Episode 22 of Bleach Thousand Year Blood War just released and created an uproar amongst the fandom as one of the fan favourite characters, captain of the 10th division, Hitsugaya Toshiro, was shown to be turned into a zombie.

This led to speculations about whether is Toshiro dead. If you too pondered upon this question then let me answer it for you in as simple a way as possible, without hurting your feelings.

Is Toshiro Dead In Bleach TYBW?

According to the manga, Toshiro is alive and well, although his lifespan has been shortened quite a lot.

Let me explain, When Toshiro was on the brink of death in his battle against Bazz B, the other Sternritter, Sternritter Z for Zombie, Giselle, spilled some of her blood on the fatally wounded Toshiro and Rangiku.

Thus turning them into her personal zombie puppets.

As we know Giselle can turn any shinigami into a zombie just by a mere drop of her blood splashing on them. This works for even captain-level shinigami like Toshiro.

However, when she summons Toshiro to fight against Captain Mayuri, the latter injects an interesting medicine into Toshiro’s body which allows Toshiro to see the future and return to the point when he was injected with the medicine in case Toshiro manages to kill Mayuri. *A Bit confusing I Know but that’s what Kubo said in the manga*

This happens several times until the side effect of the medicine kicks in and paralyses Toshiro for a while, allowing Mayuri to stab him and poison him using his Shikai.

The poison causes agonising pain to Toshiro however the cruel and curios mind of Mayuri makes the latter unable to stop.

Mayuri after successfully neutralizing Toshiro and other Captains and vice captains, wins his battle against Giselle and takes Toshiro and Rangiku to de-zombify.

This process although life-saving to both of them drastically reduces their life spans.

No need to worry though as Shinigami live for thousands of years easily.

What Happens To Toshiro After Battle With Mayuri?

As I said above, Mayuri is able to save Toshiro and Rangiku using his scientific method, post which Toshiro again joins the battle against sternritters and especially the Schutzstaffel.

If you don’t know who or what the sternritters and schutzstaffel are click the names to find out about them.

This leads to Toshiro joining in the fight against the mighty Gerrard Valkyrie, one of the strongest and the haxxed characters in Bleach alongside Kenpachi and Byakuya.

During his battle against Gerrard Toshiro unleashes his new bankai form which turns him into an adult.

Will explain the bankai in detail in another article but it is worth mentioning that this new bankai makes Toshiro the strongest ice-type shinigami of all time. He can freeze anything including extremely large objects just by mere movements of his hands.

In the frozen state, the object ceases to perform all of its functionalities and abilities. This includes the things he cuts with his sword and also if you touch him in this form you will be frozen instantly as well. With the same effects taking place on you.

Although, his Bankai was one of the strongest Toshiro was unable to do much damage to Gerrard let alone defeat him.

It was only due to Gerrard being struck by Yhwach’s auschwahlen that he was defeated or else Gerrard alone could have toppled the top tier of Shinigami ranks.

Conclusion:

Although Toshiro did turn into a zombie he was revived by Mayuri Kurotsuchi thanks to his genius intellect and scientific tools. Furthermore, Toshiro was able to unleash an extremely new and powerful bankai making him the strongest shinigami with ice-type zanpakuto in all of Soul Society’s history.

Despite that, his contributions to battles during the Quincy invasion weren’t significant. He however still keeps his rank of Captain post-war and is allegedly said to be stronger than before.

Whereas during the Hell arc of Bleach Toshiro just appears for a brief moment before all hell break loose, literally.