♪♫♪
Two things become crystal clear to the Elliora.
The first, Maximiliano blatantly disregarding and underestimating her. Sure, she had the worst memory quite possibly out of everyone in Hueco Mundo, but has his own memory began failing him as well? She never boasted a large size, or powerful muscles. Strength among them is not classified in brute strength alone, otherwise, his friend and Galia would both be standing here today, and she would be the one to be gone and devoured. But that isn't exactly how the circle of life works, as even the mightiest fall and are devoured by those half their size. Some creatures rely on venom to infect their victims, others with parasites, some even with viruses, awaiting for nature to take its course. Those with more cunning, set their traps and lie in wait. Often, it isn't until it's far too late that the predator finds itself becoming the prey.
Secondly, Elliora finds she doesn't have the necessary power to damage him extensively... or rather, fatally. Her attacks proved quite fruitful to sate her curiosity. This realization is not enough to deter her nor her insatiable desire to indulge in her desires. In fact, she becomes downright giddy. Her abilities in this form are vastly limited to what she could do in the past, where they're effective against others, at this time these finite powers are a hinderance against the God King.
Her attention is demanded when the currents of wind begin to change, to spiral against her will, further cementing the idea in her head she isn't strong enough. Her signature in the nearby winds vanishes as his spiritual energy floods the area by using his own spirals to redirect the currents of wind, overpowering Elliora's control over the currents. Perhaps he expects her to look frightened, panicked, but instead, all he sees is amazement plastered on her face. Like a child witnessing a magician's trick before her very eyes, she's fascinated. In all her years, the arrancar never came across someone able to do such a thing. The child-like monster's demeanor remains astounded even as she slowly descends from the air.
"I know all about you Elliora, your craftiness, your tricks. I watched as you casually killed my friend Aragon that day and I kept a mental note on that power of yours and how to deal with it. The thought was not pondered for long, I promise."
He seems like such an expert on her, when he had yet to seen her fight extensively, having shown only... peeks to what she could do. Sure things are different now, but are they really? How certain is he that he figured out how to properly counter her abilities? While the same could be said about her, while the underpowered monster hadn't seen him fight, she'd seen enough to expect great things since their initial meeting.
"Have you even lost your Zanpakuto? What of your Resurrección? All your existence tells me is that those saved by Izeel suffer nothing but loss and are destined to continue to lose until their losses infect the rest of my forces. Forgive me Las Noches, I will have to deal great harm to you once more…"
.
.
.
Oh... She thinks to herself
...that's right.
A zapnakuto, or rather, two. One for each of dainty hands, for the sole purpose of slicing and stabbing prey to her heart's content. Her precious
Talones. They weren't lost, but they weren't in her possession. At the mention of them, she longs for her precious weapons. Misses the hilts in her grip as she violently slices through hierro and stabs the blades deep into flesh, viciously tearing it out and watching as entrails fly and blood splattering her in red.
Suddenly, there is an explosion of spiritual pressure, causing an enormous crater on the ground and a cloud of pulverized bone to rise to the air and obscure the entire area. The pressurized spiritual energy expelled from Elliora causes the orb headed her way to alter it's trajectory like any projectile launched her way, resulting in it's detonation high in the sky and away from her and the castle. She forcibly retakes her power over the winds and sky. Within this cover of sand, the tiny body undergoes a rapid transformation: her hair grows longer, her features mature, while her body grows and fills out, forcing the small dress she wore to tear in two to accommodate her new, or rather, original size. The only thing that does not change on her is the mask atop her head, remaining broken, missing one of two horns.
"You should've given it more thought, escuincle."
Maximiliano hears from his right ear, before powerful gusts whisk away the presence out his reach. From the moment he had arrived, or rather, even before then, the air around Elliora was already saturated with her spiritual energy, as minute or imperceptible as it may have been, or if he simply chose to ignore it altogether, believing it to be entirely harmless to him. Despite having been momentarily troubled by the new powers she didn't entirely understand when she "swam" in the sand, the air above her was still permeated with her reiryoku. Especially after the fruitless search in her chest for the tiny red rock, a gem which she hosted within her many, many years.
His certainty in dealing with her external hinderances left the subtle ones go unnoticed. Every word, every sentence, his laugh, even the very breaths he took to continue to ridicule and belittle her, filled his lungs with this very air. Reiryoku infused air that was then circulated through the entirety of his body through his blood. But unlike his friend, Elliora does not cause a series of tornadoes within him. No, she bore witness to what he can do to the swirling winds, and providing the god king with spiraling tornadoes would undoubtedly be... counterproductive. This time, she'd try something different. Something she'd only briefly attempted when she came in contact with the monster that broke her mask. He'd begin to feel the encroaching warmth from within his body, the temperature in his body quickly rising as the foreign energy in his body ignites. Using his cells, his muscles, and organs as fuel even as they regenerate to replace the burned away sections, the pain in his body is continuous. Endless. In the moments his vision returns to him after his eyes pop and spew liquid out of his sockets, he'd catch glimpses of the woman too, lit aflame. The only difference, she does not burn.
She looks at her hands, watching as the flames coat her entire body, then at him, as the same flames from her reiryoku incinerate the man alive, the stench of burning flesh filling the air, before returning her eyes back to herself. The woman's face contorts to an insane grin as she relishes in this ability. These changes augmented and bolstered by the woman's idiotic choice to drink the soul king's blood, unknowingly acting as a catalyst and assisting the activation of the Crystal Sangriento within her own body. As she burned then, she became anew. Like a phoenix rising from it's ashes, she too came out stronger, faster— better from her ordeal with the crystal. The discombobulation becoming but minor setback to her rebirth, yet it does nothing else to hinder what the former espada's true power has come to be now. Now that she remembers what she was... what she is.
"Do not compare me to your fodder, Maximiliano."
