#since i hardly ever have had a ship for ichigo

[cheshiresense]

For the headcanon thing if I'm not too late. Headcanons for FemIchigo/Kisuke ship?

Lol you didn’t give me an AU? Guess I could throw them in the canon verse but the events wouldn’t be much dif imo. But let’s see how this goes.

Edit: Welp. This got long.

1. Ichigo keeps her hair long because of her mom. Masaki had long hair, and even if it’s not the exact same colour, Ichigo grows her own hair out in her honour, as a reminder of the one time she failed to protect her precious people and just because she’s never met anyone with hair as pretty as her mom’s.

The first time she gets into a serious fight with Shinigami, that dick Renji uses it against her. He grabs her hair, and taunts her with it, and in the end, she kicks his ass, but then his dick boss shows up and just about kills her. When she wakes up at the Shouten, she’s half-naked, wrapped in bandages, and her hair’s been sliced ragged, left in uneven strands around her shoulders where before it had reached her waist. Urahara is nice enough to cut and style it for her. He tells her he only knows how to cut it one way because a good friend of his used to wear her hair short. It’s cute enough, and at the end of the day, Ichigo would much rather keep her life than her hair, but she also locks herself in the bathroom later that night and has a good cry about it. It’s stupid, it’s just hair, it’ll grow back, but it still feels a little like losing her mother all over again. She gives herself twenty minutes, and then she gets her shit together because she has to go save Rukia, and Urahara promised to make her strong enough so she needs to get some sleep more than anything else right now. When she gets back to her room though, the rest of the Shouten is still silent but there’s a tray of tea by her futon, still hot, and too sweet to have been made by Tessai. Ichigo doesn’t even like tea, but it’s a surprisingly kind, amusingly awkward gesture from a man who knows too much and tells her too little. She drinks it all, making a face at the taste but appreciating the warmth that spreads all the way to her fingertips, and when she lies back down and closes her eyes, sleep comes easier this time.

2. Kisuke’s the one who carries her back to the Shouten after she defeats Aizen and subsequently collapses in the aftermath. He thinks it would’ve been easier if she’d been born a boy. She’s tall for her age and gender, but she feels more fragile like this, her shoulders narrower than her usual larger-than-life personality would suggest, her frame less sturdy. Even her bones feel more delicate. Then again, she’s still only sixteen and she’s already lost half her soul in a war she should never have had to fight in the first place, and a good chunk of that blame can be laid squarely at Kisuke’s feet, so maybe boy or girl, it wouldn’t have made a difference anyway. She’s light enough that Kisuke can carry her without difficulty, but her weight still feels like shackles around his wrists, tied to an anchor at the bottom of the ocean, like the worst of his sins given life, and Kisuke hadn’t ever thought that would be something he’d have trouble bearing until now. But the least he can do is carry her home, so that’s what he does. He takes her back to the Shouten and cleans her up and heals her– it’s a routine he’s uncomfortably familiar with these days. He doesn’t know if she’s ever consciously realized it, but he’s seen her naked enough times to feel like a pervert. He was Onmitsukidou, and he’s seen Yoruichi change in front of him enough times that the female body doesn’t make him blink, but Ichigo’s young - old enough to have developed curves, young enough that his hands shouldn’t be anywhere near her (figuratively or literally) - but there’s nobody else to do it, Yoruichi is always inconveniently away, so Kisuke keeps his eyes and hands well within professional range, runs a bath for her that takes care of most of the dirt and sweat and blood so he only has to make sure she doesn’t drown, and then whisks her off back to bed where he can bandage up what his Kidou can’t heal before settling down to monitor her reiatsu levels.

She remains in a coma for a month. Kisuke is the one who takes care of her, from fresh bedding to sponge baths to IV-fed fluids, even trimming her hair when it starts looking too shaggy (she’s growing it out again, so he doesn’t cut more than what he has to). By the time she opens her eyes, Kisuke’s just relieved she wakes at all, and it doesn’t seem like she’s (physically) much worse for wear so at least his caretaking skills aren’t terrible. All the discomfort in the world can be tolerated if it means Ichigo remains as healthy as she can possibly be.

3. Ichigo doesn’t see or hear from Urahara or any other Shinigami for the next seventeen months, and she tries not to let it get to her. She still sees her human friends at school, even if she’s no longer welcome in a large part of their daily lives, and Shinigami probably don’t think a year and a half is all that long. Besides, at the end of the day, she knew most of her Shinigami acquaintances for a handful of months tops; that’s hardly grounds for eternal friendship. She’s hurt by their absence, but she keeps herself busy with school, with homework, with the part-time job she finds just to fill the hours in-between. She gets good at ignoring the fact that she knows where her friends go after school, knows where her sisters go, and that she can no longer follow them. Urahara doesn’t wear a gigai after all, and it wouldn’t be fair to ask him to. He probably has better things to do too now that the war is over and Ichigo has done her duty.

So it’s been seventeen months of mind-numbing (soul-wrenching) monotony, and then she gains a stalker. She would never have chased that thief down if she had known Ginjou Kuugou was so… greasy. She doesn’t just mean his hair either; everything about him oozes an oily sort of charm that sets off every alarm bell her mom drilled into her head about Stranger Danger, Female Edition, and it becomes clear very quickly that Ginjou is exactly the sort of man who just won’t take no for an answer. He follows her around, flirts like he thinks she finds him attractive, keeps inviting her out for a meal, even tracks her down at work, and Ichigo’s just about had it with him after he “bumps” into her while she’s walking home from doing the grocery-shopping, because she may not be a Shinigami anymore but she sure as hell still knows how to defend herself and kick a creep in the balls when he dares to sling a too-proprietary arm around her waist, as if he has any right.

As it turns out though, she doesn’t have to. Ginjou gets about half a second to touch her, still blathering on about having something interesting to show her if she lets him treat her to some ramen, and then he’s being ripped away from her, abruptly enough to tear a shout from him, and Ichigo spins around just in time to see Urahara twist Ginjou’s arm behind him at a painful-looking angle before slamming him face-first into a nearby wall.

Ichigo doesn’t think she’s ever seen Urahara so… openly violent before. She can’t stop staring for a long moment, because that casual, effortless strength is… not something Ichigo would mind seeing again. If nothing else, it’s clearly effective (and pointedly ignores the voice that says she isn’t staring because it’s effective). The look on his face though is positively serene, if you don’t count the ominous shadow that his hat is somehow casting over his eyes.

