Commanding Power, Confronting Fear [Solo | Bankai Training]

Heh, do not celebrate too early. We still have much to do. You have only succeeded in bringing us out into your world. If you seek more, and have the full focus. You must defeat and make us submit.

Silently, Tento stood up, planting his feet down as he pivoted on his left foot to face the lion and hawk of Shiomaru.

You are ready it seems. Well, then it is time to see how far your power and determination can go, Tento!

At the declaration at Shiomaru’s provocation, Tento took in the full visage of his partner. A majestic and powerful lion, its full brown mane hung into a close fit. Its volume reaches out gently to give the essence of a peacock's feathers bellowing. The hawk hung flapping its wings softly, a beautiful surfer of the sky. The air was quiet but stiff. The atmosphere grew heavier and heavier, as if venom was filling the air. It began as a soft subtle murmur almost passable to the senses, a whisper carried by the whined. Falling leafs in the air seemed to pause mid fall, their vents growing tense. The sky seemed to stir with a raverious quake of hunger. Pebbles broke from the deep hold within the ground as the spiritual glows of Tento and Shimaru on the training field began to gain definition. The earth trembled. The ground trembled, not violently, but with a quiet insistence that sent ripples through the cement stone streets.

Within barrack rooms of the 4th division rooms, distant note takers of reports found their pens scratching hurriedly across parchment. Their rhythm was thrown off of its center. Stacked books, painting, and mountains of papers were unfurled and fingers hastily traced over erred faults. Some of them knew this spiritual energy, others not. “Dang it Tento. Why are you keeping it up a notch today of all days!!”, a disgruntled seated member sighed, throwing a pen and paper to the side. Choosing to try and finish his work later.

The tremors intensified. Buildings groaned, timbers of wooden framed creaked in protest. Sections of the Soul society beneath the eyes of the surface, the deeper breaches of the organization tinkled like wind chimes ever so lightly. Ceiling decorations brushed against one another, stained walls quivered casting kaleidoscopic patterns on the cold stone floor.

And then, the ground convulsed.

The train field seemed to sway hanging bells around clanged in discordant harmony. And the figures standing second ago vanished. In the bursts of speed, a dual stream of wind flew from the spirits’ mouths. Swirling beams of wind rashed towards Tento only for his rushing body to slam into it with outstretched hands. The tickle of an attack lost in existence as fast as it came.

On the two speed, Tento taking the gap made within the canceled wind to travel between Shiomaru, grabbing the chain of the two and yanking with a lion’s might. Swing the two in a quick spin before twisting his wrist and slamming them into the ground. Using his other free hand, he drew his blade, Shiomaru. A loose feather formed from a fallen piece of Shiomaru’s body, clutched in his hand as the real Shiomaru came into his hold.

“Soar, Shiomaru!!”, a torrent of wind came as Tento slashed his sword forward as it changed shape. Two brobdingnagian waves of wind flew out, the spinning ring of chains through the air in its background. The Lion Hawk seemed to dance on the wind though. Phasing through out of the way as the two stuck together. Choosing to move as one instead as two distant beings like they were in Tento’s inner world. With a wave of his hand, the torrent of wind broke in two circling back at their targets as one drove straight forward as the other curled. Acting as a whirlwind wall blocking off a last minute escape route. The pincer attack succeeded in its pursit, pinning Shiomaru against the breath of mother nature, hurting them but not proving successful at keeping Shiomaru stuck in their traps.

.”Come to me. Show me what you really have. Who you are, Shiomaru!!”, Tento called out in a war cry.

A call came in response to him. A twisted blend of a growl and screech. Contorted a windstorm of air swarmed around Shiomaru, acting like a veil concealing their form before they stepped out. Their chain broken. A torrent of wind in the shape of crescent blades suddenly shot out, traveling at him at freighting speed at both of his sides. Gripping his zanptauko in hand, Tento leapt into the air, swinging his fan in a spin creating a circular torrent of wind before winding up in a spinning continuing the string of wind torrents. Slicing up the incoming wind strikes as they clashed. A feather on his zanpakuto vanished after its use

Still in mid air, Tento crouched his body in, making a footing to flash step forward his blade help over his head as he lifted his arms into a spin, unleashing a wide vertical slash calming down towards the two halves of Shiomaru, four in total resembling claws.Another feather on Tento’s blade vanish, the wind scars made their marks and in his position he found himself behind them. Pivoting on his left foot he spun ready to let out another attack before solid walls made out of wind smacking the length of Tento’s melee attack to the side. But Tento’s assault did not let up, dancing in a flow of swings and slashes using the length of Shiomaru and the fan as a flail. A full on press assault that began to cause cracks to form in the wall.

Chipped and chipped with each strike of his blade. A final slash came to break the wall but only to see that they had vanished away last minute. The two figures appeared once again overhead of Tento’s position. His eyes immediately went up, feeling them. Their movements, the wind. It was a beacon to his senses and home to his instincts. It was coming faster, a second nature free from thought. In an infliction of instinct, Tento immediately raised his sword to his side, leaping into the air like a blade of grass as a feather thread plucks and evaporates. Swinging the blade reflection of Shiomaru, Tento generates a circular torrent of wind from the blade length of his sword. In a flash, Tento appeared in front of the two halves of Shiomaru, unleashing the current of wind between them, unbridled a stream of wind blades to slash at them. Flowing before expanding out and wrapping around the two continuing a wave of wind that slashed and sliced them from their exposed sides. Tento continued another flash, repositioning himself above them where a hole was deliberately let open in the flow of wind.

