Nao Murakami
New member
Listen While You Read
The final whimper of the inferno shuddered, giving way to a solitary stillness that befell the Valley of Screams.
Left in Umōmaru’s wake was a land forever scarred, brutalized into an undoubtedly familiar existence from the countless clashes before, though one it would surely never get used to. A heavy, black shroom of smoke presided over the immediate battlefield, wishing nothing more than to suffocate those still alive and trapped within its primordial purpose; a fluid pillar of black rose to the sky in an attempt to spread its influence, dark clouds forming an overcast at the chagrin of the sun. The very earth on which Nao stood, ever weary and patient, groaned as it finally realized it had been desecrated, scorched, and cratered. Ears, single-eye, and spirit attuned, Nao listened to the world as she shook hands and became one with silence. Although history proved that no one yet could sustain Umōmaru’s wrath and survive, she found herself in uncharted waters. Captains were in a league of their own, especially her proctor, who happened to be a spawn of the ever elusive Snake; speed, trickery, and lethality were always unquestionably at the ready.
As such, when the immediate thickness of the black soot gave way, and all that came to view was the Ninth Captain’s discarded haori, the panic of a lesser combatant never surfaced. What Nao already understood to be true came to be as the severed, fluttering white fabric fell to reveal emptiness, not a trace of Yasu to glean, physical or spiritual. A maneuver which the Captain-hopeful had used earlier in their bout, one she knew inside and out – again, no surprise. What many never came to realize until it was beyond their control, Captain Yūgure possibly an exception, was that their current environment, birthed by the fury of her Zanpakutō, was her domain. How many instances of these exact circumstances – obstructed by dust, debris, and suffocating fumes – had she lived through over centuries of Shikai use? An answer that would be presented in her actions soon to be unveiled.
Demeanor unchanging, spiritual senses alert yet ineffective due to her proctor’s mastery over both Shunpo and the Art of Deception, Nao remained still with Umōmaru’s lengthened blade raised to shoulder-height, pointed at the empty space where Yasu once stood; her fingers loosened around the comfortable handle. She breathed a waft of the tainted air, her existence unbothered, like a cigarette would be to a life-long smoker. The sensation of the thick smog surrounding her shifted, the anomaly registered through sight, sound, and touch; a discrepancy immediate to her front, the smog making way as something coalesced around her Zanpakutō. Unbothered by this initial cue, Nao’s determined green eye shifted left as the second, and nearly simultaneous indication occurred to her flank; the likelihood that the changes in the environment were in fact, a delayed effect of a much faster cause, was accounted for. Such that when what the brawler intended to happen, did so without surprise.
As the bubbling ooze made contact with her fingers, so too did Yasu’s being come to life before her like a demon from the shadows. Although the Swamp Queen’s sludge felt cold to the touch, and downright gag-inducing as it licked its way up from her hands to her forearm, and then yet still further as it wished to ensnare the Captain-hopeful completely, Nao’s heart, and in extension, her exterior, remained stoic; she had no purpose for such weakness, her determination taking the reins. Although she didn’t sense her proctor’s intent to scramble her brains, best accomplished by way of a monstrously executed knee, the happenings around her whereabouts spoke enough of the tale to paint the grim picture. Based on her anatomical knowledge, alongside the Captain’s ever fluid and transitioning disposition, it would only make sense that which she felt behind her head, through the parting smog, was the proctor’s hand. A gesture of goodwill gone noticed, for Nao understood the implications of the course in the making. The gurgling sludge continued consuming, having reached her right clavicle, the putrid scent assaulting her sense of smell, an otherworldly gut-wrenching. But Nao pressed on uninhibited, focused eye settled onto Yasu’s cold visage.
While the Captain’s impending assault neared but a foot from Nao’s face, an unsuspecting current of exceedingly persuasive force swept up and across the brawler’s shin and flexed leg, placing enough opposing power to reduce the intended lethal dose to something manageable – chiseled knee met frail nasal cavity, crushing her nose into a bloody mush with a crunch heard across the desert. Nao reeled back from the force, her head coming to rest under powerful yet somehow still gentle fingers. Her eye rolled back with elation, for a moment numb to the pain coursing through her face, as a plethora of sensations rushed into her being…finally, she had met the real Captain Yasu Yūgure.
