It was night, just when the moon was bright and the stars were sparse.
The bright moonlight hung in the night sky, and the hazy soft light sprinkled over the desert.
Thena did not stay inside the house, but sat quietly on the Gobi desert not far away, in front of an old tree that had long since withered to death.
Decorations similar to those used in ancient shamanic sacrifices, such as tattered cloth strips, cattle and sheep skulls, objects carved full of talismans, hollow wind chimes, and so on, hung all over the decayed tree trunk. At a glance, it looked extremely like a Christmas tree.
Ichimaru Gin observed from behind for a long time, yet was stunned that he could not see anything special.
Although Thena was sitting quietly, the aura around her body became increasingly violent. It was completely unlike a Shinigami's Jinzen, and instead seemed like she was deliberately suppressing something.
After thinking left and right, he decided to go over and take a look.
Ichimaru Gin had just walked behind Thena, and before he could say the words "hello," he saw Thena, who had originally still been sitting quietly, suddenly spring up from the ground. Then she slowly turned her head, revealing a pair of pure white pupils with only the whites of the eyes remaining.
In just an instant, Ichimaru Gin realized something was wrong.
The aura of the person before him suddenly underwent a huge change, completely different from the previous Thena, as though she were another stranger.
Especially within those somewhat ferocious and terrifying pure white eyes without pupils, there was actually a bone-chilling, trembling killing intent being released. For a moment, the desert, where the temperature had already plummeted, was suddenly coated with a thin layer of frost.
"Kill!!!"
Thena let out a roar from her throat that did not sound human. As she stepped forward, white-gold armor formed and covered her body. Holding a gorgeous golden war spear in one hand, she flashed through the night sky like thunder and lightning, swiftly and sharply stabbing toward Ichimaru Gin's head.
Wuu wuu wuu——
The war spear erupted with heaven-shocking might, as if it wanted to pierce a hole through the sky.
Thena was worthy of her mighty reputation as the Goddess of War. Her movements were swift without any dragging, clean and direct as they targeted the enemy's vital point. The sharp spearhead tore through the air, ripping out waves of ear-piercing screams, like a clap of thunder exploding across the silent desert.
"Hey, hey, hey, isn't this a bit too much?"
The smile on Ichimaru Gin's face stiffened, and he stepped on Shunpo to distance himself from this place.
The war spear's strike landed on empty air, and its violent force pierced through the Gobi desert, lifting rolling streams of fierce wind.碎 stones and sand were swept up tens of meters high.
"No one... can escape!" At this moment, Thena was like she had gone mad, continuously speaking incomprehensible ravings. Her pure white pupils once again locked onto Ichimaru Gin, her feet stepping repeatedly and raising sheets of shattered stones and flying sand, her whole body diving over like lightning.
This situation... had she lost consciousness?
Ichimaru Gin frowned slightly and discovered that Thena's current state was extremely similar to the Shinigami in the Hollowfication experiment.
Clang!
A light sword hum interrupted his thoughts.
He saw a golden sharp sword thrust straight out, the cold light dazzling abnormally in the dark night, like a flood dragon breaking through the sea and rolling up a thousand layers of shocking waves. Sword qi condensed onto a single point at the sword tip, even drawing a tiny rift in the void.
The sword edge was still several meters away from Ichimaru Gin.
But that sharp sword intent filled with killing intent already made one produce the illusion of being pierced through the heart by ten thousand swords.
"Looks like there's no way to communicate..."
Ichimaru Gin helplessly shook his head and drew the short wakizashi blade at his waist: "I'm not very good at doing this sort of thing with people, so I can only use the simplest method to wake you up. I hope when you wake up later, you don't blame me."
In the time it took to speak, Thena's sword edge had already forced its way close.
Ichimaru Gin stepped forward, and after the short blade was unsheathed, it struck later but arrived first, one step faster than her sword edge. The blade slashed diagonally upward from below, its force and angle impeccable, directly cutting into the force-bearing point of Thena's sword edge.
Clang!
The force-bearing point was broken, and the sword edge was nearly knocked flying.
Ichimaru Gin took advantage of the momentum and turned his wrist, the blade slashing down again from above, drawing a half-moon arc of light.
But Thena was worthy of the name Goddess of War. Her battle experience was astonishingly rich. She decisively chose to abandon the sword, raised her left arm above her head, and propped up a diamond-shaped golden war shield.
Shinsō slashed onto the war shield, bursting out golden sparks and producing a loud sound of metal clashing.
Thena seized the gap in Ichimaru Gin's move, condensed a double-bladed axe in her right hand, swung her arm into a semicircular arc, and chopped out the axe blade with heavy force.
Shunpo!
