Embarrasment, Fear And Revelation

Friedrich POV:

I woke up groggily, my senses still dulled but this time I sensed that my body had been recovering, I could move freely again. I looked around and saw that I was in a bedroom, she was far more furnished than the last one, but ultimately it made no difference as I don't need to be comfy to live

'Let's not expose my recovery ability, even if I have trust in them, it's better to keep some hidden cards,' I thought before faking to sleep, I'll use this recovery time to absorb an copious amount of reishi inside every items that I possess, never I'll be taken by surprise due to the weak reishi in this timeline.

After three hours of continuous absorption, I sensed that my gear was in maximum condition, my glove was pulsating with reishi and my cross was charged at maximum capacity.

'Let's continue to pretend to be sleeping' I decided before sensing a presence coming toward my bedroom, slumping in my bed and closing my eyes.

The door opened with a creak, soon after, I heard sounds of footsteps coming toward my bedside table, putting what I think was a bowl on it before gently touching my shoulder.

I faked a groan of annoyance before slowly opening my eyes. Seeing the compassionate look of Jeanne.

"I bring your supper Friedrich" she murmured before sitting on a chair on the side of my bed.

"Can you feed yourself or do you need my help ? " she questioned me while bringing out a wooden spoon.

'If I say that I can, it could be inferred by them that I have a recovery ability, but I can't be fed by a woman, I'll never allow it, think Friedrich,think of a solution !' I thought, the gears in my head turning.

'Ah fuck, it, my pride is less important than them discovering all of my powers' I thought, before looking at Jeanne and shaking my head, informing her of my inability to feed myself.

She smiled and took the bowl of soup it seems to feed me,

'ARGH!' I internally screamed this was so embarrassing,' I hope His Majesty is not watching ' I silently prayed,

I saw the spoon coming down to meet me, I was slowly losing my temper and was at two seconds to just take the bowl and eat it myself, but I soon calmed myself.

The meal was eaten in a religious silence, neither of us wanting to speak, well I couldn't in the first place but Jeanne didn't speak a word.

'What a kind girl,' I sighed. 'She died so unjustly, betrayed by the people she fought for her entire life' I looked done a bit, emotions that I didn't know were whirling inside of me

'Is this anger ?' I thought, shocked, 'I'm angered by her fate ? But why ? 'I questioned myself, It seemed as if my soul became an amalgam of many souls, my emotions were multiplied and not my own in their entirety.

'Is this because of the Shrift, but why ?' I continued to question while Jeanne still feeded me 'Is this possible that a Shrift carry the soul of the last wielder, and as His Majesty said, I carry a bunch of them' I realized widening my eyes, 'Are some of the Stern Ritter, dead' I widened my eyes at this thought.

My eyes didn't escape the sight of Jeanne

"Is the soup not to your liking Friedrich ? " She asked a bit diminished "I made it for you, as the village was short on supplies,the villagers, seeing me, didn't want to help us cook, and I am the only one that knows how to cook in the group.

'Poor girl, ostracized because of actions done by someone that looks like her' I thought before shaking my head, signaling that the soup was good

"Ah! Sorry Friedrich, it seems I still jump to conclusion a bit too fast " she smiled to me, I saw in her eyes a look of joy, it seems that she was really waiting for my opinion on her cooking

She gently resumed the feeding, I looked at her face, her smile looks a bit strained, her eyes a bit down too

'Did they fight during my rest ?' I thought before looking back at the bed

Soon enough the feeding stopped, the soup was good, I was full, this announced another good rest

"That was good, Friedrich ?" she questioned, at which I nodded "You don't need anything else, bread perhaps" I shook my head signaling my refusal of the additional treat.

Jeanne smiled, took the bowl and started to leave my bedroom,

"I hope that you have a good night Friedrich, have a swift recovery, " she said before closing the door with a smile.

I sighed, it was hard to keep my temper in check during the whole duration of my feeding, slumped into my bed and closed my eyes to sleep.

'Another night of sleep and I'll be back to perfect condition' I theorized, seeing the advancement of my recovery with the reishi.

Soon enough I drifted to sleep, but soon enough, I found myself in a pure white room

'Where am I ?' I looked around but found nothing noteworthy, just four quincy crosses located at the middle of the four walls surrounding me

Then I heard screams, these screams were so horrible, in all my life I've never heard someone scream so desperately.

In instinct, I backed away from the origin of the sound. A moment after, I heard another scream,coming from another side of the wall.

