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Idk if you’ve answered this question (sorry if you have) before, but how do you think Renji & Rukia first met ? What do you think their life was like originally before Soul Society ?

Pardon me if I'm reading this wrong, but...Rukia and Renji's first meeting is enshrined pretty thoroughly in canon? She rescued him from a water heist that was about to turn disastrous.

This is from Chapter 98/Episode 32: A Star and a Stray Dog, which is the first place you should be looking if you're interested in pre-canon Renruki lore.

As to the second part of your question...you mean before they died? What sort of lives did they have in the World of the Living?

I'm gonna pontificate, so I'll throw that under a cut

First off, I am fascinated with the fact that Kubo gives us nothing about what anyone's living life was like. On one hand, I would like to know everyone's pre-history, but on the other, I'm glad he didn't, like as a literary choice. The slate is supposed to be wiped clean. It doesn't matter. It's maddening, but also correct.

It's also one of those places that is just ✨fanfic free real estate✨ in terms of I think everyone should make up their own version for their blorbos, so of course I have them for Renji and Rukia. I have absolutely nothing to support these, they are just what I felt in my heart.

I have actually talked about Renji's beforedeath quite a bit, here and there in various fanfics, usual under the conceit that, particularly in their Inuzuri days, he would sometimes blurt out some half-remembered thing and then promptly forget it again. Here an excerpt from Chapter 3 of go places:

It’s an Alive Memory, Rukia is nearly certain. Most souls get them. All the boys did, from time to time. To Renji, it’s just brain dust. Whatever it is in Soul Society that makes people forget their lives also makes this memory detritus slippery to hold onto. Renji won’t think of this later, or attach any importance to this conversation. The funny thing is, after ten years of watching him stumble through these moments, Rukia probably has a better idea of what Renji’s life was like than he does. He lived on a farm of some sort. A small one, or at least his family grew a lot of their own food. He died of a fever. Nearly all of his Alive Memories involve his mother. Rukia is almost positive that Renji’s mother is the one who taught him to write. The sewing scissors were likely hers. In Rukia’s imagination, Renji’s mother is very tall and beautiful and kind. Rukia doesn’t need to use her imagination to know that Renji loved his mother very much.

Just to offer a little more detail--doing the math out, where Bleach starts in the early 00s, Rukia and Renji have been separated for 40 years and knew each other for 10 years before that, it would make a lot of sense for both of them to have died in WWII. However, I like to think that time is very wobbly, especially in the outer Rukon, so I like to make their deaths a little earlier-- specifically, I think that Renji died in the 1918 flu pandemic, which may have contributed to getting a plague spirit for a zanpakutou. That being said, my general vibe for his childhood is based on Kanta, the neighbor kid from My Neighbor Totoro, which takes place in the 50s. In any case, he had a pretty small and unremarkable life in rural Japan, aside from the fact that he was loved very much, which will never be unremarkable, no matter how common it may be.

I have written less about Rukia's beforedeath, mostly because she was too young when she died to have any phantom memories. [Note: I know there are some theories out there, based on some arcane clues that Kubo has dropped that Rukia may not actually be a normal soul and may be related to Hell. That's...fine. While I'm never going to say no to a storyline that centers Rukia, I really do hope that it comes to naught. Ichigo has enough Crazy Origin going on and I like the Rukia's backstory the way it is, so I'm just going to ignore all of that for the sake of this post]. Ahem! So, infant death is not anything surprising, or even really interesting, but what makes Rukia's kind of compelling is the fact that her much-older sister died at the same time. To me, this indicates either a natural disaster or a death-by-violence.

