Both Yon and Ichigo wore raincoats on their way home except for Masaki who was holding an umbrella. It was barely enough to cover both Ichigo and Yon by both her side.
This day in the original plot was the day Masaki dies and Yon has been expecting it with the intention to save her soul at first but ultimately he wants to save her life as time went on.
Little did Yon know that for cultivators such as himself, regrets becomes a cultivator's inner demon as they ascend to higher realms. If a cultivator has a stong inner demon that they can't defeat, it can be the reason for them to fail in their cultivation.
That or it simply didn't register to him since he's more focused on using his spirit sense. As they pass by the river, there it was. The grand fisher showing its bait to Ichigo but Yon who was sensing him could clearly tell where he is.
"Ichigo wait!" Masaki exclaimed as Ichigo suddenly rushed towards the little girl that he was seeing. Ichigo wasn't able to hear what his mom was saying and kept running towards the girl he thought would drown.
Masaki followed Ichigo as fast as she could to save her son since she coud clearly see that the girl Ichigo was seeing is just a bait of the hollow behind it. She saw Ichigo passed out and the bait disappears as the grand fisher shows himself ready to devour Ichigo.
Luckily Masaki made it in time but to her demise she could not activate her powers as a quincy. Left with no powers at all, this mother still didn't give up and placed herself in front of Ichigo shielding him safe from the grand fishers clutches.
The grand fisher himself was amused at Masaki's stance. "So you want to go first before your son? Then I will do just that!"
"Bang!" a gunshot was heard as the grand fisher opened his mouth to devour Masaki's soul and body.
Boom!
The grand fisher tasted blood upon closing his mouth. This blood wasn't Masaki's but his own since he was injured after Yon fired a spirit gun the moment he opened his mouth.
Masaki who closed her eyes earlier clearly heard the gunshot but was still expecting to be devoured by the hollow. What could a mear human gun do to a spiritual hollow?
'Huh? Nothing happened?' Masaki opened her eyes only to see a bloodied hollow who was angrily glaring at a child just a few distance behind her. She turned to see Yon still pointing his index finger towards the hollow.
"Yon kun?" Masaki was dazed for a moment but Yon called her out.
"Aunt Masaki please take Ichigo to a safe distance, leave the hollow to me!" he shouts as he gathered spiritual energy once again to his index finger. Once it was glowing bright enough to Masaki and the hollow's eyes he fires it.
"Spirit Gun!"
Bang!
A bigger spirit gun than earlier was fired towards the grand fisher. But the grand fisher was just caught off guard earlier, this time he saw the attack coming and blocked it with his green vine that comes out his skin.
"Go now!" Yon shouts at the dazed Masaki who picked Ichigo up and run to a safe distance.
Yon fires of a bunch more as he covers Masaki's retreat but the grand fisher wouldn't just let them as more vine like tentacles grows and shot towards Masaki.
"tsk! Your opponent is me!" Yon stopped firing and rushed towards the vine that was aiming for Masaki's back.
"Spirit Sword.!" Spirit energy formed into a sword on Yon's palm as he swung it down the vine before it could arrive at Masaki. The vine was cut easily by Yon as he slashed it one more horizontally to the left eradicating the rest of the vine as far as the sword could reach.
"Yon kun! How can you do that?" asked Masaki who stopped running after Yon saved her again.
That however was just the start since more vines were coming towards them now after Masaki asked him.
"We'll talk later, for now stay behind so I can protect you both." Yon disperses the sword and pointed both his index and middle fingers together towards the incoming vines. He used both his hands left and right while the thumb and the rest of the fingers were closed/curled.
"Twin Magnum!"
B-bang! bang! bang!
Multiple stronger gunshots was heard as Yon fired off spirit gun in succesion as if there's no need to gather them like he normally does when he only uses his index finger. He targeted the vines that were coming at them.
The vines were destroyed easily by Yon giving grand fisher a shock since he was only facing a human and a child at that. This should have been an easy snack for him like he always does.
'He is not just a normal human kid, I should retreat for now.' the grand fisher was not your normal hollow. It survived after all this time from shinigamis due to its intellect and awareness. And his awareness right now is telling him to back off if he wants to survive. And that's just exactly what he did as fast as he could.
'I could still chase and make sure to kill it but,' Yon looked back at Masaki who was holding a passed out Ichigo.
