth. The man's head was round and featureless, almost cartoonish in its simplicity, yet disturbingly uncanny in motion.
Despite the grotesque appearance, Moyu recognized him immediately.
Bulbulus, a senior researcher from the 12th Division, was the lead specialist in both Communication Technology and Reishi Measurement—eccentric in form, but fiercely competent in function.
"There's an abnormal spike in spiritual pressure in the northern sector," Bulbulus began, his words pouring out in a rush. "It's disrupting the spatial integrity of the area. Calculations show it's centered roughly 6,940 meters from our main complex. Normally, this would fall entirely within our jurisdiction, but with Captain Kurotsuchi... unavailable..."
He trailed off, eyes widening as the implications of his words caught up with him. His hand slapped over his mouth, fingers trembling.
He remembered now—who this man was. What he'd done to Kurotsuchi Mayuri.
And though the Bureau's scientists rarely engaged in battle or politics, none of them had forgotten that day. Bulbulus, who usually didn't care for titles or pecking order, suddenly seemed very eager not to provoke.
"It's fine," Moyu said, not sparing the stumble another thought. "Have you pinpointed the source of the anomaly?"
"Not definitively," Bulbulus replied, regaining his composure. "Follow me. I'll show you what we have."
He led Moyu through a corridor of gleaming white panels and curved glass walls, the ambient light pulsing with soft blue radiance as they passed chamber after chamber. Finally, they entered a large data room dominated by a screen so massive it spanned an entire wall.
On it, a spiderweb of Reishi signatures pulsed like stars mapped by chaos. Symbols flickered, lines oscillated, and one pulsing dot in particular glowed with concentrated irregularity.
"This is the northern perimeter," Bulbulus explained, pointing at the dot. "The source of the spike. We've attempted thirty separate scans and countermeasures—none successful. We even sent three combat operatives to investigate, but all contact with them was severed immediately."
Moyu watched the blinking pattern in silence, his sharp gaze assessing the chaotic reishi as his own instincts fired warnings through his mind. This wasn't just spiritual pressure—it was interference by design. The kind of disruption that had fingerprints. Mayuri's fingerprints.
He exhaled slowly. "I'll go."
"Wait," Bulbulus said, activating a panel beside him. "Before you do, please take this."
From the console, he produced a ring-like device inscribed with elegant circuitry and spirit runes.
"What is it?" Moyu asked as he slid it onto his finger.
"A real-time Reishi monitoring relay," Bulbulus answered. "It links your surrounding data directly back to our lab. We'll receive both visual feed and spiritual fluxes in real time. It's for remote tracking and tactical support."
As soon as the ring activated, the projection on the wall shifted—now displaying the data and perspective from Moyu's field of vision.
"Efficient," Moyu murmured, then turned. "I'll handle it from here."
Bulbulus bowed low. "We're counting on you, Captain Moyu."
"Responsibility comes with the rank," he replied—and vanished in a flash.
---
The coordinates led Moyu to a barren, windswept expanse on Seireitei's northern edge. The field held no buildings, no structures, not even signs of recent activity, yet the air was dense with spiritual distortion.
He scanned the landscape with trained precision. Kidō interference layered over technological manipulation coiled invisibly through the atmosphere, masking the reishi signature at the field's heart. He narrowed his focus, extending his own spiritual perception—and then felt it.
A boulder cracked, shifted, and then detonated outward in a pulse of raw spiritual pressure that tore through the field like a shockwave.
"Interference—too controlled," Moyu muttered, sensing the manufactured nature of the surge.
Before he could move, a second wave rippled into existence, this time carrying weight, form, and presence.
Nilu stirred on his shoulder, her nose wrinkling as she sniffed the air with a soft murmur. "Something stinks. It's that creepy guy again…"
She didn't need to elaborate.
There was only one man she ever referred to that way.
The atmosphere twisted like liquid being stirred, and a ripple of warping light revealed a silhouette that resolved into a monstrous figure clad in feathers and madness. White plumage, a black-and-white mask adorned with golden trim, and a smile too wide for sanity.
Kurotsuchi Mayuri.
"You were locked away in the Great Infernal Hell," Moyu said, frowning.
Mayuri spread his arms wide, grin widening with manic glee. "You honestly thought something like that could hold me?"
Even as he spoke, another pulse stirred behind him. A second figure emerged, smooth and precise—dark green hair, aristocratic robes, a noble's sneer sharpened by ambition.
Tsunayashiro Tokinada.
Moyu's eyes darkened. The puzzle snapped together in an instant. Of course—the Tsunayashiro family. Their political reach and ancient sorcery could bypass any restraint. Releasing Mayuri wouldn't even count as a challenge.
"You're here to settle a score?" he asked, though he already knew.
"Score?" Mayuri chuckled, tapping his temple hard enough that the sound echoed. "You're too simplistic, Captain Yu. I'm not after vengeance—I'm after you. Your Reiatsu. Your soul. You are the greatest enigma I've ever encountered, and I will dissect you."
Moyu winced slightly, not from fear but from the sheer insanity of what he'd just heard.
"That's... deeply unsettling. Please don't ever say it again."
"You'll feel it soon," Mayuri hissed. "Your spiritual pressure is already waning. This field is soaked in a refined drug—my own creation."
Moyu exhaled slowly, realization dawning. The sensation was subtle, an artificial dampening of spirit particles. But he had already evolved beyond its reach.
"If that's your trump card," he said coolly, drawing his Zanpakutō in one smooth motion, "then you've already lost."
Blue and white wind swirled upward from his feet, climbing the blade in tight spirals as energy hummed across the edge like a song waiting to erupt.
"I should be the one saying farewell."
Across from him, Mayuri howled.
"Bankai—Golden Zodiac: Kill Jizō!"
A monstrous form crashed into being, a grotesque golden titan with razored limbs and oozing venom. Fog erupted from its mouth in toxic waves—but the hurricane rising from Moyu's reiryoku scattered it like paper in a storm.
"You've modified it," Moyu observed. "But the function's unchanged. Predictable."
Behind Mayuri, Tokinada stepped forward, face illuminated with fanatic light.
"I owe you, Moyu. Because of your duel with Mayuri, I now understand the true might of your Zanpakutō."
He unsheathed his blade and invoked its name.
"Shikai—Drinking from All Corners of the World, Entwine the Horizon, Overwrite and Sever—Gorgeous Mirror!"
Dark green Reiatsu erupted from his blade like wildfire, scorching the sky as the wind screamed across the battlefield.
The true fight had just begun.
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