

In Season 10, after Nnoitra survives the Cero Doble that Nelliel ate and shot
back, Nnoitra said that it had been years since Nelliel was an Espada.

From my understanding the Espada only started to form after Aizen got the
Hogyoku and I don't see how it's been years since he took the Hogyoku out of
Rukia.

So how was Aizen building up the Espada before getting the Hogyoku?


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bleach
How was Aizen building up the Espada before getting the Hogyoku?


**SPOILER ALERT for those who haven't finished Aizen's Arc!**

Just a guess based on the fact that there were 2 Hougyoku. The fact that there
were 2 Hougyoku was disclosed during a flashback of Ichimaru Gin's memory as
he was dying.

There were 2 hougyoku, one made by Urahara and another made by Aizen. The
latter was then fused into the first as both were incomplete. The fused one is
the perfected Hougyoku that was hidden inside Rukia.

Since there was years prior to the story then a reasonable answer would be
Aizen was using his own Hougyoku. This is because the other Hougyoku was in
Urahara's lab. But then again, since it is Aizen that we are talking about
here, another possibility would be that after both was fused, Aizen used
Kyouka Suigetsu's Kanzen Saimin (Perfect Hypnosis) on Urahara to make him
believe that the Hougyoku was still with him while in actual Aizen took it
with him to perform some experiments with the Hollows.

The second theory has a weakness in that why would Aizen return it to Urahara,
which suggest that there might be a time limit to Kyouka Suigetsu's Kanzen
Saimin. It would be possible to determine which one happened had we know the
extend of Aizen's Hougyoku's power. What we currently know is the power of the
already fused Hougyoku and there is no way we can know the limit of the two
original Hougyoku since Bleach has already ended without it being disclosed.
It is safe to say that the original Hougyoku would be weaker compared to the
fused Hougyoku, but what abilities each can grant, whether both grant the same
abilities or not, well, we wouldn't know.


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I believe the scene in question is from chapter 291 and episode 192, so this
is what I'm going to work off of.

According to the [wiki](http://bleach.wikia.com/wiki/Espada#History):

> The original Espada were already in existence sometime before Aizen's
> defection from Soul Society and acquisition of the Hōgyoku.

So this would mean that Aizen did not have either Hōgyoku before the Espada
were being gathered.

Then to answer the second half of your question, in the scene you mentioned
Nnoitra is talking about how it has been years since Nelliel has taken her
full form as an Espada due to the trama he inflicted on her long before
rendering her appearance to that of a small child.

[!["Nnoitra said that it had been years since Nelliel was an
Espada."](https://i.stack.imgur.com/kRfB0.jpg)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/kRfB0.jpg)

[![It was because she had "vanished" from Las
Noches.](https://i.stack.imgur.com/nSyb5.jpg)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/nSyb5.jpg)

So in this instance he was not saying that it had been years since Nelliel had
_become_ an Espada, but that it had been years since she _returned_ to being
an Espada.


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The short answer: by being a magnificent bastard with an overpowered shikai.

The more general answer varies slightly between each Espada. Aizen would find
the to-be Espada and prey upon their weaknesses and desires to lure them to
his banner. Sometimes they just wanted ever more power, either because they
had a singular lust for it (like Grimmjow), or because they wished to use it
to some ends.

> For example, Halibel wanted it to protect her friends/fraccion from the
> aggressions of other hollows.

And Starrk

> Just wanted companionship. Chapter 375, Page 7, Aizen finds and recruits
> Starrk: [![Chapter 375, Page
> 7](https://i.stack.imgur.com/fONBZ.jpg)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/fONBZ.jpg)

But sometimes brute force comes into play.

> At one point, someone explains that the reason that Aizen can keep such a
> powerful group of Espada functioning together is by his sheer, overwhelming
> power. In Chapter 371, for example, we see how he recruited Barragan. It was
> basically by humiliating him. Here's a few of those pages: Page 4 [![Chapter
> 371 Page
> 4](https://i.stack.imgur.com/3ikH5.jpg)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/3ikH5.jpg)
> Page 7 [![Chapter 371 Page
> 7](https://i.stack.imgur.com/fxyzZ.jpg)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/fxyzZ.jpg)
> Page 8 [![Chapter 371 Page
> 8](https://i.stack.imgur.com/9XgO4.jpg)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/9XgO4.jpg)
> Page 11 [![Chapter 371 Page
> 11](https://i.stack.imgur.com/QfCt4.jpg)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/QfCt4.jpg)
> Page 12 [![Chapter 371 Page
> 12](https://i.stack.imgur.com/Jj0BK.jpg)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/Jj0BK.jpg)
> Page 13 [![enter image description
> here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/4MW2h.jpg)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/4MW2h.jpg)

One thing that may be worth noting here:

> When we see Aizen recruiting Barragan, he has his "soul society" haircut, so
> this is before he's revealed as the bad guy, and so before he has extracted
> the Hogyouku from Rukia. When we see him recruiting Starrk, though, he has
> his "post betrayal" haircut, so this event occurs after he has the Hogyouku
> from Rukia.


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