[BiTPR2] Hell Episode: Like a Bat

[Rater202]

What is Hell?

Some would believe that Hell is an eternity of torture. Some would say it's a lake of fire.

Others would say it's the absence of God.

In Truth is that Hell is a land where the dead are constantly hunted and eaten by giant predators only to be revived in a fiery cauldron until they give up all thought and embrace Oblivion.

A Nymphlike creature, with skin the purest white and the mask of a horned skull, awakens atop a white pillar floating among countless others of it's kind, with many massive creatures stalking and devouring countless others around her.

The figure sits up and clutches her head... It hurts.

How did she get here?

Where did the shackles on her wrists and ankles come from? The Iron Collar at her throat?

Why is she so hungry?

[Frozen_Feet]

"Hehehehe..."

The laughter comes from the nymph's left.

"It would seem... Hell has a sense of irony... sending you right next to me... hello, Little Miss. You can call me... 'Stumpy'... hehehe..."

There's a man there, dressed in black rags. His ankles have been shackled and he's missing both of his arms. Even more bizarrely... hanging from a filthy red sash, is an empty sheath for a sword. But the sword itself, had been stabbed through the man's eye and skull, pinning him to the pillar's surface. Cracked remnants of a skull-like mask lay scattered around the man's head.

[Rater202]

"Hurt... Hungry... why Iron? Know stumpy?"

[Frozen_Feet]

"Oh, no....we've never met... " , the armless man says, "but I've heard of you. I get a visitor here, sometimes.... when I'm sleeping. A girl. She fills me in on what's happening up above. Maybe, if you stick around, you'll get to see her too... hehehe..."

"... but enough of that... do you know... why you are hungry? "

[Rater202]

"No.. Hungry, so hungry..."

[Frozen_Feet]

"It's because... you've lost your heart... " , the man mutters from the ground. "It's the hole left behind by... unfulfilled desire. Never mistake it for mere hunger for sustenance... you don't need to eat to stay alive, you are already dead.... hehehe...

Far in the distance, someone screams as they are captured by the hand of some gargantuan creature and then crushed into paste between its giant teeth.

"Though to speak the truth, there has always been a hole in your heart... and in your insanity, you thought you could fill it with power... hehe... I can see it in your eyes, girl... I'd go so far as to say that is why you are here... for the grand crime of self-delusion! Hehehehe... in depths of your own mind, you have been in Hell for a long, long time.... now your surroundings have just changed to match... "

[Rater202]

"Stubby talks too much... Stubby smells yummy."

[Frozen_Feet]

"Hehehe... HAHAHAHA!" The man's laughter fills the space and returns as an echo. In the distance, a massive skull-like head turns towards the sound and glowing eyes look at its source in confusion.

"I guess I do... I guess I do! So why not eat me, girl? It's not like it matters! I will simply revive again tomorrow and they'll tear off my arms and stab me with my own sword all over again! Go ahead. Go ahead! Drink my blood, gnaw at my entrails, suck the marrow out of my bones. HAHAHAHA! "

[Rater202]

"Stumpy come back? No good. Need food stay in tummy, find something else. Smell something super yummy from down."

[Frozen_Feet]

"Hehe... everybody here... comes back sooner or later. But hey, you're right. There's all kinds of sweet stuff further below... heh... if you'd just be so kind and pull this sword out of my brain... maybe I could show you..."

[Rater202]

"Hehe... everybody here... comes back sooner or later. But hey, you're right. There's all kinds of sweet stuff further below... heh... if you'd just be so kind and pull this sword out of my brain... maybe I could show you..."

"...Me not dumb. You do bad to me, then you dumb. Me eat you and puke you back up just to make you hurt. Agree or no... dice? Head hurt, hungry, not brain well."

[Frozen_Feet]

"What, you think I would... betray you? Do... something nasty to you? Heh... HAHAHA!"

There's a rumbling sound and a shadow falls upon the nymph and the armless man. A gigantic monsters resembling a misshapen gorilla has wandered to stand next to the pillar, glowing eyes staring from the pits of its skull-like face.

"You're already in Hell and I'm an armless corpse! What point would there be for me to add to your suffering? Just thought I'd serve as your tour guide, that's all! Ah well, it doesn't matter. None of it matters! At the end of the day, we're both still doomed! Hehehe! "

[Rater202]

The nymph looks up at the massive beast.

Instinctively, the nymph knows that she can only fight it or flee from it. She can sense that it will harm her remorselessly and that she can not abide by that.

So she raises her hand, and dark, silver, high-density reiryoku begins forming and swirling in a ball in her outstretched palm.

Before, Sarah Smith was as powerful as a Shinigami Lieutenant or a Menos Grande.

But now the starving, half-mad nymph is a Togabito--a Sinner, in Hell.

For unknown reasons, those Sinners who had power--any kind of power--are far stronger than they were before being banished--a Lesser hollow, one who could easily be defeated by a shinigami who had yet to learn their sword's name, would become a credible threat to a mighty shinigami who was equivocal to a Captain or Lieutenant.

