Psychopomp (Bleach SI)

[Pangolin]

​

Yammy honestly hadn't expected to wake up and take in fresh air ever again.

But even then, maybe fresh was a bit of a stretch. Stagnant and a bit dank, more like, but it was air.

A damn shame. Defeat aside, he was curious about what came after life as a Hollow. Rebirth or nothingness, heaven or hell -- he didn’t really care which.

But as it turned out that death was a cave in Hueco Mundo.

Great.

Opening his eyes, the colossal Adjuchas noticed the warm glow of a fire off to his side, and the fact he was somehow placed down beside it. The cave could barely contain him, so how he got inside was an entirely different matter.

He moved to sit, only to be hit with the wombo combo of his injury opening up and the ceiling being too short. Double pain. He slumped back down with a rumble of the earth following.

“Man, fuck this…” the crimson furred giant muttered, his words still loud enough to boom through the cave.

“Hey! Hey! Hey! No moving, you utter goon! Look at what you’ve done now!” another loud voice said from the other end of the cave. He glanced out of the corner of his masked face to spot another hollow slithering out of a hole in the cave’s wall, frustration evident in its lanky posture.

It was a Gillian. Not the tallest one Yammy had ever seen, but they were distinct things even when they were at their most aberrant.

He then looked down at his body, the gouge running along his gut and side bleeding. Tightly bound threads barely retained their shape against his huge body, doing their best to cover the injuries. That was different.

But more importantly --

“Eh?! Who the hell are you, you little rat?!” Scurrying tiny thing. All other Hollows were. “Where the hell is this?!”

The comparatively small Gillian stopped before Yammy, looking up at him with void-like eyes… which suddenly ignited into glowing golden limbal rings. “Shut the hell up, is where! Took me hours to get your fatass in here, and longer still to clean up your injuries! Fuck you, fatass!”

The hollow then punched Yammy in the side with a bony fist. Right into the injury left by his opponents blade.

Yammy screamed for the first time in his life and slammed his head into the ceiling, falling right back down immediately. “You sonuva…!”

“Shut the hell up! Don’t move! You’ll bleed out and flood my goddamn cave! This is my town, my rules! If you move, I stuff enough herbal paste in there that you feel the sting for ten centuries!” The smaller Hollow raged, jabbing an armored white finger in Yammy’s direction, the sharp gesture threatening to poke him again.

A Gillian with personality and enormous nuts to go along with it. Now Yammy had seen everything.

He held himself back from barking back at the Gillian, clearly the only reason he was alive after his confrontation with the Rey Dorado. In his then drained state, the Gillian also held the power to end him if it so felt the need.

The Gillian lowered its finger, hand vanishing beneath the black mass of a robe which consisted of its elongated body. The jittering posture calmed into the eerie stillness Yammy associated with the Menos Grande class of Hollow. “My name is Sabado Cruzar. And you are, I assume, Yammy… Large? Largo?”

“Llargo, for fucks sake.”

“Did you pick that name yourself?” The Gillian -- Sabado -- asked.

“Yeah. What of it?” Yammy returned dangerously, his crimson eye beginning to glow.

“...You called yourself ‘Big’,” Sabado surmised. There was something about how he paused to look at Yammy that made him bristle.

“No, I didn’t! It’s just what felt right, you little twirp!”

“Llargo is too close to Largo for that to not be true, Yammy Llargo. But that is not important,” The Gillian waved off the track of the conversation, leaving Yammy a little bit fuming at him. Sabado’s tone had transitioned from an enraged indignation at Yammy into a much calmer, professional tone. “You’re in my home. I brought you back after you collapsed some few miles out in the dunes. Not an easy task, given your considerable amount of fat.”

“It’s muscle and spiritual power, you fucking Gillian. You should be able to tell.”

“I can, it’s quite oppressive. But honestly, Yammy?” He reached out, and pinched some of Yammy’s fuzzy side, squishing it. “Let us just call it muscle, spiritual power and a bit of healthy, completely normal body fat.”

Yammy squinted at the lanky waste of space. “I’m gonna kill you.”

“Roll over and you probably will. Anyway -- I’ve done what I can for your injuries, the rest is to you. Stay still, don’t make a fuss and in say… two weeks, you’ll be good to go again.”

The giant beast snorted. “I’ll starve before then, little man.”

“Don’t you worry. Let me handle the food situation. As I’ve been telling you, focus on recovery.”

“You plannin’ on poisoning me or something?” Yammy asked reasonably, concern beginning to crawl its way up his spine, an unwelcome feeling. The Adjuchas Hollow, as powerful as he was, was at too much of a disadvantage to be truly comfortable with letting some menos grande buzz about him.

Killing him was on option, but then he was trapped in a cave and close to bleeding out.

“I could just shoot a Cero into the deepest part your injury, if I wanted to kill you. It’d be messy, but I’m fairly certain it’d work, even with the ocean of power between us,” Sabado reasoned, with a wag of a finger. He moved to check on the bindings, gliding over the earth in that strange, wavy manner Gillians were prone to.

Yammy had the distinct feeling that Sabado was just putting it on, playing the ‘role’ of a Gillian in that regard. He seemed too in-tact to truly retain that mindless lumber of theirs.

But the little thing had a good point. Gillians were dirt, but they could still make use of the Cero. With the range and his temporary... weakness, he could probably do something to Yammy with that. What a shitty day he was having.

He went quiet, seeing no need to continue talking with the smaller Hollow. He let it work, lanky arms poking out from the all-encompassing black surrounding its body in order to check on the bindings it had put together for Yammy’s injury. Sabado informed Yammy of the severity of it, about how even with the speed of a Hollow’s healing, it would take a long time for him to get over it. Something about the Rey Dorado’s energy.

He didn’t really care. He picked up the useful bullet points, but nothing more.

Once Sabado was done tightening and readjusting the bindings and -- painfully -- applying some salve, there was little else to be done between them. He simply slinked off deeper into his cave, put more dry fuel into the fire at the center of it, and then went about looking at his selection of books, preening over them carefully.

What kind of Hollow keeps books? Not much help to them, and the trouble of going to the human world to get them was also too much.

The Gillian picked out a book from a stack which came up to his midsection, a veritable tower of paper and words, and settled down in a ‘sit’ which brought the ‘knees’ of its distended body up.

Yammy huffed and closed his eyes.

Weird fucker.

~~~​

“Food’s here, Llargo.”

“Thank every possible god, I thought I was gonna starve again.”

“I literally fed you no less than thirty hours ago.”

“Big body like this takes fuel.”

“Fatass.”

Sabado hucked one half of a feral Hollow up at Yammy, and the giant furred monster caught the thing whole in his giant mouth, the off-blue flesh of the thing sawed apart by the ferocious teeth of his mask. Sabado dragged the other half off for himself, looking like half a scorpion of some such.

Going halfsies with a Gillian. Didn’t exactly fill the belly, but it kept his healing going. For the week and some change he’d been there, he could feel himself beginning to store energy again.

He was ready to get out there again. Back into the sands, where he could eat properly and beat the crap out of anyone who got in his way. Such was the only life Yammy cared for, after all the years he had wandered. It was the only life he was good for.

Sabado’s Gillian mask was clearly avian in nature, an owl if the wider-than usual eye holes were anything to go but that only applied to upper parts of it. The rest was closer to the usual monstrous maw of their kind, the only difference being that it had an elegant looking upper-half to contrast it.

Given how Sabado ate like a savage, just like the rest of them, it fit.

But that didn’t change the fact he acted strange. A strange collector of human things, a Gillian with more brains than most Adjuchas and the wherewithal to mend Yammy back to health, but not the awareness to know why that was a terrible idea. Lanky idiot.

Again, the concern returned. What was this thing up to?

“What’s your game, Sabado Cruzaz? You looking to piggyback off my power or something?”

Yammy was about as tactful as a punch to the face.

Sabado paused in his meal, mid-bite into the cracked shell of the scorpion Hollow. The golden limbal rings returned, gazing at Yammy out of the corner of their vision.

“You’ve got enough weight to carry around with that block of a head,” he shot back, getting another indignant huff from Yammy. He always had something to snipe. “Nothing of the sort. I just saw someone who was hurt, and could use some help. Don’t think too much of it, Yammy,” he said as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, disregarding the very implication of his words.

Yammy’s mouth opened, and remained so for a good minute. It was in fact not that obvious.

“You’re fucking insane,” the giant finally managed to muster. “Insane and stupid. We’re Hollows, you dumbass.”

“That doesn’t mean anything. I’ve been in Hueco Mundo long enough, Yammy. I know what a Hollow is, and what we’re like. That doesn’t mean I have to like it, or even abide by that nature. When someone’s hurt, I like to help.”

Yammy snorted. “Look, even if I just nod along to that, you still kill the living hell out of those Hollow we’ve been eating--”

“Feral, mindless things. They’re animals more-so than Hollow. They could transcend that, but not before becoming a Gillian. I have no qualms.”

“You’re a Gillian!”

“A talking, highly intelligent one. I’m allowed to regard myself differently.”

A fair point, Yammy conceded mentally. But that didn’t change much to his general point -- the hypocrisy of it was still present, and even a self-admitted blockhead like Yammy could see it. He moved on, realizing that he was dealing with a complete and utter loon. “What’d ya mean, 'long enough'? You’re a still a class beneath me, couldn’t be around that long.”

Sabado sighed, turning to face Yammy completely. “Believe it or not, I’m only eating because I had to feed you. I rarely eat as it is. And you’re only as powerful as you are at such a young age because you’ve got eyes to match your considerable stomach.”

“Stop calling me fat!” Yammy roared, shaking the very cave with the volume of his thunderous voice.

“Stop being fat,” Sabado replied calmly, the general coolness of them cutting deep.

“You sonuva--”

“Anyway, your weight is besides the point. The point is that there are Hollows who help each other -- it’s not terribly uncommon. We form social groups, packs, villages, whatever you want to call them. Why would there not be a Hollow willing to help another one in passing?” Sabado reasoned towards Yammy’s prior objection.

“They do that because they’re weak. They need those things. Real Hollows don’t need them.”

“Tell that to the Lord Louisenbarn?” Sabado pointed out with very little effort, getting a visible flinch from Yammy.

Barragan had something of a ‘group’, if ‘the largest contingent of Hollowkind in Hueco Mundo’ counted as just a group. More like a hive that buzzed around the mane of a lion, but it was a group.

“Because he’s scared. He knows there’s bigger fish out there. Other Vasto Lorde, and one in particular could crush even him. We’ve all felt it, when wandering about. There’s a part of Hueco Mundo you just don’t go, because of it. It’ll kill you with pressure alone. Baraggan doesn’t have that.”

Sabado hummed, chewing on the flesh of his prey. “... Then, because he is not the absolute strongest, he gathers an army to compensate, you say?”

“Yeah, fuck it, why not. I just think he’s a big pussy. A strong one, but a pussy either way.”

“Then the one who stands at the summit is the only one who should walk alone?”

“No,” Yammy said with no short measure of resolve, brow furrowing. “We all should. That way we can find out who truly is the strongest. Getting help… removes from that.”

Sabado went quiet, still even.

“... Hum. An experience shaped that perspective of yours, but I won’t pry too deeply. I merely thought you a musclehead, but you are more of a musclehead with a history.”

“...Thanks?” Yammy asked/said, feeling that Sabado had complimented him in his own way, yet still managed to snipe him. Baffling.

“Think nothing of it. But know that I disagree. The strength of many can easily become the strength of one… as I believe we are to find out, in the coming years,” the Gillian mutter ominously, staring off into the fire.

“Hell does that mean?” Yammy pressed, narrowing his eyes at Sabado.

“I had a… trait, much like your own ability to retain power. It made me distinct from other Hollows. It’s quite a shameful one, as it only matters in particular circumstances.”

“Like a counter, or something?”

“Something like that, yes. Consider me something of an oracle, although a fairly limited one. The details I shall retain to myself.”

Yammy snorted, rolling his eyes and scratching his itchy bandage. “Then did ya know we’d meet?”

“Actually, no. But don’t think too hard about what I have and have not seen. You’ll hurt your brain. Anyway, that’s besides the point --” he deflected again before Yammy could call him out on it, “Come tomorrow, you’re leaving. Free, out of my cave to wander the sands and do what you want.”

“Shit, two weeks gone already? Feels like a day.”

“Comes with the territory of living as long as we have. Blink, and you will miss it.”

