God Yet Lives

*Free from the chains, Taiyo draws her sword and points it at the Taiylow.*

"After all you've done to me, you should die. But I don't want to die. What I do want is control over my body."

<There will be plenty of time to argue about who this body belongs to when we're not dead.>
========================================
*Taiyo regains consciousness in the physical world to find her limbs semi-numb. Senthose keeps stabbing at her chest with his Zanpakuto, & she keeps narrowly dodging.*

[This is your mess. Unless you want to try and clean it up, keep quiet.]

"Hadō #1! Shō."

*Taiyo points her index finger at Senthose, generating a small force to push him away.*

*Senthose counters with a Bala, cancelling the force. The ribbon on Irukandji unravels itself from his arm, wrapping around Taiyo's wrist. He then uses this to jerk his arm back, so that she is pulled towards the point of his weapon.*

"Hadō #33! Sōkatsui."

*Taiyo points her palm at Senthose then generates a torrent of blue spiritual energy and fires it as a direct blast.*

OOC: She deserves this much, at least.

*Senthose cuts through it, stabbing Taiyo in the chest.*

[NOOOO! This isn't how I wanted it to end! Please, just one more chance! I'll be better this time, I swear!]

*Her mask shatters & Taiyo's hands dart out, trying to grab pieces of it. As well, the fur of her Hollow form turns into black Reitsu wisps & slips off of her body. When Senthose removes the Zanpakuto, there's only a minor wound in her chest. Taiyo can feel her eyes tearing up as her limbs stop moving on their own.*

"Is...is she gone?"

[Shouldn't I be dead then?]

Iris: <Right! Let's go, Aera.>

*He grabs Aera's hand and pulls her along, following Enkidu.*

"In a manner of speaking. Whatever you had in that miserable failure of a personality you cobbled together that gave birth to the Hollow still remains. However, it is no longer sentient, & you no longer have Hollow powers. I gouged out the part of your soul that housed your Hollow Reitsu. It seemed like slightly less of a waste than just killing you outright. Of course, I would not have had to resort to either option, if you could have controlled your powers right from the start."

"Err...thanks."

*Taiyo wipes her eyes.*

"Think you could make a way for me to go home?"

*Still glaring at her, he snaps his fingers, a Garganta to the Soul Society opening behind him.*

Enkidu kept walking without checking behind him to see if they were following. He was, however, searching the surrounding area for the spiritual pressure of Senthose and Mortal.

*Aera shakes his hand off and smacks him across the head.*

Aera: <Don't push it.>

*Iris, still walking, grunts a bit.*

Iris: <Geez, you don't need to do that! Now you've gone and hurt my feelings!>

*He turns around and puts on the best pouting face he can muster, which isn't that convincing at all.*

Mortal, thankfully missed all of that after coming to a halt to ponder if when her dragon eats something does she get the nourishment. After planning to wait until she is really hungry before eating something with her dragon she rolls up behind Senthose, "So, what did I miss?"

--

Atae is wigged the fuck out by all of the Menos, and tries to back up, shooting Byakurais at them in the process.

--

Noct frowns a bit, feeling like Euryale insulted her paleness, "I... guess so."

"Oh, that's not what I meant. You're being silly."
================================
"That Soul Reaper I Hollowfied, who killed Starrk, attacked me just now. Something caused the Hollow to reassert itself, & apparently it decided it wanted to eat me. I purged the Hollow, but this could be an issue."
================================
*She pokes holes into the Menos, which seems to piss them off. One of them turns to her & fires a Cero. Lilith appears behind Atae, generating a triangular shield to block it. Noah is pulling himself out from under a tree that fell on him.*

L"The Hell kind of Squad 11 Captain gets beaten by a Menos?"

N"I was...distracted."

L"Focus on your mission, not on the 4th Seat's robes."

N"That is...unlikely."

And now that Atae has just been called ugly, "Um, thanks, oh, Lilith, you're here as well?"

Sab appeared on the scene as well, and shot a cero at the menos that shot its own cero at Atae.

--

"Right, I'm sorry," Noct smiled, "So, are you enjoying the vacation so far?"

--

"Okay," Mortal said, with the same interest a dog would take in geopolitics.

*Noah sighs in a defeated tone. He might've said, "Women." Afterwards, he draws his Zanpakuto & lops off a Menos's foot. It roars as it falls over, into another Menos. The Menos everyone keeps shooting at dissolves. Lilith fires a Byakurai into the face of another one, destroying it.*
=====================================
"Mhm. What about you?"
=====================================
"Sometimes, I think I would have more profound conversations with the Gillians."

Sab continues shooting ceros at menos until they all die, or the plot progresses to a stage where shooting menos is not needed.

Atae does the same with byakurai.

--

"I'm here with the person I love more than anything else in the world," Noctis said, "Of course I'm having a good time... Was that a bit much, I don't mean to wax poetically, but you make it easy to gush."

--

"Some crazy girl that ate Starkk tried to eat you, and you killed the part of her that liked eating people. I got it."

"Not at all. I could gush on & on about you. Well...with one exception. You really oughta learn how to take a compliment."

*She smiles.*
===============================
"A Gillian would have understood too. But it would have injected an air of refinement & culture into the dialogue. Then it would have asked how it can be of service."

*A Gillian roars off in the distance.*

"You just have to know the subtleties in which they communicate."
================================
*The last Gillian roars as Noah sticks his Zanpakuto in it & literally blows it apart.*

L"What are you even here for, anyway?"

N"I...I can't tell you...it's a secret mission."

L"That isn't true. Why are you lying to me?"

*Taiyo had buggered off into the Gargantua and is presumably running home.*

Astarte smiled girlishly as Mortal and Senthose spoke before taking on a more confused expression, "You can... "hollowfy" people?"

*Taiyo steps off into the Garganta & falls into a pond. It closes above her.*
====================================
"What? Oh...yes...that. Aamon developed a Zanpakuto, which he would often use for Hollowfication & Shinigamification. I'd seen it in action enough times to more-or-less copy the technique. And if you can create Hollow powers by cutting the Soul Chain a certain way, it isn't a stretch to assume you can remove them by cutting out the incision."

Astarte had never heard of a "hollowfied" soul reaper before, but when she thought about it, it made sense.
"Thank you for the explanation," Astarte nodded slightly.

"I'll try my best from now on then."

--

"If you say so," Mortal replied, "So, what now?"

--

Atea keeps quiet.