Darwin halted abruptly, unable to gauge his opponent's strength or skill. He decided to unleash his full power, charging up the violet miasma, releasing it from his arms in a fierce torrent.
"Who would have thought someone would dare stand before me?" Gorr boasted, pride heavy in his loud, abnoxious tone.
A challenger in his heart, Darwin couldn't restrain his inner desires fighting with a strong opponent. He didn't know why, it bothered him, though, only for a brief moment. What he wanted to experience now overrode his lingering, questioning thoughts.
"You really are reckless." Darwin remarked, his voice carrying a hint of short-lived amusement. And yet the irony behind his statement truly made him feel ever more alive. His neon green eyes burned with an intense, vivid spark of joy.
'Who cares… Let's see what you got!'
Initiating the bout, Darwin clasped his hands together, causing the miasma to ripple and spread uncontrollably around him.
"What a fool." Gorr charged at Darwin with unbridled aggression.
'Is he a simpleton? But it truly is such a Hollow way of doing things…'
Chuckling to his single minded move, Darwin taunted, "You should think before you act."
He retracted his miasma, concentrating it to form two massive walls of corrosive acid, like a sandwich, they were moving to trap Gorr between them.
With a raised brow, a crazed smile, Gorr locked eyes with Darwin, his gaze filled with murderous intent.
Sensing a shift in Gorr's Reishi control, Darwin's eyes locked, his brain going overdrive.
'What is he up to now?'
Gorr crossed his arms, channeling Reishi into a concentrated core deep within his stomach. With a volcanical outburst, his entire figure brightened, alluding to what looked like self detonation.
"Dano Inadvertido!"
He flung his arms out, releasing an explosion more destructive than a cero, engulfing an enormous radius.
The ground shattered violently, the acid walls evaporated instantly, and nearby Hollows erupted in a bloody, chaotic display, staining the floor beneath.
Gorr cracked his neck and scanned the area, searching for Darwin.
Darwin lay sprawled on the fractured rubble, his body unresponsive and his consciousness slipping in and out, struggling to hold on with sheer will.
'What—' His mind couldn't keep up, a blur had settled in, drawing his senses closer to what seems the eternal abyss.
Disappointed, his grin return normal, Gorr walked up to Darwin delivering his final verdict.
Eyes and ears were drawn at the spectacle, a scene so incredibly vivid in its tension, but the end result unsettled most.
Watching from a far, Harribel and her followers rushed to Darwin's dying figure.
But then a suction force, an attraction of neighbouring Reishi was flowing towards Darwin's chest.
A moment of reproach, a moment of analysing what this was, she lifted her right arm up halting the group in their stead.
"Something is happening to Darwin's body!" Observing silently, Harribel and the rest watched as a light came out of his body.
'What in the world is that power?! Who are you Darwin?!' Harribel's mind was in shambles, the more she saw Darwin's actions, the more she was lost in her train of thoughts.
'What monstrous durability to be able to withstand a self destructing ability. It caught me off guard considering it came from that starting point…'
He inwardly admitted—before realising his soul was being sent into a different dimension.
Sucked in without his permission, he opens his eyes to what seemed an endless void.
Darwin…
An unknown had surface, Darwin's body instinctively jumped up in a fright, lifting his arms up in a battle stance.
"Who is talking to me!" Darting his eyes everywhere, seeking for the voice of the individual, he was astonished to see that there was no one but himself in this realm.
Weak…
"Where are you?!" Distressed, Darwin flung Iyono Blades everywhere, clockwise in a three sixty motion.
'What in Hueco Mundo is happening here?!'
"If seeing doesn't work… Maybe… I have to use something else."
Closing his eyes, he tries to feel his other senses.
He tried using his five senses, yet it was all for naught, but he had one left.
'Then what about my ears?'
He heard a masculine voice. He could tell this individual was scorning him like a persecuted being. He chuckled, he knocked on something solid to create a reverberating sound, echoing endlessly in this Limbo. All these movements was clearly to throw him off completely.
"Cheeky bastard…"
Darwin confused, he continued to listen to clues pertaining to this individual.
'Who are you? Why am I here? What is happening outside?'
—-
With even more force, all neighbouring Reishi was pulled into the center of Darwin's chest.
