Bleach: Awakened — Chapter 74 - The Cause and Effect of the Shinenju

A silence like death fell over everyone. Ichigo hung his head slightly, his expression unreadable. Senna stared at him, blank-faced, unable to find words for a long moment.

The captains and vice-captains didn't dare breathe too loud. None of them wanted to be on the receiving end of whatever Ichigo was feeling right now. They'd done nothing wrong, but in a moment like this, that didn't necessarily protect you.

"Well..." After a good while, Senna came back to herself and smiled. "I thought it was going to be something serious. Turns out all they need is me."

"Come to think of it, I am the Shinenju to begin with. Even this name—Senna—I don't know whose it was. I never had any ties to anything in this world. A task like this suits me perfectly."

"If I'm remembering right, the first time I woke up was by a riverbank. The passage to the Valley of Screams should be there." Senna skipped ahead, turned back, and gave Ichigo a faint smile. "You've been by my side all day, Ichigo."

"Won't you walk me through the last stretch?"

The Valley of Screams.

Nestled within the cracks of space, a strange pocket dimension hung suspended. Its ground was formed by interlocking ridges of yellow mountain peaks, and overhead stretched a false, brilliant blue sky.

"Ugh..."

In the middle of the valley, a white-haired middle-aged man had collapsed on the ground, utterly spent. His entire left arm was gone. A massive sword wound ran across his torso.

"What a terrifying person... how could someone like that exist in the World of the Living?"

His eyes vacant, he stared up at that false sky as white Blanks rose from the ground and surged toward his body in a steady stream.

Hisss,

"It's no use..."

It was different from before. The secret technique of healing himself with Blanks had stopped working. The instant they drew near the wound, the residual golden spiritual pressure would reignite like dying embers and annihilate them entirely.

"Ha... so I won't get to witness the destruction of Soul Society after all."

He turned his gaze to the side. The white-haired man looked toward the mounting frame, the place where the Shinenju should have been secured, but in its place sat the Kototsu remains collected from the Dangai. The effect was a step down, but it would be enough.

"What a... pity!"

In his final moments, his mind turned to everything that had come before. Born into darkness from the very start, elevated as a lord and yet remaining a pitiful creature that could never step into the light.

Year after year, tormented in the dark, watching those around him leave in agony one by one, he had abandoned the stance his clan had held for so long, and changed his goal from reclaiming Soul Society to destroying it.

"To not get to see the destruction of Soul Society."

The words left him in a murmur. The white-haired man closed his eyes, dissolved into drifting motes of spirit particles, and brought an end to that long and yet terribly brief life lived entirely in the dark.

Seireitei.

"Kido Cannon charging—begin!"

In an open clearing, the captains of the Gotei 13 had assembled. Not far away, a massive cannon frame flickered with golden light as countless Soul Reapers poured their energy into it.

"Captain-Commander." Jushiro Ukitake spoke quietly. "Estimated strike window in approximately five minutes. In ten minutes, Soul Society and the World of the Living will reach the critical threshold and collide."

"...What is the situation on the World of the Living side."

"Word back from Captain Sui-Feng." Shunsui Kyoraku pressed the brim of the hat down. "World of the Living Special Operations Squad Captain Ichigo Kurosaki and Shinenju Senna are currently en route to the passage leading to the Valley of Screams."

"Estimated arrival in approximately three minutes."

"Is that so..." Captain-Commander Yamamoto considered for a moment, then looked at the towering Kido Cannon and said evenly: "Then we wait until the final moment. Firing at five minutes or firing at nine and a half makes no difference either way."

"Use the time to see clearly, just what kind of person our Special Operations Squad's captain truly is."

En route to the riverbank.

"Hey, Ichigo, I remembered something last night." Senna skipped along, cheerful as if heading out on a picnic. "My relationship with my father wasn't great. We argued a lot. Sometimes it even came to blows."

"And then one evening, I saw him again, my father, holding a portrait of me, his face full of grief."

The night had deepened. In the moonlight, Senna moved her arms and danced as she walked. The movements were completely uncoordinated, and yet in that moment she looked like a spirit dancing on air, something dreamlike about her.

"Even though I'm a Shinenju who carries the memories of Blanks," Senna slowed her movements and looked up at the bright moonlight, "the only memories I have are from the person I am right now."

"Perhaps the one who formed the core of the Shinenju at the very end was the original owner of this form."

"I'm not human, and I'm not a Soul Reaper." She turned. In the moonlight, Senna showed Ichigo a smile that was both radiant and sorrowful. "I'm just someone with no past."

"And no future. Nothing but a Shinenju. No one will remember me."

"...How could that be." Ichigo still had his head down, voice coming out low and muffled. "How could you have no past? You and I met yesterday. Today you spent the whole day with me."

"And tomorrow we can also..."

"There is no tomorrow." Senna cut him off, looking at Ichigo, grief written across her face. "I have no tomorrow, Ichigo."

"I'm going to go calm the Valley of Screams."

"...It isn't even your fault." Ichigo clenched his fist. His words carried a trace of anger and self-reproach both. "It's the Kototsu... if they hadn't used those remains, none of this would have happened..."

"If I hadn't destroyed the Kototsu in the first place, this never would have..."

"No, I'm actually grateful you destroyed the Kototsu back then." Warmth spread across Senna's face like sunlight after a long winter. "If it weren't for you, the me who exists as the Shinenju would never have been born."

"And I would never have met you, Ichigo."

Ichigo said nothing.

"I'm glad I got to meet you, you know." Senna kept walking; the lakeshore was less than half a minute away now. "It's not quite love, I suppose. I don't really understand what love means as a concept, I have no memories to draw from, after all."

"But this, letting my final moment be Senna departing as someone who was cared for, rather than a Shinenju simply fading away as a thing that stabilized space, for that, I'm truly grateful to you, Ichigo."

"So please don't feel any pressure about it." Senna's smile was radiant and sad, and then it turned just a little playful. "You're only sixteen, after all. You don't have to carry all of this on your shoulders."

"Just now, a flash of memory passed through my mind. Every cause has its effect."

"What do you mean."

"Simply put, because you destroyed the Kototsu, I was born, the Shinenju who carries the memories of the Valley of Screams. That is the cause." Senna swayed her head side to side as she explained. "And then, because the Kototsu remains agitated the Valley of Screams, destabilizing the space and threatening disaster, it fell to me as the Shinenju to mend it. That is the effect."

"Whatever cause, there will be a corresponding effect. It's perfectly logical, isn't it."

"So don't wear that sorrowful expression. You didn't kill me, Ichigo. I... am something that was never meant to exist in the first place."

➤ Next: Clean Up Your Own Mess