~~~​

“... I think I fucking blinked, because I coulda swore you were just telling me I’d be going tomorrow.”

“It is tomorrow. I keep track.”

Sabado finally removed the last of Yammy’s bandages, exposing the scarred flesh beneath it, the crimson fur of his ape-like body not quite regrowing into the way it used to be. A reminder that he had someone to beat the life out of.

“Now, to get out you’re going to have to crawl.”

Yammy blinked. “... Really?”

“Really. Chop chop.”

The giant grumbled indignantly, and began his crawl out of the cave, dragging himself out by his forearms. His lower end got stuck on the entrance.

“You’re going to have to really push!” came the cry of Sabado from inside. “If you don’t, I’m trapped in here!”

A pretty entertaining prospect, all things considered. The Gillian was a fucker who deserved that more so than he deserved death.

But even still, Yammy pushed until he was finally freed with a ‘pop’, sliding out onto sands once more.

Fresh air, dry sand and the eternal moon. He had missed it.

He looked back to the cave entrance, spotting Sabado standing at it, tall enough to have to hunch to do so, but nothing more.

“How do you feel?” he asked Yammy.

His answer was getting kicked back into his fucking cave.

~~~​

Sabado coughed, rubbing where the giant’s blow had impacted him the most. The Gillian rose up, waving away the dust and dirt kicked up by his flight from the entrance of the cave to the other end of it.

The books were scattered, he grudgingly noticed.

“What a mess,” Sabado muttered, getting to his pale feet, drifting about and kneeling down to pick the books back up, reordering them.

Order.

It was the smallest slice of it, in the world of Hueco Mundo. Keeping his abode clean was one of the few forms of organizing he could truly engage in. Thinking of new ways to structure his collection of paraphernalia from Earth was another. Given the relative time on Earth, he did not quite have things which he could truly call ‘homey’, but it was still better than the nothing offered by the vast majority of Hueco Mundo.

He glanced out of the cave, spotting the outline of his once-guest wandering off into the dunes.

Yammy had been more compliant than he had originally expected. Given what he recalled of the man, he had the image of something a lot simpler. But from the brief bits of conversation, Yammy was a creature formed by an event as opposed to inherently a beast of rage. He was angry at something, not just because he was angry.

It was a curious thing, but not something he could afford to overly focus on.

He knew the future. It was not one he intended to dabble in too much. The story had its beginning, and it would have its end. The actual cost of said story was not one he even truly recalled -- how many died in the coming conflict? How many truly suffered meaningfully?

Such were the thoughts that were allowed to a creature as long-lived as a Hollow. He had certainly grown more thoughtful in his years as a conscious entity.

Sabado brought a pale palm to his ‘head’, bashing away at it for a moment, jostling his thoughts. The host of voices and bestial screams that contested his own thoughts quietened down.

Picking up a book, the Gillian hunkered down next to the fire once more, and began to read. Gulliver’s Travels had just been released, and he had made sure to acquire a fresh copy from the world of the living.

It had been an interesting two weeks, but he did enjoy his alone time.

The future came closer, ever so slowly. But for all his time in thought, he had been merely procrastinating.

Was it right to step into the course of history? What right did he have to change a story that was going to progress to a conclusion? Rather, could he create a better one with his presence?

Questions that had remained unanswered. Many-a wise man and woman had he visited on Earth under the guise of a spirit of enquiry or messenger of one God or another, but none had provided him with the satisfaction of knowledge and certainty.

If the future was already there, should it not remain so?

After meeting a familiar name in person, the answers were no closer to him than ever before. Rather, they were further. He had stepped in to help Yammy, but what would have happened in his absence? Well, he would never truly know by just thinking about it.

All he could do was wait for the next day, and hope for an answer.

~~~
Psychopomp
A Bleach (Sorta) Self-Insert​

 

[Pangolin]

2; The Selfish Enlightenment​

The dread of losing a child is unlike any other Katsuo Higebana had experienced.

The rain pittered and pattered outside, washing away the filth of another day.

He had turned his home upside down looking for any clue to her presence, scoured the town for anyone who had seen her, but everyone was ignorant to his plight.

So he would start again from his home. And then go back out into the town. And then ask again. And then return to his home.

He had seen all of Kyoto a hundred times over.

He called for her, again and again. He had lost his sandals at some point, forced to walk on dusty roads barefoot. When he was not seeking her, he was knelt in prostration to Kanzeon, begging the Goddess of Mercy to take it upon him and his family. When he was not praying, he was searching.

At some point, he had stopped eating properly. He had stopped sleeping even. The hunger and exhaustion were nothing, until recently. The hunger became clearer and clearer, threatening to overwhelm him and his desire to find his daughter, Chie.

Why would she have left? She was doing so well. A smart, pretty girl -- one who could have joined the likes of the Great Interior with her qualities.

While her mother may have abandoned her, he never would. The Goddess of Mercy would look over him and her, he knew it. The wise one of Sanjuusangen had told him so.

So why…? Why did she delay…?

Katsuo gripped his robes, teeth digging into his lip as he stared forward at the simplistic painting on the wall of his family home, reflecting the image of the One-Thousand Armed Kannon herself.. He had done all he could to keep it intact for when she came home.

And yet, she had not returned.

He knelt once more before Her image and pleaded once more to know, for divine providence was all that was left to a wretch of a father like him.

“Why?”

The words hung in the air, and Kannon did not respond. She refused him mercy.

“Because you did this.”

Finally, she spoke, her voice as the thunder among the rain laden heavy night clouds. He looked up at the image of Kannon. Finally, she spoke to him. “What did I do wrong, o Kanzeon? Where did I go wrong?” the aging man begged, holding back the deluge of tears. The visitation was more than he deserved, as a mere mortal.

“Look around your home, once a house of gods. See your folly.”

Katsuo blinked, shakily moving to his knees and glancing around running a hand down his face. It was… the same. Empty, but the same. Everything was in order, as he left it. He hesitantly looked back to the picture.

He saw nothing amiss. He could not perceive what the Goddess perceived.

“I--”

“Again. Look again. Look past the lie.”

“What lie?!” he yelled, hands gripping at the mat beneath him, desperately clinging to the Earth. “I see only an empty home! A father without a family, beds without bodies and a fire without warmth! Tell me, O Kanzeon, what am I to see here?!”

“The truth.”

Nothing. He could see nothing. He gaped at the painting, unsure of what to do next. Was he not wise enough to see what was supposedly so obvious.

“... Then, leave. Look outside for the truth, if it cannot be found within.”

As if the divine itself acted to prompt Katsuo, a flash of lightning outside drew his attention.

But a shadow blocked a majority of the light, a pillar of dark. He scrambled to the door, hastily but fearful of what godly lesson awaited him. He threw the sliding door open, and a burst of rain and wind hit him, but his eyes remained open, wide and ready to receive the vision of Kannon herself--

A horrific white mask regarded him from on high, atop the pillar of shadow which it rested, teeth bared and eye holes wide, a crimson light glinting from the depths of the dark within them. A hole pierced through its center, as if absent of a heart.

No, it was not Kannon who spoke.

It was a dharmapala, a king of hell, judge of souls, surely. Only they could wear such a wrathful visage. Katsuo did not kneel.

The wrathful spirit spoke without a moving mouth, the voice resonating out from it.

“The first truth of Katsuo Higebana; You killed her, your daughter. That is the first truth. Your home will be empty forevermore.”

‘That’s wrong’, he almost screams. But then… he begins to recall. Katsuo looks back into himself, and his life, prompted by the creature before him.

A girl, so perfect yet flawed. She freezes before responsibility, and fears failure. A father, desperate to do what was right. She was not ill. No daughter of his could be ill in mind. She was not mad.

A man, holy in his carrying, offering a solution.

A father, gullible and foolish, cures his daughter of life itself.

Katsuo looked back to his home. The place he had so diligently tended to in the months of his daughter’s absence was… a corpse of a home. Weeds sprouted from between pebbles, and the screens were already worn and torn from the inside. Past the open door, he saw the flipped table, and the pierced painting of Kannon, delivered by a fist.

“The second truth of Katsuo Hibebana; you are dead.”

And then, it was was if the haze that had filled his head, the madness of grief and loss, dissipated. It was replaced by something else, an anger unlike any other.

At his chest, a chain dangling over his heart grew smaller, chewing away at itself.

Why had this creature done this?

“This -- this wasn’t how --” Katsuo muttered, eyes looking shiftily about. She was supposed to become someone more than him and his mother. Someone special. “What are you?!” he cried up at the thing, its tower-like body unmoving, its mask equally uncaring to the fury of a supposedly dead man.

“There are paths before you, Katsuo Higebana. All lead to the realities of death; I offer you guidance unto one. You know what I am.”

Prostrate thyself before Death, for it is they who shall lead you down their path.

“...Shinigami…”

The crimson glow of the dread mask turned into golden rings, acknowledging the answer.

“One of many,” it said, almost pleased in its tone. A frightening, taut white hand revealed itself from beneath the pillar of shadow, like a cloak parting. It extended outwards, palm facing upwards, deadly claws tipping the fingers. “My path is that of ‘contribution’ and ‘power’ in death, but not one of ‘freedom’ and ‘continuation of consciousness’. It is the void, yet it is final peace. I shall grow in power as part of your contribution, and continue my task of bringing final peace. I offer this to you.”

The other hand opened up, the lengthy arm behind it extending out to join its peer in the empty-palm offer before Katsuo. “Another path. It is ‘continuation’ and ‘self’. Within it resides the quality of ‘opportunity’, but it is not life, nor is it certain. Should another visit you, you shall be sent to the realm of the dead. You will become a new person there, and live out a second life as a commoner. It is meagre, but it is experience. If mere survival is what you value, then it is beyond that path. But… should the ‘other’ not visit you in time…”

The creature’s body finally moved, lowering itself eerily to regard Katsuo on an almost eye-level, the mask itself taller than he was. The golden rings for eyes focused on the chain at his chest. “You shall become a monster. Youkai. This is the path of the unholy and sinful. And one day, after a life of hunger and evil, you will be destroyed, never to return.”

It stood upright once more, looking down at Katsuo. He felt as if he was before Enma himself, under the deliberation of a god. The judgement of souls.

“How… how do I know I’m truly dead? How do I know this is not a deception?”

“Remember all those you tried to talk to about your daughter. They did not respond to your plight, because they could not perceive you. You have been talking to none but yourself. They act not in ignorance, for they know the tragedy of a father and daughter. It is you, who acts in ignorance.”

“And -- Chie! What about her spirit! Surely, I would have seen her!”

“She was visited by another, and now resides in the realm of spirits. Do you wish to see her again, after what you have done? Do you wish to risk the rage of monsterdom to see her again, killer of your child?”

“I want to apologize!”

“Then leave her be,” the divine creature commanded with a rumble, forcing Katsuo to his knees, a suddenly feeling of weight in the very air around him. He pressed his head to pebbles, tears now freely rolling from his eyes, blood dripping from his lip onto the wet stones beneath him. "Your role as a father is complete.”

“Then let me find the end, Shinigami! If I cannot do anything for her, then… then end this!” he begged, heaving.

...

Silence. It crushed Katsuo. The gods were slow, contemplative things. Kanzeon left him with nothing, while the thing before him merely watches him in thought.

“Very well.”

Long, bone-white fingers curled around Katsuo, and raised him up into the air as a man might a mouse.

It was only when he was face to face with the death god that he felt the weight of death’s terror.

Although he wanted it to end, the seeking and the begging, the anger and the tears…

He screamed.