“I do believe Kurosaki-san has asked you to stop harassing her,” the shopkeeper says in tones so airily cheerful only an idiot would buy the act. Ginjou doesn’t reply anyway. He can’t. Urahara’s yanked his arm up high enough to let him simultaneously choke the life out of the guy, his hand about as movable as stone as it pins Ginjou’s wrist to the back of his neck and his neck to the brick wall.

“Hey,” Ichigo says, and then stops, because on one hand, this guy probably doesn’t deserve to be straight-up murdered, but also if anyone in Ichigo’s life can kill a human and make the corpse disappear, it would be Urahara.

But Urahara glances at her, then shrugs a little and releases Ginjou, only to knock him over the head with his cane, hard enough to send him crumpling to the ground in an unconscious heap. There’s a moment of silence after that, and then Ichigo remembers to be irritated because she’s no one’s damsel in distress. “I could’ve handled him, you know.”

It comes out sharper than even she intends, but the sight of him reminds her of how long she hasn’t seen him or any of her other Shinigami friends, and it’s hard to remain mature about it when one of them is suddenly right in front of her again. Urahara, because he’s Urahara, just rakes a too-discerning eye over her like he can see right through her annoyance to the root of it. His expression tightens with something Ichigo can’t name, but all he does is incline his head in acknowledgement even as he smiles in a way that makes her want to punch him. “Of course, Kurosaki-san, but what kind of gentleman would I be if I didn’t interfere?”

Ichigo gives him the flat unimpressed look that deserves, Urahara’s smile twitches into something more genuinely amused, and for a second, it almost feels as if no time at all has passed since the last time they’d shared an actual conversation. Then Ginjou groans, Ichigo bristles irritably, and Urahara’s smile fades.

“Kurosaki-san,” He calls out before Ichigo can do more than turn away. “There are some things you need to know. But perhaps we can take this off the streets first? Come back to my Shouten; I will explain everything there.”

Ichigo turns back, scowling suspiciously at the blond, then down at greasy stalker. Great. She should’ve known; of course it would be Shinigami business that actually dragged Urahara out of his shop and into his first interaction with Ichigo after seventeen months of radio silence. But… if Urahara is willing to explain just what greasy stalker wanted to drag her into, Ichigo would be an idiot to turn him down.

“Fine,” She grumbles. “I’m using your fridge though. I’ve got ice-cream in here and it’s gonna melt before I get home at this rate.”

Urahara beams at her and hefts greasy stalker over his shoulder before ushering her to the Shouten. True to his word, he tells her about the Fullbringers who’ve invaded Karakura, and he tells her that the Shinigami have been monitoring the situation, and then he tells her he has a way to return her powers and soul-spirits to her. He shows her the sword, engraved with a bunch of intricate symbols she can’t even begin to decipher, and it thrums with so much power even she can feel it. She has a sudden epiphany that it must’ve taken even a genius like Urahara quite a while to make something like this, because she’d asked around, before she’d lost the ability to see Shinigami, and she knows for a fact that fixing her soul should’ve been impossible. The realization that Urahara must’ve been working on this for the past seventeen months goes a long way to soothing any fair or unfair feelings she had towards him, even if she also thinks he could’ve just told her. But she thinks that, and then she thinks that Urahara probably didn’t because he hadn’t wanted to get her hopes up for nothing. It’s stupid, but so is the way he eases the sword through her chest as gently as possible, as if it makes a difference at all when that first jolt of foreign reiatsu to her system still hurts like a bitch. She thinks she can forgive stupidity though if it’s coming from him. Not that she’ll ever tell him that.

In the aftermath, the Fullbringers disappear one by one, and nobody says anything but an increasingly manically cheerful Urahara gets a lot of wary side-eyes from the Shinigami trooping through Karakura over the next couple of weeks. It’s Rukia (Rukia who never so much as passed on a how-are-you, and Ichigo doesn’t blame her, but she’s never going to forget it either) who tells her later about Urahara kneeling in front of all the Gotei’s captains and lieutenants and begging them to help, who bowed his head through the Captain-Commander’s orders to keep the sword back until a powerless Ichigo has drawn out all the Fullbringers, only to immediately disobey as soon as he got the reiatsu he needed from them.

Ichigo asks, of course, just once, why. True to form, Urahara doesn’t give her a straight answer, he shrugs and lies instead, “Well it isn’t as if there’s anything else they can do to little old me in exile, is there?” But for just a moment, he also looks directly at Ichigo, his gaze steady and calm and unyielding, like there was never anything else he could’ve done, like choosing Ichigo over the Gotei was a decision made as easily as he breathed.

Much, much later, looking back, Ichigo thinks maybe that was the moment she first fell just a little bit in love.

4. Somewhere between the Quincy War and Yoruichi and Tessai moving back to Soul Society and the kids deciding they want to experience high school and normal life at the Kurosaki household, Kisuke wakes up one morning to Ichigo cooking breakfast in his kitchen and realizes he’s sharing a house with a twenty-year-old college student whose Gargantas make for the easiest commute to and from school in the history of public transportation. He stands in the doorway for a long minute, just watching her go through the motions that have become routine at the Shouten for… months now. Ever since he survived the war by the skin of his teeth and ended up half-blind because Benihime is only a quick, crude fix when Kisuke doesn’t know the exact makeup of whatever he’s restructuring. He’d had to study that, and then get some hands-on practice, before finally re-restructuring his eyes one more time. Ichigo had been a big help. Kisuke had had difficulties reading, along with dizzy spells and crippling headaches, so even though she didn’t understand everything, she also spent long hours with him, reading out loud and taking down notes for him, cooking for him and keeping his house clean and even manning the shopfront for him when Tessai was busy with the Kidou Corps. And then, once he was better… well, apparently she’d just never moved back out, and Kisuke had liked the company (has always liked her company) that he’d obliviously taken her presence here for granted.

She turns around now, probably sensing him. Her hair’s almost as long as it used to be back when they’d first met, but she’s tied it up into a messy bun. She’s still in pajama pants and one of his shirts because she likes the larger size and she keeps stealing them and Kisuke doesn’t mind, he has more than enough.

Maybe he should’ve minded.

“Hey,” Ichigo greets around a stifled yawn. “Food’s almost done. Could you set the table?”

