Bleach 566: What is Your Fear?

Zach Goodier

This week, we start up a new round of battles, this time with Rukia facing As Nodt, "The Fear."  Renji is also being pursued, but he hasn't been openly engaged yet.  The chapter opens with a flashback to just before Rukia and Renji arrived on the battlefield, discussing their plan to hide after finishing a battle so that they don't become surrounded by the enemy.  By using guerrilla tactics, they apparently hope to get the jump on some of the sternritter before arriving at their base for a final attack on the stronghold.  However, it appears that they might have a tough go of it before they even get the chance to regroup for their assault.  However, Rukia was able to get help for Rose and Kensei, who were badly wounded in their fight with "The Superstar."

After the last chapter, it's really interesting to see what happens, since even if Rukia and Renji go around dominating their battles, it seems like they would only be making Ywhach even stronger, or at least stopping his power from diminishing.  So it looks like even though the Soul Society appears to have some momentum built up, with Rukia and Renji arriving as backup, in the long-run it might be problematic if Yhwach becomes stronger due to the elimination of the Quincy army. It will be interesting to see how events continue to unfold, and when and how the other characters will become involved, such and Ginjo, Sado, Orihime, Urahara, and all the other returning/supporting characters that have yet to join the fray.