The teeth of the shinigami came down on him, leading to --

Zero.

~~~​

The house of the Higebana’s was a sad sight.

Sabado wanted to see no more of it, as he would undeniably see other similar things in the future. He reached a hand in through the door, and raked out whatever he could from inside.

Souvenirs, keepsakes, momentos -- anything he could take back to his cave.

It was all ruined by Katsuo’s rage. But one thing was unharmed; a Guanyin statue, flawless in condition where everything else was dusty or broken. Were Sabado half as optimistic as he were in his earlier years, he would consider it divine intervention, the protection of a goddess.

But he knew better. Gods were real, but they were otherwise busy with other matters. Too much to bother dusting a statue, at the very least.

Luck, he would call it. The lucky statue would come with him.

With his self-imposed task completed, the Hollow faced away from the home, a hand stretching out to tear open a hole in space once more. As his hand found the opening, the other moved to assist.

Kūmon.

The tear grew larger with each passing moment, revealing the visage of static distortion between worlds. A sight he had grown used to, comfortable with even. A regular Gillian would not have been able to appreciate the strength of simply being able to move between worlds without much effort, but he came to value it highly.

It was what kept him sane, his visits to the living world, acting as a guide of spirits. It was underhanded, but it was not incorrect. He gave the spirits he ate final peace, and he grew a small bit from it. They would return to the cycle eventually, as he would too.

A question which could rise from it would be ‘why?’

Why go out of his way to eat the spirit of the deceased in such a way?

Because it made him feel a bit better about the whole thing, is why. It made them feel better too. Despite it all, the ‘act’ he put on was to provide comfort, even if it was a lie.

It was arrogant, haughty, deceitful -- it was many things, but it was done to help. A selfish form of help.

Sabado paused. The air changed.

“Roar, Tenken!”

For the first time in so long, shock rocked Gillian.

A Shinigami had managed to conceal itself so well that he barely had time to snap his body around, even with the inhuman agility afforded to a Hollow, shadowy cloak of a body billowing with the movement. His toothy maw opened once more, an orb of red forming from arcs of furious bloody red energy, only to then dissipate into a wide barrier.

“Cero Resolución!”

Simple in principle, difficult in execution. To diffuse the energy of the standard, destructive Cero into a wide spread, ultimately making a shield of sorts. It took years of meditation to get it right.

A giant, phantasmal blade collided against it with enough force to carry through to Sabado, forcing the Gillian’s feet into the ground, the flowing crimson shield beginning to waver momentarily, only for the attacker to disengage, moving back mid-air to land on the roof of the Higebana household, the colossal ghostly blade following them.

“Sir!” came the cry of a Shinigami, garbed in their familiar black uniform, hopping from a house over to join his attacker. Sabado stared down at them, both wielding their weapons at him. Understandably, they were foes at the end of the day.

But the one who had attacked…

The monk-like covering over his head.

The would-be wolf, Sabado recalled from the depths of his memory. Komamura, was it?

“It talked,” the large Shinigami said with a rumble, bringing his sword to stance.

“Never heard of that before. Thought they were supposed to be big, strong dummies,” the other Shinigami said lightly, brow raised. Sabado didn’t recognize him.

“I’m not going to fight you,” Sabado finally said, stepping back as the barrier faded only moments after it was established. A fleeting thing it was.

“Then this will be brief,” the obscured wolf growled, in return, his Tenken's blade pulsing with the power which would eventually take him to position of Captain.

“Nor will I allow you to fight me. Go home, Komamura. You are required for far more important battles than this one.” Indeed, ominous words had become something of a speciality of his over the years. Where once he talked like a normal person, being left alone for too long with a vision of the future while deep in the past did weird things for ones vocabulary.

The wolf’s yellow eyes glared at Sabado from behind the slit allowed for his vision. “You…!”

Sabado would hear no more.

He stepped into the Kūmon, leaving the Shinigami to contemplate.

As he fell through the static between worlds, Sabado himself contemplated the brief encounter.

First Yammy, and then Komomura. It had not been a month since the former departed his company, and now for another subject of the future to show himself…

Times were beginning to change. His encounters with Shinigami in general were beginning to become more common, too.

Maybe the future would be coming to him.

 

[Pangolin]

3; Goods & the UnGood
​

“Good eve, Merchant of Earthly Goods.”

“Just Sabado will do, thanks.”

Same silly exchange each time.

The portly guard, appearing more to be a green orangutan on two legs with a tusked and intricately patterned mask, grunted. “You come to trade with the people of La Hogar once more?”

“No, I’m here for the scenery,” Sabado scoffed.

The ape hollow looked about. Apart from the white, simplistic buildings of La Hogar, there was sand. Lots and lots of sand.

It was then that the guard picked up that Sabado was pulling his leg, looking back to him with another grunt. “Cause no trouble among us, and leave in a timely manner,” the guard instructed, stepping aside. Although much, much smaller than Sabado, he nonetheless looked like a compact ball of explosive kick ass.

Sabado left it at that, stepping inside the boundary of the white ‘village’.

Hollow communities were strange things, formed out of fear and the prospect of protection more so than any desire to cooperate. It was illustrated as Sabado moved through the road leading to the centre of the circular town. Out of square window holes in the simplistic ‘homes’ popped various masks and heads, each peering at the outsider cautiously. Despite his many visits and his informal arrangement with La Hogar’s founder, there was still concern over his very presence.

Merchant of Earhtly Goods, he was called among other things. Lurking Wise Owl the Gillian was another.

But really, how hard was it to just call him Sabado? Come on now.

By the time he reached the centre of the village with his makeshift cart of goods, the master of La Hogar was visible, standing beside the ineffective well the village was built around. With him, several of his ‘councillors’, lowly regular Hollows who acted as his eyes and ears in the dunes.

It was a gathering of the weak, with only one Adjuchas to defend them from anything greater than a Gillian. The guard was paying attention still, from the village’s entrance.

The leader of La Hogar, creatively named Mayor, had few distinguishing features. He was a human-sized Hollow, his mask all-encompassing around his head and rather blank, lacking a visible mouth with a singular hole for an eye at the centre of his forehead, the rest of his body a strange, toned yet also featureless tan colour.

His arms spread wide in a welcoming gesture, a very human motion despite everything about him screaming hollow. “The elder Cruzar arrives once more. Welcome again to our humble home! I trust the journey was a smooth and unharried one?” he greeted in a… slick, voice. The Mayor was a man who clearly had a tongue of silver on a bad day, let alone his good ones.

“It was as any journey; with beginning and end, and things that happened between them, yes,” Sabado replied neutrally, reaching to unhook the chain connecting the cart from behind him. Instead of wheels, it used a bit of bark from the Forest of Menos as a board to easily get around the dunes. “La Hogar still stands. Nobody has caused you and yours any trouble, I hope?” he asked. It would be a shame to lose a somewhat close centre of Hollow activity. It allowed him to collect without collecting, as it were.

“Only a few rabble rousers and uppity sorts, but nothing Estelan could not handle,” the Mayor waved off. “It does seem like there are more of the latter, these days.”

Sabado nodded in agreement, dragging the cart closer by the aging chain. “Young Hollows with eyes bigger than their stomachs, is all. Hueco Mundo will teach them the ways. I have new items for you, if you have any interest…?”

“Always, always. Show me your wares, my good Gillian.”

“Sabado will do,” he felt the need to say again, getting quite annoyed at being called everything but Sabado around La Hogar. It was like founding civilization meant the Hollows had to be formal and ritualistic about things. He uncovered the top of the cart, displaying the goods within.

The lanky Menos reached in to draw out a small, metallic disc. He held it out for the Mayor to see, a singular eye watching it curiously. Sabado then flicked it, opening up the disc to reveal a two-ended hand pointing in opposite directions.

“Compass. It allows you to orient yourself, telling you the directions relative to where you stand.” Despite being in a different world, the compass still managed to function. Sabado wasn’t about to question it.

“...Hm. I’ve heard of these things. May I?” the Mayor offered, extending a hand. Sabado tossed it over to him, allowing him to get a better look at it, his cyclopean eye peering at it carefully. “This would be useful for our hunting parties…” he paused, mulling over it some. Sabado waited patiently, glancing around him. A crowd began to gather on the outskirts, as per usual.

What was most uncomfortable about La Hogar was the ‘family units’ they formed, even in the absence of their humanity. Older Hollows taking younger ones under their wing, along with ‘partners’ of sorts. Very strange. Very dysfunctional.

“What would you be looking for, in exchange for it? Do you have any more?” the Mayor probed finally, underhand tossing the compass back to Sabado.

“I’m running low on the necessary components for my salves, the benefits of which you know directly. If you should have a surplus of tooroot, or crystal sap, I would gladly be willing to negotiate the amounts.”

Injuries in the world of Hueco Mundo was commonplace, and healing them could be a matter of minutes.

But bad injuries were a death sentence. If a Hollow was unable to move or severely weakened, it opened them up to being preyed on by more opportunistic predators. The salves Sabado had worked on for a literal century to get right encouraged the already hasty rate of healing in a Hollow, turning a process of weeks into days, or months into weeks. It truly depended on how badly wounded they were.

Yammy for example had been infected by the reiatsu of the Rey Dorado, an unusual set of circumstances that required some creative alchemic thinking on Sabado’s part to circumvent how that impacted Yammy’s own rate of healing, slowing it to a relative crawl.

“That we do have, precisely for this sort of occasion!” the Mayor replied, an unseen grin on his mouthless mask. He clicked his fingers, nodding to one of his attendants. The visibly female, reptilian Hollow took up the task, leaving the Mayor’s side. “While she’s getting that… mayhaps you will grant me the opportunity to bother you with a more private matter.”

Sabado leaned back somewhat, golden rings for eyes awakening once more. Caution settled in. “... I do hope this is related to my wares, Mayor.”

“To a certain extent. Come, come. Walk. I will explain.”

The Mayor lead Sabado down another road of the quiet village, and as time passed the residents began to grow used to the towering Gillian’s presence, leaving their homes to once again resume their tasks and conversation. It was a pitiable existence, but one Sabado felt admiration for nonetheless.

They came to the outskirts of the village, facing towards a hilly horizon. The Mayor rubbed his shoulder before getting to the point. “I don’t know if you particularly care, but my hunters have been suffering from repeated ambushes.”

Sabado didn’t care that much, as cruel such a perspective was. That was just normal in Hueco Mundo. “Mh-hm,” the Gillian sounded, letting the Mayor know he was listening.

“The Forest of Menos. There’s another Gillian in the area -- shocking, I know -- but this one is different. It acts with a cunning, and a personality.”

Sabado glanced down at the Mayor, amusement tinting his tone. “No, I don’t know them. Not all Gillian’s with personalities know each other, you know.”

“That’s… nevermind,” the Mayor sighed, stopping before he could get dragged in by Sabado’s words. “The Guardian has yet to rein it in, either due to a lack of willingness or an inability to do so. This is making the matter of food and resources a difficult one, for my La Hogar.”

“I’m not a mercenary, Mayor,” Sabado pointed out.

“I know, I know. But… you are the only one of Menos classification we have any positive dealings with, aside from our loyal guard. While I am not asking of you to go out of your way to deal with a problem of ours, if it should ever arise that you are passing by the Forest of Menos…” he gently suggested with a roll of his hand.

Conflict was honestly not something he ever sought out, even on the worst of days. Conflict in their world was very different from the world of humanity. Even more brutal, even more lethal.

He was content to read his comparatively tiny books and do what little productive things he could.

But even still, the Mayor had been good to Sabado, his opportunism aside.

“Has the Gillian taken a name?” he asked the Mayor, looking out at the sand and blinking slowly. He would surely come to regret even asking.

“The hunters say the name ‘Tall Aaroniero’, as if it were that of a Vasto Lorde. I can only imagine that is our culprit.”

The future crawls ever closer.

Aaroniero.

Sabado was already coming to regret asking, and it had been a grand total of a second and some change.

He brought a hand to his mask, running it down slowly. “Of all the things in Hueco Mundo…” he muttered.

“You know it?” the Mayor asked as Sabado failed to keep his voice down. That, or the Mayor had good hearing.

“There is… history, yes. I am shocked to hear that the thing called Aaroniero is still alive, but the fact it remains a Gillian is concerning.”

“An old one, then?” the Mayor hazarded, folding his arms.

“As old as I am, yes. Its gluttony is unmatched among the Gillian. It should have evolved long ago.”

It should not even be alive. It was one of Sabado’s greatest regrets, in retrospect. Before he formulated his general principle of non-interference, he already broke it by nearly killing one who would go on to become something of a key player.

But he was a fresher Hollow then. Greener and angrier. Hungrier too. The Forest did not have enough room for two highly intelligent Gillians at the time.

“And yet we deal with the Tall Aaroniero, as opposed to the Less-Tall Aaroniero. No matter the form it takes, this Gillian is choking the life from La Hogar,” the Mayor pressed, his request reiterated without the words.

“Avoid the Forest of Menos for a while. If you keep giving him easy potshots, he’ll keep taking them,” Sabado advised, unwilling to even engage in the request.

“And look where else? It is where we get our means of trading with you, where my hunters often find prey, and where refuge is supposed to be offered to our kind, in the event of being cast out,” the Mayor continued, frustration bleeding into his words and defensive posture. “Hardly a refuge when one Gillian commands the whole horde, and when that Gillian seems to have it out for anything that isn’t itself.”

Sabado wanted to sigh, but he stopped himself. “Then life in Hueco Mundo continues as it always has -- with survivors and winners.”

The Mayor bristled… and then deflated. He momentarily considered trying another approach, but surrendered, raising his hands. “Very well. It appears you will not budge on the matter, even if I were to offer you continued support from my people.”

“Even if you offered me the world.”

“I would not be giving you much, to be frank. Sandy dungball it is. But if that is a dead end of business, then we should resume our prior transaction.”

“Agreed,” Sabado said, glad to get away from the topic of Aaroniero.

Their conversation returned to more regular matters, such as the directions of the winds in the past weeks, and what it might entail. It was supersticion, but it was not an unfounded one. The scent of blood and battle carried far to the ever-hungry nose of a Hollow, further than minor fluctuations in reiatsu, and so ‘change’ could almost be felt in that manner.

Come the end of it, Sabado had his reagents, and the Mayor had come away with a compass, candles, and some gauze.

Somehow the Mayor had gotten more than originally agreed, Sabado finally realized upon leaving La Hogar.