Reikaku was a tricky thing, a complex interconnection of pathways that at times eluded even the most masterful of practitioners. This was doubly true when faced against those capable of completely closing themselves off – Reiatsu and all – from the world. Nao had learned over the centuries that the one true way in which to differentiate the fake from the real, was to be in direct contact with that which you sought to demystify. With the brawler’s propensity for subterfuge, Nao needed to be certain without a shadow of a doubt that the Yasu before her, now coupling her head so firmly, was indeed the real one.
The very moment that practiced fingers met delicate skull, the Captain would feel a harmless thud against her forehead, a sudden paralysis seizing her in place as the sound of rattling chains finally reached her ears – from nothing, would be born…Umōmaru? A confused glance down at the examinee’s right arm, to which had once held the weapon, was instead found covered in bubbling goop, sword-less; a panicked glance at her other, and supposedly free arm, would surely evoke equal confusion. No blame would befall the Captain, for even many of Nao’s colleagues, themselves masters of Zanjutsu, held difficulty comprehending that which Nao found to be as simple as a fleeting thought – indeed, the force that had softened the blow was executed by a physically and spiritually elusive Umōmaru, telepathically, though with as much power as if it were being swung by her own hand. The blade’s edge had traveled with silent and unseen haste, and with such immaculate precision, that its trajectory, to which had outlined the proctor’s body like an artist would a stencil, had made no contact with the Captain’s person. The Zanpakutō hovered at the center of the brawler’s forehead, orange Reishi humming as it outlined the woman’s form, supported by a dense Reiatsu that increased in weight by the second – an advanced application of Shitonegaeshi (褥返し, Cushion Return), that in the hands of a master swordsman, placed an effect on the victim equal to that of a master’s Kidō.
Though Nao’s deepest desire was always to end a fight with the edge of her blade, to which she’d entertained many hypotheses she wished to test in the moments leading up to this predicament, she conceded upon Umōmaru’s behest. Nao’s flaw, or virtue depending on who you were, was her selflessness, an irresistible core component of who she was deep down – she would sacrifice her life for those she loved. An acceptance to be assaulted by a most detestable substance, cold and vile, that with every passing moment hungered to consume her whole, to suffer a stinging red-hot pain that felt like knives to the face brought on by a nearly fatal blow, and in the end, the possibility of abject defeat – all of it done to facilitate the will of her Zanpakutō. In the end, Umōmaru’s displeasure at its power having been effortlessly shrugged off by the Captain, was a persuasion beyond explanation.
The sound of tearing flesh came to bear as Nao’s arm ripped from its socket, an indescribable pain forcing her single eye to close, teeth crunching down hard…but she gave no audible cry, instead the hurt and distress controlled through sheer will and disciplined breathing, all of it let out with a deep exhale. She looked up at her proctor’s frozen face with a caring sadness.
Listen While You Read
So pretty…
Still in physical contact with her proctor by way of the coupling hand, to which Nao was ever so thankful as her head felt heavy, the woman’s emotions were made clear; Captain Yasu Yūgure, known to most as a Demon, a Brawler, a grotesque abomination, a heartless bitch…deep down, past the tainted Hollow signature and a killer’s intent, existed a beautiful, kind-hearted soul. A powerful guilt befell Nao, and in that moment, all she wanted was for them both to stop, to return to the Soul Society and forge a deep bond, and enjoy all that life had to offer. But such things would not, could not come to be…just yet.
“Measure…ahhh…twice…ahhhh…cut…ahhhhh…once.”
Words spoken softly through labored breaths, her proctor’s black ooze having spread to cover her entire upper half, compressing her chest with crushing force, her frail frame buckling, lungs screaming for air.
!!!
The immediate area – the earth, air and reality itself – groaned as a heavy pressure fell from above, increasing in strength and growing out to cover more space by the breath, Nao’s dense Reiatsu flaring up to levels yet unseen.
