User blog:Caesarea37/Bleach Chapter 558: The Heart of the Wolf Review

Back again, I hope those of you who take the time out to read this, perhaps in addition to Xilinoc's, enjoy it.

We open with a nice coloured flashback of Komamura's foxy old man saying that he is now proud of Sajin, which, without giving the game away too soon, seems to mean pride in him taking revenge and not pride in defending the shinigami, which he had shown distaste for previously. Over the course of the chapter it is made clear that the spirit of Komamura's clan is revenge and that the secret human transformation technique is a technique likely developed to that end, hence why the old dog takes pride in Sajin for the first time. Maybe, it's all a bit confusing in this chapter.

We move on to frames showing that Dangai Joue's attack has connected with Bambietta and further informing us that her bombs are being pushed back into her body by the force of the attack, before they can explode. She falls to the ground as the explosion dissipates and Dangai Joue returns to the ground also, observing both Bambietta's crash and Yhwach's palace in the distance. As Dangai Joue returns to Komamura, it begins to disintegrate.

Something of note: we don't appear to have been shown what effect, if any, Urahara's pill had on Sajin's bankai, given that Dangai Joue has been referred to as basically an upgraded or alternate form of Kokujou Tengen Myou'ou.

Komamura pants and struggles, begging the transformation to hold out for a little longer, saying he must reach the palace and defeat Yhwach. As Komamura despairs, the words of his old man are shown, asking if he realises that what he feels is thirst for revenge. The same thing he had once tried to dissuade Tousen from. But the old man says it's fine, as the clan is 'made for' revenge and that Sajin finally went back to his human form. He finally returned to his clan.

The next few panels reminded me (sadly) of Aizen's rejection by the Hogyoku, the same look on his face and his alterations reverting back to his original state. So this hit me pretty hard as Komamura looks on at his body returning to its animal form. As he begins to understand what is taking place, the old man chips in again saying that Sajin's life as a human will shortly end and he will become a beast seeking revenge. Proceeding to throw a spanner in the works, the old man says: "Until then you can get angry, you can curse us. You can writhe thinking about revenge. I still live...relishing in that black resentment. Sajin. Dear Sajin. Thank you for doing this for me." Not entirely sure what all that is leading to but it's pretty damn ominous, especially the frame with the last sentence.

He finished by saying that he will thank Sajin for what he did until Komamura becomes a 'silent beast'. And it's then, as the old man looks to be leaning his head to get access to the heart (possibly to devour it, by the looks of it), we realise that Komamura is not simply reverting to his anthropomorphic body. He is falling all the way back into a basic animal form. Tengen drops to the floor, then Sajin does, revealing his body as that of a fox. He wonders internally if this is compensation for selling his soul to revenge, despite being a captain, let alone a soldier, of the Gotei; for not heeding the warning he had given to Tousen.

Iba arrives and hoists his captain up onto his shoulders. He says that his captain is not wrong and says they should resolve to beat that bastard Yhwach, for Yamamoto.

We cut to the gratifyingly broken Bambietta, wondering how she could have lost to a shinigami. She despairs that why, of the '5 of us', alluding to her companions, she had to lose first. And rightly so, as the other 4 appear and stand over her ominously, saying they'll help her, as they're sad if she isn't with them. As Bambietta protests whatever Gigi and the rest of them start doing (possibly Sklaverei, but that's all I can think of right now) we cut to Rukia and Renji rocketing through the sky towards Seiretei, or what Rukia more accurately refers to as Wandenreich.

So we've got some more key characters returning to the fray in their all new super stylish costumes, the purpose of which I'm not entirely sure about. We shall have to wait and see, as we will with regards to Ichigo, Byakuya, Zaraki and all the other matters yet to be resolved or even initiated.

High hopes and expectations for the coming weeks, these few chapters have set us up well. Bring it on!