Seijūrō stood at the lecture podium, a stub of chalk between his fingers.

The blackboard held a Kidō schematic, the Reiatsu flow path of Hadō #20, Shining Sphere, mapped out in three layers of colored chalk: the condensation point of the light core, the curvature of the dispersion ring, and the outermost brightness-focusing ring. The core of Shining Sphere was light, not heat. The light core expanded the instant it released. The dispersion ring pushed the radiation outward in all directions. The focusing ring controlled the intensity, too loose, and the light scattered without blinding; too tight, and the core devoured itself, its brightness dimming instead.

His chalk paused on that outermost ring.

"The essence of Shining Sphere is not attack. It's interference. It won't burn anyone, won't leave a single physical mark. But it can strip an opponent of their sight completely, for a window of time. Not harm—deprivation. Pulling their vision out of the fight, so you and your allies have room to counterattack or fall back."

He had taught these things. Aoki had remembered them.

The dismissal bell rang. Students packed up and filtered out in twos and threes. Seijūrō stood alone at the podium and wiped the schematic from the board. Chalk dust drifted down and settled onto his cuffs.

Outside the window, white petals were still drifting through the courtyard.

A Kidō Corps member was waiting in the corridor when he stepped out.

The man bowed slightly.

"Kidō Instructor. Hollow traces have been detected in East District 12 of the Rukongai. The Spiritual Wave Measurement Research Division has picked up abnormal Reishi fluctuations. Squad 2's Onmitsukidō has already dispatched an advance team and requires Kidō support. Your Shunpo speed has been assessed as capable of keeping pace with them, and the Grand Kidō Chief sent me to notify you directly. This mission falls under Onmitsukidō operations—no official report is required."

Seijūrō nodded.

The flagstone streets of East District 12 threw off a pale gray sheen in the afternoon light.

By the time he arrived, the fight had already been going for a while. Three Hollows held the district in a triangular formation, one at each corner, their Reiatsu spreading outward and weaving into a net above the rooftops. Any soul caught beneath that net had its Reishi slowly drawn away, like water seeping through a punctured sack.

The Onmitsukidō advance team was already inside it. They wore black shinobi gear, faces masked to the eyes, and they were fast. Shunpo cut clean lines across the gravel as they sliced in past a Hollow's flank, Zanpakutō blades catching the last of the sun. But the net was contracting. The three Hollows pulsed their Reiatsu in sync, and every pulse drew the net a ring tighter. The operatives threaded through the gaps, pushing their Shunpo faster and faster, and still the net kept pace.

Seijūrō moved.

Reiatsu detonated beneath his feet. He crossed the gravel from the district entrance to the center of the net, ten-plus meters, toes touching down in short, rapid beats, each landing already loading the next burst before it was needed. Small rings of pale dust kicked up from the gravel with every step.

The Onmitsukidō operatives streaked past him on both sides. Their Shunpo was exceptional, the product of training from childhood, faster than most Shinigami in the Seireitei by a wide margin. Seijūrō matched them. Not barely: synchronized. His toes hit the ground and broke away at almost the exact same instant as theirs. Same spacing between landing points. Same rhythm through each weight shift. Same timing on every Reiatsu release.

He raised his head from the center of the net. The Reiatsu structure of all three Hollows laid itself out clearly in his perception: three nodes, three chains extending outward, closing into a single net across the air. To collapse it, he had to strike all three nodes simultaneously with equal Reiatsu interference.

Bakudō #62, Hundred-Pace Parapet. The first barrier unfurled beneath the eastern Hollow, pale blue light spreading across the gravel. The second, to the west. The third, to the north. Reiatsu burned through him fast; running three barriers in parallel demanded a degree of control that no ordinary Kidō release required. His breathing stayed even.

All three activated at once. Blue light erupted across the district. Three surges of Reiatsu drove inward from three directions simultaneously, cutting into the Reiatsu circuit linking the Hollows with surgical precision. The net broke apart.

The operatives drove in from all three sides at once. Blades swept through the dying light, and the masks of all three Hollows cracked apart at nearly the same moment. Start to finish, a handful of breaths.