'What is this, some kind of torture, but why ?' I questioned, in a blink of an eye, I started to generate my bow and arrow, to try and destroy these walls.

I shoot my arrow toward a wall, but before the arrow could even touch the walls, the quincy cross on the wall absorbed all of the reishi of my arrow.

'What ?' I questioned,

A second after, a beam of pure reishi emerged from the wall and pierced my leg

'ARGH' I groaned in pain, clenching my wound, my Blut didn't protect me in the slightest of this beam

'This was like I wasn't even using Blut, just my regular leg' I noted, before seeing that the other crossed started to gather energy too

'So if I use my reishi,the crosses absorb it and redirect it in a beam ' I noted before stopping my use of reishi

The screams coming from the wall doesn't stop, it keeps happening, damaging my psyche and making me stress,

'This environment is made to make a person fear, pure white walls, screams, all of that to make a quincy stress and use his reishi, but why ? 'I thought while looking around, trying to find an exit or anything else that could help me escape

I looked at one of the big cross on the walls while pondering

'Couldn't I just remove one of them ? "But the moment my hand made contact with a cross I saw 'Fear'.

The scenery changed and I was back there, at Soul Society, during the first invasion. I recognized it because of the use of the Gate of the Sun, creating enormous blue reishi pillars that were scattered inside of the dome of protection that Shinigami created for one thousand years.

I recognized my unit, the Third Unit under the command of Lord Accutronne, we were dispatched to eliminate the Soul Reapers under the Vice-Captain rank, it was an easy job, the soul reapers are strong only in the Vice captain and above ranks, the others are fodder.

All my life I've prepared to slaughter them, all our training and all our hardship in Silbern just for this single invasion, and yet, when we encountered him we were slaughtered, my unit was dispatched around the eleventh division's barracks, the strongest division to kill all opposition.

With us were three Stern Ritters, each one of them with their own division of Soldat in addition to ours. And yet this monster, Zaraki Kenpachi, in less than a second killed two of the Stern Ritter, the Stern Ritter Q and the Stern Ritter R, the last one was a bit different, his Shrift allowed him to take the appearance and the power of everyone that he looked at, transforming himself into that person, but yet, Kenpachi killed him with ease, the only reason that I could see that he killed him with such ease was that Kenpachi evolve during a fight, someone that strong can still be stronger just by fighting

And this man, he looked at us afterward, his spiritual pressure, so strong that it crushed all of us to the ground, but soon he left after looking at us, he left, not even acknowledging our presence.

'This is not real' I started breathing rapidly 'This.is.not.real' I thought, my heart racing in my chest in fear of the man that was there yet again, killing the Stern Ritters, yet again like they were insects.

"Oh ! " I heard the voice of the monster, he was looking at me with a smirk "There is still one quite strong here, come ! let's kill each other !" he exclaimed before dashing for me

I tried to defend myself but his sword was too fast, it cut right through me, creating a fountain of blood

'He cuts me in half, through my Blut ? And my Shrift, why didn't it activate ? ' I thought before closing my eyes forever

'AH !' I exclaimed, I was back there, Kenpachi Zaraki in front of me:

"Oh! There is still one quite strong here, come! Let's kill each other! " he dashed for me again, a sense of déjà vu washed through me,

This time I was prepared, I dodged his heavy strike, dashing backward, before generating my bow and bombarding him with Reishi's arrow, creating an explosion, then a dust cloud that covered his figure. I was not naive so I took even more step backs, creating more arrows to rain them down. I continued for a bit before stopping, detecting no movement inside of the cloud

'Is he dead ?' I thought before generating a reishi sword that I'll use as an arrow, firing it inside the cloud

*CLUNG*

I heard a sound, it resemble the clashing of metal

"HAHAHAHAHA! " I heard the laugh of the mad man that is my opponent resound "Yes that's good ! " he exclaimed, with the power of his voice, he dissipated the cloud

'Is this some kind of joke, am I so weak ?' I questioned sadly, looking at the state of my opponent , he was unscathed of all my attack except one , the sword that I fired was lodged inside of his right shoulder,

"Hey !" the beast exclaimed, "you'll need to step up the game or you'll die" he said with a crazed grin plastered on his face, then in a burst of speed he sprinted at a pace that my eyes couldn't even follow.

I tried to distance him by using Hirenkyaku but after three steps, he was already on me, sword ready to cleave me in half again. I used my Shrift to deflect the attack, it was a simple cleave downward of his sword, but it cleaved in half the building that I was standing on

"Heh" I heard him chuckles ,surely amused by my power before he continued to rain me with cuts , each time I deflected a slash, it would create an immense wave of destruction in the direction that I parried.

