Thursday 17 December 2015

Bleach Chapter 654 - 656 Review

Best keep up with these while I can.

The Price of Victory

Although Nanao was able to use Shinken Hakkyouken to defeat Lille Barro, the damage has still been done by the Schutzstaffel as Kyoraku collapses after trying to head off to join the other Shinigami. Kyoraku has done a lot to support Nanao in this fight, but I think it is now time for Kyoraku to take a rest and let Nanao heal his wounds for him. After all, he's in no position to fight right now.

Although both Pernida and Lille have both been (seemingly) defeated in the Soul King Palace, they still exacted a heavy price from their opponents, and left them unable to continue fighting.

Mayuri lost Nemu, and Zaraki, one of Soul Society's most powerful fighters, was completely incapacitated by Pernida's "the Compulsory"; now Kyoraku has collapsed from the multiple injuries that Lille has inflicted upon him, and is unable to join the fight with Gerard, which is probably for the best, given what just happened.

Either way, it shows that the Schutzstaffel are not a threat to be underestimated, as they have definitely done more damage to the Shinigami as a whole than the Espada ever did in their entire run as villains.

Inner Spirit of the Sniper


Speaking of the Schutzstaffel, we also see that Lille Barro is not dead from being split in half and scattered into light. I recall myself and others speculating this to be the case, because Hakkyouken was said to "reflect the power of a god" and split it in all directions, a description that does not mean it "kills" the God. It is nice to see that this is the case, as Lille rains down upon the Seireitei as the particles of lights scattered by Shinken Hakkyouken.

While mangaka do take liberties sometimes, I do believe these are literal light beams, since they covered the entire distance from the Soul King Palace to the Seireitei (through the 72 barriers no less), in a matter of seconds to a minute, whereas it took Ichigo half a day to cross that same distance. Moreover, these light beams are strong enough and fast enough to break through the Shakonmaku unimpeded, leaving only the lower ranks of Shinigami left to react to the event.

Aizen is also there as well, but he only made a passing remark about it. It still makes me wonder what exactly Kyoraku intends to use Aizen for. Is he only going to bring him in once only Yhwach remains? Is Aizen going to be used for some other purpose? Or did Kyoraku change his mind after seeing what Aizen did while still in his chair. Regardless, Aizen should at least do something in the future, since each light beam produced a Mini-Lille when they hit the ground.

Now, to examine his appearance once again. He still has the owl head on a long neck like before, but his body has abandoned its angelic, eldritch form and has taken on a more bird-like appearance, in terms of his body and of his legs.

But more importantly, his Heilgenschein (Halo) is missing, and its absence speaks to the nature of Lille's predicament - Lille Barro has lost his power as a God. Given the Halo appears with the Vollstandig, it backs up my idea that the Vollstandig, derived from the Schrift, is what made Lille Barro into a God, and having his power (and body) scattered by Hakkyouken caused him to lose that power and revert to this form.

As I said in my last review, Lille's form in Vollstandig is likely a reflection of what his inner spirit looks like, and that appears to be the case here as well. However, this time the appearance is one that does not reflect the influence of Yhwach's Schrift and Lille's status as a God, so it is less grand and more animal-like, akin to the physical appearance of a Hollow, or what kind of animal form a Zanpakuto spirit may take.

But Lille Barro does not take the loss of the halo, well, demonstrating the ability to still shape-shift his head and starts blasting everything that falls within his sights, vowing to destroy the Seireitei as reparation for losing his power as a God. This does show one of the big holes in every Captain-level Shinigami going up to the Soul King Palace, because it leaves virtually no one to protect the lower ranks should any enemy invade the Seireitei in the mean time.

Fortunately, it seems that Mayuri has that base covered as well.

Kurotsuchi's Monster

Before another group of low-ranking Shinigami are blown away by a flock of Mini-Lille, someone cuts the head of a Mini-Lille and its attack in half before he can fire it off, causing the attack to detonate and blow up the Mini-Lille's head. This shocks the other two, as the man who killed the Lille is supposed to be dead, at which point we see Kira, 'alive' and 'well' with the moon showing through the hole in his torso.

Kira's reanimation was shown in the most recent character book, both in a short chapter, and in a short novel written by Ryohgo Narita. According to the short novel, Kira actually did die, but Mayuri 'reanimated' him and made him more powerful by infusing his repaired corpse with the souls of many dead Shinigami, specifically his own subordinates. This process might be how he reanimated the Arrancar, and the reason Mayuri was stated to have done this is because the thousands of dead Shinigami threatened to disrupt the balance even further, so he decided to stuff the departing souls into corpses and 'reanimate' Arrancar and a Vice-Captain for his own uses.

This shows that Mayuri is able to use the souls of dead Shinigami before they depart to his own design, implying that there is a certain amount of time the soul of a spiritual being remains around its dead body before it departs into the "cycle of souls". Regardless of who it brings back, or if it was to keep the balance of souls stable, it is still a very unethical thing to do on Mayuri's part.

However, I must admit how ironic I find it that it was the Shinigami who were defeated and severely injured or killed (barring Yamamoto, whose body was blown to atoms) who have been healed/'reanimated' and have become far more powerful as a result of it (in the novel, Kira fought and defeated Shaz Domino). It is quite the turnaround, and this particular one does afford us the opportunity to witness Kira's Bankai, something we heard Kubo say was quite gruesome.

With Wabisuke in hand, Kira proceeds to strike two more Lille and incapacitate them with the increased weight from Wabisuke's ability, and is about to take on about a flock of seven before we jump back to the Soul King Palace.

Conversion into Miracle

Renji, stop trash-talking your enemies. Yes, you are now far more powerful than the average Captain, with your true Bankai, but you should at least realize that you have not had much luck in the series. I would think that your defeat by Mask de Masculine the first time would have humbled you, but you just seem to have a bigger head after the Squad Zero Training.

Gerard begins to talk about the nature of "miracles" after Renji claims he cannot beat the Gotei 13, he comments on the extent the Gotei 13 wounded him, and boasts about showing them what a "miracle" is. But Byakuya has none of this, and proceeds to use Senbonzakura to destroy Gerard's head, knocking off his helmet in the process, and even uses it on his body for good measure.

Byakuya has been quite determined since this arc began, and it seems that his defeat by As Nodt only made him more pragmatic, ruthless, and thorough in how he treats his enemies. The sheer brutality of how he dealt with Gerard was even enough to upset Momo, although Shinji reasons that Gerard was the kind of guy who could have turned the situation completely around if they let him have the chance, hence the need to kill him like that.

Shinji, you talk a lot too, but you are correct in this case...Although going so far in killing him was the worst thing the Shnigami could have done, in Gerard's case.

Just as the Shinigami prepare to leave, a giant foot appears out of nowhere, nearly crushing the Shinigami and they turn around to see Gerard has grown to the size of a Norse Jotunn, and all of his injuries have been completely healed in the process, revealing him to have completely white eyes, a laurel crown, and marks in the shape of an "M" on his head. It is at this point Gerard explains the exact nature of his Schrift - "The Miracle" allows him to "convert" the damage he takes into various effects. I say "various effects", because Gerard says this is the first time enough damage has been done to him to allow him to attain the "Size of God" he now possesses.

If this is the first time it has happened, then it stands to reason that he is almost a counterpart to Gremmy - Gremmy increase the power of "The Visionary" by creating another of himself, whereas Gerard's "The Miracle" achieves certain effects based on how much damage he has sustained against an opponent. It seems like a very circumstantial power, but its core premise is not "miraculous happenings", per se, but "conversion". The effects he "converts" damage into are what are "miraculous", but the power itself is based around "conversion".

It is not an "empowerment"-type ability in the same was as "The Superstar", "the Overkill", "Ira", or "Dirty Boots" - those require certain conditions to be met, and do not involve direct "conversion".

Funnily enough, the closest comparison I actually can make to Gerard's "conversion" is Hanataro's "Hisagomaru" - Hisagomaru takes the injuries of those its "cuts" and "converts" those healed injuries into power.

The rest of chapter 655 is relatively simple: Gerard demonstrates that his power has increased in proportion to his size, and he completely wrecks the Gotei 13. He squashes both Hinamori and Shinji with a hand, he effortlessly blocks Senbonzakura bare-handed and swats Byakuya away with his shield arm, and he finishes by literally blowing Rukia and Renji away, levelling the area, leaving Gerard to boast about how no "miracles" are coming for the Shinigami.

This is terrifying. Rukia, Renji and Byakuya were all trained by Squad Zero, and Byakuya and Renji were seen overwhelming Gerard when fighting together in chapter 654. But he uses "The Miracle" once to convert his injuries into his "Size of God" form, and he curb-stomps them. I've said this before about Nimaiya, but now I will say it again - I have only seen something like this with Aizen, and even then the quality of the people fighting is quite different, because Rukia, Renji and Byakuya are all far more powerful than the average Captain at this point (Renji wiped the floor with Mask, who defeated both Rose and Kensei easily without using his full power or Vollstandig), yet they still got beat like that.

The Heart of the Soul King

Meanwhile, Askin is casually observing from a distance that Gerard has activated his Schrift, to the extent that he decides to tell Ichigo about the nature of the Schutzstaffel.

The first point he makes is that Lille Barro was the leader of the Schutzstaffel, and was the first Quincy to ever be bestowed a Schrift by his Majesty. This seems contradictory, because Lille himself said he was "The last Quincy" bestowed power by Yhwach. Either it is a translation error, or Yhwach gave the original generation of Stern Ritter power by means other than a Schrift, with Lille being the first one given a Schrift, the new means.

As to why he calls himself "The last Quincy" bestowed power, Yhwach stated that, in his eyes, the Gotei 13 died a thousand years ago "together with [the Quincy]". Perhaps Lille was the last of the original Quincy a thousand years ago to be given power by Yhwach, but the first to be given the Schrift. The idea that he is "the last Quincy" implies the mind-set that all modern Quincy are not considered to be "true Quincy" by the higher-ups in the Vandenreich.

But the important stuff is with Pernida and Gerard. Gerard and Pernida are unique in that neither of them had any special powers bestowed upon them by Yhwach, as their powers had long been in place. As a result, those two were given Schrifts in recognition of their status, rather than as a means to "awaken" their power. Askin talks about how the Stern Ritter were "bestowed special powers", but I think this is more related to possibly the Vollstandig or awakening their "latent power", rather than Yhwach being the source of all Quincy abilities.

After all, the Lloyd brothers were born with their power, Askin was presumably taken in by Yhwach because "he would not die", and Haschwalth was born as a Quincy with the ability to share power, like Yhwach.

Because Pernida and Gerard already possessed their own abilities, rumours existed in the Vandenreich regarding who they were. As we saw in Mayuri's fight, Pernida was the "Left Arm of the Soul King", which was in fact the rumour that Askin describes.

On the other, Gerard Valkyrie of the Schutzstaffel, Stern Ritter "M" - The Miracle, is "The Heart of the Soul King". Since the rumour regarding Pernida is true, then it stands to reason the rumour regarding Gerard is also true as well.

Originally, we all believed that it was simply the limbs of the Soul King which were missing from the main body, but now we see that the Heart of the Soul King is also missing, which leaves open the possibility that there are at most two more parts of the Soul King missing from the main body. I will save it for a theory later on, but right now we have: The Left and Right Arms, the Left and Right Legs, the Heart, and the Body of the Soul King. The Body of the Soul King is what the Shinigami have used to "regulate the flow of souls", while the rest of the parts were cast away.

