"Are you really a Fallen Angel? You look worse than a Hollow," Ren remarked, his face twisting with open disgust at Kokabiel's appearance.
Even Mahiru was staring at Kokabiel with fear and revulsion—it was the first time she had ever seen something so grotesque, so utterly repulsive.
Kokabiel let out a hoarse, metallic laugh, the sound grating like steel scraping against steel. He spread his tattered black wings, from which burned feathers fell and dissolved before touching the ground.
"Ha... you humans always judge by appearances, don't you?" he said mockingly, a twisted grin revealing dark fangs.
Ren raised an eyebrow with cold indifference, as if this was just another ordinary scene in his daily life, and replied in a low voice full of disdain:
"No. We judge by smell too... and you reek like an old rag used to wipe up vomit."
Kokabiel's face froze for a moment, then his warped grin turned into an angry scowl, his eyes blazing with a dark crimson light that reflected the rage within.
"Watch your tongue, human..." he growled, his deep voice making the air tremble around them. "I've slain angels, sorcerers, and emperors long before your kind even existed."
Ren sighed lightly, as if listening to a child bragging.
"And yet, you ended up as a rat hiding in the shadows of men. Pathetic."
Mahiru took another step back as the ground around Kokabiel began to crack under the pressure of his dark energy, black winds swirling into a small storm around him.
"I'll make you regret every word you said!" Kokabiel roared, spreading his wings to their full length as a golden flash erupted from them, taking the form of a spear of light.
But Ren didn't move. He simply smiled faintly, raising his index and middle fingers calmly before his face as he began to chant:
"Emerge from the darkness, blacker than darkness. Purify that which is impure."
The air trembled. A thick black liquid appeared in the sky, spreading quickly to envelop the entire area, forming a barrier that sealed them off from the outside world.
"I've heard that Jujutsu Sorcerers exist in this world," Ren said quietly, changing his hand gesture as Kokabiel stared in shock at the Curtain surrounding them, "but they're rather isolated—dealing only with Cursed Spirits, not meddling in the supernatural world at large."
A faint blue glow began to gather in front of him.
"Cursed Technique Lapse: Blue!"
The ground beneath Kokabiel exploded violently as the blue light formed. Space itself seemed to collapse inward, as though reality was being sucked into a single point.
A small, dense blue orb hovered before Ren's fingers, spinning slowly, emitting a faint metallic creak as though the air itself were under crushing pressure.
"What is this...?!" Kokabiel shouted, trying to move back—but his feet wouldn't budge. The very air was dragging him toward that point, a pull impossible to resist.
He spread his wings desperately, but the savage gravity of Blue refused to let go. His black feathers began to tear and bleed.
Ren smiled faintly, watching as if observing a dull scientific experiment.
"It's simply... how the world punishes those who defy their natural limits."
Kokabiel screamed in desperate rage, his magical power flaring wildly as he formed and hurled countless spears of light at Ren.
Though it was impossible for those spears to harm Ren due to Infinity, he dispelled Blue and leapt aside, dodging the barrage.
The spears struck the ground with colossal force, obliterating the spot where Ren had stood moments before. A wave of burning light tore through the black barrier, as if trying to rip it apart from within.
But the Curtain absorbed the blast like a living creature feeding on energy itself, returning the world to a suffocating silence broken only by Ren's calm footsteps as he landed lightly.
Kokabiel raised his head slowly, breathing hard, his crimson eyes blazing with fury.
"You dodged? I didn't think someone like you would flee from a fight! Seems even the Shinigami—once war-crazed lunatics—have become cowards!" he spat, his voice dripping with scorn.
Ren chuckled softly—a short, almost inaudible sound amid the drifting smoke—then looked up at Kokabiel with a tilted, weary smile.
"Coward?" he said calmly, brushing ash off his shoulder. "If you truly understood fear... you'd know that cowardice is an honor you'll never have."
Kokabiel's glare froze for an instant before he screamed, his fury erupting like fire:
"I'll tear your tongue out, you bastard!"
Ren simply replied, voice and expression unchanged:
"Try. But don't blame anyone when the void swallows you whole."
In the next instant, a pulse rippled through the air—a deep, invisible beat echoing within the sealed space like the heartbeat of a giant.
The ground beneath Ren cracked again, but this time the energy wasn't blue. It was crimson—glowing as though blood itself boiled in the air.
"If you enjoy heavenly lights..." Ren murmured, his eyes flaring with crimson radiance, "...then let me show you what happens when earth collides with the sky."
Cursed Technique Reversal: Red!
The energy burst forward with a violent repulsive force, a shockwave tearing through the air and slamming into Kokabiel.
His sacred barrier disintegrated like burning paper as he was hurled backward, crashing into the Curtain with brutal impact, leaving a cracked imprint and spraying dark blood into the air.
Kokabiel groaned in muffled agony, his ragged wings shredding further under the pressure, while Ren stepped toward him slowly, his voice echoing through the eerie silence:
"I told you... the world doesn't favor those who try to fly after they've already fallen."
Ren raised his hand once more. This time, red and blue light intertwined, the air fracturing between them like shattering glass. The fusion of Blue and Red glowed with a strange violet brilliance that devoured everything around it.
Mahiru, watching from afar, gasped unconsciously as space folded in on itself at that singular point—a convergence of attraction and repulsion, of destruction and creation at once.
Ren smiled faintly, whispering words barely audible:
"...Hollow Purple."
And in the next instant, Kokabiel ceased to exist.
No body. No shadow. Not even ash.
Only a void in space, slowly fading, as the wind returned to whisper in a world now far too quiet.
Ren finally lowered his hand, the barrier scattering like black dust into the air.
He hadn't even needed to use his Zanpakuto, or Red, let alone Purple—Kokabiel was laughably weak. Ren simply wanted to test his abilities... he had even considered using Domain Expansion: Unlimited Void, but Kokabiel couldn't withstand Purple, making it pointless.
Mahiru took hesitant steps forward, her voice hoarse as she asked:
"You... erased him from existence... didn't you?"
Ren answered coolly, without looking at her:
"I didn't erase him. I just returned him to his original state..."
Then he turned toward her, his eyes utterly calm.
"...Nothingness."
...
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