Hollow
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Hollow (虚（ホロウ）) are a race of creatures that dwell in Hueco Mundo, or "Hollow World" the realm between the real world and Soul Society, but can cross over to the human world to devour souls.
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Overview
Hollows are former pluses (deceased human souls) that lose their hearts to despair or remain in the real world for too long. In the anime, nonhuman spirits can also transform into hollows. Any spirit that is not guided to Soul Society by a shinigami may eventually descend into a hollow. The process by which a soul becomes a hollow usually takes months (if not longer), reflected by the length of the soul's Chain of Destiny (因果の鎖, inga no kusari; Chain of Fate in the English dub), which resides in the center of their chest The Chain of Destiny slowly corrodes over time, reflecting the degradation of the soul's ties to the living world. The process can be accelerated under certain conditions, such as being attacked by another hollow or through the use of certain spiritual powers. When the chain completely decays, the soul is warped into a unique and monstrous form with a vaguely skeletal mask and a large hole where their chain was once connected.
The majority of ghosts peacefully move on to Soul Society after their deaths. Some, however, stay in the living world to fulfill certain goals, such as looking after a loved one, protecting a particular location, or pursuing a grudge from beyond the grave. However, with only limited abilities to interact with the living, and by definition tied to their goals, many ghosts find they are unable to cope when their loved ones move on or old enemies forget them. At this point, some will become dangerously obsessed with fulfilling those goals, even if the means to fulfill them renders the soul empty: for example, killing anyone who comes near a loved one, in order to keep them from hurting that person. In doing so, the ghost warps into a hollow and, ironically, often makes the focus of their obsession into their first victim, such as Orihime's brother, Sora, does.
Once a soul becomes a hollow, it is driven to devour other souls, living or dead, to fill the void caused by its descent. While their former obsession often becomes their first target, most hollows will eventually become mindless creatures concerned only with finding the most potent souls to devour. Stronger and more evil hollows are often able to retain some of their intelligence in hollow form, making them more dangerous than the average hollow. While most hollows are evil, or at the very least mindless, at least a few are not, as is the case with Nel Tu and her hollow companions.
The most distinctive feature of a hollow, their mask, is formed to protect the naked instinct that is left in a being after the loss of its heart, and in some ways is the tangible form of the hollow's madness. The masks of different hollows can differ greatly in shape and form, but they are always white and skull-like. The masks also obscure the original identity of the hollows. The mask can be shattered, temporarily allowing the hollow to regain its original identity, but it will regenerate after a short period once the hollow takes over again.
Hollows have widely varying physical characteristics and powers, and few hollows ever appear the same (the few that do are often clones). In terms of appearance, hollows can range in appearance from furry (like mammals) through lizard-like to outright demonic. A hollow's abilities are often determined by their power. Weaker (and by definition less intelligent) hollows usually only attack in melee style, whereas stronger hollows have a wide array of abilities with which to kill their quarry. Hollows also vary in size, though it tends to be fairly consistent amongst the various classifications of hollows. In Hueco Mundo, some hollows are no larger than common pets. Most common hollows are about twice the size of an adult human, though it can vary to a degree. Huge hollows, aptly named for their size, are as large as two-story buildings. Finally, gillian-class menos are even larger than the huge hollows, standing as tall as a common skyscraper.
Hollows are usually killed by splitting their mask and head in two, but most fatal wounds will effectively dispatch them. When this is done by a shinigami's zanpakutō, the hollow is not truly killed; its spirit is purified of the sins it committed as a hollow. This allows the spirit within to enter Soul Society as a plus. In cases where a hollow committed great sins as a mortal, its purification will summon the gates of Hell, through which the soul is dragged to its punishment. When a hollow is killed by a Quincy, however, it is destroyed, soul and all, which has potentially disastrous effects on the spiritual balance of the worlds. The effects of other spiritual powers on hollows, such as those of Orihime Inoue or Yasutora Sado, are unknown, partly due to the fact that such occurrences are rare.
Menos
Though most hollows are simply transformed human souls, a sub-group of hollows known as menos (メノス, menosu), exist. Menos are conglomerations of hundreds of normal hollows, resulting in a single composite entity of far greater strength than any normal hollow.[1] Menos-class hollows are considered so dangerous that Soul Society sends only highly trained shinigami teams to handle them.[1] These incursions seem to be rare, however, as menos rarely leave Hueco Mundo unless attracted by large sources of spiritual power or encouraged to by other forces.
Menos are created when the void within an ordinary hollow's heart becomes so substantial that human souls are incapable of sustaining it, at which point it begins devouring fellow hollows. These cannibal hollows are attracted to one another, and a mass inter-devouring follows, resulting in a gillian.[2] Following this transformation, the gillian can evolve twice more, first into an adjuchas and finally into a vasto lorde, provided certain conditions are met. Menos evolution is not only contingent upon the menos eating other hollows, but also upon the menos' ability to avoid being eaten. If another hollow succeeds in devouring a part of their body, evolution becomes impossible.
Gillian (ギリアン, girian; Spanish for "countless creatures") are the weakest class of menos and the first stage of menos evolution. They are giant in comparison to other hollows, dwarfing even the largest standard hollows by at least the size of a two-story building, but lack agility and intelligence. While a gillian-class menos is quite powerful, they are still much weaker than a shinigami lieutenant. According to Tōshirō Hitsugaya, they are comparable to "foot-soldiers", reflected in their uniform appearance. In Soul Society, gillians are known as menos grande and are shown in textbooks discussing menos. Menos grande literally means "big minus" in Spanish ("less big" is also a possible translation) or "less". Similarly, the kanji for menos grande is 大虚, meaning big emptiness.