We know the Right Arm came to be worshipped as "Mimihagi" in a district of the Eastern Rukongai, but now we know for a fact that Yhwach not only collected the Left Arm of the Soul King, but also the Heart of the Soul King, which became an independent entity much like Mimihagi, only with a Human form. The fact that both are Quincy, and that both are serving under Yhwach raises further questions about the true nature of the Soul King, and his actual relationship with the Shinigami.

This also leaves the question as to what other parts of the Soul King there are and who they may be. It has already been speculated that Gremmy may turn out to be "The Mind of the Soul King", given his true form as a disembodied brain in a protective casing, and the incredible powers of "The Visionary".

But now that I'm reviewing the chapter, I see the gap in that logic. While Askin was talking about the Schutzstaffel, he made mention of all the Stern Ritter as a whole, pointing out those two as having already possessed their abilities. He could very well be just like Lille - an exceptionally powerful Quincy whose ability was awakened by Yhwach's Schrift. After all, if that were the case, Askin would have made mention of it.

That said, looking back on it, Gremmy never did use a Vollstandig (even if giving him one might allow him to make a freakin' sun), he can create "life" via Stern Ritter with their own abilities, and even make another of himself. I don't know what to think when it comes to Gremmy, and Askin himself talked about Pernida and Gerard's natures as rumours and theories made on account of their abilities.

Someone like Gremmy did not seem to have such rumours about him, although Stern Ritter were apprehensive of his power. That said, perhaps such rumours could not spread, because he was apparently locked away by Yhwach until he deemed him necessary. He is one of the odd Stern Ritter out, and I would be happy to see if he somehow ties into the mythos of the Soul King's missing pieces.

Instant K.O. Area-Of-Effect Lethal Dose

"But how could Askin be talking so casually when he is fighting Ichigo Kurosaki?"

Because he was explaining this to Ichigo while he was eating dirt.

Either his Shinigami robs are just that baggy, or Kubo needs to learn how to draw people lying down on the ground better, because Ichigo almost looked as flat as board in front of Askin.

Remember what I said about the Schutzstaffel proving themselves to be a greater threat than the Espada? Well, the fact that Askin has taken down Ichigo without even a scratch on him is proof enough of that, as two of the five Special War Potentials have now been defeated by the Schutzstaffel with little difficulty. It really does set Askin on a level far apart from his fellow Stern Ritter, even if he too has been empowered by the Auswahlen - Askin easily knocked Ichigo out, whereas Bambietta's Stern Ritter brigade were being knocked around by Ichigo casually. It is no wonder Yhwach chose him to be one of the Schutzstaffel.

At this point, Inoue and Sado arrive and try to help Ichigo, with Sado attacking Askin, despite Ichigo telling them to stay back, but they fall within the radius of Askin's "Gift Bad", and begin collapsing and choking on the super-dense reishi in the Wahrwelt.

I will be blunt and say this is precisely how I imagined things would play out should Inoue and Sado come up against Askin - they would immediately be affected by "The Death-Dealing", and keel over. Also, Askin's power works as I imagined it would - he has to take in whatever element he wants to manipulate with "The Death-Dealing" for it to work. I suppose this means the "Gift Ball" Askin sent Grimmjow was either based on "reishi" or café au lait.

But this basically shows how dangerous Askin's ability is - you either have to take him out from a distance, or be immediately incapacitated by "The Death-Dealing". Based on what he says about "Gift Bad", it appears one may have to be on the ground and in physical contact with the "Gift Bad" for it to work, because...

Laid-Back Arrogance

Yoruichi was unaffected by it when she was hanging behind Askin. He is not shocked here, but he does look a bit annoyed at the cat that is now hanging behind him and mocking his power, much like how Bambietta once mocked it.

I must say, I am kind of in agreement with Askin, because Yoruichi, despite being the eponymous "God of Thunder" referenced in the title, is looking quite far down at Askin. I do not know why, but her rather laid-back attitude towards Askin throughout their entire fight in the chapter is kind of annoying. Even when she uses an advanced form of Shunko - Raijin Senkei - she still maintains that same laid back air of arrogance, simply telling Askin how she doesn't have time to deal with him and that he would let them through.

Askin even compared Yoruichi to Bambietta, saying that he prefers to fight with a certain amount of elegance and cachet, with those who simply brute force their way in battle i.e. "wringing people's necks" being more like Bambietta and Yoruichi. For Askin, it is about style and presentation (now I'm imagining him with Megamind's voice), both in terms of fighting and in terms of the value of women.

So Yoruichi's dead-pan look when she throws one of Askin's Heilig Pfiel back at him is kind of annoying, for my part.

And I know this is going to come back and bite her, since she just gave Askin a huge dose of electricity that he is likely going to channel through "The Death-Dealing". Askin is just that much more interesting, in my opinion. You don't go downing Ichigo in such a laid-back manner and not be a boss.      

Friday 27 November 2015

Bleach Volume 71 - Chapters 644 - 653 Review

Like the last one I did, I will try to get right to the point.

Gratitude to the Monster

Well, to carry off from my last review, I will confess I was wrong about Pernida's defeat. It seems that Pernida was indeed defeated by the accelerated cellular division of growth and cells, as chapter 644 starts with the pieces of Pernida's body exploding, but not before Pernida gets one last hit on Mayuri by attacking his feet with the "Compulsory", rendering him unable to walk.

Yes, I was wrong about Pernida surviving the fight (even if I still have some suspicions), but I do realize that the fight needed to wind down at some point. There are still many questions regarding Pernida and why it joined Yhwach, but I realize that getting those answers to those questions might reveal certain things too soon.

NOTE: No comments about the ever-absent Hanataro, because the omake in Volume 70 revealed his divine luck.

Ikkaku and Yumichika then approach Mayuri, who tells them to open the Body Protection Capsules that Nemu brought along when they entered the Soul King Palace. Inside the capsules are Rangiku and Toshiro, who were previously unaccounted for when the head-count on all the Shinigami was made a while back. As Mayuri stated, their zombification has been reversed, even if it was at the cost of shortening their life-spans. Toshiro then thanks Mayuri for saving his life. Mayuri instructs Ikkaku and Yumichika to place him and Zaraki in the other two Body Protection Capsules. Upon doing so, they then thank Mayuri for saving Zaraki, and run off to accompany Rangiku and Toshiro.

But Mayuri is not concerned about the thanks of the other Shinigami that would muster lovey-dovey fuzzy-wuzzy feelings of friendship if this were any other manga - Mayuri's great joy at the moment is how a soul that he created from nothing, Nemu, had evolved on her own accord, and his elation at having surpassed Urahara in that respect...Though I'm starting to suspect Jinta and Ururu are two such souls.

In case anyone is wondering about my thoughts on that, Rose and Kensei did not get the same treatment. You can see the two capsule behind the ones Toshiro and Rangiku were in were empty, so they are still zombies, confirming that those two, at the very least, did die.

While I still stand by my view of Mayuri being a monster, there is no denying that he has really done a lot to help his fellow Shinigami. He saved Zaraki from being killed by Pernida, and he reversed Toshiro and Rangiku's zombification, all with his standard pragmatic attitude. You will not find many Shounen characters like that on the protagonist's side outside of Dark Shounen, and it does convey Urahara's original intent when he released Mayuri - dangerous elements, if given the proper environment, can become a valuable asset.

But still, Mayuri still has a lot of weight to the sins he committed in the past, and there is the matter of him turning Kensei and Rose into his own brand of revenants (much cooler than zombie, wouldn't you say? ). Byakuya did call Mayuri out on this, but he still remained quiet about it to everyone else. I suppose that Mayuri's benefit to the war cause outweighs past sins.

Shadow Games

Then we cut back to Kyoraku and Co, where the comment is made that all of the Vice-Captains have been picked off by Lille Barro aside from Rukia, Renji, Hinamori and Nanao. I do not know if this also refers to the Visoreds, since most of them are technically Vice-Captains as well, but only speaking and mentioned characters show up in this chapter and a later one, so I suppose next week will provide us the answer.

At any rate, Kyoraku knows that there is no other way to deal with Lille than to confront him directly, so he turns to draw attention to himself and assert Lille's position. Kyoraku is completely successful, as he is able to use Daruma San Ga Koronda to make Lille shoot a "Kyoraku" he saw via his "reikaku", and then get behind Lille and engage the battle after banter with the Stern Ritter, ending with the declaration that he is the Captain-Commander of the Gotei 13.

From the very beginning of the fight, Kyoraku goes all-out with the games, and it is fair to say that he held back a lot when he was fighting against Starrk. For starters, Kyoraku never used Daruma-San on Starrk, and we saw Lille was able to dodge Kageoni. Moreover, this is where Kyoraku takes a card out of Aizen's deck with Kageokuri, which he uses to create shadow illusions of himself should Lille Barro look at his shadow with his "reikaku", turning Lille's strength into a weakness to be exploited.

Arrogance of Shinji

Now, just hear me out before anyone starts throwing torches.

When Shinji pretty much vetoed anyone aside from Nanao going to help Kyoraku, he uses the persona of two individuals to get his point across: Ukitake and Yamamoto. Now, that is not to say that Shinji did not have a point, particularly about what the duty of the Captain-Commander of the Gotei 13 is supposed to be (although the Captain-Commander would be better fit to lead the entire group than deal with an enemy on his own), but that highlights a big problem with the character - Shinji has a lot of pride, to the point of arrogance.

We already saw this back in FKT when he thought Sakanade would be enough to get the upper-hand on Aizen, and he even paid for that price big-time when he used it against Bambietta - she took him out immediately when she went Vollstandig. Moreover, if I may remind you, Yamamoto going off on his own against the enemy is precisely what got him killed in the first place.

In certain respects, it is both good and bad that the Shinigami did not go to his aid, but I'll get to that later.

But the biggest evidence of this is when the remainder of the Gotei 13 comes up against Gerard Valkyrie, setting up his fight immediately after the conclusion of Shunsui's fight. Although Renji appeared confident enough to take Gerard on his own, Gerard is having none of that one-on-one duel-of-honour stuff and wants a straight up multi-man melee with him against all the Shinigami.

And Shinji is the one who says that Gerard talks big.

Shinji, you have no right to say someone talks big when you are one of the series' biggest talkers with only a nibble for a bite. You talked big to Aizen, he owned you; you talked big to Bambietta - backwards, even - and she owned you. Now you are claiming Gerard is talking big, and I will not be surprised if you and Love try some Bankai tag-team on Gerard, and he owns the both of you.

The Man Closest to God

Back to Shunsui and Lille Barro.

In the beginning of the fight, Kyoraku's Kageokuri definitely gave him the upper-hand, using it offensively in a way that would make Aizen himself proud, even pulling off multiples at a time to give him the opportunity to run Lille Barro through with Katen.

But because "The X-Axis" also makes Lille himself intangible - his gun can pierce anything, and anything passes through Lille. He can do this any time he opens his eyes and is placed in danger. Kyoraku pushed him enough to make him open his eyes three times, meaning he is allowed to keep that eye open for the duration of the battle.

