Blue streaks slowly surfaced within the golden pupil at the bottom of the lake.
They resembled the Quincy's Blut, and in moments, the streaks dyed the golden eye entirely blue.
A pillar of blue light rose from the center of the pupil.
Sensing no danger from the Quincy power within the light, Katori Nanatsuki didn't dodge.
The blue pillar struck his body.
The next instant, he felt a strange sensation. With a thought, he "looked" inward—toward his Inner World. The scenery around the lake quickly faded into a blur.
He wasn't fully immersed in the Inner World, just diverting part of his attention to monitor the activity inside it.
Within that space, under a pitch-black sky, a column of blue light descended.
It landed somewhere within the black desert, illuminating a massive cocoon of glowing blue threads.
That was the Quincy power Developing inside his body.
The blue pillar from above fell upon the cocoon, and the moment it touched, the threads lit up even brighter, like dry tinder catching flame.
More and more blue threads appeared, and the cocoon swelled in size.
At the same time, Nanatsuki noticed something changing on his Status Interface.
He glanced at the panel:
[Quincy Power (Developing – 14%)]
A percentage value now followed the "Developing" label—and it was rapidly climbing.
14%... 20%... 90%...
But after reaching 90%, the number began to slow.
90.1%... 88.8%...
Soon, the percentage began to fall instead of rise, and within the Inner World, the cocoon began to tremble violently.
'Something's gone wrong?'
Nanatsuki frowned.
"My Lord... Yhwach's will has awakened... It is interfering with My efforts..."
The voice of the giant eye rang out once again.
'Yhwach...' Nanatsuki's eyes narrowed. 'So the Kurosaki bloodline is still affected by Yhwach, after all.'
He had mentally prepared for this before using the Bloodline Extractor.
Acquiring Quincy power without being touched by Yhwach's bloodline was nearly impossible.
All existing Quincy, aside from the Soul King, ultimately traced their power back to Yhwach.
And the Quincy powers inherited from him remained bound to him.
Yhwach could recover those powers through Auswählen.
However, if one's spiritual body housed multiple different powers, Auswählen would be ineffective.
Since Nanatsuki would eventually walk the path of transcendence and acquire Hollow powers too, he hadn't rejected obtaining Yhwach-derived Quincy power.
"My Lord... I shall bait Yhwach's will... drawing it out from the bloodline... You may take this opportunity to eliminate it..."
The blue beam extending from the eye widened dramatically.
It was trying to force out the trace of Yhwach's will buried within the Quincy bloodline.
Since this was a rare chance to eliminate future trouble, Nanatsuki accepted without hesitation and fully entered his Inner World.
As soon as he stepped inside, a black-haired girl emerged slowly from his shadow.
"Kagehime."
"This place is getting worse by the second. There's something nasty growing on the cocoon!"
"I see it. Let's deal with it right away."
Nanatsuki's gaze locked onto the problem.
Something black had sprouted on the cocoon formed from blue threads.
That black mass was absorbing the cocoon to grow itself—rapidly shrinking the cocoon back down to its original size.
The eye's interference had inadvertently awakened Yhwach's will from within the Quincy bloodline. That black mass devouring the cocoon was Yhwach's will itself.
"The cocoon's shriveled up by several layers."
Nanatsuki frowned. He couldn't strike yet—not until Yhwach's will completely separated from the cocoon.
The black mass bathed in the blue pillar of light from above, rapidly expanding and beginning to take humanoid form. At the same time, its point of contact with the cocoon was steadily decreasing.
It was peeling away.
Moments later, a shadowy humanoid figure completely detached from the cocoon, hovering midair.
Meanwhile, the blue glow in the eyeball's pupil faded and returned to gold—though the golden light now appeared dimmer.
"My Lord... strike now..."
Within the Inner World, the last rays of blue light fell from the sky and were devoured by the shadowy mass.
The black matter rapidly shifted—transforming into a middle-aged man with black hair.
This man didn't look like the "Zangetsu uncle" in Nanatsuki's memories, but resembled Yhwach himself.
"Is that Yhwach?" Kagehime now held a black-bladed sword.
"It's not really him. At best, it's just a part of Yhwach," Nanatsuki replied, also summoning a sword.
The "Yhwach" hovering above the cocoon opened his eyes—single, black pupils.
Nanatsuki sighed in relief. He had feared it might be the double-pupiled Yhwach. That would've been a nightmare.
"The Shinigami who stole the power of the Quincy King..."
Yhwach's voice was deep and steady.
He raised one arm, and in an instant, conjured a long blue light arrow that resembled a spear.
"Be severed."
He thrust forward, launching the blue Holy Arrow at Nanatsuki.
Heilig Pfeil!
A flash of steel—Nanatsuki's blade cleaved the light arrow in two, sending both halves flying wide.
Boom!
The Reishi light arrow exploded—but Nanatsuki remained unharmed.
At the same time, Kagehime appeared behind Yhwach.
By the time he turned around, her blade had already fallen.
Slash!
Yhwach was cleaved in half.
And yet he remained eerily calm, showing no concern for his wounds.
No blood spilled from the cut—only blue Reishi.
His bifurcated body rapidly shifted and transformed into two fully formed copies of himself.
"Looks like we have to eliminate him completely!" Nanatsuki frowned.
Although the eye had managed to force out Yhwach's will, it had been intertwined with the Quincy power projected through the blue light.
This "Yhwach" wasn't a true spirit body—his form was made of Quincy energy transmitted from the giant eye.
Ordinary attacks were ineffective.
Fortunately, this projection of Yhwach wasn't particularly strong, and this was Nanatsuki's domain. Total elimination was within reach.
Still, it stung a little.
With a thought, Nanatsuki summoned his Status Interface:
[Quincy Power (Developing – 0.001%)]
All the blue light from the eye had been absorbed by "Yhwach!"
Even some of the original Quincy power from the cocoon had been drawn out.
This "Yhwach" was formed from—and inseparable from—that Quincy power.
Destroying him meant wiping out those fragments of power as well.
'At least this gets rid of the risk of Auswählen... it's not a total loss,' Nanatsuki consoled himself.