~~~​

Several hours later, amid his trek back to his cave, Sabado had the distinct feeling he was being watched.

It was not an uncommon feeling, moving about the surface of Hueco Mundo -- there was hardly any place to hide, and any other Hollow was a potential threat and-or food. But in Sabado’s case, he had learned to weed out the feeling of passing observation with intentful watching.

He wanted to owe it up to the conversation he had with the Mayor about Aaroniero putting him on edge, but it was hardly a subtle thing. If it was after him, he would know.

Sabado came to a halt, the sound of shifting sand ceasing and leaving only the occasional weak breeze. His eyes shut, and he turned his mind inwards. He sometimes visualized his reiatsu, something non distinct and ephemeral, as a valve which required turning in a manner none too distinct from water pressure, but that was the blunt visualization.

To use it for more precise detection, it became more of a spiders web, sprawling out from beneath him, until it finally caught something.

The Gillian’s head snapped to its right, a cone of bloody red fire spewing from a concentrated point just before its mouth, arcs of power sparking off to the side wildly as the attack carved a gorge into distant hills of sand, causing them to topple and with them reveal his tracker --

A Cero for a Cero, a streak of concentrated power screamed through the air, threatening to blow Sabado apart. He found his legs, pushing off his feet to the side with a leap, dragging his cart with him.

The detonation sent Sabado reeling to the side, the aftershock rocking the area with a visible wave of impact, a cloud of sand obscuring him from his attacker.

That Cero made his look like child's play, he noted. All power with very little grace, but the strength of it compensated. Sabado glanced to his side to look at the impact zone, looking upon a crater several houses wide.

Sabado had missed his shot, his attacker had missed theirs.

But from then on, Sabado could feel where his attacker was. It was a vague sensation, more of a gut intuition urged on by his own reiatsu, but he could make it work.

He hadn’t spent years practicing for nothing.

The Gillian’s head turned upwards towards the sky. The same crimson energy gathered, steadily, slower than usual, the crackle of the compressed power sounding closer to a giant tree nearing collapse than electricity, or a fusillade of rifle fire.

“Cero Miríada!” he howled, the yelling of the technique focusing his mind to a point, enabling the precise execution of the controlled flow of power.

The stream of destructive power shot into the air, until it simply halted above the cloud of sand and smoke, coalescing once more into an unstable orb, hanging there as an angry miniscule star.

And then it rained fire.

Sunrays of Cero shot out from the gathered point, ten separate roaring attacks carving up the land beyond the obscuring cloud, wildly shifting and overlapping with one another until… silence. The red star faded.

A scattershot Cero.

A pained yell from afar. He had hit.

Sabado took that as his opportunity, breaking from the cloud, long legs striding forward in a manner rare for a Gillian -- they tended not to run, because they simply were not smart enough for it.

But a Gillian that does run is terrifying, even to Sabado.

His grounded opponent, a splotch of white and yellow from the distance, took more shots at Sabado, rapidly sequenced Ceros with little power but plenty of desperation. The sight was having its intended effect.

One landed, slamming into Sabado’s chest, causing him to stumble not stop, the pain ignorable due to the distance and lack of explosive power behind the warding Ceros.

Finally, he leapt, clearing the distance of a field between him and the downed Hollow, the scent of its spilled blood taking up more of his senses than even sight.

As he landed over the prey, his mouth opened unintentionally, drooling on the Hollow. The desire to feast grew louder alongside the howling, feral voices in his mind. He ignored them both.

It was something of a mix between a burrowing spider and a wasp, body intersected with white armored plates over yellow flesh.

And Adjuchas, but a painfully weak one.

“Gyaaaah!” it yelled in horror at the Gillian looming over it, one of its several arms lashing out to pierce Sabado’s mask.

His hand caught the insectoid limb by the joint. Sabado’s mouth closed.

“Quiet,” he instructed, taking in the vaguely familiar appearance of the Hollow before him. “Keeper of Keys, was it?”

“You mother -- agh!” the Hollow visibly winced, body shuddering in pain. The Cero had carved across its back like a blade, taking with it a hind limb and a wing. “Just eat me already you fucker! Don’t draw this out!”

“I’ve heard of you. You’re not from around here. Very distinct look. What brings you so far?” Sabado continued, his voice tense despite the casual nature of his words. An Adjuchas was an Adjuchas, he needed to be careful. Adjusting his weight, he pinned the superior Hollow beneath him, his spindly limbs acting to pin each of the spiderwasp’s down.

“Get off me, you sonuva -- !”

He was in a state of panic. Natural, given he could very well be eaten by a Gillian.

Sabado hissed… and relaxed, standing up off of the Adjuchas. “Fine.”

The Keeper of Keys stopped wriggling after a moment, only realizing a second later that he had been released. “...Okay.”

Sabado tilted his head, standing upright once more “Okay?”

“... What’re you doing?”

“Getting off you, like you requested.”

“Okay, sure. But why ya doin’ that?” the Adjuchas hissed in return, trying to get back onto its front, only to falter with a growl.

“I’m not in the business of punching down,” Sabado sniped with an amused tone, looking down at the strangely malnourished Adjuchas, getting a glower from its many yellow eyes. “Why are you here?”

“For food, obviously,” the Keeper of Keys grumbled, averting its eyes in shame. “Not much option anywhere else, especially not the Forest. But hell, one if one of you super Gillian’s wasn’t bad enough... “

Sabado would have furrowed his brow, were his face not a rather static mask.

“...It’s that bad, is it?”

“I’m here, and not there. How’d you know me, anyway?”

“You’re a smuggler. You find paths into the human world which are hard for those who would hunt us to trace, and bring lesser Hollows there to feed. I’ve considered using your services in the past,” Sabado explained calmly, watching each movement of the downed Adjuchas carefully.

“Like you need ‘em,” he pointed out in return, nodding up to the Gillian in reference to how he handled an Adjuchas, his natural predator aside from other Gillians.

“You lost because you’re malnourished, not because I’m strong. When did you last eat a full meal?”

“...Months ago.”

Sabado hummed.

He brought his goods up front, and reached inside for a clay pot. He opened it, and dipped a hand inside. “Roll over, and don’t move.”

From within the pot he brought out an inky green looking muck, a handful of the stuff. It smelled like a cross between mint and corpses.

The Adjuchas, hesitant, complied after a moment of watching Sabado stand there. It took a few tries, but eventually he managed.

The cracked armor and broken flesh wasn’t as severe as the bloodloss made it look. Painful, for sure, but manageable. The limb on the other hand was not going to be coming back any time soon.

Sabado did what he could. Gauze to tie off the limb, salve to encourage the healing of the wounds, and wrapping to cover them from the elements. The hardest part was figuring out how one was supposed to triage a lot of the odd and varied body shapes of Hollows, but he turned it into something of a thought exercise -- a puzzle to keep the mind fresh.

“There.”

“...You’re that Owl guy, aint’cha?”

“No idea what you mean,” Sabado said dismissively, double checking his work. “Find cover for the night. When you wake, head west to the Ribcage. There’s a lot of feral Hollow around there, looking for scraps. You might get lucky.”

The Adjuchas, having been given time to recompose itself, stood unevenly on seven legs. It looked up at Sabado still, an uncertain look crossing its insectoid features.

“I’m… not the only one,” he finally said. “There’ll be more. Lesser and Adjuchas alike. S’too wild in the Forest for us.”

Sabado shut his eyes. “I had figured.”

Without waiting for thanks, Sabado turned and continued on his way home. Back to the cave.

The Keeper of Keys watched him go silently, before eventually skittering off.

Once he was clear of any observers, Sabado cussed to himself.

There was an ecosystem in Hueco Mundo -- a brutal and savage one, but it functioned. If the surface was going to be flooded with the relative refugees of the Forest, it would be thrown into chaos.

The strange Hollows of La Hogar would not survive it, but he would as he had every other shift in the sands.

It was something to consider.

 

[Pangolin]

4; Shark Empress​

The sand had been worn to the point that a path formed through the most-walked route to the heart of Las Noches. If one were watching on a particularly bad day, they may even spot several Hollows trudging their way through exhaustion and hunger to reach the demesne of Hueco Mundo’s king.

The army of Barragan grew with each passing day.

In the absence of a home, those of the Forest of Menos were driven to their next point of safety. Barragan was a source of stagnation, asking little of his subjects yet holding them all to extreme standards -- failure was certain death, yet the Lesser Hollow could simply sustain themselves off of his raw presence alone.

In hushed tones, past the domain of the God-King Barragan Louisenbairn, creatures less powerful than he would speak of Barragan as the ‘Second Sun’ of Hueco Mundo, the second greatest thing to reside among the sands.

Unlike the First Sun, he could provide nourishment at the price of living under it. The First simply scorched all beneath it, the ‘death’ that Yammy spoke of. It was without identity merely because none could approach it without being absolutely crushed by its rampant Reiatsu alone.

And so the displaced marched across a hostile land, monsters under the foot of monsters.

But to what duty did he hold himself responsible, which made him watch their journey from afar? The slow deliberation of his mind had yet to respond on that front, so he simply observed the route from atop a jagged stone pillar jutting out of the earth, one of many in the area, making no effort to conceal his presence from the passing stragglers below. They often spotted him, but none stopped to consider his presence.

As far as they knew, he was another predator out for another meal.

It was the opposite.

He didn’t know what he wanted. Did he wish to help them, or merely let the tale play out, same as it ever was? Would the exodus not also explain the size of Barragan’s army, come the future?

Uncertainty struck him, same as it ever was. It kept him from acting in a manner which could be called ‘true’, always dangling off by the edges of history and time. The question of the morality of his inaction had long since been tossed to the side as meaningless, but the question of ought and ought not had not been resolved.

“You appear lost in thought.”