The fact that Lille Barro has such power with both of his eyes "open" kind of reminds me of Yhwach's "The Almighty", and As Nodt's "The Fear". To be more specific, all three of them have some ability that is related to their eyes in one form or another - Yhwach can "see the future" and "know" all power when he "opens" "The Almighty"; As Nodt "opens" his eyes when he uses Tatar Foras, allowing him to channel "The Fear" through line-of-sight alone and his own eyes; Lille Barro becomes intangible when he "opens" his eyes. If I am to make conjecture, I would say that As Nodt and Lille, by virtue of having powers tied to their eyes, bear the "mark of a true Quincy" as a result. Neither bear the same eyes as Yhwach, but I would expect a Quincy's "opened eyes" to reflect the nature of their own power. Moreover, both of their powers effectively "evolved" from what they were in base, a contrast to what one sees with most Vollstandig.

But what is interesting about Lille Barro is that he calls himself "the final Quincy granted power by his Majesty" and his greatest creation. I do not think that Lille is a "newcomer" among the Stern Ritter, but that he may have been "the final Quincy" granted power by Yhwach over a thousand years ago. Yhwach said "the Gotei 13 died a thousand years ago along with [the Quincy]", so it is possible that the Schutztaffel are all remnants of the Quincy from a thousand years ago, and there is some perception that the Quincy that came after them are not "true Quincy".

But Lille wastes no time in getting down to business now that he's allowed to keep his eyes open, and activates his Vollstandig, Jilliel.

Herein lies another similarity to As Nodt - both of their Vollstandig drastically change their physical appearance more so than any other Stern Ritter. In Lille's case, he becomes an eight-winged angelic being with three holes in each wing that can fire "The X-Axis", which he proceeds to do to Kyoraku by blasting two holes into his body, with the third shot hitting his straw hat (must not have much practice with this form).

Nevertheless, Lille still managed to severely wound Kyoraku with both strikes and push him into retreat, and we see even Kido is ineffective against Lille Barro's intangibility. But something happens that definitely caught my interest when I first saw it:

Lille Barro uses a teleportation technique when in Vollstandig.

The only time I have ever seen that in Bleach was when Aizen used it.

I'll go into more detail later.

With Kido and Katen Kyokotsu proving ineffective against Lille, Kyoraku ran all the way back to the city where the Gotei 13 started off in when they first arrived, and he now figures that this is far enough way for him to use his last resort - Katen Kyokotsu: Karamatsu Shinjuu.

The Theatre Suicide


Even if they did not get caught up in it, the release of Karamatsu Shinjuu was still enough to cause a dark and despair-filled reiatsu to cover the Wahrwelt, as we see Ichigo and Askin (another fight set-up) and the rest of Ichigo's group sensing and commenting on the nature of the reiatsu. We have seen a lot of Bankai in the series, but Karamatsu Shinjuu's initial release alone is enough to set it apart from the rest.

For starters, the Zanpakuto does not change its appearance at all - the main change is the despair-filled reiatsu that permeates the area, and the fact that the spirit of "Katen" manifests by Kyoraku's side throughout the fight. I can only recall one other Shinigami in all of Bleach canon that has their Zanpakuto spirit manifest invisibly to everyone else when in Bankai, and that someone was Azashiro Soya from "Spirits Are Forever With You".

Moreover, as I agreed with Ohana, Kyoraku's Bankai is more ethereal and other-worldly than any other Zanpakuto we have seen in the series up to this date. This is evident by the fact that it was able to affect a being who is completely intangible to any physical strikes. The First Dan - the wounds that have been inflicted upon Kyoraku are inflicted upon the enemy. The Second Dan - the enemy is inflicted with an incurable disease, caused by shame from their injuries. The Third Dan - drops Kyoraku and Lille Barro into an ice-cold abyss of water until both of their reiatsu expires. The Final Dan - a thread of reiatsu which bypasses Lille's intangibility and slits his throat, blowing his head up.

The Bankai is strongly thematic as well - Kyoraku's Zanpakuto develops from "making children's games reality" to "making tragic theatre reality". In both cases, the "ability" is still the same - a form of entertainment is being made a reality. It is the departure from the innocence of childhood games the despair of adult theatre. Frankly, no one could have expected Kyoraku's Bankai being like this, and even Ichigo was just shocked that Kyoraku's reiatsu became such a despairing feeling in Bankai.

This is not the kind of Bankai that we have seen thus far - Other Bankai simply expand upon already-existing techniques, implementing them in a new fashion - Karamatsu Shinjuu feels like a straight-up evolution from the "children's game" by comparison. This Bankai will make you feel despair, and then it will finish you off with a certain-kill technique.

Pity that Lille Barro is no longer Human in Vollstandig.

A Human Made God

Just when it seemed like Kyoraku had won by blowing up Kyoraku's head, Lille blows a hole through Kyoraku's stomach and teleports above him, affirming that a Shinigami's Bankai could not kill him before he undergoes a transformation into the new form his Vollstandig - reforming his head into that of an owl on a serpentine neck.

Now, time to analyze the appearance of Lille's transformation. To start off, Lille's appearance is meant to reflect the appearance of Angels from the Old Testament. For those not in the knows, the original angels were not the winged, beautiful men (or women) that modern angels are depicted as, but straight up eldritch beings. Cherubim, for example, had four heads - a lion, an ox, an eagle, and a Human - four wings with hands under the wings, "straight" legs (kind of like Lille), and they had eyes everywhere on their bodies, even in the spaces between eyes. In the case of Seraphim, their name means "fiery serpent", they had six wings, and seeing one with all its wings unfurled is a one-way trip to heaven via vaporization.

As for why he is an owl, it seems Kubo dug really deep for this one - owls can represent Jesus himself. The idea is that Jesus loves the darkness of night because he does not want sinners - represented by the darkness - to not die, but to be converted. This is where the dark twist comes in - Lille does not seek to convert sinners, but wipe them out in Yhwach's name as his invincible and immortal messenger.

He also delivers on that boast in terms of power, as his attacks after this transformation become much more destructive, culminating in the Trompete - God's Trumpet - at the end of the most recent chapter, which essentially erased the entire section of the Squad Zero Palace in the area he pointed it towards .

 For further points of symbolism, Trompete could have been drawn from multiple places in the Bible - the trumpet of Joshua which blew down the walls of Jericho, the tradition of Gabriel as the trumpet blower of God, or even the trumpets that blow to signal the coming of the Apocalypse in Revelations.

But even Gods have a means of being defeated, and it comes from one of the most unlikely of places.

Priestess of Shinto

With Kyoraku completely up against the ropes and all but defeated, Nanao finally reaches him and urges him to bring out her Zanpakuto. They hide from Lille in his own shadow, and then Kyoraku proceeds to give us his long-awaited back-story and the history of his kimono.

As it turns out, Kyoraku is Nanao's paternal uncle, because her father was Kyoraku's brother. We learn that the Ise Family was a family of only women throughout its entire recorded history, as those men who married into the family died shortly afterwards, which is the fate that befell Kyoraku's brother. Although Kyoraku and his brother did not have the best of relations, it was Nanao's mother that made things better between the two of them up to the time of his death.

Nanao's mother believed that the curse of the Ise Clan was associated with the Sacred Treasure it safe-guarded - Shinken Hakkyouken, a unique Zanpakuto handed down through the Ise Clan to the head of the Clan, created for the sole purpose of fighting against Gods. It takes in the power of the God, and reflects it in the eight directions. For the sake of sparing Nanao from this curse, her mother entrusted Hakkyouken to Kyoraku, who used Kyokotsu to hide it for him. The price for hiding the Zanpakuto, however, was the death of Nanao's mother, as Central 46 executed her for losing one of Soul Society's "Sacred Treasures".

I have little doubt that this is more of a back-story than what most people expected to see (so many people wanted Lisa or Shutara to be Nanao's mother the week before we actually saw her), and it also goes deeper into the history of Soul Society, along with raising the question as to why a weapon like Hakkyouken even exists, and what God was it originally created to fight against. People complained about Hakkyouken "not fitting" what we knew about Zanpakuto from Nimaiya's words, but I don't think it compromises anything - Nimaiya was likely the one who made Hakkyouken in the first place for its intended purpose, meaning it dates back to Soul Society's foundation.

NOTE: I've heard a lot of people complain about how contrived Hakkyouken's existence seems to be, but the fact that its back-ground expanded on the back-stories of Kyoraku and Nanao, and raised some questions about Soul Society far out-weighs any complaints that might be had, in my opinion.

However, it wasn't exactly an instant-win button for Nanao. Although she could cut off Lille's arm with Hakkyouken, her own inexperience with a sword and fighting almost crippled her with fear when faced with Lille Barro. It is a genuinely human reaction to someone being thrown into battle in such a situation, which may be a product of Kyoraku sheltering her from any genuine battles, as his niece. But there is a strong familial bond between the two of them, and Kyoraku's presence alone is able to comfort her and instill confidence in her.

In Kyoraku's case, the flash-backs also showed how tragic his family life was. Not only did he lose his brother to the Ise Curse when they were starting to become closer, but his sister-in-law also died because she entrusted something of great value to him to safe-guard. You can really tell by his thoughts as he rises out of Nanao's shadow - the shadow of his brother and his brother's wife - and pleads for her to allow him to protect her.

This entire situation is in stark contrast to what happened with Mayuri and Nemu. Throughout the Pernida fight, Nemu was always Mayuri's shadow, and did what he ordered to do. When Mayuri became endangered, Nemu made the conscious choice to intervene and protect Mayuri by fighting Pernida on her own. However, that only led to her own death, as she still remained in Mayuri's shadow.

On the other hand, the "shadow" is the one Kyoraku is in cast in because of his own emotions of sadness over the deaths of his brother and sister-in-law, and he finally emerges from that shadow, symbolically represented by his rising from Nanao's shadow to give her the confidence necessary to stand against Lille Barro. And in doing so, they claimed victory.

The Nature of Gods

Because Lille Barro did become a God when he activated Jilliel. This is affirmed by Hakkyouken cutting his arm off, and reflecting the Trompete's attack back at him in what appears to be the killing blow (I will abstain from making assumptions either way after last time). Hakkyouken reflects the ability of the God it is fighting against, and doing so to Lille's "The X-Axis" is proof that Lille was not simply boasting when calling himself a "messenger of God".

Throughout the fight, I have seen various aspects about Jilliel that reminded me of Aizen in his Hogyoku forms. First and foremost, the ability of teleportation was demonstrated by Aizen in his third transformation, and Lille displayed teleportation in the second act of the fight against Kyoraku. I recall speculating that this "teleportation" might be a Quincy technique of the highest level as a result, and that Aizen's demonstrating that was evidence of the Quincy aspect of his power in his Hogyoku forms.

Second, Lille's regenerative power and transformation. Normally, nothing in Bleach can survive having its head blown off without outside assistance and/or some unique ability (Ichibei's power of "Names" allowed him to restore his entire body by drawing on Ichigo's power), but Lille did just that when his head was blown off by Karamatsu Shinjuu, regenerating it into a new, monstrous form.

People have ridiculed the transformation to no end, but I do believe there is something more symbolic behind the transformation, because Lille's form reminds me of something in particular: the form of a Hollow.

A Hollow's physical appearance, Mask and unique ability are the result of their "lost hearts". In a sense, it is the Human body being subsumed by their inner spirit and being left "heartless" as a result. I believe Lille is the product of something similar being brought about by Yhwach's Schrift - Lille drew on the power of his Schrift to such an extent in Vollstandig that it transformed his body into a form akin to what his own inner spirit would look like.

For the Shinigami, these inner spirits are their Zanpakuto spirit, so what happened to Lille is the same as what happened to Tousen. The name of his Zanpakuto translates into "Cricket", and Tousen's Grillar Grillo turned him into a giant, Cricket-Hollow. It may have been another point that fore-shadowed Zangetsu's true nature, because I am fairly certain that the physical appearance and abilities of Hollows would inherently correlate with what kind of abilities and Zanpakuto spirit said soul would have if they were Shinigami.

