"Cole!!!"
The roar shook the sky. Staring at the emptied Kuchiki estate, Byakuya's face went so dark it edged purple. "You dare dismantle it a second time!"
The first time he'd tolerated—he'd been feigning alliance with the zanpakuto then. But a second time…
He stamped once; a white streak ripped forward, his reiryoku flaring without restraint.
"Yikes, he's here…" Cole muttered—and still chose to deal with the nearer crisis first. He called up to the glowering Yoruichi, "Beautiful, adorable Yoruichi, this is a misunderstanding. I'm teaching your brother to be a man—look at that presence he's got now."
Yoruichi nearly fainted from rage, jabbing a finger at the Shell-Breaking King's crown where Yushiro hung trussed. "He's a boy who now likes being tied up—and likes 'talking' with you. That's your 'manly presence'!?"
Cole's mouth twitched. "You're misunderstanding. The rope is because I lifted him—"
"Lifted him!?"
Yoruichi's vision swam. Finished. Her little brother was the submissive one. What depraved kink was this?
"Big Sister, you're wrong!" Yushiro's entire face went red. "I don't have any special hobby, and Big Brother Cole didn't bully me."
"Still calling him Big Brother…"
Yoruichi lunged. "Brat—die!"
Cole slid one foot back and let her swipe scissor the air. She blinked. "You dodged?"
She hadn't held back—that had been her peak normal speed.
Across the courtyard, Cole smiled. "Three days apart, see with new eyes. Lady Yoruichi, you can't catch me now."
All that "dismantling" hadn't been for nothing; the reiryoku he'd absorbed had soaked into every fiber. His hoho sharpened, cleaner, faster.
Yoruichi bared her teeth like a cat. "Interesting. But don't forget—I'm the Goddess of Flash."
She leapt—golden, electric. Cole flashed ahead, black streak skimming the earth. The sky shrieked with torn air as two colors of light chased each other.
Rukia and the gathered nobles stared, blank. Not figures—light. Anyone below captain level couldn't even track their shapes, only the trails they left behind.
"Big Brother Cole is… so strong…" Yushiro whispered. If not for his sister, he would never have been head; she was his idol, the shape he chased. Yet even her hoho was getting edged out by a human-born shinigami.
"So fast… so fast…" Rukia swallowed. "Is this what hoho looks like between true elites?"
She'd thought bankai vaulted her near other captains—if not Kyōraku, then close to the rest. But those two didn't even draw their blades; with footwork alone they could crush her.
"Captain Soi fong—can you keep up?" she asked.
Soi fong's eyes never left the streaks. At last she said, low, "Not like this. But I can with Shunkō (Flash War Cry) active."
Rukia blinked. "If you can't… how—"
Only Soi fong understood her own words. In a normal state she couldn't touch either one. Only by fusing kido and hakuda into a detonating surge—Shunkō—could she claw to their heels. And even then… neither of them had shown their true ceiling yet.
Nanao only puffed out her cheeks and shook Seven-Mirror Sword helplessly. She couldn't even see them, let alone chase.
"Yoruichi, I've said this a dozen times," Cole called forward, somehow still speaking easily as he ran. "I'm just showing your brother what a man should do—"
"You—can still talk!?" Yoruichi's calves burned. If he was talking, he wasn't maxed. A few months—and he'd reached beyond centuries of her grind?
At this point, she wasn't running for her brother anymore. She was running for the title on her back.
She stamped, arms flaring wide. "Shunkō!!"
Explosive reiryoku burst from both shoulders, thunder hissing. Yellow cloth shredded; sun-browned skin flashed as wind howled—and her speed jumped a whole tier.
Cole whistled. "Going straight to the big move, huh?"
He answered in kind, stepping harder—his speed spiking a tier as well. Even so, he could feel the edge of his current limit; he hadn't dumped every point into raw speed.
"He can still accelerate…" Yoruichi almost lost her breath. She was in Shunkō—and still hadn't closed. She also hadn't forgotten: Cole knew Shunkō, too.
Was the name "Goddess of Flash" about to change hands?
A cold presence cut in—Byakuya, finally on scene. His gaze flicked from one streak to the other, then tightened. "To match that cat-demon's speed…"
He watched a few seconds more, then drew his zanpakuto. "Cat-demon—you chase from behind. I'll block the front. He won't slip past both of us."
Yoruichi's eyes lit; she pressed on. Byakuya swept his blade—and silver-white steel dissolved into a drifting storm of blades.
