If You Call Me Beast, Kill You Like Tempest

As the wounded Ichigo tries to stand and reach Nelliel, Tesra kicks him aside, grabs Orihime by the throat, and declares that Nelliel is an obstacle in Nnoitra's path that must be removed. The chapter then travels into the past. A younger Nelliel bests Nnoitra in a training bout and remarks that they finished in time for lunch, but a bloodied Nnoitra demands she finish the duel and kill him. She refuses, chiding his belief that they are equals: as former Humans who became Hollows and then regained reason as Arrancar, they need a genuine reason to kill, which his mere hatred is not. She will not shoulder the life of a beast rather than a warrior, and leaves.

Watching nearby, a young Tesra offers to help Nnoitra up, only for Nnoitra to hurl his weapon past his head and berate him for imagining they are equals. Asked why he fixates on Nelliel among all the Espada, Nnoitra coldly answers that he cannot stomach a woman standing above men on the battlefield. In the present the two clash again, Nnoitra taunting her with her own words about beasts and asking how it feels to be slain by one.

Another flashback shows Nelliel returning to her quarters hungry for dinner, only to find Nnoitra waiting. She calmly walks past him, but an explosion tears through the wall to reveal Pesche and Dondochakka bloodied on the floor, their masks torn off. As she rounds on him in fury, the Nnoitra before her dissolves in light, and the real Nnoitra brings his weapon down on her head, cleaving her mask and opening a deep gash across her face. He carries the unconscious Nelliel and her guardians to the edge of the Las Noches dome. When Szayelaporro appears claiming to be a comrade come to see the outcome, Nnoitra sourly corrects that they merely share an interest, then throws all three off the roof, reasoning that by the time she heals and crawls back, he will have climbed beyond the reach of her blade.

The chapter reveals Nnoitra's defeat and humiliation by the younger Nelliel and roots his grudge in his refusal to accept a woman as his superior. It shows the ambush itself: using a hologram supplied by Szayelaporro, Nnoitra cut open Nelliel's mask and face and cast her and her Fraccion out of Las Noches, causing the regression and amnesia that turned her into Nel.

The chapter was adapted in Episode 194, Nelliel's Past. The Viz edition expanded the title to If You Call Me a Beast, I'll Kill You Like a Tempest. The flashback supplies the backstory that ties Nel, Nnoitra, and Szayelaporro together across the arc.