Seijūrō stood on the gravel. The Reiatsu in his body recovered steadily, like seawater washing back over sand after a tide. His knees hadn't touched the ground. No one around him had been hurt. He hadn't even needed Dankū.

He had done it.

---

Seijūrō sat beneath an old pine tree, back against the rough bark, a cup of long-cold tea in his hand. He'd picked it up passing through Nanamagari on the way out and hadn't had the chance to drink it.

A soft sound came from the branches above.

Yoruichi dropped out of the canopy. Not a jump, a fall. Like a leaf shaken loose by the wind, direction unconstrained, landing point exact as if measured by a ruler. She touched down in front of him, short purple hair catching the last warmth of the sunset, golden eyes on his.

"You kept up with the Onmitsukidō's Shunpo today. In East District 12."

She sat down beside him, back against the same tree. In the dark gold light, her profile looked sharp enough to cut: the arc of her brow, the line of her nose, the angle of her jaw. She reached out and tapped his calf once, not hard, but exact.

"Progress is something you might not feel yourself. I can see it."

Seijūrō looked at her. "Still a long way to go."

"Obviously." Yoruichi let out a short laugh and tilted her head back, watching the sky through the gaps in the canopy. The last of the sunset fell into her pupils and turned the gold to amber. "But you've hit something important. Your Shunpo isn't just how you move anymore—you can sync it to someone else's rhythm. One person moving fast, that's speed. Syncing with the Onmitsukidō, that's tactics. Speed you can train. Tactics need judgment. Anticipating where to land, when to shift your weight, when to release Reiatsu: you were doing all of that before your toes ever hit the ground. That's not reaction. That's anticipation. Judgment isn't something you can teach someone. Either you have it or you don't."

Seijūrō looked at her. Her golden eyes held the pine branches and the open sky.

"Lady Yoruichi. Thank you for teaching me."

Yoruichi tilted her head, purple hair brushing her ear. She didn't answer right away. Instead she pushed off the tree trunk, stood, and walked out to the center of the training ground. The last sliver of sunlight stretched her shadow long across the gray-white gravel and traced a thin gold line along her silhouette: the curve of her shoulder blades, the line of her back, the faint hollow at the small of her back. She turned around. Golden eyes on him.

"Call me 'Lady' one more time and I'll hit you."

Wind moved through the pine forest. The needles rustled.

Yoruichi took a step. One step, and her body cut a straight line across the gravel from the center of the training ground to the base of the pine tree, ten-plus meters, the shape of her nearly leaving an afterimage in the air. She stopped in front of Seijūrō, and the wind she brought with her rippled the surface of the cold tea in his hand.

"Get up."

He got up.

"Follow me."

She turned and walked into the pine forest. Not fast, but every step landed steady and quiet. Seijūrō followed. Not chasing. Synchronizing. The instant her toes touched down, his did too. The instant her weight shifted, his shifted. The instant her Reiatsu released, his released.

The pines swept backward past them on both sides. Pine needles lifted in the wake of their passing and drifted down behind them in a long trail. After some unknown distance, Yoruichi stopped, planted on the needle-covered ground without a single stumble. Seijūrō pulled up half a step behind her.

She turned around. Her golden eyes settled on him, and the curve of her mouth slowly widened.

"Barely passing."

---

That night, moonlight spilled across the gravel training ground of the Onmitsukidō compound.

Yoruichi sat up in the pine tree. Seijūrō sat on the gravel below.

"You've been spending a lot of time around the Kidō Corps lately." Her voice came down from above.

"Grand Kidō Chief Iwakizhi Tetsusai came to see me." Seijūrō looked down at the cup in his hands. "He wants me to join the Kidō Corps. I'd be allowed to keep teaching at the Academy, and certain regulations wouldn't apply to me." A beat. "I agreed."

Yoruichi was quiet for a moment. "Makes sense. Your Kidō was never meant to stay inside a classroom."

"Lady Yoruichi," he said.

"Hmm?"

"Uh—Yoruichi?"

"Mhm~"

"Lately, something feels off. Like things are getting unsettled."