"Scatter—Senbonzakura (Thousand Cherry Blossoms)."
Petals shimmered into life and floated to block Cole's path. Yoruichi bore down from the rear. Seeing the petals ahead and a furious sister behind, Cole sighed—and then smiled.
"If you both want to 'discipline' me so badly… fine. See the Vasto Lorde with a million attribute points."
Yoruichi's eyes narrowed; Byakuya's sharpened. Hollowfying?
They'd seen it before, but as they watched, black bled to black-red; an evil tide of pressure poured out. A hole yawned in the chest; a jagged white-red shard crawled up the cheek. The shihakusho vanished; black-red lines armored a bare torso, black-red reiryoku forming the lower garb.
"His Hollow form… changed again," Byakuya murmured, shaken. Was this even still a Vasto Lorde? Staring at him felt like peering into an abyss. Meet this in Hueco Mundo and no one would mistake him for a shinigami—they'd think he was a king of hollows.
Cole laughed up at the drifting petals and ran straight in barehanded. "Brother-in-law, my Hierro (Steel Skin) is tough."
Steel rang on steel. Petals scraped sparks off his skin; not a mark marred him. Cole planted a heel and grinned back over his shoulder. "Yoruichi—you can't catch me now."
"Sonido!"
He vanished—then appeared dozens of meters away, as if he'd stepped through space.
Yoruichi skidded and bared her teeth. "You little—using sonido."
Hoho and sonido both read "speed," but the gulf between them was real. Hoho was speed; sonido warped position. Chase normal sonido with hoho, and you still had angles. Chase Cole's version that hopped dozens of meters per step… and your life got hard.
Cole teed his hands on his hips, pleased. "Brother-in-law, little cat, give it a rest. We're friends. Don't nitpick a few buildings."
Both of them trembled with the urge to beat him senseless.
And then—across the distance—a cold, low voice:
"Shoot him—Shinsō (Divine Spear)."
A silver gleam flashed, crossing seven kilometers in an eyeblink. Cole's pupils snapped tight; he thrust out his right hand and caught the extending blade.
Metal screamed. Even clenched in his palm, the spear kept growing—until the tip scraped his left shoulder with a nails-on-steel shriek and failed to pierce his Hierro.
Cole arched a brow, gripping the blade. "Ichimaru Gin's Shinsō?"
The reiryoku at the far end wasn't Gin's—yet the technique was. Yoruichi frowned; Byakuya's face went stony.
They turned toward the distant figure. "Tsunayashiro clan… you wield Enra Kyōten? For Cole? That crosses the line."
"Enra Kyōten?" Cole aimed his right forefinger into the distance. "What's that?"
"An inherited Tsunayashiro artifact," Yoruichi said, grim. "It can mimic any zanpakuto's ability." A taboo tool—every use shaved away life.
Far off, the current head of Tsunayashiro—a sour-faced elder—glared. "A mere human. A few little 'achievements' do not excuse your insult to nobility. Today you will learn—"
"Drop the 'noble' every other word. It's exhausting." Cole cut him off, voice flat. "This is why I hate you lot—lofty tone, kill at a whim. You aimed Shinsō at my heart, didn't you?"
He leveled his forefinger at the old man's chest. "Then I'll return a shot."
Black-red light gathered at the fingertip—compressing to a sesame-sized point that hurt to look at.
"Wait, Cole—" Yoruichi's face blanched.
Cole's voice fell cold. "Cero Oscuras (King's Hollow Flash)."
The beam erupted—black-red, laser-straight, screaming across the air at many times the speed of sound. The old man's pupils shrank. He hadn't expected his Hollow state to be this monstrous—like staring at the Commander himself.
Desperate, he slashed his blade and chanted, "All waves, become my shield! All lightnings, become my blade! Sōgyo no Kotowari (Twin Fish of Logic)!"
Shinsō blurred to glitter—and resolved into Ukitake's twin blades. One angled into the beam, drinking reiryoku madly.
Cole glanced at the absorbing edge—at the fact it was only in shikai—and the corner of his mouth lifted. "How like a high-born fool. You don't even know a zanpakuto's limits."
"Three… two… one."
Bang.
On his last word, the old man's eyes bulged. The black-red sun burst.
Thundered.
The world inverted. An ovoid bloom of annihilating light swallowed the field; earth split into clawing fissures; empty courtyards became blasted waste where rebuilding would be a nightmare. The elder's body disappeared into the storm.
(End of Chapter)
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