Hueco Mundo — Desert.
Nanatsuki stood at the edge of a massive sand crater.
He had learned several Quincy abilities recently, but hadn't yet tested them in real combat. So, he came to Hueco Mundo to try them out against a powerful Hollow.
"There should be an Adjuchas-class Hollow here."
He pulled out a reconnaissance map from the Onmitsukidō.
According to the map, this crater was home to a particularly strong Adjuchas. The Onmitsukidō team that had originally scouted the area was nearly wiped out.
They determined that this Hollow was among the top-tier combatants within the Adjuchas class.
It was a perfect opponent for testing his Quincy abilities.
Nanatsuki put away the map and looked down into the crater.
The scale of the pit was immense—over a hundred meters in diameter.
At the bottom grew a few stonefruit trees.
These were rare in Hueco Mundo's desert.
Their trunks resembled the common stone trees of the region, but they bore peculiar fruit: coconuts with Hollow masks.
Those weren't just fruit—they were a kind of small animal-type Hollow, parasitic in nature, feeding on the Reishi from the stone trees.
"Adjuchas..."
Nanatsuki saw two Adjuchas down in the pit, fighting over the fruit of the stonefruit tree.
The trees themselves weren't aggressive, but their fruit contained an extremely high concentration of Reishi.
To a Hollow, these fruits were premium nourishment.
The two combatants were a serpentine Hollow with black-red metallic scales, and a massive tyrannosaurus-like Hollow.
Neither looked easy to deal with.
The dinosaur-like Hollow stood nearly ten meters tall and radiated immense pressure—but it was at a disadvantage.
The serpent had already wrapped around it, coiling tighter and tighter.
Its crushing strength was enough to visibly dent the dinosaur's abdomen.
Facing death, the dinosaur Hollow bit down on the serpent with all its might.
Its fangs, normally capable of shattering Hollow masks and bones with ease, only left shallow marks on the serpent's armored hide.
Its defense was astonishing—so much so that the dinosaur shattered several of its own teeth.
Crack! Creak! The serpent squeezed harder. Bones snapped audibly. The dinosaur's midsection caved in.
"——!!!"
The dinosaur Hollow let out a howl of pain, unable to escape the serpent's death grip. It could only wait for the end.
"You won't have it easy either!" it snarled, unwilling to go down quietly. Reishi surged to its mouth, forming a red beam.
The serpent's tail whipped out and struck the dinosaur's jaw.
Its head was knocked aside, and the Cero fired harmlessly into the sky.
"Fool," the serpent muttered in a cold, deep voice.
Muscles tensed. It crushed the dinosaur in a flash, tearing the massive body into several pieces.
But it didn't eat immediately.
It turned its head toward Nanatsuki, its gaze filled with killing intent.
Nanatsuki hadn't hidden his presence—it had already noticed him.
"A Shinigami?"
The serpent shifted its enormous body, adjusting into an ideal position to attack Nanatsuki directly.
"So this territory changed hands already? Outside Las Noches, the turnover is fast."
Nanatsuki sighed.
The map he had was made by the Onmitsukidō last year.
Now, just a bit over a year later, the data was outdated.
And neither of the two Adjuchas matched the ones marked on the map.
Originally, this crater had belonged to a scorpion-type Hollow. It used the stonefruit trees as bait, luring in prey attracted by the Reishi-rich fruit.
But this serpent Hollow had no intention of talking. It attacked instantly.
A fan of green mist spewed from its mouth.
Where the mist passed, even the sand and stones hissed and corroded.
"Acidic fog... No wonder the sand here is pitch-black."
Four silver tubes, each the size of a bullet casing, slipped between Nanatsuki's fingers. He wasn't planning to use his Zanpakutō today—this was a Quincy test run.
These silver tubes were hand-crafted by him.
Kurotsuchi had successfully deciphered the production method of standard silver tubes, so Nanatsuki put them to use.
He tossed the four tubes in a square formation. The Reishi inside linked together, forming a rectangular prism.
"Heizen!"
The Reishi pillar surged forward into the acid fog, sizzling audibly.
Heizen instantly unleashes the Reishi stored in four tubes. Its destructive power rivals a Cero, with the added benefit of instant casting and no prep time.
The serpent's acid fog couldn't corrode the pillar fast enough.
The Reishi pillar pierced the mist and flew straight toward the serpent.
Seeing that the mist failed, it stopped spraying and dodged instead.
"Burst!"
Nanatsuki clenched his fist midair—boom!
The Reishi pillar detonated right next to the serpent, which had only just twisted its head to avoid it.
BOOM!
The massive body—over ten meters long—was blasted into the air.
It slammed into the edge of the crater, carving out a new chunk.
"You damned Shinigami!!!"
The serpent rose again, but its once-glossy armor was now cracked and bleeding. The blood sizzled as it hit the sand, eating through it like acid.
Its blood was venomous and corrosive too.
"That's tough..."
Nanatsuki figured that attack would've killed a seated officer-level Shinigami instantly.
But this Hollow had survived.
Compared to Shinigami, Hollows lacked finesse and techniques—but their raw durability was on another level.
Nanatsuki raised his hand again. Between his fingers appeared four glowing orbs of Reishi.
These weren't silver tubes—they were condensed directly from his own Reiatsu.
He was experimenting with converting Quincy techniques into Kidō-like spells.
The four Reishi orbs were thrown in the same square formation. As they expanded, they gradually formed another rectangular pillar.
