A Short Escapade to the Human World

Sometimes, your mind just wanders. It is the happenstance lacking development in the reality around oneself, compensated in turn by a heightened activity within one's mind, the inner sanctum. The drizzle was constant, with no strikes of lightning or torrents of wind to change the vista here. The monotonous patter led way to ambling thoughts for one special soul, containing subjects such as these: If you considered yourself a rain drop in this very storm, what would the ride be like? The story played out in her mind, finding herself in a fantasy where wind blew past her face as she fell. Or perhaps she was flying, or ascending. The world around her was disguised by a damp gray fog. For a second she was lost; but too soon were these worries, as she was jettisoned out of the rain cloud and presented with a horizon to horizon view of the world below. Feelings of glee and excitement exuded from this rain drop as it experienced skydiving for the first—though not last—time. Details began to become more clear the closer the Earth came to it's prolapse, showing her a somewhat familiar area. Her troubles remembering exactly where were not because it was an old memory, but rather because it was so new that it had not been etched into the female's mind yet. And seeing it from an entirely different view made it difficult to simply recollect. But it did not matter; fast as her thoughts were, her dive came to an end with a light impact.

A particularly powerful droplet of rain splashed upon Fantasia's nose, causing her to blink as some of the excess hit her eyes. Though, it was water, and not a big deal. The golden wheat-haired effeminate teen was strolling down one of the sidewalks of Kougai Block toward her home on Hakushi Block. Decidedly, her hands moved up to pull her hood over her head and grant herself a reprieve from the sodding downpour. Not that the precipitation would bring her down for the count or any such nonsense. The hood was part of a full body cloak of an ashen black, so roomy that the movements of her body could not be read, barring vague rustles of the shady fabric. Beneath that was an underlay of light body armor ingeniously composed of a mixture of durable Kevlar plates wrapped in a flexible synthetic fiber. The body neath even that was slinky at best even with the great strength of its possessor, because it was fat that brought forth the size, and Fantasia lacked much of that. Her face, a reflection of her thin frame, was small and mostly rounded. Petite features excepting her expressive gray eyes. Last to note would be the massive weapon sheathed against her back side, audibly jangling around with each step down the sidewalk. Even when resting inside of its scabbard, the royal blue sapphire that was her Anima Stone was visible in the cross guard, inseparable from Fantasia.

Hakushi Block, the sign said, as she crossed the street to the far more familiar square of housing. Though immediately Fantasia felt something wrong. Her thoughts, she pulled herself from her mental wanderlust and deigned to pay attention to the world around her. Her nose perked up ever slightly, sniffing once and immediately being assaulted by the revolting scent of blood. Her face scrunched up and her expression darkened as she looked ahead in the direction of the source. Immediately her eyes locked on to the towering specter that was lumbering through the light fog toward her. Almost simultaneously the entity centered on her and began stomping her way with increased vigor. It only took a fraction of a second for the female to determine what she was looking at, and with it came a flash of white light that blinded her to all but her grotesque memories of blood and fire and death. Familiar voices screamed at deafening volumes in synchronization with the array of aberrant images, before it was all consumed in darkness by an overpowering feeling of hatred. Reality came back into focus, and Fantasia was now a resolved young woman who was no longer powerless to do what she should have done to the Hollows of her past.

To kill them.

She violently tore her Claymore out of its scabbard and swung it out in front of her in preparation for the bloodletting to be done. Her teeth were grit tight, hands clamped almost painfully around the grip of the sword. The heavy rain, the day's exhaustion from school, and the scent of death in the air were all trivialities in the face of this. The Hollow, showing it was not just some pushover hulk of a creature, would push off at blurring speeds toward its prey, shadowy claws slicing through the air toward the puny girl's throat. It's mouth was already open in the anticipation of the meal... nothing more than a foul dog to Fantasia. It's hand went flying off into the middle of the street as it was detached from the rest of the corrupted soul's body. The creature didn't even have time to comprehend that it had lost its hand before the perpetrator was shoving her massive blade through its chest where a human's heart would be. The hollow did not drop, to Fantasia's surprise, and she withdrew the weapon as she retreated a leap backwards. When it finally came to the Hollow's attention what had happened, it scoffed and convulsed in a vile distortion of a laugh before it unhinged its jaw and opened the dark maw at the girl. Speckles of light phased into view and collected into a small sphere within the mouth. She only realized it with milliseconds left, in which the marble of light became of a blaze of energy annihilating the patch of sidewalk she had been standing on.

