"Nelliel, Harribel, you two go up and wait for me."
Sora used a Kidō that could transmit sound in water, telling them to get away from here.
The power of the thing under the lake was unknown. If a fight broke out, he might not be able to protect his disciples.
Nelliel and Harribel looked worried, but they obeyed their professor's words and left.
"Professor... glub... be careful... glub..." Nelliel's voice was mixed with the water.
After they left, Sora continued to observe the movement at the bottom of the lake.
The giant eyeball had not yet shown any hostility. Sora wanted to see if he could communicate with this strange spiritual being first.
He observed for a while but couldn't discern any emotional fluctuation from the eye.
Then, the eye in the lava trench began to move.
Its golden pupil locked onto Sora's position.
"My Lord..."
Sora was slightly startled. A strange voice suddenly echoed in his mind.
"My Lord... you may focus your mind... to communicate with me..."
The strange voice echoed in his mind again.
It was a cold, empty voice, as if from an emotionless machine.
"I can communicate with it through my thoughts?"
Sora understood that this was likely the giant eyeball communicating with him.
This thing didn't seem to have any ill intent.
But Sora had many more questions. Why did it call him "My Lord"?
He didn't remember ever having such a "servant."
"What are you, and why do you call me 'My Lord'?" Sora focused his attention and thought the words in his mind.
"I am a creation of the Soul King... naturally a servant... of the Soul King..."
The voice came from the eye.
"A creation of the Soul King..." Sora raised an eyebrow. "But I am not the Soul King."
Sora couldn't find any information about this giant eye in his memory.
Whether it was information from his past life or information currently available in the Soul Society, content related to the Soul King was rather vague. Most of it leaned towards grand narratives, with few records of what the Soul King actually did.
"You are the Soul King's... Shadow... you are also my Lord..."
The voice came from the eye.
"You can see the essence within my spiritual body?"
Sora's eyes narrowed. He was beginning to believe this thing was a creation of the Soul King.
The moment Sora had transmigrated into the Soul King's shadow, his consciousness was essentially born from it.
When he was cut off and sewn into Batsu'unsai Katori's Reigai, he became an independent individual, just like the other parts of the Soul King's body that had gained self-awareness.
But for so many years, apart from the Royal Guard who had personally sewn him into the Reigai, no one in the Soul Society could see that he was the Soul King's Shadow.
Yet this giant eyeball had perceived the Soul King's Shadow within his spiritual body.
"I am an instrument created by my Lord... I can sense my Lord's presence..."
The voice came from the eye.
"Why are you here?"
Sora continued to ask.
"I am here... to guard the passage... the passage to Hell..."
"There's a passage to Hell here?"
"That is correct... my Lord ordered me to guard... the soul of the 'Lord of Hell' sealed within the passage..."
"The Lord of Hell is sealed in this passage? As far as I know, the Lord of Hell was split into three parts. Is this one of them?" A thought struck Sora, and he recalled the records he had read before.
"I do not know of other matters... sealed in this passage is a blade... a blade created by the 'Lord of Hell' by stealing my Lord's power... and splitting his own soul..." the eye answered. "Perhaps now it should be called... a Zanpakutō..."
"The Lord of Hell's Zanpakutō!" Sora was shocked.
This was not recorded in any ancient texts.
The struggle between the Soul King and Hell was too ancient, even older than the history of the three realms. There were few records of it.
"Did the Soul King create you to use Quincy power to suppress the Lord of Hell's Zanpakutō?" Sora thought of the Quincy-like spiritual pressure he had sensed from the eye.
"That is correct... the power of a Shinigami and the power of that evil blade share the same origin... they are more easily eroded... and corrupted by it..." the eye answered.
"The Lord of Hell actually stole the Soul King's power... perhaps that is the root of the conflict between the Soul King and Hell?" Sora guessed in his mind.
The giant eye did not know the answer either. The Soul King had created it only to guard the blade, and had not granted it much other information.
"The Lord of Hell's Zanpakutō can easily erode and corrupt a Shinigami. If I come into contact with it, will I be affected?" Sora continued to ask.
A great secret was laid out before him. It was impossible not to be curious and want to investigate.
"Your power is not yet sufficient to suppress the evil blade... you must surpass the limits of a Shinigami or a Hollow... and master the power of a Quincy... only then can you be unaffected by it..." the eye answered.
"Surpass the limits of a Shinigami or a Hollow... that means becoming a transcendent being. That's still a long way off," Sora frowned, made a mental note of it, and continued to ask, "Could the Soul King not destroy this Zanpakutō? Why was it only sealed here?"
Sora felt that with the Soul King's power, destroying a Zanpakutō should be possible, even if it was the Lord of Hell's.
"The evil blade can summon spiritual particles from Hell... those particles pass through the passage... sink into the depths of the Forest of Menos... and become a part of Hueco Mundo's foundation..." the eye answered.
"I see... I felt before that the number of Menos in the Forest of Menos was abnormal."
Sora understood now.
The Soul King was bleeding Hell to nourish the three realms!
The Soul King was using the evil blade's characteristics to continuously draw spiritual particles from Hell into Hueco Mundo.
Hueco Mundo had become like a spiritual particle transit station. After these particles arrived, they would circulate throughout the three realms through the activities of Shinigami and Menos.
"Perhaps this is why the high-reishi areas in Hueco Mundo are constantly expanding..." Sora stroked his chin.
"My Lord... I can sense it..."
The voice came from the eye. "The Quincy power that is gestating within your body..."
"You can even sense that..." Sora raised an eyebrow.
Within his spiritual body, there was indeed a gestating Quincy power.
It was the Quincy bloodline he had extracted from Tsukisaki Kurosaki using the 'Bloodline Extractor'.
He had previously underestimated the time needed for the Quincy power to gestate.
Perhaps the loss from using the 'Bloodline Extractor' was significant, and the amount of Quincy blood extracted was too little. It had been gestating for years and had not yet hatched.
"My Lord..."
The voice came from the eye. "I shall offer a portion of my power... to accelerate the gestation... of the Quincy power within my Lord's body..."
"It can do that?" Sora raised an eyebrow. The turn of events was somewhat surprising. This giant eye could actually accelerate the gestation of the Quincy power within his body.
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