Chapter 228: We Are the Challengers
A universally acknowledged fact.
Yamamoto Genryusai Shigekuni was a living fossil of the Seireitei: one that could walk, think, and still cut down virtually anything it crossed paths with.
He had lived long enough. He had seen enough. But mostly, the old man was simply, genuinely that capable of fighting.
In a certain sense, he alone represented the Gotei 13's total combat strength.
If you said the Gotei 13's fighting power measured ten, the old man personally claimed nine of those measures, and the remaining dozens of captains and vice-captains scrambled to divide the last one among themselves.
And now, standing face to face with that figure, a vigorous and ferocious version of the man from before age had fully settled into him, black-haired, built with the hard density of a man in his prime, the kind of face that could stop your heart...
All four of them stepped back on instinct.
Even Unohana Retsu was no exception. The bloodthirsty one might not always keep her composure in everyday circumstances, but in situations that genuinely called for clear judgment, she generally knew what mattered. Though if a certain someone else had been present, that might not hold.
"What do we do?"
Ukitake Jushiro's voice carried a faint undercurrent of confusion, and Kyoraku Shunsui, standing nearby, showed something similar.
Both were Yamamoto's most celebrated students. His teachings, his philosophy, his way of seeing the world had run through the lives of both men for as long as either could remember.
And now they were supposed to draw blades against the teacher who had raised them?
They knew this was a construct. They knew it was something like a dream made solid. But that knowledge wasn't enough. Both men were carrying a tension that went beyond words.
Even summoning every scrap of courage available to them, they were probably going to struggle to perform at half their actual capability.
Sasakibe Chojiro watched their reaction and said nothing. His brow had tightened on its own, but he made no move to argue or push them.
He understood these two too well.
So this was not the moment for speeches. When someone had already lost the will to fight, stepping back for a moment was better than throwing them forward unprepared.
Sasakibe made his decision quickly.
"Captain Unohana!"
"Mm."
Her response came immediately, one hand drawing her sword into position, her body dropping into a lower stance.
In that case. The two of them would go first.
"The opponent's parameters are still uncertain. Move carefully. Captain Unohana—"
"I understand."
Probe with light contact. Learn the construct's behavior patterns through gradual testing, then build judgment from there.
The ideal outcome: this Yamamoto was hollow. Nothing behind the appearance, no real fighting capability to speak of. In that case, even without Kyoraku and Ukitake joining, Sasakibe and Unohana together would be more than sufficient.
And the less ideal outcome?
Sasakibe's thoughts hadn't settled when Unohana's foot touched the ground and she vanished.
It wasn't that she had no interest in discussing the approach. It was simply that she found thinking too long about it less useful than trying it directly.
Besides.
When I was young, I never got a chance to fight you. Now that this is here in front of me, I can't help wanting to try.
So then.
How much of what you once were have you kept?
"Show me, Yamamoto!"
Her figure moved like a ghost, skimming the ground, then abruptly climbing in a sharp arc to drive at his jaw from below.
Fast, precise, deadly.
Unohana Retsu, in this moment, was pure killing intent.
But the result was nothing like anticipated.
The construct did not react with any excess motion. He simply stepped back half a step, as though he had known the move was coming before she made it. He slipped the kill strike in one clean motion, drove his left hand forward, and from the blurring speed of her charge...
Closed his hand around her throat.
"Ugh..."
One short, cut-off sound. Not even a full breath. Then she was lifted off the ground and thrown straight down.
BANG!!!
The earth fractured. Debris flew.
She had taken a devastating hit in the same instant contact was made, but Unohana showed no inclination to stop. She gritted her teeth and drove her Zanpakuto upward.
Clang!
One clean ring of steel as the construct deflected it without effort, then tightened his grip on her throat.
The same woman who had been moving like a predator seconds ago was now completely pinned, with almost no avenue for counter.
"Evil creature. Die."
He pressed her down without expression. He had not even released his Zanpakuto. Just suppression, clean and absolute, and the angle of his sword tilted toward her with something closer to clinical indifference than rage.
"Stop!!!"
A bolt of crimson-purple lightning tore through the air and struck the construct's right hand, disrupting his motion by the smallest possible margin.
"..."
But he paid it no significant attention. In a multi-on-one fight, the correct move was to eliminate one opponent first and reduce the numbers. That was the only logical priority.
He continued bringing his sword down. But the resistance he was expecting, and the blood that should have followed, never appeared. He paused briefly and turned.
Some distance away, Kyoraku Shunsui was crawling out of the shadows, hauling Unohana with him, both of them breathing hard.
The construct gave a cold exhale and straightened.
"You think those small tricks are enough to trouble me?"
Ukitake Jushiro looked at Unohana, who had blood at the corner of her mouth and was clearly in real pain, and asked with genuine concern:
"Captain Unohana, are you alright?"
"Cough... a minor injury. Nothing to make a fuss over."
Though there were more pressing things to think about than her condition.
"This Yamamoto... his strength is very considerable."
Some things didn't require emphasis to make clear. Unohana had no reason to hold back in that exchange. Conditions had been even on both sides, neither releasing their Zanpakuto. And even so, she had been suppressed in an instant, brought within a single motion of being cut down on the spot.
The phrase "strong as a demon" might have been invented for exactly this kind of situation.
Unohana wiped her mouth and got to her feet, coughing. Her posture carried a faint dishevelment that made clear the exchange had not been as simple as she'd described.
The speed of it all had left everyone in the standoff with expressions bordering on helplessness.
Kyoraku Shunsui bared his teeth, his voice carrying a faint tremor.
