How Renji vs Mask de Masculine BROKE Bleach Power Levels | Bleach DISCUSSION 

Just how strong do you think Renji and Mask were by the end of this fight? How do you think The Superstar works? Let me know!

Honestly Mask made it fun as heck. Like a protagonist using the power of friendship to win the day, only losing when he gave up on being the "hero".

Mask de Maculine is sort of a poor man's Gerrard Valkyre.

MR Tommo legit carrying the bleach franchise on youtube on his own , never quit man you are so good

Wait you normally don't have scripts? Thats awesome considering how well you explain and talk in your videos.

I loved Renji's attitude towards this fight he gave off Captain level vibes and actually took care of business

Ichibei had the ability of "I can depower you entirely", Yhwach had the power of "I am all knowing and can decide the future", Yammamoto's bankai made him a living nuclear explosion, Gremmy was "Anything I imagine is real" and both Gerard and Kenpachi had the ability of "logic does not apply to me". Power levels in the last arch had left reason behind, it was all about good and bad power matchups.

I feel like Hisagi should've gotten some of the shine Renji got.

I think rose lost this fight because he told mask how his ability worked lol

The whole fight with kensei and rose should have never happened, we should have seen ikkaku yumichika and hisagi fight him then they get beaten and then renji appears to destroy mask. Kensei and rose should have got other fights.

Yes, Renji got really strong. Even in the fullbring arc, we get statements that indicate that he had gotten much stronger. He could have been a captain probably, but he likes working with Byakuya.

When thinking about how strong Renji is, it's important to remember that he was confident enough in his power to wilfully accompany Ichigo at the end. I don't think this was foolish bravado. He knew he would be contending with Aizen levels of power and still felt like he could contribute in some way. Not saying he's on that level but it does speak to something. Food for thought.

The biggest shocker of the fight was when renji reveled his new bankai....... Sououo Zabimaru

James is probably like Lilynette was to Starkk.

Renji is legit that strong. Everyone who trains with the Zero Division not only comes back with greater understanding of their Zanpakuto, but they've also had their reiatsu increased from Hikifune's food. If Rukia goes from Lieutenant level to Bankai level in a few chapters, then yeah Im not surprised by Renji's growth

Its the wrestler effect! Wrestler who are depicted as heroes usually get a power boost from the fans but only just enough to defeat their foe. I would say that Jame's cheers give more of a power BUFF than a power BOOST! Its like adrenaline, it can bolster your power temporarily just to finish whatever conflict you're in. Renji got a substantial power BOOST cause he got to know the real name of his zampakuto which is an extension of himself. And I agree that he would need to spend time with his zampakuto more to get stronger, but thats in the area of mastery (ie technique) not strength. (perfect example of this is bankai ichigo vs bankai white. They were same strength level but white has a fundamental mastery of zangetsu because he is Ichigo's pure battle instinct)

This just would have have made byakuya's death so much better. He die then everyone take revenge, and renji be's the new captain of squad 6.

The only issue is Vizards seem to refuse to use their mask or bankai. They needed to use both like Ichigo but they never did.

great video as always bro , I'm kinda happy Renji got to show his Real strength cuz from the beginning we all knew he was something special at least compared to vice captains and even some captains

Aside from Arrancar arc Renji is one of THE best character written. Deeply emotional and as i said aside from arrancar arc his fight with Ichigo showed the CONCEPT of RESOLVE in BLEACH which was continued against Byakuya. RESOLVE was theme for Renji and Ichigo's rivalry and Friendship.

Who's the one gillian scrub that disliked this? Get purified hater! 😂

Renji has always been one of my favorite characters so glad he got a good flight in this arc

Renji trained with zero squad. + has a new bankai that is his actual bankai Renji was never fighting in full power before hand and then when he does he just got buffed from training in zero squad

This fight was supposed to show power increase Renji gained by spending time and training with Zero Division. It makes sense that he would obliterate his first opponent. What does not make sense is why did Mask de Masculine had to beat 3rd and 5th seat, Liutenant and two Vizard Captais effortlesly before Renji showed up. In the end, it was just rushing and pleasing the majority of readers and cutting up this enitre Arc. Additionaly, Mask is a really disguisting Sternritter (but most are), and i was so happy Renji beat him so easily.

If mask doesn’t get a Latin voice actor for the dub imma freak out.

Wish Kensei was fleshed out a bit more and got a power boost as well...