The blonde was flipping through the air at dizzying speeds, now alongside a perfect duplicate of herself spawned out of the energy of the hollow. The clone took control of her aerial momentum with her gravity-defying capabilities of flight, in order to near the original Fantasia and grab a hold of her free hand. Her muscles bulged underneath the sleeves of her cloak, as she spun around to build momentum, until she finally threw herself toward the Hollow from above. Synchronously, Fantasia was prepared for this maneuver as she brought the Claymore to the nose of her dive, aiming for the beast's mask as it was just finishing up it's energetic attack. "DIE!" was all that she managed to utter before a resounding crack drowned her out, echoing all across the neighborhood. Fantasia hit the ground roughly at the feet of the Hollow, followed by her sword clattering to the ground nearby. She rolled toward her blade to grab it on the go and shot up to her feet for a counter-attack. It was then that she saw it—the fracture on the forehead of the skull-like mask. Her weapon hadn't seemed to very well push through the thick head of this Hollow, yet it appeared stunned for the time being. Fantasia would take this chance to charge forward, while her clone now came for a peregrine dive from above, scheduled to hit the creature at the same time from different angles.

But it suddenly came to life, thrashing it's arms at both combatants and batting them away like rag dolls. She let out a light cry as her back hit and skidded the streets away from the sidewalk, and her clone was discarded in her neighbor's front yard. The landing had disoriented her vision, and she was afraid of being attacked in her weakness. She swung her sword out blindly as she struggled to get back up and clear her vision. When the world came back into focus, it was clear there was no attack coming. She looked at where the Hollow was; there was a Hollow no more. She was jerking her head left and right, checking her peripherals, even trying to reach out with her Soul Detection—accomplishing nothing but a headache. She was by herself again. She felt the rain on her body again, she felt tired again, and she smelled the scent of blood clear once again. She dismissed her clone, dispersing it into the dark energy that had spawned it, while pushed her body up off the damp ground. Checking once more to affirm the Hollow was not nearby, she discovered the source of the smell so strong even in this rain. Wordlessly, the blonde trekked toward it, dragging her bloodied sword lazily behind her, scraping against the street.

Two bodies strewn in seemingly random areas of the road, each displaying a mortal injury that more than explained their method of dying—most assuredly all at the hands of the Hollow. There was also a broken down carriage here, very unlike the flying cars present in the main city of Karakura. It looked like it was supposed to be drawn by something, but whatever had was long gone. Fantasia didn't know what to do. She had literally trained her life up to this point to destroy the Hollows and stop them from spreading their death. And yet here, despite her power, she had not been able to stop the demon. Not from these children. no. And not from its next targets, because she had let it get away. Her face scrunched up harder and harder as though she were about to cry, but rather what came out was a pained scream into the rainy atmosphere, craning her neck back and letting the heavens hear her agony.

A warm droplet streaked down her cheek, molten hot compared the rest of them, for it was not truly a rain drop. It was a tear drop, expelled from the girl's damp eyes. And with the first came many more, as though whatever dam was holding them back finally became released. She was frozen in place, pained to watch over the fallen children, yet incapable of looking away. These casualties couldn't have been any older that Fantasia herself, and probably had hopes and dreams that had been crushed in the matter of seconds. And what of life after death? Would these children be safely escorted to heaven, or whatever nice place awaited them? Or would a sinister force grab a hold of them and tear them away from such a fate? Could it likely be that through this death, these innocents would become that which slayed them? Fantasia shook her head violently, and wiped her tears away with her free arm; a very deliberate action that thrust her eyes into darkness as her black sleeve enveloped her field of view. Be it fear, or denial? She did not want to come out of that darkness and back to the reality of the situation. She wanted to hide away, go to sleep, and dream happy dreams. The force of her failure was just so crushing... But in the darkness she felt a tap on her shoulder. Surprised, she lifted her sleeve to come into contact with a strange void-esque place in place of the rainy suburban neighborhood that had surrounded her moments ago. There was no ground, no sky, no horizon in view; no rain, no wind, no lingering death to behold. It was a place empty of anything aside of the slightest sapphire hue that pervaded it.

