"You came… well we knew you would." Shuren said smugly as he stared at the three intruders. "And you brought a stray with you. How crude."
"Eh, funny you say that. Remind me again who ran from who last time." Kokutō mocked, aggression clear on his face.
Shuren snarled at Kokutō as the others came into view. The clear target was the Shinigami Captain, specifically the one called Itachi Uchiha, but it seemed that they would have to take care of the two hangers-on.
"I see, he's not here. How unfortunate." Shuren sighed, completely ignoring Kokutō after seeing that Isshin wasn't one of the ones that came. "I had been expecting a rematch."
"Quite unfortunate. I'm afraid I'll have to settle your displeasure." Byakuya remarked, angling himself to keep Shuren and his entourage in sight even as they tried to encircle them.
There was a derisive snort to Byakuya's words. "This won't go like it did in the human world. There are no restrictions for how much power we can exert here in Hell." Gunjo said arrogantly, making Byakuya turn to him.
"Good. It is the same for us, so there won't be a problem." He took a step forward, fingers on the hilt of his sword. "I have two questions for you: how did you get into the human world, and why did you try to lure a Shinigami into Hell? Answer this truthfully and we'll leave."
There was no use killing them in Hell, that much was understandable, and they came here primarily for information so if they could easily get out then it would be the ideal outcome… obviously it was never going to be that easy.
They had been waiting for them, knowing Kokutō would lead them here— that much was clear to see… and it made no difference either way. Their objective here did not change.
"Where is he?" Itachi asked.
That made them pause before a smirk appeared on Shuren's face.
"Down below. But first of all, you'll have to get through us. And don't think—"
"Byakuya."
Byakuya looked at Itachi for a moment before he slowly gave a nod. "Don't dally."
"I had no plans to."
"Hm. I'll clear out this rabble shortly."
"Let's go." Itachi said to a surprised Kokutō who nodded unsurely but still followed after him.
"Were do you think you're going?" Gunjo appeared above Itachi, his arm-like tentacles in a wide swing that tore through the air and bore at a seemingly oblivious Itachi… only for them to be cut off at the stem.
"Don't make me repeat myself." Byakuya said, his blade resting softly in his hands. The rest of the Togabito looked confused, more so Gunjo, as none of them sensed what had happened seeing as Byakuya never left his position. "I'll be the one questioning you. You will do well to answer."
Itachi and Junpei jumped into the sea of water surrounding the large crater islands and let it draw them to the next layer of Hell. Once again, he felt the embrace as the darkness swallowed him but it only lasted for a short while before they were spat out.
The stench was the first thing that hit their noses. The vile air that aimed to eat at their everything was the second.
A land of poison, one so thick that it ate at your soul simply by breathing it in. He could see thousands of damned souls scattered across the land, undead and undying, and yet their suffering was the one thing they shared in common.
Sickly yellowish poison bubbled out of the ground and let out terror mists that sucked out whatever unlife could be found here.
As bleak and traitorous as this layer of Hell was, something that was even more bleak — as impossible as that could sound — was that this was a truly dead world. There was no surviving in this world. It was in a constant loop of undeath and redeath.
All the Togabito he could see were unmoving because they could not muster any protection from the extremely volatile atmosphere and so they all laid still, quietly suffering for however long they would remain here until Hell was merciful enough to let them be reborn in another layer.
Interestingly, this entire layer of Hell looked like one huge mountain since he could very well see clouds seeping up from some of the corroded crevices. If only those damned souls could crawl towards these crevices: unfortunately, Hell was not that merciful.
The protection of his Reiatsu easily warded the atmosphere so he didn't have anything to worry about, but that didn't mean he wanted to spend any more time than strictly necessary in this particular layer of Hell.
Unlike the Seireitei however, his wishes were not Hell's commands.
The ground shook heavily as three Kushanāda rose up from the puddles of poison scattered about. As they rose up to their full height, he could see the streams of poison that had once been a part of the ground melded into their skin. They were living breathing personifications of Hell.
"Oh shit," Kokutō cursed as his worry crept up. "You got any great ideas on how to ditch these guys?"
Itachi, not saying a word, drew his sword — an action that seemed to spurn the Kushanāda into action.
They moved with a speed that should have been foreign to creatures of their size, and yet swung with the force that completely complimented it.
Kokutō jumped away from their path but they completely ignored him as they barreled towards Itachi with the weight of Hell behind them.
Black flames wreathed around Itachi's body and condensed around his sword — a blade that seemed to suck in all light from the already bleak world —which seemed to make them even more determined against him.
The first one got to him with a roar, in which the conflagration of flames around Itachi responded in intensity and surged even higher, which further enraged the charging mountain as it brought its weight to bear and fell on the tiny spark of flame.
"Enton."
The flames rose like a pitch black curtain had draped itself mockingly over the world, and the mountain above him fell in two.
The other two who were directly behind the first flanked Itachi, uncaring of the retreating curtain. Their hands came down and blot out the sky above, leaving the Hell below them in an engorging shadow. Alas, even in Hell there were shades to the abyss.
"Honoikazuchi." A blackened star bloomed in the second layer of Hell.
Amaterasu rose with the grace of inevitability that crowned her as the arrogant matron that she was. She announced herself as who she said she was and she had no problem forcing the world to accept it — be it Soul Society, Hueco Mundo, the World of the Living, or even Hell.
Lumps of flesh and poisoned streams fell to the ground as the two Kushanāda fell in multiples pieces after Amaterasu's flames pierced through them like a pincushion.
The flames around Itachi petered out like they were being sucked back into the sword, which seemed to draw Itachi's attention as he started staring hard at his sword.
Whatever conversation he seemed to be having with his sword was cut short as a deep rumbling beckoned his attention somewhere else.
"I don't know what you did, but it seems to have pissed them off. We have to get out of here now. Fighting them off is a losing battle, trust me, I know." Kokutō shouted with increased urgency.
The pieces of flesh and lumps of limbs rolled over themselves and flew up under the influence of an unseen force as another Kushanāda rose up from the ground. They flew over to meld into the body of newly arisen Kushanāda, and under Itachi's speculative gaze and Kokutō's morphing horror, they watched as it grew bigger and the stench of Hell around it grew more potent.
"Okay, this is bad! This is really bad!" Kokutō muttered sharply. His eyes tracked the figure slowly lobbing it's way towards them. "Oi, don't you understand? Hell is seriously trying kill us— you — and whatever is happening right now is new, and that is never anything good in Hell."
The fear that was masking Kokutō's face was as real as it could get and it told Itachi that the damned denizen was truly afraid of what this new development might bring.
In a world as dark and bleary as Hell, the universal fear of the unknown was even more prominent.
The rising Kushanāda felt even more terrible that it's predecessors and told Itachi that Kokutō's fears weren't unfounded. He could kill it now, but there remained the fact that others would come looking for him and Byakuya the longer they stayed in Hell. Hell was a dead man's land, and the longer they stayed in it, the more it'll become true for them.
"I don't know what that thing is, but I'm smart enough to know not to tease Hell without the promise of death." Kokutō said warningly as he saw Itachi staring focusedly at the fully formed Kushanāda.
"You're right," Itachi acquiesced. "Let's hurry." He was about to jump down the cliff, down through the clouds below when he stopped sharply and looked at the ground they stood on.
A new tone was being played… and Amaterasu had stepped onto the stage to give a wonderful dance.
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