Bleach scaling to universal/multiversal does not make sense narratively and does not hold up under scrutiny
Universal/Multiversal doesn’t really make sense narratively if you actually read the manga and is supported by a single statement with no actual feats to back it up. At least in Dragon Ball, despite it being extremely inconsistent, at least it has an actual feat to support multiversal scaling. Bleach doesn’t even have feats to actually support this.
The feat most commonly cited to support the idea of multiversal Ichigo is supporting the weight of the universe and being a Soul King candidate. The problem with this is that if Ichigo really is multiversal, then every character in every fight besides Yhwach should be one shot by Ichigo, no concept of diff.
Since this is not the case, you mean to argue that character went from country/continent at a high ball to multiversal after one training session. Considering how Ichigo has heavily stat gapped every other character constantly, that seems a bit unreasonable. Also, if that’s the case, why was Ichigo ever viewed as special and why did Squad Zero not bathe every Shinigami in those pools if they can easily upgrade a Shinigami from having finite power to having infinite power.
Because of how unreasonable a multiversal scale seems, it’s far more likely that Ichigo is stabilizing the universe as a catalyst rather than an actual universal feat. It’s like how a concrete pillar in a skyscraper doesn’t have large building level durability, but if you destroy it the skyscraper will collapse. This makes even more sense when you consider that Bleach cosmology is held together by silly string as it was able to be destabilized simply by Yhwach and the Quincies killing a bunch of hollows is Hueco Mundo.
Now you might say, “Senjumaru shook the three world with her Bankai,” and my response is, you don’t need to be multiversal to do this. Unlike the shaking the universe feat in Dragon Ball, there is no indicated destruction from Senjumaru’s feat, only that people could feel the universe shaking. As an example, in real life two distant black holes colliding causes ripples in space time that “shake the universe”. Senjumaru’s Banki simply had enough spiritual pressure to create waves akin to this, but to a significantly lower degree. Even if you assume her Bankai is as strong as two black holes colliding, you can only really scale that to solar system level, which is still far weaker than multiversal.
Now, if you’re going to ask, “but how did it shake all three universes with only solar system level AP?”The answer is that the only condition for the waves to travel between universes is for them to have a 5th dimensional axis to move on between universes. This gives no indication of AP, it’s simply a direction that it can move since joules, the unit for measuring energy, is Independent of spacial dimension.
Another question may be “But the ripples will only move at light speed.” This is an appeal to reality argument, because if Bleach is FTL, our concept of relatively clearly doesn’t apply so it’s completely believable that the waves could move FTL.
Now you may also ask about “what about Kenpachi escaping Gremmy’s space?” The feat is clearly cutting through space, which is a hax ability and doesn’t give an AP scaling indication. If you want to wank this feat to galaxy level, it’s literally stated that Kenpachi was boosted by Gremmy because of how strong Gremmy was imagining Kenpachi to be. This feat is generally irrelevant.
When you watch/read Bleach through this lens, the high end is clearly country/continent level. I’m not going to downplay Ichigo to mountain or island level, but things like Ulquiora’s spears being continental is completely unfounded. If you calculate the power for the mountain passive destroying feats by Dangai Ichigo when he was fighting Aizen, it’s around county to continent level. Things like the Sokyoku destroying the soul society is clearly not an individual attack, but more what it can be used for by Aizen over time when you reasonably read the panel.
At most you can only really high ball EoS Ichigo to Senjumaru’s hypothetical scaling, which is solar system level.
I’m not trying to be a Bleach down player, but at least Dragon Ball had an on-screen feat that at a surface level is clearly universal without convoluted cosmology scaling, and with cosmology can get to multiversal. Bleach doesn’t even have that. It has a vague statement that when analyzed with 70 other vague statements gets it to multiversal. That just doesn’t really hold up to scrutiny, especially compared to the narrative shown in the story and on-screen feats.
My conclusion is that aside from the Soul King, no one in Bleach is anywhere close to universal. A reasonable scale to continental, with a high ball being solar system level of you want to wank Senjumaru.