With a thought, Luca stopped the moving pillar beneath his feet.
In a few steps, he walked to the center of the black ground and stood in front of the... "sword?" planted vertically in the earth.
"Uh? This is my Zanpakutō?"
As he approached, Luca couldn't help but scrutinize the bizarre "longsword."
The sword was entirely pitch black, blending almost perfectly with the flat black ground.
The upper half—the hilt with its anti-slip grip and the square guard—looked normal enough.
But the blade itself... it was slightly rectangular and thick, engraved with intricate, elongated patterns. One side of the seamless edge had various notches and hollows of different sizes.
Because of these single-sided notches, the black sword stuck in the ground looked like an oversized key with a handle.
However, the moment Luca reached out, grasped the hilt, and pulled the black sword from the ground...
The elongated patterns engraved on the blade instantly lit up with flowing blue light, giving the sword an unexpected sci-fi aesthetic.
But...
Luca looked at the "sword tip" in his hand, then at the matching socket left in the ground where the sword had been plugged in. His face darkened.
"I get it... This isn't a key! It's a damn USB drive chip plugged into the ground!"
Yes, if it wasn't obvious when it was stuck in the ground...
Now that it was pulled out, the flat "tip" connected to the blue "circuits" on the blade, combined with the way the blue lines on the ground converged at the socket, made the black-and-blue sword in Luca's hand look exactly like an elongated data chip.
And those hollows Luca thought were "key teeth"? Now they looked more like the notches for securing screws on a circuit board...
But before Luca could roast the sword's design for not fitting the Bleach aesthetic, a flood of information regarding the Zanpakutō poured into his mind.
In an instant, the look of disdain on Luca's face turned into delight.
"Shinken (Core Key)? It really is a key..."
Sensing the information in his mind, Luca's smile widened.
"Although the style is a bit weird, it seems to have some pretty good abilities~"
"And it's a Zanpakutō without its own consciousness... doesn't that mean...?"
However, perhaps because he had already achieved Shikai, before he could explore further...
The next instant, Luca's consciousness was ejected from his inner world and returned directly to his physical body.
When he opened his eyes again, he was shocked by what he saw.
The classroom looked like a category 12 typhoon had swept through it. It was a mess. Desks and chairs were blown everywhere.
There was a giant hole in the ceiling directly above him. The entire room was covered in fine cracks, and the surrounding walls looked like they were about to collapse.
As for his classmates, they were all hiding outside the classroom, peeking cautiously through the door and windows with lingering fear on their faces, staring at him.
"Uh... are we playing hide and seek?"
What Luca didn't know was that just now, after he entered the Jinzen state, his Spiritual Pressure began to climb uncontrollably.
Since Luca's base Reiatsu was already leagues above these ordinary students, many weaker ones were pinned to the ground on the spot.
When he grasped Shinken and mastered Shikai, the sudden explosion of Spiritual Pressure blew everything around him away.
Fortunately, the Zanjutsu instructor had anticipated this and evacuated the students early. Otherwise, some unlucky kids might have been injured or knocked unconscious.
But right now, no one cared about the destruction.
Noticing that the violent Reiatsu fluctuations had calmed down, the instructor rushed in, unable to suppress the excitement on his face.
"Luca! Did you successfully master Shikai?!"
His voice trembled with excitement, as if he were the one who had just awakened his Zanpakutō for the first time.
Luca looked at the excited teacher in front of him, then at the sword in his hand—which had transformed from a standard Asauchi into a short Zanpakutō, roughly the size of Soifon's wakizashi.
Luca decided not to hide it. He nodded slightly.
"Yes, I've mastered it."
The classroom erupted!
Ignoring the mess, students flooded back in, disbelief written all over their faces.
"He really awakened it?!"
"That's Shikai! On his first attempt at Jinzen!!"
"Truly a once-in-a-century genius!"
Not just his classmates—the Reiatsu explosion was so massive that curious students from neighboring classes ran over to ask what happened.
For a moment, Luca felt like a rare animal in a zoo, standing awkwardly in place while being gawked at.
Seeing this, the instructor immediately turned and shouted sternly at the other students.
"Quiet! What is all this noise?! You! Which class are you from?! Get back to your own class!"
The teacher's authority suppressed the restless atmosphere. The students from other classes who tried to sneak a peek scurried away.
Of course, armed with this juicy gossip, they would undoubtedly continue the discussion back in their own classrooms.
After shouting, the instructor turned back to Luca. Like a Sichuan face-changer, his expression instantly switched to a warm, kindly smile.
"Student Luca, come with me. I'm taking you to see the Headmaster!"
Hearing this, Luca's face fell.
"Again..."
However, the excited instructor ignored Luca's expression. He threw a quick order to the rest of the class:
"Self-study for the rest of the period!"
Then he dragged Luca enthusiastically toward the Dean's Office.
Once they left, the classroom buzzed with noise again. Almost everyone couldn't stop talking about Luca.
Only a few students, perhaps inspired by Luca, focused their minds and resumed their own Jinzen.
Meanwhile, in the Dean's Office.
The Headmaster of the Shin'ō Academy, who had just brewed a pot of tea and was preparing to enjoy a leisurely afternoon, was so shocked by the instructor's news that he knocked over his beloved teapot before he could take a sip.
"He really awakened Shikai on his first try?!"
Ignoring his tea-soaked clothes, the Headmaster stared with wide eyes, bypassed his desk, and Shunpo-ed right next to Luca.
"Can... can you demonstrate your Shikai?!"