"Was Old Man Yama always... this strong?"
Ukitake used the moment to begin emergency healing on Unohana, both of them working through the technique together to restore the damage as fast as possible.
Sasakibe Chojiro gripped his sword, palms damp, voice carrying a slight tremble.
"This is... this is the Captain-Commander's former strength."
As the person who had once served closest to him, and who still worked as his direct aide, Sasakibe's word carried genuine authority on this.
And what he was about to say was deeply counterintuitive.
Yamamoto Genryusai Shigekuni did not simply grow stronger with age.
"After the battle a thousand years ago, the Captain-Commander became increasingly aware of how much killing had accumulated on his hands. It had long since passed the point of recovery."
Even a war god eventually sheathes his blade. Even a demon eventually closes its eyes.
"Since then, the Captain-Commander has rarely initiated combat. He became more merciful. More measured."
Yes, a thousand years of refining his reiatsu, and deepening his command of Zanpakuto techniques, made the current Yamamoto more powerful in those specific respects. But by the same token.
The older the weapon, the cruder its make, and the more raw power behind it. That strange rule applied here too.
So the most difficult version of this opponent was perhaps not what they were facing right now. Perhaps it was what was about to happen.
Kyoraku Shunsui swallowed, staring into the distance with an expression somewhere between resignation and uncertainty. Whether it was instinct telling him the moment had arrived, or simply the obvious reading of what was building in front of him.
Either way.
Something that could not be described was reaching a breaking point.
BANG!!!
A deafening resonance, and the construct's presence erupted. His reiatsu climbed, rapidly, continuously, and the expression on his face, the ferocious righteous fury of a man who had committed himself completely, now made him look genuinely inhuman.
The worst-case scenario was now here.
The TYBW peak Yamamoto was about to release his Zanpakuto.
Carrying a touch of desperation and a great deal of sheer grasping-at-anything energy, Kyoraku Shunsui put on his most conciliatory expression, raised his right hand, and pointed at his own face.
With a strained smile:
"Ya... Yamamoto-sensei. Do you remember me? I'm your student?"
Can we maybe work this out?
At those words, the construct didn't react immediately. But the others, who had been focused on the confrontation, all turned to look at Kyoraku.
You will say literally anything to survive, won't you.
Though.
This wasn't actually a terrible idea either.
There was no guarantee the construct had lost all normal cognition. And from a different angle: their side had moved first, which could be framed as the initial provocation that triggered the response. Explanations always existed if you needed them.
And the most pressing question right now was simply how this was going to develop.
So: what did the construct make of it?
He heard Kyoraku's call. He turned his gaze in their direction, measured the four of them in silence.
"..."
A brief pause.
And in that brief pause, the cautious hopefulness that had started building in everyone's expression shifted toward something that looked like genuine surprise.
Wait. Is it working?
The thought had barely formed before the construct's reiatsu blazed outward, and flowing, scorching flames wrapped around him like living lava, and the figure standing in their light was something between a man and a demon.
"Evil creatures. Pleading for your lives at this stage... I will destroy you utterly today. Body and soul."
The boiling flames leapt and danced, brilliant and hungry. Through a slow exhale, his voice came quiet and even:
"I have no desire to waste time on you. Yhwach is still slaughtering my subordinates and my comrades..."
It sounded incomplete at first, but the meaning assembled itself quickly.
This moment. This state. The version of Yamamoto Genryusai Shigekuni standing in front of them had set everything aside, every restraint and every mercy, solely and completely to kill Yhwach, who had been tearing Soul Society apart and was threatening to overturn all three worlds.
That was what he had prepared himself for. That was the moment this construct came from.
And in that state.
He held nothing back.
"Bankai: Zanka no Tachi."
Light and heat swept inward and concentrated onto his blade.
The world went white. Every face in the domain showed naked apprehension.
It seemed to have gone quiet. But every single person present had enough experience to recognize what this was.
The last stillness before something unstoppable arrived.
The old man was going all out.
After Kyoraku's spectacular diplomatic failure, nobody wanted to open their mouth and risk making anything worse. No one had any idea what this construct might produce next. The situation was already bad. Please, no additional complications.
"Kyoraku... look what you've done."
Ukitake managed it through gritted teeth, his hands trembling slightly around his sword.
In hindsight, the attempt had achieved precisely the opposite of its intended effect.
No way out.
Sasakibe Chojiro watched the air around them beginning to tremble, boiling at its edges, the world itself starting to vibrate.
He reached up to wipe at his face on reflex.
Then realized there was nothing to wipe.
Already evaporated.
Because they had all witnessed what Yamamoto was capable of in the past, the conclusion they reached was simultaneous and wordless.
This was not a hollow shell.
This was the genuine, undiluted, beyond-argument combat ceiling of Yamamoto Genryusai Shigekuni.
"This really is... this really is..."
Even Kyoraku Shunsui, who could normally find something easy to say about almost anything, found himself unable to finish the sentence.
"We've become the challengers now."
The words landed.
Sasakibe Chojiro stepped to the front. His eyes narrowed. He shouted and moved sideways in the same motion.
"Here it comes! Everyone stay sharp! That Yamamoto is attacking!!!"
Kyoraku Shunsui clenched his jaw and raised both swords, like a man making his last desperate stand.
"Is there seriously no other way?!"
"I don't know, but there's no choice! If you can't break through, focus on defense! Stall for time!"
Sasakibe's voice rang out above the roar of building heat.
"Believe that Captain-Commander Yamamoto will come to get us out! Until then... hold on!!!"