Sabado looked out of the corner of his eyes to see the owner of the voice, holding back the gut reaction to just Cero the surrounding area from surprise alone. He was glad he did not. Blue and white armor over a female figure, blonde hair sticking out of the top over tan skin in a messy tuft. Jade eyes. The musculature of a shark.

The air went still in his throat.

Over the years he had picked up the ability to give a rough appraisal of an enemies combat abilities, and plan accordingly, from a glance or two. The shape of a Hollow said much about how they fight, and that shape could inform him of the gap between himself and his enemy.

No plan came to his head.

There was only darkness behind her, a void that signified finality. If he reacted on the urge to attack in surprise, he would be destroyed instantly.

It certainly sobered the mind.

“Vasto... Lorde,” he responded observationally, stilted by the sudden presence of a crushing gravitas.

Indeed, it felt obvious in retrospect. She had been watching him watch the others for quite a while. He should have been able to detect her the moment she entered a mile radius of him.

Only her Reiatsu spread out from her like a nation. He had entered her territory long ago, and he simply hadn’t noticed the sensation. She was the norm of the part of Las Noches they were in, the ‘air’ replaced with her presence.

One of the living gods of Hueco Mundo stood beside him, watching the Hollows pass into supposed safety.

Unfortunately, in his shock, he simply failed to say anything in a reasonable amount of time which only created an awkward silence.

“...Apologies, I just found myself struck by a significant amount of dread. I’m honoured to be in your presence -- I think,” Sabado offered with an uncertain blink. There was no correct way to react to a Vasto Lorde other than to choke on one's own tongue at the raw thought of one stopping to talk to you.

“Most do not share that feeling.”

She returned to looking down at the path, empty of Hollows. She added nothing else. You merely joined her in quiet observation.

But the silence must be broken eventually, and unfortunately it was by him.

“You knew I was not a wild Gillian?” he asked, wondering why she had even approached him in the first place.

“We have met before. You would not remember it,” she answered without any hesitation.

“...”

He recalled no such meeting. He would certainly remember meeting Halibel.

“I was a much younger creature, at the time. My form was vastly different too, nor did I have the wherewithal to speak. I was unconscious, for the most part.”

“...”

Sabado really reached back into his memories, as intact as they were despite his ever growing age. ‘Age’ was truly just a number for a Hollow, and how they felt mattered more. Barragan acted and looked old because he felt ancient, as an example. He had killed far too many Hollows and been far too strong for far too long.

How long had he been alive? He kept track of days, but not years.

“...The shark,” he finally recalled with a pang of revelation. One of the stragglers he had taken into his home and tended to, over the years. The Vasto Lorde before him had once been an Adjuchas too, he remembered. “I’m… surprised you remember.”

“You do not often forget when someone saves your life.”

“You would have lived. It was a flesh wound,” Sabado insisted with a gesture of a dismissive wave of his hand. “I needed to test my wares.”

“Funny. From how you yelled and cursed at me for moving in my sleep, I was lead to think my injuries dire,” she returned with an absolute ease.

“... Well, yes. I am not fond of needing to do things twice. A once and done approach is perfect service, as they say.”

Who had said that? He… couldn’t remember. Too far back.

“I did not know they say that. I’ll be sure to keep it in mind.”

Sabado grunted. “Is there anything I can help you with?” he asked in the hope of getting to business before the pillar they stood on crumbled from age.

“My curiosity. I wondered if you were the same creature which helped me. And if you were…” she looked Sabado over, a glint in her lidded jade eyes.

“I don’t make an effort to evolve, if that is what you are wondering. I… haven’t, for a long time.”

“Why not?” she asked, reasonably at that. Evolution and growth were the be all and end all. The common wisdom of Hueco Mundo was ‘be strong, live well’, with the latter following after the former. He stood in defiance of it, out of a strange principle born from a life that was centuries ago, possibly not even real -- a figment of a mad Hollow’s desire to be more than what it was, maybe.

“Because fear is a funny thing,” he said after deliberation, tilting his head up to look up at the crescent moon, clear in the eternal empty night sky. “I don’t want to become something that only exists to eat and grow. I don’t want to lose what I’ve built up after so long.”

“And what would that be?”

“Self.”

Harribel appraised Sabado quietly, allowing the answer to settle in. He could see it out of the corner of his eye, the sight of her trying to understand, empathize even.

It was a strange thing. Most Hollow’s simply lacked the ability to even think in a manner that could be called compassionate. If he recalled correctly, it was something quite unique about the Vasto Lorde and her approach to the world.

She finally spoke, her voice gentle despite being a walking icon of fear. “The future is a frightful thing. The changes it brings to us, as creatures with thoughts, is the most terrifying thing of all. But it will come. The future is always here, Lurking Owl.”

He exhaled. “Sabado will do, please.”

“Sabado,” she corrected, dipping her head in momentary apology.

“I do think about it often -- what I will become, in so many years time. Sometimes I feel like I’m merely running from what is inevitable,” he admitted, ashamed. He had not expected to be having such an open discussion with a creature he only met once, but socialization was strange between their sort.

Maybe it was because they were both less violent sorts that they were able to talk in such a manner.

But… had it been so long? When had talking to people become so difficult? Was it always so hard?

“Most Hollows in Las Noches are aware of you. You have outlived many. It surprises just as many that you have not moved on. In a way, your continued existence as a Gillian has become a point of comfort for many. But we must all confront the fact that the world will change around us.”

“A point of comfort?”

The Vasto Lorde huffed in mild amusement, a break from her usual stoic demeanor. “Days may go by, your pack may die, but no matter what, Barragan shall rule and the Owl shall remain tall.”

Sabado squinted at that. Why hadn’t he heard that before? Was his existence actually just common knowledge? He thought he did an admirable job at being a cave-dwelling hermit.

The Vasto Lorde must have picked up on his thoughts, because she answered them. “You have helped no small number of Hollows, over the years. Some have gone on to become much stronger, and they remembered.”

“...Everybody gets one, I suppose,” the lanky Hollow muttered, begrudging his apparent fame-and-or-infamy. The whole non-interference thing had just been falling apart recently. “Maybe it’s a sign.”

“A sign of…?”

“That it’s finally time. Tell me, Vasto Lorde, if you had read a story from its beginning to its completion, had seen the characters within reach conclusions to various extents with an outcome that is otherwise acceptable, what would you do if you were then placed in that very same story?”

A bit of a specific and heavily loaded question, but it was what it was.

“I suppose I would retain information regarding the story,” she said, getting a nod from Sabado. “Then the answer, to me, is simple. Become part of the story.”

He let out a rumble. He was afraid of that answer. “Why so?”

“Because it would not truly matter if I did nothing, nor would it matter if I did something. The story remains a story. It will end, and I must come to acknowledge my own role as a character. To deny it at that point would be absurd. A being with knowledge of the future is not uncommon in such wonderful tales,” she said with shut eyes, as if picturing herself in that very role Sabado described. “Although a story, it is reality to those who act within it. Who would I be to deny that?” she answered with a final question, a subtle empathy to her words which sounded outright alien to the Gillian.

Sabado considered those words.

Was it nonsensical, to do nothing? Indeed, doing nothing would lead to the same result, but was it even possible for ‘nothing’ to exist within such a context? His smallest actions, be they his visitations to the Mayor or a random act of kindness, count as ‘something’, and have already tainted the story he knew in some regard. Maybe not in a severe manner, but the world has been changed by his addition.

But that still did not mean he should do more.

Then again, maybe that was simply an excuse to avoid changing the life he had established for himself. The ‘self’ he spoke of, with a routine and sense of sanity in the face of maddening circumstances.

If finally acting in a true manner brought that toppling down, would it be worth it? Was there anything to be gained by leading such a stagnant life, just to retain the mediocrity he had built for himself? Was change truly that scary?

He stared down at the worn sandy trail.

Even then, he wasn't sure how to answer that question. He had no grasp of that fear. It ruled him.

“Is that sufficient, Sabado?”

“... I think so. Thank you for your thoughts, Vasto Lorde. I would pay for them, but I am afraid I have no currency.”

She looked at him, but said nothing. He did not think there was much else to be said. Sabado hopped off of the pillar, landing on the sand beneath with an eruption.

He cast her one last look and a raised hand in farewell, which got a nod in return. An odd encounter, another one to add to the list. In a way it was fortuitous, as what other Hollow could offer him such a conversation?

Certainly not bloody Yammy, that was for sure.

Sabado went far to the east, where an entrance to the Forest of Menos lay.

His path was illuminated by the knowledge that he could not stop change. As obvious as it may have seemed, it had eluded him.

 

[Pangolin]

5; Blink -- Century Gone
​

Sabado looked down at his copy of Gulliver’s Travels, the pages warping with age, threatening to fall apart from exposure. He had forgot he had it, after reading it the first few times. It got lost beneath the stack. He realized how foolish he was for forgetting it, with its state. It needed to be stored away with the rest of the older items in his collection.

He had forgotten because it was easy to forget, with the passage of time.

That, and the past century and a half had been relatively busy for him. He had neglected his collection in exchange for more frequent ventures to the world of the living, and to hunting in general.

Even still, he could not bring himself to be the ravenous beast his instincts demanded of him. What he ended up eating was minimal compared to his peers. When put into the timeframe of a century and a half, however, it was a lot different. It all added up.

The Gillian had not grown in size, but in presence. The ‘whole’ of Sabado was now many more spirits than what it was when he left his encounter with a Vasto Lorde.

The landscape had changed, and he had too. For better or worse, it was hard to say... but he was inclined towards the latter.

The Forest of Menos had effectively been emptied of most residents apart from the Gillian and a few braver Adjuchas, but the rest had flooded the desert. It was a blessing, and a curse.

If a Hollow didn’t want to sign up with Barragan or any other pack, then they often ended up as prey. That lead to a remarkable increase in the God-Kings forces, but also an immense increase in the amount of conflict within Las Noches and the surrounding areas.

The strong ruled in Hueco Mundo, and such a free-for-all created strength through desperation. Stragglers from the Forest had grown into contenders for land and flesh in the absence of their prior, quieter lifestyle.

He had become one too, in a way. He had started to change.

The voices were growing louder, more plentiful. Noise that couldn’t be ignored completely at all points in the day. Screaming. Hungry. It was what he had been avoiding.

But he was stronger, and his mind was more focused than ever. Shunting the noise was an active task in directed thought that lasted all hours. On the days where Sabado could not cope, he simply decided to let the day go -- he would meditate.

Despite it all, he did not feel anything truly significant. Stronger, yes, but no closer to breaking the barrier between Gillian and Adjuchas. After the past century, it had become a priority with the growing influence of his hunger and the additional noise lapping over his thoughts.

The longer he spent as a Gillian, the more risk he was exposing himself to. The longer he spent as a Gillian, the closer he came to becoming a mindless monster once more.

He needed to eat his own kind. He needed to consume Gillian in the feeding frenzy that resulted in the birth of an Adjuchas, one based on whatever Gillian came out on top of the all out cannibalistic massacre which was part of their lifecycle.

That too was a gamble, but that was why he needed to grow stronger in the first place. He needed to reduce the risk.

Sabado set the copy of Gulliver’s Travels down atop the stack, making a note to himself.