Kisuke makes an agreeable noise and starts pulling down tableware from the cupboards. The coffee’s also done so he pours a mug, and then prepares the tea with the water that’s just finished boiling. Five minutes later, they’re seated around the table, Ichigo grumbling memorized literature quotes into her coffee because she has finals next week, and Kisuke just… watches her. They’ve thrown the porch doors open because it’s summer and the morning breeze is nice. Ichigo has her back to it, and the sunrise that frames her head like a halo gilds her bright hair gold. When she finally sets her coffee down, she looks up and catches his eye, and even as her eyebrows go up in an unspoken question, the smile that blooms across her face at the same time is as much a reflex as it is genuine, like the mere sight of him is something to be happy about, and Kisuke is helpless to do anything but smile back.

Shit, he thinks, far too late. I’m definitely going to hell.

5. “I’m definitely going to hell,” he moans into the table. Yoruichi, because she is first and foremost a terrible best friend, is too busy laughing at him to console him. At least she came prepared with the sake when he called her in a panic once Ichigo had left for class.

“Took you long enough,” Yoruichi chortles, like this isn’t a Big Problem. “Tessai thought for sure you’d realize she’s practically your wife-” Kisuke winces. “-when she went off to college and still went back to the Shouten every night. But I’ve known you longer so I figured it would take you a while before it clicked.”

“We are roommates,” He hisses vehemently, downing another cup of alcohol before pouring himself some more. “I’ve never- Yoruichi-san, I would never- I wouldn’t-”

“Well that was obvious too,” Yoruichi snorts, but her gold eyes are suddenly a lot less amused a lot more focused, acute and unblinking on his face. “But you know, if she’s old enough to kill for you, then she’s old enough to fuck.”

Kisuke freezes, and then straightens, and he has never looked at Yoruichi the way he does now, but there’s ice in his veins and a knot of flash-fire rage and black-fanged guilt clawing up his gut, and he couldn’t stop the crass words if he wanted to, “She was old enough to kill for me at fifteen; was she old enough to fuck then too?”

Yoruichi doesn’t even flinch, just pins him with a burning look sharp enough to cut. “Well you didn’t wanna fuck her then, did you? But she’s an adult now, and she can make her own choices, and I know you suck at human-ing so I’m gonna go ahead and give you a piece of advice in advance and hopefully save everyone a lot of needless drama - in general, people don’t like it when you make decisions for them because you think you know better. So before you panic even more and start pushing her away ‘for her own good’ but really actually because you freaked out about having feelings, maybe, just maybe, ask her what she wants.” She grins like a tiger that has its prey cornered. “Ichigo’s not stupid. Even I don’t know if she knows about your gigantic crush yet, she’s surprisingly closed off about personal issues, but let me just remind you, Kisuke - she didn’t sit at my bedside, or Shinji’s, or even Rukia’s, after the war, and you know full we were all laid out for days, if not from injuries then exhaustion.” She leans forward and snags the front of his Shihakushou to give him a hard shake. “Are you listening to me, Kisuke? She cares about you, and you care about her, and I have not seen you this happy in a very, very long time.” She glares at him, daring him to argue. “Even if nothing comes from this, even if you just stay friends, don’t you dare fuck this up for yourself. You’ve got a good thing here. She’s good for you, and she makes you happy. And it’s not a crime to be happy, Kisuke.”

She lets him go. Kisuke doesn’t move for a long minute, and this time, Yoruichi waits him out. “…What if I’m not good for her though?”

Yoruichi clicks her tongue and reaches for her own sake again, limbs going feline-languid once more. “That’s for her to decide. She’s got a decent head on her shoulders, Kisuke; if you really were poison for her like you seem to think you are every damn turn of the moon, she would’ve dropped you a long time ago.” She pauses to take a swig, and then she kicks him under the table hard enough to make him yelp. “Now quit being a coward, drink your damn sake, and then go home and be disgustingly domestic with your roommate when she gets back. And if after all this crap you put me through, you still end up hurting her, I’m gonna tell Kuukaku, and she’ll make you wish you were just dead.”

Kisuke thinks about that for a moment, remembers some of the antics Kuukaku used to get up to with Yoruichi, and internally cringes. “Right,” he sighs. Yoruichi rolls her eyes at him, and he sighs again. Well, he supposes he should’ve known better than to get any sympathy from Yoruichi. He also mulls over what she’s said though, and… well. If nothing else, Ichigo’s choices are her own. Kisuke’s manipulated her into a war once already. He can’t - he won’t - do it to her again, for anything.

He downs the last of his alcohol and this time dares to hope.

6. They never actually sit down and lay all their cards on the table and talk about it. It’s not in either of their natures; Ichigo prefers actions, and ninety percent of Kisuke’s words have always been used to deflect and manipulate. But, for Ichigo, the Shouten becomes home. She never moves out (and yes, she knew what she was doing when she packed up most of her belongings and carted them over to the shop), and at first, it was just to help because Kisuke was so badly injured from the war, but the longer she stayed, the harder it was to think about leaving again for good. When Kisuke hadn’t said anything even after he’d fully recovered, she took it as permission to stay, and of course that didn’t do anything to make her like him less. She enjoys his company, likes reading in his labs while he fiddles with his experiments, likes surprising him with new recipes, likes being surprised when he modifies or creates yet another Kidou spell for her monstrous levels of reiatsu so that it won’t blow up when she tries it. She likes that he always tucks her into bed if she falls asleep at her desk studying, and she likes that he trusts her enough to walk around without wearing his hat all the time. She likes that between her strength and adaptability and his creativity and cunning, they’re more or less evenly matched in a spar, and the harder she pushes him, the more thrilled he gets at having to work for his victories. She likes that he comes home one day with something both new and still familiar in his eyes when he looks at her, and a month later, on her birthday, he takes her halfway across the world to a rare book convention with a focus on Shakespeare, and halfway through that, his hand swings out to tangle her fingers with his own.

They never really talk about it, but Ichigo migrates into his bedroom one night and never sleeps in her own room again. They take things slow, honestly more for Kisuke’s benefit than her own, but she doesn’t mind because mostly, she just likes having Kisuke there, with her. He still treats her like glass sometimes, like something priceless he’s afraid to smudge just by touching it. Those days, Ichigo sprawls across him with all her weight and stays there until he wraps himself more firmly around her, usually dozing off while Ichigo works on a draft of her first book.

They don’t talk about it. But they don’t have to, to know what they mean to each other.