Upon looking at him Masaki could clearly read that he wants to chase that hollow. She could only smile bitterly at the young man before her and say "Go ahead Yon kun. We'll be alright. You can visit us later on."
Yon could understand that last sentence. She probably wants to talk about how he's able to see and fight hollows. "Thanks aunt Masaki. I'll see you soon."
"Geppo" Yon jumped continuesly until he was high enough and looked at the direction the grand fisher ran to. His Spirit sense could still follow it but will soon be out of range if he doesn't give chase now.
"Soru" using his very own version of shunpo, he hurriedly chased after it.
A few minutes later
Grand fisher went into a forest area and found a spot to rest in.
"That human brat, I will definitely find him again. And when I do, I'll devour him whole for ruining my meal.!" Shouts the grand fisher who was obviously furious at Yon's interference earlier.
Yon was able to hear all of it since he had long since caught up to it. He was just hiding himself using Space Concealment that's why grand fisher was unable to feel his reiryoku or presence at all.
He was a few distance away from him so he undid the technique and focused his hand on forming a katana instead of just his normal spirit sword. The gathering of his reiryoku obviously attracted the grand fisher to look at his spot.
"So you've come to die, brat!" grand fisher declared with a furious tone.
"Nope. I've come to make a breakthrough to xiantian realm, and your gonna help me with it." Answered Yon with a smug face. "Spirit Sword : Katana version." a blue colored katana formed on Yon's hand as he gripped it with both hands. "Let's dance, grand fisher!"
"Just die brat!" grand fisher unleashed a number of vines towards Yon. Just before the vines could strangle or put a hole through Yon's body he vanished just in the nick of time. He arrived almost instantly behind grand fisher. The latter was unable to trace him until he spoke.
"Kendo Kata, Nihon-me: Kote-Uchi.!" Yon flashed from behind grand fisher in one breath to the front. As he appeared the vines from grand fisher's body were all cut cleanly making the hollow scream in pain.
"No! Damn brat! Just die!" Due to his emotion kicking in, the grand fisher was unable to think like it normally did and tried to devour Yon with his mouth. His basic insticnt to devour kicked in, removing any rational thought. This was an opportunity for Yon who calmly dodged every bite and prepares another attack.
The 2nd Kata of kendo's principle was to target the opponents wrist with the intention to incapacitate the target. In the grand fisher's case was ofcourse the vines coming out it's body. The 1st Kata however was much simpler. It has only one intention, and that was to cut the enemy in half from top all the way down. In other words it was a technique to kill!
"Kendo Kata, Ippon-me: Men-Uchi.!" Yon strike at the furious grand fisher and incorporated his skills on that strike. Geppo to be high enough then kiai with riatsu, Soru, and Zone.! The grand fisher could only see a jumping Yon in front of him as he fails to bite him. Then the next second his vision was cut in half.
The grand fisher was cut in half successfully as it's body started to disintegrate. Yon who was so serious awhile ago slamped himself buttfirst to the ground.
"That was intense!" commented the tired Yon. Although he's at the 10th order of the Houtian realm now. His reiryoku was still limited. And executing the katas including the spirit gun earlier left him with only a quarter of his reiryoku.
Yon used his spirit sense to check the surrounding if there were hollows attracted to their fight.Seeing that there wasn't one, he began to recover himself so he can absorb the reishi risidue without any setback just because he lacked reiryoku.
After a few hours he finally recovered himself back to top shape. He sat in a lotus position beside the reishi risidue. With the amount of reishi risidue left behind by the grand fisher, Yon was confident he will finally be able to break through a whole new realm.
He began greedily devouring the reishi risidue as fast as he could inside his dantian but he didn't immediately tried to breakthrough. The plan was to build up this reishi risidue and attempt to break in one go.
A few more hours later
'Break for me!'
Yon attempted to breakthrough as soon as he was ready. 3 months ago he struggled breaking through the next realm upon reaching the late peak 10th order of the Houtian realm. But now he was finally able to. The 12 meridian channels he opened up before that were connected from his dantian to his organs were flowing with reiryoku and to his surprise 8 more meridians were opened up.
The reishi particles in the area of the forest gathered around him and started going through the new 8 meridians. These 8 meridians were also known as Eight extraordinary meridians. These eight extra meridians differ from the standard twelve organ meridians in that they are considered to be storage vessels or reservoirs of energy and are not associated directly with the internal organs.
Yon started feeling good and the feeling was familiar back when he made his first breakthrough.
Enlightenment!
End of chapter 12