Page 69
Chapter 155: Aizen's Heart Moved
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Chapter 156 Look, the elephants are flying~
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Chapter 157 Dragon and Martial Arts
[Speaking of which, I remember that in the setting, Soul Society is called the East Branch, and there is a West Branch in England, right? I wonder if the West Branch really exists in this world.]
[If so, doesn't that mean "dragon" also exists? ]
Gu Shi sat cross-legged on a towering stone pillar. A wooden doll was lying on top of his head basking in the sun, a tin doll was flying around his head, and a glass doll was swinging on his fangs.
Ignoring these little things, Gu Shi supported his chin with one hand and thought secretly in his heart.
The author of "The Dragon and the Witch" and "Bleach" is Kubo Tite, and the two stories are set in the same world, but "Bleach" takes place in the Higashi-Shoku Bureau in Japan, and "The Dragon and the Witch" takes place in the Higashi-Shoku Bureau in London, England.
However, when "The Dragon and the Witch" came out, Gu Shi had become a typical tired office worker. He didn't have the energy to follow the comics and just wanted to wait for the animation to come out and watch it. Therefore, he didn't know the details of this new story.
The only knowledge Gu Shi had about "The Dragon and the Witch" was from some information he looked up while slacking off at work. He roughly knew that the combat power of the Xishao Bureau seemed to be relatively weak, and that there was a monster called "dragon".
Different from the dragons in the traditional sense, the "dragons" in Xishaoju are all strange creatures with bizarre shapes. Of course, among these bizarre "dragons", there are also some with relatively ordinary looks. They usually look like ordinary animals, but can spread their wings when using their power.
It seems that the only things these strange dragons have in common are that they can all grow wings and possess dragon venom.
Yes, the dragons in this world are "contagious" in some way. When ordinary people come into contact with dragons, they will be infected with dragon toxins and become dragon possessed.
Gu Shi didn't pay much attention at the time and didn't know exactly what the setting of the dragon possessor was and what abilities it had.
What suddenly reminded him of this story and made him somewhat concerned was the dragon poison itself.
Gu Shi was very curious. In the worldview of the God of Death, the soul is obviously more important than the body. Since "The Dragon and the Witch" shares the same worldview with "The God of Death", will the dragon toxin also infect the soul? What will happen after infection?
The spiritual power of the void is naturally highly corrosive. If the soul of an ordinary person is exposed to the spiritual power of the void for a long time, it will become irreversibly empty.
So, if the Void comes into contact with a dragon, will the dragon's soul be corroded by the Void's spiritual power? Or will the Void be infected by the dragon's toxin?
Of course, unlike the void, dragons have flesh and blood.
Generally speaking, a living body has considerable resistance to the erosion of spiritual energy. Even ordinary people, if they are not devoured by the void, but just come into contact with the void's spiritual energy, will only feel weak, powerless, and dead, and will not become void while still alive.
A living dragon might be immune to the erosion of Hollow's spiritual power to a certain extent through its physical body, but what about the soul of a dead dragon?
Furthermore, what would happen if the dragon's soul became ethereal?
Is it true that as long as one spreads one's own spiritual power, all people who come into contact with this spiritual power will be infected by the dragon toxin in the spiritual power, greatly expanding the scope of infection of the dragon toxin?
Or is it because Long Xu's dragon poison is itself composed of Xu's spiritual power, so even living things, after being infected with the dragon poison, will have their souls directly corroded by Xu's spiritual power?
I always feel that in terms of their destructiveness to life, dragons and voids seem to have a strange complementary relationship.
Fortunately, the combat effectiveness of the Western Branch is relatively low. Even the strongest Fairytale Dragon seems to be inferior to the ordinary captains and Achucas. The Soul Society (Eastern Branch) looks down on them and does not record the situation there.
Otherwise, if Aizen went to the west to capture a few dragons and added some dragon toxin to the Hougyoku while conducting the Hollowification experiment, that would ruin the whole thing. The speed and scope of the Hollowification experiment would probably increase significantly.
Those people in the Masked Legion are probably even more doomed. When they become virtual, they not only have to endure the erosion of virtual spiritual power, but also are infected by dragon toxin. It is unclear whether they can survive. Even if they survive, they will most likely become walking sources of infection because the virtual in their bodies carries dragon toxin.
Moreover, considering that Aizen had set his eyes on Kurosaki Ichigo as soon as he was born and personally trained him to be his strongest opponent, once Aizen knew the existence of dragon, Kurosaki Ichigo, the hybrid of a Quincy and a Shinigami, would probably have to have some dragon's blood in his body.
[By the way, should I go to the west and catch a few dragons to study? ]
[It would be great if we could make a few dragons. Even if we can't, the scraps can be sent to Tianpeng to make pills. Maybe he can make something new and good.]