I created a sword made of an immense quantity of reishi while parrying. I thrusted the sword, trying to impale him, but meeting the sword was his hand. He caught my sword and crushed it like it wasn't made of an important quantity of reishi but of sand.

'Impossible' I widened my eyes before seeing his fist coming right for my head, I used my Shrift to parry, but at the last second, my Shrift disappeared and he pulverized my head with his jab.

And a second later I was back at square one, same environment, same opponent, same talk, same outcome.

'It must be a training opportunity that was given to me, that's why my Shrift is forbidden now, I rely on it too much' I realized before dying another time because my Shrift didn't activate normally.

This training continued and continued and continued, until I wasn't mentally apt to even draw my sword, I died an immeasurable amount of time, my instinct were far better and I didn't rely on my Shrift, I could even force Zaraki to remove his eyepatch, in the last fight he did that and I was cut in half before I could even see the strike.

Then the scenery changed and I was back in the white room, but this time a Stern Ritter was present, I deduced it was him with all the screams and my huge fear that crept on me during all my fight, Äs Nöddt, given the letter "F" for the Fear, during the first invasion, he decimated all resistances in his wake and even mortally injured the captain Byakuya Kuchiki.

"You" came the raspy voice of the Fear, hearing his voice made me madly uncomfortable "You used your fear as training and overcame it " he added before generating a spike of reishi and throwing it to me, promptly dodged and as I dodged it, the scenery changed once again, this time I was back in France, but against Jeanne was not the Witch but the Stern Ritter.

"Jeanne, back off" ! " I cried, before she was impaled by a blue thorn of reishi. As Jeanne was touched by this thorn, I heard her wailing a cry that had so much pain and sorrow in it that it made me shiver. I heard her mutter, "Mom" before I dashed and dislodged her from the thorn.

"Are you ok Jeanne ?! " I asked her looking for an answer but as she opened, what came out was not her voice but a fly cloud that attacked me, but I didn't drop her body even as the flies were circling me. I used reishi to Hirenkyaku out of it.

When I set my eyes on Jeanne again, what I saw was a decrepit old woman with the two eyes hanging out of their sockets.

" s Nödd !" I cried before gently letting down Jeanne and dashing for the Stern Ritter, enhancing my power and speed. I swing my fist at the Fear, trying to kill him.

I hear the laugh of Äs Nöddt as he catch my fist easily with his palm,

"You still fear, Friedrich" I hear his raspy voice again "This your own purgatory, in here, I am invincible and you'll never defeat me" he said before the scenery changed again, this time everyone was present, the Chaldeans, Jeanne, Siegfried and even the enemies that I fought, the witch,Atalanta and Martha.

"They're your enemies but you still fear for them ?" I heard the voice of the Fear behind me,"Why ?" he asked before dodging my arrow.

"This is contradictory, you killed them, yet you still fear for their well being" He smiled at this remark,

"I don't fear for them !" I exclaimed, puzzled "I never once felt a ounce of sympathy for any of them so why are you making me see that"

"You fear for them, to make this stage, I drew every fear for the people that you had encountered lately " he explained "But you still can't come to the conclusion that you care for them ? " he questioned while walking around me

'I care for them ? ' I recited in my head, trying to find the truth

"I'll tell you why you care for them, they're the first people that you talk to since centuries" he started, "In the Reich, you don't speak as a Soldat, you execute the orders, the end " he said exaggerating making exaggerated movement with his arms."But here, each one of them is a living person that you can grow attached too, even an opponent"

"So that why", he snapped his fingers, the two Jeanne caught fire, Napoleon was drowned, Atalanta and Martha were diced, Siegfried transformed into a skeleton , Ritsuka and Mash,

were absorbed in a black hole and disappeared, Marie-Antoinette was guillotined and Mozart was crushed by musical notes.

'My heart!' I exclaimed, it hurt so much, why ?

"As long as you have fear" I heard this accursed voice "you can be exploited and don't think that your future opponents can't do what I'm doing, exploiting your fear " he said stopping in front of me, smiling

"Now fight !" he said before I saw his eyes roll back before revealing an emblem of the Wandenreich inside his eyeball, then an enormous pillar of purple reishi exploded from the ground. "I'll show you ultimate fear, Friedrich Braun" He said calmly before his form was revealed

He was hideous, truly a monster born from the pure emotion of fear, looking at it I was petrified

"Vollständig: Tartarforas(Fear of God)" I heard the shrilling voice of the Fear say.