[godkilller]

@magical-girl-coral​​

Can you see an au where Gin reads Orihime like a book when she gets kidnapped by Aizen and understand why she's really there(mostly because he is in a similar situation), convince her to team up with him and take Aizen down together? Maybe Gin still loses his arm but in a less painful way.

          out of character.  HELLO AGAIN ! Thanks for the ask ! I myself have been guilty of daydreaming all possibilities in terms of what Gin could have done differently, so I’ve certainly thought about this one in particular before. It’s cute, it’s entertaining, it gives Orihime a chance to shine in an otherwise dropped plotline in which she takes away the Hogyoku using her unique powers of rejecting space and time. It’s all really cool ! But I’ve also come to a conclusion...

          As fun as that sounds, it’s sadly a tad bit unrealistic to both Gin’s character as well as Orihime’s in that point in canon. She has no reason to trust Gin, SHE MET HIM ONLY BRIEFLY DURING RUKIA’S RESCUE and he was, not surprisingly, absolutely awful and terrifying. Why would Orihime, at canon’s face-value, trust that Gin isn’t simply pulling her leg and making her admit that she has a churning plot to try and negate Aizen’s Hogyoku whilst captured? In her eyes, she’s surrounded by enemies, and the last person I reckon she’d feel safe confessing treason to would be Aizen’s right hand man.

          And Gin has no reason to seek a human teenager out in attempt to take Aizen down alongside her; one, he’s not big on involving others in general, he’s a lone wolf type and he’s been validated for decades via Shinji being taken out, Urahara being exiled, that anyone who takes a shot at Aizen with the power of friendship / connections to others, open weaknesses, etc. would simply become manipulated and thus disposed of in various creative ways. Gin involving a girl he hardly knows goes against his strict trust issues, too. Not only that, but that would endanger Orihime instantly by bringing her into a scheme that has been a century in the making up against the most powerful Shinigami yet, whilst she is also a prisoner of war and going through self-doubt, trauma, and life or death scenarios as is. I DON’T SEE GIN EVER WILLINGLY APPROACHING SOMEONE ELSE TO HAVE THEM TEAM UP WITH HIM IN GENERAL.

          Yeah, it’s frustrating for us to look back on Gin’s choices, his secrecy, the whole grand thing, but we can’t lose sight of the fact that THERE’S A REASON GIN NEVER TOLD ANYONE, never sought any help.

          Aizen kept track of all loose ends. It took Gin meticulously unraveling and obscuring his connections to Rangiku for Aizen to still be, at least somewhat, confused when Gin reported that he had killed her, and had no feelings for her. AIZEN ISN’T DUMB, and the quote “I knew this (that you wanted me dead), but I brought you with me regardless” -- Aizen may not have known Gin’s reasonings, his desires, his heart, but HE KNEW ENOUGH TO BE CAUTIOUS, having never shown Gin his blade within arm’s reach when alone with him because that would be all it’d take for Gin to backstab him. There’s an unspoken threat, as shown with the multiple times Hitsugaya made his move at Aizen only to put Hinamori into harms way, or directly into his blade’s path, via Aizen’s manipulation of the playing board -- that Aizen has no issue playing dirty, jabbing at weaknesses with the courtesy of Kyoka Suigetsu’s warping ways. If Orihime’s ready to take down Aizen and Gin decides to make his move with her there, who’s to say Shinso’s stabbing Aizen and not Orihime, then? It’s tricky. HE NEEDS TO BE ALONE.

          Not to mention the extremely unfortunate fact: If Orihime confessed she wishes to negate the Hogyoku, GIN WOULDN’T WANT THAT TO HAPPEN. He is selfishly and self-destructively hellbent on returning Rangiku’s stolen soul piece to her, and destroying the Hogyoku goes against that wish, even if in hindsight it makes the most sense for him to take that route for a better chance at successfully killing Aizen. It’s even hard for me to justify whether or not Orihime was even present to HEAL GIN FROM DYING in Karakura Town, as she wasn’t there yet and had no reason to B-line for anywhere other than where Ichigo was.

          THAT AAALLLLLLLLLLLLL BEING SAID....

          I fucking love the idea of Gin and Orihime bonding, since it’s shown that Rangiku and Orihime got along great and it’s a very maternal (but in a ‘cool mom’ way) friendship between the two, IT’S NOT TOO FAR OFF TO ASSUME, IN BETTER SETTINGS, GIN WOULD ALSO GET ALONG WELL WITH HER. Gin and Rangiku share a lot of the same likes and dislikes, and actually a lot personality-wise, too, when one half of the coin isn’t committing war crimes and dying. It’s safe to say that outside of the conflicts and betrayal, perhaps, they could have made some form of makeshift family. At least, that’s what I like to tell myself when I’m in a more fluffy hurt/comfort mood with Gin’s canon divergent routes.

          Canon-wise, it’s hard to say, it feels inevitable that Gin couldn’t succeed because so much of his character’s flaws rested in the belief that he HAD to do this all in the first place, alone, suicidal in nature, and the only way for him to learn and grow and develop past that would be to fail AND live. That’s why my Redemption Verse exists, to explore his rebirthing and the various connections made thereafter. I CAN CERTAINLY SEE GIN AND ORIHIME MEETING AGAIN AFTER THE WAR, but there would be no talk of conflicts or schemes between them. The priority here would be APOLOGIZING FOR THE HARM SHE WENT THROUGH, regardless of how indirect of a part he had in it, because Gin, if anything, does not enjoy seeing girls cry due to Aizen’s manipulative ways.

          From there, they can absolutely team-up for badass moments. I like the idea of Gin visiting the human world and crashing at Orihime’s because Rangiku’s insisted they pop by for a movie night, and things of that nature. I LIKE INCLUDING ORIHIME IN THESE HAPPIER MOMENTS BECAUSE SHE’S JUST A KID, AND GIN DOESN’T WANT TO DRAG HER INTO ANYTHING AWFUL. Orihime’ll have to be the one to be like ‘we’re doing this’ and Gin’ll go along for the ride.

          Things are lighter and more possible once the whole Aizen ship has sailed and sank.

[hashtagartistlife]

▲ for Zangetsu?? (Quincy and Hollow versions)?

please dont send in any more of these bc im just clearing out my inbox and i wont answer them

the zangetsus, fake and real: 

- ngl, despite the fact that the real zangetsu being the hollow instead of the old man had been foreshadowed since early on in the manga i was maybe a little devastated when it was actually confirmed only because i am ship trash and the black/white aesthetic between old man zangetsu and shirayuki was way too good to let go of

- that being said, the hollow being ichigo’s zanpakutou…. made sense in a way than the old man being ichigo’s zanpakutou didn’t. as if ichigo’s soul was some wise cryptic old man who talks in riddles…. No, it suits him a lot better to have a raging barely-leashed ball of instincts as his sword and/or soul. 

