Bleach Hereafter RPG

Niji shrugged, ”I do not throw away allies quite as easily as you do.  I take no pleasure in someone sacrificing themselves for me.”

She stood up slowly, the sense of acceleration abated without the feeling of coming to a stop. Which was, of course, because they weren’t stopping.

The Fullbringer gave a wolfish smile, her voice dripping with scorn, ”Oh, come now, Virgil; you managed to wrong the entire spiritual world.”

Two hundred and fifty meters.

”You were scared of the potential of one of your people, but you were not willing to kill her yourself, so you gave her over to the enemy.”

Five hundred meters.

”And in doing so, gave the Gotei 13 a weapon of mass destruction that smashed the hope of people like us to stand against them.”

Seven hundred and fifty.

"Of course, you managed to get countless uninvolved innocents killed as collateral damage; but I have to assume that does not bother you in the slightest.”

One kilometer below Tokyo, and no intention of stopping.

Niji shook her head, "As long as we are being open with each other; one question continues to bother me, why did you not simply kill Valentina yourself?  Lying about her sanity and morality burned bridges with a very resourceful ally for no real gain to the Red Lotus.  I am no friend of Sadaharu Tendo, but I would rather keep him at arms length than actively turn him into an enemy."

Hibano

Maria's limp hand, thrown forward by her teeth, landed on the grip of the Zanpakuto. Just touching it was not enough. She still needed to hold it and activate a single incantation... so close, yet so far. Her vision, meanwhile, and senses in general, were starting to turn dim, and it was turning into a struggle just to keep herself awake. No... No...! Surrender would mean instant death.

Just... n-need to... clench my... fingers...

Yet, with no blood in her limb at all, how could she possibly... do anything?

Virgil didn't show much emotion at first. Niji had a lot of choice words for him, although they did not revolve around his morality all that much. Then, he faintly smiled. Once the woman finished, challenging him not just about Val's death, but also about surrendering a second Hogyoku to the Shinigami and burning his bridges with Tendo, Virgil snickered.

"Really now...?" he muttered. "You have nothing to fear about the Hogyoku that the Shinigami extracted from Valentina. If they could harness its power, would I really still exist? Being able to harness such power - near omnipotence and fulfilment of any desire - they would have found a way to eliminate their enemies in the spiritual world already."

Briefly, he pulled his hands out of the pockets of his coat and displayed them wide, in a show of confidence. "No, nothing has changed, and, if anything, the Shinigami are even more on the back foot today than they were two years ago. Something must be preventing them from harnessing the power of the second Hogyoku. My guess... and I am no spirit scientist, but since it was made specifically for Valentina and out of Valentina's flesh, her soul and the second Hogyoku must be intrinsically connected. You would need to convince a conscious Hogyoku, with the same instincts as the real Valentina, to give you its power - and would any Shinigami really be able to accomplish that?"

Since Niji did not even try to defend Valentina, nor claim that she was an innocent victim, she must already be aware of what she was like, and so, Virgil's statements must go without saying. He pushed his hands back into his pockets.

"I could have killed Valentina, and kept Tendo in my pocket. But... I had already extracted all the value I could from him - he taught me how to wield my Fullbring, he helped me find the first contacts to found the Red Lotus with, and... he knew that. He knew that I no longer had an use for him, and he is just as much of a snake as I am. Or anyone, really. If I had not betrayed him... he would. And when he would, he would bring the Shinigami with him to descend upon me. He had not severed any of his contacts with the Gotei 13 since his exile, I am sure you know that. After all, you know... it was the Captain-Commander himself who first approached him, requesting the beginning of the Second Hogyoku project."

Virgil snickered again. "So, when he approached me, I saw an opportunity, and took it. Of course, this means he is now an enemy... but, what is important, it severed his trust with the Shinigami. What they used to see as a valuable ally in the World of the Living is now, in their eyes, an unreliable actor. Maybe he's not lying about being framed? But the Captain-Commander and others, as much as they might have put up smiles when they descended to his laboratory to stop Valentina, will think twice about working with someone who almost doomed all of reality. Morgan, you... will think twice about working with him. A shattered coalition against the Red Lotus, all at the cost of a single girl's life."

After Virgil’s monologue, she had to divert some of her reiatsu into keeping the temperature in the room from rising as they descended, but she had more than enough. The longer they talked, the further they went from the surface.

