The Supreme Soul, Starting with Death

The Death Girl appeared suddenly on the treetop like a ghost, waving and greeting Gu Shi below with a smile. Before Gu Shi could respond, she flashed forward and sat back on Gu Shi's shoulder.

"You really have a gluttonous appetite. When I came back, I checked and found that you had already eaten three kinds of 'Xu' in the short time I was gone."

Gu Shi rolled his eyes, said nothing more, and continued to follow the scent to find his next target.

Who knows if he was cursed by this world? During the time this madman was gone, he managed to find seven Hollows and fought each of them. He even killed three of them, but he didn't encounter a single Hollow that could open a black cavity when it escaped.

...?

Just as he was about to find a random excuse to change the subject, Gu Shi suddenly felt something was wrong. He took another deep sniff of the Death Girl's scent and raised one eyebrow in confusion.

"That bearded guy has blurred into nothingness?"

This madman went to deal with Big Beard's matter, but when he came back, he didn't smell like Big Beard. Instead, he had a strong smell of emptiness. Gu Shi couldn't help but suspect that this madman had suddenly come up with a brilliant idea and used Big Beard to conduct an emptiness experiment.

Given her style of doing things, it wouldn't be surprising if she did something like this.

"No, when I got there, that guy had already been eaten by the Hollow. I killed the Hollow that ate him."

The Death Girl answered easily, but Gu Shi was stunned for a moment and couldn't help but confirm it again.

"died?"

"That's right, he's dead. So, get ready, big guy, we're going to pick up that little genius, and then we'll be heading back to my territory."

Gu Shi was silent for a moment. He didn't expect that he would have to go back to face Aizen less than a day after leaving that dilapidated shrine. The thought made him feel heartbroken.

However, this might not be a bad thing. This madman's sudden demand for Aizen to move might anger Aizen, and then Aizen could easily dig a hole and kill the madman, thus freeing himself.

Thinking about it from a different perspective, Gu Shi cheered up again, called out to Jiro, and then turned and ran towards the shrine.

It must be said that the Hollow's growth was indeed rapid. Less than a day had passed since he left the shrine, but because Gu Shi had consumed five Hollows during this time, greatly improving his spiritual power level, the time it took to return to the shrine was much shorter than when he left. He returned to the foot of the mountain where the shrine was located in no time.

"Go up and call him, I'll wait for you at the foot of the mountain."

He decisively stopped at the foot of the mountain, and Gu Shiyi stated sternly and firmly:

"If I suddenly ask someone to move, who knows if they'll get angry? I don't want to be caught in the crossfire."

Gu Shi's excuse was reasonable, and the Death Girl was also worried that the genius would get angry and accidentally kill such an important subject, so she nodded considerately.

"That's true. Big guy, you wait for me, I'll bring him down soon."

After saying that, the Death Girl used Flash Step and disappeared from Gu Shi's sight in a few blinks.

While waiting, Gu Shi, who had nothing to do, simply started playing a reaction game with Erlang, repeatedly touching Erlang's head to see if Erlang could bite his paw before being touched.

After playing the boring little game for a while, Gu Shi sighed in disappointment. According to the scent feedback from the shrine above, the two of them hadn't even had a minor conflict, let alone fought. They had already walked past the torii gate together and started moving down the mountain.

【Pity. 】

As Gu Shi was thinking this, he suddenly caught a whiff of something else and looked up at the sky.

Sure enough, at some point, a creature resembling a bat was quietly circling in the air, seemingly observing something silently.

A typical Hollow always exudes a strong killing intent and appetite; once you get to know them, it's easy to sense their approach.

But the Void in the sky was very strange. Gu Shi could not sense any killing intent or appetite from it. Not to mention Void, it didn't even seem like a "life" at all. It was like a hollow mass of air with a physical form.

If it weren't for the faint scent, Gu Shi suspected that even if this creature stayed by his side the whole time, he would hardly be able to detect its presence.

When did he catch up with us? What was his purpose?

Gu Shi muttered to himself, suspecting that this was a special Hollow sent by Aizen to monitor him and the Shinigami girl. Perhaps it had been by his side for some time, but he just hadn't noticed.

Even if Aizen is still alive, theoretically he wouldn't have many magical abilities, but when faced with such a suspicious situation, Gu Shi immediately suspected this super boss.

[...Damn it, when I spotted that bat Hollow, I stared at him a few times, which gave away the fact that I discovered him. This is troublesome. Once Aizen finds out I found out about the camera he planted, who knows what he'll do to me!]

[Damn it, I still lack experience. Now it's impossible to pretend I didn't notice.]

After hesitating for a moment, Gu Shi simply raised his paw and waved to the bats in the sky as a greeting, expressing his friendliness. Even if he couldn't get them to cover for him when reporting to Aizen, as long as they didn't badmouth him, the greeting wouldn't be in vain.

