Chapter 108 - Rumors

(Early 100 Power Stone Bonus Chapter.)

Another two months elapsed in a brief moment and he already spent a total of 3 months in Soul Society

Besides his Zanjutsu that reached Expert mastery. His achievement in Kidō aldo reached Expert mastery in such a short moment all thanks to his AI's deduction ability.

The basics of mastering Kidō is just like typical magic. It's the matter of memorizing incantations, being proficient in creating the mental spell formula and module and also accurately channeling his Spiritual Energy. Nothing difficult with a literal supercomputer in his brain that can perform all these subroutines with machine-like precision.

After the basics are learned, it's just a matter of repetitive casting to familiarize the casting process so that everything becomes natural and second nature. At that level is chantless casting.

Adam already reached the level where he can use chantless casting of both Hakudō and Bakudō below Rank 40 without being affected by any penalty.

Besides Zanjutsu and Kidō. His mastery of Hakuda is actually quite low, still on Novice while Hohō already reached Skilled two weeks ago.

During this two months training, Adam realized he reached a bottleneck for both Zanjutsu and Kidō. Especially the former one that made no progress for the past two months despite his harsh and brutal training that always makes him dance at the death's door.

For Zanjutsu, his instructor said he needed enlightenment to break through. He tried to ask how he can get that enlightenment but his instructor said that is for Adam to figure out himself.

As for Kidō, Adam simply needs to master all spells thoroughly to increase his mastery except the process is ridiculously grindy and the higher rank spells eat a lot of Reiryoku to cast and he can't train consistently without running dry on reserve so until he increases his Reiryoku reserve even more, training higher rank spells is impossible.

———

In the first week of the fourth month, Adam once again participated in the expedition.

It has been three hours since the expedition started and Adam had been traveling deep into white desert wasteland of Hueco Mundo in search of stronger Hollows. Mainly a Menos. Which are rather difficult to encounter in the outskirts of Hueco Mundo.

Due to the strict quota limit, Adam has to choose his prey carefully like a farmer choosing ripe fruits in his orchard. He has to find one with Reishi more powerful than himself but just powerful enough that he can defeat them. Besides, he has permission to hunt stronger Hollow for the purpose of his training to seek out life and death battles inside of just killing the weaker ones.

Because he is hunting specifically for Menos, Adam went to the edge of the Forest of Menos looking for isolated Gillians since the weakest of Menos, Gillians usually move in large groups which is difficult to hunt for his current ability.

Adam was lucky as when he arrived, he saw a small group of three Gillian was hunting for Common Hollows at the outer edge of Forest of Menos.

Adam first observes the surroundings to ensure there isn't another Gillian nearby before he casts a spell, Hado 4: Byakurai. The spell is obviously not enough to kill the Gillians. Once Adam get their attention, he turn on the Hollow bait to maintain the Gillians attention on him and chase after him while he lure them into a place he prepared that gives him a more favorable battle advantage.

After all, Gillian may be the weakest but their Reishi are Lieutenant Seat level. However, that doesn't mean they are impossible to be defeated. They are mindless and work on instinct alone. Their attack pattern is very easy to read and as long as Adam is very careful. Hunting Gillian Menos isn't an impossible task.

When the three Gillian Menos were lured into the narrow valley, a barrier sprung up and locked down the area and sealed the exit which forced the Massive Gillians to squeeze deeper into the valley to chase after their prey and consequently restricted their own movement, making the valley their own prison.

"Hadō 33: Sōkatsui"

Blue beam of energy shot out of Adam's right hand that pointed at the three stucked Gillians and exploded with an explosion of blue energy.

Adam immediately drew his Asauchi after firing his Hadō and dived into the enemies. The Kidō isn't enough to kill them. At least Adam's Reishi level is not enough to kill all of them in one go. One Gillian had died, another heavily injured and the last one at the very back is slightly injured.

Using Shunpo, he scaled up the valley and slashed the mask of the heavily injured Gillian and then aimed his left hand at the lightly injured Gillian.

"Bakudō 9: Geki"

The Gillian that were about to swat Adam midair suddenly become paralyzed and engulfed by a red glow.

