The hollows cries echoed through the night, it tried to find food all night but only found a few smaller souls that weren't even appetizing. Hearing a brothers cry made it's mouth water and it changed it's course to head straight towards the other hollow. As it approached it saw that another hollow, some kind of praying mantis creature, was bleeding from various cuts and surrounded by small black clad figures. This would be perfect. Not only could it feed on a stronger soul but a group of soul reaper's as well.
The creature rushed forward, surrounding the hollow and biting down into the creature's neck as it tried to cry out in terror. It choked on it's own blood as the hollow quickly consumed the dead hollow. Then it turned towards the soul reapers with a nasty light in it's eyes. The small group of soul reapers backed up a few steps, but the hollow encircled them and bit down into one after the other of the soul reapers. It could taste their own terror, making the meal even more exquisite. Some of the souls tried to fight back, a few actually getting cuts into his tough hide. However when one was able to hurt him he instantly pounced on that one.
The slaughter continued until there was the hollow and a child-like girl soul reaper, her green hair matted with spattered blood and tears of sorrow and fear were blurring her sight. She slowly picked up her phone as the hollow watched her. She had a feeling this would be the last thing she could do so she would call for help. Not for actual help, but for vengeance.
"Help... Me..." she managed to say before the hollow rushed forward, biting down into her and killing her instantly. The soul phone fell to the ground, but somehow managed to stay open. Caterpillar cried into the night, not satisfied with the feast that had been laid before him.
Note: Changed the title when I figured something out that worked much better XD
Cameron ran through the Dangai like a man on fire. Still etched in his eyes were the word that had scrolled, not ten minutes before, across the screen of his cellphone.
"Help...me..."
Something had gone terribly, terribly wrong in the Real World. Reports were telling him that an entire group of shinigami sent to deal with a surprisingly strong hollow had been obliterated. The 10th Division was in disarray, members everywhere, no-one but Cameron free to respond to his fellow's call for salvation; he had answered it without though, when the order came...assistance was to come from the 8th when he got there.
THERE!
The young man came hurtling out of the exit into the air high above Tokyo and almost directly above the dreadful scene he had been deployed to deal with. In the back of his mind, he noted the alarming accuracy with which the Ninth Division had placed the gate...he would have to have a word with them about non-emergency gate placement, which was always so, so far off. Gazing at the ground below, he took the whole grizzly image, dead shinigami, blood by the gallon, concrete rubble, flaming cars and one truly hideous hollow, in in a second. What he needed, was time.
What he did not have, was time. Unless...
"Carriage of thunder. Gap of the spinning wheel. Divide this light into six pieces..." cringing that he was wasting so much energy so early on, but seeing no other option, he hardened his resolve. "Bakudou #61, Rikujoukourou." Light flashed, energy sizzled and Cameron was gone in a whisper of shunpo; trusting in his skill with kidou to buy himself a few vital moments to check for survivors and find the guy who was supposed to be here helping.
The hollow howled in anger as a strange light hit it right in the midsection. He turned towards where he suddenly sensed a new presence, a stronger presence. His mouth watered at the promise of better food. He struggled to get up and howled again as the pain ripped through him as he tried to struggle. Why did all soul reaper spells always hurt? Well he'd survived enough soul reaper attacks to know how to get their attention so he could break free.
Opening his mouth the monstrous caterpillar shot out miniature caterpillars straight at the soul reaper that had appeared. They flew through the air, ready to explode on the soul that was unfortunate enough to be near them. As soon as they got close enough the hollow clacked it's mandibles together twice, sending the signal to the mindless things to explode. As soon as the explosion and smoke gave him an effective screen he strained against his bonds. He'd rush forward and eat that damned soul reaper that had shown up and bound him to the ground.
He felt the bindings buckle under his increased pressure to get out, then felt a snap behind him and he could move again. The smoke had slowly began to flow from the scene and he rushed straight into it, blindly trusting that it's explosions had managed to weaken the soul enough that it could enjoy it's newest meal.
Throughout his transition to the Fifth, Raury had found a massive abundance of free time. Large portions of this time were spent in local watering holes, as one would expect, but as a way of keeping him useful Soul Society had also begun funneling him into patrol duties to assist in hollow suppression. A short while ago a hunting group had sent a distress call. Wiped out, apparently.
