Mystery! The Sword-Consuming Assassin / The Reversal of Rukia! The Rampaging Blade.Episode 176 Mystery! The Sword-Consuming Assassin: Rukia's opponent, Jinnai Dōkō, reveals that the unique blades the assassins are using are called bakōtō, swords that consume the user's spiritual energy to increase their strength. Jinnai eats his bakōtō to increase his power and fire blades from his back. Uryū fights Kuzuryū, who uses his bakōtō to transform into mist. Chad fights Genba, who uses the same rock wall-forming bakōtō a previous assassin used. Chad repeatably destroys the walls with his energy blasts, but Genba fuses with the walls to attack Chad from behind.
Episode 177 The Reversal of Rukia! The Rampaging Blade: Rukia uses kidō to restrain Jinnai, and freezes him with her shikai. He breaks free from the ice, but is consumed by his bakōtō when it draws too much energy from him. Before Rukia can retrieve the bakōtō, several assassins arrive and take it. Uryū realizes that Kuzuryū is using his bakōtō to fuse with the surrounding mist, and uses Sprenger to defeat him. However, Uryū is caught in the blast radius and is injured. Chad destroys the surrounding walls to stop Genba's attacks, and, in a clash between the strongest attacks of the combatants, Chad is victorious. Ichigo fights Hanza, and, using the enhanced speed from his bankai, breaks Saiga's mirror. In response, Hanza uses one of Saiga's abilities to engulfs Ichigo in light from the shards of the mirror.