"Compared to Kendo, I am inferior to you; compared to Reiatsu, I am also inferior to you; compared to Kendo, I am still inferior to you."
"But Shunpo, I have great confidence in myself."
"This is the third of the 'Four Maples', Kong Chan, let's see it, Ran Yan."
Shihouin Yoruichi stepped forward with such a fast speed that her figure flashed like lightning, and she grabbed Ran Yan's shoulder with one hand:
"Bakudō #61: Rikujōkōryō, Ju-ren."
Ran Yan still had his back turned to Shihouin Yoruichi. Until her palm was less than ten centimeters from his shoulder, the space behind him suddenly burst into brilliant golden light.
Immediately afterward, six golden sheets of light appeared out of thin air, then each was multiplied tenfold, forming a glowing net that surrounded Shihouin Yoruichi from all sides.
"You... Ran Yan, when did you master the Kidō technique of quasi-singing?"
Faced with the massive net of light encircling her with no gaps to escape, Shihouin Yoruichi looked like a feral beast trapped in a cage.
"Isn't it written in the Kidō Encyclopedia?"
"Techniques like simulacrum are child's play. I just needed to see it once to grasp it."
Ran Yan looked down at the Spiritual Arts Academy and replied calmly.
"Sure, quasi-singing is not that difficult."
"But this is Bakudō #61! You cast it ten times in one breath. Forget how much Reiatsu that takes—how can each casting remain as powerful and accurate as a fully chanted version?"
Shihouin Yoruichi stared at Ran Yan like he was a monster.
She herself could perform dual casting, but only for low to mid-tier Kidō with the chant omitted. For anything high-level, even captains struggle to maintain effectiveness without chanting. And certainly not tenfold!
Normally, omitting the chant with high-level Kidō results in either failure due to Reiatsu instability or catastrophic backfire.
But Ran Yan?
He not only successfully cast ten instances of Bakudō #61 without chanting, each was perfectly executed and under complete control.
"Did I say I used quasi-singing?"
Ran Yan turned around slowly to look at the stunned Yoruichi.
"If it wasn't quasi-singing, what was it?"
"Abandon re-chant."
"What? I've never heard of that. Does Soul Society even have such a technique?"
"I created it," Ran Yan said with a calm smile.
"You created it? When?"
"The day before yesterday."
Shihouin Yoruichi was speechless. Her jaw dropped.
First it was his kendo—strong enough to pin Hirako Shinji to a wall. Now he's inventing Kidō techniques?
It takes lifetimes for most Shinigami to innovate within Kidō. Yet Ran Yan had only been studying it for less than ten days.
"Are you even a Shinigami? Or a being built from the same matter as me? How are we in the same six-year curriculum and you're this good?"
She stared, equal parts awe and envy.
Ran Yan only shrugged off the praise. He couldn't exactly admit that ever since Unohana Yachiryu came to him for a moonlit duel and declared him the strongest, he'd been pushing Kidō harder to keep pace with his skyrocketing kendo.
With Kendo showing off every chance it got, Kidō had been training like mad to catch up.
In just a few days, he'd mastered several top-level spells, created "abandon re-chant," and even refined it beyond double-chanting and quasi-singing by combining all three.
Abandon chant lets you skip the incantation and use the Kidō by name.
Double-chant lets two Kidō be merged by specific rules and cast simultaneously.
Quasi-singing boosts the power of non-chanting spells using extra Reiatsu, but is limited to mid-tier spells.
Ran Yan's creation could release two, three, even ten high-level Kidō simultaneously with minimal cost, all with high power and precision.
And that was just the start.