Birth of the Asauchi

(Oetsu POV)

Argh, my head. Why do I have such a headache? 

"...u"

Eh? What was that sound? Is someone calling me? What ... is going on? I feel unwell, like waking up from a coma or something. I had enough of those experiences. 

"...tsu"

There it is again, that voice. Calling me from somewhere. Am I dead?

"Oetsu!"

"Oi, Oetsu. Are you awake?"

"Did you die?"

"No, that is impossible. But your name ... just changed slightly. It seems the Oken did its work. Your name seems different. More powerful. ...Good."

"Oh, you awake. Hello there. I was waiting for a while.", the man in front of me says with a big smile, showing his teeth. 

!

And then the light goes on and I remember everything. Last life, death, wishes, essences, Oetsu Nimaya, Bleach ...

Then this must be ...

"Ichibe Hyosube..."

"Oh? You can say my name just like that? Fascinating. It seems like you are worthy to say it then. Good."

"Argh my head hurts. What happened?"

"Well when the Oken was infused with your bones, you suddenly fell unconscious. Quite peculiar. I might have to look into that. But now that you are fine I'll show you to your place, come!", Ichibe said. 

They went to what would in the future be one of the islands of the Zero Division. At the moment there were only two, his and Ichibe's. So Oetsu was always the first member after Ichibe ... interesting. 

"This is your place. You can design it as you wish of course. I imagine you will want to create a forge. You are pretty much free. I already told you everything else. So feel free to visit me from time to time, whenever you have something you wish to show off.", Ichibe said and then left me on my own. 

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I must say I expected something like this. Complete freedom to do whatever I wished. Although not complete freedom. However, it was cool to be able to begin with crafting and inventing. 

I had so many ideas I wanted to do. And I had enough time too. My idea about Asauchis was recognised by the Soul King and that is why I am now a member of the Royal Guard. 

Divine General of the West ... it had a nice ring to it. 

Now let us talk facts. I am now Oetsu Nimaya thanks to the wishes I made. I was sadly not able to cheat by writing new wishes or anything like that. But I got some cool things. 

First I chose to be reincarnated as Oetsu Nimaya in Bleach. Now that was something that I loved. But of course, I was not interested in dying by the Schutzstaffel. Oh no, I was going to need something special.

And so I decided to get myself some Meta Essences. I could only get one Essence per wish and I decided to choose three that worked well together with Oetsu Nimaya. So the three Essences I eventually chose were the Essence of the Crafter, the Essence of the Mad Doctor and the Essence of the Blank. 

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(3rd Person POV)

Now why those three? 

Well, let us get the first one out of the way. Essence of the Crafter. This one should be obvious. Oetsu Nimaya was the creator of Zanpakuto, so crafting was his thing. 

But what is really cool about the Crafter and the Mad Doctor as well, is that it allows you to conjure ingredients as well as dead or inorganic materials to work with. Now this was a huge deal for a Crafter like he was. 

Just imagine Oetsu will in the future try and replicate or improve upon the Hogyoku ... well what does he need for this? Or what does he need to make Asauchi? Well, that matter can be summoned with a thought and he can then work like that. 

There was nothing that was not possible for him to craft with the Essence of the Crafter. Be it Marvel or DC comics, or another comic or story, he could make it and it would be better than the original as well. Just imagine him creating Excalibur or the sword Dragonfang ... and let's not even start with things like the 'Sword of Superman' or the 'Twilight Sword'. 

He could create lightsabers ... well those might be useless here but still. He could create awesome guns or powerful armour. He was truly free in all of his creations and that was what made the Essence of the Crafter so good.

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The Essence of the Mad Doctor was something that went well with the Crafter. He liked the bonuses of beyond genius-level intelligence and the increased thought speed as well as the perfect recall and memory storage.

And he could now also conjure ingredients for potions. And these could also be organic. This would allow him to conjure organic and inorganic or dead materials. He was truly happy about this.

And then there was the power to create Homunculi. He immediately thought about the Arrancar 'Wonderweiss' and the things that the Hogyoku could do. 

Oetsu will be able to do that and so much more. He will be able to replicate what Mayuri did with Nemu or Urahara with Jinta and Ururu. No, he will be able to far surpass all those things. He might be able to create a tribrid like Ichigo will be.

And what's more ... he will be able to give himself more abilities by making himself stronger as well. He could go the same way Aizen did and remove the barrier between Shinigami and Hollow. 

