KEEPER OF HADES [Dragon, Rangiku, Tento, Noharu]

The Dragon followed suite into the soul society for the first time in her millennia of unliving. Taloned feet crushed the stone upon which she walked, her size causing tremors to emanate with each step the massive beast took. Her one wing stretched out, flapped in a sort of test of the airflow here, and then folded back against her body. And then she was gone. Where she ended up after that, she didn't know, but there was an abundance of shinigami already flooding out of their barracks to answer the call to defend. What poor, unfortunate souls they were.

Like a meteor barreling at full speed, The Dragon crashed down into those barracks and let her body's natural functions do their work. The force was enough to plow through the barrack's solid foundation and the power enough to crater the earth where she impacted. Anyone caught in said impact would simply be crushed, and those who didn't immediately die were then met with the explosion of acidic effluvia that billowed out from beneath her scales, forming a mushroom cloud a mile high into the air and reaching a quarter mile out from the impact in a matter of seconds.

Screams of despair would fill the locale, and just as soon as they started, most of them would stop. Flesh melted into goo and bones turned into dust until there was not a trace of those people left at all. Even the environment was left to rot and decay like it was being digested in the open air, and in a matter of minutes walls would collapse and the ground would become a hazard. But that hadn't happened yet.

"Meaningless morsels... Is there not any more filling food nearby?" The Dragon lamented as the gray gaseous effluvia returned to her body and the digested Shinigami along with it. Soon the environment was clear again, but who knows how long it would be until she found her next prey. Until then, The Dragon wandered aimlessly. Her senses piqued and listening for the real threats that she knew existed, but she otherwise took her time until given a reason otherwise.

It all began with a sunset. The radiant rays beaming to a quiet peaceful half of his day when it all went out of spiral. In a drop of a hat there was a quick sense of power far away. Tento's head shot up from his paper as the sensation of a world ending pressure shook the Soul Society. With a flare the deafening sounds of emergency sirens filled the barracks as the beats of war began. Feet pounded the ground, voices yelled, chaotic actions transpired as the 4th stopped what they were doing and immediately went into action.

The sound of explosions awoke the 5th seats spirit. The gravity of the situation quickly came to the Shinigami's senses as he was already on the move. Standing out of his room with zanpatuko in hand. The fast pace tightening of his Shihakusho and the placement of his 5th seat badge onto his right shoulder. Tento's voice roared over the voice of the blazing alarm within the 4th division sector. Every utterance filled with determination, urgency, and yet calmness. “No, this is not a drill. Grab your teams and move out! Lend aid to combatants, slow down foes, and be the first there if needed. Send some squads over to kido Division to ensure they have protection for healing!”, if what he was sensing…and they were a number of them growing. A large number of powerful hollows somehow got into the Soul Society. And with what he could feel there were going to be plenty injured…

“Do not face anyone you can't handle, especially alone unless it is absolutely necessary. We are the blades of the Gotei. It does no good having you fall for no reason where you could have bested another”, Tento gripped his zanpakuto before feeling a burst of a well familiar energy as she burst through a ceiling of the barracks. The 3rd seat was already out on the move, and he could only give a chuckle and smirk at her action.



“Remain calm. Locate the threat. We need to defeat them one at a time and show them what happens when they dare attack the Soul society!!”.

The 4th dispersed. Each going to do their duty as the death squad. “Soar, Shiomaru!”. With haste Tento went on the move. Standing on a roof sensing for energy nearby wondering where to go when it was answered for him. The ground shook before he sensed its energy. Tremors shaking his foundation like its spiritual energy. And the silence fading from other energies.

“Dang it…”, it was so much already. The size of that hollow and the mushroom cloud bursting high in the air expanding out. Acid. With a flash step he was on his way. Hurrying to close the distance when he felt another energy ignite. Hurrying to do a number of flash steps, Tento appeared on a building next to her as his own spiritual energy began to spike. “Want some back up Vice Captain, Rangiku?”, Tento asked before quickly calling out to his zanpakuto spirit, energy bending together to make their pressure strong and heavy like a growing storm. His zanpakuto in movement, a slow twirl as the wind gathered around him.

It was the arrival of the first two Shinigami that got the Dragon to stop where she was walking, and it was their chatter that made her eager to kill. She could tell these ones would sate at least some of her hunger. Temporarily, of course. But then came the sudden appearance of something else, something far faster and with much more potential. If it weren't for her animalistic instincts, she wouldn't have reacted in time.

The first attack Noharu made whiffed only by an inch as the Dragon recoiled just out of reach, then the rest hit scales as she took off into the sky and twisted her body around to angle her wings out of the way of what came next. By the time Noharu was done, the Dragon was several dozen feet in the air and audibly sucking in air that was bellowed out in a screech so shrill and loud that any normal person would have gone deaf.

Food. Yes, food. That was what she came here for. And this food was dangerous. Dangerous food was nourishing, gave her strength, and all three of them could prove to be dangerous. Yes, this was a feast. One she was glad to earn by natural right of survival of the fittest.

That was why she went full blast straight from the get go.

Effluvia erupted from her every scale, bursting forth in a series of flowing streams of gas. Every inch of her was surrounded in it and any contact would prove very painful. It wasn't so fast as to immediately engulf her opposers, though. Not until she took direct control and, with a flick of a claw, her revolving effluvial storm started to split several long, flowing streams off of it that would each individually target a Shinigami, moving as fast as sound.

