"Gigi…"
The three women stared blankly at the enormous crater in the ground.
A full-fledged member of the Sternritter had been smashed into the earth in the most brutal way possible—by nothing more than an ordinary Soldat from the Military Police.
In the Wandenreich's past several hundred years, something like this had never happened.
No—since the day the Wandenreich was founded, it had never happened.
With a Schrift and a Quincy Vollständig, they might look no different from common Soldat on the surface.
But in terms of what they were on the inside, the two were no longer even the same "kind."
And yet this man…
"Damn you, bastard! You actually dared do that to me—I'll definitely kill you! I'll turn you into my zombie…!"
A furious voice roared up from underground.
Giselle, face smeared with blood and bruises like fingerprints stamped around the neck, clawed her way out with a vicious, twisted expression.
Seeing that, Cole couldn't help being a little surprised.
"Not bad. You really are Sternritter—your recovery's impressive. You took that much damage and you can still move."
It was praise—but none of the three women felt honored.
They only felt humiliation.
As Sternritter, they'd been crushed by a mere Soldat… and then praised for being "strong."
To a warrior, that was the worst kind of insult.
Giselle nearly bit her teeth to pieces.
The rage of having her true gender exposed, stacked on the shame of getting beaten down, finally made her explode completely. She roared:
"I'm going to kill you! Absolutely—absolutely going to kill you!!!"
She wanted to turn this man into a zombie—keep his self-awareness intact—make him watch as she toyed with him.
Make him beg to live, unable to die.
In the next instant, Giselle shot up into the air and unfurled the wings of her Quincy Vollständig.
"Kanseitai: Kami no Shi (God's Death)!!!"
"Dancing Death Boys Club!!!"
Along with Giselle's incomprehensible shout, four strange skeletons appeared out of nowhere at her side.
They were still translucent blue—but they looked oddly cute, like chibi figures.
"What's this?" Cole tilted his head, watching the four wobbly little skeletons approach. He reached out and poked one with a blue arrow. "Does this kind of thing even have any attack power?"
Bambietta had told him before about Sternritter abilities.
For example, Giselle's Schrift was "Zombie"—turning people into zombies and controlling them like puppets.
But what were these weird little skeletons?
While Cole was looking them over, the four chibi skeletons attacked.
They swung their adorable blue skeletal hands at him.
Cole's expression grew even stranger. He didn't even bother shooting. He casually flicked his blue spirit bow twice.
The four chibi skeletons instantly fell apart.
What…?
Were they trying to kill him with cuteness?
But seeing that, Giselle didn't look disappointed at all—she looked even more excited.
"Damn Military Police—now you're dead!"
Under her control, the scattered chibi bones surged toward Cole as if alive.
Ka! Ka! Ka…
The frames of those four chibi skeletons snapped onto Cole's joints, locking his body in place.
Giselle immediately turned to Candice and shouted, "Little Candi! Hit him now—make him lose his fighting ability!"
She didn't want to kill Cole. She wanted him half-dead but still alive—so she could turn him into a zombie.
That way she could preserve his self-awareness to the greatest extent.
Candice froze for a second. Then, as Giselle kept urging her, Candice pointed at Cole with a weird look.
"Gigi… I don't think it matters if I attack right now."
Giselle blinked, turned her head—and saw Cole casually tearing the blue bones off his body, holding them up like a toy.
"This ability isn't that strong. It just pins people down."
As he spoke, Cole lightly pinched the bones between his fingers and crushed them into fragments. Then he looked at Giselle with open curiosity.
"So this is your Schrift? Isn't it… kind of weak?"
Giselle's face turned purple with rage.
She lunged straight at Cole, roaring, "Damn it! Don't look down on me!!!"
Cole had just lifted his spirit bow, not even having time to fire, when Giselle abruptly stopped.
The bow in her hand shifted into a blade. Gritting her teeth, she stabbed her own chest.
Self-harm.
"Ah!"
Blood sprayed out.
Cole hadn't expected it—his white uniform was splashed red.
He tugged at the stained fabric with blatant disgust.
"What are you doing? This is brand-new—just issued by the Military Police. If you want to hurt yourself, can't you go do it somewhere nobody's around?"
Giselle ignored him, enduring the pain in her chest as she sneered.
"You still have the mood to care about that?!"
Giselle's Schrift was Zombie—able to turn any living being into a zombie under her command.
But there was one crucial detail:
Unlike many other Sternritter, her ability couldn't be directly "fired off" in battle.
It was passive.
Only when her own blood splashed onto someone else could she forcibly activate it and convert them into a zombie.
That was why, for hundreds of years, she had never used this ability in combat.
But now…
Cold light flickered in Giselle's eyes as she poured everything into her Schrift.
The blood splattered across Cole's clothes and skin began to shift—turning from red to blue, glowing with a pale azure radiance.
Cole's skin tone started changing too, deepening toward a dark shade—darker even than Yoruichi's.
"Now! Become a zombie!!!" Giselle stared at Cole with feverish excitement.
Cole only sighed and scratched his head.
"So that's your big move?"