This just highlighted how badly the vizard captains were used in this arc. They felt so weak compared to the other captains.

Plot twist....you're secretly kubo aren't you

I never thought about this, probably because by this point, the power levels were already crazy. But I assumed bcuz he trained in the royal realm and Ichibe himself told him the name of his bankai, it skyrocketed his power. Whatever the explanation, I didn't mind because Renji needed this win

Bruh. Renji already told y'all in the battle against Jackie, dirty boots.. We've been training for an opponent like Aizen. Remember Aizen was locked awat at this point defeated by Ichico and Hat and Clogs. But we saw what happened in the fight against Jubach. Renji got shut down again. Granted he was very powerful. I would say he's Ichigos rival.

Renji needed this win. Lol

Renji was pretty powerful, Kubo was trying to show how powerful Renji became. Rukia had to defeat the person who old Byakuga had issues with to show how strong she had become.To be fair Gerrad was the Soul kings heart so he worked from different. I do agree that some things were not done so easily. One thing that shows is how Hirako was also able to use shikai against Aizen

can you do a Capitan ranking? but have it be all the captains. like EVERY SINGLE CAPTIAN we know about not just, end a series captains. like from the beginning of bleach to the ending of bleach and rank all of them.

Tbh this was my favourite fight in the thousand year blood war and it made Renji my favourite character

I trust Kubo to put together worlds I wish I could belong in. I trust Kubo to summon the creativity and charm to create characters I'd die to meet. But Tite Kubo does drop the small stuff a lot. Maybe I'm being narrowminded and unaware of how distractions and complications could have forced his hand. I love the manga despite the flaws. A part of me wants to collect the pages in any shape I see them in whenever I see them.

The soul palace training is the ultimate zenkai boost of the series. I think renji being this strong at this point makes sense. I also believe he was intended to succeed byakuya as captain until fans forced kubo to keep him alive.

Renji getting that level of power is fairly consistent with the boost that we saw Rukia, Ichigo and Byakuya get from the training. Byakuya, despite getting less training than the rest due to taking longer than the rest to heal, was still stronger than his former Bankai in Shikai. We also know that Lieutenants don't have to promote to captains if they don't want to, with Sasakibe staying in squad 1 despite having Bankai and being strong enough to scar Yamamoto. Renji is most likely stronger than most Captains, barring Shunsui, Byakuya, Rukia and Kenpachi, but stays under Byakuya out of respect, the same way Sasakibe did for Yamamoto. Shunsui was able to fight against Lille 1v1, even after Lille went full power, and Lille is likely the strongest Sternritter. Byakuya and Rukia got the same training he did, and Byakuya is definitely still stronger than Renji while Rukia is about equal. Kenpachi is Kenpachi. Mask's power most likely isn't an equal boost every time, and likely has diminishing returns, which is why Gerard was in Ywhach's personal guard while Mask was not, despite having seemingly similar powers. Mask most likely capped out his power when he went into that weird form with star nipples, which is why he destroyed James, he couldn't gain anything more from his power, so he just let James die. Mask went from needing a cheer to beat Ikkaku, Shuhei and Yumichika to beating Bankai Kensei in 3 or 4 to losing to Bankai Renji with more than 10. The first few grant him a massive power boost, going from low captain level to beating on a mid-level captain's Bankai without Vollstanding. The ones after it grant smaller boosts as another 6 in addition to his Vollstanding, which was relative to a bankai, couldn't overcome the Bankai of Renji.

That mask vs renji fight really confuses me , if renji can get this strong then why didn't they just have everyone train in the soul palace , instead of having kenpachi kill unohana , just send him to the soul palace to train . It's also makes what happened to the zero squad that much more disappointing, you see how strong renji got and you expect to see twice that awesomeness from the zero squad , but they get offscreened , godammit kubo .

