Chapter 73: Birth of the Arrancar
The battlefield, both above and below, fell into a stunned hush. The violent escape attempts, the roars of defiance, the desperate struggles—all paused at the sight of the new entity materializing in the shaft of light.
It stood where the soul fragments of the slain Level 6 criminals had coalesced, a being sculpted from Levi's unleashed, rampageous Reiatsu and the lingering, malignant will of dead legends. It was humanoid but wrong. Its skin was a pallid white, like bleached bone, segmented by plates of black, chitinous material resembling primitive armor. A jagged, bone-like mask, shattered on one side, covered the upper half of its face, revealing a single, cold, inhuman eye and part of a slack jaw. From its back protruded uneven, skeletal growths that might have been vestigial wings or spines. In its hand, it clutched a jagged shard of what looked like crystallized darkness—a crude, born Zanpakutō.
An Arrancar. A Hollow that has torn off its mask to regain intellect and a humanoid form, wielding a fragment of its power as a blade. A being from the cosmology of Bleach, born here, in the depths of Impel Down, from the slaughterhouse of souls.
Levi stared, his own fury momentarily derailed by sheer, analytical shock. Reiatsu… can do this here? It doesn't just manipulate souls. In conditions of extreme spiritual density and violent death… it can reshape them? Fuse them? The implications were staggering. This wasn't part of the system's given framework. This was an emergent property, a terrifying interaction between his power and the unique spiritual conditions of this world.
The Arrancar—for that is what it was, in form and essence—tilted its head. It had no master, no loyalty. It was born of chaos and death. Its single eye swiveled, taking in the cowering criminals, the wounded Magellan and Rayleigh, the stunned Blackbeard, and finally, it locked onto the source of the Reiatsu that had birthed it: Levi.
It saw not a creator, but the greatest concentration of spiritual energy. Prey. Or a rival.
With a guttural, scraping sound that was not a voice, it raised its jagged blade. Black and white energy, a crude mimicry of Levi's own power, crackled around it.
"Interesting," Levi murmured, his cold curiosity overriding his anger at the escape attempts. This was a new data point. A dangerous one.
Before the Arrancar could move, a new presence erupted at the mouth of the shaft, from the level above.
"RAYLEIGH!"
Shanks. The Red-Haired Emperor had arrived, bursting onto the scene with his core crew. He took in the horrific tableau: the shaft of light, the dozens of dead and dying legendary criminals, the strange, monstrous being in the center, and finally, his old mentor, battered but standing beside the Warden.
His eyes blazed with concern and fury. "What the hell is going on here?!"
His Conqueror's Haki, a tangible force of crimson will, exploded outward, a protective, dominant wave meant to clear the field and assert control. It washed over the remaining prisoners, making them flinch. It washed over the Arrancar.
The creature shuddered. The invasive, dominating will clashed with its own nascent, chaotic spirit. It was a spiritual attack, and this being was made of raw spirit.
The Arrancar screamed—a high, piercing sound of rending souls. It swung its jagged blade not at Levi, but at the source of this new, painful pressure: Shanks.
A crescent of black-and-white energy, unstable but devastating, tore across the chamber toward the Red-Haired Pirates.
Benn Beckman was already moving. His pistol barked, not with a bullet, but with a compressed sphere of spatially-warping force. It intercepted the energy crescent mid-air. There was no explosion; the crescent simply twisted, contorting in on itself and vanishing into a pinprick of nothingness.
"What is that thing?!" Lucky Roux gasped, hefting his meat bone.
Shanks' expression was grave. He hadn't missed the source of the bizarre creature's birth—the lingering spiritual pressure that was unmistakably Levi's, now condensed into this abomination. His eyes lifted, through the shaft, to where Levi stood silhouetted against the sky. "Black Crow… what have you done?"
Levi ignored him. His focus was on the Arrancar. He watched as it adapted, learning from the clash. Its Reiatsu—for it had Reiatsu now, a crude, stolen copy—fluctuated, trying to find a frequency to resist Haki's dominance.
It learns. It evolves. A weapon, then. An uncontrollable one, but a weapon nonetheless.
Blackbeard saw his chance. In the confusion, with everyone's attention split between the monster, the Red Hair Pirates, and Levi, he made his move. "Zehahaha! Now's our chance! To the surface!" He, Shiryu, and the few powerful recruits he'd swayed—including a wary but opportunistic Catarina Devon—bolted not up the main shaft, but toward a secondary maintenance tunnel they'd scouted during the riot.
Levi's peripheral perception caught it. He could stop them. A focused Soul Crush would drop them in their tracks. But… he let them go. Blackbeard, fleeing with a handful of monsters, was a problem for the World Government. A distraction. Let him run. He was part of the chaos Levi needed.
Instead, Levi descended. He floated down the shaft, landing lightly between the Arrancar and the Red Hair Pirates. The creature instantly recoiled, hissing, sensing the overwhelming power in its progenitor.
"This is not your concern, Red-Hair," Levi said, his voice flat. "You came for Rayleigh. There he is." He gestured without looking. "Take him and leave. This," he pointed at the snarling Arrancar, "is Marine business. A containment issue."
Shanks' gaze hardened. "You turned men into… that. That's not containment. That's abomination."
"They were dead men the moment they raised a hand in this prison," Levi replied. "Their remains are my concern. Not yours. Take your man and go. The war at Marineford is waiting for you, isn't it? Or have you abandoned your stake in the era?"
It was a deft manipulation. Reminding Shanks of the bigger picture, of Whitebeard, of the balance. And offering him what he came for: Rayleigh, apparently unharmed and now free to be "rescued."
Shanks looked at Rayleigh. The Dark King gave a minute, almost imperceptible nod. It was a complex signal—part gratitude, part warning, and part the influence of Levi's geas. Go. This is deeper than you know.
Shanks clenched his fist around Gryphon's hilt. Every instinct screamed to purge the unnatural horror in front of him, to confront Levi over this grotesque act. But Rayleigh's safety was paramount. And the clock was ticking on Marineford.
"This isn't over, Black Crow," Shanks said, his voice low and deadly serious. "The world will know of this."
"Let it," Levi said, unconcerned. He turned his back on the Emperor, fully facing the Arrancar. "Now… let's see what you can do."
As Shanks and his crew quickly moved to extract a weary Rayleigh, Levi advanced on the creature born of his own power and the prison's despair. This was an unexpected experiment. A breach in the expected rules. And in that breach, Levi saw not just danger, but a terrifying new potential.
The Age of Whitebeard was ending on the surface. And in the depths of hell, something new and monstrous had just been born.
(End of Chapter)
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