Chapter 211: Hueco Mundo Battle Royale
Arrancar research had been one of Matsushita Yusuke's primary assignments for a long time now.
As previously established, the Club's membership was limited, and everyone had their own assigned area and responsibilities to cover.
Matsushita Yusuke's piece of it was specifically the stability of Arrancar form, along with the various problems that kept surfacing during the transformation process itself.
What the original story showed you was the polished end result: Arrancar drawing and sheathing their weapons at will, shifting freely between forms at any given moment. But all of that was a result. Something that only became possible after a long period of research, correction, and refinement before it could be achieved and consistently maintained.
The process you never got to see was where all the real headaches lived.
Going by the original story's timeline, Aizen's team must have lost a considerable amount of sleep getting to that point.
And now it was Matsushita Yusuke's turn.
He looked the two young women over from both sides, arms crossed, nodding steadily.
"Purely in terms of appearance, there's absolutely nothing to complain about. As a skin, you're already at a perfect score."
Of course, the innate drawbacks that came with Arrancar-ification were a part of the package you couldn't avoid. The cow horns currently sitting on their heads were a case in point.
The two sisters weren't sure what "skin" meant. But at least they understood "perfect score."
"Matsushita-dono, does that mean we count as successful products?"
Seeing the faintly excited look on their faces, Matsushita Yusuke laughed and nodded readily.
"That's exactly what it means. Get yourselves tidied up and head over to Aizen-sensei's palace."
Both women's faces broke into something close to delighted surprise. They turned to each other, visibly moved, and spoke at exactly the same moment.
"Thank you, Matsushita-dono, thank you Matsushita-dono..."
Very excited.
Understandably so.
Because under the worldview Aizen and the others had instilled, every Arrancar that qualified as a finished product still needed to go through a second round of selection. The venue for that selection was Aizen Sosuke's palace.
The name made it sound like it might be something glamorous. In practice, it was anything but. The selection was soaked in blood from beginning to end.
The reason was simple enough.
It was a battle royale. An elimination-until-one-remains.
Aizen Sosuke had, at this stage, already begun running something like a ranking and selection mechanism. Not yet at the point of identifying the ten who actually mattered — that would come later — but something similar in spirit. A prolonged format that went on long enough that every Arrancar produced afterward treated this kind of thing with complete indifference.
Partly that was down to the nature Hollows were born with. But Aizen's training methods were more than sufficiently Spartan to account for the rest.
In any case.
Matsushita Yusuke rubbed his chin and looked at the two excitedly animated Arrancar in front of him.
All he remembered was that these were two Adjuchas captured together and forced into the experimental process at the same time. They seemed to be sisters. And over the past several months, some combination of his ability level and his general presence had produced a kind of admiration in them that had settled into something like deference.
By neither ethical nor legal standards was Matsushita Yusuke responsible for what happened to these two Arrancar. The selection was Aizen's business. Not his.
But.
He stood there for a moment, something turning over quietly.
After a brief pause, the kind where something catches just for a second, Matsushita Yusuke finally spoke.
"You two. When you get to Aizen-sensei's place, if something feels off, remember to move toward less crowded areas. Don't go picking fights. And if it really comes down to it, just surrender."
The battle royale was designed to surface the strongest. Aizen only cared about whoever was still standing at the end. As for the ones who didn't make it, he had no particular feelings about them one way or another. Whether they lived or died didn't enter into his calculations.
Which meant what Matsushita Yusuke had just said was genuinely important survival strategy.
'Their strength has improved a bit, but actually winning the whole thing would be a stretch. Better to live badly than die well. I hope you make it through.'
He raised his right hand and ruffled the hair of the one on the right, his tone carrying a certain weight.
"As for anything else? Well... that's up to you."
He turned and walked forward, passing between them, lifting his right hand in a light wave as he went.
"Stay safe. I hope there's another time."
The two women didn't entirely follow what had just happened. But out of respect, if nothing else, they wouldn't do anything too reckless. Watching the direction he had gone, both of them lowered their heads and bowed carefully.
Matsushita Yusuke made his way back to the familiar lab.
Whatever had briefly shown in his expression dissolved as he rubbed his face, dissipating piece by piece like an effervescent tablet dropped in water.
"Matsushita-dono, here is the experimental data..."
Among Arrancar there were naturally some gifted individuals capable of real communication and complex task completion. Those selected for work like this were essentially on a direct track. Individuals who could actually read a report were genuinely rare in this environment, and sending them straight into the battle royale would be a waste.
"Results already? Let me see..."
Matsushita Yusuke scanned through it briefly. His brow furrowed.
"Not good. Both the data and the stability readings are too far outside what we need. This batch isn't presentable."
He handed the materials back. The Arrancar holding the data sheet was visibly at a loss. He couldn't and didn't have the standing to make that kind of judgment himself.
He could only ask for direction.
"Then what do we do, Matsushita-dono?"
Matsushita Yusuke raised his left hand without turning around, gave it a light wave, and spoke in a tone that was almost breezy.
"Dispose of the whole batch. Keep it clean. Don't leave too much of a blood smell."
The flash of humanity was only ever a momentary halo. For members of the Club, doing whatever it took to get the result was the genuine norm.
Clearing out an entire batch of unqualified test subjects in one order — Matsushita Yusuke had done things like this more times than he could count.
And this particular moment was just another brief, unremarkable step on the path to something that worked.
Even if it meant thousands of spirit bodies losing their lives, to Matsushita Yusuke this had long since stopped being something worth dwelling on.
If I don't do it here, Yhwach comes charging in later and does it himself anyway.
As for the weight of it, early on there had probably been some discomfort. By now, Matsushita Yusuke had more or less fully adapted.
Rest in peace. Becoming a Hollow is rough enough as it is. Might as well reincarnate into one of the other two worlds and start fresh from there.