Talking about power , I noticed that way back in the soul reaper Vs espada arc , I felt like barragan could've been stronger , like I'm aware his Respira was a very strong ability in and of itself but he himself didn't have much of an impact , especially since he was ranked as number 2 , also something I believed you mentioned about barragan was that he didn't use a cero in his fight with soi fon , and I thought that was strange too since he's extremely old , I heard a rumor that he was the first hollow or something so I got thinking , back in the chapter where you could see the top 3 espada showing off their spiritual pressure , hallibel is yellow , starrk is blue and barragan is red , and all espada have cero's that are connected to their color (gran ray cero and what not) , what if all basic cero's are red BECAUSE of barragan? IF he was the first hollow and he so-to-say , created cero's? Just a theory / idea

I've always been of the opinion that a large part of the royal training power boost was temporary. The super reiatsu they took in when they ate Hikifune's food shouldn't really grant a permanent strength boost, as once it's all been expelled/used they will be forced to used they own gathered power. When Renji fought Mask, he was riding his super reiatsu high still, and that's why his power was awkwardly higher than it should have been. Rukia even advised Renji not to over do it and rush into fights because she knew the power boost wasnt going to last.

Theres also this bit in the Unohana v Kenpachi fight where Unohana mentions that Zaraki now has allies worthy of standing up to him and one of the characters shown is Renji(Alongside Ichigo and Byakuya I think).

I am rewatching Bleach and just realized that Ichigo managed to become a proxy soul reaper and then defeat 2 captain level (Kenpachi and Byakuya) within 2 weeks of "training".

people just focus on rose and kensei defeat not how they got defeated,they were stronger than mask (atleast rose) but they misunderstood his power and took him lightly thats why it fired back.people complain about rose telling him that his bankai works with sound but who would have though that mask was gonna crush his ear drums,i didnt and i bet a lot didnt aswell

Power levels kind of got thrown out the window all throughout the show imo, Vizards that aren't Shinji were all pretty weak (even then Shinji didn't really do anything) even though they should all be Captain level having been Captains and Lieutenants and then being amplified by the Vizard/hollow side. Also the Espada rankings how we had Yammy who was suddenly rank 0.

I don't think it "broke" the Power Level. Even though they're Vizards and were Captains, they've spent a lot of time in Human World, we're we don't even know if they kept training or fighting Hollows, and even if they trained, it'ld only be within the Vizards reunited there, which at some point would make you stop growing cause you're just fighting the same people all the time and when Rose and Kensei fought Mask, they didn't exactly knew about James and their Bankais were easily counterable by him: Kensei needed to be touching him and Rose needed his ears to be intact. Renji on the other hand, was training since Soul Society arc to achieve his Captain Level, and even went to train on a high spiritual place with the man who named Zanpakutou itself, and since their bodies are made of Reishi, training in a place with enhances it in you, will make you hell of a lot stronger. Mask was very hulky but all his "power" came more fom his regeneration than anything, since, without it, Rose and Kensei were "easily" dealing with him. When Renji came to play, he was a man who has been fighting "non stop" for at least 1 year and 6 months, had been healed by the master oh healing, gained the right to his sword with the master of swords and had his combat, Reishi and his Zanpakutou name revelaed to him by the leader of the Zero Division, AND, he knew about James already and the need to deal with him first, which already rendered Mask without healing for half of the battle. I thibk what confuses people is that they focus too much on the "Captain Level" part and forget Captains themselves have different power levels and they also forget how long people actually been without proper training and fighting in universe. Even the Soul Society in the first invasion had a gap of almost 200 hundred years of proper fighting since the Quincy extermination. And yeah, the Power level was a little rushed like all the ending of Bleach, but the Power Level wasn't brokenin this fight, even the Sternritter have different levels of power and some great ones are not even that much Battle Oriented. I think everyone was on the same power level in this fight, at leasg in regards to the captains, 2 Vizards who weren't using their masks and have spent more than 100 years far away from the captain mantle, and a Lieu-tenant with Captain Level already who was fighting his way to development. Heck we even had Ikkaku as Captain Level at the first invasion but the guys was just third seat! And also, Bleach power level is not very very quantifyable since it's HEAVILY connected to the emotional and mental side, as well as beinf connected to how much you know yourself, your relation with your powers, your state of mind, which goes against the numerical politics of common Power scaling where you kinda give somethinf a value and that thing will almost always be this value. Well, I think you people got my point, sorry if it was confusing

James was the Sternritter 100% Its how he was doing the weird things since he was far stronger than he looked.

Mask is clearly a stand user; James is his stand, and "Cheer-ee-oh" is it's ability . . . .

The one thing I did not hear you consider is the fact that the "pluses" as you call them might not work to the same level each time it is used. As in there might be diminishing returns as each cheer is made especially once you get past a certain number of them it probably drops off significantly.