- i’m still not entirely sure on what exactly ichigo’s powers were doing towards the end of the arc. i mean, i realise that discussion on this is practically irrelevant now since the arc ended in a dumpster fire, and anything in the last 20 chapters is just… one poorly explained asspull after the other, and likely not to constitute any sort of intended or planned canon, but, like, ????? the fact that there was literally no explanation of any part of his new powers just dumbfounded me…. like this is a battle shounen…… powers and how they work are such an integral part of its make-up…. anyway from what i could remember they were just like ‘quincy and hollow powers fused into the two swords. that’s it goodbye’ which…. i Don’t Like That. I’m still sort of split on how I think Ichigo’s powers should have ended up at the end - either he accepts the fact that he’s a massive hybrid, and somehow manages to balance the shinigami-hollow-quincy sides of him, which i think should have led to him becoming some form of renegade who works outside the confines of soul society’s structure to bring justice to those wronged by it - OR he denounces the other identities, proclaims himself shinigami, and works from inside the soul society system to change it for the better. Essentially, revolution from the outside versus revolution from the inside. Despite my personal tendencies being for the former (oppressive systems gotta be broken! reform from the inside is hardly ever fast enough), i feel like narrative-wise bleach was going for the latter, since the former sort of excludes rukia and whatever its other faults, bleach only really works with rukia by ichigo’s sideaNYWAY that is a different meta altogether, tldr 

im very ambivalent about the zangetsus as a whole but i liked it when the hollow was revealed to actually be the representation of ichigo’s soul, since i’ve been rooting for it being a part of him ever since he was first introduced (as opposed to those people who read him as something to be defeated and/or eliminated), and it’s always nice to be right 

[mahoutoons]

Unpopular opinions: Magical Girl edition

I’ve seen lots of people make unpopular opinions on various topics so I decided to make one for Magical Girls.

1. Yuki Yuna and Madoka Magica are both good shows.

They both have their good points and their problems. PMMM fans say that YuYuYu is a ripoff while YuYuYu fans say that their show is actually a lot better than PMMM. They’re both equally good shows. I don’t see the point in fighting over them. 

2. Seasons 1 and 2 of Sailor Moon Crystal aren’t that bad.

Yes, they had their problems. I will admit, the animation WAS off sometimes. But it isn’t the worst thing to ever exist like some people make it out to be. People love to praise season 3 as if its perfect and trash the first two seasons. I’ll admit, season 3 WAS an improvement, but you can praise it WITHOUT bashing the first two seasons.

3. Mahoutsukai Pretty Cure isn’t that bad.

I can certainly see why some people dislike it but I didn’t find it terrible. I will admit I found Mirai a boring character but I loved her bond with Riko, Mofurun and Ha-chan and found it an overall fun season. Nothing too special but it wasn’t too bad.

4. Ichigo x Masaya is my favourite pairing in Tokyo Mew Mew.

Its the canon pairing yet its the least shipped because people either ship Ichigo with Ryou or Kisshu and hate on Masaya for being bland. I ship Ryou x Ichigo but I can’t see why people hate Masaya so much. Okay, you find him boring, but it hardly justifies all the hate. He’s a caring boyfriend and genuinely loves Ichigo. He even waited in the rain for her. Sure, he was mean as Deep Blue but that wasn’t Masaya there. 

5. Villains like Kisshu and Demande don’t deserve to be redeemed.

They both harassed and sexually assaulted the underage main female characters and did a bunch of other horrible things, yet they’re easily forgiven because they made a sacrifice. The fact that both these shows are aimed at a young female audience doesn’t help matters. It sends a dangerous message to young girls, that even if someone sexually assaults you, you must forgive them if they do one good thing. I get they’re trying to push a message of forgiveness, but this is NOT how you do it. 

(On a side note, Demande doesn’t get redeemed in the manga or Crystal. He’s actually killed off and I’m glad for that)

6. I don’t ship Amu Hinamori with anyone.

Not with Ikuto, or Tadase, or Utau, or anyone for that matter. I prefer her as a girl who finds herself before jumping into romance.

7. While I adore Madoka Magica to bits, I’m not a fan of its impact on the genre.

Sure there were dark magical girl shows BEFORE Madoka but they weren’t a lot of them. But ever since Madoka came out, there’s a wave of these Magical Girl shows that try too hard to be dark and edgy. They think killing off characters left and right and making them suffer makes for an emotional story, when that’s not the case. The reason we were sad when bad things happened to PMMM characters or when they died was because we had time to care for them. These edgy Magical Girl shows try to put as many “dark” things as possible in an attempt to be cool but they fail miserably at it. I feel Yuki Yuna is the only post-Madoka dark MG that doesn’t try too hard to be dark and edgy. It shows us the happy parts and lets us get attached to the characters BEFORE tragedy strikes.

8. While on the topic of Madoka Magica, the people who hate it just because its dark are just as annoying as the people who hate the happy Magical Girl shows.

Its fine to not like the show or if dark shows just aren’t your thing, but some people who hate on PMMM to be cool are really annoying. You’re not any better than people who hate things just for being light and happy.

9. I’ve said this before but, I don't ship MadoHomu or KyoSaya.

90% of the PMMM fandom only cares about those relationships but I don’t really ship both pairings. MadoHomu has always been unhealthy for me, even before Rebellion and as for KyoSaya, they lack development. They only met for one day and hated each other, then suddenly Kyoko is Sayaka’s biggest regret in Rebellion. I honestly prefer MadoSaya and KyoMami (and even MadoMami).

10. This isn’t specific to Magical Girls alone but, there is no such thing as a worst fandom or best fandom. 

Every fandom, from Sailor Moon to Madoka Magica WILL have some toxic fans as well as some good fans. The most we can do is just enjoy whatever it is we love and try to avoid the toxic fans. 

Which of these opinions do you agree or disagree with?

[cero-blast]

Your post about Gin "messing with people's heads" makes me think, doesn't this also apply to Ulquiorra? He also psychologically tortured Inoue, don't you think it's hypocritical to say Gin's actions don't nullify the bad things he did, but say that UH is good/not toxic? I'm not trying to hate on you, I don't ship anything in Bleach, I just wanted to know why Gin is considered a bad inexcusable guy but Ulquiorra's relationship with Inoue is glorified?