She laughed slightly, ”While I will acknowledge I did not know it was the Captain Commander that put him on the path, I did not trust Sadaharu Tendo even before what happened with the Hōgyoku.  As you say, he is a snake, and fancies himself a spider.”

Niji was certainly not acting like she was defeated, nor that she was victorious, she was treating Virgil with respect, but not deference, ”That being said, while I can appreciate severing the trust between that man and the Gotei 13, they are not in a worse position than they were two years ago.  I may not be a fan of Shinigami, but immortality and no ethics gives them a lot of time to plan and be creative."

The Fullbringer held up three fingers, ”They found a way to utilize Valentina’s soul within three days of her death.”

The woman shook her head and continued explaining, ”They placed her soul into the body of a relative and wiped his memory. Not a bad kid, but he was confused and occasionally overwhelmed by Valentina’s emotions bleeding through. Nonetheless, he was able to tap into her power. I have not been able to find him for some time, so I have to imagine the Shinigami are busy molding his confused sense of self as we speak.”

She shrugged, ”I suppose I should have eliminated the threat when I had the chance. But I do not kill innocent people; I was trying to find a way to separate them.”

Hibano

"I don't know how well you follow news from Soul Society, if you do at all, but currently, Captains are dropping like flies, hunted by a threat they can't find or counter. That does not spell ingenuity or a good position." Apparently, one of them was left alive with the condition that he informs the rest of the Shinigami that a demon invasion will strike Tokyo in a month's time. Though it was apparently held secret by the Gotei 13, Virgil managed to get a hold of that information. He had his channels.

What Niji described about how the Shinigami were making use of Valentina's soul was very interesting. Apparently, they decided to weaponize her, putting her into the body of some person and allowing that person to tap into her power. He did not even know that it was possible to merge two souls - in fact, he had heard it explicitly said that it should not be possible. For that, and such an ingenious way to use Valentina, he'd applaud the Gotei 13, but...

"...but that's not quite the same, is it?" Virgil suddenly asked. "Valentina's soul, as strong as it is, is the useless part of the Second Hogyoku package - and that does not sound to me like her lending her power, merely it being drawn out against her will. Frankly, what you describe... sounds like something that would blow up straight in their faces. We both know Valentina cannot be controlled, and if she can take over this man like you say she could, then it will be Shinigami who will become his enemy, not you and me."

Please... I must... Maria's fingers still could not wrap around the grip. Yet, stopped at the last moment, with her vision dimmed and tunnel-like, her senses fading, her body on the precipice of death, she still tried. With her forehead, she pushed her body forward, towards her weapon - if her hand did not work, she will have to use her teeth. Push the limb forward, get the fingers to align on the grip...

Mouth out, without sound, an incantation.

"Well, I might. You won't leave this room alive." Virgil finished his thought, still nonchalant.

Three seconds until death.

What? Was Niji planning to strike him first? No... it was something else.

Far, far above them, from the skies of Tokyo, a bolt of lightning struck the ground, splitting the street and getting several vehicles to turn to different sides in shock. It punched through five kilometers of rock and concrete in less then a second and struck down next to the auditorium with a powerful bang - striking the supply closet that was to the left from both Niji and Virgil, and got the Director to turn his attention there.

That can't be right. No person could have survived being completely drained of blood for over two minutes. And yet...

A sudden burst of powerful Reiatsu pressure was released from the closet, which immediately got Virgil to slide back to the other side of the auditorium. After a fraction of a second, the wall burst, spraying dust and rubble across the entire room, and an amped up, transformed, pissed off, berserk Maria launched itself forth - instead of her usual enormous graysword, two blades were gleaming in each hand, and her muscles were now unnaturally engorged, making her almost a foot taller and wider.

She flew across the air without stopping, aiming to crash down at anyone and anything in her path where Virgil, alongside Niji, had stood a mere second ago.

Niji shook her head at Virgil’s threat, voice still calm and collected, ”Gods, but you are arrogant, you die the mome–”

She was interrupted by an explosion and Virgil jumped to the side of the room, sensing the sudden burst in reiatsu, Niji, aided by the kami, did the same, leaping to the opposite side of the room.  Maria had appeared, in what she presumed was her bankai. Better late than never.

There was less than second to reassess the situation, and it seemed like Virgil was taking the same opportunity. Maria was between them; and in what appeared to be her fully released state, even Niji’s natural reiatsu was dwarfed. The woman did not seem particularly precise with her attacks, and if Niji hadn’t have moved quickly enough, she might very well have been caught in the initial strike.   But Virgil had moved before the woman had even launched her attack, and Niji had been so keyed into his body language that his reaction jump started hers. 