A request for assistance had been called out to the Eighth, but apparently they had their hands full. Or something. He didn’t know the details, he just knew something needed killing and he was supposed to be the person to do it.
Arriving on scene, you didn’t need two seconds to register the level of carnage. A giant fucking caterpillar, corpses and a lone shinigami slinging magic at the beast. Raury watched as it burst from a binding kidou and rushed forward into a mass of exploding...minipillars.
Aw, fuck.
He rushed forward, wasting no time on a release. One did not fuck around with giant hollows.
"Let’s rock, Zhang Xu!”
As the release took shape he launched himself full-force into the growing smokescreen. He couldn’t see, but as soon as he felt his body make contact he brought both fists down in a hammer blow. Raury couldn’t tell where he was striking, but hopefully it would at least get that thing off the other shinigami’s ass.
When called to, Zhang Xu takes the form of metallic arm and shin guards, enveloping Raury's forearm and leg, yet leaving foot and hand untouched(save for fist augmentations in the form of knuckle caps), so as to not interfere with the complex joint movements and dexterity that is requred of Raury when using his Martial Art. The guards appear relatively simple, aside from a poem scrawled rather sloppliy on each of the bracers, and are a dull silver in color.
Abilities:
Punch Drunk:
When consecutive strikes land on Raury's
opponent, at the cost of 2% of Raury's reiatsu
per strike, his opponent suffers a drop in thier
dominant combat stat per turn equal to 2% of
Raury's hakuda, capping out at 10%. The effect
lasts 4 combat rounds. Maximum debuff applied
per turn is 2%
Spin The Bottle:
By expending 200 reiatsu, Raury can launch
himself at an opponent, spinning through the air
in a corkscrew fashion. Landing this attack upon
his opponent counts as normal strike damage,
however while using this technique, Raury's
Hohou is buffed by X1.2 of his base Hohou.
Landing this attack counts toward the "Punch
Drunk" debuff.
"Enkosen!" Cameron yelled just in time, so loudly in fact the he would have sworn he heard himself call out the word, as the minipillar nearest him and died an explosive and fiery death. Though weakened by the lack of an incantation, the shining golden circle he conjured managed to stop the worst of the explosion leaving him with only slightly singed hem on his right arm. Knowing that it had been mostly luck that had saved him, the young man turned around and sprang away from the bodies he had been checking and hating himself for it; it went against every fiber of his body to leave people in need behind but rationality ruled that day and he knew that it would be better for him to gain some distance and do what he could to the hollow before it took more lives.
Where in the hell is that guy from the 8th? he wondered, enraged at his partners tardiness. He was so horribly outmatched by this Hollow and Cameron knew it, yet still he gathered his reiatsu about him and began to mouth the words to another kidou but was stopped short by an explosion of reiatsu and a whirling black something that whizzed passed him to strike the giant Hollow.
It was the third time in his life that he had felt the electric zap of relief surging down his nerves and he savored every iota. His backup (or really, the intended primary, judging by the feel of his reiatsu) had arrived and not a moment too soon.
"Took you long enough!" he called, the strange, flat quality of his voice greatly exaggerated by the volume of the call. "Keep it busy! There's something I need time to do." Not wasting time with an explanation Cam drew his sword, reverse gripped before himself as silver light began to gather about his sturdy frame.
"Helista, Kaja; Tühista." He murmured, trusting the other shinigami to be able to buy him enough time to lock away enough reiatsu.
Spirit: Kaja has no tangible form when she is manifested in the real world. Best described as a series of ripples and impulses, one detects, almost hears her presence in the back of their mind rather than to behold her with their eyes.
Form: When released, Kaja takes the form of a knife, split down the center into two distinct parts that join half way down the blade and are anchored at the hilt. The two halves of the knife are tapered to sharp points and the hilt is made of a dull black substance; complete with a rippled surface for a better grip.
Knife
Ability -- Kaja (Echo): At the cost of 500 reiatsu, Cameron coats his body with a thin layer of reiatsu. Upon a successful strike (by Cameron) the reiatsu immediately attacks the opponents body and paralyzes the limb that either initiated or got struck by an attack on the following round. Paralysis lasts one turn.
