Gabriel blinked, his mind momentarily blank as Harribel's words sank in.
Husband.
She had just called him her husband.
For a brief second, his brain completely stalled, the weight of her declaration hitting him like a Cero to the face.
His brain was currently fried... cooked. He couldn't even think right now. He didn't know who he prayed to for his prayer to be answered, but he would pray to that person again.
Such a pretty woman accepting his offer.
He touched his Hollow mask.
"Am... I dreaming?" He pinched his hand, making sure this was real.
Mila Rose and Apacci, however, were not handling this nearly as well.
"HUH?!" Apacci practically screeched, pointing at Harribel with a look of absolute betrayal. "Since when?! What?! HOW?!"
Mila Rose looked like she had just been hit by a Bala at point-blank range. "Hold on, hold on, hold on—did you just call him your husband?! Since when did this happen?!"
Sung-Sun, ever the composed one, merely covered her mouth with her tail. She was very flexible... well, to be fair, she was a snake. The glint in her eyes suggested she was enjoying the chaos. "Oh my, what an interesting development~."
"Why are you surprised? You helped me for this purpose, did you not?" Harribel's calm words cut through the noise.
"Yes, I did, but at the same time, this feels like your way of avoiding a fight with Barragan."
...
...
"Oh my, seems like he can read you pretty well~."
Doesn't take a genius to guess who was talking.
Harribel walked close to him. He could tell—she was practically willing to sacrifice herself as long as he lived.
Was he that weak that she needed to think of something so drastic?
...
No. Those tender eyes... reminiscent of the way his dad used to look at him. She was worried about him.
But why sacrifice so much for someone who had been living for such a small amount of time?
Before he could say more, he heard a sound.
That sound...
His eyes snapped to the source, his gaze sharpening as he spotted a familiar figure standing at the entrance to their hideout, draped in his obnoxiously bright fuchsia cloak.
Szayelaporro Granz.
The Espada's grin was nothing short of predatory, his amber eyes gleaming with undisguised delight.
"Oh my, what a fascinating spectacle I've stumbled upon~," he purred, pushing his glasses up with a smug tilt of his head. "A brand-new evolutionary breakthrough... and a charming little marriage proposal on top of it? Truly, I must be the luckiest researcher in Hueco Mundo today."
Gabriel tensed, his playful demeanor vanishing in an instant.
Szayelaporro had found them.
And now, they were his research subjects.
...
...
...
"Hunt, Tiburón."
This man really came here uninvited and expected for shit to be all sweet.
BZZZT—BOOM!
Man really thought he could interrupt Gabriel when the man was trying to get a smooch from his wife-to-be.
Playing the gentle way did not seem to work at all, so maybe the Hollow way would.
Gabriel did not care how long it took. The man who blue-balled him shall pay.
BZZZT—BOOM!
"Faster than I expected," the great Szayelaporro said.
The man dodged all of their attacks.
He was taking this easy, after all. He was a Vasto Lorde-class Arrancar and Espada Number 0.
BZZZT—BOOM!
He was stronger.
A powerful kick landed to his side...
BZZZT—BOOM!
Hellfire consumed his body in flames. If not for him activating Hierro at the last second, he might have died here.
CRACK
For some odd reason, Szayelaporro felt as if Gabriel had some pent-up rage against him.
The boy's fire was now even hotter than before. The flames were so intense that the man was being dried out.
Gabriel deactivated his fire. Szayelaporro had a questioning look on his face—why would he do that if continuously attacking him would have helped deal great damage?
BOOM
Szayelaporro crashed into a nearby dune. His bones were not feeling the best right now, and yet, instead of fear, what seemed to be excitement flashed in his eyes.
Harribel's water was way stronger than he had anticipated. She had become an Arrancar after all.
Her power was simply magnificent. He must study her... if she was a natural-born Arrancar, Szayelaporro wanted to study her anatomy to see how she had evolved.
Which, to be fair, he wasn't fully wrong. Technically, she was a natural-born Arrancar. Realistically, she was artificially made—not like by the Hogyoku or anything, but by a man.
Gabriel had infused the soul and power of five artificial Adjucha-class Arrancar into her body, using them to enhance her soul to a new level.
And by boosting her soul, her mask naturally came off on its own. Gabriel himself did not remove it, nor did he use his Idle Transfiguration to destroy the mask.
The power transferred to her was great, and her soul was enhanced so much that she simply... evolved.
And the power of her water techniques had increased because—one, she was way stronger now, and two, with Gabriel's fire working like a buff, anytime he stopped using those flames, the humidity in the air increased... dramatically. Which meant... her water control got a lot better.
"It would be a shame if the fun ended here," the man said calmly.
Gabriel looked at the man as if he was insane. Did he expect to win this with the way he was getting his ass beat?
Gabriel watched as the man took out his Zanpakutō and began... deepthroating it.
...
...
...
"Sip, Fornicarás."
And just like that, Gabriel watched a grown man deepthroat a sword.
Though, it seemed like deepthroating the sword served another purpose...
The man's body began to change.
His body then swelled to enormous proportions, releasing spiritual energy that covered his immediate vicinity in a fine mist that slowly cleared away as he transformed.
In his released form, the lower half of his body became a multitude of purple tentacles reminiscent of a sea anemone.
His feet extended from under the tentacles, which were then replaced by a layered dress-like garment. His upper torso became a segmented and form-fitting gray suit, with white sleeves extending from the elbow down to a wide opening at the wrist, revealing a purple interior.
Three small, dark purple extensions spanned upward from the elbow, while four long, dark purple strands that looked like falling drops hung from the underside of the sleeve itself.
His hands turned white, and his fingertips became slightly elongated and purple.
His hair gained various purple drop-like strands as well.
His Hollow mask took the form of a headdress that formed a thin band across his forehead, as well as what appeared to be half the bottom structure of his Hollow mask "glasses," attached on either side of his head by fan-like coverings.
His left eye gained purple markings that took the shape of four lines on the top and bottom.
He also grew four large, gray branch structures on his back—two on each side—which formed a shape similar to the wings of a butterfly.
Each branch had twelve equally spaced red strands that resembled falling drops. These strands could expand out, becoming thicker until they looked similar to feathers, giving them the appearance of actual wings like those of a bird.{copy and pasted straight from the wiki, with some slight changes}
"Now... the Second Act will begin," the man said quite arrogantly.