She spun around, coming face to face with... with herself, four-fold. Before her were four clones, though each seemed different in a way. Their hair stylings were of course unique among each other, but it was not just that. When she looked at them it was not just copies of herself she saw. She saw her Will, standing strong and wearing only her combat suit—her hair did not simply hang down lazily, but seemed to spike down like hundreds of miniature blades. She saw her Love, holding herself in a hug and giving Fantasia a warm smile that showed this trait so well—her hair was collected into two ponytails that rested against her shoulders. She saw her Respect, gray hues looking back at Fantasia from under the dark hood of her cloak—a multitude very straight and long locks spilled out from her hood. And lastly was Revenge, standing behind the lot with her weapon unsheathed and held ready at her side—her hair was short as a boy's, barely an inch long. They all were there for her, clear as day despite the infinite dusk of this realm. It would be the closest one, Will, who reached out to her and placed a hand on her shoulder. "We made our promise," came her own familiar voice from Will's mouth. It was quiet, but it did not need volume to communicate the strength needed to overcome her fears. "Are we going to hide from the responsibility we made for each other? Are we?"

"No..."

The hand dropped, and Will stepped back for Love to take her place. This clone looked smaller, and younger. Her eyes would not match Fantasia's, but would rather come to her chest level. The youthful clone would hesitate for a moment before she pushed herself into a consoling hug. Now it was Fantasia's turn to hesitate—so unsure—her body frozen and eyes wide. It took a moment, but eventually her arms would come to encircle Love and simply accept the warmth of the affection, albeit oddly self-serving. When Love backed away her eyes were bright and her smile wide. "Try not to think of the bad times... Yes, they happened and they cannot be changed. But we have to remember the good times, instead. Our parents loved us so much, and we need to always know that in our hearts to overpower the tragedies in life. A happy memory is more powerful than you think." Fantasia's eyes drooped a bit as she tried; tried her best. Her father's quirky and fun-loving attitude always brought a smile to her face. Her mother, she was always there for her when she could be, with nothing but care and compassion. "If we follow our goals," Love would continue, as she began to backtrack to make room for the third doppelganger, "We will be saving others from the same fate, and ultimately, preserving love like what we feel in our heart now."

And then Revenge pushed ahead of Respect, and stabbed her sword in the ground between them. However, there was no clamor whatsoever, and the tip of the sword did not disappear from view either. The Claymore just seemed to float still where she had thrust it down. Regardless, Fantasia had little time to ponder over the physics of this strange place, as Revenge's words were sharp like knives. "Perhaps the bad memories should not be thought of, but they should never be forgotten. They were unforgivable actions, Fantasia, and we know this deep down at the core of our soul. We will not hide and let these monsters get away unscathed. We will find the Hollow again, and those who killed our parents; and we will bring justice to them." Her hands clasped loudly together on the Claymore, creating a heavy bang that echoed through the void until it drifted into silence, a silence filled by Revenge's final words. "This weapon shall be the tool of justice. This weapon shall bring an end to the Hollows. We follow our goal, and we can create a better world accomplishing it." And then the weapon was pulled and swung back into Revenge's scabbard on her back, before she too fell back. Will, Love, Revenge... they disappeared into the darkness, leaving Fantasia with only Respect. Oddly, the world shifted back to reality, rejoining with the rain and bloody mess, and rural neighborhood. "These people need to be buried properly," Respect whispered to Fantasia, in a broken whisper that she was unsure even reached her ears; and yet she understood. As finally Respect returned to the ethereal with the others, Fantasia alone would nod, and begin to inch forward toward the body with the intent of following her own advice.