Her goal here was to simply devour as it would be with any other Hollow. The ulterior motives of Ichigo and his companions meant nothing to her. This was a time to feast, and the Dragon would never get a chance like this again.

Gazing up at the two and a half story tall hollow, Tento thought that the two of them were going to be in for a rough time of a fighting. Manageable but they would have to be very careful. All around he could sense it as Tento trained his eyes on the monster before him. War. Distant howls of death, screams of pain hollow and Shinigami alike.Explosions rocking the group as kido and cero were fired. Spikes in spiritual pressure as Shinigami upon Shinigami called upon their zanpakuto to defend their home. Many Tento felt flashes of recognition.

An explosive banaki on the level of the 4ths captain with…some energy twisted and broken that seemed to be violently superior even to that. Lerna and a lot of weaker Shiniagni facing off against a familiar hollow energy that Tento could not quite place a name to. Shura and another struggling against a strong arrancar. Double energy attacks being fired left and right. His Vice Captain, Rio releasing her Shikai against an overwhelming spiritual pressure that matched Captain Kanae. But as well as something that startled him internally. Two Captain’s power going off in banaki with no hollow energy nearby that he could sense…

Captain Kanae and another Captain level Shinigami…

Just when things could not get chaotic enough. A pulsing sound came before a a tingle of a freshly acquired spiritual energy was felt before a blonde comet came streaking buzzing around the dragon hollow before landing between himself and Rangiku. It was Noharu!!! …naked. OH MY SOUL KING. she was petite but did she have that thang on her!!!

Hearing the vulgar language did nothing to shock him. That was nothing compared to what they had to deal with. And as Rangiku's dust from her shikai broke off to block the three way gas attack he had little doubt what he needed to do. With a spin of his body Tento swiped his fan in a wide arc, letting loose a wide strong gust of wind to knock away any fleeting puffs of gas that managed to slither past her dust defense towards him before he disappeared in a flash. Appearing at a pincers anger to one of Noharu’s clones off in the distance.. Tento was silent, no wise cracks. Flirty comments about the two women fighting alongside him just a cold iron determined resolve.



Shiomaru…I know I don't have the best control yet. But we can't waste time here!

Hidden in the middle of Rangiku's kido. Using the debris for a moment. He closed his eyes and Tento's inner world ignited as he felt Shiomaru heeded his call. A storm of wind gathered around him as the sky began to turn gray and the air grew volatile. He could feel the pulsating energy of his zanpakuto, an extension of his very soul, calling out to him. With a sudden inhalation, his eyes snapped open, a fierce brown flame dancing within their depths. The ground far beneath his feet cracked, energy radiating outwards as he drew upon the full power of his spirit weapon. The air grew heavy as the atmosphere shifted, charged with a palpable force of Tento's zanpakuto began to resonate with a low hum, vibrating with the power of a thousand storms. The blade itself seemed to come alive, its surface shimmering with a spectral light that was both beautiful and terrifying.

“Ban-kai, Shiō Gomonzen”

With a roar that echoed through the battlefield, Tento unleashed his zanpakuto’s power. A brilliant arc of light erupted from the blade, carving through the air as his form was overtaken. A black fog of energy heavy enough to be mistaken for a hollow's energy signature washed over Tento before he shot out before the black energy vanished. A hollow mask on Tento's face, a mantle in the shape of a lion's mane running down his back from his head and shoulders. A plentitude of feathers in the shape of two large plumes of feathers sprouted as wings flapped as his head was covered by a hawk shaped helmet. A set of armored covering his shoulders and full length of his arms; a taloned gauntlet over his right and a clawed lion's shaped gauntlet over his left. With a heave Tento swiped his his left hand forward in the shape of a paw strike, a highly concentered push of wind in the shape of a lion's face ROOOOOAR as it made it way head fast toward's the dragon's front right leg.

None of it was worth stressing about. From the dust of Haineko that blew her acidic effluvia away, to the lion-shaped attack that barreled towards her, to even the attacks that Noharu aimed at her vitals. None of them would hit.

The moment she was exposed, The Dragon's instincts naturally swapped to acknowledge this. With a kick off of the air, she leapt over the rocks that Rangiku had flung at her, twisted her figure to narrowly avoid Tento's attack, all while Noharu's simply scraped against her thick scales. There were some bloody gashes left, but nothing so deep that it would matter to The Dragon. If anything, it was like papercuts. They'd have to try harder than that to hurt her.

But in the realm of hurting, The Dragon was queen. Just as quickly as her dust had been blown away, she regathered it with a deep, audible inhale, sucking it back into her body and straight into her lungs as her eyes focused on a new smell. A fake hollow, a Vizard or whatever they were called. A Shinigami attempting to mimic the power of their mortal foes.

Her eyes fell upon Tento as The Dragon hovered in the air, still twisted from when she had narrowly avoided their attacks. She had barely begun to twist back into an upright position when she suddenly thrashed her neck in the direction of Tento, jaws unhinging horrifically as the effluvia she had just inhaled was roared out of her lungs and straight at the Vizard at mach speeds. Noharu might have been the juiciest soul, but the Dragon had something other Hollows didn't.

Principles.