Adam once again uses Shunpo to jump up to the Gillian's head from midair and slash its mask into two halves.

[Killing LV 49 Gillian Menos Grande obtains 3400 EXP and 490 Spiritual Power.]

[Killing LV 51 Gillian Menos Grande obtains 3500 EXP and 510 Spiritual Power.]

[Killing LV 45 Gillian Menos Grande obtains 3200 EXP and 450 Spiritual Power.]

"16 more to go." Adam quietly reminds himself of the number of Hollows he can hunt while glancing over the notification.

"Haah… fuck balance. I wish I could just as much as I want." He grumbles as he reset the barrier trap before going out to lure more Gillians at the Forest of Menos' outskirts.

(I know I wrote about him hunting hundreds of Hollows last time. Let's conveniently forget about that and move on.)

———

At Zanjutsu class dojo in the afternoon after the expedition. Adam is having his daily training and today he is dueling the 18th Seated Officer of the 11th Division.

Clang! x8

Steel clashes against steel without any words exchanged. Adam's eyes bulged wide open as he struggled to block the very heavy strikes that kept pushing him back.

When another slash was about to connect with his blade, a light blue half sphere suddenly appeared on his blade, at the trajectory that his opponent was about to hit.

His opponent widened his eyes in astonishment. Adam just wordlessly casted Bakudo 8: Seki so precisely and accurately to parry his strength blow. His opponent couldn't do anything as his body had already been forcefully pushed back when his blade hit the half sphere, it violently repelled the blade and broke his opponent's stance which opened up his guard for Adam to make his move.

Adam didn't hesitate to use the opening he created and dived in with a Flash Step. He propped his blade up and ended up pointing at his opponent's neck. Adam stopped as the duel already ended in his victory. His opponent lowered his blade and conceded his defeat.

"I never believed when Tetsuya-dono said you could defeat me after just a few bouts. But you really did. Hahaha!" The Shinigami laughed boisterously.

"His analytical skills are too great. I fear one day no one will be able to win against him when he becomes strong enough to overcome the gap of strength." The instructor approached from the side and congratulated Adam for winning against a Seated Officer.

"It is all thanks to your teaching, sensei." Adam didn't accept the praise and instead thanked his instructor as he indeed teached Adam a lot that he wouldn't be here today if not for him.

"Of course. Of course. You are one of my best disciples. Now, since you had won against an 18th Seated Officer. It's time to turn up the notch." His instructor said before making a thinking pose and suggested him a new opponent.

"Eh! The 10th Seated Officer? Isn't the difficulty spike very steep to go from 18 to 10?" Adam groaned but he knew it was useless to change his instructor's mind.

"Do you want the shortcut or not? The more you feel like dying, the faster you will hone your instinct. It's useless to increase the difficulty slowly. It's either go big or go home. Or is your conviction all just empty talk?" His instructor suddenly became stern. He frowned and stared at Adam with scrutiny.

"I will do it, sensei!" Adam responded back passionately.

"Good. I will arrange the 6th Seated Officer from 3th Division for your next duel."

"Wait, 6th?" Adam questioned because he felt like the number was incorrect. But when he peek at his instructor, Adam decided to not tempt fate again since his instructor is rather fickle and he might arrange him a Lieutenant as an opponent if he dare ask again.

After saying his goodbyes, Adam is now on his way back to the 7th Division barrack.

On his way back, Adam opens his stats screen and takes a look at his improvement.

Reiryoku: 91,620

Reishi: Upper, Average-Class

"According to my assumption, once I reach a hundred thousand. I should reach the Reiatsu level of Unseated Officer Class. The dividing line between a capable Shinigami and cannon fodders." Adam mumbles while he is thinking about his Zanpakuto awakening.

To start nourishing his Zanpakuto with his Reiryoku, Adam needs minimum Unseated Officer Class Reiatsu level apparently to even start. It would take another expeditions to reach that level.

As for why nourishing Zanpakuto requires high level Reiatsu is beyond him. None of the books explain anything about that and him figuring out the requirements is through his System instead of any existing books or records.