The room began to rapidly begin heating up as Niji drew in her power; the room continued its silent descent, that bit had already been paid for and then some. For some reason, Niji felt an odd sense of pride at seeing Masha in her full power, even if it was clear she was still relatively new to it. But there was no time for congratulations, everything she had learned about Virgil was that the first strike was the most important, it had to be immediate and decisive. There were few defenses against his powers, and the goal was to kill him before he could really mount a resistance.

Her reiatsu flared out again, a golden bonfire that cast Maria’s shadow over the Director of the Red Lotus, and several tiny winged humanoids sprouted from that light. Two flew towards Maria with a mission, and another appeared next to Virgil, who would hear a faint laugh in his ear, ”Really shoulda known a Tokareva wouldn’ta gone done so easy.”

At the same time, the wall he had jumped towards for protection rippled, and molten tendrils of earth pushed through the wall and aimed to seize him.

Hibano

Maria crashed in the center of the room, slamming both blades of the released Midnight into the floor and sinking them deep. The sheer force of the strike sent trembles throughout the entire complex and left deep cracks through the concrete, ones which reached all the way to the walls and revealed the ground underneath them.

Virgil gritted his teeth. He couldn't understand how the Shinigami was still walking and fighting after a complete loss of her blood in her entire body, and yet, there was no more time for him to worry about the reasons behind it. Maria was alive, and she was swinging. A voice in his mind, or somewhere next to him, told him that a Tokareva wouldn't go down easily. It must be Niji's doing. Virgil faintly scoffed.

"We'll see about tha-"

Right on time, tendrils of magma burst out from the walls to restrain his arms while Maria lunged towards him at full speed. In a blink, she covered the distance, grabbed Virgil by the neck, breaking apart the newly fashioned restraints along the way, and slammed the Fullbringer into the wall, splashing reinforced concrete around like water.

"Haaah!" Maria let out a mad scream and continued, swinging Virgil's body over herself and throwing him into the floor. Another powerful tremble followed from the impact, and the throw's momentum was enough to send the Fullbringer crashing through the ground for several meters, leaving a trail of broken concrete.

It wasn't enough to kill him, yet. Now that he's aware of what he's dealing with, his enormous Reiatsu could slowly tap into action, shielding his body from harm - even then, he was on the back foot against the raw strength of such a powerful Bankai.

Virgil leapt back, again, making some distance from the berserk Shinigami. Heat was rapidly building up in the air, the first trail of sweat, mixed with blood, was running past his cheek. Let's try another strategy. Maria was not making another lunge and stayed back, as if something in her own body had just gotten her attention, which granted Virgil precious seconds - with his eyes still kept on the Shinigami, he pointed his finger at Niji, aiming to take control of her blood.

By forcing blood into the right muscles to get them to contract or expand, it was possible to control a person like a puppet - and Virgil's plan was to get Niji to run in front of him, as a meat shield.

"Haaaa!" Maria let out another scream, Reishi overflowing and bursting out of her body against her own control - an enormous barrage of blasts followed, launched at every direction and tearing into the entire auditorium, blasting apart the concrete and the heated stone surrounding it.

Shit. The first volley hadn’t taken him out; and it didn’t seem to help that Maria’s newfound strength seemed to come with a berserker fighting mode. The woman seemed to hesitate after her first hit; was Virgil trying to explode her heart? Niji had emphasized the importance of not letting up until the man was defeated.

Niji took two steps towards them before she realized that, no, Virgil was probably not using his power on Maria, he was focusing them on her.   Her legs and arms pumped rapidly, as if she was running full speed towards the duo; she didn’t go anywhere after those few steps, at her mental instruction, the earth beneath her feet was moving like a treadmill, keeping her in place.

In that moment of distraction, Maria seemed to have regained her senses and launched a barrage of energy; aimed at the entire auditorium. Niji quickly threw up a stone wall between her and the attack, reinforcing it with extra reaitsu. The attack still shattered it, blowing her back and slamming shards of rock into her.  She called on the air to catch her and deflect the most dangerous pieces of stone from any vital organs. The fullbringer remained in the air, likely looking slightly foolish as she ran in place a few feet off the ground.

The attack had thrown out clouds of dust and debris as it struck wildly; the battery powered construction lights were destroyed, and the room was lit by the gold-green light of Maria and Niji’s reiatsu. Where parts of the room had been entirely obliterated, it revealed rippling walls of rock as the cavern continued to descend into the depths.

