One Bankai after another was unleashed simultaneously.
This power, once hailed as one of the Seireitei's greatest forces, was indeed as insignificant as a child's toy before the Monk's Reiatsu.
It could not even stir the slightest bit of interest in him.
"Cough... cough..."
Tsunayoshi coughed twice and struggled to pull himself up from the ground.
In this tense situation, even the slightest movement was magnified infinitely.
"Tsunayoshi!"
Tatsuki hurried to his side and helped him to his feet.
Tsunayoshi raised his head and looked at the Monk standing high above them.
He forced a smile.
Compared to Tsunayoshi's miserable expression, the Monk was smiling quite happily.
As long as he wasn't dead, that was enough.
A living Sawada Tsunayoshi still had value.
And looking down at the two precious candidates for the position of Soul King, the Monk's mood was exceptionally good.
"Sawada Tsunayoshi, I acknowledge your strength."
After their successive battles, even the Monk had been forced to acknowledge Tsunayoshi's combat power.
"But your greatest misfortune was coming to this world."
"Your misfortune is my fortune."
"Come with me. Return with me to the Soul King Palace!"
The Monk extended his palm.
A gigantic hand reached toward Tsunayoshi.
Everyone immediately prepared themselves and launched their attacks at it.
It was useless.
Completely useless.
The attacks they had always taken pride in could not even stir up dust against the Monk's palm before being crushed instantly.
"Move!"
A heavy roar accompanied by overwhelming Reiatsu scattered everyone.
Yamamoto appeared above them in a single step.
Both of his hands had turned crimson, resembling molten magma.
Ryūjin Jakka had disappeared from sight.
He thrust both fists forward.
"Genryū: Sōkotsu!"
A tremendous wave of heat erupted.
Yamamoto's fists contained terrifying flames.
Even the faintest glimpse of that fire caused Shinji and the others to feel instinctive fear.
Their instincts told them that merely touching it meant certain death.
Yet even such a powerful attack was forcibly suppressed by the Monk's palm.
The extreme heat spread outward like an enormous umbrella turned upside down over them.
The surrounding earth rapidly dried beneath the heat, cracking apart into chunks of parched soil.
The vegetation fared no better.
Everything withered rapidly under the scorching temperature.
BOOM!
CRASH!
Yamamoto poured every ounce of strength into the attack and managed to shift the Monk's palm slightly.
That was enough to prevent the Monk's hand from successfully grabbing Tsunayoshi.
But Yamamoto's own hands were already covered in blood.
The flames that had once covered them had been replaced by blood plasma.
Ryūjin Jakka had also returned to his waist.
The Monk did not care about Yamamoto's resistance.
It had merely been an ordinary Senri Tsūtenshō.
If he wished, he could unleash millions upon millions of such palms.
Instead, Yamamoto's actions irritated him.
"Put away your little trick."
"An untrained power—what qualifications do you have to stand before me?"
"Or are you planning to have the entire Soul Society buried alongside Sawada Tsunayoshi?"
For that brief moment, Yamamoto had entered a state of Zanpakutō Fusion.
Just as the Monk had said, Yamamoto had never used this technique before.
He had failed to stop the Monk's attack while simultaneously injuring himself.
As for taking the Soul Society down with him...
It was unavoidable.
Yamamoto himself was unfamiliar with this power.
How could he possibly control the temperature produced by a fused Zanpakutō?
That was why Yamamoto had insisted that the Gotei 13 evacuate.
He could not guarantee that his own power would not injure the others.
To the Monk, however, Yamamoto's willingness to drag the Soul Society into the battle without his permission was an unacceptable violation.
"Since you all want to die..."
"Then die together."
Another palm swept forward.
The Monk had already decided.
Aside from Ichigo Kurosaki and Sawada Tsunayoshi, no one else needed to be left alive.
As for the Gotei 13, if they wanted to return, let them return.
If they didn't, he had plenty of time to cultivate an entirely new organization.