"You felt it too." The lazy ease was gone from her voice. "Soul disappearances in the Rukongai are increasing. It's not ordinary Hollow feeding, the vanished souls leave no Reishi trace at all. Like they've been pulled completely out of existence. Hollow appearances are also climbing, and we're seeing a surge of aberrant variants. Like those three linked ones in East District 12 today."

She dropped down from the tree and settled beside him.

"The Onmitsukidō is running a quiet investigation. Every lead goes cold."

Seijūrō's fingers tightened on the teacup. "Sōsuke Aizen."

Wind moved through the pines. The needles rustled.

Seijūrō looked at her profile. "Be careful."

Yoruichi turned her head, golden eyes on his. Then she smiled, not the lazy offhand one, not the quiet one that surfaced slowly from somewhere deep. This one was brighter, touched with a flicker of surprise and a deliberate kind of ease.

"What's going to happen?" she said. "I'm Flash Goddess Yoruichi."

He looked at her. Moonlight on her short purple hair. Moonlight on the curve of her dark shoulders. Moonlight on that bright smile at the corner of her mouth. He said nothing more. Some things only needed to be said once.

He stood, brushed the gravel from his shihakushō, and turned toward Shin'ō Academy.

"I'm heading out."

"Not staying the night?"

"I have class tomorrow."

---

A room somewhere beneath the Seireitei had no windows.

Every wall was set with monitors, pale blue light pouring from the screens and steeping the entire chamber in cold luminescence. The displays scrolled in real time: Reishi concentration data from across Soul Society, broken out by region, east, west, north, south Rukongai, soul counts for every block, Hollow appearance frequency, Reiatsu anomaly readings, all of it flowing across the monitors in numbers and waveforms.

A single figure sat before that wall of screens.

He wore a standard shihakushō. A Squad 9 seated officer's armband was fastened to his sleeve. Short dark purple hair, dark skin, lean build. He sat with his back straight, facing the array of hundreds of screens, as if watching something closely.

But he had no need to watch.

His eye sockets were empty. Only a field of pure white.

➤ Next: The Muguruma Ninth Division

Chapter 20 - The Muguruma Ninth Division

On the flagstone boulevard of the Seireitei, morning light filtered through the gaps in the tree canopy and fell onto the blue-gray pavement in scattered dappled patches.

Kisuke Urahara walked ahead of the others. The Squad 12 Captain's haori hung loose over his shoulders, lapels open, his pace so unhurried he might have been strolling through his own garden. His pale blond hair caught a soft sheen in the morning light. His army-green eyes were half-lidded, the corners of his mouth curved in that particular way that made it impossible to tell whether he was being serious or not. To his right, Hiyori Sarugaki followed with her brows drawn together and lips pressed into a hard line, looking as though she was enduring something she'd very much like to stop enduring. To his left walked a tall, gaunt man with short dark blue hair, his face covered in black-and-white paint that left only a pair of sharp eyes visible. He wore a Shihakushō and moved at a pace that was neither fast nor slow, falling into an odd synchrony with Urahara's casual stride. Mayuri Kurotsuchi. Third Seat of Squad 12, Vice President of the Technological Development Bureau.

Shinji Hirako came from the opposite direction. The Squad 5 Captain's haori draped over his shoulders, both hands tucked into his sleeves, his walk as relaxed as his expression. Sōsuke Aizen followed a step behind, Squad 5 Vice-Captain's Shihakushō, black-rimmed glasses, an easy smile. One looked like he couldn't be bothered with anything; the other was composed and courteous. They shouldn't have looked like they belonged together. Somehow they did.

Urahara stopped and raised a hand, his smile widening slightly.

"Good morning, Hirako-san."

Shinji's brow creased. His light golden hair slid off his shoulder as he tilted his head.

"Didn't I say just calling me Shinji was fine? You're really a pain."

Urahara smiled and said nothing.

Shinji's gaze drifted from him to the black-and-white-faced man. The lazy curve returned to his mouth.

"Morning, Mayuri."

Mayuri's eyes cut sideways toward Shinji, sharp and cold. His voice carried undisguised distaste.