She reached out with her reiatsu senses, trying to locate Virgil; he couldn’t stay suppressed at this level of conflict and stay aliv—there he was! Where she had located the man, she began to superheat the air around him, diverting the heat of the earth to his location. As she did so, the fae spirits that had flown to Maria looked for an opportunity to trigger the bracers; the Shinigami may have lost her sense of strategy, but leaving those weapons on the table was folly. And the sooner they were activated the better.

Hibano

(Break Through the Limit)

Maria's barrage turned the auditorium into an obstacle course - there was hardly a piece of solid ground remaining between the craters, the exploded rocks and the magma that had been spewn forth by Niji's attacks. Blasts battering the walls and ceiling of the hall only revealed more rocks, the brittle of which fell, like a rain of heated stone and gravel. Darkness set forth throughout the battlefield, yet even then, it was easy for Virgil to see what was wrong.

We're no longer in Tokyo. The cunt sneaked us all away God knows where. Perhaps because they were so far below the surface and the walls of the auditorium were no longer shielding them from the rising warmth, the air around him was getting increasingly hot and-

I will die in two and a half seconds.

So, he leapt to the side, propelling himself with his Reishi to run across the battered walls. Unlike his opponents, he did not need to focus on his Reiatsu senses to know where his enemies were - their blood gave them away, more precisely than their energy would.

"Haaah!" Maria lunged forth with a ferocious scream after the excess energy in her body was finally released. She didn't bother to wait for Niji's fairies to reach her and unlock the energy still stored in her inactive bracers - her lunge forward drove right through them. Once she slammed her foot down at where she sensed Virgil a moment ago, however, she found nothing there. Virgil had left before she even screamed.

First, I need to make sure that she doesn't sink this hall even deeper than she already has. Simone will be able to extract me once she finished her job, but let's not make it any harder for her. For that... he had to handle Niji.

Maria turned around and unleashed yet another burst of pure Reishi, this time a focused one, at Virgil, to no avail - the Fullbringer danced along the walls, jumping from one side to the next, to avoid the berserk Shinigami's attacks. His attention was brought back to Niji. Using her powers, she was able to stop herself from running in front of him as a meat shield - so, to force her to cease, he went for another approach. The blood in her arms would suddenly get her muscles to tense up and send punches directly at her face.

Normally, a human brain is too hesitant to injure its own body, so it takes a lot of mental fortitude to strike yourself in a way that is actually meaningful. For Virgil's manipulation, however, it was not an issue at all.

As for the elephant in the room...

Jumping from place to place to avoid Maria's attacks, Virgil placed his hand on a bleeding wound on his arm, then began to draw out his own blood until he fashioned a small dagger. Now, all he needed was to find the right opportunity to use it...

Niji felt her nose break as her fist unexpectedly flew towards her face. The second blow hit the same spot, and stars swum in her vision.  The small spirit next to Virgil let out a maniacal laugh, then hovered distractingly in front of his face, ”Ooo, careful there; if Mistress Gaia loses focus tha’s a few hun’red million tons a collapsin’ rock you’ll haveta deal with.”

Indeed, as Niji staggered, the ground lurched below them as the floor suddenly slowed its descent, though the ceiling took a moment to catch up and seemed a few meters lower than it had been a few seconds ago. After a few more painful blows, Niji’s arms were suddenly pinned in place to her side, her muscles flexing helplessly against a solid sleeve of stone. Virgil had used his control to throw a punch more effectively than she would have been able to do with her own martial proficiency, but she was not particularly strong, even with the other Fullbringer maxing out her muscles, and she had no chance of breaking through her self-made restraints.

There was another surge of reishi from Niji, and a strong burst of wind thrust all of the dust and debris to the opposite side of the room, clearing the sightlines for her bruiser companion. Not only that, but the air kept moving around Virgil, until there simply wasn’t air around him anymore; a shimmering bubble of air pressure would prevent him from getting any new oxygen.

She knew this was a long shot; but it was easy enough to accomplish. Like Niji, he was ultimately still human, and humans needed to breathe.  Maybe it wouldn’t do much, depending on how his power over his own blood worked. But just as possible, the lack of new oxygen to his bloodstream might weaken.

