chapter 25

"So... This is Hueco Mundo." Yuki said as she looked at the great expands of sand in front of her. Above there was just a gigantic moon shining through and no stars, the world as if divided in the black of the sky and the white of the sands.

BOOM

"You know of this place, Yuki-sama?" Zest questioned as she also observed this unique location that nowhere else could show.

"DEMON."

"FORGIVE US!"

"MOMMY!"

"Yes, I heard of it from some journals my father left behind." Yuki said, completely ignoring the desperate screams coming from the back. "It is where all the hollows go to, their world so to say."

"HAHAHAHAHA, DIE, DIE, DIIIEEEE!"

"I see, that is interesting." Zest nodded her head as she continued to avoid what was going on behind her.

That was due to how utterly bizarre it was, considering that it was the scene of Ace shooting flames everywhere, burning all hollows he came across while laughing maniacally as he hunted down every single hollow he could find with no hesitation.

If anything he was filled with glee at the chance.

Yuki and Zest were originally worried about letting him fight like that, wanting to help, but it quickly became apparent that he really didn't need any help for these hollows.

If anything he wanted to kill as many hollows as he possibly could by himself. For Ace, there weren't a lot of chances to get points back on Earth, but right here anything he catches he can kill with no remorse.

And kill he did. He has been in this place for the last hour or so and he did not stop yet.

Apparently sending an army of weaker hollows wasn't really that good an idea against someone who was a Logia and, thus, could send fire just about everywhere with no consideration for the amount he unleashes.

So, yeah, there was that.

The hollows that had captured Sora were all quite weak being only simple hollows that were not even at the Menos Grande level.

Their lack of unique abilities made it so that Ace could breeze through them without any issue even if he found a slight problem.

So, it seems that hollows can hit him despite him being a Logia. Probably something to do with hollows attacking the soul or something, Ace could not tell, but that wasn't important right now since these hollows he was currently facing were far too weak to actually hurt him. If anything it was too easy for him to eradicate them as he completely crushed the hollows in the area after making sure that Sora was alright.

Orihime, for her part, was decidedly not ignoring what was going on. If anything she was paying rapid attention to the fig... dispu... slaughter, yeah let's call it slaughter that was being displayed right now.

She had, besides her, her brother who was still trembling in fear. The air in Hueco Mundo accelerating the speed at which his soul chain decreased and, if he was to stay here for too long, he was sure to turn into a hollow.

As such, they needed to find a way back home to Earth. There was no other solution for this, however, that would have to wait since they couldn't leave while so many hollows were around. Orihime, in particular, was in a terrible spot considering she was just an ordinary human and, thus, very much killable.

Orihime, admiring what was being shown, had her eyes wide open and asked.

"How? How did Ace-kun become like this?"

Yuki, hearing this, turned to access the situation to see Ace, having taken out a machine gun, firing at the hollows while laughing.

"I guess videogames, I heard they make people quite violent." Yuki said, nodding to herself. In her mind, she began to wonder if she should try and check his room for videogames and change them to something a bit less violent. Maybe eroges involving female knights who just so happen to be childhood friends, who knows?

"No, not that. I know Ace-kun was always a bit enthusiastic about justice and doing good deeds, like the times he beat up some gang members who tried to harass my friends, or the time he beat up some loan sharks who were harassing my neighbors, or the time he beat up some people because they were looking at me strangely. That is fine, really it is, but how did he become this strong?" Orihime questioned, not finding anything weird about her friend doing what he was.

If anything she only wanted him to make something like a transformation device or a giant robot with laser eyes. But still, even without this she was still very interested in what he was doing and wondered if he could teach her how to shoot fire everywhere. She'd definitely like it to burn away her homework sometimes, or making toast just right.

"I do not know exactly how, but his strength right now is not something others can copy, nor something that others need to copy. Everyone has their own strengths in the end, it is just a matter of finding them and improving upon them." Yuki said to which Zest nodded, now also looking at Ace as she reevaluated what she knew of the man she thought as her owner (whenever he wanted to or not).

Clearly, he liked to fight, maybe she should challenge him to some spars in the future? Food for thought.

Regardless, it was another twenty minutes until all the many, many small fry hollows perished. Ace was sweating profusely from this as this was one of the longest fights he has ever had, but it was decidedly something he used to improve himself considerably.

'Damn, if I knew Hueco Mundo would be this good a place I would have tried to push to come sooner.' Ace thought to himself, feeling a strange sense of belonging here as well as the sheer amount of points he obtained from this single fight.

In his mind, he was already wondering ways to not only get out of Hueco Mundo but, most importantly, ways to get BACK into Hueco Mundo in the future. This was a natural great battleground for Ace who needed to fight as many enemies as he possibly could to improve and, over here, there was no limit to the number of opponents available. There were all sorts of enemies and no real restriction regarding damage to the area he should think about (one of the main reasons he didn't use the Poison fruit much despite it being one of the strongest fruits possible).