"Why the familiarity? Didn't I tell you to call me Kurotsuchi? Insufferable."

Shinji blinked. His expression didn't change, but something tired moved through his eyes.

"You're a handful too, you know."

Urahara stood to the side, smile fixed, watching like a man who'd seen this play run every morning of his life. He was just about to say something,

A foot in a white tabi sock came flying in from the side and connected squarely with Shinji Hirako's shin. Not a heavy kick. A precise one.

"BALDY!"

Hiyori's voice detonated across the flagstone boulevard.

"What is your problem! You greet Kisuke, you greet Mayuri, but you completely ignore me — who do you think you're looking down on?!"

Shinji glanced down at his shin, then back up at Hiyori. His expression barely shifted. Only the corner of his mouth moved, like he was swallowing something.

"Hiyori."

"What?!"

"I hadn't gotten to you yet."

"Liar! You do this every time! First you talk to Kisuke, then you talk to Mayuri, and then you pretend I don't exist!"

"That's because every time, you kick me before I can get a third sentence out."

"That's because you never greet me!"

"I don't greet you because every time, before I can even say a third sentence —"

Hiyori's other foot went airborne.

Sōsuke Aizen stood half a step behind Shinji, watching. The soft, precise smile never moved. His eyes followed Hiyori chasing Shinji around with complete calm, the way a person watches something that has nothing to do with them. Then he spoke, voice gentle, unhurried, as though he were commenting on the weather.

"Incidentally, the unnatural deaths in Rukongai have been increasing."

Hiyori's foot stopped in mid-air. The trace of a smile left Shinji's face.

Aizen adjusted his glasses.

"People die in place, yet their Shihakushō are left behind completely undamaged. The souls themselves vanish without a trace of reishi residue — as though they've been pulled out of this world entirely. Similar reports have been coming in from districts across Rukongai for several months now. Cases like this existed before, but the frequency has been accelerating noticeably."

Urahara's army-green eyes narrowed a fraction in the morning light.

Shinji pulled his hands free from his sleeves. His light golden hair caught the sun softly. The easy, flippant tone was gone.

"Things like this have happened before, yeah. But back then it was occasional — maybe a handful of incidents in an entire year. This is different."

He paused.

"The frequency is going up. The range is expanding. That's why Squad 9 has been dispatched to investigate."

---

The sky over the outskirts of Rukongai was that ambiguous color, too dark for morning, too pale for dusk.

Kensei Muguruma stood on a stretch of desolate gravel. His short white hair shifted faintly in the wind. The Squad 9 Captain's haori hung over his shoulders, collar open wide to bare a solid chest, and right in the center of it, a bold "69" tattoo.

Heizō Kasagi stood at his side: tall, broad, his shaved head showing a faint blue-gray stubble beneath the pale sky. Shinobu Okishima stood on the other side, lean and clean-featured, not a single crease in the lapels of his Shihakushō. Behind them were six other Squad 9 members.

Kensei's gaze swept the area. Gravel. Dry weeds. A few dead trees. Residual Hollow Reiatsu hung in the air, faint, but enough to read the direction.

A scream came from somewhere ahead.

Kensei's toes hit the gravel and Reiatsu rippled outward in a ring. He was already moving. Heizō's Shunpo followed right behind. Shinobu and the rest of the squad kept pace.

3 children stood on a dried-out riverbed. Eight, maybe nine years old, tattered clothes hanging off thin frames, faces smeared with dirt and dried tears. One boy had bangs that covered most of his face. In front of them, a Hollow was dragging itself out of a crack in the riverbed. Its body was like a plesiosaur, long slender neck, malformed head balanced at the end of it. Thick limbs, claws sunk deep into the gravel; every step gouged a trench into the earth.

Kensei landed in front of the children. The Hollow's eyes swung toward him. Its neck arched back like a coiled snake.

"Heizō! Shinobu!"

Two figures swept past his flanks. Heizō Kasagi's Zanpakutō cleared its sheath and carved a bright silver arc across the Hollow's front left leg. Shinobu Okishima's blade hit the right leg in the same instant, clean and precise, finding the seam in the carapace, severing the tendon. The Hollow's neck snapped forward, its malformed head lunging straight at Kensei.