Hibano

(Break Through the Limit)

Even when punching herself in the face, she's still relying on the oldest trick in the book, it seems. Virgil did not even bother to respond or try to shoo the fairy away - he figured that the Reishi construct will just wrangle herself out of any grip and keep on harassing him afterwards. So, he focused on the battle itself. Maria was, once again, stopping before attacking, and looked down to her hands instead. Much like last time, Reishi was overflowing inside of her, and she couldn't control it.

That provided an opportunity which-

I will die in thirty seconds.

"Huh?-"

Virgil let out a brief blurb and then leaped off the wall, landing on the broken floor with a roll. Maria was not attacking, she remained in place. While it did seem she was about to burst to another barrage, it would surely take a bit longer than that to begin... All that he could feel was warm air rushing past.

So where did the warning come from, and what did he leap away from? Nothing that he could see besides the wall where he stood, aside for an ever permeating Reiatsu... It must be Niji's job, somehow. To ensure she does not pull anything out of the blue, even when punching herself in the face, Virgil continued to stay mobile, moving from place to place while paying attention to Niji and, of course, Maria in the center of the room.

"Virgil..." she managed to gush out in her berserk state, then let out another powerful roar. Green energy was soaring and swirling around her, oozing out of her body in enormous mass. Virgil did not waste a second. Suddenly, he lunged forward, moving faster than the human eye could track, appearing behind Maria and stabbing his dagger into her back. Instantly, it turned into liquid blood and drained into her body.

"Agh!"

Instantly, with a painful crack, Maria's body was forced into a cross shape, while the energy around her dissipated in a small puff. The engorged muscles shrank down to normal in the midst of the useless struggle, the transformation no longer possible to maintain without its building up power getting constantly released, and, for the first time since whispering her Bankai incantation, Maria realized where she was. And her situation was... not good.

"If I can't control your blood, then have some of mine," Virgil stated, then walked away, towards Niji. The punch across her face broke her nose - perfect. With the mere point of a finger, the blood seeping from her nostrils would suddenly begin to superheat, bubbling and reaching hundreds of degrees of Celsius in under a second. It was pointless to keep up the polite pretense now, so Virgil drew another blood dagger from his wounds and briefly twirled it in his hand. "Now, how about you?"

Her teeth forced to grit, even her face locked in the same position it was at the time of the stab, Maria shifted her eyes to the side. The bracers on her wrists were still there, and if she can't activate her Bankai, they might be the last option left, yet... reaching them was going to be even tougher than her near-death experience last time.

Shortly after the text to the Red Lotus, continued:

Niji nodded at the bracers as they made it to the auditorium, ”Those bracers are custom made from a friend.  They suppress your reiatsu signature down to mortal levels, but it is not mere suppression.  They are storing the spiritual energy your body produces within them.  Saving it.”

---

Present time:

Niji screamed in pain as boiling blood flowed up her nose, she fought to remain conscious through the agony. There was another jerk of motion as their descent slowed further, and the roof closed in by another few meters.  Her vision narrowed to a tunnel, but she wasn’t looking at Virgil; she was looking at Maria.

They still hadn’t played their ace in the hole, and while Niji wasn’t sure why, that was still the best play they had. The Fullbringer wasn’t fast enough to make it past Virgil, especially as injured as she was. There wasn’t time to focus on healing, that could come later. She gasped in air, then, through gritted teeth, growled a few words as another flood of reiatsu poured out of her.

”Break, Midnight.”

The storm of reiatsu coalesced on the Shinigami’s fallen zanpakuto, and suddenly there was a figure standing in front of the stricken Maria. He simply wasn’t there a moment before, and then he was, holding the massive bludgeoning zanpakuto of her shikai. The young man glanced past Maria at Virgil approaching Niji, and shook his head slightly.

”I'm never gonna get to eat her if you don't pull it together.”

The spirit shot out its hands. The one holding the massive weapon went for one of Maria’s crucified hands. The other touched the bracers Niji had given her.

---

“I have worn them since my wedding day, and the entirety of the time I was pregnant with Tomoi.”

---

The spirit grinned as it held Maria's zanpakuto to her palm and pressed a concealed button on the bracer.

---

”The spiritual energy inside...one could probably use it to level Tokyo, if they so wished.  We will be focusing it entirely on one man."

Hibano

(Free Fall)

Seeing her Zanpakuto spirit suddenly manifest, Maria's eyes widened - only faintly, as her forcefully induced paralysis was preventing her from making any moves. This... wasn't her doing, was it? It was Midnight, though, only he could drop another eyeroll inducing comment in the middle of the most tense battle of her life. Fuck off... Thankfully, that attitude was short-lived - Midnight, handed her both her weapon and activated the energy stored within the bracers.