This will get… really long. I’m genuinely sorry it’s this long.

I never said Ulqiorra did nothing wrong (though it’s fair to say I didn’t happen to specifically point it out), or that UH is a ship with many positive feelings associated to it. That would be… an interesting take. I hope you don’t think I think that. But I also need you to understand that I don’t base my taste in ships on what I desire/consider healthy in real life. They exist in the context of the canon — not interchangeable with reality considering the existence of superpowers, ghosts, semi-human creatures and time warping — and that’s where it ends for me. Applying the dynamics in my ships to any situation other than the precise one of Bleach’s canon would make them fundamentally different.

I’ve wanted to mention this about Ulquiorra for a while now and I’ll take the occasion to do so. It’s a mistake to put him in the same framework as a human or shinigami. (The latter two also have their differences but based on observation shinigami seem to behave in a much more human-like manner compared to hollows/arrancars.) He’s practically incapable of understanding what empathy is or find any good reason not to hurt other people, which is why it’s surprising when he manages to grasp even a shred of the concept right before dying. Hollows are born from experiencing such severe pain that it distorts their whole ‘essence’, so something has gone terribly wrong with them emotionally by definition, whether they evolve to arrancar form or not. Ulquiorra’s aspect of death, his ‘theme’, is emptiness — characterized by complete neutrality towards everything. Since a person with a healthy mindset tends to focus on danger and negative events, neutrality often comes across as immoral for being equally conceding towards moral right and moral wrong. The point is, Ulquiorra’s motivations for provoking Inoue had nothing to do with him taking joy in causing pain to her. In fact, it’s hinted he’s not even fully aware he’s doing it, like the scene where he tells Inoue he’d laugh at her friends’ foolishness in her place. He’s unaffected by most things AND has difficulty placing himself in others’ perspective, which results in him assuming everyone around him would be unaffected. The only thing that factored into him doing just about anything was curiosity, the need to fill the void, however you want to put it. If a human or shinigami behaved the same way he did around Inoue, it would come across in a vastly different way and I’m not sure it would even interest me as a ship. Ulquiorra is not only a hollow, but a hollow with a particular impediment in understanding how others feel, and this is an integral part of him as a character, of his interactions, of UH, of anything regarding him. I know it’s funny as a fandom meme to act as if he were human, but he’s NOT and this needs to be kept in mind.

This applies to any arrancar or espada, really. It’s tempting to judge them on the same basis as enemies who are closer to humanity, mainly because of their appearance and intellect. But this is the trick itself the narrative plays, a progression that has been present in Bleach since the start: it created a human/monster (shinigami/hollow here) dichotomy, then spent the longest arc deconstructing it by blurring the lines between the two. It doesn’t matter how smart and eloquent the espada manage to get, the only productive way of interpreting them is as people who are missing a very core part of their personality, so someone severely psychologically ill. (I say this as someone who has their own problems, before it gets misinterpreted as condescension.) Should this absolve them from punishment? Bleach says a very clear no. They almost all get killed by shinigami, in Ulquiorra’s case Ichigo specifically — Ichigo, who, by his own admission, empathized with everyone he fought and even gets angry at Yammy for speaking ill of Ulquiorra after his death. (I don’t want to start arguing about how he was in hollow state when he defeated him. He would have killed Ulquiorra either way if he continued to stand in the way of protecting his friends.)

In summary, the espada aren’t human. Ulquiorra isn’t human. It’s unrealistic to expect him to behave like a human. You’re free to pick who you want to have compassion for among Bleach’s positive and negative characters and if you decide Ulquiorra is irredeemable in your opinion, that’s fine — many characters would agree. But at the very least it can be objectively said that Bleach spends a lot of time presenting ‘evil’ characters’ perspectives as nuanced and explicable instead of writing them off. It gives the audience a choice in the matter. A core message of the entire story is that we’re subjective and maybe we’ll never manage to see the world the same way as someone else, but that’s fine and it doesn’t make us all that different; hollows can become *almost* shinigami, shinigami can become *almost* hollows, and they both have ways to relate to one another while retaining the insurmountable differences and even fighting and killing each other.

Now, onto Gin. First off, you seem to be under the impression that I don’t like him as a character. That couldn’t be further from the truth; I only said it in the tags because I figured saying it in the post would have sounded like making excuses, which is not what the post was about. I don’t know if I would call him a ‘good’ or ‘bad’ person. All I know is that I really enjoyed him as a character and I could see how he evoked sympathy — in the tragic way antagonists do when they get some sort of redemption. I noticed it’s a common tool in fiction to make an impact on the audience, I suppose because we’re happier when we see ‘bad people getting fixed’ rather than someone already good doing more good things. It’s a Prodigal Son type of thing; can be argued about but it definitely makes an impact.

Gin is a quintessential ‘mysterious type’; he has a long-running plan that he executes throughout almost his entire life without ever consulting with anyone (an important detail). He had a hypothesis on what would be the most effective way to kill Aizen and constructed a convoluted plan based on it — a plan where the ends would have justified the means in many, many situations, and that required causing problems to a lot of people. He had, however, no certainty that what he was doing would lead to the desired results (which it then didn’t…). A lot of his provocation was a means to create a certain image of himself and there’s a big question of where to draw the line there, whether all of that was absolutely necessary. Leaving to Hueco Mundo and technical demonstrations of loyalty were, sure, but mocking Rukia on her way to being executed? He considered keeping everything a secret a prerequisite for things to work out — presumably because if he talked to anyone, Aizen could have noticed — but was it, really? Many of his actions were based on his personal judgement on what would and wouldn’t have ruined the façade, subjective and hunch-based since he didn’t know the outcome for sure.

Gin isn’t inexcusable, but I noticed a lack of emphasis on the damage his actions caused among fans, both because of the chronological order of the story and his affiliation with the protagonists’ side. Because the last thing he did was a good thing, that’s what he’s remembered by, without taking into account the sum total of his interactions with others. He posited himself as vicious until the last moment and did so consciously. Ulquiorra had a very, very gradual progression in the way he talked to Inoue, which doesn’t make it less rude and traumatic, but there’s a difference between him showing up and telling her she ‘has no rights’ and later taking an active interest in her views on the Heart. It would be equally reductive to interpret him by his last moment and nothing else, but all he did before led to that moment progressively, while Gin’s was a very abrupt twist.