Yamamoto suddenly raised his head.
He wanted to use the power of Zanpakutō Fusion again.
But his hands were trembling uncontrollably.
They no longer obeyed him.
"Move, old man!"
Yamamoto abruptly turned around.
What he saw was Ichigo drawing back a black bow and aiming it at the Monk.
Dense blue lines resembling blood vessels covered the bow.
And the arrow nocked upon it was even more familiar to the Monk.
Black and white powers intertwined around it.
The Monk's eyes widened.
How did this Kurosaki Ichigo know how to use this kind of attack too?
Tsunayoshi had the Tenth and the others helping him inside his body.
Ichigo had Zangetsu and Old Man Zangetsu discussing the matter with him.
They had independently arrived at the same conclusion as Tsunayoshi.
Instead of merging the powers, they would stack all of them together and fire them in a single attack.
Whoosh!
Ichigo's arrow pierced straight through the Monk's Senri Tsūtenshō and continued toward him.
This time, the Monk became serious.
He directly confronted Ichigo's attack.
Black and white powers condensed into a sphere within his palm before he thrust it toward the incoming arrow.
There was no explosion.
Ichigo's attack simply dissolved.
After being bombarded by Tsunayoshi's Sky Flames for so long, the Monk had nearly forgotten that his own ability could actually work against these powers.
Black erased the names of the various powers contained within the arrow.
White bestowed upon them the designation of the weakest possible attack.
With a single motion, the Monk crushed Ichigo's painstakingly prepared attack into fragments.
"Damn it! Again!"
That first arrow had already consumed the overwhelming majority of Ichigo's Reiatsu.
Even if Ichigo squeezed out every last bit of remaining power, the second arrow would be far weaker than the first.
And even if it were somehow stronger, so what?
Before the Monk's conceptual ability, Ichigo could accomplish nothing.
Unless...
Unless Ichigo could perfectly fuse all four powers and reach the level of the Soul King.
"Enough, Ichigo."
Tsunayoshi's quiet voice made Ichigo stop drawing his bow.
Ichigo's hand trembled.
He knew Tsunayoshi too well.
He knew exactly what Tsunayoshi was about to say.
It would be an attempt to persuade them to leave.
"Everyone..."
"Thank you. Truly."
Tsunayoshi straightened himself.
"You all still have wonderful lives waiting for you. You shouldn't come here and fight a battle that can't be won just because of me."
"Go back."
"This is my battlefield."
Tsunayoshi gently wiped the tears from Tatsuki's face and patted her shoulder.
"If you have the chance..."
"Please look after my mom and dad."
Tsunayoshi staggered forward.
But when he passed Ichigo, Ichigo grabbed him firmly.
"What do you mean, it can't be won?"
"I don't understand!"
"If you're going, we're going together!"
Hearing Ichigo's sincere yet almost childish declaration, Tsunayoshi could not help laughing helplessly.
If there had been even the slightest hope of victory, he would never have driven these people away.
But the Monk was simply too powerful.
There was no hope of winning.
"Wait!"
"If we can't do it, there's still Aizen, right?"
At the critical moment, Ichigo's mind worked remarkably quickly.
"I'll go unseal him."
"We still have the Hōgyoku!"
Before Tsunayoshi could respond, Ichigo immediately used Shunpo and rushed toward the place where Aizen was sealed.
The Monk's expression became filled with annoyance.
One Sawada Tsunayoshi.
One Sōsuke Aizen.
These troublemakers who had repeatedly wreaked havoc in the Soul King Palace were impossible to leave unattended.
The Monk aimed at Ichigo's position and brought down his palm.
Tsunayoshi and the others had no time to stop it.
Or rather, they had no power to stop this enraged strike.
Just as the palm was about to crush Ichigo, a gigantic sphere of Reiatsu flew over.
It blasted Ichigo back toward Tsunayoshi's group.
Chad hurriedly caught Ichigo, preventing him from suffering a second impact.
