"As a result, the people around her also benefited and were affected by the Hōgyoku," Aizen continued, his voice resonating with newfound power. "Orihime Inoue, Yasutora Sado, and others awakened their abilities or developed significant spiritual pressure because of its influence."
His transformed face showed no emotion as he spoke, but his purple eyes gleamed with an unnatural light.
"My wish was simple—to transcend the limits of both death and Hollows. To become something beyond either state of existence. Now the Hōgyoku has finally submitted to my will and is helping me realize that ambition!"
He spread his arms, the white chrysalis-like armor cracking further to reveal more of the strange purple substance beneath.
"You are mere mortals," he declared. "It's time for you to witness the wrath of a god and experience my true power!"
Despite his lengthy explanation, he had deliberately avoided directly answering Urahara's question about controlling the Hōgyoku. This evasion was calculated.
For Aizen, beings like Urahara Kisuke and Ichigo Kurosaki were the few existences that made this world less tedious. Although these unknowns represented challenges, they also provided rare pleasure.
He could see through most people at a glance and dispatch them with a single stroke of his sword, just like crushing ants. A world populated only by such insignificant creatures was truly boring.
It was for this reason that Aizen had never embarked on an indiscriminate killing spree, and why he had kept Gin Ichimaru by his side all these years.
Because Gin made life interesting.
It was because of these few unpredictable elements that Aizen had not completely given up on this world. He believed it could still be salvaged, reshaped into something worthy of his attention.
However, Uehara Shiroha was an entirely different matter.
Although this mysterious figure also represented an unknown variable, he was not the kind of unknown that Aizen believed he could manipulate at will. The unpredictability found in Ichigo Kurosaki, Urahara Kisuke, and Gin Ichimaru presented just the right level of challenge for him.
Confronting these individuals was like playing an elaborate game. Although it could be tense and exhilarating, it remained, fundamentally, just a game—one in which Aizen himself was never truly at risk. These people could not genuinely threaten him.
But Uehara Shiroha was different.
When facing that man, Aizen was the challenger, not the master of the game.
This remained true even in his current chrysalis form with its tremendous power.
So when confronted with Urahara's provocations regarding Uehara Shiroha, Aizen chose not to refute them. He knew that now was not the time to challenge Uehara Shiroha directly.
Only by evolving to an even higher level could he be confident in defeating Uehara Shiroha.
Therefore, he would not halt his progression. He would continue to evolve until he surpassed everything and everyone in existence.
In the Ice Palace, observing Aizen whose form had changed so drastically and whose strength had increased exponentially, Yoruichi Shihōin was shocked, her heart racing with apprehension.
She had never expected that the true ability of the Hōgyoku was to "grant wishes." This complete fusion between Aizen and the Hōgyoku was truly terrifying.
Suddenly, she felt a profound sense of unfamiliarity with the world she thought she knew. Everything had changed in an instant.
But the spectacle wasn't over yet!
Aizen, now fused with the Hōgyoku, was performing a magnificent demonstration of his ascent from mortal to divinity.
With a casual release of his reiatsu, he had knocked Urahara, Uryū, and Isshin to the ground as if they were nothing. These three masters, each with captain-level combat ability, seemed no more significant than children before him.
Such power was genuinely terrifying.
Yoruichi felt her scalp tingling as she stood frozen in shock.
After a moment, she recovered enough to ask with a trembling voice:
"Is this Aizen's version of Hollowification? It's overwhelmingly powerful! Can we possibly win against something like that?"
Uehara Shiroha replied calmly, his voice steady and assured: "We will win."
He truly wasn't concerned about Aizen, despite the enemy's dramatically increased strength.
In fact, when facing any opponent, Uehara Shiroha never worried about their power level. It was impossible for them to be stronger than him—this was as certain as the fact that the wealthy make friends without considering financial status.
Rather than focusing on Aizen's raw strength, he paid more attention to the opponent's judgment and control of the situation.
Even as Aizen grew overconfident, he hadn't acted rashly or impulsively, thinking he could defeat Uehara Shiroha immediately. Nor had he immediately come to Hueco Mundo to issue a challenge.
In truth, it wasn't just Aizen's appearance that had deteriorated—his rational faculties were diminishing as well. Aizen clearly hadn't learned the lesson demonstrated by Kaname Tōsen: the more monstrous one's appearance became, the harder one fell; the worse one looked, the closer one drew to death.
Perhaps this was the price of "taking shortcuts" to power.
Just as Tōsen had lost his greatest perceptive abilities through Hollowification, Aizen was losing his cool analytical mind.
But even so, the man had still accurately gauged his own strength relative to Uehara Shiroha's and recognized that he was not yet a match.
Uehara Shiroha could perceive that compared to the original timeline, the current Aizen showed more restraint and hadn't completely abandoned himself to his transformation.
On one hand, Uehara's overwhelming power was so intimidating that Aizen dared not be careless; on the other hand, Aizen truly possessed remarkable patience and judgment.
However, even these qualities wouldn't change the inevitable outcome.
A compromised mind was still compromised, and even if one could resist impulse temporarily, that control couldn't last forever.
Moreover, Aizen couldn't even overcome Ichigo Kurosaki and Urahara Kisuke, let alone Uehara Shiroha.
Speaking of which, it seemed that Urahara had somehow obtained an "Aizen User Manual," handling his opponent with remarkable precision.
In the world of Bleach, no self-proclaimed god ever met a favorable end.
Aizen, the officially "appointed" transcendent being, would eventually be beaten until his defenses shattered, reduced to a near-catatonic state before finally becoming the infamous "chair spirit."
Lille Barro, who possessed the power of a god, would encounter the Hakkyōken, a divine weapon specifically designed to counter his abilities, and be forced to transform into a bird-like creature. Then he would meet the "bird-slayer" Izuru Kira and suffer a defeat so crushing one could kneel and write the word "miserable."
Yhwach, who considered himself a god with "astonishing wisdom" and could destroy worlds with a gesture, would ultimately defeat himself, becoming nothing more than a living corpse—a mere "wooden stake."
Even the Soul King himself wasn't immune to this curse, having been torn into pieces and scattered across existence.