As I said above, there are infinity ways you can go with this, but to me, there were two important things I wanted to capture 1) given Renji's descriptions of Rukia having an inherent grace and nobility, and the idea that something about Hisana caught Byakuya's eye, I thought that maybe they should have been noble, and 2) I wanted them to live by the sea. I do not actually remember how I landed on this, but in the 1850s, a bunch of sea fortresses were constructed to protect Japan by attack from sea (see here for more detail). This was the tail end of the Edo period and I liked the idea that maybe Rukia came from an old samurai family, and her father was sent to oversee one of these coastal forts. Did they die in a bombardment? A bad storm? The Kanto earthquake? I never got that far. I'm not even sure if this is a realistic scenario, if they had civilians living there, etc, this was just a half-thought-out thing I came up with for a bonus chapter of a fanfic that someone requested once. The one other detail from that that I came up with and stand by is that I think there were more siblings in their family between Hisana and Rukia. I also like that this idea that makes Rukia somewhat older than Renji, even though the math is impossible and the points are made up anyway.

[recurring-polynya]

Summary: Long ago in Inuzuri, Abarai Renji broke his arm. It healed. At least the bones did. His kidou ducts have never been the same. Now that Renji's finally having the surgery to get them corrected, Rukia is determined to make sure he gets the love and care he deserves during his recovery-- whether he wants it or not.

Starring: Rukia and Renji, of course!! Featuring: Their Inuzuri pals! All the (good) lieutenants! H-a-n-a-t-a-r-o-u! The hard-working staff of Kuchiki Manor! (...is byakuya here? unfortunately, you know he is)

Rating: Teen, for violent trauma, cussing, and sexual innuendo.

Updates: Weekly

This time: Zabimaru is a bad houseguest.

Read Chapter 6 on ao3!

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at one point in last night's DunMesh, they translated "yare yare" as "criminy" and i am going to be thinking about this for the rest of my life

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i am losing my heckin' mind

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all bleach video games should have this

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Writing/Art Update 4.16.2024

I know I said I wasn't going to do these for a bit, but I felt like doing one. It's not good news, mostly I just want to complain because I'm very frustrated. I *want* to write, but my brain is just very, very empty and I hate it. I've been working on my ChadIshi story for what feels like a million years. It's not even very good. It's about 1500 words at the moment. I write about 3 sentences per day on it. I have no idea how to end it. All that being said, I would like to *finish* it, rather than just let it sit in my WIPs for 3 years, but I'm also worried that I am just sort of letting it drag on because I don't know what to write after that, either.

Candidate #1 is my Rukia-and-Renji-dirtbag-teens-in-Inuzuri fic, which I love to death and I *hope* that if I work on it, I might be able to make some progress on it. It's 11k words already (some are trash, I'm sure) but it's Most of a Fanfic and it might be kind cool to publish it after Damage History.

I've also been trying to brainstorm the next two parts of Heart is a Muscle. My plan had been for the next part to be an epistolary fanfic where Rukia and Byakuya have to go on a mission together and Renji gets left home with his still-healing arm. However, right at the beginning of Damage History, there's mention of Rukia and Renji going to some dreadful seafood festival at the train museum in East Rukongai. I was originally going to put that in as an epilogue, but then there was something else I wanted to do for the epilogue, and I told myself that it would be kinda fun to have a little short chapter about Rukia and Renji Having a Nice One, For a Change. The problem is, I don't know how to write that. I've spent the last two weeks trying to brainstorm ideas and my brain keeps going "maybe they could solve a murder mystery?" Don't get me wrong, the only thing that is keeping me from turning this into a murder mystery is the lurking Byakuya and Rukia Solve a Murder Mystery that the next one is gonna be (it's probably not actually going to be a murder mystery, but that's the vibe). I just want to write some cute little short hijinks thing and I am too dumb to come up with anything! I even read an entire Wodehouse book, trying to spur the old noggin to churning out a fruity idea or two, but the ideas were not forthcoming, not even a rummy one.

The other option is that I know I am supposed to get back to a little in love eventually, and I was kind of putting it off, because I didn't want it to get caught in my annual summer doldrums, but maybe I should just go for it.

Anyway! I wish I had ideas!! I have no ideas!!