As to why Lille became a "God", there is further parallel with Tousen. Tousen became a Hollow-Shinigami hybrid, which gave him the power of a Hollow. Lille Barro was given a Schrift and power by Yhwach, and his Vollstandig turned him into a "God" because of how much he drew upon the Schrift which Yhwach gave him.

In other words, Shinken Hakkyouken would not have worked on Lille Barro if Yhwach, the one who gave Lille that power, was not a God himself, the very thing Aizen sought to become using the Hogyoku.

In Bleach, one way you can define a God is as one who possesses aspects from all four soul types - Quincy and Shinigami, Human and Hollow - in one's own soul. Ever since we saw Auswahlen in action, I have been certain that Yhwach was a Transcendent Being - a God, since Aizen said Hogyoku can 'shatter the boundary between the mortal and divine' - and I do believe Lille is indirect confirmation of that fact, since his Vollstandig is the power of the Schrift which Yhwach gave him. Lille may not be a true "God", but he drew upon enough of the power from his Schrift to make him into one, which means Yhwach himself is a God by proxy.

Which means calling his power "The Almighty" is not an empty boast, and further cements his relationship with the Soul King, whom I believe may have had his limbs cut off by Hakkyouken at some point in the distant past. After all, it is a sword made to fight against Gods, we saw the Soul King de-limbed and two of his missing limbs out and about. No one can not say that Kubo does not play the long-game if this turns out to be the case.      

Friday 13 November 2015

Stabilizing the Flow of Souls - The True Purpose of the Soul King

The Soul King is the linchpin of the worlds of Bleach, and it was created with the purpose of stabilizing the flow of souls into and out of Soul Society, which had previously been rendered "unstable" by the flow of soul. The fact that a Soul Society existed before the Soul King was created indicates that the worlds could indeed exist without the Soul King as their linchpin. Because of his current existence as the linchpin, killing him is said to cause all the worlds to vanish into oblivion.

But is that truly the case, since the Soul Society and Living World existed before the Soul King? Is this collapse a consequence of what the Soul King does to "stabilize the flow of souls"; did the Soul King's power as the linchpin change the fundamental existence of the worlds into ones that cannot exist without him?

Why can Quincy blood not forgive the existence of the Soul King? Is there more to the Soul King's power than to stabilize the flow of souls?

While the subject of the Quincy's survival has given me a sore spot as of late, there are certain factors that have failed to add up ever since Bazz-B and Haschwalth's back-story was revealed. Yhwach calls himself and is believed to be "the father of the Quincy" by his followers and those who hear the stories about him. But in Bazz-B's backstory, he talks about a Quincy folktale regarding a rare occurrence of Quincy born incapable of gathering reishi. Those Quincy were culled when young as aberrations, and the last one born like that before Haschwalth was two hundred years prior, whereas before such Quincy were born every few decades. As we saw in the backstory, Yhwach was that Quincy, born with the ability "to share power with others", just like Haschwalth.

What is important to take from this is not only the existence of unique Quincy (odds are Ginjo and Ichigo might be such Quincy), but the fact that this folktale spoke of Quincy pre-dating Yhwach. If Quincy pre-dated Yhwach, then he could not truly be the "Father of the Quincy", regardless of what was said about him even back then. Moreover, Yhwach is the son of the Soul King, and Pernida said, in a manner reminiscent of royalty, "I have always been a Quincy". Since the Soul King is Yhwach's father, that verifies the existence of Quincy before Yhwach, in a manner of speaking.

Which brings up the question as to when rumour or fiction became reality. When did Yhwach truly become the "Father of the Quincy", whose blood flows in the veins of all Quincy?

I believe it happened in the Quincy-Shinigami War a thousand years ago, and the creation of the Soul King.

Yhwach, when he killed Yamamoto, talked about how the original Gotei 13 exterminated the Quincy, and said "the Gotei 13 died with us a thousand years ago", referring to the Quincy whom Yamamoto exterminated. Despite this, the Quincy still exist in the modern day, and all of them have Yhwach's blood flowing through their veins. To be more specific, all Quincy bear a piece of Yhwach's soul.

So how is that no Quincy have been born outside of those who bear a piece of Yhwach's soul, when Bazz-B's backstory implies that was not always the case?

I believe it all goes back to the entity the blood of the Quincy cannot forgive - the Soul King. If the Soul King is responsible for "stabilizing the flow of souls" into and out of Soul Society, it is entirely possible the Soul King's power even extends to influence the "nature" of souls as they go through the "flow of souls", or even decide where souls go when they die.

In other words, the Soul King could have been preventing any new Quincy being born in the Living World, and may even be the reason why it is believed a Quincy's arrows "erase Hollows from existence".

The idea that the Soul King is preventing new Quincy from being born, outside of the bloodlines which already exist, goes back to the idea of the "memories of reiatsu". The reason why Ichigo's Quincy power came to the surface was a result of Quilge's reiatsu being drawn into his soul after pushing himself to his limits to escape "The Jail". This means that Ichigo's "racial ability" as a Quincy was a "memory" that was dormant until awakened.

What if the Soul King does something opposite of that on a grand scale - whenever a Quincy soul dies and is eventually reborn in the Living World, the Soul King's power to "regulate the flow of souls" allows him to "bury" the soul's memory of their Quincy potential, causing them to reincarnate as normal Humans.

This may be why Quincy have only been born in the past thousand years to Quincy who bear a piece of Yhwach's soul - the piece of Yhwach's soul keeps the "memories of the Quincy" alive within the bloodline, perhaps as one of the "miracles" said to occur as a result of being given a piece of his soul. But this only works so long as the bloodline is "pure", because we know that inter-marrying with Humans may "weaken" Quincy potential.

I am by no means trying to justify the entire Gemischt and Echt Quincy separation; I am trying to explain why it might exist at all in the context of this theory. According to Isshin, an Echt Quincy naturally possesses the ability of Blut, whereas a Gemischt Quincy has to train in order to acquire the ability. It is possible that the influence of Yhwach's soul was weakened when a Quincy has a child with a Human, and as a result the Gemischt child's "memory" of the ability Blut was buried.

Suppose that, if a Gemischt child then married a Human, their Quincy abilities could either weaken further or vanish in their entirety, leaving the child born between a Gemischt and a Human a pure Human, the "Quincy memories" of their soul completely buried.

Given the Soul King was created by the Shinigami, it is likely the Shinigami wanted to erase the Quincy from history forever, since we already know that they have been erasing the Quincy from even their history books and the Academy's curriculum. As to why they would do this, the likely answer would be that the Quincy a thousand years ago posed some kind of threat to the Shinigami's authority. One could say that this is due to the Quincy's arrows "destroying" Hollow souls, because Quincy advocate the through killing of Hollows rather than sending Hollows to Soul Society.

Yhwach's existence gave another possibility to the final destination of Hollow souls - being killed by a Quincy arrow causes the soul to be absorbed by Yhwach, explaining why the Shinigami do not know where those souls go.

But this theory advocates another possibility: Hollows killed by a Quincy could reincarnate as new souls in the Soul Society (the initial description indicates only the piece of Yhwach's soul goes back to him, not the entire soul), but the Soul King prevents that.

NOTE: The other option is that Hollows originally killed by Quincy went to Hell, because they do not "purify" Hollows of their sins, so Hollows are sent to Hell for their sins committed as Hollows. That is what I believe happens when any Hollow is killed by any means other than a Zanpakuto (yes, even Fullbring).

The Soul King "regulates the flow of souls" into and out of Soul Society. This indicates a strong influence over souls as a whole, Human and Hollow alike. How a Shinigami Zanpakuto "purifies" a Hollow soul has not been explained in detail (we know "what" it does, but not "how" it does it), while we are told that Quincy arrows "destroy" Hollow souls. Perhaps it is not that a Quincy arrow "destroys" Hollow souls, but that the Soul King's power keeps those Hollow souls killed by Quincy from reaching their destination.

If that is the case, where would the Hollow souls go? I can imagine two possibilities right now:

1) they fall into the Garganta and vanish entirely, unable to go to Soul Society because they are not "regulated" to Soul Society by the Soul King.

2) They fall into the Garganta and become Kyogoku.

There is a third possibility, but I will get to that later.

What Yoruichi said about the Kyogoku is that they are composed of "stray souls", and that Soul Society does not know how they remain stable in the Garganta outside of having a unique reishi composition compared to normal reishi.

This is very suspect, because the Soul King's ability to "regulate souls into and out of Soul Society" should mean that "stray souls" should not escape just like that, and in a large enough quantity to form a number of pocket dimensions ranging from small to large, no less. One could claim that these build up over the course of a thousand years at minimum, but this might not be the case.

The Valley of Screams could be dimensions that formed from the gathering of Hollow souls that were killed by Quincy, but were stranded in the Garganta because the Soul King's ability kept them from entering the Soul Society. This would create the 'illusion' of Quincy destroying Hollow souls completely, as it is possible these souls became untraceable when lost in the Garganta, giving the Shinigami that impression. This congregation of souls could explains their unique reishi structure, as they would be dimensions of Reishi created from Hollow souls.

Now, moving on to the final aspect of the Soul King's power - his status as the linchpin. The Soul King "regulates the flow of souls", and his death, as demonstrated, led to Hueco Mundo, Soul Society and the Living World experiencing earthquakes as they started to collapse. Soul Society was most heavily affected, as the world literally began to come apart, whereas the Living World only experienced perpetual, minor earthquakes that only the spiritually aware seemed to be aware of. So there is truth to the Soul King's existence as the linchpin of reality.

But how did that truth come about?

Before the Soul King existed, souls naturally flowed into and out of the Soul Society. The implication is that they did not need Shinigami to send souls to Soul Society via Soul Burial (discounting those who were bound to the Living World by their desires), and that souls might have been able to make it to Soul Society on their own. There are many stories of living Humans travelling to the Afterlife in various mythologies and religions, and coming back from the Afterlife. Perhaps, in the distant past, this was true in the Bleach universe, and the Jureichi may have once been a hotspot for such pathways to the Soul Society.

NOTE: I say the above because it would explain why the piece of land where the Jureichi is specifically is required to create an Ouken.

In other words, Soul Society, the Living World, Hueco Mundo, Hell and even the Dangai were all different dimensions existing in the same space without touching one another, just as the Vandenreich existed in the shadows of the Seireitei. Because they existed in the same space as one another, pathways between the worlds naturally existed. In the case of the Soul Society, this connection between Soul Society and the Human World accounts for the vast and chaotic flow of souls into and out of Soul Society that made it "unstable".

When the Soul King was created by the Shinigami, the Soul King separated the dimension from one another. Hueco Mundo was cast off from the other dimensions; the Dangai was turned into a bridge between the now-separate Soul Society and the Living World. I can only assume that Hell and the Living World, for whatever reason, are still directly overlapping one another, as we saw no Dangai or Garganta or anything similar separating the Living World from the domain of Hell when the Doors of Hell first opened in chapter 12.

Urahara stated that, when the distortions caused by Quincy killing Hollows appear and disappear, a massive amount of energy, enough to connect Soul Society and the Living World, is released. We have been told numerous times that the Soul Society will collapse into the Living World because Hollow souls killed by Quincy do not return to the Soul Society, causing the number of souls to only increase in the Living World, and that this collapse will result in the destruction of both worlds. What if this "collapse" is not the product of the worlds veering towards their mutual destruction, but a product of the worlds returning to what they once were?