What had been minutes in the strange place had only been seconds in actuality, so it was now that the pace shifted and Fantasia's intentions would be interrupted by the strange appearance of a man unknown to her. The signals were the sudden gust of wind paired with the aperture of rain falling upon her, and she would look up to come face to face with the figure. But it was not the figure that Fantasia's gray hues lingered on too long, because it was the giant blade hurtling down at her face that truly caught her attention. Her weapon arm twitched and shot up with all her might and haste, with nothing more than the intent to smash the opposing weapon away from her with her own elephantine sword. It was in the moment their swords met that she knew it would not go as well as she had thought it would. For starters, she had underestimated the force behind this initial blow. Secondly, she was using but one arm to combat this. And last but not least was the fact that this terrible surprise of an assailant had gotten the jump on her and had caught her unprepared. Add all that to the exhaustion she was feeling, and things did not turn out spectacularly at all. With a heavy clang of metal she would at least deflect the blow from falling upon her body, because her strength was not to be underestimated either. However, the excess force would blow Fantasia down to the ground on her back, splashing against the somewhat crimson water around her.

"Wha—?" was what sputtered out of the female's mouth as she looked up at the attacker from her less-than-preferable vantage point on the street surface. She did not offer a counter attack. She was not presented with the Hollow she thought might pull off a dirty trick like this, but instead someone who looked human; someone who she bore no ill will toward until this very moment when he had tried to kill her. There was just too much surprise and sluggishness in Fantasia this very moment that she would not be able to offer a counter attack before he was able to follow his initialization up. How unfortunate.

Fantasia's question was cut off harshly by a pervasive ring, a wave of sound barely faster than the blade that it originated from. There were many thoughts racing through the girl's mind at that moment; from the malice within his regard of her, to a good reason her defense had been rather ineffective being due to the fact the assailant's weapon was an axe, to just how dire the situation had become for her. The forefront of her mind was preoccupied with the instinctual cognition of survival, neurons working twice as fast to transmit the electrical signals through the brain for the necessary actions. The current shot through the female's body with God speed, tugging at the strings of the soul like a harp to play a fine note. It was a race between the executioner's strike and the visceral reaction, a matter of life and death. It ended in less than a second, and with nothing less than a ground-quaking impact that cast aside all other noise. Fantasia had never felt such intense physical pain before. It was like magma was roiling trough her stomach and quickly draining her of heaven's grace of life. A fountain of blood erupted from the grievous wound inflicted, painting the axe and the area around it with a liquid crimson. Fantasia did not even have time to scream; the wound had been fatal. Just before the attack's aftershock kicked up a cloud of dust to consume the girl's form, the draining of color from her eyes could be seen as she passed into the void.

Comes the quietus once, t'was only a single facet of the situation at hand. The body that had been cleaved right through would become a sheer phantasm, as would the blood as it evaporated into nonbeing. It was simultaneously that mirror images of the blonde came into the world's view, a four-pronged maneuver enacted upon the axe-wielding bushwhacker. Before the cloud of dust even faded, they were upon him with wind to their step; but mere hazes as they moved into place. One rushed into a slide across er knees toward the male with open arms, throwing herself into a crushing hug with his legs. A second was in place behind him, throwing her arm around his neck and pulling his body tight up against hers with the hook of her arm. Her free arm would grip is left shoulder and try pinning it against his side. Another figure was on his right facing the opposite direction with her sights set on his weapon arm. She threw her own right appendage through the gap between his and his body as though she were about to go square-dancing with the guy, when in actuality she encircled and constricted the arm as much as she possibly could before smacking her free left hand down on his shoulder, and locking the arm into place. The last of them all appeared directly in front of the attacker within his guard, and just on the rim of the crater created by the axe. She took one simple action, by lunging her right hand forward toward his face, and with easy-going force, poking his forehead with her index finger and pressing against it. Her other arm was crossed against her chest, resting upon her opposite shoulder yet intriguingly close to the handle of her sheathed Claymore.

It would be noted, that none of these complete duplicates of Fantasia would have drawn their swords, as no lethal offense was intended. The girl chose suppression over lethality, and the difference between the two was directly commensurate to the presence of a Hollow. The humanity present within the assailant was starkly contrasting to the demonic entity that had assaulted her moments ago; it brought hesitation to Fantasia's conscious. But the hesitation would not be enough to easily escape the four-woman grapple she had swiftly coordinated in the short time she had. A phantasmal split displaced the original Fantasia among the four remaining duplicates, while a mere clone had taken the axe's killing blow. The response from Fantasia was set to punish the male's investment into the attack, surrounding and restraining him as he was going through with it. Unlike Fantasia, it was very likely that he would not be able to carry out two combative actions at the same time, which is why this timing had been chosen. So, when the dust settled, chances were Fantasia would be in the superior position, and would finally take a good look at who had attempted to kill her.