Gu Shi shook his head, threw away the glass doll hanging on the fangs, grabbed the chattering tin doll, and subconsciously narrowed his eyes.
Judging from the Hollow in Ichigo Kurosaki's body, the Zanpakutō's soul may also become hollow. So will the soul be infected by the dragon toxin? After infection, will every cut be equivalent to incidental poison damage?
The tin doll was frightened by Gu Shi's stare, and it closed its mouth and pretended to be dead.
With a sneer, Gu Shi threw the tin doll aside and began to communicate with the wooden doll on his head, trying to ask the other's name.
Unfortunately, until he was awakened by Erlang, Gu Shi still couldn't hear the name of the wooden doll.
After returning to the material world, Gu Shi opened his eyes and saw Erlang's excited face.
"Gu Shi, I succeeded, I created my first set of martial arts!"
Gu Shi was stunned for a moment before he realized what Erlang meant and couldn't help but become excited.
"Hurry up, show me how to do it!"
Without Gu Shi's urging, Erlang could not wait to mobilize the spiritual power in his body and let it flow along a specific route. Then he proudly knocked on his chest, making a harsh sound of metal being hit hard.
"Golden Bell Cover and Iron Cloth Shirt! How about it? My defense is now super strong, even Tianpeng can't hurt me easily!"
Gu Shi also reached out and knocked on Erlang's chest, thinking secretly in his heart.
Among the many talents of the Hollow, there is one called "Steel Skin", which can greatly enhance the defense of the Hollow. The fifth of the Ten Espadas, Nnoitra Gil-ga, has this ability.
However, although the Hollow's steel skin is called steel skin, it does not really turn the skin into steel. When Nnoitra's steel skin is cut, there will be no sound of metal clashing.
The ability displayed by Jiro at this time is more like the iron block in One Piece than steel skin, or in other words, like Cheng Shifei's "Vajra Indestructible Divine Art", both have the characteristic of turning the flesh into steel.
So, did Erlang really succeed? Did he really create a "martial art"?
"Ji Lang, if it hurts, just bear with it."
As he spoke, Gu Shi grabbed a corner of Erlang's black robe and began to tear it hard.
Killian's black robe is actually a part of his body. At this time, the black robe on Erlang's body has become extremely hard, just like his skin, and has some properties similar to metal. Gu Shi plans to tear off a piece to see if there will be any changes after it leaves Erlang's body.
Chapter 158: Civil Engineering Tiankeng!
It has to be said that Erlang's new martial arts were indeed extraordinary. His physical strength increased to an outrageous level. It took Gu Shi a lot of effort before he finally tore off a corner of the black robe.
Interestingly, even after being separated from Erlang's main body, the black robe's metallic properties still remained, and it felt both hard and flexible when held in the hand.
After a careful study, Gu Shi finally confirmed that Erlang's martial arts did not make the body "like" metal, but actually turned it into real metal. If he found a craftsman to start a furnace, he might be able to directly use the black robe fragments to make a soft knife.
"…How is this done? Is it similar to the principle of stones?"
Gu Shi pinched the piece of black robe in his hand, patted Erlang's stiff body, his eyes full of confusion.
Erlang was filled with a sense of accomplishment at this time and couldn't wait to show off. When he heard Gu Shi's question, he immediately started to explain.
“Hey, Gu Shi, didn’t you tell me before that when I have free time, I should read more of the information I got back from Soul Society? A few days ago, when I was killing time, I happened to see a book called “Space, Order, and Aesthetics”, and I really found inspiration from it!”
The information brought back from Soul Society was all recorded in written form by Gu Shi himself. During the transcription process, he remembered most of the books even if they were not of great interest to him. When he heard what Jilang said, he immediately recalled the general content.
Although the name contains words like "space" and "order", and it sounds like some kind of secret manual about laws, in fact, this book should be classified under the category of civil engineering and architecture.
The main content of the book is about how to design and build buildings that are beautiful enough while ensuring the rationality of each structure of the building and avoiding ridiculous architectural mistakes.
Although Maou Spiritual Academy is a school for training Shinigami, it does not only send new members to the 13th Division. Every once in a while, Maou will open various targeted classes to train new members for organizations such as the Kidōshu and the Construction Class. The responsibility of the Construction Class is to construct necessary new buildings for the Seireitei, as well as repair buildings damaged by battles and other unexpected situations.
This book, "Space, Order and Aesthetics", is a super unpopular book specially prepared for these students in the architecture-oriented classes. When there are no architecture-oriented classes, this book may be placed in a corner for hundreds of years and no one will take it out to read.
...Did this book give Erlang the inspiration to create new martial arts?