Ichimaru Gin suddenly disappeared and appeared dozens of meters away.
At the instant he had just disappeared, the golden axe blade actually split open a huge ravine in midair.
The explosive fierce wind was like tens of millions of blades and swords, plowing countless gullies along the Gobi desert. Layer upon layer of roaring airwaves shattered a raised sand dune ahead, throwing tons of sand and stones dozens of meters into the sky.
"Tsk... how dangerous."
Ichimaru Gin's narrowed eyes slowly opened a little, revealing some scarlet coldness.
The clothing in front of him had been cut through at the waist by that axe blade, and on the fair waist of his eight-pack abs, a thin bloody mark was astonishingly left behind. It could be imagined that if his reaction had been a little slower just now, he would probably have been cut in half at the waist by that axe.
"Kill!"
Thena let out another roar and dove over close to the ground.
"Shoot to kill... Shinsō."
A scarlet light appeared in Ichimaru Gin's slightly opened eyes.
Without seeing him make any movement, a dazzling blade light suddenly appeared, astonishingly splitting open the black night ahead!
Although this astonishing blade light was fast, Thena reacted even faster. Before she was about to be hit, she condensed a golden war shield.
Clang!
A huge roar lifted a sonic boom air ring in the desert.
The result was no surprise. With a force like crushing dry weeds and smashing rotten wood, Shinsō instantly pierced through the golden war shield, and without losing momentum, pierced through Thena's shoulder, fiercely nailing her onto the Gobi desert.
"Kill!!!"
After being injured, Thena roared in fury.
She actually ignored the shoulder pierced by Shinsō, forcibly struggled up from the ground, then forcefully tore apart her shoulder. Large pieces of flesh and blood peeled off, and one arm was directly crippled, but she felt nothing, continuing to charge over like a mad beast.
Ichimaru Gin directly used Shunpo to go over, his five fingers covering Thena's face, violently pressing her onto the ground.
Bang!
Thena was pressed by the back of her head and directly smashed into the ground, the violent impact making her brain buzz.
"Sorry, the game ends here."
Ichimaru Gin's eyes were half-closed and slightly opened, revealing a sinister and venomous chilling coldness, and he fired a Shakkahō right into her face.
Boom!
The crimson fire cannon exploded point-blank, raising a huge ball of flames that swallowed the crazed Thena.
Although the power had been precisely controlled by Ichimaru Gin and did not reach an unpredictable effect, he had still underestimated the crazed Thena. After taking a Hadō Number Thirty head-on, not only was she uninjured, but it instead stimulated her madness.
"Ahhhhh——!!!"
A shrill scream tore through the night sky, and the blazing fireball gradually dissipated.
Around Thena's pure white pupils, terrifying blue veins bulged. Her mouth let out an angry roar, her hands each holding a golden dagger, completely adopting a stance of exchanging injury for injury, and she stabbed toward Ichimaru Gin's abdomen.
Ichimaru Gin's expression suddenly changed. With no time to continue controlling Thena, he directly used Shunpo to dodge these two blades.
What a vicious woman.....
Ichimaru Gin wiped the cold sweat from his forehead, feeling lingering fear in his heart. Just now, his kidney had nearly been stabbed apart.
Although this bit of small injury was not impossible to treat, at most he could go find Urahara Kisuke to replace it with an artificial one, but in the end it was still somewhat uncomfortable. After all, the original was still better. Moreover, he had not even used these two kidneys yet.
"Huff... huff..."
Thena staggered and slowly climbed up from the ground, panting heavily in large mouthfuls.
First her shoulder had been pierced by Shinsō, then she had forcibly taken a Shakkahō. At this moment, Thena's shoulder was a bloody mess, half of her battle armor had been scorched by flames, and her beautiful blonde hair had become charred black. Her appearance looked extremely miserable.
"It's becoming more and more troublesome..."
Looking at Thena, who was still full of fighting intent, Ichimaru Gin was extremely speechless inside. He held his forehead and sighed: "If Captain Aizen were here, that would be good. An instant-cast Hadō Number Ninety Kurohitsugi could probably directly make her lose the ability to move."
Among the four basic Shinigami arts of Zanjutsu, Hakuda, Hohō, and Kidō, only Kidō was his weak point.
So when facing this kind of situation, he was rather helpless. He wanted to make Thena lose the ability to move, but did not want her to be injured too heavily. This was quite a severe test, completely unsuitable for his fighting style.
"Forget it, I won't hold back anymore."
Ichimaru Gin's eyelids were half-lowered, his right hand casually holding Shinsō as he slowly walked toward the crazed Thena: "The next slash won't be at the same slow speed as before. If you can't block it... then go die."