Tossing today’s update in!
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“That was quite entertaining, but is it over already?”
Lucifer spoke with a smirk, looking at the dazed Yeriel who had been rampaging under his fist until moments ago. They were supposed to be standing in his laboratory, but nothing remained of the facility to suggest such a place had ever existed. Like the rest of Hueco Mundo’s desolate landscape, only white sand stretched out beneath their feet.
BOOM!
A burst of crimson Reiatsu erupted from the motionless Yeriel. It was the final glimpse of her hollowified form. In the next instant, the red pressure dissipated, revealing Yeriel exactly as she usually appeared.
“Haa... I’m back? But I have absolutely no strength left.”
Hearing Yeriel’s actual voice instead of the monstrous distorted shrieking, Lucifer knew for certain she had returned to her senses. Furthermore, her Reiatsu had shifted. Until just a moment ago, her Hollow and Soul Reaper powers had been clashing like oil and water, unable to mix, but now she had settled back into a purely Soul Reaper signature. Lucifer found this peculiar.
“What happened to the Inner Hollow?”
“I killed it, obviously.”
“Did the Hollow say anything to you? Something about a horse and a king, perhaps? Or did it threaten to devour you?”
“It just screamed like a beast.”
Yeriel replied with a look of pure disgust at Lucifer’s questions. Hearing that, Lucifer knit his brows as well. Logically, a Soul Reaper consuming a Hollow was an absurdity, but considering the battle he’d just witnessed, there should have been some fundamental change. If she was truly back to her normal self... he could only conclude the experiment was a failure.
“It’s too early to give up. Yeriel, try to activate your Bankai.”
“Impossible, impossible. There’s no way I can pull off a Bankai in this state.”
Indeed, the Reiatsu currently within Yeriel’s body was less than a fraction of its normal volume. She was in abysmal shape. The reason was obvious: the struggle within her inner world and the simultaneous beatdown Lucifer had administered from the outside. While she was tearing herself apart internally, Lucifer hadn't been idle.
During the fight, Yeriel had suddenly manifested High-Speed Regeneration, which served as a green light for Lucifer to start whaling on her with zero restraint. Knowing that any injury would just knit itself back together via her predatory instincts, Lucifer had pummled and tossed her around without a shred of mercy. He nodded at her refusal, acknowledging her exhaustion.
“Fine. We’ll see once you’ve recovered your Reiatsu. The real change will likely only manifest when you enter your Bankai state.”
Lucifer figured she followed the same logic as Ichigo, whose hollowification changes became most apparent during Bankai. For that to happen, she needed rest.
“Besides that, where the hell are we? This isn’t the lab.”
Yeriel looked around at the ruins—or rather, the spot where even the ruins of the lab had vanished. Lucifer gave her a cryptic smile and pointed toward the ground. Yeriel looked down with a clueless expression.
“Huh?”
“This is the lab. And you’re the one who made it look like this.”
“What!?”
Yeriel couldn’t hide her shock. She kept pointing at herself and then at the sand, repeating ‘what’ over and over. Lucifer gave her a confirming nod.
“You lost your mind and went on such a rampage that you wiped my lab off the map without leaving so much as a trace. Anyway, let’s head back. I’ll be sending you the bill for the laboratory repairs later.”
Lucifer turned and walked away, but Yeriel didn’t follow. She remained standing there, staring at the sand with a face of utter disbelief.
The truth was slightly different. While the hollowified Yeriel had indeed attacked him, Lucifer had taken the opportunity to treat her like a punching bag. Since she had High-Speed Regeneration, Lucifer had beaten her like a dusty rug on a sunny day or a stray dog in the heat of midsummer. But since she was trapped in her inner world at the time, she had no way of knowing he was the primary architect of the destruction.
Update! Update! Update!
The bad boy Lucifer’s project to turn Yeriel into a munchkin is in full swing!
This concludes the Hollow Awakening arc! Tomorrow, the kidnapping of Orihime begins. That means Nelliel’s restoration and Ichigo’s group invading aren’t far off. I’ll play around with Ichigo’s group, bait the Captains, and then head straight to the World of the Living to finish this by the end of the week. Kehehe.
Yeriel’s skills were detailed in Chapter 48, but why is everyone acting like Engetsu is dead? Kehehe. I never said she was dead, yet everyone is treating it like a funeral. You people are terrifying.
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