knight504 said:
Just saw this question, and to be honest, I think only the zanpakuto has the power to do anything with souls, as far as sending them anywhere. In the beginning, konso was performed by stamping the forehead of a wandering soul with the pommel of the zanpakuto. Defeating a Hollow with a zanpakuto would similarly cleanse them, unless the Hollow in question was a total scumbag in life, in which case, they got turned over to Hell. We never saw any other methods used, nor were any other methods mentioned by Rukia (who probably wouldn't have relied on Ichigo initially if Kido worked as well). Seeing that asauchi are man-made devices and the 13 Squads were originally a flock of murderous killers that just so happened to have been on the "right" side at the time, not to mention have some strong historic ties to the Quincies, it would probably be accurate to say they weren't always baptizing evil spirits into the light, that they had to learn how to not screw over the world balance, insofar as they could tell.
I assumed otherwise since Shingami treat the soul balance as a pretty big deal yet don't seem to be that picky about how they kill Hollows. We've seen Tessai punch a Hollow to death, numerous attempts to kill them with kido (and Hachigen succeeded in killing Menos with his barriers) and Love tore one apart with his bare hands. Considering how many souls make up a Menos, not using a zanpakuto seemed like a good way to fuck things up, and it makes destructive kido a bad idea against Hollows. And then you have to wonder what actually happens to all the Hollows who get killed by something other than zanpakuto, especially when Quincy are said to be the only beings capable of destroying souls. So if they're not being purified and not being destroyed, what's going on? :hmm:
Given the examples mentioned, I don[t think any of the named ones were interested in things like soul balance at the time of mass slaughtering. Especially since I believe it would take a tremendous amount of destroyed souls to cause an imbalance. Slaying a few Hollows/Menos/Arrancar without it passing Go and collecting $200 here and there wouldn't really make too much of a difference in the grand scheme of things.
Of course, if souls aren't being destroyed or saved, where were they going? Primordial soul soup is my best guess, barring everything ending up in either Hell or Purgatory. Of course, I now wonder if SS and HM are artificial constructs trying to play God (which will probably be revealed as "yes" and continue to reinforce that Yamamoto and Co. are colossal dicks).
knight504 said:
I went trawling through the manga thread about the two year deadline and I get the feeling that it came from these posts:
Spectral said:
nick012000 said:
Spectral said:
So I very much doubt that even with all this content, he can continue the story for another ten years. At best, we're looking at a two year time-frame. Kubo has a lot of characters written into Bleach, but he doesn't have the issue like Kishimoto does; where there are just far too many characters existing to give them proper and meaningful closure that isn't hamstrung at the last minute.
Consider that we're going to be getting another Soul Society or Hueco Mundo/Karakura Town-length arc regarding the Spirit King and 0th Division, and say that again.
I'll say it in red.
The Bleach manga, despite the upcoming content in terms of its final arc; will not continue beyond a period of two years.
Which was in response to Kubo saying that this was the final arc after he'd said that he'd be continuing Bleach for another ten years. Seems like it was just a someone's opinion that got blown out of proportion. Which could mean that we really do have 8+ years left.
Possibly, though, going by the chapter development, I'd say he really is running on a two year clock. And then it ends in a "Rocks fall; everyone dies" scenario because time ran out.
knight504 said:
On the whole issue with Ichigo's powers, how would things have worked if Quincygetsu had been destroyed or dominated by Shirogetsu i.e. would have done both types of training (Shinigami and Hollow) with Shirogetsu and end up like a Vizard again?
Would the training have crossed over to something like defeating Shirogetsu for bankai would earn him his Hollow mask too?
And I remember Amoldesino saying that his hollow's evolution could have been due to how White was capable of it, but could it be something else like more of Ichigo's suppressed power coming out?
Was Ichigo's suppressed latent potential referring to his spiritual power, growth rate or the abilities of his zanpakuto? Which is most likely?
I refer to fanfic for the answer because trying to contemplate the thing that is Ichigo Kurosaki gives me a very bad case of head explody.
Quite honestly, Ichigo is a cosmic abomination. I really, seriously wonder how can he exist solely. If his sisters turned out with similar powers, it might not be such a hard turn of events, but only him being so special and they getting what amounts to dick bothers me greatly. In my head, either they should all have fantastic powers beyond most people's comprehension, or Ichigo should have been an only child. While some parts seemed to have been planned, there's a dearth of crap that just makes me go "WTF Tite?" and the reveal of Ichigo's Quinciness and the impure power theft is just breaking my mind at this point. From a writer's perspective, this is overkill and we're not in the position to use overkill. It's just bad writing through and through, and it bugs me. It bugs me tremendously that this is the way I am told Masaki Kurosaki died. That this is what Ichigo is. That this doesn't even begin to satiate anything I was longing for to come through. It's just feeling like a bunch of random ideas are being forced to converge on this story, and we lose sight of the story, the premise. Just why did any of this matter in the first place? Nothing about this story really matters to the rest of the series, and it's a shame. While I didn't like how long the story about the arrancars went on and on, I could, at least pretend to not give a crap, just read for the fighting and the sword play and whatever. But after the reveal of Ichigo's hidden heritage? It's a herd of elephants trampling on the roof of my house. And the house was NOT built to withstand herd of elephants trampling on the roof.
...man, I was holding that bag something fierce.