Maybe Renji is in a different tier of power because of his training in the squad zero's lake thigmajig

I had this question since I was a kid: When ichigo first fought byakuya, his speed and power is already about the same as Byakuya. I think at that moment his bankai is weaker than Byakuya's but his half-hollowfied form made he as strong as Byakuya if not more. Later when Ichigo fights Grimmjow, he has to go full-masked +bankai to match Grimmjow. Does that make Byakuya weaker than Grimmjow RF? What really broke my sense of power level is, when ichigo fought Ulquiorra, with his new hollow mask, he can't even react to ulquiorra's speed and power. I was deeply confused that if this is some other captain, they would already been killed. Because I admit Byakuya is not the strongest captain, but he should be somewhere at the middle. Which means at least half of the captains would be one shot by ulquiorra.... Another thing I don't understand is. Toshiro had a very tough time with Luppi, which is NO.6, and he failed to kill Luppi even with a preparing time and an ambush. Later on, he can hold up against Tear Halibel. Although he didn't win, but I was expecting the situation to be worse for him. So I'm not surprised about the power scale in TYBW. It was mentioned that the power of hollow is like poison to Quincy, but non of the Vizard captain thought of using hollowfication or cero against their enemies. It would be cool to see that, then Quincy would show that during these years they somehow developed a way to counter hollow's power. That would make more sense. And I do agree with your Vizard ranking. Only Tosen fully utilized this power, maybe too much. But the mask+bankai should makes Vizard stronger than normal Captain class with bankai. It's funny that only ichigo is smart enough to use mask+bankai at the same time. But I guess there are just too many details that Kubo doesn't have enough energy to complete them.

I’ve really grown to love your vids. Always kinda hated how you said “that’s a video for another time” and then never made them but when you do, it’s awesome lol

The power levels definitely escalated but I don't find this fight to discard them completely. If Ichigo got as powerful as he did while healing and training, it makes sense for Renji to at least get as strong as he did. By using your method of determining how strong Masculine is as well as Fullbring bankai ichigo at the start of this arc, I think Renji in shikai at this point was just above that level of power and it would make perfect sense given how strong ichigo was even at that point in the series (it was that ichigo that was labeled a war potential before he got his true zanpakuto and performed better against Yhwach than anyone else at that point even while slightly injured from his previous fight). As for Masculine, he had the advantage the whole time anyway as soon as Rose and Kensei told him how their own abilities work considering how he took advantage of that information almost immediately after (displaying an intelligence feat more than power, even with the James buffs). With Mask reaching the power he did shortly there after and fighting Renji, it makes sense that now going into bankai, he would be as strong as he was there to show such dominance (much to like how Quilge needed his holy form and absorb Ayon, who he considered close in power, to contest a non restricted bankai ichigo at the start of the arc). Also, people forget just how many buffs Renji got before hand as well. After getting beaten, he was healed by the 0 Division, of which their hot springs heal and buff you, hence Tenjiro's punch test, the time spent training with the best shinigami at the time, acquiring the true extent of his zanpakuto's power, and returning to Soul Society in 0 Division attire that buffs you as well as stated by Shutara, making four significant buffs heading into his fight with Mask, with Bankai still left on the shelf until the end. Makes perfect sense.

Renji is one of my fav characters he just feels so awkwardly used after the SS arc lol. Even this arc should of been his story coming full circle but it really doesnt

What if... His power is boosted per opponent? I see him as a wrestler like old school WWF. One battle One cheer, after one is defeated. RESET.

I honestly think because it was the last arc, Kubo just said fuck it, let give Renji a real win.

Vegeta: Wrestling’s fake… MaskDeMasculine: 👀 Star Lariat! Star!! ⭐️

One of my fav TYBW fights featuring my all time fav Bleach character and his magnificent new and dope Bankai

What about an Orihime analysis! That would be pretty good good over how really OP her power was

You didn't consider the 10x boost when the star appears on his fist. What's crazy is that Renji blocked those with his bare hand, yet was blown away by the One Mile Arts from Mask's transformation, which are just shockwaves made by Mask's gestures.