'Yeah, that can work I guess.' Ace thought, a slightly evil smile on his face as he thought of a suitable solution.

Having finished cleaning up the place Ace turned to talk with the others.

"Well, that was fun."

The three girls and one ghost looked at him as if he was slightly mad, but let it slide considering the bright smile on his face.

Zest, being the least knowledgeable regarding this place (well, except for Orihime but she was too busy making sure her brother was fine and fantasizing about something) decided to question.

"Well? How could we return to our home?"

At that question, Ace proposed.

"In my opinion, there are a few options. First is waiting until a certain lazy shopkeeper takes a moment from his oh so precious time that he uses to make overly complicated dumb planes to come to take us back. It is a sure thing but could take from a few hours to several weeks so I wouldn't recommend it since we would likely die of thirst and starvation by then. Second is we try and search for someone who can open a portal for us, this one would be rather quick but the one that could be willing to do that might just as easily kill us for shits and giggles. And finally, my personal favorite, we make a hollow of some strength a familiar."

"... You want to make a hollow a familiar?" Yuki questioned, wondering if Ace hit his head a bit too much during that conflict just now.

"Well, to be honest, it just came to me. I mean, it is not that hard to try something like that in my eyes. I just need someone to jump-start my own creation of mana. If I get that then it should be quite simple to get a hollow as a familiar and make it go and help with opening a portal back home for us. All theoretical knowledge is pretty much cramped in my mind by now so I should be able to make a familiar contract as long as I have a little bit of magic energy."

Hearing this Yuki and Zest nodded but Orihime raised her hand.

"Oh, oh, if you are going to become a magic-user I want it too. I want to be able to shot magic and become a magical girl!" Orihime said and made both Ace and Sora chuckle at her. Orihime was Orihime no matter the situation.

But, both knew what she was thinking so Ace decided to question.

"Hime-chan, are you wanting magic because you just want magic or to be able to help out too?"

At this simple question, Orihime's exuberance faded slightly as she nodded her head.

"Yes, I want to be able to help. I don't want to just be protected like I am right now." Orihime admitted in a quiet and low tone, completely unlike that of previous moments.

Sighing Ace moved to her and put a hand on her shoulder.

"Hime, listen, while I can't deny that this whole ordeal could have been avoided by simply doing what I asked, things escalating to this degree was not something I considered. Besides, even if you had magic energy, there is no guarantee that you would be able to use it as it takes a lot of practice and studies to truly learn magic. Just focus on what you can do and improve on it, that is enough." Ace explained and Orihime looked up at him, her eyes hardening in resolve as she nodded.

"Yes! Leave it to me."

///---///

+1 Affection with heroine Orihime Inoue (83/100)

///---///

'... Why are her numbers so high? You know what, don't answer that. Let's ignore this and just chalk it all up to weirdness born from this anime-like world.' Ace decided with a nod to himself, not wanting to think more than absolutely necessary about this matter.

"Anyway, can either of you do this? Zest, Yuki?" Ace asked to confirm.

"Sorry, but I can't." Yuki admitted. "My type of energy is extremely unique to my race, if I tried to transfer it over to you it could create more harm than good." She was not joking. Yuki's race was amongst the extremely few that mixed spiritual and supernatural energies, as such, this energy was very unique and it could not work to help someone start their own mana production.

"I can do it." Zest said, fully confident she could do it.

Hearing this Ace nodded his head, looking around he saw how this place was not exactly safe to do it considering there are no walls that can help in case they are needed.

Thinking for a bit Ace had to rethink the Devil Fruits in his possession and which ones could be of greater use. He could use the Soul fruit, turning the sand around him in a homie and order it to make a barrier around him, but that wouldn't work that well considering he had no real idea just how big an area the homie would cover and he didn't want to risk making a homie with his own soul here in this world, with all this corrupted energy around who knows what could happen if he tried. Most of his other fruits were also a no go, he could change his Logia but he didn't fully trust what would happen if he did that since he would rather keep his fire powers for a while longer.

He had several options but, after a while, he came to a decision in one that would be the best overall in the end since it could better defend him and the others as well as not being that far away from Awakening. The process to Awaken a fruit is not so complicated, you need to have used the exact same fruit for at least one month and obtain a certain number of points with it. 1000 for a simple Zoan, 2500 with a Paramecia, 9000 with a Logia, and 10000 with a Mythical Zoan. Of course, it is possible to shorten the time but you must double the number of points for every half of the time removed.

As such Ace, who knew of this part of the system, made his call on what he would do next, changing his Paramecia fruit.

///---///

Horo Horo no Mi (Spirit fruit) - Pero Pero no Mi (Candy fruit)

///---///

With the candy fruit's powers Ace quickly made a veritable fort out of candy, multiple walls that were harder than steel one after the other, and even the ground was covered in a very tough layer of candy.

It was a bit exhausting for Ace to do such a thing, but he did it anyway and sat down on the hardened candy that would work as the floor.

