The 24th episode of the highly anticipated Bleach Thousand Year Blood War arc dropped and boy oh boy, not only did we get some fantastic action scenes of the Zero Squad and the Schutzstaffel, but also some critical backstory in the form of anime original scenes in which we dive deeper into the history between the Souls Reapers and the Quincy.

These anime-exclusive scenes are so impactful that they answer many age-long questions of the Bleach Thousand Year Blood War arc and it is a gift to finally get these answers long after the manga has ended!

We see a meeting held between the leader of the Soul Reapers Ichibe Hyosube and the Leader of the Quincy Yhwach in the Lichtreich where the former proposes signing a non-aggression pact between the two parties.

Things do not go that well as there are still preconceived notions in play. The clash of ideas provokes Yhwach to use the Almighty but Ichibei does something unprecedented which adds a lot to the story.

We are here to explain today the impact of the flashback scene and what kind of a story is Kubo cooking that seems to be taking a much better route.

Enough talking, let’s jump straight into it!!

Bleach Thousand Year Blood War Episode 24 Flashback Scene Explained!

As mentioned before, the episode starts with a meeting held between Ichibe Hyosube representing the Souls Reapers, and Yhwach representing the Quincy thousand years ago. The meeting is being held not in the Soul Society but in the Holy Empire of Lichtreich.

The purpose of the meeting was to sign a non-aggression pact between the parties. Ichibe proposed to Yhwach to leave the management of the world to the Soul Society and in return no one would prevent the Quincy unification.

Yhwach was angered by hearing it and went on to question the formation of the world. He also activates the Almighty, the strongest ability in all of Bleach. Yhwach asks who was the one to separate the world into realms of life and death and Ichibe nonchalantly mentions that it was the Soul King’s doing.

People know the Soul King or Reio as the God of the Universe but anime-only fans might be confused about the context. One can read about the history and formation of the Bleach Universe in the novel series Bleach: Can’t Fear Your Own World.

What Did The Soul King Do?

The main focus is on Reio and his history where we dive deeper in this article but for a concise context, the world was one where life and death did not exist. In this world, Hollows threatened the creatures of the world and amidst the chaos, the Soul King manifested into the world, his whereabouts before manifesting in this world are unknown.

You’ll find more details about Reio/Soul King in this article:

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However, Soul King’s power was enough to eradicate anyone and anything. He came to love the beings of the combined realm, especially humans and quincies.

In order to protect them he went on a spree of destroying all Hollows across the realm.

Although the Soul King did everything out of love for the creatures inhabiting it, his act of mercilessly killing the hollows proved to disturb the balance of the world. This attracted the attention of the five great noble clans of the Soul Society.

Be it any race, humans, Shinigami, Quincy, etc., all emerged from Reio and his descendants decided to seal the Soul King and use his power to separate the world into three parts: Soul Society, Human World, and Hueco Mundo. As the Soul King didn’t provide any resistance to his exploitation.

This led to the butchering of the Soul King and sealing him in a crystal that would render him immobile. His limbs were cut and each limb gained sentience.

For some reason, the soul king did not resist the Noble Clans mutilating him in such a way.

Post the mutilation, Ichibei who was an ordinary person but still strong af back then found Reio and the Noble Clans gave him the responsibility to take care of Reio, protect him and use that body to keep the three worlds separate.

For now, the merger of the three worlds will lead to the destruction of all the three and all the countless lives in them.

This event was known as the Original Sin of the Soul Society.

It is due to this that Yhwach brought up the topic of the world. Ichibe mentioned that it was the Soul King’s fault (their perspective) but Yhwach couldn’t fathom the disrespect of the Soul King who was reduced to a piece of meat in Yhwach’s own words.

Yhwach’s true plan is to bring back the world to its original form, a world without death, and also become the God who created it.

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Bleach TYBW Flashback Scene Explanation Continued

As Yhwach rejects Ichibei’s explanation and flexes his Reishi, Ichibei retaliates by showing the palm of his left hand from which an eye erupts. Yhwach’s underlings attack him but he easily blocks and repels those attacks back to them.

Through the eyes of his palm, Yhwach experiences a history in which Ichiebi is holding the Reio in his hands. Ichibei then proclaims that it was he and Reio who had kept the world safe from danger till now, which is true.

Not to forget, it was the Shinigamis’ who led the world to be this way.

But being the hot-headed leader as he was, Yhwach could not hold himself back and grabbed Ichibei’s left hand. Referring to his eyes as “troublesome”, Ichibei’s hand disseminated and it forcibly merged with Yhwach, which also deactivated his Almighty.

This was the reason why Yhwach was sealed and how Yamamoto would have been able to defeat Yhwach.

If you still haven’t lost it the props to you. The hand that Ichibei had was none other than Pernida Parnkgjas, the left hand of the Soul King himself!!! We get a more refined backstory on how the Almighty was sealed and some more lore on the mysterious Pernida.

Also, Ichibei had come prepared with Pernida. His true intention of holding a meeting was to seal the Almighty. This is also how Yhwach met Pernida, as there was no info on how or where they met.

The flashback lasted for a total of 4 minutes and the episode continued with one of the most awaited fights in all of Bleach: Yhwach and his Schutzstaffel vs. the Zero Division.

We are going to witness a clash between two of the strongest characters of Bleach!

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Conclusion

Kubo decided to explore further the history of Bleach Thousand Year Blood War by adding more context through anime original scenes. We get to see a thousand-year-old flashback where Ichibei Hyosube and Yhwach meet to sign a non-aggression pact where the Soul Reapers would manage the world and the Quincy would rebuild their empire. Neither of them were to interfere with each other but Yhwach felt insulted.

He rejected the offer and showed aggression towards Ichibei, talking about the segregation of the world and his plan to unify it back to one where death doesn’t exist. Ichibei who had come prepared, activated the left hand of the Soul King to seal the Almighty.

What do you think? Do you like the scene? Did it do justice and fill the gaps in the manga? Do let us know below!