He didn't do anything fancy. He simply accelerated the circulation of spiritual power through his blood vessels—
and his skin returned to normal.
"Eh…?" Giselle froze, eyes vacant. "You… you're fine?!"
"Of course I'm fine."
Cole appeared right in front of her. Under Giselle's terrified stare, he grabbed her by the throat again, lazily speaking as if this was obvious.
"You really thought an ability that works on weaklings would work on me too?"
No matter how outrageous a Quincy power might look—
in the world of Death Gods, only one factor decides strength.
Spiritual power.
This little femboy was trying to use that pitiful amount of spiritual power to convert him into a zombie.
What a joke.
Did Kensei want to cut down Aizen?
If he could do that, then the Wandenreich wouldn't need to wait for Yhwach to revive. Kensei alone would've been enough.
In other words—no need for Yhwach's revival at all.
I will surpass Yhwach.
Tears welled in Giselle's eyes. Terror took over her face. She waved her hands frantically, pleading in panic:
"Don't—don't! I know I was wrong! Don't hit Gigi anymore! I won't turn you into a zombie! Please—please let me go, okay?"
She forced a smile, trying to ingratiate herself.
Cole chuckled once.
Then he tightened his grip, swung his arm, and smashed Giselle down like a bowling ball.
"Men are very clear about grudges and gratitude."
Boom!!!
The ground of the castle shook again.
A savage shockwave swept through the entire structure.
Cracks that had already crawled across the walls split wider—running from the bottom all the way to the top.
The whole castle trembled violently.
Thick fractures spread beneath it like an earthquake zone, opening like black bottomless pits.
"…This is bad."
Cole blinked, suddenly uneasy about the castle's fate.
Maybe…
He'd used too much strength.
The next second—
With a thunderous crash, the castle collapsed completely. The entire structure disintegrated as huge chunks of stone rained down from above.
About half a minute later…
The white castle had become ruins. Dust filled the air, bricks and rubble burying what used to be the grand hall.
Fortunately, no one in the castle was a normal person—otherwise there wouldn't have been a single survivor.
"Boom!"
Cole kicked a massive boulder aside, patted the dust off himself with a helpless look, and glanced at the three women across from him.
"…Honestly, I kind of liked this castle. You destroyed it—so shouldn't you rebuild me a new one?"
On the other side, Candice and the other two women stood atop the rubble, faces grave as they stared at Cole.
"Your Seikessō (Blood Vein) and Dōkessō (Blood Artery) seem different from ours. You can fight at full power while still keeping defense."
"Can you tell us how you did it?"
To become Sternritter and receive a Schrift from Yhwach, they'd already proven they had talent and intelligence worth noticing even before gaining a Schrift.
And after watching Cole's fight with Giselle, they understood where his strength was coming from.
Seikessō (Blood Vein) and Dōkessō (Blood Artery).
Standard abilities for this generation of Quincy.
But whether Cole had modified them, or his physique was special—either way, he had fused the two.
He possessed the terrifying defense of Seikessō (Blood Vein), while also holding the shocking attack power of Dōkessō (Blood Artery).
That was what they couldn't understand.
What kind of structure could allow a Quincy's blood to be both still and flowing at the same time?
That was a contradiction!
Seeing their confusion, Cole didn't bother hiding it.
After all, it was something only he could do.
He smiled, pointed at the flowing blue spiritual power patterns along his blood vessels, and said:
"What's so hard about it? You just need finer control of spiritual power—compress a massive amount of it into your blood vessels."
Right now, he had infused one-tenth of his power into his blood vessels.
And using the suppressive power of the Ruyi Jingu Bang, he prevented his vessels from exploding. On that foundation, he accelerated the flow of spiritual power and blood—
thereby activating both Seikessō (Blood Vein) and Dōkessō (Blood Artery) at the same time.
Of course, if Cole entered Kyoka (Hollowfication), then even without the Ruyi Jingu Bang's suppression, he could brute-force it with his body.
His hardened skin was enough to suppress the blood's violent flow.
But Candice and the others didn't know any of that.
They stared at the flowing blue lines on Cole's body in disbelief.
"You're… just dumping massive spiritual power into your blood vessels?!"
"That's impossible—your vessels would explode!"
"With that much spiritual power fused into every drop of blood, how can you still control it precisely and suppress it?!"
They couldn't accept it. It was like their whole worldview was cracking.
Infusing spiritual power into blood sounded easy.
But doing it was harder than reaching the heavens.
In the Wandenreich, every year countless Quincy died because their control slipped and their blood vessels ruptured.
And yet, many still chased it obsessively.
Only a very small number could truly master Seikessō (Blood Vein) and Dōkessō (Blood Artery).
The more spiritual power you fused in, the harder it became to control each blood cell.
Once spiritual power reached a certain point, every blood cell became a bomb—move it slightly, and it explodes.
"So that's why you're a bunch of trash."
Cole smiled faintly, gripped his blue spirit bow with his left hand, and looked down at them with arrogant superiority.
"I… am the strongest Quincy!"
(End of Chapter)
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