Though gillians usually have no personality to speak of, one of the many hollows that comprise it may retain control over the new entity, reflected in the unique mask it wears in comparison to a normal gillian. Only these gillian variants have the potential to evolve into adjuchas-class menos. The evolution is facilitated by the continued cannibalization of fellow hollows, even other gillians.
Adjuchas (アジューカス, ajūkasu; Spanish for "stone demon") are the medium class of menos in terms of power, and the second stage in the menos evolution. Adjuchas can vary radically in appearance, from bulky humanoids to the jaguar-like form of Grimmjow Jeagerjaques. Unlike the gillians, they are roughly human-sized. They are also much smarter than the gillians and have the power to match. It is likely they could fight evenly with at least a shinigami lieutenant. They watch over the many gillian-class menos, and in the anime are also capable of controlling them, or at the least those put in charge by Aizen can.
Adjuchas-class menos are much smaller in population compared to the gillian class, due to the rarity of any one hollow being capable of overwhelming the many other hollows that comprise the body of a gillian. Furthermore, the adjuchas must continue to devour hollows, or its mind will be absorbed by the hollows comprising its form and it will revert back into a gillian. The subsequent lack of an individual will also preclude the reverted gillian from becoming an adjuchas again.[3]
Vasto lorde (ヴァストローデ, vasuto rōde; Spanish for "enormous king") are the most powerful class of menos, and the final stage in the menos evolutionary line. They appear almost completely humanoid, and each one is stronger than an average shinigami captain; Tōshirō claims that ten of them under Sōsuke Aizen's control would be enough to defeat all of Soul Society. It seems that Aizen has important plans with them, but the details haven't been revealed.
Vasto lorde are the least common form of menos, but the exact population is unknown, though it is probably very low as Vasto lorde only eat other Vasto lorde. They are believed to reside within the very depths of Hueco Mundo. Apart from the need to cannibalize even more hollows, any special requirements for the creation of a vasto lorde are unknown.
Powers
Like Shinigami, Hollows have a multitude of combat skills and abilities, most of which are usually unique to specific Hollows. The more powerful Hollows, however, have access to a range similar techniques of greater power or use than their own unique skills. Hollows usually acquire energy to power their abilities by devouring souls, but can also ingest energy from the atmosphere when in realms with high concentration of spiritual energy, such as Hueco Mundo.[4]
- Bala (虚弾（バラ）, Bara; Japanese for "hollow bullet," Spanish for "bullet") is an arrancar alternative to the cero. The technique hardens the user's spiritual pressure and fires it like a bullet from their fist. Though weaker than a cero blast, it moves about twenty times faster and can be fired at a much higher rate.
- Cero (虚閃（セロ）, Sero; Japanese for "hollow flash," Spanish for "zero", "Doom Blast" in the Viz translation) are high-powered energy blasts that can be fired from various body parts, such as mouth, tongue, hand or fingers. Only menos, arrancar, and vizard have so far been shown to use cero attacks, and it appears that stronger entities can use it more efficiently. Various arrancar and hollow characters display variants of the technique, such as the Espada-exclusive gran rey cero (王虚の閃光（グラン・レイ・セロ）, guran rei sero; Japanese for "royal hollow flash," Spanish for "great king zero"))[5] and Pesche Guatiche and Dondochakka Bilstin's cero sincrético (融合虚閃（セロ・シンクレティコ）, sero shinkuretiko; Japanese for "united hollow flash," Spanish for "synchronized zero").
- Garganta (黒腔（ガルガンタ）, Garuganta; Japanese for "black cavity," Spanish for "throat") is how Hollows move to and from Hueco Mundo. Kaname Tōsen and Kisuke Urahara have also demonstrated the ability to use the technique. It literally tears open the dimensional fabric separating the worlds, revealing a tunnel of whirling, torrential energy that must be focused and solidified to create a discernible pathway.[13]
- Hierro (鋼皮（イエロ）, Iero; Japanese for "steel skin," Spanish for "iron") refers to the hardened skin of the Arrancar, which is a result of their compressed spiritual power.[14] While their skin is strong enough to block even released zanpakutō bare-handed, it is by no means impenetrable. Stronger Arrancar have proportionally stronger skin.
- Negación (反膜（ネガシオン）, Negashion; Japanese for "counter membrane," Spanish for "negation") fields are used to rescue fellow Hollows. Only the Gillian-class Menos have shown the ability to use it. Negación fields surround a target in a square beam of light that isolates the target from the dimension they are currently in, making it impossible to harm them. The field then pulls the target towards the menos that created the field.[6] Espada have a special cube-shaped device called Caja Negación (Spanish for "Negation Box") meant to simulate negación fields, which are used to punish their subordinates if necessary. The cube, when used on a subject, traps them in an alternate dimension from which there is no escape; however, this assumes it's being used as intended. More powerful arrancar, namely the Espada themselves, can escape given enough time.[7]
- Pesquisa (探査回路（ペスキス）, Pesukisu; Japanese for "inquiry circuit," Spanish for "inquiry") is the Arrancar equivalent of the shinigami ability to sense spiritual pressure. It functions similar to sonar.[17]
- Sonído (響転（ソニード）, Sonīdo; Japanese fo "resounding revolution," Spanish for "sound") is the Arrancar equivalent of the shinigami flash steps and the Quincy hirenkyaku; it allows the user to travel at incredibly high speeds for short distances. Use of sonído is punctuated by a brief static sound, in contrast to the "swish" sound heard near flash steps.
Arrancar
Main article: Arrancar
An arrancar is a hollow that has removed its mask and have gained shinigami like powers. The word arrancar comes from the Spanish verb meaning "to remove" or "to rip off".
