Shadowfall Mission [OPEN]

That was a textbook version of a direct hit, if there had ever been one. Thanks to Ichigo's incredible speed and offensive power, the blast of the Getsuga Tensho left Eric with quite the wounds, but sadly, Ichigo wouldn't be able to follow up on that success right away now. The reason for that was, obviously, the other demon - and the sudden explosion that erupted around him and threw the Captain backwards with a loud crash.

Ichigo gasped for air, as the fiery detonation ripped apart quite a bit of his Shinigami uniform, and the skin beneath - blood was running down his body from the moment he emerged out of the smoke of this explosion, but still being pushed backwards - his view focused again, and with a determined grunt, Ichigo slammed down his feet onto the ground, got his sword back into position - and ripped the free, left hand infront of his face. This foe was no joke - the Vizard had no time to look at the badly hurt demon right now, who would've probably also been damaged even further by this explosion. And it didn't seem like the foe was done yet - putting on the mask had not been an action of offense from Ichigo, but one of defense.
The next wave came just as suddenly, crashing towards Ichigo - ready to engulf both him, the entire prison room and Eric with it's exploding power. Had this prison not been built for supernatural captives, then the room would've bursted apart by now for sure - but as it stood, it was still in one place, even if slightly scorched. And this next time, Kurosaki wasn't going to take the full brunt of the attack without stopping - sure, he had just been exploded alive and charred, and was bleeding all over his arms and upper body, and even face, but that little bit of pain and damage wasn't enough to slow down this Vizard. But then, just as Ichigo was raising Zangetsu, the next explosion obscured all vision of him - and the energy of it made sensing anything impossible for a moment, making it impossible to tell as to what happened to Ichigo over the loud sound of yet another bunch of explosions.

“Stand up. Face forward. Hesitate and you will die. Retreat and you will age.”

The next sound to be heard... Was quite odd. In fact, it sounded a lot like a single blade, rotating at impossible speeds... The source was impossible to detect, right until the smoke was ripped apart once more, and revealed the Vizard Captain again - unharmed, this time around. And with Zangetsu being swung around his own body, at a speed so incredible that only a fleeting black line of the giant cleaver was visible.
How was this possible? Quite simply, the attack used against him was composed out of countless small, vibrating, explosive and volitale 'cuts' - when he had been hit by the brunt damage of the first wave, Kurosaki had been able to figure out the composition of this move almost right away. It was quite easy to determine, after all, that he first got cut up, then exploded.
To deflect it, Ichigo used an old technique he had once used to fight against Byakuya Kuchiki - by swinging Zangetsu into every direction, at every single cut coming at him, Ichigo had created hundreds, if not thousands, of attacks in close proximity to himself, bashing against the incoming cuts one by one thanks to his insane speed, making it impossible for these waves to directly connect with his body. Obviously, one would assume the resulting explosions to still be devastating - but the speed of Zangetsu had caused yet another positive side-effect. The immense strength behind every single, supersonic swing had created a complete, perfect vacuum-cell right around Kurosaki - the explosions, on their attempts to reach him, had been sucked into the paths of Zangetsu, where the explosive energy was then ripped through space around his body like a sphere of raw fire that slowly expired. In a way, Ichigo had redirected the secondary, and arguably more deadly, effect of this wave attack by defending against the first one directly - and as his wild swinging now stoped, and his right arm crashed away to the side, the simple eruption of wind from Zangetsu ripped a hole right into the highly reinforced ground. In fact, the giant sword was glowing in a faint light, superheated from this attack - even the right hand of the Vizard was smoldering a little bit from this pressure and heat. However, it did not matter to him - because while wearing his Vizard mask, his pain endurance was incredible, just as his natural defense.

The next deep breath that Ichigo took had the typical, double-voice effect of a Vizard speaking, as he grabbed Zangetsu with both hands. Thankfully, the evacuation had spreaded yet further into the prison, so he could risk to do that... Just in time to deflect another, almost sun-heat wave rushing towards the ground. Was this second demon not even caring if the badly hurt one got incinerated as well?! If there was one other prime way to piss Ichigo off besides hurting innocents, it was hurting ones allies!
"...Damn you..." Grabbing Zangetsu hard, spiritual energy rushed from the Vizard right into his extension of the soul, as he pulled back the blade to his right, above his shoulder - blue and black energy circling around it, now that Kurosaki had his mask and Hollow power activated.


Swinging his sword upwards with a roar, Ichigo unleashed his attack in the usual, ranged form this time - and the result was devastating. This was a Getsuga Tensho as a seasoned Captain in Shikai would unleash it - the destructive, black wave of energy ate right into the next wave of attacks, and with an explosion loud enough to rival multiple starting jets, the energy exploded - and split right over Kurosaki Ichigo, causing the destructive heatwave to burst down besides him, melting into the plating of the ground, and starting to damage the outer walls of this room quite badly. However, no damage was done to the Captain once more - his precisely aimed, tactical application of Getsuga Tensho had completely nullified any blast that would've hit him.
Now, Ichigo was wondering two things - first, how to get back at this smaller demon, and second, if the first demon had survived these explosions. A sudden roar, and a fist towards his face, answered that concern, as the mad demon bursted out of the smoke of these explosions.
"Eric Zarathos... You're so full of it!" Kurosaki was angry, quite a bit in fact, as he simply stormed towards the mad demon - and took the punch right into the face.

A loud crack was heard, but it didn't come from Ichigo's jaw. Instead, the sound had come from the mask - Ichigo's sign of being a Vizard had shattered into pieces under the impact of the fiery punch, but had also reduced the impact strength quite considerably. A direct application of 'Mask Defense' - the dense material of a Hollow Mask that a Vizard could produce was far above any normal Hollow mask. Now, however, the blue eyes of Ichigo were once more focused right onto Eric, who was now right infront of him.
"You're not ready for anything. You're done." Shooting out his left hand, Ichigo attempted to grab onto the fist that had just hit him right into the face - and at the same time, the giant cleaver in his right came down from above once more, in a vertical cut... aimed right at the arm of Eric Zarathos, with all the strength Ichigo could muster. It was simple, really... Kurosaki didn't know how the mad demon had survived the explosions, but he was quite sure that with one arm less, his enemy would maybe finally lose the will to fight. Of course, aiming this attack right at Eric again left him open for Demonica once more...

Or did it? As the shards of the Hollow Mask were still on their way towards the ground, and the cleaver aimed to cripple Eric, this battle was just beginning.