Nnoitra Gilga
Other names/titles: Nnoitora Gilga (official English translations), Nnoitora Jiruga (romanization problems), Espada #5, Quinto Espada, Former Espada #8
Zanpakutou: Santa Teresa ("Saint Teresa" in Spanish, or a colloquial name for praying mantids, kanji reads as "Sacred Crying Mantis")
Release Phrase: Pray
Fraccion: Tesra Lindocruz (Tesla Lindocruz in the official English translations)
Character Description: This guy is freaky looking. Seriously. He stands extremely tall at 215 cm (~ 7'), and he's freakishly skinny. He's also constantly grinning and showing his upper set of teeth, which just makes him look him like a creep, and has long black hair. He wears an eyepatch over his hollow hole, which is situated in his left eye socket, and is surrounded by the bone fragment that the Arrancar have, which looks like a set of jaw bones. His Espada tattoo (5) is located on his tongue. What a freakin weirdo.
Like most of the Espada, his Arrancar outfit is kind of modified. He has a big dorky looking hood behind his head, and he has an opening in his outfit to show off his chest. Sorry man, it works for Grimm, but I don't know if you can pull it off. He has also has big Keebler Elf boots. All in all, he looks ridiculous.
His zanpakutou, Santa Teresa, is also weird looking, but kind of cool at the same time, IMO. Instead of just a regular-looking sword or katana, its like a giant double-bladed axe, with crescent moon-shaped blades fused at opposite ends. It's attached to his wrist, so he can throw it and pull it back, which is pretty cool. Back when he was Espada #8, it only had one blade, but it still looked pretty cool.
Now, when he releases Santa Teresa, his outfit changes a bit. He grows extra sets of arms (six in total), each one covered in white armor. Each one holds a long pole with a curved blade at the end, kind of like a mantid's front legs. His cloak looks more tattered (and cooler, IMO), and he grows a helmet with horns over his head, one horn longer than the other.
Personality: He's a kitten. He acts like he wants a good fight, but he's not above resorting to blind-siding opponents or playing tricks to severely weaken them. He aims to be the strongest Espada, and he has an insatiable bloodlust for battle, much like Squad 11 Shinigami Captain Kenpachi Zaraki. His apparent idea of a fulfilling death would be "to die on his own two feet while drowning on his own blood". He's also a bit of a chauvinist, displaying an abnormal amount of hatred to his former female superior, Nelliel Tu Odelschwanck, and kicking himself repeatedly for being weaker than a woman. He's also a bit of a pervert and a foul-mouth, referring to Orihime as a 'pet', and inquiring of Ulquiorra as to how much he had 'disciplined' her.
Despite this horrible attitude, he seemed to have a soft soft for his underling, or at least seemed to be concerned over his well-being on one occasion. Right as Tesra decided to make the fatal decision of fighting against Kenpachi Zaraki in battle, Nnoitra warned him to get out of the way. Not much, but probably the nicest thing we saw him do, in my opinion anyway. Also, a lot of his bad attitude probably stems from an inferiority complex, as we saw in his interactions with Nel and his final moments with Kenpachi.
Nnoitra had several small appearances before his real introduction into the story, but his first big appearance was right at the end of Ichigo's friend Sado's fight with Privaron Espada Gantenbainne Mosqueda. He basically appears after Sado wins his fight, but takes him down easily. This happens a lot to Sado. Poor guy.
He next appears after Ichigo and Grimmjow's fight. After having lost to Ichigo, Grimmjow tries to continue the fight against him. All of a sudden, Nnoitra's big axe weapon blind-sides him and cuts him across the chest. Wow, you're cool, Nnoitra. Attacking an injured guy when he's not looking. Sheesh. Anyways, Nnoitra tries to kill Grimmjow while he's on the ground, but Ichigo jumps in to defend Grimm. They start to fight, but Nnoitra just wipes the floor with him. I mean, seriously, Ichigo just finished fighting an Espada! Can you really expect him to fight another one? Anyways, Orihime, is who being held by Tesra, asks him why he's being such annoying bastard, and he responds with some stupid speech saying that battle is supposed to be unfair. No it isn't! You're just an ass!