The bat hovering silently in the sky was momentarily stunned. It had been ready to fight when the other party spotted it, but it hadn't expected that the big bear Xu would not only show no hostility but also seem quite friendly.

After a moment's thought, although it didn't see any point in this behavior, the bat still circled in the air for a few weeks as a response to the other party's goodwill.

Upon receiving the response, Gu Shi breathed a sigh of relief, lowered his head, and continued to tease Erlang, pretending that he hadn't noticed anything.

After a few moments of playful banter, the Death Girl, accompanied by a young man who called himself Yusuke but looked exactly like Aizen, walked down the mountain path.

"Sorry to keep you waiting, big guy, we..."

Before the Death Girl could finish speaking, Gu Shi saw a blinding green flash streak across his face, silently piercing through her chest and leaving a deep hole in the ground.

Gu Shi suddenly looked up and saw that there were still some green spiritual particles lingering around the mouth of the bat-like creature, and a second ball of light had already condensed in its mouth.

The next moment, the corner of the sphere of light facing the ground suddenly broke open, and the spiritual particles that had been compressed to the extreme inside the sphere of light poured out through the small hole, forming another dazzling flash of light.

[...Is this...Cero?]

Chapter Thirty-Two: Locks

Cero is arguably one of the most iconic moves of the Arrancar in the later stages of the story, besides Resurrección. Gu Shi is certainly familiar with it.

but……

[So ordinary Hollows can use Cero? Isn't it only possible for at least Killian (lower-tier Hollows) to use it?]

While Gu Shi was filled with doubt, he kept a close eye on the Death Girl. If this madwoman showed even the slightest weakness, he would not hesitate to make his move.

Unfortunately, the moment she was hit by the first Cero, the Death Girl was already covered in layers of Healing and Binding spells, combining healing and defense.

When the second Cero struck, the Death Girl's chest wound, though not yet fully healed, had stopped bleeding and successfully blocked the attack. She looked up at the bat-shaped Cero without hesitation, seemingly unaffected by the hole in her chest.

Is this all the power of Cero is? Or is it that while ordinary Hollows can use Cero, its power is actually far less than that of a Hollow Grande?

"Wow, that's really unexpected."

The Death Goddess, protected by layers of binding spells, gazed at the bat-shaped void in the sky. Her face showed no anger, but rather an expression of great interest.

"A peculiar spiritual energy structure, hmm? And it seems there's more than one lock. Not bad, not bad. Rare materials have come to me willingly. After a day of bad luck, some good things have finally happened."

[A knot? What is that?]

Gu Shi unconsciously frowned and carefully searched through his memories before finally recalling that there seemed to be such a setting in the early part of the story, which said that if the absolute weakness of a spirit was broken, it would lose all its spiritual power.

[What the hell? Isn't the soul made up of spiritual power? What's the difference between losing all spiritual power and a normal person losing all their bones and flesh? No wonder this ridiculous setting never appeared again.]

[But so, there really are chains on a soul? If that's the case, if I can break this madwoman's chains, can I easily kill her?]

Perhaps sensing Gu Shi's confusion, or perhaps simply in a good mood and wanting to share with others, the Death Girl, while stacking more Binding Spells on herself, took the initiative to explain to Gu Shi beside her.

"Big guy, do you know what a 'locked knot' is? Actually, it's not hard to tell from the name, right? It's the place where the soul's chest connects to the causal lock. It's an absolute vital point for a spirit. If it's damaged, it will create a hole in the soul, causing almost all of the spiritual power to leak out."

"However, this is only the vital point of an ordinary soul. Once the Shinigami completes the communication with the Zanpakuto, when it performs its first Shikai, the lock bond will merge into the Zanpakuto. This will not only eliminate the vital point but also stabilize the connection between the Shinigami and the Zanpakuto, allowing for subsequent releases at will."

"The Hollow's bindings, after Hollowfication, undergo a peculiar transformation and merge into the Hollow's mask. This is why a Hollow loses its ability to continue evolving once its mask is destroyed. But!"

As she spoke, the Death Girl seemed quite excited as she raised her finger to the sky, pointing at the Bat Hollow that was preparing its third Cero, her excitement overflowing.

"Look at him! He clearly already has a mask! But there's a lock somewhere just below the void! How amazing! How lucky! His form of existence happens to coincide with my research direction!"

After listening to the Death Girl's excited account, Gu Shi realized the special nature of this bat Hollow. But more than that, he was concerned that he had just thought he had found the enemy's weakness, only to be told that the weakness had long since disappeared.

Disappointed, Gu Shi could only secretly hope that the person standing next to him, who appeared to be Aizen, would step in and quickly come up with some backup plan to kill this dangerous individual who looked unsettling.