The one whose finger lied upon the boy's forehead looked the part of the leader, and would prod harder against his temple, trying to aim his head up toward her to get a look into his eyes. Such vehemence and raw outright hatred within his olive-colored irises—tides of blind anger washing out the rest of them. Fantasia shifted uncomfortably in place, taken aback by the glare, for it had that much force. There was a moment of silence in place, as the girl's gray hues scrutinized him from beneath the hem of her hood. Her left hand brushed back her hood, allowing the rain to fall upon her already glistening wet hair. The moment was deliberate, but it would immediately and suddenly carry through into a barreling strike to the center of his stomach. In the aftermath of the blow, her hands clutched together at scruffs of his army green black-trim robes. "Who are you?!" she shouted into his face, voice stalwart and commanding of an answer. "Who sent you? Why did you try to kill us?" The shift in her attitude came with the jab into his midsection; she was now carrying a ferocity of her own, gathering strength within herself when it was needed.

She only now began to consider this happening, and was at best confused. Two consecutive attacks upon her within the same day, same hour, practically the same minute. However, when Fantasia's mind tried to link the two occurrences, said coincidence would be the only similar factor between the two. A Hollow, even Fantasia knew, thought much more linear than a human being would. Hollows, those wretched beasts, devoured the souls of anything they could get their hands for, and their insatiable hunger for them defined their existence. Most sensible humans, however, carried a reasoning behind their motions. And for the life of Fantasia Nevermore, she could not decipher that reasoning from the mask of hatred in this boy's face. She had never seen this one before, as far as she could remember. She tried to think back to any deplorable actions she possibly could have performed to justify this stranger's anger-driven assault... but none came to mind. So, she repeated the question, urgently:

"Why did you attack us?!"

1, 2, 3, 4.

The Phantasmal Split was used, warping the reality of herself and splitting her being into five different shards. These shards not only were near-perfect duplicates of Fantasia herself, but united they each stood stronger than the original because of each other's mere presence—it was quite the contrary to what one would believe being split would be like. The physics-defying capabilities of the technique allowed the young woman a get-out-of-jail-free card, by allowing her to assume the position of any of these doppelgangers, which would explain why the initial target had become but a personage of energy. It was fortunate, for milliseconds later and she would have suffered a fatal wound. The clone that took her place gladly died for the cause of the collection, and before her life departed from the realm of Earth, the four remainders would issue a thought of thanks to her. This procession would go unnoticed by the angry young man who had attacked her, as he was dead set on sending Fantasia to the Soul Society without a body to her name, thus why the fight continued from this point on. She was not successful in incapacitating him from the get-go, seeming to have transformed into a complete copy of the metal axe he wielded.

No, that was not quite right. As the first three bodies delved into the uprising of debris caused by all this fast-paced movement, they would catch themselves from touching any sharp edges of the medieval weapon, albeit slightly confused at the situation. But as the fourth body—by who the man would suddenly appear next to in his high-speed maneuver—spotted him out, the information of the replacement would be relayed to the other three to bring everyone up to speed. It was just enough time for the ladies to steel themselves for a counterattack, for in their dive they were most certainly open to one. It came—a contactless attack that for some initially unexplained reason would send those three skyrocketing out of the dust plume. Their soul power took the brunt of the damage automatically, but it was not fullproof in any case. Crying out in unison, they landed onto a nearby lawn, causing small craters in the once green grassy field. Dirt sprayed every which way and grass blades scattered through the air. In the meanwhile, the last Fantasia standing focused on rebutting the man's rebuttal, making a quick lunge in his direction to throw a open-handed chop to the side of his neck to hopefully bring him down. Her strike sliced through empty air...

Any guesses?