‘Put away if I’m alive later.’

~~~​

The Guardian of the Forest regarded Sabado with a critical, intelligent eye.

Sabado returned it in kind.

The humanoid, tailed Adjuchas before him was the one who had long ago taken on the responsibility of keeping the wandering Menos Grande in check. It turned out to be a fairly necessary role in the lifecycle of a Hollow, allowing the process of natural selection to take place within the confines of the Forest. To the ambitious Lesser Hollow, they were opportunity to grow. To the Adjuchas, an occasional snack. To the Gillian, a home.

Someone had taken that role from him.

“You look like shit,” Sabado began helpfully.

“You always do,” he returned with a smirk in his voice, his mask perpetually giving a wry grin with sharp, golden eyes. Red line patterns ran along the helmet-like mask, its sides jutting out in the fashion of ears. “Welcome back, Cruzaz.”

He was missing an arm.

“I wish I could say it’s good to be home, but…” he trailed off, looking deeper into the dark, subterranean nest. The crystalline spires stood tall as ever, refracting the glimpses of moonlight from the holes in the surface. “It’s really not.”

“Then you’re here for purely selfless reasons, certainly.”

Sabado scoffed. “Of course. I’m here to see Aaroniero.”

The Guardian shook his head, eyes going dark. “You’re welcome to try. I certainly have, and few others have given respectable attempts too.” The humanoid Hollow gazed down at Sabado from atop a crystal branch, tail waving behind him. “You’re entitled to yours.”

“I wasn’t looking for permission,” Sabado hissed, taking a step forward to pass the Guardian. Important role or no, he had no interest in talking to the Adjuchas.

“I figured as much,” the Guardian shrugged, a generally relaxed air about him. Sabado honestly expected more of a reaction. “Watch your back, Cruzaz. That’s not a Gillian anymore. I’m not even sure if it’s an Adjuchas.”

Sabado waved over his shoulder, and stepped deeper into the Forest of Menos.

Whatever had become of Aaroniero in the years since their last confrontation, it wasn’t anything beyond the realm of what was reasonable.

~~~​

It was a place that made Sabado wish he had never returned.

The distant groans of hungry Gillian, their towering forms, taller than even Sabado himself, rocked in deceptively gentle ways in the distance, swaying like trees in heavy winds. He intentionally went around them, sneaking in a way a Gillian should not be able to. There was a chance that they would react negatively to his presence, but there was also the possibility they wouldn’t even acknowledge him.

Either way, Sabado wasn’t willing to risk it, not until he found the Gillian he was looking for.

It was a good thing he knew exactly where to look. Unfortunately, ‘where to look’ was the deepest, darkest part of the Forest, where the slight rays of moonlight from the cracked surface couldn’t reach.

Splash.

A step forward in blind darkness found his foot ankle deep in water, of all things. The very rare sensation brought him to a halt, the noise putting him on edge.

It had been thunderous by the standards of a very quiet, pitch black underground cavern.

How the water got down there… he wasn’t about to question. It was good to know that it was there, at the very least. Despite not requiring it for survival, water could still be helpful in some ways.

He took another step.

Splash.

There was no escaping it. He was going to have to proceed while making more noise than he was comfortable with, giving away his position and all.

It continued like that. All other and vision faded away, completely deprived of his senses aside from sound. Even the scent of the Forest had become muddled because of the water, apparently having been washed away.

It was as if a tsunami of fresh water came through at some point.

The absence of sight allowed for Sabado to focus some of his effort into detecting the Reiatsu of whatever was in the area. While there was something, it was hard to pinpoint it other than a general direction, or even how close he was to it.

It was… muddled. A spread out mess of coloured paints slammed across a wall.

After an hour of steady walking through water, and the direction of the presence changing every so slightly, Sabado’s patience finally wore thin. There weren’t even enough trees in the area to orient himself and make his own landmarks, and the fact he hadn’t encountered a wall…

He was certainly going in a circle -- or he was in the middle of doing one.

Sabado stopped.

His mask’s mouth opened.

A ball of angry red gathered from energy arcing out from it, his frustration and impatience further adding to the ferocity of the coming attack.

And then he fired in a straight line, briefly illuminating the cavern with its light and exposing the situation Sabado found himself in.

Several Gillian toppled, carved through by the Cero.

All around him, Gillian. They had been moving with his footsteps in the water, surrounding him the entire time, disguising their movements beneath his own.

All around him, their mouths opened. A cacophony of gathering energy followed, and the cavern was illuminated completely.

“... Come on, that’s just petty.”

Their response was to shoot him, innumerable streams of energy launching around him.

“Cero Resolución!”

The barrier wouldn’t handle all of them for even a second, but he didn’t need too long.

Each strike slammed against the crimson barrier, its protective flow stuttering almost immediately, threatening to falter and expose Sabado --

He jumped, That rare thing Gillian’s usually don’t do. He returned their Cero’s in kind, a rapid fire fusillade of evil ghost powered mouth cannon shots. More were fired up at him, the cavern fully visible to Sabado’s eyes.

And mid-fall, he saw it; the Reiatsu that had within it the hundred Gillian in the cavern beneath its umbrella.

If Sabado was as tall as two houses, then the purple, inhuman thing across the waterlogged cavern was as tall as two of him, and as wide as three of him were tall. It didn’t even look like a Hollow. It wasn’t something that belonged in Hueco Mundo, just from appearance alone.

He landed, a hand outstretched to grip the mask of one of the mindless Gillian surrounding him, his mouth opening wider than it ever had before, lashing forward with a ferocious intent and ripping through the side of its head, the flavour of Hollow flesh filling his senses, energising him.

Already, more Gillian were moving to take a bite out of him, clumping around him, teeth sinking into his form.

The pain was present, but it was blocked out by the instinct drumming in Sabado’s head.

What the Gillian were doing was natural. It was something he had to do too.

He opened his mouth, the process of thought abandoned.

Sabado slipped away. A multitude took his place, each vying for control over the body of what contained them. But they silenced after a mere instant, unifying in purpose along with the owner of the body.

And joined the frenzy.

~~~
​

Petty, was it?

Yes. Petty. That it was.

But it wasn't.

A slaughter unfolded before the Gillian which had come to be known as the Tall. A wild bulbous eye blinked on one side of its grotesque and bloated form, a set of teeth beneath it grinning wildly. On the other side, a blind and cataracted eye and a set of shattered teeth. A purple asymmetrical mass of a cephalopod, stubby yet large tendrils eagerly wriggling at the sight of his first and greatest mistake as a Hollow.

After so many years, he had returned.

The ache of his missing self, his other ‘him’, his second head, still resonated through his soul.

For Aaroniero Arruruiere was in truth two Hollows. Twins who cannibalized one another, the process finally ending the ouroboros and creating a two-headed snake.

But Sabado had taken one of those heads.

That merely left Aaroniero. The silence of singular thought, the isolation of ‘I’ as opposed to ‘we’.

How could the other Hollow stand to live in such a state, he wondered to himself each night. Life without family, the sole comfort apart from a full meal, was one which he did not wish to continue in.

How close had he come to self consumption? Or to ordering his Gillian thralls to unleash their entire Reiatsu’s worth of Ceros upon him?

Too close.

There was still something driving him forward. The memory of his brother was still with him, and so too was the desire to make things right.

Sabado Cruzaz, vile little beast. So intelligent for a Gillian, yet crueler than even he and his brother. Maybe in another world, they could have worked together.

He watched the killer of his brother writhe around in the undulating mass of black and white masks, all chomping and violently tearing at one another. His control over them had vanished once Sabado had started feeding, the collective instinct to evolve overcoming them all. Sabado stood out, utilizing the gangly limbs of the Gillian to their fullest extent, while the others were no better than worms on feet with mouths. It remained true that even with such an advantage, even Sabado could fail. Parts of him were missing, an entire half of his hand, parts of his shoulder and black-cloaked torso...

An egg of violence, awaiting to birth a potential apex creature -- Adjuchas.

“Fall, Sabado. Or evolve, and die. I anticipate both outcomes.”

Arrurriere…

We’re finally home.

As the chaos began to settle, and a singular figure emerged, the cave bloomed with a crimson light. The water stirred, whirling into aquatic tornados which spun violently around the expansive cavern, filling it with the sound of storm, the very foundations quaking fearfully at what was to come.

The crimson orb dwarfed even the abomination of a Gillian. Steam rose from the very water he had created.

The grand light of Aaroniero's vengegul Cero; the only light that gave him comfort.

The collective wrath of 33,649 Hollows which he had evolved from.

 

[Jace Spicer]

This is all sorts of interesting , watched for more

 

[Pangolin]

6; An Egg In These Trying Times
​

There was a time… a long time ago, around when Sabado first regained his senses.

He ventured into the human world.

He met a scion of the Minamoto. A child, praying before a shrine to a lost family member.

For two days they prayed. Sabado watched, the act of prolonged grovelling fascinating to his reborn mind. Was it the Heian period, then? He could not recall.

The child only looked up after Sabado got closer, peering down at them closely, inspecting every micro-movement, seeking something. A reason, maybe.

But for what, he could not recall.

The child regarded not him with fear, but that looming master known as Death. Indeed, in him did the child see death, still alive and merely born gifted with the talent of perception, and in death did she see the fate of her parent, awaiting her at a road of some few decades and pointless effort.

For what was the point of legacy, if one could not see it through? What was the point of growing into a lady, to have a child who would aid in the rule of her clan, if she could not love that child forever? Why hold connections to anything, if there is but a sheer cliff to denote the end of accomplishment.

She spoke to him as if he was a god.

It confused him.

“...”

He stared down at her, stock still. What words could he offer? He was not a wise man. He was a monster.

“Accomplishment--” he finally began, the sound of his own voice eliciting surprise, a noise he had not heard before. His memories of what he was before a Gillian were absent, aside from the wisdom of a life that felt as if it were beyond time itself. “--begets pride. Once a long task is complete, a long day over, the peace of rest comes to you. It is in that rest that accomplishment is achieved. Satisfaction is born.”

But to what does that have to do with death, she asks the being before her. How is she to take pride in finality, and the involuntary abandonment of connection?

“Your life is a task. Survive. Grow. Build. Achieve. Populate. Love. Hate…” he trailed off, trying to think of his own experiences.

Nothing. Just the future.

“And when that task is complete, you will be tired. And you will sleep. What comes is either dreamless, or rebirth into another form. Take your pick.”

A sufficient reassurance, but not a good one. The child went quiet, staring at the shrine Sabado loomed over. She didn’t want them to go.

“Yeah.” That was obvious.

But he had no other reply.

“Sorry, kid.”

Philosophy was of no comfort to a grieving child, and bereft of wisdom.

~~~​

Light pierced through the swarm of Gillian, obliterating a number of them from the very core of the violence itself, lancing out towards Aaroniero and searing across his flesh, harming him in no way but superficially.

But it did not stop. A constant stream of Cero fire, it arced upwards, shooting over Aaroniero’s body and to the wall of the cavern, carving through it, up and up, until it finally reached the ceiling…

The ray of light had avoided Aaroniero’s own, building Cero -- the thing which would completely destroy whatever remained. It did not even feel aimed at him --

But at the ceiling. The steam of red intensified with a pulse of Reiatsu, distinct in its taste.

Sabado.

For the first time in centuries, fear bled into Aaroniero’s mind. He knew what was happening.

“Cero!”

No more. He would allow no more.