(also, it's is very hard for me to write when I am on a Posting Schedule, I am very aware of this, and I am pretending like it's not true even tho I know this is probably the main issue)

In other news, I drew a Rukia and I was proud of it, please go look at it for me, thank you in advance.

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It has been 14 hours since I found out that, according to Kubo, Byakuya calls Renji by his given name "because Rukia does" and I am obsessed with this information.

This is both the best and worst possible answer to this question. I feel like if you asked Byakuya, this is exactly the reason he would give. However, if Rukia were present, she would lose her damn mind. While I do think Rukia's assertion that Byakuya didn't look at her even once in 40 years is hyperbole, over that time I can imagine Renji's name coming up in conversation once, maybe twice tops.

Like, two weeks before she goes on her fateful mission to the Living World, B's been shortlisting Vice-Captain candidates, and over dinner, real casual:

B: Rukia. You know your friend?

Rukia: My who now?

B: That friend of yours who shouts too much. The boorishly tall one. With the red hair. Is he in Squad Eleven now?

Rukia (wracking her brain frantically for people Byakuya would consider 'her friend'): You mean Renji?

B: Yes, him.

Rukia: What about him?

B: Is he in Squad Eleven? The Sixth Seat?

Rukia: ...maybe? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

The next day, Byakuya's office, Renji shows up for his job interview.

B: You must be Renji.

Renji: uhhhhhhhh sure why not?

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i've been watching kuroko no basket and this green-haired dude has the upsetting vibes of an infinite jest character

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From idiots to lovers

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girl of all time

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Summary: Long ago in Inuzuri, Abarai Renji broke his arm. It healed. At least the bones did. His kidou ducts have never been the same. Now that Renji's finally having the surgery to get them corrected, Rukia is determined to make sure he gets the love and care he deserves during his recovery-- whether he wants it or not.

Starring: Rukia and Renji, of course!! Featuring: Their Inuzuri pals! All the (good) lieutenants! H-a-n-a-t-a-r-o-u! The hard-working staff of Kuchiki Manor! (...is byakuya here? unfortunately, you know he is)

Rating: Teen, for violent trauma, cussing, and sexual innuendo.

Updates: Weekly

This time: Renji goes under the knife. Some Kuchiki handle this better than others.

Read Chapter 5 on ao3!

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I've been trawling around on TVTropes for, um, reasons, and I'm obsessed with this information as viewed through the lens of my thesis that Renji was crafted explicitly to be Rukia's love interest (other things as well, just that the love interest part of it was on-purpose and a primary design consideration)

(and yes, Rukia is the lead character of Bleach, the Magical Girl Anime. Just ask her, she'll tell you)

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i said in the tags that i initially suspected that Rukia's outfit here appeared in the ska ending, altho it didn't bear out. in fact, several of these outfits show up in Asterisk, in slightly modified form

i want the boots rukia is wearing in this color spread more than anything

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i want the boots rukia is wearing in this color spread more than anything

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Izakaya Kamenoya, part 3

It's been so long, and I kept getting busy with stuff, but rest assured, I have not stopped thinking about every shinigami's favorite watering hole, Izakaya Kamenoya, for even one second of that time, and today I am going to talk about what's really important: what kind of booze can you get there.

The multiplicity of drink options is honestly the thing I really love about Kamenoya. On a meta level, someone has to draw all this stuff, like, with their hands. I have no idea, actually, if the animators consider this sort of thing a break from all the powering up and sword fights and rolling across cave floors, or if they consider a Trip to the Bar to be really tedious. My point is, they very well could have just always drawn people drinking out of the same cups, except they didn't, they drew a series of loving close ups of sake-pouring and a variety of drinkware styles. On a more Watsonian level, I just like the idea that, like Alice's Restaurant, you can get anything you want at Izakaya Kamenoya. So let's get into it!