However, to Gu Shi's disappointment, the bat Hollow did not seem to be Aizen's subordinate. This young man, who called himself Yusuke, still had that gentle and calm demeanor, and did not feel that the shouting Shinigami girl was dangerous at all.

Just then, the third Cero, which had been brewing for a long time, finally landed. The bat Hollow's aura in the air quickly weakened. Clearly, for someone who was not a Hollow Grande, even if he could use Cero, using it continuously was still a considerable burden and drain.

Seeing this, Gu Shi had given up hope that Bat Void could kill this madman. He only hoped that Bat Void would be smart enough to retreat quickly and launch a sneak attack when Bat Void was stronger.

However, the Hollow Bat had only just completed its Hollowfication and its mind was not yet clear. It was merely following its obsession and instinct to hunt down its enemy. Seeing that the Cero was useless, it suddenly swooped down, intending to kill the Death Girl with its sharp fangs and claws.

Speechless, Gu Shi looked away, knowing exactly what was going to happen next without even looking.

As expected, after giving up its high-altitude and high-speed advantages and taking the initiative to land, the bat's only chance of escape was gone. It was bound tightly by the binding spell in just a few moves and slammed heavily to the ground.

"Haha, I'm so lucky today! Big guy, this shrew is a rare specimen, you can't eat it!"

With a happy smile on her face, the Death Girl picked up the bat-like Hollow who was tied up like a dumpling and tossed it onto Gu Shi's back.

"Come on, take good care of him, let's go home!"

With that, the Death Girl grabbed the young man who called himself Yusuke by the collar, used Shunpo to dash ahead towards her territory, and you could tell how happy she was just by looking at her back.

Gu Shi rolled his eyes helplessly, shook the bat off his back, picked it up with his claws, and followed after it.

The bat-like creature held in Gu Shi's hand remained calm and indifferent, its emerald eyes showing no trace of anger or hatred.

When he was in the Hollowfication stage, he had already lost a lot of emotions. At this moment, there was only an emptiness in his heart. His pursuit of the Goddess Girl was only driven by the obsession he had before he was Hollowfied. He did not feel disappointed when he failed, nor did he feel resentful when he was captured by his enemy.

Seeing that the guy hadn't lost his mind, Gu Shi decided to start chatting with him.

"Why are you so inflexible? If you had run away sooner, you wouldn't have suffered like this. By the way, what's your name?"

[Run away, why? Because of your name? What's the point?]

Her heart felt empty, and her eyes revealed a clear sense of confusion. Although she did not answer Gu Shi's question, she did respond to Gu Shi's words in some way.

As long as there's a response, it's good. After all, he's a rare chatterbox. Gu Shi doesn't care whether the other person finds him annoying or not, and immediately starts rambling on and on.

Gu Shi's conversation was a jumbled mess. One moment he was complaining that he loved spicy food, but there was no chili pepper in this godforsaken place, shattering his dream of eating his ethereal flesh with chili peppers. The next he was saying that Erlang's talent was lacking, and that he hadn't been able to become ethereal after all this time, wasting the mask he had given him. After complaining for a few minutes, the topic shifted to whether having bone armor on one's ethereal body and running around naked counted as liberating oneself and embracing nature.

After rambling on for a while, Gu Shi figured the girl in front of him was probably tired of listening and her attention was no longer on him, so he took advantage of Erlang's excited barking and asked the question he cared about most in a low voice.

"Can you speak in a cryptic voice? It's a gateway to other places."

The bat stared blankly, its claws parting to reveal a small, dark crack.

P.S.: Please recommend and add to your favorites!

Chapter Thirty-Three: Nonsense

Upon seeing the tiny, dark crack, Gu Shi felt a surge of joy and almost burst out laughing. Fortunately, he remained calm and didn't lose his temper.

Taking a deep breath, Gu Shi continued talking about irrelevant topics before Erlang's shouts subsided, lest he suddenly fall silent and alert the Death Girl in front of him to anything unusual.

However, as the nonsense in his mind spilled out, Gu Shi quickly considered the current situation.

"Do you think Death farts? I don't think so. Logically speaking, people fart because food ferments in the intestines and produces gas. Death eats food made of spiritual energy, which is absorbed as spiritual particles as soon as it enters the stomach. There is no fermentation process, so Death definitely doesn't fart. Would Death then use 'You farted' to insult people?"

[I can't be careless. The Black Cavity isn't a teleportation portal; you can't enter it one second and arrive in Hueco Mundo the next. I have to move through the passages within the Black Cavity for a while. Given that madwoman's speed, if she discovers I've entered the Black Cavity, she'll probably drag me back before I even reach Hueco Mundo.]