The cruel sun descended on the cavern.

~~~​

Getting to other regions of the world as a Hollow -- or at the very least, a Gillian -- was a difficult affair, but possible. Although Hollow’s could reasonably come from anywhere and end up anywhere, there was a high concentration of them in Japan.

For what reason that was Sabado never really figured out. If he was to owe it to anything, it was likely the machinations of the Spirit King or some nonsense.

“My lord!”

Sabado turned his head to the man overlooking the battlefield, the aforementioned lord doing the same. The sound of ignited gunpowder and violent clashes came from all around their position.

Ishida Mitsunari, for his part, furrowed his brow atop his horse, eyes shutting. His day was about to get worse.

“Speak.”

“The forces on Mount Nangu haven’t moved, sir! The plan --!”

Failure. Sabado saw it then on Ishida Mitsunari’s face, the look of realization coupled with a supreme disappointment -- both in himself, and his allies. It was not the first betrayal he had suffered that day, after all. Had things gone as he planned, he could have potentially swept the field of Sekigahara.

But Sabado had seen the events leading up to the battle. There were many snakes in his harvest. Blessed with a prescient awareness and first hand knowledge, he knew that Mitsunari was not destined for victory.

“Shinigami…” the daimyo said calmly, collected despite the imminent defeat. As his men moved towards the cavalry of the Shimazu, his once allies, he knew that there was no miracle to be found in war. But still, his expression remained as a rock. “Is this why you have followed me?”

He looked up at Sabado.

“For this moment?”

“To some extent,” Sabado said conversationally, his inhuman voice causing a moment of clear discomfort to the commander of the Western Army. “I merely… wanted to see it unfold with my own eyes. History.”

The man looked away from Sabado, showing no emotional reaction to the answer. “History. Hmph. And what awaits this loser of history, then?”

“Are you afraid?”

“No. I am merely curious,” the aging man said, returning Sabado’s earlier nonchalance. The men nearest Ishida glanced at their lord confusedly, but did not question him as he continued to talk with himself. Sabado stared out at the approaching cavalry with him. Ishida would be captured and executed. His history was written.

“The same as every man. A grave, some memories, and a corpse. Maybe something more, but even I haven’t figured that part out yet.”

“If even a shinigami cannot tell me, then I am truly a doomed soul,” the old man mused with a smirk, his eyes narrowing dangerously. “Then I suppose there is nothing left but to lose.”

“... Whatever does await you, I assure you -- it will offer opportunity,” Sabado offered, a pittance to a dead man.

The man’s facade finally broke. He threw his head back and cackled like a hyena, displaying a level of energy before unseen. Once he was done, he grinned up at Sabado. “Is that so? Then, do excuse this ambitious fool of a loser.”

For all the weapons at his disposal, Ishida Mitsunari did not draw the bow, or ready the arquebus. Instead, he drew the sword, the fire in his eyes focused upon his new enemy. “Shimazu!” he howled, tugging on the rein of his horse, stirring it into a frenzy to match his own. “Let us go! To history!”

It was infectious. It spread to his men, and they too also became fools alongside their lord, a single unit hoping to face down the cavalry of the Shimazu clan. The final gasp of a bureaucratic samurai.

Sabado shut his eyes. All around him, the earthbound spirits of soldiers rose from their bodies, fearful and confused. All around them, the growls and heckles of creatures known as Hollows, drawn to the battle. And around them, the true Shinigami. As the battle of Sekigahara drew to a close, a new conflict began beyond the sight of regular men; a battle for the souls of the dead.

But Sabado did not take part in that fight. Instead, he just followed Ishida from afar. When the time of his execution came, after being captured by villagers in a last ditch effort to flee and handed over to Tokugawa, he stuck to his word.

Once it was done, he merely released what Reiatsu he could into the surrounding area. A flare for Hollow and Shinigami alike, alerting them to his presence. It was a coin toss, leaving the ultimate end of Ishida Mitsunari in the hands of fate itself.

It was what awaited all souls. A cruel gamble which dictated which afterlife you would be part of. Rebirth, Hell, Soul Society, Hueco Mundo… humans had very little control over what happened to them, when their hearts finally stopped.

Sad.

But why was he remembering such events?

~~~​

The light of the moon hung over the cavern, blinding Aaroniero, freezing him place. The damned light. Even without his senses, Sabado Cruzaz was a cruel opponent. His attempt to gain an edge over Aaroniero had worked, but the monstrous Gillian had won.

For all of Sabado’s wit, it did little to save him from the raw difference in power between the two of them.

But… there was silence again. The crumbling cavern did not speak to him in the same way the sound of Sabado’s struggle did, nor could it ever come close to the presence of his brother. The thrall Gillian, mindless as they were, were a source of living sound he had grown used to. But they were also gone.

It was too quiet. Aaroniero grit the in-tact set of giant teeth together, hissing out through an opening. The waters stirred to his mood, trying to placate him with the sound of it rolling against what remained of the pillars.

The pain of the light was nothing before the agony of silence, but the former was one he could amend. All he had to do was crawl to a darker part of the forest, and he’d recover.

Splash.

It was sound, distinct from any other in the cave. Movement.

Aaroniero’s blinded, bulging eye squinted.

The owl-like Gillian glared back, eyes a blank gold. It rested on one and a half hands, and a single foot. Holes torn into its body drooled a dark red ichor into the water, polluting it.

It moved forward like that, towards Aaroniero. It was fixated, beastlike in its movement.

“...Cruzaz,” Aaroniero cursed, eye shutting with a certain finality to it.

Somehow he had survived. Half a Hollow, but he lived. As injured as he was, he now had the advantage.

The moon’s light had frozen Aaroniero to the core. Were he stronger, had he evolved further to overcome that weakness, were his brother with him.

No.

The eye snapped open, confronting the moon itself. The water stirred into raging, spinning spires, and it converged on Sabado. Aaroniero was not powerless. He was not prey.

The lesser Gillian endured flowing blow after flowing blow, swatting him away with the raw power of the jets of water Aaroniero commanded, only for him to come crawling back. He -- nay -- it began to move faster as it gained better control of moving across the flooding cavern with only three limbs, bounding from crystalline pillar to crystalline pillar.

The Cero it began to fire were not aimed at Aaroniero, but the weaponized water, warding off the attacks with the explosive heat of his projected anger.

Aaroniero focused, his control of his newest ability refining more and more with each passing second. Sabado had gone wild, but mere feral fury wouldn’t be enough to kill Aaroniero.

He pictured blades like teeth. The water conformed to his will.

Spears of pressurized water jutted out from the waters below the crippled Gillian, impaling it in several direction and then dissipating as quickly as they had appeared.

Sabado landed with a wet thump. It was less, a mere hunk of flesh with dangling limbs in a dark cloak.

The golden eyes blinked futility before finally closing. The ferocious owl mask of Sabado had its mouth wide open, but nothing formed. Nothing happened.

Aaroniero waited, watching his foe through hazy moonstruck vision, the seconds passing with a dreadful feeling, but nothing happened. For all the Hollows Aaroniero had eaten, he had never felt the pure paralyzing tension he was enduring.

And then he finally picked up Sabado’s limp corpse with a fat, stubby tendril. There was only one more thing left to do. He opened his first mouth, and chomped down on what was left of him.

Silence followed.

It was over. Aaroniero had won.

How would his brother feel? What would Arrurriere say?

“Cero… Miríada.”

Light carved through Aaroniero insides.

~~~​

He remembered… because he had yet to accomplish. He was not a fool, nor a loser. Not yet. Death had made a fool of him once, but not again. Not until he was tired.

Not until he could look back and feel pride as a Hollow.

Sabado consumed Aaroniero from the inside out. A haze of hunger and desperation drove the Gillian to eat and grow, the most fundamental and inherent desire of any Hollow. The fear of returning to death overtook him, and it made him no better than the creatures he tried to be better than. The owl pecked at the corpse of a monster, tearing off chunks with the remains of a hand. Everything felt correct, then and there.

The more he ate, the deeper and deeper he went into the corpse of Aaroniero, chewing through what flesh, bone and organ he could. The form of his historical opponent eventually collapsed into something unrecognizable, more of an indistinct orb.

Sabado failed to notice as the orb formed around him. He merely ate and ate, until...

The egg of violence was complete.

 

[Pangolin]

7; Pequeño Búho​

He experienced one more vision, but it could not be called one of the past -- or of any time for that matter.

In the deepest recesses of his mind, there was indeed a town that had once flooded during his residence, but not to the extent that he witnessed then. It was a ruin, the waves having calmed long ago, but the effects of their rage lasting in the damage done to the residential homes, roads and trees of the once-idyllic looking town. The rain still poured from the sky, and even Sabado found himself struggling to wade through the water, for even his body was different in the vision.

In fact, he didn’t have a body. He could not perceive any form of limb or corpus aside from the vague sensation of them being there. He could see, think and walk, but he was not there. With no end to the vision in sight, he continued down the first road he found, the sun blotted out by heavy grey clouds.

He ventured into the town centre, the once-peaceful homes gone and replaced by battered storefronts, tilted buildings and vacant, moulding flats. The docks, once the most modern part of the town, filled with glass and renovated warehouses, had been shattered, the old repurposed warehouses in various states of crumbling and collapse.

A cathedral sat at the very heart of the town. The building itself, ancient as it was, had not crumbled. Rather, it looked… infested, vines of darkly coloured organic matter wrapping around the height and spires of it. Parts of the vine-like creature were green, while other parts hung off like orange hair -- or tentacles, depending upon the perspective taken.

At the center, stood stop a submerged fountain, her feet adamantly refusing to sink into the depths of the flooded town, was a person. Man or woman, he simply couldn’t tell.

He could see their grief and torment, written plainly across patchy, discoloured skin. Green melded into tan melded into porcelain. Tears fell from their eyes as fonts, directly into the waters which destroyed the town.

“Get out…” they pleaded in a gentle yet agony wracked voice.The decorated, blue and gold flecked dress they wore was in tatters, worn with age and moisture. They faced the water, body eerily limp.

He would leave if he knew how. And he’d tell them that if he knew how to talk.

“Just… leave. Please.”

He doesn’t know how.

“Forever… let me rust away…”

He doesn’t know how.

“Then… you’re worthless.”

They looked up at him. Stormy bloodshot eyes. There was beauty behind it all, but for the life of him he could not find it in himself to appreciate it.

Especially not with several swords sticking out of his non-corporeal body.

~~~​

It was quiet.

Sabado opened his eyes. He could see so clearly

Sabado stood. His body reacted without flaw.

Sabado spread his wings. It felt like they had always been there, all seven of them.

Yet, even so… everything felt incorrect. He arched his head back to look up at the sky, taking in the clearness of the moon’s light.

He had become so small, and so different. How he had appeared when he first became a Hollow had long been lost to him, but it could not have been like the body he perceived in the remains of the water Aaroniero had controlled.

An owl’s face stared back at him, white in the fashion of a Hollow’s mask -- and it took him a moment to realize that it was in fact his mask, greatly changed and far less… ferocious and feral looking. Brows akin to blades jutted off into a skywards facing curve, wide golden eyes blinked back at him.

The face which the masked covered was surrounded by a copious lion-like mane of grey hair… or rather, hair-like feathers maybe? Two ‘lesser’ wings protruded from the hair at Sabados attention, although they soon receded into the mass of grey, becoming almost indistinguishable from the rest of it.

His torso had gained a human-like appearance, the flesh defined and powerful in that way most humanoid Hollows naturally were, the skin coloured like seaweed in its green. His arms followed suite right up until the elbow, where a tuft of the grey fur-feathers began and then promptly ended, the rest of it hidden beneath white plates that covered from the forearm down, leading to avian-like digits with claws ending them off, hooked and predatory in their appearance.

Sabado’s legs were a different matter, the layer of fur-feathers returning from the waist downwards, only growing progressively fluffier from the knees down, almost obscuring the four vajra-like talons-for-feet, each positioned in a diagonal direction, gripping the earth fiercely.

Were that all there were, he would have described himself as a ‘snowy owl gone wrong’, but the inclusion of his wings made it almost… ominous at best, messianic at worst.

The seven wings sprouted from his back, their span wide and made from the same substance as his mask or the armor on lower arms, making the feathers on the wings themselves somewhat redundant given their solidity. Solid and bone-like, they nonetheless had all the mobility one would expect. The strange kicked in with their positioning -- the uneven number of seven aside, they were assymetrical, forming a ring instead of opposing one another, and all were ‘facing’ the same direction to the point where the wing on his rightmost wing was just upside down.

There was also an eye on each wing-wrist, dopey looking tired things which seemed to function as well as his regular eyes. He was fairly certain he could see a lot more than he could before, and that was jarring.

Worse still, there was a sheathed sword at his feet, resting in the water.

Sabado reached down, talons dipping into the water and curling around the scabbard, lifting it from the water.

He regarded it with utmost caution and wonder. Holding it felt wrong, like it wasn’t his. Like he was a thief. Hise wiseman facade failed him in that moment.

“... I am quite lost.”

‘I am quite lost,’ echoed the cavern.

It was so quiet. There was no myriad of voices to focus him on moving forward, only the gap left by them. It felt like he was falling through it, an isolation louder than any madness.