Darwin's Hollow hole, once a perfect void, now filled two-fifths of the way, something unheard of for a Hollow. It was curious inducing, it definitely struck many as odd.
"This isn't something that should happen to a Hollow." Sung-sun lamented, carrying a cautious but keen eye on his ever changing physique.
"Well isn't this fascinating?" Curious to Darwin's resuscitation process, Gorr awaited, watching to see what he would unfold.
Reishi stopped flowing into Darwin's laying figure, his eyes opened without notice, both arms smashed the ground beneath, propelling his entire body upwards.
'Oh… I can hear… no… I was able to hear before… but this… oh…'
Happy beyond belief, Darwin focused his attention on his ears.
Darwin listened, and suddenly, sound became sight. The sight he saw was what he could see with his eyes. No, there was a big difference. What he heard saw a different, alternative view on reality.
He saw afterimages, each joint, each motion moved frame by frame, almost as if it was a movie.
'Vision overlap! This—this is powerful.'
Placing his attention on Gorr's figure who stood idly by staring at Darwin in fixation, he hears the faint flow of Reishi across Gorr's entire body, currently it was still an engine on standby mode.
Gorr yawned, he was interested for a moment, but it no longer fazed him, it was placed into the back of his mind never to be reviewed again.
'Bored aren't you… But I can't say I feel the same.'
"Shall we go at it again." Darwin suggested to hulking entity standing directly in front of him.
"That is if you don't bore me." Gorr delivered a strong right kick sending Darwin hurdling backwards.
Rolling across the platform, he gripped the ground tightly as to not lose footing.
Darwin was reviewing what he had witnessed.
He heard the movement of Gorr's Reishi directed to his right leg. He then saw a vision overlap of his muscles being put to use, frame by frame, easy to measure and understand.
Gorr felt something amiss, he felt his right leg weaker. When he went to look at it, he was shocked to see acid seeping into his skin.
'When did he—!'
Darwin delivered a strong, acid punch to Gorr's temples. No time to react. No time to counter.
Crashing down to the floor, carving his thick skull forming a crater into the stone pavement of the platform. A sharp tremor ran through his core—not just from the pain, but from something deeper. Something long forgotten.
'When was the last time I've felt this feeling…' Gorr thought, recalling a past experience from when he was but a scrawny Hollow.
A scrawny Hollow who had to wonder aimlessly, be treated like a no one, and had to fend himself against powerful beings.
His food was taken, he was bullied for being weak and miserable. A feeling he had never imagined resurfaced back again to haunt him.
'I see now… I see where all my frustration I pent up went…'
Reality is quite cruel to those who live in Hueco Mundo, reality never turned out perfectly what one imagined. One never wanted to be born weak, it was a reality he was born with.
Struggling through the ranks, training his body to withstand intense power and deliver devastating blows. He was hardened to carry a will, a will to let everyone know who he was.
"Entertain me more! Strong one!" Throwing himself into the air, Gorr threw consecutive punches towards Darwin's line of direction.
"Devastacion Masiva." Raining beams of light shot forth destroying the platform beneath Darwin.
Darwin can both see and hear the direction of the attacks and where it came from, allowing effortless dodging.
Seeing as though his attacks were not hitting, Gorr retracts his barrage, falling down on his feet.
He begins inhaling a wide breath, a torrent of Reishi gathering to the tip of Gorr's mouth and down into his central body. His body expands, steam arises from his sweat glands, muscles glowing and glistening.
A destructive ability that increases its user's strength and durability by two folds.
'In return for a power up, his Reishi reserves are draining quicker…'
Gorr's new physique didn't deter Darwin at all. Releasing all the violet miasma he had in his storage, he compressed them into a singular point.
He throws the compressed ball of acid towards Gorr at a speed Gorr couldn't avoid.
"I hope this present is satisfying enough for the likes of you."
As it draws closer and closer to him, brushing across Gorr's skin, Darwin said, "Sweet Presento!"
The compressed ball of acid decompressed, opening up what seems to be a nuclear explosion.
A shockwave spreads across the entire platform. Harribel, Sung-sun, Rose, Appacci and Figgs, all fled to safety.
Darwin expected it to be brutal, but he didn't expect the attack he came up with on the spot to be destructive, to the point where it created a massive dip on the platform.