I think the thing that really made me notice this was this scene from the Amagai Arc, where you see Kira doing mokkiri, or overpouring his sake. (At least I think that's what he's doing. The articles I read sounded more like the server is supposed to do it, which emphasizes the establishment's generosity, so maybe Kira is just being a messy drunk. I'm pretty sure you're also not supposed to pour yourself sake, you're supposed to do it for your tablemates)

Often, mokkiri is done into a masu, which is a small square box that was used as a standard measure for rice. You can see Nanao drinking out of one here!

What kind of cup to drink your sake out of is a huge topic, but basically, it depends on the flavor and characteristics of the sake. The fact that Kira and the Lads are drinking out of clear glasses might imply that they're drinking chilled, summer-style sake (or possibly trying to appreciate the clarity of the vintage, as if this is what you call up Iba and Renji to go to the pub for).

I am not an expert, so I'm not going to attempt to identify exactly what these different cups would be classified as, but you can see a variety of shapes, sizes and materials.

I found less information on different shapes of tokkuri (that's the slightly bigger bottle that you serve from), but those come in a variety, as well. Mostly, they have either the large, oval-shaped jugs you can see in the first picture, or the more slender white ones in the second. I am really fond of these tall boys that Kira and Hisagi have, which seem to have straighter sides than the other kind, kind of like a milk bottle.

While we're looking at that picture, there's an ad on the wall for beer. Beer!

In modern times, beer is actually the most popular alcoholic beverage in Japan, which Wikipedia tells me came about after WWII because of restrictions on the use of rice. They've had beer since the Edo era, though, and many of today's major breweries got started in the late 1800s. I love the idea that beer is a thing you can get in Soul Society, but it's clear that it has not overcome sake in popularity the way it did in the World of the Living--which makes sense, because of they never had those restrictions. (In other words, throw this in the bucket of stuff like tattoos and attitudes toward homosexuality that I think diverged from the Living World because of weird quirks of history).

In fact, Kamenoya apparently imports beer from the World of Living (maybe it also has local brews as well).

Look how lovingly that bottle of Kirin is drawn. 😂 The fact that it's shown in a glass mug in the ad, but served in a Pilsner glass here supports the idea that there are multiple kinds of beer available. Now, I believe that Kirin Zero is non-alcoholic. It's surprisingly hard to do research on beer labels from 20 years ago. I couldn't find a label that looked exactly like that, and Kirin's non-alcoholic offering seems to be called Kirin Free now (Kirin Zero is now zero-carb and I couldn't figure out if it's alcoholic or not). In any case, I am choosing in my heart to believe that this is because of weird TV censorship and in no way implies that Rukia is not one of the champion drinkers of the Gotei-13.

Don't get me wrong! I love a bar that offers non-alcoholic options! You can also get tea at Kamenoya, which you can see Tobiume and Okyō drinking below; Momo has some as well (they also have a discussion about it)

earlier posts in this series: (part 1) (part 2)

[recurring-polynya]

Summary: Long ago in Inuzuri, Abarai Renji broke his arm. It healed. At least the bones did. His kidou ducts have never been the same. Now that Renji's finally having the surgery to get them corrected, Rukia is determined to make sure he gets the love and care he deserves during his recovery-- whether he wants it or not.

Starring: Rukia and Renji, of course!! Featuring: Their Inuzuri pals! All the (good) lieutenants! H-a-n-a-t-a-r-o-u! The hard-working staff of Kuchiki Manor! (...is byakuya here? unfortunately, you know he is)

Rating: Teen, for violent trauma, cussing, and sexual innuendo.

Updates: Weekly

This time: Rukia gets some advice. Byakuya tells a lie. Rukia and Renji make up.

Read Chapter 4 on ao3!

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Writing/Art Update 4.3.2024

I was too busy to do this yesterday, but the more I thought about it, I think I'm gonna put these updates on hiatus for a bit. They're very useful for me when I'm in the trenches of a project (or trying to get there). I'm focusing more on real life stuff right now, and while I still *try* to write, having to report in about it just makes me feel bad, and that has never been the point of this. I'll start this up again when I have things to report, but in the meantime, I just need to go off and play by myself for a little bit.