My post was a comment on psychology on the most basic, technical level, not a moral judgement. The two are separate in the way we process trauma and that’s exactly what I find interesting. Having strong negative emotions associated to a memory (what I think Kira, Hinamori, Hitsugaya or Rangiku could have had with Gin’s betrayal) creates a very subconscious reaction that can hardly be fixed by suddenly finding out it was necessary for a positive cause, which is why healing from trauma requires years of therapy. Because *in that moment* you didn’t have that knowledge, the pain remains in your memory and it’s not a matter of logical reasoning. Now, I’m not saying Ulquiorra’s interactions with Inoue were numerous or productive enough to properly process the trauma he caused her — the canon info is ambivalent on how comfortable Inoue was around him towards the end of her captivity because there’s both scenes like the famous slapping one *and* her seeming more light-hearted towards Ulquiorra in Unmasked, plus no one has any idea of which came before which. All things considered, I think repeated discussion and an attempt at mutual understanding does a better job at elaborating something traumatic than one single piece of information on why what traumatized you was justified. And note that the *only reason* the understanding between Ulquiorra and Inoue could have been mutual is because Inoue was exceptionally patient, empathetic and willing to face discomfort, way beyond the base level or what should be expected from anyone. Even if it was a *small amount* of *not very productive* discussion, it’s better than one act in my opinion (which most of the people who had some sort of issue with Gin didn’t even directly witness). Which of them is *morally worse* depends on how you draw the lines and define morality and that’s not something I feel qualified to decide.

So, in the end;Ulquiorra:-working towards enemy goals overtly-motivated by curiosity, which can be considered self-oriented-gradual improvement-not fully conscious of the emotional impact of his actions-Inoue considers him an ambivalent presence but “Isn’t afraid”, in her words-half-succeeded, as in: failed the goal of killing Ichigo but sated his curiosity

Gin:-working towards enemy goals on the surface and soul society goals covertly-motivated by attachment to Rangiku and/or revenge, less self-oriented but still focused on close acquaintances -long-running façade of being a terrible person followed by a sudden twist towards the good side-completely aware of everything he’s doing, plan laid out hundreds of years in advance-Gotei 13 don’t interact with Gin throughout HM arc, consider the traitors a lost cause-failed to kill Aizen

Instead of this encyclopedia I could have just written “Gin isn’t irredeemable, I just said he did bad things before”, but I thought too much about it. And I might go through spelling mistakes once I wake up.

[blackrainbowblade]

BLEACH RANT 4: YOU DIDN’T HAVE TO PAIR THEM UP, KUBO What is it with pairings? What was wrong with things as they were? And why did Kubo assume that a ‘satisfactory’ ending must involve marriage a children when he had developed characters who had never shown any interest in this before. None of the characters had ever acted on it, but setting aside the shipping wars, there were certain strong relationships that were tantalising enough that they created the shipping wars. So, whoever you might ship, you can hardly deny that the following were shown in canon: - Renji had strong feelings for Rukia - Ichigo had strong feelings for Rukia and Orihime - Rukia had strong feelings for Ichigo - Orihime had strong feelings for Ichigo Now, I admit, I found Ichigo and Rukia’s relationship super sweet. I would contest that the arguments and anger stemmed from the fact they both kind of loved each other and didn’t know how/didn’t dare express it. Ichigo was also shown to have always liked, even loved Orihime. The bittersweet part of Ichigo and Rukia’s relationship was, for me, that they could never actually be together. Ichigo being with Rukia would have involved his becoming a shinigami in Soul Society and probably not getting to see much of his family or friends. That would have been abhorrent to his character. Had Rukia settled down with him, she’d have had to give up being a shinigami. Since she spent her whole life proving herself in the Gotei Thirteen, I could hardly see her being happy and settling down as a human waifu. So I accept that, short of a huge upheaval e.g. Ichigo’s death perhaps (so that separation from his living family was inescapable), they were not to be, but…

[sonnets-and-snowdrops]

For the fanfic prompts, could you do “ i got you. it’s gonna be okay, you’re going to be okay.” for a Ukitake/Byakuya ship piece? (maybe with Ukitake saying it to Byakuya?) Your stories are amazing, btw ^^

From here || Always accepting!

I’m SORRY that it took me so long to get to this. Thank you for your patience, kind Anon-san! And thank you EVEN MORE for your lovely words! I’m so happy you like my stories! ^_^

Also I uh kinda forgot that this was from a hurt meme and totally made it about emotional shenanigans instead of an actual physical injury so umHope that’s okay

It also might be worth mentioning that I went with a kinda-sorta-established-relationship-type-thing here. Just made more sense, I thought. Okieeee, I think that’s all - enjoy!

Heshould have known better than to come here, if he sought solitude.

Hekneels, head bowed and hands folded in his lap, and he keeps his diligentvigil. The sun rises slowly and casts long shadows across the grass, and hesquints when its willful rays breach the top of his parents’ grave, and pierce likeso many traitorous blades into his tired eyes.

Itis the first day since the fall of the Sōkyokuthat Byakuya has had the strength to come to this place.

Hetells himself that it is because his body had not yet recovered. He tellshimself that it is because he did not, until today, possess the fortitude toput one foot in front of the other, to maintain any true semblance ofwakefulness and mental clarity, to stomach any lingering pain from the deep andgrievous wound in his chest.

Hetakes some solace in the knowledge that this is not entirely a lie.

Itdoes not surprise him when he hears the footsteps approach. As like as not, hehas been shirking some duty by spending his valuable time here; perhaps thereare reparations he must attend to, or finances he must distribute, or legalmatters he must brush away or bring to a head. Perhaps, for all he knows, anotherlegion of menos has descended silently from the sky, leagues away, and SoulSociety requires his sword already.

Butas the footsteps grow closer, Byakuya finds himself struck by uncertainty. Thereis no urgency to the footsteps. There is no rush, and no hurry. Byakuyalistens, but he does not turn his head. His vigil has not ended, for one thing,and he would be horribly remiss to let his attention stray from his meagerattempt at atonement. For another thing, it annoys him, ever so slightly, thathe cannot place this interloper’s gait. The steps are too heavy to be Rukia’s,and too steady to be Renji’s, and this newcomer, whoever they are, has kepttheir reiatsu tightly furled and guarded, so that even Byakuya cannot identifythem by the telltale swirling of their soul. A person of some skill, then. But who…?

