c16 - Achukas?
Deep within the Forest of Menos, where moonlight could not pierce the eternal dusk, four colossal trees wound around one another. Their vast branches interlocked, forming a twisted, natural fortress that served as a high perch in the forest canopy.
"Roar!"
A monstrous voice bellowed from within the wooden nest a Hollow roar laced with fury and disdain. Standing tall at nearly five meters, the creature known as Hubert Allen had a humanoid upper body fused with a serpentine lower half. His crimson mask gleamed faintly as he glared down at another Hollow part human, part scorpion cowering before him.
"Ian Gray, you worthless degenerate," Hubert hissed, his voice venomous. "The two hundred Gillians I entrusted to you vanished! Do you seriously expect me to believe they weren't devoured by your own pathetic underlings?"
With that, Hubert's muscular tail lashed out like a whip, sending Ian Gray hurtling through the air, crashing down from the nest in a spray of bark and dust.
Groaning, Ian Gray scrambled back up, his segmented scorpion limbs twitching. He lowered his head in shame and growled, "Great Lord Hubert Allen, I swear on my mask, I haven't consumed them. I've already marked the Hollow responsible. Permit me to lead a purge and execute this traitor!"
Hubert smirked cruelly. Watching Ian bow and grovel before him, he savored the humiliation. "Hmph. You always were a failure. A fallen warrior unworthy of evolution. Fine. Hunt him down. Kill the fool who dares challenge my order and don't return until his mask is shattered!"
"As you will, my exalted master!"
Snarling under his breath, Ian Gray turned and led a host of standard Gillians away from the treetop. Their heavy footfalls echoed across the barren forest floor. Midway through the march, Ian's temper erupted. His tail shot out, impaling the closest Gillian through the mask. The creature shrieked before Ian tore it apart with feral rage.
"Damn it! Damn it all!"
The rest of the Gillians trembled, terrified by Ian's outburst. For all their size, they were little more than mindless pawns.
Ian Gray had once been an evolved Hollow a true Adjuchas. For centuries he prowled alone, avoiding alliances and refusing to command the Gillian hordes. But that changed the day he met Hubert Allen, an Adjuchas of equal strength but with one key advantage subordinates.
Though matched in power, Ian was overwhelmed by coordinated attacks. Hubert deliberately crippled him during their duel, slicing away vital portions of Ian's mask and body. Unable to regenerate or hunt effectively, Ian's spiritual integrity began to erode. He lost the stability required to maintain his Adjuchas form—and regressed into a malformed Gillian with lingering intelligence.
To ensure loyalty, Hubert embedded spiritual venom into Ian's core, enslaving him. Ian was forced to command lesser Hollows on Hubert's behalf, a mockery of the evolution he once strove for.
Now, Ian Gray led over a hundred Gillians through the Forest of Menos, closing in on a specific target...
...
Elsewhere, Ye Chuan was in the middle of yet another hunt.
For several months, he had relied on his breath suppression technique to move silently among the Gillian herds. He struck without warning, culling the weakest. By his count, he had killed over one hundred Gillians.
His spiritual pressure had multiplied tenfold since entering the forest. His body had stabilized at around twenty meters towering for most Gillians, but still short of the typical Adjuchas. Yet no matter how many souls he devoured, no evolutionary shift occurred.
"Could it be that consuming Gillians alone isn't enough to reach the Adjuchas stage?" Ye Chuan wondered. "Maybe I need to defeat one myself..."
He recalled the manga: most Hollows who evolved into Adjuchas did so after internal struggle among Gillians, but few had self-awareness. None had achieved such numbers or retained individuality while consuming over a hundred others.
Still pondering, he spotted another lone Gillian nearby. Without hesitation, he cleaved it in two with a heavy slash from his soul-forged Zanpakutō. His tail extended, and a dark golden whirlpool appeared at the tip, sucking in the Gillian's spiritual remains.
Before he could finish absorbing it, a second Gillian stumbled into view.
"Heh... this feels like a trap."
Even so, Ye Chuan didn't back down. His current power was close to Adjuchas, and unless he encountered a true Vasto Lorde a rare evolutionary peak in the Bleach hierarchy he didn't fear ambush.
He slew the second Gillian, then sensed a third. Chuckling darkly, he decided to play along and consumed the third one, too.
The moment he finished, the trap was sprung.
A thundering cadence of footsteps shook the earth. Dozens of Gillians emerged from the surrounding forest, forming a rough circle around him. Their empty masks reflected no thought only blind obedience.
From the ranks emerged a smaller figure barely seven meters in length. His humanoid torso glistened with chitinous armor, two massive pincers clamped shut at his sides, and a thick, segmented tail waved behind him like a scorpion's stinger. His red mask had a human-palm-sized hole—a mark of previous injury.
"An Adjuchas?" Ye Chuan narrowed his eyes. "No... based on the decay of his reiatsu... this is an unstable Gillian that fell from Adjuchas."
It was the first intelligent Hollow he'd seen since entering the Forest of Menos, save for the ambush in the desert months ago. His eyes lit up with curiosity and bloodlust.
Ian Gray studied Ye Chuan's tall frame, puzzled by the clarity in his eyes and the long, blade-like weapon he wielded.
"What are you? You look like an Adjuchas... but why would one of your level still bother with hunting basic Gillians? And that sword... it reeks of a Shinigami's reiatsu."
Ye Chuan didn't answer, only smirking.
"He mistook me for Adjuchas? So my spiritual pressure's already reached that level?"
Pleased, Ye Chuan met Ian's gaze head-on. There was no fear in his movements.
Reading the silent challenge, Ian Gray raised one claw and motioned for the Gillians behind him to hold. He wanted this fight for himself a proper duel.
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