Ability -- Tühista(Negate): By paying 5% of his reiatsu per turn to a maximum of 4 turns and stacking to a maximum of 20%, Cameron is able to completely negate the use or formation of an ability which has a cost less than or equal to the threshold of the ability. Because of how tough this ability is to control, Cameron can only target a single person/being at a time and can only be used at an interval of two turns between when the stacks were consumed.
The hollow howled as not only did it's prey avoid it's attack but another soul showed up to join the fight. The second soul seemed stronger, which distracted him from his original prey. Now the hollow actually had to decide who it was that it would eat. It froze for a moment before deciding to ignore the first soul in favor of going after the stronger soul.
Opening it's mouth wide again it shot out more tiny caterpillars straight at the newly arrived soul reaper. The tiny bugs flew forwards, as if eager to embrace the prey that they were shot at before exploding. Caterpillar grinned as it clacked it's pincers together, the explosion would be so beautiful to see.
"The skies break open and thunder pours down. Tremble and see the sparks lunge," Cameron wasn't about to allow those minipillars to explode near Raury. "Bakudou #48, Gorogoro!"
At his call, the sky rained balls of lightning complete with pointed ears, tails and murderous intent. Miffed by the sudden and fast movement of the minipillars the cats sprang into action, each one pouncing upon a caterpillar. The result was an astonishingly brilliant display of fire and a basso rumbling that Cameron felt in his bones, as both the cats and the minipillars exploded in an arc across the sky but away from Cameron's fellow.
In the wake of the explosion, the deaf shinigami solidified reiatsu on the soles of his feet and kicked off the air, rocketing towards the giant hollow's jaw aiming a savage straight arm punch wrapping his reiatsu around his body as he did so. "Kaja," he whispered as he threw his punch transferring the reiatsu around his body into the Hollow's jaw muscles as a savage electrical current.
Silently blessing his stars that the other guy seemed to be on his toes, Raury wasted none of the time that had been bought by that odd kidou. Quickly diving a hand into his overcoat, he brought out a small flask and quickly drained its contents.
Nearly pure alcohol. Even he almost choked as it tore through his throat, instantly setting his guts on fire. As the feeling began to spread, he fueled it with reiatsu, magnifying it’s properties and sending pulses of energy through his limbs.
"Greeeagh!”
Not an eloquent man, as has been stated many time over. Raury had charged behind the other man, following up his strike with one of his own, putting the full force of his body behind his fists as he sent a double hammer at the creature’s mass.
[370]
used feets--
Belligerent Stupor ]
Drinking affords the user the ability to ignore his/her physical limits, allowing the user to expend
reiatsu to allow a temporary boost to Martial Prowess.
An increase to overall physical combat damage dealt to opponents by 15% (15% to Hakuda). For the duration of the technique, wounds are treated as one level lower. Minor wounds are ignored, moderate are treated as minor, etc.
5% of total Reiatsu to activate. This effect lasts three rounds. User must be intoxicated.
The hollow hissed venomously as it felt the human strike it in the jaw. After that strange rain of angry red kitties it had expected something else just as flashy, and hadn't expected a quick strike to it's body. It felt a strange numbness spread through it's jaws and it tried to howl, although with no jaw, mouth or tongue, to control the noise came out as more of a shrieking or mewling noise. The hollow shook it's head, trying to bring back the feeling in it's jaws. It felt another soul at it's side and felt a strange pain, more then the hollow had felt in quite a while, at it's side as it was physically pushed away.
Angry enough to forget about it's temporary disability it tried to spit out it's anger in the form of caterpillars at the first target it saw, the one that had cast the spell at it. Unfortunately with no control on it the caterpillars just fell out of it's mouth and landed at it's feet. That's when it noticed the oddly drunk soul at it's feet. It immediately clacked it's pincers together, even though this took sever concentration to do, then it realized what exactly it had done.
The explosion sent the creature flying out of the park and into some of the nearby buildings, crashing through them and into a nearby intersection.
"Ow..." the hollow managed to hiss once it's jaw was no longer numb.
Blown back by the sudden explosion of minute cater-bodies, Raury found himself splayed out on the asphalt, much of his clothing scorched. The drunkard quickly regained his feet, tearing off the his overcoat in the process and scanned for the hulk of a hollow, finding it prone some twenty yards off.