Although the Soul King initially separated the worlds, the "balance of souls" is all that is keeping the Soul Society and the Living World separate from one another, and keeping them from returning to their natural state - as overlapping dimensions existing in the same space. However, the Shinigami painted it as the Quincy's actions leading towards the destruction of the worlds in order to give them the justification required to massacre the Quincy once more, leading up to the Quincy Massacre of 200 years ago.

A thousand years ago, the Shinigami asserted their dominance over the system of souls by exterminating the Quincy, leaving only those who followed Yhwach and his Quincy into the Soul Society and the Vandenreich as the sole survivors; two hundred years ago - synchronous with the birth of a new Quincy with the ability "to share power with others" - the Quincy who repopulated the Living World became too numerous and too much of a threat, so another Massacre was carried out under the pretense of saving the world from destruction.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

In other words, I believe these are the purposes which the Shinigami created the Soul King for:

1) To regulate the flow of souls into and out of Soul Society

2) To keep new Quincy souls from being born in the Living World (outside of those who bear a piece of Yhwach's soul)

3) To prevent Hollow souls killed by Quincy from reaching their destination, giving the illusion that they destroy souls.

The separation of the worlds from one another is an extension of the Soul King's power "to regulate souls" - keep Human souls from reaching Soul Society on their own and make them dependent upon the Shinigami. The distortions and the imbalance caused by Quincy destroying souls are a result of the "flow of souls", which is necessary to keep the worlds separated, being disrupted, thus causing the possibility of Soul Society and the Living World returning to being worlds that exist in the same space as one another.

The third purpose might seem counter-productive given the consequences, but it is productive in the sense that it gives Shinigami motive and reason for wanting to discriminate against, limit the number of, and kill Quincy. If the Quincy's actions are painted as being dangerous to the existence of the world, that is all the Shinigami need to exert their authority and to wipe them out "for the sake of preserving the worlds".

This all depends on what the truth turns out to be in the future. Now that Yhwach is the new Soul King, we may see what that entails, depending on what he uses the power of the Soul King to accomplish (or undo).      

Sunday 18 October 2015

"The Transcendent God" - One Who Wields All Power

The nature of a Transcendent Being has always been up for debate ever since "Deicide". Some people see it as a mistake that Kubo has or will retcon out of the story, others do not talk about it, and I've seen very few who are willing to discuss it in detail. However, I believe the recent chapters of the Thousand Year Blood War warrant the discussion being brought up again, because of various instances where the Quincy have displayed abilities that appear to be quite similar to Aizen Sousuke when he was becoming a Transcendent Being. To be specific, Quincy abilities that indicate that a Transcendent Being is one who possesses and can wield all Powers in Bleach - Human, Shinigami, Quincy and Hollow.

Back in chapter 406, when Aizen finished the Chrysalis stage of his transformation, he said this to Ichigo:

Credits to Cnet128 @ Mangahelpers for the translations I'm using

Aizen: ......You, I will leave in this place. // There is no need to consume you... // ...until everything has come to an end.

NOTE: I will NOT link manga sites, because I've been having a certain issue with them as of late.

Now that just seemed bizarre to anyone at that stage. Why would Aizen state he would "consume" Ichigo, a statement further elaborated on when Aizen said in chapter 419:

Aizen: Once, you destroyed the boundary between Shinigami and Hollow, becoming a transcendental being. // But now, you have lost the power you gained, and are but a shadow of your former self. // As you are now... // ...you are not even worth the trouble of absorbing and comprehending!

The intent behind Aizen's words were that he would "consume" and "comprehend" Ichigo's power. Most people probably dismissed this because they felt he was going mad with power. But here is what Yhwach recently said in chapter 620:

Juchabach: I will steal the Spirit King in his entirety. // As for Seireitei, I will cover it with a lid.

Juchabach: So that until I steal the Spirit King... // ...absorb him... / ...and consume him entirely... // None will be able... // ...to stand in my way.

In hindsight, it actually reveals what Aizen was planning to do: he was going to do to Ichigo the same thing that Yhwach did to the Soul King. When Aizen became a Transcendent, he didn't simply become "a being transcending Shinigami and Hollow", or even just a being whose power was so great that it could not be perceived by normal Shinigami and Humans; Aizen attained a power like that which Yhwach possessed, a Quincy ability.

I say it is a Quincy ability because Yhwach "consuming" the Soul King reminds me of Quilge's "Sklaverei" - Quilge used the reishi dominance of his Vollstandig to "enslave" the reishi of Ayon's body, absorb it, and add his own power to it. By comparison, Sklaverei is a watered-down version of Yhwach's power, which makes sense because I believe the Vollstandig in its entirety is the Quincy drawing out the latent power of the Schrift bestowed upon them by Yhwach.

But it is not simply Yhwach I am drawing a comparison to. Remember Aizen's teleportation technique in "Deicide":



Now, let us take a look at what Lille Barro did in the recent chapter:

 


Just as Aizen did in Deicide, Lille Barro was able to move from one location to another via teleportation. It is not just that, but people have also brought up a comparison between their respective appearances - an entity clad in white and possessing wings. In other words, when Aizen became a Transcendent Being, he developed abilities quite akin to the highest-level of Quincy ability.

It is not just Quincy ability, but Shinigami and Hollow as well.

As we saw in Deicide, and Aizen commented on, both Ichigo and Aizen's Zanpakuto melded with their right arms as a product of their respective evolution. Aizen hypothesized that this was the true form of the Zanpakuto/the proper form all Zanpakuto should take on (depending on translation), and I do believe that Aizen was correct, even if Ichigo's Zanpakuto evolution went one step even further. To this point, no other Shinigami outside of Isshin has displayed a Zanpakuto like that, or even the potential to reach such a level. Not even the head of Squad Zero had a Zanpakuto like that.

When Aizen reached his Final Evolution, the form looks so much like a Hollow because Aizen let himself be consumed by his negative emotions, the kind of emotions that cause Human souls to become Hollow in the first place. But even then, Aizen possessed the pinnacle of powers of a Hollow. He has no Mask, much like Ulquiorra's Segunda Etapa, and he gained the ability to use Fragor and Ultrafragor, the former being a small blast of reiryoku that did this:

 




As I stated in a theory thread on the "miracles" of the Hogyoku a long time ago, "the Hogyoku's power allows it to materialize events that would otherwise be impossible, so long as the "potential" exists for it to occur." As Aizen called the events brought about by the Hogyoku's power "miracles", that applies to himself as well in turn.

If I were to list the hierarchy of influences in Aizen's transformations, it would be like this:

 


His first form after the Chrysalis stage was predominantly Shinigami. The white robes created by the Hogyoku and his eyes indicate a Quincy and Hollow influence, but Aizen's power is still predominantly Shinigami at this point, as evidenced by only possessing the Zanpakuto melded with his right arm.

 


His second form was not only the point where Aizen said he had truly evolved into "a being surpassing both Shinigami and Hollow", but also the one where the Quincy influence upon his power is the strongest. He possesses wings in his form (the same number as Lille, in fact) and acquired the power of teleportation. His eyes are also now akin to how certain Quincy's eyes change when they enter Vollstandig, but the appearance of his wings more echoes Hollow influence, which is to be expected when the base for his transformation was Ichigo's reiatsu, specifically a Hollowfied Ichigo.



Nothing more needs to be said about his final form, where it can be said that his transformation into a Transcendent Hollow became complete. Just his physical appearance in this form is enough to tell you that much, and his two techniques used (and the high-speed regeneration immediately prior to the transformation) are both evidence of Hollow ability in this form.

When Aizen lost the power the Hogyoku gave him, it was not just the level of power, but the Quincy and Hollow abilities as well. Even then, Aizen still retained his power as a Shinigami, but at an even higher level than before (he didn't even need a Zanpakuto to mess with Yhwach's senses), and got even stronger while in Muken, to the point where his power in his normal form is intense enough to disintegrate a normal Shinigami's hands.

The concluding point of this entire discussion is that the nature of a Transcendent Being is not just one where, via a fusion of Shinigami and Quincy, and Human and Hollow souls, one can reach an entirely new plane of power beyond which any one individual of the four aforementioned races can reach, but it is also one that possesses all their abilities and the potential to wield them at their highest level.

Ichigo is the premier case of this phenomenon in Bleach, particularly now. Ichigo fights as a Shinigami using a Zanpakuto, but he also possesses the natural Quincy ability of the Blut, and the armor he's wearing right now is most definitely the influence of his Fullbring. If what Zangetsu did in Ichigo's fight with Zaraki is any indication, he may even be able to use the "Shadows", and I'm willing to bet that Ichigo is also a Quincy that can "share power with others", since that would tie into Urahara's explanation of how Inoue and Sado manifested power in the first place.

Even before the time-skip, we had Ichigo fighting with Hollowfication, and he is the only individual with the Hollowfication that we know of so far who could use both his Hollow Mask and his Bankai at the same time. People have complained about how Kensei and Rose did not use their Masks with the Bankai, but I think the reason is that they couldn't use their Mask and Bankai in tandem. A Bankai is the full manifestation of a Zanpakuto's power; a Visored Mask is the externalization of the user's heart, much like what a normal Hollow's Mask represents for them. Since the Visoreds are a hybrid of Shinigami and Hollow, I do not believe that they'd be able to use both Bankai and their Masks at the same time.

But the thing about Ichigo that does not make this immediately evident is lack of training. The times we did see him use Blut were completely instinctual, and Ichigo is more trained in the use of his Shinigami power than any other abilities. Hollow influence is still evident in his Zanpakuto (his Inner Hollow does double as his Shinigami power) as shown with the Black Getsuga in a recent chapter, but Ichigo has not trained his Hollow or Quincy abilities to be able to use Hollow and Quincy techniques, and his Fullbring, his "Human" power, is already fused with his Shinigami power.

On the other hand, the Hogyoku's influence made it so that Aizen did not need training to access these abilities, as they became natural and inherent with each transformation.

As a result, when there is another training arc in the future for Ichigo, I do hope that it will be one where Ichigo trains himself to be able to utilize all of his inherent abilities - not just Shinigami, but Quincy and Hollow as well. Ichigo has learnt about his roots and the true nature of his power in the past of this arc, but now he must train himself to effectively use all of his inherent abilities if he is to defeat Yhwach in the future, whom I firmly believe is the same kind of being (as is the Soul King), only he is a Quincy-dominant Transcendent.

Saturday 19 September 2015

Bleach Chapter 638 - 643 Review

Given how I've left six chapters un-reviewed, I'll do my best to cut down on the details.

Science Vs. God

From the start of chapter 638 to the end of 643, Pernida vs. Mayuri can be accurately described as a battle between the concepts of science and the divinity.  Mayuri is the premier scientist of the Gotei 13, and Pernida is the Left Arm of the Soul King, one of the closest things in the series that people can describe as "divinity". 

Despite this, Mayuri looks down upon Pernida and sees it as merely a specimen to be captured and studied, as observed by their banter at the beginning of the fight.  However, Pernida is quick to put Mayuri on edge from the very start, able to use "The Compulsory" to take control of even the ground and form it into hands to attack Mayuri with, which not only causes the self-destruct mechanism on his Sun Armour to activate, but also forces Mayuri to use the Hirenkyaku function he installed in his boots to avoid "The Compulsory" on the ground.