"Quincy techniques really are efficient. Without the built-in scripts from the silver tubes, it's way harder to control..."
The formation time was significantly longer.
If he had used silver tubes, the Reishi pillar would've been instantly formed.
Those tubes carried embedded formation scripts tailored to Quincy techniques, allowing fast and effortless casting.
The pillar shot toward the serpent, which wasn't foolish enough to take it head-on again. It immediately dove into the sand.
Thunk! The Reishi pillar embedded in the sand, but didn't explode.
Nanatsuki raised his hand again—but this time, he didn't trigger the detonation.
The Reishi pillar began to disassemble, dissolving into loose Reishi threads and flowing back toward his palm.
"It works!"
At Level 81, his Reishi Control gave him precise command over external Reishi.
And since the pillar had been cast with his own Reiatsu, he had even greater control.
Nanatsuki had just reclaimed the Reishi pillar using Reishi Control.
The threads gathered in his palm, swirling as thin blue strands.
"Quincy really have incredible sustainability..."
Although some energy was lost, this method greatly enhanced his ability to sustain prolonged fights.
"Too bad I can't reabsorb it into my body..."
That was the one regret: while he could still use this Reishi to cast Quincy techniques, he couldn't reintegrate it into his spirit body.
If he could, he'd basically be flying with one foot pushing off the other.
Just then, the sand below started rumbling.
BOOM—!!
A massive wave of sand erupted toward Nanatsuki.
The serpent Hollow was thrashing underground, generating a sandstorm.
Whoosh! Nanatsuki vanished from his position and reappeared above the crater, dodging the wave.
But then—a red beam shot toward him at high speed.
A Cero!
The sand wave had only been a distraction—the real kill move was the Cero.
Nanatsuki calmly raised his left hand.
BOOM—!!!
A blast strong enough to destroy a full Onmitsukidō squad exploded around him.
"Die!! Hahahahaha!!"
The serpent roared with laughter.
That Shinigami was strong—it had actually been injured.
It had ruled these deserts as a top predator for years. This was the worst beating it had taken in ages.
But now—its Cero would reduce him to ashes!
Then its grin froze.
The flames cleared.
Nanatsuki stood unharmed in midair.
His left arm was glowing with thin blue lines.
Blut Vene.
He had blocked the Cero using only Blut Vene's defense.
His Blut Vene level wasn't even that high.
A normal Quincy at his level wouldn't have gotten much protection from it.
But Nanatsuki's Blut Vene was formed from his own Reiatsu.
Power makes miracles!
With captain-class Reiatsu, even a low-level Blut Vene could become a near-impenetrable defense.
If he continued leveling it up, it would only get stronger.
"What... what is that?!"
The serpent was utterly horrified. It had never seen a Quincy before—didn't recognize the ability Nanatsuki had used.
Its strongest attack... had done nothing!
This Shinigami was terrifying!
The Hollow completely lost its will to fight and tried to flee underground.
But the Reishi that had been circling Nanatsuki's right hand suddenly formed five sharp Reishi Blades.
"Sprenger!"
The five blades stabbed into the ground, linking together with beams of Reishi into a pentagonal formation.
The serpent was locked in the center, completely immobilized.
Sprenger was a chantless trap array. Normally, it required a spiritual tool called Seele Schneider to cast.
But Nanatsuki's mastery of the Reiatsu Blade allowed him to replicate the same effect.
As long as the five Reishi Blades weren't destroyed, the Hollow couldn't escape the center of the formation.
Nanatsuki didn't stop there.
Reiatsu surged. His right hand glowed with threads of blue light, condensing into a Reishi arrow.
The silver ring on his left middle finger lit up. The spiritual bow unfolded.
Heilig Pfeil nocked, the bow released a storm that twisted around the arrow.
The gale tore the air open, forming a vacuum corridor.
Thwip!
The arrow struck the Hollow instantly.
BOOM—!!!
If fired purely with Level 81 Reishi Control, a Heilig Pfeil would be about as strong as a lieutenant's Hadō.
But Nanatsuki used his own Reiatsu as well.
The result?
This one strike was more powerful than most elite Quincy could manage.
The massive Hollow serpent was torn apart in an instant.
Heilig Pfeil's power was focused and precise—the crater left behind wasn't even that big.
"My Heilig Pfeil, powered by my Reiatsu, is stronger than most Hadō spells... It can match some high-tier incantationless spells."
Nanatsuki was pleased.
It was clear why Heilig Pfeil was the Quincy's signature move.
Fast cast. Focused power. Reliable performance.
Even Yhwach used it regularly.
"Sprenger is equivalent to a mid-tier fully-incanted Bakudō."
For ordinary Quincy, it was also very practical.
But Nanatsuki's Zanpakutō already had binding abilities, so he rarely used it.
This was just a test—to see if he could cast Sprenger through the Reiatsu Blade.
Turns out, he could.
Though very few Quincy could replicate it—it required extraordinary mastery of Reishi weapon shaping.
"Heizen and Burst combo packs a punch. I can cast them using my own Reiatsu, but with silver tube support, it's much faster."
When using silver tubes, the strength of Heizen and Burst depended on the Reishi stored inside.
Today, he had used standard silver tubes. Each one stored about as much Reishi as a low-level Hadō.
Once Mayuri cracked the formula for high-density storage silver tubes, these moves would become even more devastating.