Guess it got itself, too.
He hadn’t pegged hollows to be the suicidal type; they were overall pretty selfish. It had most likely been unintentional. Wincing at the thought of wounds he would most likely be feeling later, he silently blessed the reiatsu charged booze coursing through his body as he motioned for them to pursue their quarry.
"Les’ not give ‘im time to recover, Caster-san! Up an’ attem!”
Hoping the other man had his back, Raury charged forward with another surge of energy, vaulting into the air as he reached the splayed out beast. Raury spun, corkscrewing through the air with the intent of using his skull as a bashing implement.
[533]
Things--
By expending 200 reiatsu, Raury can launch
himself at an opponent, spinning through the air
in a corkscrew fashion. Landing this attack upon
his opponent counts as normal strike damage,
however while using this technique, Raury's
Hohou is buffed by X1.2 of his base Hohou.
Landing this attack counts toward the "Punch
Drunk" debuff.
Caterpillar is now under the effect of 2 stacks of PD=260 drop in it's combat stat
The hollow hissed as the strange creature didn't let up. It howled as it was bashed, strangely the soul reaper was using his head as some kind of insane blunt instrument. The hollow rolled over, trying to crush the soul as it got up and retreated further into the park and closer to where the attack had happened. It howled in anger as it was chased back into the park. As it made it's way further in it passed the scene that it had caused and it stopped when it heard a groan.
Caterpillar looked over to see one of the soul reapers slowly sitting up. The beasts mouth suddenly watered as it tried to keep its mind on its survival rather then its addiction to the spiritually brimming flesh of soul reapers. It lost the fight and lunged forwards, crunching down on the soul's body as the reaper screamed in agony. It ate the body in moments, leaving a messy pile of gore and allowing the hollow to forget about it's danger for a few moments.
The hollows confidence was now brimming and it resumed it's attack, creating a crimson ball of energy and launching it at the soul reaper that had dared to touch it.
"DIE SOUL REAPER!!" the hollow howled with glee. It would kill the insect this time.
"MOVE!" Cameron screamed to the beaten survivor of the Hollow's initial onslaught as he sat up. But his warning came too late, or had fallen upon ears too hardened by pain to hear; so he was forced to watch as the Hollow violated the poor man's body and soul, reducing him to a bloody mass of entrails.
Rage and guilt sent electricity snarling down Cameron's nerves as he watched the Hollow feast upon the few survivors of it's initial attack. The survivors that Cameron had been forced to abandon. The guilt...the guilt was crushing, but he would not let it consume him. There was work to do yet, he knew. The swell of reiatsu that he could feel building within the hollow was unmistakeable; even before the red energy began to coalesce. Cameron didn't even need to see the gathering crimson energy to know what the hollow was doing. He simply snapped his fingers the sound ringing in the air with the massive amount of reiatsu he had sealed away since he released his zanpaktou and the Cero vanished as Kaja's laughter echoed in his mind.
He swayed on the spot as the toll of expending so much reiatsu so quickly hit him but he kept his eyes on the giant hollow before him. He wasn't done yet.
"You'd think," he said slowly, as the Hollow gazed stupidly about, it's shock tainting the air with malice, "that something as strong as you would be more aware...but I guess not. Bakudou 10: Sealing Rings."
Once again the silver latticework of silicon wires embedded below the skin of his hands blazed with power as the three yellow rings of his kidou shot out and snapped to around the Hollow's body. Weak though it was, Cameron hoped that the bakudou would buy him just enough time.
"Mask of blood and flesh," he murmured, speaking quickly as the two massive streams of energy whipped through the air to pool within his cupped hands, "all creation, flutter of wings, ye who bears the name of Man! On the wall of blue flame, inscribe a twin lotus. In the abyss of conflagration, wait at the far heavens. Hadou #73, Souren Soukatsui!"
At his command, the fiery twin lotus of kidou that he had summoned blasted from his hands, streaming toward the bound Hollow, its flames seeking to burn flesh and bone. In its wake though, Cameron wavered then fell, catching himself on one knee, all but spent.
Sorry about the long turn. Cam doesn't have a ton of reiatsu left after this...don't let me die, Nelo.