Gu Shi pinched the fragment of black robe with metallic properties in his hand, and suddenly a light bulb went off in his mind, and he understood what Erlang meant.
Unlike civil engineering in the modern world, in Soul Society where everything is made up of spirit particles, the Shinigami of the construction team do not have to dig stones or trim wood by hand. Their work process is relatively simple. They just need to work together and connect the spiritual powers of several or dozens of people to build a stable framework. The special equipment exclusive to the construction team will then collect the spirit particles in the atmosphere and import them into the framework.
Those special instruments can automatically change the order of lepton within the frame, transforming them from free active lepton into more stable lepton structures such as wood, stone, and metal, and add many "natural" patterns with sufficient beauty.
This job sounds simple, but because the equipment is not very efficient, the nature of the work in the construction team is actually very hard.
Even though the amount of spiritual power each person needs to output per unit time is not much, they must output spiritual power stably for several hours or even more than ten hours to maintain the stability of the spiritual power framework. After a round of work, almost everyone will be seriously exhausted.
If a large-scale emergency construction task is assigned by the superiors, some team members may even cause their own spiritual stability to be affected, and need to be sent to the Fourth Team for emergency rescue.
Therefore, the construction team is almost the least popular unit in the entire Jingling Court. If given a choice, many people would rather go to the prison to clean than work in the construction team.
When he saw the introduction to the architecture class, Gu Shi not only lamented with gloating that even in the afterlife, civil engineering is still a sinkhole industry, but also sighed:
"It turns out that it's not just high-level ghost arts like the Five Pillars of Iron and the Black Coffin that can convert spiritual energy into metal structures. Ordinary death gods can also do it with the help of special equipment. And the converted materials seem to be more stable than those of high-level ghost arts. It's true that every profession has its own specialty."
At this moment, when Gu Shi heard Jilang say that his new martial arts were related to the architecture specially provided by Soul Society, he immediately remembered his previous sigh.
"You transformed the surface around you into a real metal structure?"
Seeing that Gu Shi had guessed his thoughts, Erlang was a little depressed at first, and then he became more excited.
"Gu Shi, you really understand my thinking! That's right, our body itself can be regarded as a stable 'framework'. As long as we let the spiritual power imitate the working principle of the equipment in the construction class and change the arrangement of the spirit particles in this 'framework', we can transform the body into materials of various properties!"
As he spoke, Jilang slapped his body hard again, causing a series of metal collision sounds.
"My current body structure is made of the same material as the torture instruments in the special prison cells of the criminal army. Not only are they difficult to destroy, but they also have the characteristic of reducing the activity of spiritual particles. If I hold someone in my arms, his spiritual power will immediately become sluggish!"
Erlang became more and more excited as he spoke, and he opened his arms wide to hug Gu Shi and show him his real power. Gu Shi could understand Erlang's pride, so he simply gave up resisting and let Erlang hug him. As expected, he realized that his own spiritual power seemed to have become a little more inert.
"Great idea, Jilang, your idea is really great!"
After first praising Erlang and affirming his intelligence, Gu Shi raised his own question.
"But in this case, won't the speed of your martial arts be slow? Also, after turning into metal, can you turn it back?"
Erlang was not discouraged by Gu Shi's question. It didn't matter if the martial arts he created for the first time had some flaws. The fact of taking the first step was enough to satisfy him, so he answered with a smile on his face.
"It is indeed slower, but because it actually changes the body structure, it does not need to be maintained after it is activated. It can be kept in the activated state all the time. It only needs maintenance every once in a while. There is no need to worry about it not being useful in battle.
"As for changing back, it's actually not that difficult. All you have to do is rearrange the spirit particles in your body and return to your original appearance."
Chapter 159: Transparent World!
"Uncle Gu Shi, are you okay?"
While Bai was carrying the boulder and doing frog jumps, he looked at Gu Shi's body with some concern. Asido, who was sitting cross-legged on the boulder, also had some concern in his eyes.
It's no wonder that the two were so worried. It was because Gu Shi's shining colorful light in the sun at this moment made people feel uneasy. They were afraid that if Gu Shi moved a little, he would shatter into pieces.
"It's okay. I just transformed my body into glass. I can transform it back later."
Gu Shi comforted the two of them casually, and continued to lower his head, staring at his body intently. Erlang naturally would not hide anything from him. Under Erlang's hands-on teaching, he quickly learned the new martial arts created by Erlang.
However, unlike Erlang's idea of converting his body into metal to increase defense, after Gu Shi learned it, the first conversion was to turn his body into pure glass. Through the transparent glass, he could see the circulation path of his spiritual power very intuitively and grasp the whereabouts of every spiritual power in his body.