"Absorbing reiryoku!?"
Even Yoruichi, in her black cat form, was stunned. Her golden eyes swept over the crater-filled battlefield. "All of this… is from the reiryoku he absorbed? Is this brat some kind of bottomless pit?"
Urahara and Tessai both shook their heads helplessly.
They couldn't explain Cole's bizarre constitution. He appeared to be just an ordinary shinigami, yet the sheer amount of reiryoku he absorbed rivaled dozens of captains combined.
Fortunately, reiryoku was infinite in the world—no matter how much he consumed, there was no risk of it running out.
Meanwhile, Cole was nearly ecstatic. Battling while stealing glances at his system panel, he watched his attributes skyrocket.
In only moments, his distributable points surpassed ten thousand for the first time, and they continued to soar.
"Add points! Add to shunpo! Add to zanpakuto!"
He poured points madly into both.
Without shunpo, he'd just keep getting hit. Without strengthening his blade, it would break entirely.
Before Jinta's horrified eyes, Cole's speed increased rapidly—until Jinta could barely keep up.
Even as he swung his bat, he couldn't stop himself from shouting toward Urahara. "Shopkeeper! Did this guy already know shunpo!?"
Urahara shook his head. "I saw it clearly. Cole-san is learning shunpo directly from you."
Yoruichi's feline voice purred lazily, "Jinta, he may have just picked it up from you—but he's already on the verge of surpassing you."
Jinta's face turned purple with fury. He pushed his shunpo to its limits, slamming his bat down hard against Cole's massive zanpakuto.
CLANG!
At last, Cole's blade shattered—shrinking from an eighty-meter giant to just twenty meters.
Ichigo's face paled. "Cole, are you okay!?"
Cole shook his head calmly. "I feel nothing… but… I think I heard the voice of my zanpakuto."
Everyone in Urahara's shop froze.
Tessai's voice grew heavy. "Shopkeeper… could it be he's already learned his zanpakuto's true name?"
Urahara's eyes flickered with disbelief. "Impossible. It's been less than a month since he became a shinigami."
Yoruichi's expression turned grave. "If he truly awakened his zanpakuto… then things just got very interesting."
Among the millions of shinigami, fewer than twenty thousand knew their zanpakuto's true names.
If Cole had reached that stage already, he had surpassed over ninety percent of Soul Society.
"Add points! Add points! Add points!"
He consumed attribute values like a madman, pouring them into shunpo and zanpakuto.
Shunpo—over four thousand points.
Zanpakuto—ten thousand points.
And in that instant—his blade spoke.
Cole gripped the broken sword, raised it high, and declared for all to hear:
"Grow and shrink as you please—Ruyi Jingu Bang!"
Golden light erupted, stabbing into the heavens, filling the entire space with divine brilliance.
"Oi oi oi… what kind of zanpakuto is this!?"
Urahara and the others shielded their eyes.
Within the blazing light, they saw it: a towering golden pillar, a staff that touched the very skies.
When the glow receded, their jaws dropped.
It wasn't an illusion.
A true, colossal golden staff stood there.
"…It really is the Ruyi Jingu Bang."
Cole's lips curled into a joyous smile.
The moment his zanpakuto awakened, the image of the weapon that had left the deepest impression in his heart had surfaced.
The staff of legends. The pillar that once anchored the seas.
The Divine Iron—Ruyi Jingu Bang.
Sure enough, the Great Sage blessed every wanderer.
"N-no way. That's… a zanpakuto!?"
Jinta craned his neck upward, eyes trembling.
He couldn't even see the top. It was as if a sky pillar had appeared, cutting heaven from earth.
Snarling, he swung his bat with all his might against it.
BANG!
Pain shot through his hands, nearly splitting his grip open.
The golden pillar didn't so much as scratch.
Tessai muttered in shock. "From an eighty-meter blade… now it's at least eight thousand meters."
Urahara and Yoruichi could only gape.
Eight thousand was impossible—this space wasn't even that tall.
But hundreds of meters, at the very least.
Urahara asked gravely, "Yoruichi… has there ever been a zanpakuto in Soul Society's history of such size?"
Yoruichi blinked her cat eyes. "…The largest was Aoga's, even with bankai, it never exceeded a hundred meters."
"Exactly…" Urahara stared, awed. "So what is this zanpakuto?"
Cole smirked, pressing his palm lightly against the staff's gleaming surface.
With that faint push, the towering pillar toppled, crashing downward like the fall of heaven itself.
Jinta's eyes bulged in horror as the shadow swallowed him whole.
"Shopkeeper! Tessai-ossan! Yoruichi-san! Save me!!"
It was like the entire sky collapsing.
Escape? Impossible.
"Hado #81: Danku!" Tessai roared, raising a transparent barrier before the golden staff.
"BOOM!!!"
The impact thundered.
The staff's descent paused—then spiderweb cracks fractured the barrier like glass about to shatter.
"Even #81 can't hold!?" Tessai paled. He lunged forward.
Urahara and Yoruichi dashed in as well.
Together, they unleashed binding spells.
"Bakudo #37: Tsuriboshi!"
"Bakudo #63: Sajō Sabaku!"
"Bakudo #73: Tozansho!"
Three layers of restraint wove together, halting the golden pillar's fall at last.
Urahara turned to Cole, his voice low and shaken. "Cole-san… just how heavy is your zanpakuto?"
Cole thought for a moment, then smiled faintly.
"Right now? About 950 tons. But give it a bit… it should climb a few thousand more."
...…
...
(End of Chapter)
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