This is very impressive on Mayuri's part, as he showed himself capable of developing a technological-based version of the high-speed technique that Quincy use naturally.  While this does stop "The Compulsory" laced in the ground from affecting Mayuri, Pernida itself has some secrets of its own, as shown when the pinky finger that Mayuri blew off as a sample revealed an eye of its own and struck Mayuri with "the Compulsory", necessitating Mayuri ripping his own arm off and re-arranging all the nerves and blood vessels in it at a rapid pace to counter it. 

The Essence of the Godhand

According to Mayuri, there is apparently a book in the Soul Society's anthologies that talks about the Soul King and the abilities which he and his Arms possessed.  The Right Arm governed "Stillness", while the Left Arm governed "Advancement".  The latter is indeed a trait that is observable of Pernida throughout the entirety of the fight, both through its speech and mental faculties, and its ability. 

The main means by which Pernida uses this power is through "the Compulsory", but that is for later; the immediate sign of this is how his pinky he lost (and the middle finger he deliberately pulls off) both grow into left arms themselves.  I'll go into detail a bit later, but such an ability leads me to believe that Pernida's true essence is not as an "arm of flesh".  What if Pernida started off like Mimihagi - an "arm of shadow" - but its "Advancement" ability led to it eventually developing a body of flesh over its original self? 

That said, Mayuri was undaunted by Pernida splitting itself into three.

Demon Womb Wrapped In Disease

Specifically, he was undaunted because he "reconfigured" his Bankai to have an entirely new ability - rather than emit poison gas and possess the form originally had, Mayuri's Konjiki Ashisogi Jizo "Demon Womb Wrapped In Disease" now has the ability to "give birth" to a new Ashisogi Jizo based on the data he sends to it during battle.  The initial form takes the appearance of a large, deformed, demonic looking infant with a cut in the middle of its chest, and it is from that area that it violently gives birth to a new Ashisogi Jizo - a black-eyed multi-limbed abomination tailor-made to counter "Compulsory", specifically by having 70,000 different epidermal layers of nerves spread out across its skin.  This leaves Pernida's attacks initially ineffective, as "The Compulsory" simply peels away with each layer of skin it comes into contact with, and is thus devoured. 

We do learn more about how his Bankai came to be later on, but it does show how twisted Mayuri is as a scientist.  Not even his own Bankai, which is meant to be a reflection of his own self, is safe from his experimentation, and the demonic appearances of the aspects of his Bankai illustrate this quite clearly.  It is a horrific device, even if it can be interpreted as one of the most dangerous abilities in the series, able to counter virtually any opponent. 

But in this case, Mayuri forgot something as Pernida promptly blasts its way out of the Ashisogi Jizo using a Quincy Bow and Arrow, which it proudly states to Mayuri once free.

"I have always been a Quincy"

Although Mayuri confesses he didn't forget, he just simply couldn't imagine the Left Arm of the Soul King identifying itself as a Quincy.  That is when Pernida's character changes completely for a moment, and makes this bomb-shell of a declaration:

Quote by BadKarma:

Pernida:――――滅却師を名乗る事が
------How can referring to myself as a Quincy
Pernida:恥知らずとはどういう事だ
Be brazen?

Pernida:余は
I
Pernida:もとより滅却師である
Have always been a Quincy

A lot of people in the past were inferring the possibility that Pernida was likely enslaved or brain-washed by Yhwach (I think some cited the chains as evidence of this), but Pernida's statement here changes things. 

First off, while it would not be obvious in the English language, Pernida's very style of speaking changed when he made that statement, which is more noticeable in the original Japanese raw.  If I recall correctly, I heard it said that one of the ways Pernida refers to itself is in the same style that a person of royalty would refer to themselves.  This would be why Mayuri surmised that Pernida may have been regaining its memories from when it was part of the Soul King, meaning it was effectively the Soul King's voice that spoke through Pernida.

Secondly, Pernida saying that it has always been a Quincy has implications for the Soul King itself.  If the Soul King is also a Quincy, then it places the nature of the Thousand Year Blood War in an entirely new light, with this statement setting it up.  This has been further building on what has been indicated ever since Yhwach called the Soul King his father - the Soul King seems to be less a ruler of Soul Society, and even less a figurehead monarch, and more like a prisoner puppet.  A Quincy was imprisoned and used by the Soul Society and the Shinigami to act as the "lynchpin" of the worlds, and Squad Zero are less his "retainers" and more like his "wardens". 

It raises more questions to the mysteries that are hidden behind the curtain of this war. 

Nemuri Nanagou

Pernida then continues its attack, using five arrows for each finger (including the two that regrew themselves), and fires a barrage of arrows at Mayuri that are laced with "The Compulsory", which actually tag Mayuri and managed to force him to sacrifice his left arm.  Pernida was even able to use the nerves on the ground to bend an arrow back towards Mayuri.  It would have actually struck him dead on as well, if Nemu did not step in to save Mayuri, sacrificing one of her own arms in the process and risking her life. 

We've always known that Mayuri never treated Nemu very kindly ever since the Soul Society, and he shows the same mind-set here, scolding Nemu for acting on her own, and even revealing her true name - Nemuri Nanagou, "Sleeping #7), referring to how difficult it would be to raise the "next" Nemu in the same way as the current one due to all the events they've been through.

After finishing his scolding, Nemu then hands Mayuri the Hojikuzai to restore his lost arm, and Nemu does the same, who comments that Mayuri forgot to bring the Hojikuzai with him as he usually does.  Writing it off as creepy, Mayuri then leaps into battle against all three Pernida again, activating the max-power of his Hirenkyaku to dodge the storm of arrows they fire at him, all the while relaying a plan to Nemu.

To simplify: While Mayuri spreads a concentrated narcotic anesthetic throughout the battlefield to dull Pernida's nerves, Nemu will inject a "Nerve Freezing Agent" directly into the nerves of "The Compulsory", thereby freezing Pernida's blood flow and killing.

Now to clarify one I've heard some protests thrown around:  this is not one of those "conveniences" of story.  A "nerve freezing agent" would affect any living being, and Pernida counts as one of those.  Mayuri could use such an agent against any opponent, since it is also virtually perfect for capturing a specimen intact (which is what Mayuri sees Pernida as).  So yes, Pernida is a specimen Mayuri wants to study, but he's made it clear that he will kill Pernida if that is what it takes. 

The process is successful, and the nerve freezing agent spreads to the main body and freezes it completely, and proceeds to do the same to another Pernida, a process which seems to imply that all three arms are linked through Pernida's "Compulsory", rather than acting independently (unless there are three different arrows that Nemu injected with the agents).

With the agent beginning to work on the third Pernida, Mayuri declares victory...

Advancement

Only for the remaining Pernida to break off its thumb before the nerve can take affect, and Pernida responds in a manner that is quite similar to Zaraki's own manner of speaking.  It is then that Mayuri realized too late - Pernida's "Advancement" is directly linked to "The Compulsory", as his nerves collect information from anything its nerves attach themselves to and matures through that method.  This causes Mayuri concern, since it means that Nemu's reflexes and speed won't be enough to keep up with nerves that have reached Zaraki's level, and he orders her to retreat.

Behind him, Pernida sheds its skin like the "Demon Womb Wrapped In Disease" Ashisogi Jizo, and prepares to strike down Mayuri. 

This is how Pernida has been able to "advance" throughout the fight, but Zaraki is not the only character whom Pernida has affected with "The Compulsory" and most likely has gained information from.  The other two are Mayuri and Nemu.  As of the most recent chapters, we don't know if these instances will have an effect on the battle (I'll address it later), but Pernida could end up being all the more dangerous if it gathered enough info from Mayuri and Nemu to mature itself further - gaining an intellect like Mayuri's and Nemu's abilities.  .

Mayuri's Masterpice

As the events of chapters 641 and 642 play out in the Wahrwelt, we cut to flash-backs of Nemu's childhood as she is speaking with Akon, inter-linked with events in the present where Akon explains to a Squad 12 member named Kuna the nature of the project that created Nemu - "The Nemuri Artificial Soul Project".  Mangapanda called it "Godly Soul", whereas Mangastream and CNet128 @ MangaHelpers translated "Artificial Soul".  Given that we already know that Nemu was created with a combination of Artificial Soul and Gigai technology, I'll go with the "artificial soul". 

As with all things, science doesn't start off "perfect".  The first three Nemuri were failures, only stringy masses being the result of the first three projects.  While the Fourth and Fifth were also failures, they progressed further along to a point that Mayuri could exploit the remains.  The brain of the Fourth was used to fix the mind of another 12th Division member.

The Fifth was used by Mayuri to modify his Zanpakuto and to become a Captain.  This definitely explains a lot about Mayuri's Bankai.  We know that it was split in half by Uryu in the Soul Society arc, and that Mayuri self-destructed it when Szayel took it over in the Arrancar saga, yet it was able to be restored both times, despite Mayuri's assertion that "Bankai" cannot be restored to the way they are.  This puts what Mayuri said by "modifying" his Bankai into clearer context - technically speaking, Mayuri never attained his Bankai in the proper manner, and so his Bankai would not follow the rules of other Bankai, given that it is essentially made from the fetus of Nemuri #5.

They eventually got all the way up to a living infant with Nemuri #6, but that one died at the age of two because of the life-span of artificially created soul cells. 

But Nemu was successful.  She surpassed the two year life-span, and became Mayuri's dream and masterpiece - an Artificial Shinigami, the creation of a new soul out of nothing.  Some translations attribute that line of dialogue to mean "to create in the same way God creates".  But it also gives the reason why he called it "Nemuri" - it was essentially his dream despite him being awake, and every day Nemu was alive he was living out that dream.  As Akon says, Nemu was Mayuri's masterpiece, and her evolution throughout her childhood and into the present day was proof of that.

The Fruits of Sacrifice

Back in the Wahrwelt, Nemu has sprung to Mayuri's aid, saving him while obliterating the main hand at the same time.  The reason why Nemu is now displaying enough power to decimate the body of a Schutzstaffel is because she is pushing her body to within 0.8% of what her body can handle before it collapses.  While Mayuri is angry that Nemu is acting on her own again against his orders, and reiterates her purpose to grow and evolve, Nemu responds by saying that she can best show that by protecting Mayuri, claiming it is her purpose. 

She thus deposits Mayuri on a nearby building, and Mayuri comments on the humiliation of having to entrust a battle to Nemu.  She confronts the remaining Pernida (the third one might actually be dead or still recovering), shaves off 6% of her soul, and fires it as a technique called Gikon Jurrinjuu ("Artificial Soul Heavy Ring Cannon"), and blasts it right into Pernida's eyes.

Now, I'll make it clear - I was deeply moved and amazed by chapter 642.  I was in awe of the end result of what Mayuri created in Nemu, the power she displayed, and on one forum I even called Mayuri a God in my excitement.  More than that, one could be led to believe (as I was) that there was indeed a Human side to Mayuri's monstrous character, to have worked so hard to create Nemu and raise her. 

But what truly amazed me was the power Nemu displayed.  Pernida easily defeated Zaraki, one of the Special War Potential, while nowhere near as developed as the current Pernida.  Yet Nemu seemingly obliterated it, one of the Schutzstaffel who defeated Squad Zero after Yhwach's Auswahlen.  I even made myself think that Nemu could be confirmed as one of the Special War Potentials with such a level of power. 

True, I will admit that I fully expected Pernida to come back even from that (in a new form, I might add), but I was still in awe all the same, and was expecting the possibility of Mayuri sacrificing himself for Nemu in later chapters.

