On Hermes' group side, Asfi and Hermes temporarily left Naaza and the Takemikazuchi children to go convince the last member that would be coming with them.
Not being able to hide her curiosity, Asfi asked Hermes, "Hermes-sama, it's weird for you to back down after just a few words. Why did you agree with Kisuke Urahara? Aren't you very curious about their Familia?"
Fixing his hat, Hermes answered with a smile, "He's dangerous. Better not mess with him too much."
Asfi froze on the spot. This was probably the most ridiculous thing that she ever heard from her God, "W-what? What do you mean by that?" Asfi hurriedly followed him and asked in a flustered voice. She had never heard Hermes saying that it's better not to mess with someone too much. After all, he even had the gall to mess with both Freya and Loki.
"Nothing, really. It's just the feeling I'm getting. All I can say for now is that he's similar to me, yet very different."
Asfi wanted to ask more about it, but they'd already arrived at their destination. Hermes opened the closed door of the Hostess of Fertility and said, "Mia~. I want to ask you something~."
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Kisuke, Yoruichi, and Ais arrived on the 13th floor and at the spot where Takemikazuchi Familia passed the parade of monsters which went after them to Bell's party.
Yoruichi looked around for a bit and led the group through the floors where Bell's party passed through. They went on until they reached the 17th floor and stopped. At this point, they already figured that Bell and his party indeed went deeper instead of going back to the surface. They only stopped because of the Goliath blocking their way.
"Are they still alive?", asked Ais while looking at the monster.
"They are. There are traces that they went through here successfully." Yoruichi answered.
Ais nodded and took out her sword to deal with the Goliath, however, Kisuke suddenly stopped her, "What's wrong?"
"Nothing, just let the others deal with it," Kisuke replied. He was specifically referring to Hermes' group, wanting to trouble them for a bit.
Ais hesitated a little but chose to listen to him. They then went through the 17th floor without fighting the Goliath.
Arriving on the 18th floor, Ais immediately led them to the Loki Familia camp, because Yoruichi told her that Bell's party was most probably taken in by her comrades since their camp was nearer on the path to the 17th floor compared to Rivira.
Once they stepped into the vicinity of the camp, everyone from the Loki Familia and Hephaestus Familia looked in their direction and wondered who is this group that the Sword Princess is leading, "Do you want to meet the Captain first, or Sona, Aika, and Shirone?" Ais asked.
"Let's go to those three first," Kisuke replied.
Ais nodded and walked straight towards the tent which housed the three. They entered the, compared to others, relatively large tent and Kisuke turned to Ais, "Wallenstein-san, if you don't mind, please ask the whereabouts of Cranel-san's party. They should be around this floor."
"...Leave it to me." Ais figured that they wanted to be left alone and left the tent. But before she started to look for the people they needed to rescue, Ais reported Kisuke and Yoruichi's arrival in their camp to Finn, Riveria, and Gareth.
Yoruichi went to the corner of the tent while Kisuke went straight to the three unconscious girls. He first went around them before checking their pulses through his Mana and Reiatsu-Ki. He also took out some tools from his inventory to check on them and a few minutes later, Kisuke went to a relatively large spot and turned to Yoruichi, "Please close it off."
Yoruichi silently nodded and went out of the tent. The moment she came outside, the top executives and some other members of the Loki Familia were not far away from the tent they stayed in and were currently observing the situation. The one who looked for Bell's party, Ais, was also among them, "Good day to all of you. Thank you for taking good care of our girls." Yoruichi smiled and greeted them.
Finn stepped up and replied, "It's fine. In fact, it should be us who should be thankful. If not for them, we probably couldn't have returned. By the way, I heard you're looking for Bell Cranel's party. They are currently in our care and are recuperating in one of our tents."
"I see. That's good." Yoruichi saw that Finn wanted to talk more, but before he could speak, she continued, "I'm sorry, but we can't entertain you right now. My hubby over there is busy checking on the girls."
Yoruichi then took out four daggers from her pouch and tossed them upwards. With her great skill, each of the daggers landed on four corners of the tent. A second later, strange symbols started lighting up on the handle of the daggers and they suddenly drew lines of light from the handles until the top of the tent.
After another second, new lines of light emerged and this time, it connected all the daggers before a translucent green film colored the shapes the lines created. The creator of this, Yoruichi, nodded at everyone from the Loki Familia who were currently sporting a dumbfounded expression before she entered the tent protected with the barrier.
Closing the curtains, Yoruichi disappeared from their sight.
"W-what was that!?" Tione exclaimed as she tried to approach the barrier.
However, Tiona immediately grabbed her shoulder in order to stop her recklessness, "What are you doing!? Don't touch any random barrier!"
"Ah, sorry... It's just amazing that she was able to create something like this in an instant. Is it because of those daggers?"
Finn turned to Riveria and asked, "What do you think, Riveria?"
But Riveria only shook her head in disappointment, "Please don't ask me. I don't know. This is also my first time seeing something like this, and even with my knowledge of magic, I still don't understand a single thing about this."
"E-even Riveria-sama?" Lefiya muttered.
"Not a single clue?" Ais asked.
But she only got the same answer from Riveria.
Rubbing his beard, Gareth suddenly said, "Let's just say that it's a Hestia Familia thing."
Everyone looked at him with unbelieving eyes, but a few seconds later, they realized that this would be the best answer they could get right now, "Somehow, that's strangely convincing... What the hell is wrong with them?" Bete muttered.
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Inside the tent, the moment Yoruichi reentered, she saw a bunch of equipment being taken out, "You're going to make some medicines on the spot?"
"Yep. They need it, especially Aika." Kisuke replied while putting together some ingredients.
"Hmm? What's wrong?"
"While Sona and Koneko's injuries don't look good, it's only limited to their physical bodies. Aika's injury spans to her soul."
"What? Why? Even if she released her powers to their full potential, she should just be tired."
"The problem lies in her Hollow side. It's too strong... Way stronger than her Shinigami part. The only reason why she wasn't consumed by it was because her Zanpakuto doesn't want to. As you know, once a Shinigami unlocks his or her Hollow side, the Zanpakuto has the majority of the control over that power."
"Since Aika's Zanpakuto is very special and unique due to its nature, I don't know much about it and it's only now that I realized that her Hollow side is too strong, so it created an imbalance in her soul. To make it worse, she has a physical body and her Reiatsu can't grow without attaching it to Ki or Mana. And even though she automatically acquired Reiatsu-Ki due to how she was converted, it's still harder to handle than just the Reiatsu."
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Editors
Alexander
28th00: So, that happened. Poor Aika-chan is in a world of hurt (literally, inner world and all.) because Phis-chama and Great Red were like "That looks cool. Be more Dragon." and since Dragons = Primal Beings of Chaos and Instinct, and Hollows are Corrupted Souls that are almost all Instinct… Yeah.
Goyya: She really can't use her cheat to its full potential without working her butt off.