As his spiritual pressure condensed, a layer of blue light enveloped Lucas’s right arm.
The next second he charged out again, closing rapidly on the Hollow that was still healing itself.
Discovering his approach, the tentacle Hollow extended its many tentacles once more.
This time their primary target was Lucas himself.
The thing had already tasted the power of his attacks.
Self-healing or not, it could not take many more hits like that.
So seeing him dare to charge in, its first thought was to finish him before he could land the next blow.
What it did not expect was that just as its tentacles neared him, his speed suddenly surged.
In an instant he bypassed them entirely and was standing right in front of it.
Lucas was no fool.
On his first approach he had relied purely on physical speed.
Now, with his spiritual pressure reinforcing it, his speed had risen dramatically.
At that pace, never mind the Hollow failing to react.
Even if it had reacted, it would have been useless, because he was already there.
“Boom!”
His fist smashed fiercely into the tentacle Hollow’s mask.
With a thunderous roar, its head was blasted into nothing.
At the same time, Lucas discovered that the power absorbed by his left arm far exceeded any previous instance.
Opening the panel, he saw it.
Two percent this time.
Clearly, the stronger the Hollow, the more power his left arm could take in.
“You could have finished it easily from a distance. Why get close? Against this kind, long range is the safest option.”
Uryū did not quite understand.
Long-range sniping was the optimal choice here, and yet the man had charged in.
The opponent’s strength was nothing to speak of, but it was still somewhat risky.
“I like the feeling of fist on flesh. And I need to hone my close-quarters skills.”
Lucas made up the excuse on the spot.
You had to keep in mind that both Shinigami and Quincy were mortal enemies of Hollows.
Uryū would not necessarily turn hostile over it, but it was better to avoid unnecessary trouble.
As long as he said nothing, nobody would know his power ran closer to a Hollow’s.
And once the Brazo Izquierda del Diablo awakened, he would simply call it an improvement in his special ability.
Fullbring did genuinely change as it was continuously developed.
Hearing the excuse, Uryū simply ignored the second half of it.
He had decided the man was just a battle junkie.
As for honing skills, what skill was there to hone in rushing up and one-shotting the enemy with a single punch?
From the moment the bait shattered until now, they had encountered eight Hollows in total.
Except for the second one, killed at range, Lucas had taken the other seven down in close combat.
Just as the two were planning to keep waiting, their gazes suddenly shifted in the same direction.
“This spiritual pressure. It should be the Shinigami stationed in Karakura Town. Let’s go. We can leave this place to him now.”
Obviously the continuous appearance of Hollows had drawn the town’s stationed Shinigami.
But thinking about it, that made sense.
This place was not far from Karakura Town, and eight Hollows had come since the bait shattered.
Even if the Soul Society were slow to react, they should have noticed something was wrong by now.
“Looks like my first live combat training has to end here. What a pity.”
Lucas said it with some regret, and he meant it.
These Hollows were experience packs for him, capable of accelerating the awakening of his Brazo Izquierda del Diablo.
But there was nothing to be done now.
Once a Shinigami arrived, he had to avoid him.
At this stage he did not want to clash with the Shinigami.
If he wanted to use his abilities openly, he would have to wait until the plot began and he could make his trip to the Soul Society.
“I’ve discovered that besides being a training fanatic, you’re also a battle junkie. I can give you some more Hollow bait later.”
Uryū rolled his eyes.
“Then thank you. As a token of my gratitude, dinner tonight is on me.”
Lucas smiled hearing that.
A few minutes after the two of them left, a figure in a shihakushō appeared.
The newcomer was a Shinigami, but it was not Kuchiki Rukia.
In the manga, Rukia only arrived in Karakura Town in the early morning, and the plot began that evening.
“There are traces of a battle. It looks like the Hollow has already been finished off by someone. Who on earth did this?”
He searched the area and found the marks of the fight, but the people were long gone, and he could not sense any spiritual pressure nearby.
However, just as he was pondering it, a ripple suddenly appeared in the sky, and a Hollow came out not far from him.
Seeing it, the Shinigami immediately drew his Zanpakutō and engaged.
As a Shinigami stationed in the human world, he would not dare claim to be very strong, but he was more than capable of handling ordinary trash-tier Hollows.
In the manga, when Rukia came to Karakura Town, she was already a Seated Officer with considerable strength.
The reason she looked weak was that she had taken a blade for Ichigo at the very beginning, which left her severely injured from the start.
Later she gave her power to Ichigo, and was then tricked by Urahara Kisuke into a specially made Gigai.
Which was why, in the human world, she came across as about as threatening as a power level of five.
After finishing off the Hollow in front of him, the stationed Shinigami had just let out a sigh of relief and was planning to investigate the surroundings again.
Then another Hollow popped out.
And over the next dozen hours or so, more than a dozen Hollows emerged one after another, until the Shinigami stationed in Karakura Town began to seriously doubt his own life.
This was not his first stationing mission.
He had guarded high-density spirit areas before.
But it was the first time he had ever encountered over a dozen Hollows appearing in a single day.
Meanwhile, the culprits behind all of it had already finished dinner and gone home.
Lucas was in no hurry to get back to training.
He planned to learn some close-quarters technique, some actual martial arts, since his current fighting style consisted of simply rushing in head-on.
Acting like a brute was fine against enemies weaker than him.
But against enemies at his own level, or far stronger, charging in head-on would undoubtedly be suicide.
Even with his current monstrous vitality and recovery, he could not afford to be reckless.
Since he had the enormous talent that opening his limiter gave him, why not learn some combat techniques?
With that talent, he could master them in a short time.
The only pity was that the Shinigami arts, Zanjutsu, Hakuda, Hohō, and Kidō, were still out of reach.
So human-world techniques would have to tide him over for now.