But this is not the standard Shounen.  This is Bleach, written by Noriaki Kubo, and this man doesn't play by the house rules. 

The Eldritch Hand of God

Which finally brings us to the most recent chapter. 

At the beginning, it is shown clearly that Nemu's exertions did take a toll on her.  She not only pushed her body to close to its absolute limit, but she also cut off 6% of her soul as a final attack to destroy Pernida, and virtually all souls in Bleach do not recover from having a substantial piece of their soul taken away from them (Starrk's wolves and Yhwach are likely the exceptions). 

But it genuinely does look like Pernida was destroyed.  Its body was blown apart, and it appears to be disintegrating and falling to pieces, as Nemu falls down to the ground alongside Pernida's remains and lays her eyes on her father and creator, Mayuri.

Then the pieces of Pernida's falling all lay eyes on her. 

This is what I mean by Pernida originally having a form like Mimihagi.  Nothing living does not simply recover from an attack intended to obliterate their body like that.  One of the closest things I've seen to this in another series was Majin Buu, and he was literally made of magic and a personification of evil.

Hell, the last time we saw anything in the Bleach series with regenerative powers like this, it was James, the manifestation of Mask De Masculine's "The Superstar", who I would not be surprised to find that he was a physical manifestation of Yhwach's soul fragment in Mask - the Schrift "S".  After all, Yhwach did talk about James returning to him in chapter 565. 

But this reminds me more of the torrents of the Soul King's power than anything else.  I think it is the eyes that do it for me.  Just as the Soul King's power manifested itself as those little shadowy Cyclopes, Pernida is now replicating itself through any limbs that are taken off the main body, even if the main body was blown up. 

Every one of these pieces of Pernida's body contains its will - and most likely the will of the Soul King as well - and they are all linked to Pernida's one mind.  That is why I do not believe that what happens at the end of the chapter will kill Pernida. 

But that's for later. 

Immediately after laying eyes on Nemu, the pieces of Pernida's body generate fingers, and send out "The Compulsory" to rip through Nemu. 

With one last look of fear at Mayuri and a soundless scream, Nemu is then ripped apart into a torrent of blood by Pernida.

That remains are an arm and her cerebrum. 

A Monster Reborn

Mayuri can only look on in disbelief at the scene, his daughter's blood splattered around and upon him, Pernida reforming itself, and Mayuri can only think of Nemu's name in despair.

Which his subconscious, taking the form of Szayel Aporro Granz, picks up on and begins chastising Mayuri for it. 

Now this was a brilliant narrative device on Kubo's part.  I watched other reviewers before making this one, so my perception is slightly influenced by them, but I definitely agree on how Szayel is used here.  It really does show us that Mayuri's fight with Szayel had a greater impact than beyond Mayuri looting his lab to find Arrancar to use for his "Revenant Experiments" (felt like using something other than "zombie").  We are seeing that Szayel's fight with Mayuri definitely did leave a mental imprint upon Mayuri, manifesting as the Arrancar itself. 

Szayel then breaks down the current Mayuri, piece by piece, by reminding Mayuri of what he said to Szayel - Perfection is meaningless, despair is inherent in perfection, "I myself despise perfection".  In other words, because Nemu died in such a manner, it meant she was far from perfect, and that left Mayuri room to go back to the drawing board and make another Nemuri better than her.

Then Mayuri's Szayel delivers the final blow - "Now I get it.  It's that good-for-nothing flesh marionette...You actually fooled yourself into thinking that thing was "perfect"."  He then tells Mayuri that he should be grateful to Pernida for destroying Nemu, since it removed the air of hubris that Mayuri had been breathing.  Szayel ends by claiming to not know whether or not to laugh or cry, and Mayuri "grabs" Szayel and dissipates him, Mayuri fully agreeing with "Szayel's" words, because he himself doesn't know whether to laugh or cry because a scientist of Szayel's ilk - one that believed themselves to be perfect because they developed the ability of rebirth ("Gabriel") to make themselves immortal.

This is where Mayuri returns back to those cold, amoral, monstrous roots that we first saw of him in the Soul Society Arc.  People may claim that Szayel manifested because of the narcotic anesthetics that Mayuri was also exposed to, but that does not ignore one fact - that "Szayel" is Mayuri.  This "Szayel" was to Mayuri's mind what the "Zaraki" that appeared in Ichigo's Inner World during his fight with "White Zangetsu" was to Ichigo - an innermost representation of an aspect of their instincts and themselves as reflected by an individual they fought in the past. 

In Mayuri's case, "Szayel" reminded Mayuri of his core aesthetic as a scientist, what makes Mayuri so dangerous.  However, with it comes the loss of attachment he had to Nemu, as he reminded himself through "Szayel" that Nemu was not "perfect", and that he could simply create another Nemuri. 

That is what brings about Nemu's tragedy, and also the tragedy of her name, Nemuri.  To Mayuri, Nemu was nothing more than the substance of a dream to him, one he can simply recreate anew.  For Nemu, the dream was the 'purpose' she made for herself - to protect Mayuri - a man who could care less now if she were to lose her life in the process of that. 

To Consume to Advance

With Mayuri coming to the realization that returns him to the monster he has always been, Pernida then assails Mayuri with two separate hands - one presumably being the other Pernida that was affected by the nerve agent, the other being the one that recovered from Nemu's attack.  However, the one that recovered now has multiple eyes covering its entire hand, and its original eye was replaced by...a mouth and a tongue, and both hands proceed to use "The Compulsory" or that tongue to devour Nemu's corpse.

Mayuri lets Pernida do so, but he takes the cerebrum for himself, and keeps Pernida away with a last-resort electrical discharge from one of the head-rings that are in place of his ears (count on Mayuri to always have functional fashion), and tells Pernida to hurry with devouring Nemu, because he will die before he finishes digesting her. 

As Pernida's body starts to suffer the effects of what Mayuri implied, the scientist explains what happens: in order to surpass the life-span of artificially created soul cells, Mayuri installed a special organ into Nemu's pituitary gland, a function that accelerates the cellular division and growth of cells within the body.  Nemu's brain was modified to regulate these processes so they do not run out of control. 

Without the cerebrum, there is nothing to slow the accelerated cellular division of growth and cells in the body.  Essentially, by devouring Nemu's pituitary gland without the brain, Pernida is now afflicted with cancer that affects the whole body, and his physical body will keep on "regenerating", dividing and replicating cells until it self-destructs, and the chapter ends with just that happening to Pernida (or at least one of them). 

Now, I've heard people complain how Pernida wanting to devour Nemu was just a device used by Kubo to get Pernida to kill itself through the method seen in the chapter, but I think they are too quick to do so.  Pernida's ability is "Advancement", and it used its "Compulsory" to gain information for the sake of advancement.  It makes sense that Pernida would want to consume Nemu's corpse because it wants to "advance" further, and what better way of "advancing" than to devour the corpse of the enemy that did so much damage to it in the first place?

It is also akin to what Mimihagi attempted to do against Yhwach.  Yhwach stated that Mimihagi was trying to "consume" him when it lashed out in its final attempt against Yhwach, so Pernida simply shares an ability its counterpart possesses, and possibly the same ability Yhwach used when absorbing both Mimihagi and the Soul King's body. 

But as I said, I don't think this will be enough to finish Pernida off.  Even if both hands are affected by the pituitary gland, Pernida is still the "Left Arm of the Soul King".  Part of what "Advancement" means is also to adapt and evolve to counter threats to its life, not simply "gain information and mature".  Who is to say that Pernida will not eventually "advance" to a point where it too can control the cell division, since it has not only consumed Nemu's body but it previously used "The Compulsory" on her arm once before?

But if that is not the case, then I think that Pernida will survive its body self-destructing due to this cell-division.  I suppose we will just have to wait and see.

Yes, I know that people would likely want this fight over and done with, but it'd be anti-climactic if Pernida went out this way without us learning all there is to know about it, and what its behaviour implies of the Soul King himself.




Wednesday 2 September 2015

[Discussion] Are the Quincy Pre-Destined For Extinction?

I was in a bad mood one day, saw a post that sparked some of my cynicism in regards to the Quincy's position, and this little essay came out of it. 

Quote from: Polgarena @ Bleach Asylum
Thank you, everyone, for your great contributions! :loyal


Bazz-B was not done just yet. He was struggling, as his fist on the ground showed, even though his body got slain. Burner Finger 4 provoked Haschwalth to react in a pretty emotional manner, revealing Bazz-B’s full name - Buzzard Black! I love it, but during the time I was reading the chapter I thought that this was the first sign of Bazz-B’s defeat/death.

In the flashback three more years passed. Jugram with that hat looked funny (good that he doesn’t fashion it anymore), but I really enjoyed Bazzard’s good looks in that "oldish" uniform. I thought Hubert would end up being Algora, but oh well, Kubo thought otherwise. The relations between Sternritters weren’t ideal even back then, so it’s good to know that some things never change. Hascwalth’s “I’m watching” panel was excellent. It was terrifying for a moment, and Hubert felt that.

Bazz-B wanted to fight badly. He wanted to resolve their problems with fists. But Jugram was smarter. In a way. He didn’t want to fight, and not only because fights between Sternritters were punishable by death, but because they’re not a good tool to resolve conflicts. Of course, it’s not like he was all “in the right” and Bazz-B “in the wrong”, because by avoiding fights, Jugram also avoided interaction. And without interactions conflicts can never be resolved.

Cue the current fight. The moment when Jugram cut Bazz-B’s had hurt even me. But it wasn’t the gore that hurt, it was Bazz-B’s face. That’s the face of utter defeat if you ask me. It was sad. And now that we’ve seen the magnificent Burner Finger 5, Bazz-B’s hopes of survival decreased even more.

People can say what they want about this chapter, Jugram’s and Bazz-B’s characters. They can say they’re badly written, that the last few chapters were Kubo’s grasping at straws... They may question the point of these chapters, as the glorious character development ship sailed long time ago for Sternritters. People have their rights not to like something. But, the only thing that I didn’t like in this set of 4 chapters is the fact that Bazz-B’s (99,99%) gone [he sustained a diagonal/vertical slash]. And I’m sad; not that much for Bazz-B himself, because this counts as a beautiful “gone in the blaze of glory” death.
I would have wanted him to live of course, but I’m sad for the Quincies in general. I now really fear that Kubo envisioned the future of Bleach-verse without them.

Sadly, I must agree with you on this, with the way things are going, even with the emphasis placed on the fact that Ichigo also has the blood of a Quincy in him, which he inherited from his mother.  More than anything else, Ichigo has identified himself as a Shinigami, and just as a Shinigami.  In the Arrancar Saga, Ichigo feared his Hollow side; in the Lost Agent Arc, his Fullbring powers were just a means to an end to regain his Shinigami powers; in the Thousand Year Blood War, learning about his Quincy heritage and coming to terms with "old man Zangetsu" were just stepping stones towards him repairing his Bankai and attaining his true Zanpakuto.

But that's not over yet.  I am sure I am not the only one who noticed it, but Ichigo has not drawn Old Man Zangetsu's blade even once since Yhwach manipulated Ichigo into killing the Soul King.  One would think that Ichigo would draw both Zangetsu when he was fighting back against Yhwach, but he only used "White Zangetsu's" Zanpakuto to fight.  Even when he was preparing to defend himself from Grimmjow (before Neliel's interruption), he only had the one drawn.  I do not know if these are simply recent details, or will develop into plot points later on, but the incident with the Soul King might be causing Ichigo to reject his Quincy side, whether he himself is conscious of it or not. 