Instantly, it began to surge across her body, and it swiftly became clear that the Fullbringer wasn't kidding. This... was something else.

And if she understood how she was able to resist Virgil's powers in her Bankai form... overpowering him outright should make his techniques ineffective.

Virgil, initially, was not anticipating anything. Niji's resistance was collapsing, there wasn't much left for him. By infusing his blood into her, he'll keep her from keeling over and dying, thus hopefully preventing her from burying them all for now, while also keeping her harmless - and, afterwards, he'll have to figure out a way out of here. It wasn't impossible. He's been through a lot, and his abilities were surprisingly versatile, as long as he could put out blood.

"Well, it was a good try. You even surprised me at times. If you were just a bit more ruthless, you could get quite far in this world," Virgil stated as he stopped in front of Niji and raised his dagger. "It's almost a shame. We, Fullbringers, have to stick together, you know. As long as we rid ourselves of radicals, like Valentina, we could... overthrow Soul Society itself."

Then, he lowered his weapon.

I will die in-

"What?"

That... couldn't be. That couldn't be her. What was she made of?!

Slowly, Virgil turned over his shoulder, to see what was taking place. The last wisps of air still remaining in the broken and collapsing room rushed past with the speed of a hurricane. With her Zanpakuto once again released into its enormous Shikai form, Maria was flying straight at Virgil - her power fully replenished, her body broken out of the internal blood shackles, her eyes bursting with fury.

Time seemed to slow to a halt, even if it wasn't dilated at all.

"Go to hell!"

One powerful slash, swung with the full weight of her body, releasing a shockwave that tore through the entire auditorium and disintegrated rock and concrete with ease. With a painful crash, Maria landed on the ground - still contorted in the shocked, surprised expression of the last moment of his life, Virgil's body collapsed limp next to her. All effects of his blood techniques instantly ceased.

Maria's Zanpakuto returned back to its normal form, the enormous power boost of the bracers faded, yet, after a grunt, she pulled herself back on her feet, against the aching pain. There was still one thing left to do.

Double tap.

Maria turned the Zanpakuto in her hand around and pressed its hilt against Virgil's forehead. Just as she expected, the soul inside did not simply sink into Soul Society. No, a powerful hum rolled across the auditorium, before an enormous gate, adorned with skulls and bones, appeared, breaking apart and disintegrating rock that stood in its way while it opened. Bone protrusions shot out from within, impaling Virgil and dragging him inside, before the gate closed and vanished once more.

It was over. Letting out an easier breath, Maria crashed on her back.

Of course, just like last time, the arrogant fucker couldn’t resist gloating. She was still focused on Maria and the spirit, but that job was done, and she turned her narrowing vision to Virgil, still fighting to remain conscious. The woman let fear into her eyes, letting the man think he’d won, keeping the focus on her; she even resisted the urge to grin at the last moment as the Director looked over his shoulder.

And this time, he wasn’t quick enough. Niji’s saved reiatsu, combined with Maria’s martial competence, cleaved through Virgil as well as a good few kilometers of bedrock. Immediately, she felt her arms and legs stop flexing of their own volition, and she knew they had killed the man. She took a deep breath, and solidified the groaning room around them, further damaged by the massive attack.

She began to send some reiatsu to the surface, where she had instructe—

Niji started to cry out towards Maria, but it was too late, the Shinigami had immediately transitioned to giving Virgil a soul burial. Before she could intercept, the gates of hell had already opened and shut, claiming the man’s soul before the final step could be taken.

She choked down the frustration at Maria’s actions. For allowing Virgil’s soul to continue existing as a conscious entity. Particularly with the theoretical threat she had been told Hell presented. But what was done was done, and they were both alive. Rather than sending reiatsu to the surface, she focused it inwards, her wounds knitting shut and her nose repairing itself. The dress was probably a lost cause, what with the massive bloodstain down the front.

The fullbringer staggered over to Maria and looked down at her, trying to assess the woman’s injuries. The reiatsu from the bracers probably fixed up most of what she had taken before, but it was impossible to tell; Virgil’s blood powers were mostly invisible internal injuries. Her arms and legs ached with pain from the ex-Director forcing them to operate beyond their normal maximum, who knows what he had done inside of Maria. Her voice was gentle, as if they hadn’t just worked together to kill one of the strongest spiritual beings currently residing on earth, ”You okay?”

Hibano