An earth shaking hum resonated from above the trapped Nao, just ahead at eye level of the immobilized Yasu, a subdued red glow in the shape of a foot-long feather emanated beyond the smog, and then it was gone. The light flared again, but brighter…and then it spread in all directions, more red-shaped feathers glowing up as a larger frame came into view. Again they disappeared into the smog, and again they returned, brighter and louder, starting from the original center red, and then pulsating outward, at some point transitioning from red to orange, and then eventually to a shimmering teal. The intervals came and went faster and more pronounced, but mere fractions of breaths, accompanied by an ever louder reverberation of pulsating energy, snaking around them and overhead, the lights coming together to form a dome. The sheer amount of Reiatsu pouring down upon them had reached a fever pitch, the intensity shackling, a gravitational pull beyond measure; Yasu's black tar, that which covered Nao and otherwise, began to buckle under the pressure, screeching as it peeled away, forced to the ground; the earth crumbled and cratered under the weight as far as the eye could see, dunes and boulders imploding from the abuse. Two large and red hues manifested above the two combatants, their shapes resembling eyes, equally distanced by mere meters.
A sudden and invisible force struck at the thick air, dispersing the smog to reveal the truth: behind Nao stood a giant Phoenix, its majestic and perfect frame coating them in a second layer of shadow, formed by thousands of feathers***. The Phoenix’s enormous wings came together around both the still Nao and Captain Yūgure in a fury-filled embrace, encasing them completely. It came as no surprise that the Captain had yet to glean the exact capabilities of Umōmaru, this encounter being their first meeting of blades. The feathers used in their earlier exchange numbered in the double digits, nothing more than a fraction of what had been created. And if Yasu had sought answers through the spiritual realm, she would only find a thick signature surrounding Nao, for the Reiryoku infused in these feathers – done so even before their creation into the world – was hers, and as such there was no distinction to be had.
In the realm of monsters, the Phoenix was at the top of the food chain.
The Phoenix cocked its nape back, then lunged its head forward at Captain Yūgure, beak agape in a scream that deafened all – such a sound couldn’t possibly reverberate from a creature comprised of inanimate objects, and as such, what the Captain heard was the existence warping clamor of a calamitous eruption – a blast declared through the simultaneous detonation of thousands of feathers, all of the Reiatsu melded into one ominous release, the power produced equivalent to three fully-incanted Hadō #88. Hiryū Gekizoku Shinten Raihō (飛竜撃賊震天雷炮, Flying Dragon-Striking Heaven-Shaking Thunder Cannon). Unfortunately, hearing would be the last sense affected, for it was the slowest element of an explosion to manifest, meaning one would already have been subject to those that came before. The first element to go was sight, eyes burned even beyond closed lids, for the light born from the blast shone brighter than that of any sun. Next came the force manifested by the blast, the strength of which utterly destroyed all Reishi in its outward path, and then the inferno, temperatures reaching millions celsius, disintegrated whatever monsters were sturdy enough to survive the shockwave. The sphere of the blast continued outward and upward as far as the eye could see, and then proceeded further, the Valley submitting, shuddering as the layers of its earth were erased, leaving a miles-long crater in its wake. The sky, now a moody black, roared as heavy clouds grumbled.
Nao reveled in the catastrophe, unperturbed by the sounds, sights, and sensations brought forth by Umōmaru. The flames were like a warm blanket that eased her pains, the vile black ooze completely obliterated, releasing her from its vice grip; she took in a deep breath through the mouth – the fire itself sustenance – as she lay in absolute weightlessness and ecstasy, uncaring to the fact she was missing both her nose and her right arm.
If Captain – Yūgure in the form presented throughout their ordeal so far – was a monster beyond Nao’s reach, somehow capable of matching the monumental Reiatsu birthed by thousands of Reiryoku-infused feathers igniting simultaneously, and emerging unscathed; and if she were capable of reacting quick enough to evade Umōmaru’s singular efforts at immobilization through Shitonegaeshi (褥返し, Cushion Return), where Nao had sacrificed her body in the hopes that it may succeed; and if she were capable of deceiving the Captain-hopeful, who read the very source of one’s soul by way of direct touch with the Captain’s body.
Then Nao resigned the license for the venerable monster to drag her to the Seventh Division by her hair, and throw her back into the hole from which she’d crawled out of, for she would be undeserving of such esteemed company.