I can't say it made that much sense for kensei and rose to get annihilated in masks base form then for renji to take his full power technique without a scratch and one shot him. Worst ep so far for me but mask was Hella fun

The lack of explicit limitations and restrictions to the powers in Bleach especially in the last arc results in characters simply getting Dragonball training montages and powering up instead of utilizing unique techniques and strategies to get the upper hand I always appreciated Ichigo and Renji’s second fight in Soul Society due to the subtle nuances characters get an upper hand on each other like Ichigo discovering the shikai’s limitation of 3 strikes before it detract s and so forth

No bankai was never stated to be just 5-10x in power in chapter 120 yuroichi just said In GENERALLY it 5-10 . On average bankai are concerned to be 5-10 mean the mutpler can increase

I haven't even read the last arc, but these vids are so entertaining I cant help myself!

I think Mask was still just physically overwhelming more then overall stronger. He destroyed Kensei but likely would have lost to Rose if Rose hadn’t explained the bankai the way he did. Renji’s power level I think puts him in second tier captain level. Still under Shunsui Kenpachi Mayuri Byakuya

Kenpachi without eyepatch lost to shikai Ichigo, Kenpachi with eye path defeats Tousen who used bankai, bankai Ichigo was losing badly to Grimmjow who didn't use his resurrection or even his sword, non-bankai Tousen speed blitz and cuts of Grimmjow's arm, and Tousen at full power lost to Shuhei and Komamura. Does any of this make sense to you?

Basically, this wanna-be superstar is just cheering for himself. The counter to him would be someone who is really good at talking someone down. Probably a local Soul Society Karen will do the job.

Mask and James remind me of Yachiru and Kenpachi. Especially when you take into consideration James powers up Mask by cheering. Yachiru powers up Kenpachi by unlocking the power of his bankai.

To me the power level broke when vasto lorde ichigo vs ulquiorra hapeened then it shattered to pieces when aizen fought mugetsu

I agree that Mask's power builds on itself, but my headcanon is that there is a diminishing return to the cheers. That makes it less ridiculous how strong Renji gets.

Eos the only captains that for sure beat Renji are: Kyoraku (1st), Byakuya (6st), Hitsugaya (10th), Kenpachi (11th) and Mayuri (12th). Rukia (13th) and Shinji (5th) are debtable, but he beats the rest (2, 3, 4, 7, 8 and 9th).

If we assume Mask´s power cannot go to infinity, but has a set max output and each chear just brings it closer to that max, it could be like reciprocal graph, with the first chears having the greatest effect and every subsequent having lesser and lesser effect

I never really considered it. Renji is now stronger than several captains 😮

I think the cheers exponentially increase Mask's power at first but then after a few cheers the power boost declines exponentially so he gets less power with each cheer after a certain point

EOS Captains that I think are most likely stronger than Renji: Shunsui, Shinji, Byakuya, Hitsugaya (when in adult bankai mode), Kenpachi. EOS Captains that I think are roughly on-par with Renji: Hitsugaya (bankai, not adult), Mayuri, Rukia EOS Captains that I think are weaker than Renji: Sui-Feng, Rose, Isane, Iba, Lisa, Kensei.

Got my teacher to let me watch this since it's an educational video lol

The problem i have with people saying "Captain level" is that they generalize that statement. There are 3 Tiers of Captain level and those 3 beaten by Mask are Tier 3 the lowest. Soul Society has a Ranking like the Espada have and a Raiatsu Rankin of 1-3 is a Captain. Just to show you the difference of those 3 levels: Rank 1: Yamamoto,Unahana,Shunsui Rank2: Byakuya,Zaraki (pre Shikai,Bankai),Ukitake (because of his stamina issues) Rank3: Komamura,Mayuri I hope you understand the difference of power is like Heaven and Earth even inside the Captain Rankings. So when someone tells you character XY was Captain level you should always ask "what Tier of Captain ?" As for Mask he clearly was a lower Tier Captain level yes. Tier 2 is already getting rather toasty for him let alone Tier 1. The term Captain level is heavily overused without actual context. Kensai for example even as a Vicard is still just a Tier 3 Captain. In fact the only 2 Vicards that make it into Tier 2 are Love and Shinji. Shinji has a Bankai forbidden to use in Soul Society because its just that powerful and Love was able to deliver some blows against Starrk just in his Shikai....heavy blows. Rose is also beaten badly by Mask even with his Bankai because he is so stupid and gave it away. Hiory,Lisa and Mashiro are not even Captains Lisa just became one because Gotei13 desperately needed one. So even Captain level Vicards can be weak enough and land in Captain Tier3.