Was that why Aaroniero hated him so?

~~~​

The look on the Guardian’s face was… the same as always, actually. But it still had a certain surprised hint to it that was delicious to the Less-Tall Sabado.

The incredibly Less-Tall Sabado he realized, standing next to the Guardian. Concerningly short. About the height of a short teenager.

“I dealt with your Aaroniero problem,” he said, for once needing to look up. His voice was… softer, than he had expected? Very different from the throaty, ominous rumble of his Gillian self.

“... I can see that. Sabado?” The Guardian asked, probing carefully with a squint of an eye, bending over to get a better look at his new body.

“Correct,” Sabado confirmed with a neutral tone, blinking.

“Wow.”

“I know. Don’t say a word.”

“It’s just… I would have expected something a bit taller and majestic, is all. Then again, you were always short -- even for a Gillian.”

Sabado bristled. “I’m plenty majestic as it is, you hopped up game warden.” The wings, having retracted into a formation close to being a form of clothing, wrapping around his body, splayed out in an aggressive display, matching Sabado’s short mood.

The Guardian snorted. “Congratulations either way. You’re one of the big boys now. That was one hell of a transformation -- I felt it all the way out here,” the Guardian informed him, leaning back and crossing his remaining arm across his chest, folding it beneath the stump of the other. “And I wasn’t the only one, probably. The hell happened in there?”

Sabado continued to stare up at the Guardian silently. The sword, hidden beneath a wing, felt rather heavy.

“Who knows, but you were right about Aaroniero. That wasn’t a Gillian,” the newly born Adjuchas said, a moody tone in his voice.

“Mrh. What was he, in the end? Other than prey.”

An Adjuchas? No, he hadn’t felt like one. His power felt like… more. A Vasto Lorde? Certainly not, but… something close? Something with potential. Maybe he was something else entirely, with that odd ability of his.

Ultimately Sabado just shrugged at the Guardian, wings moving back into position, covering up his upper body by curling around him and overlapping with one another.

He left like that, walking away from the Guardian. The Guardian watched him go, and hummed.

“Took you long enough, you weirdo.”

After so long, the Guardian returned to his duty undisturbed.

After so long, Sabado changed.

~~~​

La Hogar had changed in the century since the Mayor had informed Sabado of Aaroniero’s antics. Had he acted then, he might have caught Aaroniero before he became… whatever he was. Alternatively, he would have just died. It was hard to say.

The town changed as a result of his initial inaction. It had grown smaller as units of Hollows left to try their chances alone, as food became less plentiful. There were empty homes in La Hogar, a town which was already an insect’s imitation of civilization. A bad sign.

The Mayor himself had also changed. As Hollows fled the Forest, some tried to make food of the people of La Hogar. There was a hardened edge to his eye which was not present before, a sign that a quick tongue had not worked in the face of a desperate and hungry surge of Hollows over the land. Signs of battle scarred some of white, basic buildings of La Hogar, the attempted repairs doing little to hide the fact that they were just repairs.

Even as Sabado stood before the Mayor, now a head or two shorter than the simple humanoid Hollow, there was suspicion in his eye, where before there was opportunity.

“Your hunters can return to the Forest,” Sabado declared.

“A tad late,” the Mayor shot back with audible agitation in his voice. He caught himself, sighing and running a hand down his featureless mask. “What made you act, if you don’t mind me asking? It has only been a century and then some.”

“I owed Aaroniero the visit, and the chance. I also… wanted to help. It was a bit late, but I couldn’t afford to just walk in there, as weak as I was.”

“So, what? You spent years slowly building up your strength? Surely there was another way.”

“... Maybe. I just couldn’t see it at the time, or any time after. After all, if I had asked for help, would any of your hunters joined me?” Sabado asked in return, golden-rimmed eyes flicking to the Mayor’s aides. They had… declined in numbers, by at least two. They were ever-loyal. He could only imagine what had forced them to part.

“I’m inclined to say yes, but you clearly think no,” the Mayor retorted, folding his arms defensively. “Do you value the partnership we fostered over so many years so lowly?”

“It’s not that, Mayor. It’s…” Sabado exhaled, stumbling over his words. “I like being alone. If I had dragged your hunters into this, I would have been responsible for them. I didn’t want that.”

“... There’s problems with that, but I know you know that. Nevermind. It’s a pointless line of discussion, what’s done is done.” The Mayor’s posture relaxed, a weight leaving his shoulders. “We can start rebuilding.”

“I am sorry, for it’s worth.”

The Mayor waved it off. “It’s worthless, don’t worry,” he said, getting a snort out of Sabado. “But nonetheless, what are you plans now? You are clearly…” He looked Sabado over. “Changed. An omen if there ever was one, the Tall Owl changing his station to Short.”

“My height is perfectly acceptable,” Sabado defended quickly. “But there is no plan. Just… life. I’ll live, I’ve decided. I’ve spent too long cooped up in a cave, confined in a cage of my creation. I want to fly,” he declared, asymmetrical wings unfolding, the eyes on each elbow lazily staring at the Mayor. “You and the people of La Hogar have been good to me, Mayor. I won’t forget that, and I’ll be sure to stop by with more wares when I have the time.”

“Preempting my questions now, I see,” the Mayor muttered, hands moving to his hips. “That’s good! Your wares are unique, and I detest the idea of losing all access to them. But until then… I suppose adventure awaits you.”

If Sabado could smile, he would. Instead, his mane puffed up a little. “Be well, Mayor. Look after your people.”

“They’re my weirdos and misfits, and it’ll stay that way. Good luck out there, Sabado.”

With one last nod, Sabado’s wings moved, pressing against the air and kicking up a gust of wind, sending sand up with his ascent.

His first flight, natural as breathing. It was instinctive to his form, yet alien to his mind.

Sabado soared through the sky of Hueco Mundo, his impossible formation of wings carrying him.

~~~​

His cave waited for him, as it always did. It was a lot larger and more spacious than he remembered.

Sabado landed inside, coming to a screeching halt as his talons scraped across the stone floor. He had only been gone a few days, but it had felt like months. The comfort of familiarity returned to him, his eyes shutting as he wandered over to his tall tower of books.

Taller than him, actually. He’d need to change that. He still hadn’t forgotten Gulliver’s Travels, but rest called to him before all else.

With a flick of a clawed finger and a spark of crimson light from them, he lit the fire once more. The warmth of fire joined the comfort. The small Adjuchas plodded on over to its side, and curled up on the spot, his wings tightening like a blanket over him.

His hands moved to take the sword at his side and bring it before him.

It was strangely heavy. Strangely judgemental. Yet even still…

He drew the Zanpakuto from its scabbard, ever so slightly. Enough for the metal of the blade to glint from what little light slipped through his stone-like wings.

It did not talk to him. The fire crackled. He had his thoughts to himself.

Everything remained so quiet.

 

[Khepri14]

...Well, canon's certainly been completely fucked. Or if not, it's definitely one major step off the rails. Either way totally watched.

One question though, are we gonna get attacks named after every day of the week?

And I wonder if Nejibana is still there or not...

 

[aevum]

Really really liking it this far! I'm also trying to imagine a running and jumping Gillian.
Anyway looking forward to more!

 

[HymnOfRagnarok]

I've really warmed up to Sabado. He is very zen, and the chat with Hallibel was pitch perfect. It helps give the feeling of age, knowing that he is still a Gilliam when she's completed her ascent to Vasto Lorde.

Aaroniero was also built up quite well, with a wonderful reveal of what Sabado did to him. And for a little bit, I honestly though Aaroniero killed him, and that this would be how the SI's story ends, so the reveal and sudden comeback was even better.

Looking forward to more.

 

[BradLaw]

This is a very interesting change to Bleach and I am curious as to how canon may change as this story progresses. Keep up the good work!

 

[CovertCloud]

This is so damn good. Also, sounds like with his transformation he probably won't be able to pull off his king of the dead psychopomp routine any more.

I'd say angel instead, but with the mask and the general creepynes I'd be pretty surprised if people actually believed him. They'd probably think he's a fallen angel tbh.

I really liked how he was happy to stay as the Tall Owl, and even though he never knew it, he had an effect on those around him. Even more interesting is how they drew comfort from his unchanging nature and the idea that various Hollows around the desert feel that they are alive because of his kindness is really interesting, it all serves to flesh the whole place out in cool ways.

His transformation is going to be an interesting little change for Hueco Mundo's society, which is such an interesting thing to say. I almost want to see various hollows learn about it.

Also, it seems like most of his problem is he knows quite a lot, but he doesn't really have anything he wants from that knowledge. At the same time, he's very aware that to act loses him that knowledge, and he is afraid he would regret that choice when finds something he wants.

At the same time, it's not like most of his actions can really change the large strokes of what will happen. Aizen gonna Aizen no matter what, Soul king and Quincy stuff has already mostly happened, really all he can mess up is if he interacts with the main characters backgrounds, or the details/outcome of the story, which he's already rolled the dice on a bit.

 

[joeblac]

great chapter and progress, cant wait to see where this goes

 

[matrience]

Very interesting, watched

 

[Shadowbyte]

The 'Not-so-tall'Owl that Lurks, becomes an adjuchas. Calling him that is fitting. Who knows if one retains their name after the egg of violence is complete. He might have lost a bit of self their. Can he remember what it was like to be human?

He seems to be very talented at using Cero. There are many different variants of Cero that he could pull of. Cero Cornea for example.

Or as part of a physical attack, like Mashiro's Super Cero which would made more since as a Bala combination. I guess if you're a fan of the Rider kick and have actual combat experience its going to look different.

After spending so long as a Gillian, is it possible that Sabado retained the Negacion ability? Maybe even developing something similar to Caja Negacion.

Sonido seems to require a more humanoid form usually in the form of a Vasto Lorde or regular Arrancar.

 

[varoksa]

So why does he have a zanpakuto? i remember something about how that mutant gillian ate a soul reaper but nothing beyond that.

edit: i just realized, was that vision the mindscape of the shinigami? I just remembered how ichigo's mindscape worked, may have been the zanpaktou itself, i am fairly sure it was water based im going to have to read the wiki.

 

[Shadowbyte]

So why does he have a zanpakuto? i remember something about how that mutant gillian ate a soul reaper but nothing beyond that.

edit: i just realized, was that vision the mindscape of the shinigami? I just remembered how ichigo's mindscape worked, may have been the zanpaktou itself, i am fairly sure it was water based im going to have to read the wiki.

Click to shrink...

Though shinigami and hollow are similar planes of power separated by some barrier; the hollow and arrancar are not separated by that barrier.

 

[Disposable_Face]

So... If you were at Sekigahara, were you also there 18 years earlier, by chance, at Honnoji?

Edit: If Oda didn't end up as a Hollow, I would be immensely surprised.

 

[varoksa]

Im hoping he still becomes a Espanda, they each have an aspect of death attributed to them, maybe his would be acceptance? The only positive one after possibly Harribals 'sacrifice'.
Would be very interesting seeing the other Espada deal with the legendary wise hollow espicially considering how many have a history with him like Yammy.

Is it me or does it feel like Ulquiorra would follow him around like a duckling?

 

[Disposable_Face]

Im hoping he still becomes a Espanda, they each have an aspect of death attributed to them, maybe his would be acceptance? The only positive one after possibly Harribals 'sacrifice'.
Would be very interesting seeing the other Espada deal with the legendary wise hollow espicially considering how many have a history with him like Yammy.

Is it me or does it feel like Ulquiorra would follow him around like a duckling?

Click to shrink...

Starrk would hate him for willingly choosing to spend most of his life alone.

 

[varoksa]

Starrk would hate him for willingly choosing to spend most of his life alone.

Click to shrink...

Eh i wouldnt think so its not like there arent other anti social hollows those are fairly common, he is just different for being both social and solitary.

 

[Grey The Wanderer]

Super cool story. Kinda weird that Sabado didn’t use Negacion at all though.

 

[Greaterfish]

One of the things that has always disappointed me about Bleach was how little they used the afterlife as an actual setting with all of its implications. Your second chapter really lives up to what I think the setting could of be been. It reads like a fable, but doesn't feel about of place from the rest of the chapters at all. It really contextualizes the rest of the chapters and gives it a mythic/gothic bedtime story that is just amazing. I'm a big fan of the story

 

[varoksa]

Super cool story. Kinda weird that Sabado didn’t use Negacion at all though.

Click to shrink...

Im fairly sure they cant use it on themselves. Otherwise they would be too hard to kill, seems more like a get out of jail card back to hueco mundo