[415/1228]
Raury tried to not let the scene disturb him. When it came down to it, he was a soldier. Still, this was a grim reality that the day to day life of a shinigami generally didn’t feature. Comrades dying right before your eyes. Just not a thing anyone can really ‘shrug off’, and if they could, Raury probably wouldn’t want to meet them.
This is why we fight! This is why we fight!
He screamed in his head, keeping sanity as level as possible as he charged forward to rejoin his fellow combatant. The hollow was weakly bound, but the man had managed to get off a full kidou, and that made for good openings. Raury felt the reiatsu-charged alcohol still strong in his body, but knew it wouldn’t last much longer.
Gotta make this count!
Reaching the beast, Raury coiled his legs and shot forward, raising both fists in an almighty uppercut to the beast’s mask.
The hollow hissed, it was bound again. Why hadn't its cero worked? The attack had literally winked out of existence. Then it was tied down once again, and before it had the chance to break itself free it was hit with the twin blast of explosive blue energy. The creatures keening wail of agony shook it's entire body. Chunks of it's body were blown off, leaving giant weak spots for the drunkard to aim for. Its mask had small cracks going through it, making the usually sturdy mask weak. Then the uppercut didn't help. half of it's mask fell off and it howled as it felt a rush of pain as the raw skin beneath met the air. The force of the blow didn't help either. It jerked upwards as the pain made it shake even worse.
A resounding snap came from the creature's spine as it fell to the ground again. It panicked as it tried to move, but it couldn't feel anything below it's face. It howled, trying to breath and watching the filthy pair of soul reapers approach him.
"Please, mercy... I beg of you..." the hollow said between gasps, breaking through the pain. "I dont... Want... To die..."
He tried to ignore the rolling nausea that hit him as the last bits of charged energy began to fade from his body. Waves of pain and shock were left in its place. That explosion had caused some serious damage, it seemed. He might have something broken. Luckily, he wouldn’t need much to finish things up here. Its pleas for mercy didn’t reach deaf ears, but they didn’t reach sympathetic ones, either.
"Sorry,mate. Ye forfeited the right ta beg fer yer life when ya ate our comrades right in front of us. Still, dun worry. I ain’t gonna kill ya. Didn’t ye hear? We’re Shinigami.” He let his words hang in the air as he took a last few steps toward the caterpillar, seeing something of hopefulness and apprehension cross its ‘face’. "We purify ya.” He said, putting his fist through the prone creature’s mask.
Ribs! His mind screamed as he straightened from the blow. Definitely a busted rib! God’s Blood, aaaagh.
Stepping over, he gave his comrade an appraising look. "Can ye walk, mate?” He asked, not even sure if he himself could say yes. The man only looked drained, really. Raury thought he had been the only one directly injured by the hollow.
Though his vision was blurry and his mind skirting the razor's edge between consciousness and unconsciousness, Cameron had still managed to outlast the hollow. It took a considerable effort to look up high enough to read his partner's lips, and more effort still to drag himself slowly to his feet before he even tried to respond.
"I..."he said, trailing off and gasping for breath, "I just overdid it. Used...too much reiatsu too quickly. I'll be fine."
His gaze slid to take in the grizzly scene. The hollow was dissolving, leaving nothing but a burst of malice hanging in the air when it finally finished it's slow purification. It would seem, some spirits were all but pleased with the prospect of redemption, but that couldn't be helped.
"Come on," he said, grasping Raury's shoulder before heading off toward the few shinigami stirring weakly some ways off, "let's get them home."
[151/1397] FINAL.
Nodding to his cohort, Raury turned to examine those left after the gruesome mauling. Some survived, some had not. A sobering thought, that they couldn’t prevent all of the casualties. It was easy to forget that Soul Society was in a constant state of war, sometimes. Until you saw something like this happen.
We fight ta stop this kinda thing from happening.
"Put in a call to the Fourth. Need ta get these folks some shock treatment now.”
Raury shook his head, running fingers through his unruly mass of red hair.
"Fuck, mate. Good work out there. After we get this report done, come with me. I’mma buy us a couple drinks.”
[1020 final]
Sorry if the format/text is funky on my last few posts. Laptops fucking blow.