Hearing the thunderous sound of the Monk's palm striking the ground, his gaze shifted beyond the Seireitei.
Places as weak as the Rukongai normally did not even warrant his attention.
But he knew exactly where that projectile had come from.
The Shiba family.
The place where the Tenkū no Kurō was launched.
Kūkaku Shiba had aimed the Shiba family's cannon directly at the Monk.
Beneath the cannon, Kūkaku proudly rubbed her nose.
Looking at the screen Urahara had installed for her, she said,
"If you want to lay a hand on a junior of the Shiba family, did you ask me first?!"
Forget it.
Kūkaku Shiba was no threat.
The Monk withdrew his gaze.
His priority remained capturing Tsunayoshi.
This time, he had no intention of using Senri Tsūtenshō.
Instead, he slowly descended from the heavens, stepping down onto nonexistent stairs.
This body, comparable to that of the Soul King, was the Monk's greatest source of confidence.
As the Monk descended step by step, Tsunayoshi smiled.
He wanted to walk forward as well.
Perhaps it would allow him to meet his end with a little more dignity.
But the moment he took a step forward, every figure behind him moved ahead of him.
They stood between him and the Monk.
"You..."
"You're injured, so stay put, Baldy!"
Hiyori shouted loudly.
Yet her hands were trembling.
How many people could truly remain fearless when staring death in the face?
"Good!"
Ichigo stood at the very front of the group, pointing his blade at the Monk.
"If you want to get to Tsunayoshi..."
"Then you'll have to step over our corpses!"
"Hmph."
"A bunch of insignificant insects."
The Monk raised his enormous hand.
A vast expanse of white descended from the heavens like a waterfall.
He no longer had the patience to erase names and assign new ones individually.
He intended to give these troublesome insects the name of "ants" in one stroke.
"They're not insects..."
Flames slowly spread outward.
They formed a curtain across the heavens, shielding everyone from the cascading white.
Ichigo and the others turned their eyes toward Tsunayoshi.
A new flame had reignited above his forehead.
Tsunayoshi was becoming their shelter from the storm.
Flames.
Those orange flames again.
The Monk clenched his fists.
Why did this Sawada Tsunayoshi always interfere at the critical moment?
The Reiatsu of those flames was clearly not particularly powerful.
Yet they could perfectly neutralize the power of names.
Harmony.
Because Tsunayoshi had already memorized the structure of the Monk's power, even an ordinary Sky-type Shikai was enough to completely harmonize with and neutralize it.
"The reason I've been able to grow this far..."
"is because I have these friends."
"They have always supported me from behind and pushed me forward."
"For the sake of my friends..."
"For the sake of my family..."
"I have to become stronger."
"The strongest!"
"Strong enough that no one can stop me."
"Strong enough to protect my ordinary life!"
Tsunayoshi no longer had the strength to wait for the Tenth to come up with another solution.
He knew that if he let this final breath escape him, he would never be able to stand again.
While he was still conscious, he had to unleash one final battle cry against the Monk.
"Ichibē Hyōsube!"
"COME AND FIGHT ME!!!"
As his fighting spirit continued to rise, the flame on Tsunayoshi's forehead burned brighter and brighter.
By the time his final words left his mouth, the flame had reached its absolute peak.
The fire above his forehead shot into the heavens.
It was no longer burning Reiatsu.
It was burning Tsunayoshi's life.
Inside the Inner World, the Tenth remained silent.
He simply synchronized his own flame with Tsunayoshi's frequency.
Quietly.
Wordlessly.
He burned himself alongside Tsunayoshi.
It was a failure.
He had no better solution.
The only thing he could do was accompany Tsunayoshi to the very end.
◇ BONUS & SUPPORT
◇ 1 bonus chapter for every 10 reviews — drop a comment!
◇ 1 bonus chapter for every 100 Power Stones.
◇ Read 70+ chapters ahead on P@treon → patreon.com/Sagamaster789