Zest nodded at herself before sitting behind Ace. She wanted to do her absolute best and helping Ace unlock his own magic would certainly help with that.

As such, she got close to Ace and pressed her hand on where his heart would be.

"This might hurt a bit, but will get better soon enough." Zest said as she started pressing her magic energy into Ace.

Ace took it easily enough, standing there quietly as Zest poured energy into his body.

It was all going well, until it didn't go well anymore.

CRACK

A sound like if something had cracked came out of Ace's body as his veins surged all over his body as if they were a thousand worms just beneath a thin layer of skin. Blood started trickling down Ace's eyes and mouth while blue flames started to appear all over the place, healing him constantly but not as quickly as he was being wounded since his entire body looked like it was one step away from exploding into a thousand little pieces. The energy of Hueco Mundo entering his body slowly but surely, causing him even more pain.

Ace's bones creaked as he started puking black blood from his mouth, it was a terrible sight and made both Yuki and Orihime more than a little scared. Even Nehan, the little fire homie, was scared but for entirely different reasons.

As a being born out of a soul it could sense spiritual energy very well, as such it could sense the presence of other souls to a degree. It was not as perfect an ability as those of hollows or other spiritual beings, but Nehan was still young and needed time to truly unravel all he could do. However, even if he could not detect other spiritual beings as well as some other races it could detect well that a large number of hollows was approaching, attracted by whatever was happening with Ace.

As such Nehan flew up, above the walls of the fort Ace made and started looking around, ready to face off with whatever might come as it did not intend to allow hollows to devour its 'father'.

Meanwhile, Zest's eyes widened as she pulled away from Ace, stopping feeding him energy but by then it was too late. The changes in Ace's body were already beyond her control and she started to hyperventilate, thinking herself guilty of the pain Ace was currently going through.

'Failure, I failed again. I, why did I try? I am useless, I even hurt the one who gave me worth, so what use am I for? No, no, please no. Sorry, sorry for being useless.'

Zest's mind went into disarray and she could not react anymore as she could only watch as Ace's body seemed to be in great pain as blue flames covered it and kept it going. The dark-skinned woman looked to be suffering even more than Ace at this moment as she observed Ace until she fully shut down.

BOOM

It was at this moment that an explosion rang on the outside of the fort. The one to snap out of it was Yuki who quickly jumped to the top of the innermost wall and looked outside, seeing that in front of her was no longer an endless desert. Now several figures emerged as the sands twisted and turned as a gigantic form came from it.

This hollow has a large, grey body and is made entirely out of the sand. His arms are long, with the forearms being much thicker than his upper arms, its head resembling a sand castle, while his Hollow hole is in the center of his chest. He wears a low-slung cloth around his waist and decorated bracelets on both wrists, the mask on its face had what looked like a mustache that went all the way around the area where it should be its head.

"I HAVE BEEN AWAKENED BY MY SANDY SLUMBER, I AM RUNUNGANGA, GUARDIAN OF THESE SANDS. FOR INVADERS OF HUECO MUNDO, PREPARE TO DIE!"

The giant hollow spoke as its mouth opened dramatically, a huge mouth filled with too many teeth was presented there as red energy was collected into a sphere in the middle of it.

It was the signature ability of high enough level hollow, Cero.

The blast of death came to the place where Ace and his group were. Nehan was about to try and intercept, even if it doubted it would be able to, but there was no need.

Yuki moved faster than it could react. She was a blue blur as she moved far too fast, a white sword in her hand as she approached the hollow. When she was so close that all she could see was red she murmured.

"Cleave the wickedness in my path, Shiroi Shikiri."

///---///

On another place on earth, a young girl was walking through the corridors of her academy. She had an elegant walk, every feature of hers was proportional to the point it looked almost artificial but still entirely natural. Her long deep black hair was extremely lustrous and cascaded down the small of her back until around the area of her backside. Her eyes were a shade of blue like that of the ocean and carried with it a coldness that would be considered unnatural for anyone else seeing it.

It was like she was the most perfect flower of nature, but this flower was as cold as ice and just as disinterested in everything and everyone else around her.

As she walked many people admired her, the students of other classes all watching her with great interest and admiration for this cold beauty.

This was just like any other day for the school, or so it was until said girl suddenly felt a sting of pain inside her heart. It was extremely abrupt as she put her hand in her chest in pain, the students who were previously simply admiring her quickly clamoring to her in all nervousness trying to help. Quickly one of them called the teachers to come, but said girl gave them all no mind.

Her eyes, which were so cold one would shiver if they looked at it for too long, now were no longer cold. Instead, her eyes were wide and fear grasping at it as she realized what was going on, her mouth uttering a single word.

"Onii-sama?"

///---///

AN:

Sorry for the shorter chapter, really wasn't that well this last week. Regarding what will happen moving forward, I guess it is wait and see as to what will happen.

Now, about what happened with Ace, that will be explained better in time, so don't worry regarding that. And finally, Yuki's sword.

It is a Zampakutou but not one like most others, that is all I will say for now.