Anyways, Nnoitra owns Ichigo for a bit longer, until he notices Ichigo's friend Nel on the sidelines. Nel, from what we've seen so far, is just a little girl who just drools and yells at Ichigo with a lisp all the time, and seems to have a small crush on him. Why does Nnoitra recognize her? Is he a pedophile? Probably, but that's not how he knows her. Nnoitra breaks Ichigo's wrist, and prepares to kill him. Right then, Nel transforms into Nelliel, an amazingly hot green-haired woman, and is revealed to be the former Espada #3. As it turns out, Nelliel and Nnoitra have some history together (I'm not sure when, since it's only been a few months since Aizen created the Espada, but whatever). While serving as Espada #8, Nnoitra would always try to defeat Nel (I like that name better, so I'm gonna call her that) in combat, only to have to her own him every time. He would get mad, but she wouldn't care. She seemed to take a slight interest in him, due to, in her eyes, his slow development from a beast into sentient creature, like herself. One day, Nnoitra, decided to be a cheap bastard, and played a trick on her. He ripped the masks off her fraccion, and scarred her own Arrancar bone fragment, severely decreasing her reiatsu (Bleach version of chakra). As a result of her decrease in reiatsu, her body began to shrink, and she turned into a child, with no memories of her time in the Espada.
In the present, Nelliel thanks Ichigo her helping her, and starts kicking Nnoitra's butt. YES! A cool fight ensues, and basically reaches a point where Nelliel prepares to finish Nnoitra off. Hurray, it's almost over. But, no! She then randomly reverts to her child form right then, much to Nnoitra's delight. He kicks her away, prompting Ichigo to fight against him, only for Ichigo to get beat down. Nnoitra gets bored, ordering Tesra to beat up Ichigo, while forcing Orihime to watch. This goes on for a while, and it's pretty brutal. Finally, when Tesra is about to finish Ichigo off, an unexpected ally appears.
Kenpachi Zaraki, the giant demonic captain of the 11th Shinigami Division blocks the attack that might have killed Ichigo. Tesra tries to fight him off, only to be taken down in a single slash. Kenpachi explains that several captains have arrived in Hueco Mundo, Aizen's base, and are now fighting against the Espada. He goes on to explain that he will be taking over the fight. Awesome, just awesome! He introduces himself as the 11th Division captain, and Nnoitra responds with his own title. The two begin fighting, but it doesn't take long for Nnoitra to get annoying again. He claims to have the strongest hierro (Spanish for iron, kanji reads as "Steel Skin", basically Arrancar armor) in all of the Espada. Kenpachi counters by piercing Nnoitra though his eyepatch. Nnoitra laughs like a bastard, and shows him that he only stabbed through his hollow hole, and stabs Kenpachi through the chest. Kenpachi simply smiles. The fight continues!
Kenpachi laughs, since he was worried that Nnoitra somehow survived a sword to the brain, but now knows that all he needs to do is slash harder. Believe it or not, it works! Kenpachi starts cutting wounds in Nnoitra's skin, claiming that he's still warming up, and he normally doesn't get to fight opponents on this level. Kenpachi starts winning, and Nnoitra, trying to get the upper hand, tries to stab him again, only to accidentally rip off Kenpachi's eyepatch instead. This increases Kenpachi's power (the eyepatch is basically a reiatsu seal), and he slashes Nnoitra across the chest. Enraged at this new development, Nnoitra releases his zanpakutou.
In his new form, Nnoitra now his four arms, and four big scythe looking things. Kenpachi smiles at the new challenge, and charges at him. Much to his disappointment, Nnoitra simply blocks the attack, and wounds him again. Kenpachi falls for a bit, as Nnoitra sets his sights on Yachiru, Kenpachi's Vice-Captain. Yachiru playfully comments on the fight not being over, right as Kenpachi chops one of Nnoitra's arms off. He states his new strategy as simply to chop all of his arms off but one, so that Nnoitra won't be able to guard against his attacks. Nnoitra says he's dumb, and regenerates his arm, he then catches Kenpachi off guard by generating two new arms, and piercing him in the chest.
Now six-armed, Nnoitra continues to talk smack, and keeps on attacking Kenpachi. The latter doesn't seem to care, and just revels in their fight. Finally, Kenpachi realizes that his wounds are fairly grievous, and he may actually die if the fight continues as it is. Not wanting to die against Nnoitra, Kenpachi decides to use his trump card. He grips his sword with both hands, telling Nnoitra he is going to finish him off using kendo (normally Kenpachi just swings his sword one-handed like a madman). He states he doesn't care for kendo, but he does acknowledge that wielding a sword with two hands is more effective in combat. Nnoitra gives a WTF face, and charges at Kenpachi. With one swing, Kenpachi is able to almost cut Nnoitra in two, and breaks most of his arms.
As Kenpachi starts to walk away, Nnoitra tells him the fight isn't over. Kenpachi's like, "Umm...yeah, it is. You're almost dead." Nnoitra charges at Kenpachi one last time, as Kenpachi relents and strikes him down once and for all. As he lies dying, Nnoitra looks over at child Nel one last time, right as Nel wakes up to see his final moments. Kenpachi then thanks him for a good fight.
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