It hasn't simply been this arc either, but an over-arching theme throughout the series up to this point.  From the start, the Quincy were depicted as a danger to the system making up the Bleach-verse - the more Hollows they kill, the more they upset the balance of souls, and run the risk of the Soul Society and Living World mutually destroying one another when they blend together as a result of the balance being lost.  Ryuuken, the one who inherited Souken's title as "The Last Quincy", was content to simply let the Quincy die out with Souken's generation.  And to be honest, in his eyes, why not?  Yhwach has his claws into every Quincy in the modern day, and he used the Auswahlen to kill every last Gemischt Quincy barring Uryu to regain his power, including Katagiri, all for the sake of finishing the war that began one thousand years ago. 

And at this rate, I would not be surprised if that war was instigated by the Quincy in the first place, since that is the direction the flash-backs pointed us towards.  After all, Yhwach created the Stern Ritter with that very purpose in mind.  In other words, Kubo has been painting the Quincy from Day One as the aggressors; as the one element in the system that does not belong; the aberrant souls that endanger the world's existence just by fighting against Hollows to survive and to protect souls; the group of people who produced an individual as horrible as Yhwach; the race who brought down the Soul Society and killed the Soul King, the entity whose existence stabilizes the world.

Quincy and Shinigami fighting alongside one another?  Souken's dream?  I would not be surprised if one of Uryu's reasons for joining the Vandenreich is eventually revealed to be that he realized that Souken's dream was doomed from the start.  It was a pre-destined doom, because Yhwach and the Stern Ritter were going to begin their war against the Seireitei once again no matter what happened.  Yhwach is not the problem, but the Quincy race as a whole.  They've all held onto feelings of hate for the Shinigami for far too long for there to be reconciliation.  The only one who envisioned such a world was Souken Ishida, since it has been all but made clear that every other Quincy in existence outside of the Ishida Clan was all-in for war against the Shinigami.

While I do hope that Bazz-B may survive, that will likely be in vain, and Bazz-B's death likely shows the inevitable fate of the Quincy race - extinction after an empty existence of hate and vengeance.  Bazz-B spent the entirety of his unnaturally long life, which was likely only so long because of Yhwach's Schrift, challenging Haschwalth to see which one of them was stronger and for what?  In the end, he effectively threw his own life away in a suicide run.  He had a chance to fight alongside the Shinigami, but he instead went on his own path, and made his own grave. 

It is not simply the fate the Quincy made for themselves, but the Shinigami would likely not stand for any other fate.  In this war, the Gotei 13 lost too much to the Vandenreich.  Yamamoto was destroyed by Yhwach, a number of the friends and allies of the remaining Shinigami were killed by the Stern Ritter, and now the Quincy have succeeded in killing the Soul King and claiming the Soul King Palace as their Wahrwelt.

Shutara said the Quincy were even worse than Aizen, whom she claimed was the embodiment of evil.  What is worse than the embodiment of evil? 

Chaos.  Throughout many mythologies and folklore, one of the greatest evils in any religion has always been an entity embodying Chaos.  In Bleach, the Quincy have been set up as that element of Chaos from day one, and Yhwach is its embodiment.  Haschwalth put it best - Yhwach's very existence is built around sustaining himself through the death and chaos of battles.  The war with the Shinigami is just another war with which Yhwach sustains himself, and also means the elimination of the one power that halted his endless conquests in the past. 

I will not be surprised if that becomes the true reason why Quincy fight Hollows to begin with - their arrows do not "erase" Hollows from existence, but Hollows killed by a Quincy's arrows or power have their souls absorbed by Yhwach, regardless of whether they were ever aware of it or not.  In other words, all the Hollows every killed by any Quincy in the past thousand years has all been for the sake of Yhwach absorbing more souls to sustain himself, so as to avoid regressing to the state he was born in - mute, crippled, blind, deaf. 

The fact that Quincy may have existed before Yhwach was born does not matter anymore.  They are nothing more than carriers for Yhwach's soul, nothing more than the vessels by which Yhwach sustains himself and absorbs souls through every Hollow they will ever kill and through their own deaths. 

Because of how they are all linked to Yhwach, I will not be surprised if their extinction is the only way to permanently kill Yhwach.  After all, Yhwach has a piece of his soul in every Quincy, and it is likely that those souls would sustain Yhwach even after his heart his stopped, as the "Kaiser Gesang" began with him regaining his heartbeat, meaning the only way to keep him from coming back would be to kill every Quincy that bears a piece of his soul.

This war has done the opposite of what was spoken of between Ichigo and Uryu in the Sub Shinigami arc - it has shown that there can never be peace between Shinigami and Quincy.  It is not simply a matter of killing Yhwach, because he has never been the source of that blood feud between Shinigami and Quincy - too much conflict between Shinigami and Quincy has taken place for there to be peace, and the Quincy Massacre of 200 years ago occurred without Yhwach's influence so he was not responsible for it.

In the current world system, the Shinigami are the essential aspect - they are the ones who purify Hollows and send them to Soul Society as normal souls, and they are the ones who lead souls to Soul Society to maintain balance between the Living World and the Soul Society.  The Quincy are aberrant - they destroy Hollows, and every Hollow they kill upsets the balance of souls and threatens to destroy the world.

The only way this could be justified, and the only way the feud between Shinigami and Quincy could ever stop, is if the current world is unnatural.  After all, the current world is heavily reliant upon the Shinigami - they are the only ones with the power to guide souls to Soul Society, they maintain a "balance of souls" that is necessary to keep the world as it is, and they are the only ones with the power to purify a Hollow's soul and send it to Soul Society.  We know they even created the Soul King, the entity who stabilized the flow of souls into and out of Soul Society and held the worlds together.  Yhwach even mentioned that, before the Soul King was created, the Soul Society was unstable due to the souls constantly flowing in and out of it. 

This means that the Soul Society and the Living World existed without the Soul King, and the implication is that the Shinigami, at one point, did not control the flow of souls into and out of Soul Society.  In the modern day, the Shinigami are the only ones with the power to send souls to Soul Society; before the Soul Society, souls apparently flowed into and out of the Soul Society at their leisure.

However, for such a thing to be so would be for it to require the Shinigami to be equally at fault, if not more so.  But they've been protagonists for too long for it to suddenly be revealed that they created this world and the Quincy have been depicted as a group that disrupts the balance for far too long for them to be suddenly given a pardon, even if the current war has left any hope of peace out of the question.  Moreover, the current system is depicted as beneficial, since it brought stability to the Soul Society, which once suffered instability because souls were constantly flowing in and out of Soul Society.  With the Shinigami being the only ones that can send souls to Soul Society, likely as a result of the Soul King's power, the flow stabilized. 

In addition, the Soul King has been so entrenched into the system of the world now that his removal threatens to cause the collapse of all three worlds.  Were the worlds once dimensions overlapping each other in the same space, just as the Vandenreich and the Seireitei were, and did the Soul King's power cause them to separate?  Have they always existed as separate from one another?  We cannot know for certain, but that would make or break this idea either way. 

Moreover, the question such a reveal would present would be whether to let the world return to its natural state, or to continue maintaining the system that the Shinigami artificially created through the Soul King.  When you weigh the positives and the negatives together, the world created by the Shinigami would be seen by the protagonists as preferable to the worlds reverting to their original state, whatever that world was like, and if the Quincy's extinction will be the necessary foundation stone for the world's stability, then so be it. 

But within all of this lies the question - what about Ichigo?  Would he allow the Quincy to be made extinct, including his former friend, Uryu?  Couldn't Ichigo, since he was the one who told Uryu that Soken wanted Shinigami and Quincy to fight together as allies, be the one who tries to make peace between Shinigami and Quincy and end their blood feud?

To the first: Yes.  To the second: No.

Yes, because Ichigo identifies himself as a Shinigami.  As a result, the death of every Shinigami also affected him as much as it has affected the Gotei 13 Shinigami themselves.  Furthermore, Yhwach killed his mother, and Yhwach was the one who forced Ichigo to strike down the Soul King through his Quincy blood.  As I mentioned before, Ichigo has not drawn the "Quincy Zangetsu's" Zanpakuto even once since then, and I would not be surprised if it comes up as a plot-point later of him rejecting his Quincy heritage in favour of his Shinigami heritage. 

Does it clash with his entire revelation about both of his Inner Spirits being Zangetsu and his Zanpakuto?  Yes, but the nature of his blood and its link to Yhwach was not yet an issue back then.  For that matter, the fact that Ichigo's Quincy blood caused him to kill the Soul King when he grabbed Yhwach's swords means that it was Quincy Zangetsu itself that made Ichigo cut the Soul King down.  There's bound to be repercussions as a result, and I'm almost certain that we'll see it subtly when we no longer see Ichigo drawing the Quincy Zangetsu out to fight against the Schutzstaffel, Haschwalth or Uryu.

No, because the Vandenreich's existence and actions against the Shinigami have made peace between Quincy and Shinigami impossible.  There's been too much blood-shed between them for any peace to come about, and both sides will forever hold grievances against one another, regardless of who survives.  One might make the argument that Bazz-B and Co siding with the Shinigami is evidence they can still make peace, but that is not true.  None of the Gotei 13 even noticed that the Quincy disappeared, despite noticing immediately that Mayuri was not with them.  For the Shinigami, the only benefit to having the Quincy was towards opening the Gate so they could reach the Soul King Palace, and the same holds true for Bazz-B and Co, who only approached the Shinigami because they desired revenge against Yhwach. 

In Ichigo's case, Yhwach killed his mother, as I have mentioned before, on top of his identity as a Shinigami.  The only issues he has had when confronted by a Quincy thus far has been with Uryu, and that is only because he considered Uryu his Nakama.  Ichigo's own nature will not allow him to seek peace between Quincy and Shinigami - his only desire is to protect everyone he considers an ally or friend, and the Quincy's only desire is to destroy all the Shinigami, the ones whom Ichigo considers to be his allies and friends.  The two views are irreconcilable, and I will bet that events in the coming future will also make Ichigo and Uryu irreconcilable as well.  All Uryu has to do is kill one Shinigami (even if that Shinigami is Mayuri, the one had it coming for a long time), and that will be the end of it.

But does that not clash with Ichigo being the one to tell Uryu that it was Souken's dream to see Quincy and Shinigami fighting together as allies?  Yes, but the current war has made that impossible, as stated before.  Because the Vandenreich had been in the Seireitei's shadows for a thousand years, and the Quincy have been planning for this war for those thousand years, Souken's dream was pre-destined to die the moment the war started.  Furthermore, Uryu joining the Vandenreich is what buried it permanently, because the only way Souken's dream could have remained alive is if Uryu had stayed with the Nakama, instead of joining the Vandenreich for whatever reason.  But as we saw, that did not happen, and events have been set up that will permanently drive a rift between Uryu and the Nakama in the future.

As things stand, that is the destiny the Quincy face in their future - the Monks of Destruction will eventually face their own, final destruction as the foundation stone for the Soul Society's peace.  The only way things could be turned around is if some dark truth is revealed about the world the Shinigami govern came about and how it was created, but that will never happen, because the Shinigami have been protagonists for too long for that to suddenly be turned on its head.

If you disagree with this, feel free to speak your defense for the Quincy. 
If you agree with this, voice your reason for why you believe this will be the case.