The battle had taken a dire turn. The situation was overwhelmingly unfavorable, and Nelliel Tu Odelschwanck's body was covered in deep wounds. Her spiritual pressure was rapidly declining, leaving her barely able to stand.
"She's at her limit! Let's finish her off together!"
Charlotte Chuhlhourne—shouted, rallying the five other Adjuchas-class Menos. They immediately began charging their most powerful ceros, eager to end the fight.
"Damn… I won't be able to block this one."
Nelliel's thoughts raced, but her body refused to move. She had no strength left to evade.
"Is this really how it ends…?"
As a former Espada, she had witnessed countless deaths, yet she never expected her own to come so soon.
"What a shame. I just made a good friend… and now I have to say goodbye."
She closed her eyes, a quiet regret filling her heart—but at least she had done her best to protect Pesche and Dondochakka. If she had to die, at least it meant something.
Then—
BOOM!
A cataclysmic surge of reiatsu exploded in the distance—so immense it warped the air itself.
"What!?"
Charlotte and the other Menos flinched violently. Their bodies trembled under the sheer weight of the pressure, their half-charged ceros fizzling out as instinct screamed danger.
"This… this reiatsu…! It's impossible!"
It was unlike anything they'd ever sensed—terrifying, oppressive, and utterly beyond their comprehension.
"How?! Who in Hueco Mundo possesses such power?!"
"Could it be… a newly evolved Vasto Lorde?"
"No! Even the strongest Vasto Lorde wouldn't radiate pressure like this!"
While Vasto Lorde-class Hollows were said to rival or surpass average Gotei 13 captains, there were only a handful of beings in existence whose reiatsu reached truly monstrous levels—Genryūsai Shigekuni Yamamoto, Sōsuke Aizen… and perhaps one or two others long thought extinct or sealed away.
"Wait—it's coming this way!"
The Adjuchas turned their horrified gazes toward the horizon. In that instant, Nelliel was forgotten. Survival instinct overrode all else—because something far more terrifying was approaching.
"Who…? Who is that…?"
Even Nelliel, barely conscious, could feel it. The reiatsu was staggering—so immense it drowned out her own senses. And yet… something about it felt familiar.
"Is… is it him…? Could that really be… Akira…?"
Confusion warred with disbelief. She'd never known anyone named Akira with power like this—certainly not in Hueco Mundo. Was it a trick? A hallucination brought on by blood loss?
"We must retreat—now!" Charlotte barked, her voice tight with panic.
They all understood: whoever—or whatever—was coming wasn't an opponent they could hope to face. Perhaps only their former king, Baraggan Louisenbairn, might have stood a chance… and even that was uncertain.
"Understood!"
The Adjuchas scrambled to regroup—but retreat wasn't so simple. One misstep, and that overwhelming presence might decide they were worth erasing.
"BOOM!"
A hasty Cero tore through the air—raw, unrefined, fueled by panic rather than precision. Smoke and debris billowed across the barren dunes of Hueco Mundo.
Then—silence.
Not a breath. Not a footstep.
Every Menos stood frozen, as though time itself had congealed around them. An invisible pressure clamped down on their very souls, rooting them in place.
Charlotte's voice cracked, trembling like cracked glass.
"S-So strong…!"
The Reiatsu had arrived.
And when the smoke parted like a veil—
Akira stood unharmed.
No flash step. No incantation. No shikai release. He hadn't even drawn his blade fully. Yet the sheer density of his spiritual pressure alone had shattered Charlotte's assault before it could land.
It was brute force elevated to art—the kind only someone who'd studied Zaraki Kenpachi's battles could replicate. Not for style. Not for show. But because overwhelming power is the technique.
"You!" Abirama's eyes widened, her breath hitching as recognition struck like lightning. "You're the Shinigami His Majesty ordered us to eliminate!"
Only a captain-level—or beyond—could walk Hueco Mundo alone and make its horrors flinch in his shadow.
Akira's gaze drifted past her, landing on Neliel Tu Odelschwanck, her injuries raw but her eyes wide with disbelief. Then back to Charlotte, who was already signaling for backup from deeper within the desert.
A cold glint surfaced in Akira's eyes—not malice, but finality.
Neliel's voice was barely a whisper, trembling with memory and awe:
"You… Are you Akira? It's really you, isn't it?"
How? How had he grown this powerful so quickly?
With this Reiatsu alone, Grimmjow wouldn't have needed her aid. Akira could've pinned that arrancar down with a thought—and crushed his pride along with his bones.
"Yeah. Sorry for hiding my Reiatsu earlier," Akira said, casual as if apologizing for being late to tea. His hand tightened around the hilt of the Sword of Vowed Victory.
Instantly, the air turned glacial. Charlotte, Abirama, the other Adjuchas—they all felt it: the weight of extinction pressing against their chests.
"We fight—now!" Charlotte roared, shaking off the paralysis. "We're Adjuchas! The pride of Hueco Mundo! We won't be erased by a Shinigami without even swinging a claw!"
Galvanized, the remaining Menos reared back, their hollow masks flaring with crimson light as they pooled Reiryoku into their gaping maws.
Six Cero beams ignited at once—black at the core, wreathed in blood-red fury—casting long, jagged shadows across the wasteland.
Akira didn't flinch.
"Wind…" he murmured.
The translucent barrier of the Wind King dissolved like mist, revealing the blade beneath—gleaming gold, humming with stored energy. Photons condensed along its edge, charged with spiritual power so dense it warped the air.
"CERO—!" the Menos bellowed in unison.
"EXCALIBUR—!" Akira countered.
Golden light erupted.
Six black-red Cero beams met a single, searing lance of radiance—not clashing, but being devoured. The golden torrent didn't just overpower them—it unmade them, reducing their destructive force to ash mid-flight.
"BOOM!!!"
The shockwave ripped through Hueco Mundo like a god's sigh. Sand vaporized. Cracks spiderwebbed across the desert floor for miles.
And then—screams.
Charlotte and his comrades vanished in the golden inferno, their final cries swallowed by the light.
Silence returned.
But this time, it was Akira's silence.