Originally posted by Q99
Chad has spiritual power he was channeling, even before it fully manifested as an arm. Yea, they're physical to other soul-stuff, but that's part of the point. Every time someone who's a soul reaper or hollow is being cut, that's their soul. We see them leave their bodies behind often enough, and their normal forms are made of soul-particles.Zanpaku-to literally means soul-cutter sword.
It's a central premise of the series.
(Plus there's enough funky zanpaku-to powers, some of 'em are bound to work on various Logia).
It blew a huge hole in the giant stone dome on a glancing hit, in a lesser form.
http://www.onemanga.com/Bleach/347/06/
That dome is multi-kilometers across, so that's a lotta mass destroyed.
The latter one, that missed, made a blast almost the size of the city and did blow up some plateau things that might've been huge buildings or natural formations that were caught in it's area. It wasn't just empty desert that was hit.
You make good points.
Ulq's blast didn't only destroy it, it vaped it. That's even more energetic than a large explosion. It takes more energy to vape crap than to just blow it up.
Also, Chad beating Hollow's with anything physical more than proves that souls can be beat down by any physical thing.
And the opposite is also true: Ichigo saved the day, multiple times, for humans. Some aware, some not aware.
One thing, though: Broli cannot see Yamamoto.