Vultures of the Desert (Part 1)

< Location: Hueco Desierto >

" Oh my, what's this? " said a large Hollow Spirit that came near the Barrier where Shiro is training, the Barrier that the System made in order to guard Shiro against outside influences during his pause.

" A 'Barrier'? in this Desert? "

" How unlikely? " said the hollows as they all discussed it, they were shocked as another Hollow came to see them.

" Oh Leader, you came... " said the Hollows as they welcome their band's leader.

[ Name: Cráneos Buitres ]

[ Astral Manifestation: Spirit ]

[ Astral Race: Hollow ]

[ Evolution Stage: Incursor (Raider) ]

[ The Incursor (Raider), is the first Evolution Stage that a Spirit will attain after entering the Astral World. In this Stage, the Spirit will be plagued by intense hunger for the Spirits in the Raider stage tends to have their Astral Core drained due to their small amount of 'Demonic Taint', thus the situation pushes them to feast on other Spirits to eat their Cores and also the Souls as they feast on them to absorb their Astral Cores and Energies too. ]

...

" What is going on in here? " Cráneos asks as he descends and slowly stops clapping his vulture-like wings.

" Oh leader Cráneos, you're here... " said another Incursor Hollow.

" We just came here after we smell the faint Astral Energy that we suspected came from an Ordinario (Normal) Spirit. "

" And after we came here, we see this Barrier that came out of nowhere. " the Hollow says.

Seeing that Cráneos approached the Barrier he looks at it with great care and thinks about something.

" This Barrier, it's not a Hollow's Barrera (Barrier) nor even a Cortina (Curtain)..."

" If it is a Hollow's Barrera then the Astral Energy Construct of it will at least make a Skull Symbol of the Hollows, but instead the Barrier looked like a Black Ball Astral Energy Construct decorated with Neon Light lines that sparkle around it. " Cráneos says as he looks at it.

" But leader, if it's not a Barrera that could it be a...? "

" No, I've seen a Cortina before, it doesn't look like this. "

" A Cortina is an Astral Sub-Dimensional Barrier that only those who achieved the highest of evolutions can use to shield and cover their very Astral Presence and Energy from the others. "

" Usually a Cortina will made the user invisible both to our eyes and senses, thus making them impossible for us to see their exact location. "

" Wait a minute leader... " one of the Incursor Hollow says.

" If that's true, then could it be that the Barrier's owner is... "

" Not from the Desierto, yes... "

" Either the Barrier's owner came from the Djinn Spirits from another Desert Region, or from another Spirit Region, or even a Lost Soul that dares to enter Hueco Desierto without permission... "

" Especially these territories of the region that ruled by me, the Strongest Incursor Hollow, Cráneos Buitres, the Grand Vulture of the Deserts!!! " Cráneos says as he pecks the Barrier that the System made for Shiro as the person inside is still on his hard training regiment to re-prepare himself in this region.

As Cráneos peck the Barrier with his very sharp Vulture Beak, he then uses all of his strength to attack the Barrier for he began to feel angry after he gets a glimpse of an idea about another 'unknown' Spirit is rudely entering his very territory which the very thing that he hates the most, rudeness.

" Ooo you stranger Spirit, or whatever you are inside this Barrier... "

" Let me, Cráneos Buitres tell you this... "

" NO ONE DARES TO ENTER THIS TERRITORY WITHOUT MY VERY PERMISSION!!! " Cráneos Buitres says as he pecks the Barrier harder than before.

" All of you join me! " he orders his men as they begin to attack the Barrier that Shielded Shiro from the outside world while he is inside the System Space to prepare for his journey from zero.

...

[ Location: System Space ]

" It's so loud... " Shiro says as he does some push-ups with a 100 kg of Astral Steel put on his back, while he had done the training for many days since the System made the time difference to be a Hundred Months inside the System Space while the time in the Astral world was only around one hour after Shiro's official arrival in the Astral World.

As he does the last set, Shiro was so drained as he wasted so much energy to do one training regiment right, probably because he never had proper training before back when he was alive that resulted in him having great trouble doing some strength training that was only being the basics such as push-ups, curl-ups, squats and etc that he was ordered to do by the System or...

" GYAAHHH!!! " Shiro screams as the System shocks him for doing the Squat Wrong after he finished the Curl-Up Training Set.

" System stop, you're disrupting me. " Shiro screams in pain and cries while the System then responds by saying.

< No, Astral Player, I will not stop punishing you until you did it right (\ _ /) >

< Now start from one, again!!! (\ _ /) > the System says in anger as he shocks Shiro with its torturous Thunder, forcing Shiro to count his movements back from one again as the System wants his training to be perfect.

As Shiro does his training in a tortured way, he can only cry as he now realized that death is not the end of one's suffering in life but the start of another that will come in this 'Astral World', the world before the end destination for those who died in the mortal world.

"( Is our existence only made for suffering, both living and dead? )" Shiro wonders during his 'training' while reminiscing his memories about his still clear memories of his childhood days before his family screwed off.

Back then, he was just a little child, so pure and happy as he remember everything happy from his childhood the condition where all things are good to him at the time, where they were no suffering and hardships that he need to bear until those beautiful memories fade away as the next scene of his memories shows what happened afterward until finally, the memories show the last scenes of his life before he dies.

After he sees those memories, Shiro continues to train but in a different emotion, from the sorrowful sadness, he felt turned into hatred and rage as he recounts all suffering and evil he felt back then, thus increasing his anger even more than he didn't know that very anger is helping his training right now, with it, he now successfully done the training properly as his anger buffs his mentality slowly.