IS THAT ALL, TENTO!? Bellowed out a dual voice as the voice of the lion and hawk spoke as one once again, becoming closer in its synergy than before. Melting as if it was in a pot cooking over a slow flame. Within the gale storm, winds of change were stirring. A subtle breeze flowed around the hawk as its wings seemed to cause illusion duplicates of itself to form with each flap of its wings. Growing in their number before the hawk suddenly flew upward, forming a vertical cyclone in its size as its barreled its way towards Tento head on. The whirlwind clashed with the thrashing wind assault. Before Tento knew it, the lion lowered his head, a violent wind immediately wrapped itself around his body matching much in the way that the wind traveled around the hawk. Raising its head in a majestic leap, the soft swirl of wind soon grew into a whirling storm, joining the crashing wind that the hawk danced in before expanding in size, resulting in Tento’s attack to explode. Tornados danced on the surface as the created wind was sent haywire, twirling on the ground as it dug away before slowly dying out

In the midst of the obliterated battlefield, where the clash of will and the cries of skill being tested. Where seconds of focus could make the difference between writers of Victor's or the hymns of the fallen, stood Tento, bracing out of tailwind end as the tornados disappeared. His eyes, the color of soft tendered soil, was aflame by a calm burn. Eagerness, a peaceful enjoyment of this challenge from Shiōmaru. By all means he felt bloodless coming from each swipe and bite from his summoned Zanpakuto spirit. But, it felt…good. It was filled with emotion but yet empty. It was resistance yet with each step he took with his maneuvering, he felt they were holding outstretched arms to him in an awaited embrace. His eyes had seen many hollows fall by his blade in his years since leaving Shin'o. And many more Shinigami fall in the war.

This battle, felt different though. Good, a soothing calm where there was only his blade. The ground where he stepped, and the air he sliced. This assault and time was nothing like what an enemy could give him. Even right now, Captain Kanae's was little to his mind in comparison. There was no desire to grow for growth sake. No need to be serviceable to Hanako or to find a home in the Gotei United. There was only Shiōmaru, this battle, and the gift they gave him in the very air that he breathed. They were his, and was determined to show them so!

As Tento raised his sword, a gleaming extension of his indomitable will, the world around him fell eerily silent. The wind, once again a gentle whisperer of ancient secrets, turned traitor at his beckon. With a sudden, ferocious howl, it lunged from him like a beast unleashed. The warrior’s eyes widened in surprise as he felt something within him break away, his battle-hardened intellect momentarily overtaken by the sheer force of the gale. He only had instincts to guide his attack.

Pulled by the wind itself, Tento’s attack struck Shiōmaru with the wrath of a thousand spirits scorned, a tempest’s fist that sought to claim their very footing in the air as they lunged toward him. Tento's cloak billowed like the sails of a storm-tossed ship, and his fluff of styled hair whipped about his face, obscuring his vision. The wind, a living entity, danced around him with wild abandon, a maelstrom of nature’s fury that sought to sweep him from the realm of the living. On and on it danced as it twirled out of his blade. Flying in a destined trajectory as if it was painted on a canvas as it decorated the scene as it moved like a painter’s brush as it arced towards the two figures.

They stood firm as the wind washed over them. The moment of surprise was, but just that, a fleeting moment shadowing across their features. One that was swiftly replaced by the strong resolve that whelmed within Tento’s Zanptauko. With a defiant roar the lion braced himself against the invisible onslaught, his muscles tensing like coiled serpents ready to strike. The warrior and the wind, the hawk was right there alongside him, locked in an elemental struggle as they stood tall against the onslaught. It became a spectacle in a way, a smirk growing on their face etched in an inner memory of the Shinigami partner. Out of the wind they came, battered, bruised, and still fighting.

Tento swung his sword in hand as he watched him, his chain hand held to the side as he glanced at the number of feathers he had left. “You were right, Shiōmaru”. Tento his right hand holding the blade of Shiōmaru up as he continued to speak. His voice calm, serene, and yet centered, sured.

“I DID rely on my other powers more than you”, Tento raised his right hand with blade. His spiritual energy gathered in a wordless incantation. “It was me overthinking challenges and not a unity. Weakness. As much as I hate to say it, his power is mine just as yours is. I need balance between us all to be full”, in a moment of seriousness he let a little of his goofy side show in a light smirk. “But you need to stop getting mad at me for using kido so much”.

In a sudden slash that moved quietly and silently as if muffled by the wind. Tento used Hadō #78. Zangerin and let out a large amount of energy flew from Tento's Zanpakuto blade in a sickle slice blasting outward after being rapidly built up exploding out in a blinding light alteration to its kido structure that overshadowed the large lion's and hawk's figures. Enveloping their defensive wind like a rainfill.

As soon as the light energy left the blade, Tento crouched low and sliced at the ground. Flucking dirt and dust up in a storm that swept through the battle field. The violent eruption shattered the standing building behind Shiōmaru. Catching the two despite their best attempts to evade. Airborne, their smoking and blackened body flew as a swirl of wind gathered in their mouths before being shot into the ground below.