Asif in answer, a low voice, cool and calm and kind, breaks what has been, forByakuya, an hours-long silence.  “If youwould prefer to be alone,” it says softly, “you need only tell me so.”

Atthat, Byakuya longs, desperately, to melt.

Senpai, he thinks, and his heart swells.

But Byakuyaanswers simply. “No,” he says. He tightens his fists in his lap, as if doing sowill help him maintain his firm grip on his composure.

Byakuyasenses movement behind him, and then, he finds himself bathed in shadow.Ukitake Jūshirō stands at Byakuya’s shoulder,tall and proud, white hair and white haori billowing behind him in elegantwaves as they are caught by the warm breeze of the summer morning. His face isset and serious. In his hand, loosely held, are two bright snowdrops.

Ukitake turns his head, and hesmiles. “No?” he repeats. “I must beg your pardon, Byakuya-kun. An answer asvague as that is beyond an old man’s understanding.”

Byakuya is not amused. “You wantto hear me ask,” he says flatly. “That’s in poor taste, senpai, given thecircumstances.”

Ukitake’s green eyes glint, andhis smile twitches. “Perhaps.” A moment passes, and then his smile fades, justa little. “But - you’re right, of course. I see that I must begyour pardon once more.” The petals of the snowdrops tremble faintly in Ukitake’spale hand. “Please, forgive me for seeking something familiar in the midst ofthis strangeness.”

Byakuya shakes his head. “There’snothing to forgive,” he says. “Don’t speak in riddles, senpai. It’s in evenpoorer taste, and you know that.” He eyes the snowdrops more closely. One issmaller than the other, and both look as if they were picked freshly thismorning. “Shiba-fukutaichō?” Byakuya asks.

Ukitake nods, slow and somber. “Miyako,too.”

“You’re on your way to visitnow, I take it?”

Ukitake nods again. “I want totell Kaien about Ichigo-kun,” he says. “It will make him happy, I think.” Ukitake’sbreath hitches - a hesitation. The moment brief, but Byakuya notices. “I’lltell him about Rukia, too,” Ukitake says quietly. “He’ll want to know, and sheisn’t ready to tell him herself. Not just yet.”

Byakuya turns back to hisparents’ grave. “Good,” he says. “Go, then. I won’t keep you.”

But Ukitake makes no move todepart. “I don’t mind being kept, Byakuya-kun,” he says. “Not if youneed me.”

Byakuya’sfingernails dig into the soft flesh of his palms. “Thank you, senpai,” he says,“but I do not need you.” His words are tight and stiff. His chest aches, and Byakuyadecides that his wound, not his heart, is the source of the pain.

Hehears a whisper of shifting cloth, and a dry rustle of grass. A gentle handdrops onto Byakuya’s shoulder, and Byakuya suppresses the urge to cringe.

“Please,senpai,” Byakuya says, “don’t. I know what you’re going to say.“

Hecan almost hear the smile in Ukitake’s voice. “Oh?” Ukitake says. “What am I goingto say, Byakuya-kun?”

“Itdoesn’t matter.”

“Doesn’tit?”

“No.”

“Andwhy not?”

“Because,”Byakuya says firmly, “need and want are hardly equal in importance.”

Thehand departs from Byakuya’s shoulder, and the shadow cast across Byakuya’s facedisappears. For a moment, Byakuya actually fears that his senpai has allowedhim to have the last word, for once, and panic grips him -

“Wanting,”comes Ukitake’s voice in Byakuya’s ear, “is not weakness, Byakuya-kun.”

Andthen, strong arms wrap Byakuya in what is, perhaps, the warmest and mostwelcome embrace that Byakuya has ever experienced. “I’ve got you, Byakuya-kun,”Ukitake murmurs. He kneels behind Byakuya and, snowdrops still in hand, holdshim close, and presses a small kiss to Byakuya’s temple. “It’s going to be allright, Byakuya-kun,” Ukitake says, and he kisses Byakuya again. “It’s going tobe all right. It’s going to be all right…”

Fora long, long time, Byakuya is still. He rests his heavy head against Ukitake’sshoulder, and he swoons like a lovestruck fool beneath his senpai’s tender kisses- his forehead, his ears, the nape of his neck, and his fingers, one by one byone. When Byakuya’s weary eyelids drop closed, Ukitake laughs, and kisses them,too. Something familiar in the midst ofthis strangeness, Byakuya thinks, as Ukitake’s gentle hand finds its wayinto Byakuya’s hair.

“…Ithought I’d lost everything,” Byakuya hears himself say.

Ukitake’shand drops, and starts to rub small circles into Byakuya’s back. “Hm?” he asks.“How’s that, Byakuya-kun?”

“Everything,”Byakuya says again. He cracks his eyes open and turns his gaze sideways; hewants to see his senpai’s face when he says this. “Rukia,” he says, first. “Renji.The respect of my fellow Captains. The respect of Soul Society. The right tocall myself my parents’ son. The right to mourn my wife. My pride,” he says, his voice cracking. “And…”He swallows, hard. “You, senpai… Iwas certain I’d lost you, too…”

Goodhumor flashes in Ukitake’s clever eyes. “If you intend to lose me,” he says,ducking his head and placing a kiss on Byakuya’s shoulder, “you’ll have to trymuch harder than that.”

Byakuyabristles. “I’m serious, senpai.”

“Soam I.”

Theykneel together in silence until the sun has risen fully, and the day, brightand brazen and blue, has emerged. After a time, Byakuyacasts a glance to the snowdrops which still hang, all but neglected, betweenhis senpai’s fingers. “You’ve kept Shiba-fukitaichō waiting long enough,” Byakuya mumbles. “You should go,senpai. Before the hour grows too late.”

“I supposeyou’re right,” Ukitake says. His eyes are softly fixed on the grave before him.“I hope you know,” he says, “how proud they would be, Byakuya-kun.”

Byakuyaalmost laughs at that. “I betrayedthem,” he says.

“Onlyin your eyes,” Ukitake says.

Withwhat seems to Byakuya like a great effort, Ukitake rises. He lets his fingertipslinger on the top of Byakuya’s head before, at long last, pulling his hand awayand heaving a great, long sigh. His steady footsteps begin, and then growsofter and more distant, and then fade away altogether as he departs.

Byakuya,for his part, returns his gaze to his parents’ grave.

Hewill depart soon, he decides - but not quite yet.