Chapter 306: Aizen's Solitude

"So I said, even if you know my weakness, you won't have the chance."

H'el sat on his dark steel throne, his eyes showing a hint of indifference, his voice almost mechanical in its emotionless tone.

He seemed to be in a state akin to divine detachment, fully focused on constructing an attack that could penetrate Aizen's spiritual pressure.

After seeing that Hado #4: Byakurai could break through Aizen's spiritual pressure, H'el's thoughts within his Shikai universe became more active and complex, meticulously calculating a way to create a lethal attack to kill Aizen.

"Oh? Is that so?"

Aizen responded, seemingly unconcerned. His figure continuously appeared beside each dark sphere, slashing them with his Zanpakutō, chanting various spells of Kido. In the blink of an eye, he had destroyed over a hundred dark spheres, and with a slight smile, he asked: "H'el, do you have any other tricks? If not, I'll finish off your Three Thousand Worlds, and this battle will end sooner than you expected."

Suddenly.

"Are you lonely, Aizen?" H'el asked an unrelated question. Sitting on his dark steel throne, he looked down at the world with a sense of detachment, like a being that had existed since the universe's inception, forever isolated.

In asking about loneliness, H'el seemed even lonelier.

Aizen was momentarily taken aback by the question. His eyes, behind his black-rimmed glasses, showed a hint of nostalgic reflection.

However, his Zanpakutō did not pause. His figure flickered continuously, using Shunpo in conjunction with Kido, destroying another two hundred of H'el's Three Thousand Worlds.

Am I lonely?

Aizen indeed felt a profound loneliness.

His talent was simply too great.

When his peers were still delighted to master Hado #31: Shakkahō, he had already mastered all forms of Kido.

That included Hado, Bakudo, and Kaido.

So what was so gratifying about learning a single Shakkahō? Shouldn't they be ashamed of learning so slowly?

When his peers were inscribing their spirit and will into their Asauchi, aiming to awaken their Shikai, he had already become a captain.

If you can't even understand yourself, how can you wield your Asauchi? Living in such confusion, like beasts without wisdom, how pitiful.

When other captains were still studying their Bankai, Aizen had long surpassed the need for his own Bankai, having reached the pinnacle of a Shinigami, with no further progress possible.

With such a clear, obstacle-free path of invincibility, wouldn't you say he was lonely?

Before Aizen could answer, H'el had already dismissed the need for a response.

"Never mind, it's just the self-important loneliness."

H'el, seated on his dark steel throne, no longer cared for Aizen's reply.

Ultimately, it's because he never experienced the mindset and intelligence of ordinary people, nor the mundane aspects of daily life—food, clothing, and shelter—that he could look down on them from a high vantage point, feeling that no one could relate to him, feeling like he was on a different level, and consequently, feeling lonely.

H'el never had this feeling.

Because he had genuinely experienced life as an ordinary person, struggling for three meals a day, buying a house, paying for a dowry, arguing over the trivial but crucial matters of family life. These things, now irrelevant to him, were once deeply etched into his memory.

When you're at the bottom, you're too exhausted to feel lonely.

There's no need to feel lonely on the path to becoming powerful because there are countless powerful beings. Right now, you're still an ordinary person, easily crushed by others.

"In loneliness, one goes mad, struggles, raves, becomes hideous, sinks until silence, unable to recall past memories, eventually forgetting everything, even losing oneself," H'el said coldly, sitting on his dark steel throne. He spread his left hand, fingers splayed, and chanted indifferently:

"Small Thousand Worlds!"

The remaining 2,132 dark spheres rapidly connected into a massive string of black pearls, rotating and expanding in the sky, merging at a speed so fast it seemed instantaneous.

Aizen's eyes behind his black-rimmed glasses narrowed slightly. His spiritual pressure and Zanpakutō tore through the air, striking at the Small Thousand Worlds, but only cut through empty air.

He was directly engulfed by the Small Thousand Worlds.

"In this absolutely tranquil world, you will experience your senses more acutely than ever before.

You will see every single hair on your body.

You will smell the dirt in every pore.

You will hear the sound of your heart pumping blood through your veins.

You will taste the foul odor in your mouth.

You will feel the movement of spiritual particles at your fingertips."

The most important thing is that within the Small Thousand Worlds, you will experience an intense loneliness, magnified and accelerated by a billion times in your perception of time.

In your own perception, a mere ten seconds in the outside world will feel like you've lived in loneliness for a billion years.

This world—it's just you now!

Even forget yourself."

Aizen looked around, seeing nothing but darkness, an eerie silence enveloping him, his senses acutely aware of the effects H'el described.

"Is this Kyōka Suigetsu? Complete control of the five senses, learned and then innovated by you, amplifying and magnifying certain emotions. You intend for me to go mad with loneliness and forget myself in the Small Thousand Worlds.

A truly terrifying opponent."

A vast spiritual pressure erupted within the Small Thousand Worlds, stronger than any Aizen had previously unleashed. The interior of the Small Thousand Worlds cracked, but immediately, another nested sphere enclosed him. He couldn't shatter the Small Thousand Worlds with his spiritual pressure nor escape from it.

"Hmm?" Aizen's eyes behind his black-rimmed glasses narrowed.

"It's useless. I've calculated your spiritual pressure strength. There are still 2,132 spheres in the Small Thousand Worlds. By the time you shatter the fifth one, the first shattered sphere will have already repaired itself.

If you have no other method, then you'll just have to taste your self-imposed loneliness and forget your own existence within the Small Thousand Worlds."

H'el sat on his dark steel throne, looking up at the Hell's Gate that was almost fully opened, his brows slightly furrowed.

"Before I met you, I was lonely."

Suddenly, a massive and complex, chaotic mix of spiritual pressures burst forth, shattering the Small Thousand Worlds with a 'boom.'

The nested spheres couldn't keep up and were shattered.

The chaotic and complex spiritual pressure shockwave shattered the surrounding space, rippling far into the distance.

Aizen held a transparent cube in his left hand, with a black, iron-like sphere suspended inside it. His right hand held his Zanpakutō, the blade piercing through the clothes of Gin Ichimaru and Rangiku Matsumoto, lifting them up.

His face still bore a smile as he glanced at the familiar captain-level spiritual pressures approaching from afar and said with a smile:

"You forced me to use something unfinished to break your Small Thousand Worlds. You are indeed remarkable, H'el."

There was no more time.

Neither of us can do anything to the other!

°°°

Hungry for more chaps? Then check out our pătreon!

Link: Påtreon.com/BaphometFiction

I post 10 advanced chapters of this fanfic there.