Adam is very eager to unlock his Zanpakuto because Zanpakuto spirit and power is influenced by a Shinigami's soul before it was forged from a part of its owner's soul. Adam already knows about the property of his soul. Aka, his Semblance.

Naturally, his Zanpakuto Spirit and power will be influenced by the Fragment of Nihility that similarly affected his Semblance.

With his Semblance power to deny and devour powers, it made Adam wonder what power his Zanpakuto would be. What for sure is it would be an enhanced version of his Semblance.

"Haah… is there another way for me to hunt Hollows?" Adam groaned because waiting for another week felt tortuous when it was so close within reach. He wish he can just rush in to Hueco Mundo and kill some more Gillians.

Just as Adam passed by few Shinigami from other division that is walking through the same path as him, he heard of something very interesting.

"I heard the 2nd Division scouts discovered another Quincy remnants on the Human World and the Captain-Commander is organising an extermination mission." An older looking Shinigami mentioned.

"Should we join? I mean, it's basically free bonus since those Quincy are weak as shit." The younger one laughed and didn't take the Quincy seriously.

"Weak? That's because you never saw real Elite Quincy idiot. I still remember it a century ago when Seireitei is still actively at war with Quincy. They are absolute monster in Reishi dense area." The first Shinigami said, recounting stories that he still remembered from the war.

After the two take another turn into another path, Adam ponder on the talk he just overheard and to be honestly. Adam really liked Quincy power. In the right situation and place, a Quincy is much more superior with their power system that absorb ambient and the surrounding Reishi and use those as their strength compared to Shinigami that is limited only to their own Reiryoku.

"Should I participate?" Adam wondered as he is very much interested to acquire a Quincy Cross and other Quincy tools for experimental purposes.

*Ding*

"I take it as a yes." Adam sighed at the realization that the freedom of choice is a lie.

[Extermination of the Quincy Remnants]

According to the history, the remnants of the Quincy are bound to be exterminated anyway. So why don't we try to profit from this situation?

Mission

Extermination of the secret Quincy village.

Death of the village chief, Tatsuki Ishida.

Death of the village elder, Ichika Kurosaki and Ren Katagiri.

Reward: Echt Quincy Inheritance, ???

"Echt Quincy Inheritance?" Adam gasped and quickly looked around if anyone overheard him because Seireitei was crawling with Onmitsukidō.

Let's not say the walls have ears. Not even in the toilet can you truly be sure there are no ears listening and eyes watching. At the very least Adam has his omnipresent minimap which detects any and everything he perceived as people. So, Adam is quite sure he was safe this time.

But regardless, the Pureblood Quincy Inheritance. When Adam inquired about his System, what does the inheritance entail? His System replied that it is 'a complete package of Quincy power, technique and tools that is enough to revive an extinct bloodline'.

Also not to forget his System specified this bloodline is completely independent from Yhwach and unaffected by his Auswählen which is weird since he remembered Yhwach should be the progenitor of Quincy race? How could there be a Quincy Bloodline that predates Yhwach?

Anyway, what's important is that this is a good reward for Adam. If Ichigo can get all that BS power by making himself a cocktail of races, why can't Adam do the same? He would already try to become a Fullbringer if he knew how to do it safely. But the group that should be the Fullbringer hadn't become one yet. Namely the Captain of his own division. Captain Love Aikawa. But he does have a goal to try to achieve that when nearing the end of his stay.

"I accept this mission." Adam said with a conflicting mind.

They are fated to die anyway, what is the difference if Adam does it. He can at least earn power through it. His resolve and conviction to seek power and grow stronger helped him to squash off the remaining guilt he has.

"This is just a necessary evil and my family is more important than a bunch Quincy that is fated to death." Adam mutters to convince himself and subtly applies self-hypnosis.

Not a method he is particularly a fan of but useful for when he needs to remove his hesitations to make a difficult decision.

"Haah… I felt like I am becoming more and more of a hypocrite." He said and wondered about his own alignment that slowly moved away from good to evil.

—————