A blast of energy equal to the Cero of a released, artificially transmorphed Aadjucha level Arrancar erupts from the nymph's hand and heads directly for the Warden's eye.

[Frozen_Feet]

In response, the monster lifts a palm to shield its face. For a moment, the raging energy pushes against its palm... before being crushed back into a ball. The creature holds the ball in its hand, looking at the nymph.

"Hehe... don't bother. Even if you win this one, there's no end to them. It's like the Forest of Menos, except worse! There, at least, you could avoid battle if you kept your energy low. The mindless Gillians had no interest in seemingly weak souls. But here, they don't care if you're strong or weak! Any nail that sticks up... will be hammered back down! "

In the distance, two more of the ape-like creatures turn their heads, alarmed by the Cero's energy. They push a few of the floating pillars out of their way as if they were made of styrofoam and begin running towards the pillar on which the nymph stands and the armless man lies.

[Rater202]

The nymph responds by ripping the pinned man and his sword off the ground and running very fast in the other direction. Jumping on occasion, to other pillars.

Of course, the Wardens are likily to see where they're going, since every leap or burst of speed is announced by a flash of green light.

[Frozen_Feet]

Barely a second after the nymph leaps, there's a thundering explosion as the warden she attacked slams the captured Cero against the pillar they were on. The pillar is smashed to pieces and turned into an expanding cloud of dust.

The armless man hangs from the nymph's grip like a ragdoll, dripping black, ink-like blood everywhere. He keeps on laughing the entire time.

Where is the nymph going to run to? Ahead are just more floating pillars. No matter which direction she goes, she will just run into more wardens besides the two hot on her trail right now.

Some forlorn penitent souls lift their heads and look up to the pair dashing past. In their minds, they all agree: they have no hope. It'd been better to just stay put and wait for the end of the world.

[Rater202]

The nymph knows that there's a down.

She looks for a way down.

[Frozen_Feet]

Below, travelling between the floating pillars of white, is some kind of a blue pathway. What lies below it, is unseen, as the edge of the pathway seems to end in a yawning abyss.

As the nymph looks for a way down, one of the ape-like creatures climbs on the nearest pillar and swings its massive fist down at the nymph, to send her falling down into that abyss.

[Rater202]

Well, whatever super yummy thing the nymph is smelling is down, so... Down into the abyss she goes, of her own accord rather than the fist of the brute, however.

[Frozen_Feet]

The ape-like creature thinks it hit her, and wanders off, satisfied.

For the nymph, it is a long, long fall. It takes a long time before it becomes apparent what she is falling towards: water. An ocean's worth, with tiny islands here and there.

Except, they're not islands, and they're not tiny. They are giant, stone waterlilies, with skeletons of those ape-like beings lying in the center of them.

Hopefully the nymph can control her fall.

[Rater202]

The nymph is the soul of a fullbringer.

It is well within her power to make the air itself slow and cushion her fall, which she does on instinct as she starts to get close to one of the lilly-pad-stone-island-thingies.

[Frozen_Feet]

She descends on the edge of one of the waterlilies. Standing on it, it's much more palpable how massive it is. She is smaller than a water flea in comparison. The empty eye-sockets of the dead ape-creature stare at the nymph.

[Rater202]

The Nymph sets Stumpy down on the pad.

"Why gorillas kill and mount one of themelves?"

[Frozen_Feet]

"Why would I know?" , the armless man responds. "Maybe they didn't. Maybe this is a grave. The thing died on its own and its comrades just put it here. Or maybe it was never alive and just sprouted to existence alongside with this petrified plant. This a place beyond death, where those who are torn to pieces today can be fished out of a lake of lava tomorrow. How much sense can it really make? "

[Rater202]

"...Lava lake near desert? Me remember... Need desert... Why need desert?"

The nymph clutches her head.

[Frozen_Feet]

"A desert? Eh, I suppose you could call it that" , the armless man mutters. "I don't really know why'd you want there. Maybe it reminds you of Hueco Mundo? Or maybe it is related to the Sin you're here for. Maybe both. I've heard it claimed the sands of Hueco Mundo are remains of all those Hollows who died but were not eaten. Just as well, the ashes below are supposedly crushed bones of former Sinners. Practically identical if you ask me. Though it's not much of a surprise. Hell and Hueco Mundo are the bottom-most of the six worlds of suffering. Everyone here is so wrapped up in their misery that the best they can hope for getting out is wait for the world itself to turn and be recreated... "

[Rater202]

How get to desert?

[Frozen_Feet]

"You're asking a man who only has one eye and is lying on the ground."

[Rater202]

"You're asking a man who only has one eye and is lying on the ground."

"Stumpy been in hell long time. stumpy talk about die, come back. stumpy have to get from Lava back to top, yes?"

[Frozen_Feet]

"I couldn't actually tell if its long or short. Do you see the sun rising or setting? Do you see the seasons changing?" , the man says teasingly. "Heh. But yes, I've been to the pit and back. So what? I don't know where you run to and I don't know where we fell. Plus I can't see a damn thing from the ground. Why don't you look around? Can you see a shore to the ocean?"