The internal joke from one of Fantasia's hundreds of pieces was unnecessary, but did happen to make a point. Little to no thought was necessary, and even less movement would be essential. She bent her upper body forward and simultaneously thrust her body upward as hard as she could in as small an interval of time as possible. The fact that she was already lunging forward with her chop attack made this action fluid as water. And likely enough, she felt the dull bang of something impacting the hard metal of her Claymore's hilt. The force of the attack was strong enough to counteract her upward movement and send her back to the ground as soon as she left it. The significance of the move did not change however, as she had succeeded in blocking the attack. She immediately transitioned into a riposte, launching her right hand up into the air in the last place she felt his arm. If luck would have it, she would be able to catch the limb before it moved away, and would tightly grasp onto it with iron strength. Once secured, she would throw her strength into an effort of throwing him over her head and onto the ground in front of her to deepen the crater he had created earlier. But on the off-chance, she would have to disengage by throwing herself into a forward roll followed by a pirouette to face the attacker again. Off to the side, the other three duplicates would be picking themselves off the ground, and prepared to jump in at a moment's need. For now, they stood by waiting and watching for an opportunity. They had the speed to be there and ready, even at such a distance.

Fresh, smooth skin. Fantasia's hand had acquired a vice grip on the combatant's wrist, but even though she was indeed trying to take the young man down, it did not make her senses numb to the reality of things—there was nothing to differentiate what Fantasia was feeling from an ordinary human being's skin. So why was it that they were locked in combat? It boggled the mind, with the blond still making attempts to understand even amidst the battle. And he seemed particularly allergic to a situation of surrender, making an easy solution difficult to accomplish. These thoughts rushed through Fantasia's mind while she tried to drag the male through the air and into the ground with terrible force. But somewhere around the crest of the trajectory came the counteraction; a loud, stern voice followed by a headache. Fantasia felt like a car had had hit in the head and crumpled her body into the already sizable crater to kick up what was now becoming a storm of dust and debris. The world went dark for a second as flashes of red flitted through her clouded vision, and by the time she had woken up she was on the ground taking the form you'd think a beaten corpse would prefer. Instead of staying down on the ground as the assailant might have desired, Fantasia would instead groan as she pulled herself to her feet just as he was doing the same himself. Shards of rock and dirt were shaken off of her body by the movement, though it could hardly be seen through all this visual interference. The shockwave hadn't produced the effects intended.

Fantasia's saving grace hadn't been any modicum of skill or finesse, but simply a declaration of how much spiritual power she boasted. She was far more durable than a typical human, and could take a couple hits of such caliber before going down like the rest. This was the crux—that was simply one entity of many within Fantasia's arsenal, and as time would pass the number would see more and more chances to grow. In fact, as Fantasia's body climbed out of the hole created by the Kidō attack, a congruent figure would 'step' out of her body and join by her side—one of Fantasia's abilities to absorb some of the energy from an attack and utilize it to produce the cost-efficient duplicates her power revolved around. Additionally, if this young man was an observant one, he'd notice that each of his movements are a little more consuming than usual and his abilities tire him out a little bit faster. As long as Fantasia's clones persist, they also will be passively drawing upon the spiritual energy contained within him. The point the higher entities beyond were trying to get to was the fact that the power gap was just too wide for him to make the leap across. Fantasia, wanting to end this nonsense without any more deaths, would stop playing games and place her hand on her sword, while the three clones who had been previously knocked away would arrive alongside her with such legerity that the clouds of dust would abate.

The team, five strong, would suddenly unleash a pressure that pervaded the entire neighborhood, vibrating the atmosphere and physically gusting through the trees and the grass of nearby yards. "STOP!" the entire group called in perfect unison, creating a choir that seemed to bolster the power of the spiritual torrent for a fraction of a second. If this boy would not submit and then answer her questions peacefully, she would shout the inquiries at him instead. With a voice that would cause his rib cage to shake, they called, with utter synchronization to the syllable: "Who are you? Why are you attacking us? Answer us! Are you allied with the Hollows?!" At this point the cloud of dust was nothing but faint patches of particles, as the force from their combined angry voice seemed to cause most of it to dissipate. At the back of her mind, Fantasia wished that this fight did not have to continue any longer... it would not turn out well for the boy.