Dance With Snowwhite

Faced with a Rukia who shrugs off The Fear, As Nodt insists such immunity is impossible and hurls more Reishi Thorns her way. This time she catches one bare-handed and freezes it solid from the point of contact, letting the shards drop as she admits she had indeed been fleeing earlier; coaxing out the real strength of Sode no Shirayuki takes time, and until now she could not risk a single hit.

As argues that fear cannot be halted by ice, since the fluid dissolves into the skin at the lightest touch. He lectures that every living thing can always name why it dreads death even when it cannot say why it feels safe, so all creatures grow and struggle only to escape fear, which means his power must work as long as Rukia lives.

Rukia's reply is that she is not alive at this moment. Rather than breathing cold from its edge, Sode no Shirayuki drops her own body temperature below freezing, chilling everything it touches and reaching farther through the blade. By governing her Reishi she stills her molecular motion and temporarily kills herself, stopping the seeping fear at the surface of her skin. She flashes past As with Shunpo, freezing and splitting his shoulder, and reports minus eighteen degrees, the point where blood will not flow. At minus fifty the ground quakes as the water beneath it turns to ice, and as As rushes in she reaches minus 273.15 degrees, absolute zero, a state she can hold for only four seconds, freezing him completely solid while he wonders if this is what fear feels like.

The chapter unveils the lethal core mechanic of Rukia's released blade during the Thousand-Year Blood War. It was adapted into episode 385, The White Haze, and features only As Nodt and Rukia Kuchiki.