Kensei drew his Zanpakutō. The guard was rectangular, aligned parallel to the blade. Blue-green wind patterns wrapped the steel.

"Blow it away, Tachikaze."

The moment Shikai released, the wind patterns along the blade erupted. A violent tornado swallowed the Hollow's entire neck whole. Wind blades crossed and cut like threads of silk; inside the funnel, the Hollow's neck came apart into fragments, carapace, muscle, reishi structure, everything shattered and flung outward from the eye of the storm, scattering across the dry riverbed. It was over in less than a breath.

The Hollow's head hit the ground. Its mask cracked. The light in its eye went out fast. Then the head, and the body still half-buried in the riverbed, dissolved into reishi and were gone.

Kensei sheathed his blade and turned around. The 3 children stood behind him, tear tracks still wet on their faces. The boy with the bangs was crying the hardest, snot and tears all over his face, shoulders hitching in uneven spasms.

Kensei crouched down to eye level.

"What are you crying for, brat? You're still alive. You should be happy. Smile."

The boy cried harder.

Shinobu Okishima stepped up beside him. A touch of helplessness crossed his delicate face.

"Don't force it, Captain."

"How am I forcing anything?" Kensei turned to glare at him. "I told him to smile — how is that forcing it?"

"He's young. He just got attacked by a Hollow. Crying is normal."

"So what if he got attacked by a Hollow? I got attacked by a Hollow when I was a kid. Did I cry?"

"You did, sir."

A beat of silence. "...How do you know that."

"Heizō-san told me."

Kensei snapped his head around to stare at Heizō Kasagi. Heizō stood not far away, toothbrush mustache twitching, bald head gleaming with an expression of total innocence under the pale sky.

"...I only mentioned it once," Heizō said, voice carefully lowered.

Kensei made a sound in his throat, turned back to the crying boy. He reached out, his rough, large hand closed around the boy's arm, and pulled him up from the ground. The boy stumbled, found his footing, stood there with shoulders still shaking.

"What's your name?"

The boy sniffled. His voice came in fragments.

"Shū... Shūhei Hisagi."

"Shūhei. Wild name." Kensei let go and patted him on the shoulder, not hard, but enough to make the boy sway. "Stop crying."

Shūhei wiped his face with his sleeve, smearing the snot across his cuff. The tears kept coming anyway. Kensei looked at him. His lips moved slightly. He said nothing.

Hiyori's voice came from somewhere behind them.

"Kensei!"

He turned. Hiyori Sarugaki was standing on a small patch of open ground at the edge of the riverbed. At her feet, 10 sets of Shihakushō had been laid out in a neat row, as if someone had arranged them deliberately. Every one was completely intact, no tears, no damage, no residual reishi. 10 sets of Shihakushō. 10 pairs of straw sandals. 10 Shinigami, gone without a trace.

Kensei's eyes stayed on those 10 uniforms for a long time. The ends of his short white hair moved in the wind.

Then he spoke. Low and short.

"Shinobu. Contact Central 46. The soul disappearance incidents — this is the first time we've seen Shinigami as victims. 10 people."

Shinobu Okishima's eyelashes moved slightly. He nodded, turned, and vanished via Shunpo. His slim silhouette disappeared at the far end of the riverbed.

"Izaemon." Kensei's voice continued.

A lean squad member stepped forward. Izaemon Tōdō, Sixth Seat of Squad 9, a young face, steady composure.

"Collect all the reishi residue data from these Shihakushō. Compile it into a report and send it directly to Squad 12. To Kisuke Urahara, Squad 12 Captain. Tell him Squad 9 is formally requesting the Technological Development Bureau's assistance with this investigation."

Izaemon nodded, crouched down, and began moving along the row of uniforms with a portable reishi sampler.

"Heizō."

Heizō Kasagi stepped forward.

"Get the tent. We're staying the night."

He nodded and turned to go.

Kensei turned back to the 3 children. The sun had sunk to the rim of the riverbed. The pale gray sky was bleeding into dark orange.

"You three. Get home before dark."