It could also be that mask's power has diminishing returns, so the more cheers he gets the less effective each one is.

im pretty sure james is based on the "BUT ITS REAL TO ME" sobbing guy in the wrestling bleachers. old OG youtube meme. basically there are some amature pro wrestlers doing a meet and greet and this guy "jeff" is thanking and congratulating the wrestlers for everything they do to their bodies for the sport. ive since day 1 assumed james was based on this meme. they even look the same.

Ken hasnt evolved his bamkai is a few hundred years renji kept evolving and learning and his bankai

So my running theory is that the Superstar is not actually the power to cheer, but applies wrestling logic to fights. Masque was ganged up on, and as such, as he starts with the role of the face, he gets stronger. As his fans cheer, since he's the face, he gets stronger. When Renji, however, comes back to defeat him, Masque loses the role of the face and instead becomes a heel. This in turn grants Renji the upper hand, as Renji turns the logic of his power on its head. Masque's power's vagueness comes back to bite him.

The only thing I didn't like about the last arc's power levels is that they are prone to NO LIMITS FALLACY like how Gremmy can IMAGINE anything, how Uryu can NO U any effect, or how Yhwach can, well... They don't really have apparent limits and if you think about it you can even scale them to universal to even multiversal levels especially Yhwach except that scaling them to the characters they have fought such as Ichigo and such who don't really have that much power gets in the way of that. It's all very confusing.

Also known as how renji because useful for once

I think this fight would’ve made more sense if two things had happened 1) they had shown even one page of Renji being told why he was now stronger by Ichibe. And 2) if Masc was one of the Schutzstaffel and was justified as strong enough to take down everyone he did

Renji casually shitting on Kensei and Rose's status in Shikai

It's even funnier when Renji later gets one shotted by Gerards breath. LOL

Byakuya should’ve died in the first invasion. Would’ve made the first invasion one of the most emotional arcs in shonen history. Byakuya’s death and Yamamoto’s revenge would’ve made it so good. Tbh bleach should’ve had more deaths

1.go back to The lost agent arc, where renji states he was training to fight people on aizen level 2.obviously squad zero training would give him a high buff 3.kense/rose would of won that fight if not for there arogance 4.im not sure but I think the captain made a promise to yama to never use there hollow mask 5.almost every anime/manga a few characters will be left out especially if the cast is too big. 6. If Kubo had gave the shine to the visored y'all would be screaming they aren't popular and other things.

I think we all knew this was a bit of an asspull but we accepted it 'cause a) SS had taken enough L's by this time and b) Renji was dire need of a powerup lol

This just makes me even more upset that Iba becomes a Captain.

Cant wait for this fight now the anime is finally here, its mad this Renji could probably beat any captain in shikai including Shunsui

The Zero squad training is such a cop out for Rukia, Renji and Byakuya(this one should've stayed dead).

Look, power scaling be damned, I'm just glad renji got such a big win.

I always thought that James was Mask's own subconscious coming to life. He kept telling himself he can beat his opponent and once he activated his volstandig his egomania reached levels where he thought he is unbeatable. Also an interesting 'what if' would be, the following: What if Mask's power Resets everytime James 'dies'? If it does, Mask returns back to 'normal' JUST before fighting with Renji, and also puts Renji's power level on a more tangible level in my opinion. It would also further your theory that all the 'mini james' are seperate +1s. Renji kills James by slicing him and to quickly regain power, all the mini james start chanting.

Glad you said you will redo the ranking, please include Vice-captains also because, Renji, Hisagi & Ikkaku should be in there

10:19 "there's a lot of demolishing going on"

Bleach does not deserve you. Horrible written. Just an action manga with a god damn scholar reviewing it

I believe mask to be roughly stark level. Even though love and rose only used shikai, they did use their masks against stark which should put them at bankai level without a mask. Stark also fought them at the same time whereas mask fought them back to back and stark had just had scuffles with two of the strongest captains. So it’s fair to say bankai renji is a fair bit above stark, probably around gin level. Still well below shunsui, adult toshiro, post royal guard byakuya and Kenny.

Royal Realm Training=Hyperbolic Time Chamber in sense of the plot.

He's like Starbrand for Marvell. He's given enough power to fight on the level of his current opponent. t. This seems clear because he can only get the power up when he's loosing.He has to be the underdog for his power to work.

"It's not just a matter of who is weaker or stronger, it's interesting because there's no measuring who will win or lose." Thorkell the Tall