Or he could go passed that and add Quincy into the mix. The possibilities were endless.

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Now for the last Essence. The Essence of the Blank was a must-have for Oetsu. Wherever you get to choose, choose limitless potential. It is not an immediate power-up, but it was a long-term investment. 

The Essence of the Blank went well with his other two Essences. Any limit that he might have had, was practically removed by the Essence of the Blank. 

He could now reach heights that were considered impossible in the world of Bleach. And he knew just where to start with that. He was a very skilled swordsman, but there were now no more limits to his growth. He could become a better swordsman than he already was. 

The rules and regulations were quite strict for the Zero Division. For some reason, they weren't allowed to help the Gotei 13 in any way, unless the safety of the Soul King is concerned and that also only if the Soul King tells them to.

Now in Oetsu's opinion, the Soul King was no longer truly alive and all his commands they received were given in the past before he was sealed. He used the power of his eyes, saw the future and then gave the instructions.

Meaning they got orders from a Soul King, from the past. Those eyes were truly powerful and seriously something he should get a closer look at in the future.

But Oetsu had to watch out for Ichibe. The Monk who calls the Name was as psychotic as they came. He would not allow Oetsu to grow in strength and do whatever he wished. He had to build something of a secret room that was impenetrable. 

And the material for such a room should also be possible for him to conjure. But what element could stop the power of Ichibe's Zanpakuto, Ichimonji? 

Well, there was Element X from DC Comics. That was an element or metal of pure imagination personified. Yeah, that should do. And the fact that he can just conjure it ... oh my goodness that was seriously broken. 

But for now, he had to focus on finishing his work with the Asauchis. They were not yet fully ready to send down to the Seireitei. The material these Asauchi were made of was essentially the same that souls were made of. 

It was a strange process that I have no idea how the original Oetsu came up with. But I must say the idea to use the material this way ... truly the work of a genius. 

Well done old Oetsu ... but let me take over from now on. We will make some bonkers Zanpakuto to use for ourselves. Ah, I can hardly wait. 

.

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So Oetsu got to work. He first designed the place where he would work. It was the most important part of his island. He loved to start as his head was overflowing with ideas and thoughts. Good that he had that infinite storage and recall boon from the Essence of the Mad Doctor.

When he was finally ready to start forging his very first Asauchi ... he noticed that he might need help with that. He thought about it for a moment and then just brushed it aside. He was perfectly capable of doing it himself. 

He conjured some of the material he needed to create an Asauchi ... well he tried. 

It didn't work the first time. The material was ... slightly off. He could feel that it wasn't the right one to do it. 

He left his forge and entered his storage room. There he found the right ingredient needed to forge an Asauchi. He checked it for a moment and then tried to conjure the same material. 

It got much better this time, but still not what he wanted. He tried again and again until he managed to conjure the perfect material to craft an Asauchi. 

This was a good experience for him. His conjuration was not that simple to use. He truly had to know what he wanted to summon. And because he didn't know the name of the material that Asauchi's are made from, he had to go with trial and error. 

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So Oetsu took the material and entered the forge again. He took off his glasses which he had already created and started the fire. The fire started to reach the temperature he wanted ... but then got too hot and he had to cool it down again.

The material was ruined when he finally got the flames under control. So he conjured more and started anew. 

This was the process he went through that first day. From failure to failure, from failure to success and then from success to more success. At the end of the second day, Oetsu finally had a finished Asauchi in his hands. 

He could feel it ... the connection he had with his creation. It was a wonderful feeling. To create something with your hands. Something this magnificent. Full of posibilities. Asauchis were essentially the ultimate Zapakuto, as they could become anything. 

As soon as a Shinigami infused their souls into this, the Asauchi would change and become a Zanpakuto. He was a genius and he knew it. 

Oetsu put the Asauchi down and breathed heavily. He had been going at it nonstop for two days. But he still didn't feel tired. That was a first. But not unwelcome. He felt emotionally tired though. His mind needed a rest. 

He was getting used to everything and that was stressing him out a bit. Thankfully the Essence of the Mad Doctor and the Essence of the Blank were constantly working. The Blank was making him better and better with each attempt he got closer to creating the Asauchi until he finally did. 

And he would only get better. 

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Oetsu looked at the first Asauchi he held in his hands. It was a euphoric feeling to see it. He would keep this one as a souvenir. And from tomorrow on, he will create them in bunks to send them to the Shinigami below.