Kenpachi Zaraki's mouth curled upward. "Looks like you finally learned how to enjoy a fight!"
"But unfortunately... it seems you can't keep enjoying it with me." Ulquiorra's gaze seemed to pass through Kenpachi Zaraki's battered body and see the scenery behind him. "Your wounds are severe. Without High-Speed Regeneration, if you keep fighting, only death awaits you."
"Aren't pain and death part of battle?" Kenpachi Zaraki raised his Zanpakutō. Even that simple movement sent blood spraying from his wounds. "How am I supposed to enjoy a fight where nobody gets hurt and nobody dies?"
"Very..." A Lanza del Relámpago formed in Ulquiorra's hand. "Correct."
They vanished from where they stood almost at the same time. Great swaths of brick and stone cracked apart, then were smashed again by the figures moving at high speed.
The Lanza del Relámpago and the blade clashed again and again, blooming like ghostly green fireworks beneath the starless moonlit night.
Their tangled figures shuttled through the air. Before they even touched the towers, the fierce winds they carried had already shattered them.
Kenpachi Zaraki cut off Ulquiorra's arm, so Ulquiorra used his tail to drag the arm back, then crushed it in his grip to release Gran Rey Cero.
As their violent Reiatsu collided, terrifying shockwaves danced wildly. An overwhelming pressure descended from the sky, and even Menos far from Las Noches lost control of themselves for a moment, trembling as they bowed to the ground.
Their high-speed movements stretched into chaotic lines above Las Noches. Only at the instant they collided could a faint glimpse of their afterimages be seen.
Almost... just a little more!
Kenpachi Zaraki's blade cut through both the Lanza del Relámpago in Ulquiorra's hand and his arm. In the next instant, the arm finished regenerating, grabbed the severed limb, and fused it together with the Lanza del Relámpago.
Boom!
Kenpachi Zaraki was blasted away by the explosion, his stark white ribs faintly visible.
But Ulquiorra, who had unleashed that attack, did not escape unscathed either. Half his body was blown apart, and his regeneration speed had clearly slowed.
Ulquiorra reached back and tore off the ruined wing on his back. A Lanza del Relámpago, mixed with pitch-black and ghostly green, emerged in his palm. As the strange long spear gradually stabilized, it warped even the air around it. "If you had not fought me with everything you had, I never would have thought to combine Gran Rey Cero and Lanza del Relámpago."
Ulquiorra gripped the Spear of Vasto Lorde with both hands. "But... this time, it truly ends."
"Both hands, huh..." Kenpachi Zaraki wiped the blood from his wound. "In that case, I'll have to use both hands too."
Ulquiorra carefully adjusted his posture, preventing the Spear of Vasto Lorde from exploding in his hands. His eyes narrowed slightly as he keenly sensed the change in Kenpachi Zaraki's Reiatsu. "What... is that?"
If Kenpachi Zaraki's Reiatsu before had been like a crazed beast, now it was more like a dragon holding its breath.
"I don't have much choice. Been a long time since I used it, after all. The so-called [Kendō]." Kenpachi Zaraki adjusted his breathing. "Back when I joined the Thirteen Divisions, I once fell for the Captain-Commander's trick and got beaten down by him. I don't really like that kind of stuff, but I did learn one thing: two hands are stronger and more powerful than one."
"Something like that..." The Spear of Vasto Lorde in Ulquiorra's hands took on a dangerous, dark-jade sheen. "Doesn't seem like something you can understand just by looking."
"Exactly." Kenpachi Zaraki raised his Zanpakutō. "Come on!"
Without his wings getting in the way, Ulquiorra's speed clearly increased. He charged toward Kenpachi Zaraki like a bolt of pitch-black lightning.
Reflected in his dark green eyes, Kenpachi Zaraki suddenly lost an arm.
A flash of white light split him in two... no!
Ulquiorra's movements froze in an instant.
The one split in two was not Kenpachi Zaraki.
It was Ulquiorra himself.
There had been no time to react. The cold blade passed through his body, and the fierce wind that followed tore Ulquiorra apart. Carrying Ulquiorra's blood with it, the gale crushed every round tower within sight behind him, turning them into dust that covered the sky.
"Hoo..." Kenpachi Zaraki slowly exhaled a breath of white mist, blowing away the churning smoke and dust. "You're not dead yet?"
Flesh and blood rapidly regenerated, and Ulquiorra stood. "Then let's continue..."
"No." Kenpachi Zaraki turned away. "It's already over."
Unwilling to accept it, Ulquiorra took a step forward. "Wait..."
He had only taken one step when the arm he had just regrown turned to ash.
High-Speed Regeneration did not come without cost. Using it repeatedly in such a short time had drained Ulquiorra greatly.
The proof was in his newly regenerated legs. They were far too thin.
"Tsk... is this where it ends?" Ulquiorra stopped. "Kenpachi Zaraki, kill me."
"I'm not interested in someone who's already lost the ability to fight." Kenpachi Zaraki glanced at Ulquiorra. "I'm going to find someone else for the next battle."
"Ken-chan," Yachiru Kusajishi suddenly said. "There's something..."
"Hm?" Kenpachi Zaraki looked up at the strange black substance floating in the air, like droplets and gas at the same time. He reached out, grabbed it, and rubbed it between his fingertips. "What is this stuff? Why does it look so much like Muten Natsu's Spirit Ink?"
"So that much time has already passed?" The black substance was pulled by some invisible force, gathering toward Ulquiorra. His dissolving body solidified again, and in the Hollow Hole at the center of his collarbone, a black bead gradually took shape and grew solid. "It seems... you do not need to find anyone else."
...
"You're the one I've been looking for!" Grimmjow gripped his blade with one hand and strained against Muten Natsu, while light flashed in his other hand. "I finally found you!"
"Should I congratulate you?" Muten Natsu stomped down, and Spirit Ink surged up, slamming into Grimmjow's palm on its own and disrupting his charge. "Though I still don't know why you're so fixated on me."
"You killed them!" With the charge in his left hand interrupted, Grimmjow simply let go of the hilt and finished charging with his right hand. A crimson flash blasted toward Muten Natsu at close range. "Did you forget?"
Layers of ink spread out, blocking the Cero. Muten Natsu swung his arm, and Myōki broke free from the ink, slashing toward Grimmjow's throat. "If you're avenging your subordinates, then you should remember that you attacked us first."
Grimmjow knocked Myōki aside with one claw, used the force to leap up, and grabbed the Zanpakutō he had just thrown. "I'm not fighting you because you killed them..."
"Muten Natsu, you never treated me like an opponent!" Standing atop the tower, Grimmjow raised his Zanpakutō. "You've always looked down on me!"
Muten Natsu's eyes were full of innocence. "How have I looked down on you?"
Grimmjow growled, "You killed them!"