The other 2 boys nodded, grabbed Shūhei, and ran. A few steps out, Shūhei stopped and looked back. The last of the sunlight came in at an angle from the edge of the riverbed and fell across Kensei's chest, lighting up the "69" tattoo. Shūhei's eyes lingered on those 2 digits for a moment. Then he turned and ran after the others. His small figure shrank to nothing at the end of the riverbed.

Heizō came back with the tent on his shoulder. The Mutsuro Shock Troop set up camp on the riverbed. Hiyori crouched beside the Shihakushō, head tilted, watching Izaemon work through the data collection. Shinobu returned after contacting Central 46, leaned against the side of the tent, and drank his tea in silence.

Kensei sat on a piece of gravel at the river's edge. He laid his Zanpakutō across his knees. The blue-green wind patterns on the scabbard caught the moonlight and held it faintly. The moon shone down on the dry riverbed, on the 10 intact Shihakushō, on the "69" tattoo on Kensei's chest.

---

At that same moment, deep in the alley that branched off from the Seireitei's flagstone boulevard, the noren curtain of Nanamagari shifted in the night breeze. Seijūrō lifted it and stepped inside.

An old wooden bar counter, the surface worn to a deep brown gloss by countless elbows over countless years. On the stove, a pot of stew bubbled steadily. The white-haired old woman behind it stood with a slight stoop, but the hand moving the knife was steadier than it had any right to be at her age.

He settled into the corner seat at the bar. His usual spot, back to the wall, facing the door, everything in the shop within sight. The old woman glanced at him, turned, and took a teapot down from the shelf. Not his usual kind. New leaves.

"Just arrived," she said. Her voice was hoarse and brief.

Seijūrō took the cup. The liquor was darker than usual, the aroma richer, with a faint roasted note underneath. He took a sip. Lightly bitter going in, the sweetness coming up fast. Shinobu's kind of taste.

"Shinobu would like this," he said.

The stew had a new recipe. He could smell it, the miso proportion was heavier, and something else was in there that he couldn't quite place. If Heizō Kasagi were here, he'd probably slam the counter hard enough to rattle it, bellow "Boss, this is excellent! Another bowl!" in that gravelly voice of his, and then genuinely have another. He'd work through 3 massive bowls before he slowed down. Then he'd turn with miso soup clinging to that toothbrush mustache, thick fingers wrapped around a sake cup, and say to Shinobu Okishima in his low, blunt way, "You eat too", then turn his head and ask, "Kidōin-sensei, what do you think?"

Shinobu Okishima would sit quietly at his side, his clean features reflected in the surface of the tea, drinking without hurry, occasionally offering something soft and precisely placed that made Heizō's booming voice sound even louder.

Seijūrō cradled his teacup and watched the miso stew bubble on the stove. Neither of them was here tonight. Out on a mission, most likely. Squad 9 had been running the Rukongai investigation for a while now, souls vanishing without a trace, Shihakushō left behind in perfect condition. The captain and fourth seat of the Mutsuro Shock Troop were probably out there somewhere in Rukongai with Captain Kensei right now.

He took another sip. The roasted fragrance of the new leaves spread across his tongue. The sweetness came up slowly. Shinobu hadn't tried this yet. Heizō hadn't tried the new miso yet.

"They'll come tomorrow," he said.

The old woman's knife paused for exactly 1 beat. Then it came down again, and the rhythm against the cutting board was exactly what it had been before. The stew kept bubbling. White steam curled out from under the lid and drifted into the dark night beyond the noren. Moonlight leaked in through the gap in the door and fell across the deep brown grain of the bar counter, fell across the teacup in his hands. The tea was still hot.

He held it without drinking. Just held the warmth.

Tomorrow they would come. Tomorrow he would tell them, the new tea was Shinobu's kind of taste, the new miso was something Heizō could put away 3 bowls of. Tomorrow they would be back in their usual seats. Heizō with miso soup on his mustache. Shinobu drinking the new tea in silence. And he in the corner, back against the wall, facing the door, the way it was on every night they were here.

He held his tea and waited for tomorrow.

➤ Next: Hollowfication