I was here, frozen in fear, my body refusing to move, all of my nerves frozen, I could only watch his disgusting form

'I can't , I can't ,I can't !!' I repeated in my mind, my breathing ragged, as if I was searching for oxygen.

'Pull yourself together' I hear a voice, composed of a myriad of other voices, neither male nor female 'This is just fear, it doesn't exist, it doesn't affect you, trust yourself no your eyes.

At this moment, I used every ounce of will that I kept, using my own Vollständig, A red pillar

erupted from the ground, this time I could use my full powered Vollständig instead of the half baked version that I used against the Witch.

My appearance was the same as the last try but this time I had six pairs of red wings each with an eye on each wing, a red halo adorned my head, in contrast with the Halo of s Nöddt, it was far holier.

"Vollständig: Zephyr Engel" I said before the pillar dissipated.

"You think that with this Vollständig, your fear will disappear ?" asked Äs Nöddt with ridicule in his voice "Fear comes from everywhere! " exclaimed before generating a dozen of thorn and sending them toward me

"You said ?" I asked him, the thorns were destroyed as if they were crushed by an enormous hand."I can't hear you with all this wind you know ?" I mocked the man that tortured me for His Majesty know how long

I used my Vollständig to warp the entire space around my eyes and my ears, so that his fear could never reach me again.

Then I started my offensive, sensing his reiatsu in front of me, I closed three of my eyes on my wings, warping the space around him to crush his entire body, the compression was fast, but he was faster, he used Hirenkyaku to disappear from my zone before I could crush him and appear next to me

'An error, Fear' I thought before closing all of my eyes that were still not closed. At this the entire room shook, the body of the Fear compressed into a ball of flesh that rolled on the ground. I created an entire twisting space in all of the room, except me, he had no chance to dodge.

"You see, perhaps I fear for the people that I find interesting, but you, I don't fear for you at all, but thank you, you clarified some things for me." I said before generating a gigantic arrow of red reishi and firing it to explode the ball of flesh.

At the explosion the entire room changed back to the white room, but this time, there was a door opened for me to go through

'Still a trap ? " I thought for a while before going through the door, 'Let's see what lies beyond, anyway I can't leave'.

I followed a barely lit long corridor before arriving at a door, I opened it and saw a blond haired man sitting on a throne, I recognised the Grandmaster of the Stern Ritter, Lord Jugram Haschwalth, sword resting in front of him,

"Lord Haschwalth," I said before kneeling in front of the true heir of His Majesty, I'll never acknowledge Ryuken's offspring as a successor.

"Stern Ritter W, Friedrich Braun" said the blond man with a regal voice, "I wanted to see you, Candice said that you had a extremely good potential, so I arranged this meeting, you didn't disappoint me, I am strongly surprised of your abilities with the Vollständig, you did outsmart s Nöddt too, so you gave me an excellent good impression" the man congratulated me

"Take this as token of my appreciation" he throws me, one of the medallion that the Stern Ritter used to steal the Bankai of a Shinigami and a Seele Schneider, this arrow is different, it's virtually a blade but it can be used as an arrow too, but the true power of this weapon is that it's blade is making 3 million rounds tips per second, it's an vibrating blade that instantly cut the Reishi that it touches, and it can even absorb the reishi that it cuts.

"Now go, W, may His Majesty watches over you" he said before the scenery changed YET AGAIN to reveal the ceiling of my bedroom

Haschwalth POV:

"So how was it Äs Nöddt ? " I demanded the kneeling Stern Ritter,

"He was far too emotional during the fight, it will be hard to canalize him " I heard the Fear say before I started to tap on the armrest of the throne

Friedrich was an amalgamation of all of us after all, we are all him as he is us, he has the emotions of all Stern Ritters in him because he has the Shrift, he just has to not lose himself in his own emotions and that'll do.

"You can dispose," I said to the Fear before he disappeared "I'm waiting for the moment that you'll use my Shrift my son" I said the voice not belonging to me, but his majesty speaking through me

"Friedrich Braun, I grant you your voice ! " exclaimed His Majesty through me

'I hope you'll like the gift Friedrich' I thought, smiling before the shadows enveloped me and the entire castle.

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Well big chapter here, with a bit of a plot twist in it and the training of poor Friedrich, I truly pity him

See you soon