Soul of darkness (Done)

[Darkoda]

It was early morning in Seirietei. Shinigami were just beginning to head off to whatever duties awaited them for the day, the morning sun comfortably in the sky. One particular shinigami however, was within a hidden arena, specifically, the secret training grounds for the Division 2 elite. Shin walked on the training grounds, with his usual impassive appearance in place, but this time, he was deep in thought. What he about to do today would be the beginning of the end, and he knew very well that once he started, there was no going back.

Shin had spent the vast majority of his time as a shinigami training to be the fastest, most lethal being in existence. While the existence part hasn’t happened yet, there was no denying that he was powerful. He certainly was among the faster shinigami, and while he still couldn’t fight with kendo worth above general mediocrity, his hakubo skills more than made up for it, and his released zanpakuto gave him options outside of conventional kendo anyway, which suited him just fine – that fighting style was a pain in the neck. However, if he wanted to be able to stand up to anyone, he needed to reach his fullest potential, to achieve the ban release. It was finally time to confront his shadow. He made a mental note to be disturbed later on about calling that fox his shadow – he blamed Kumori.

Shin stopped about 30 meters from some of the healing springs scattered about the area. He took one last calming breath and took out his zanpakuto, the blade form of his spirit, his closest friend, and his killer if he wasn’t prepared for whatever she had planned. It seemed that Kumori wasn’t immune to the gravity of the situation; usually the kitsune would have done something by now to break the tension, only because it bored her.

Shin spun the sword around his fingers a few times, and then threw his zanpakuto into the air, the sword spinning until it landed blade first five feet away from Shin. He surged his reiatsu, and the zanpakuto glowed purple in response, until it exploded into a plume of black fire. Despite the appearance, the flames gave of no heat, and when they dissipated, there was no sign of any damage to the ground. Actually, there was no sign of anything. Well it wasn’t exactly in Kumori’s nature to do anything the way Shin expected. He opened his senses on full alert; the crazy fox would pop out of nowhere just to irritate him for the morning with her first attempt to inflict unnecessary pain.

“I’m right here Shin.”

Shin spun around to see a girl dressed in a white robe and hakama staring at him. Her green scarf was billowing behind her, carried on an ethereal wind as usual, which was also keeping her two oversized strands of hair behind her. What was unusual was the serious look within her golden eyes.

“I’m not going to ask if you’re ready because you aren’t stupid enough to summon me like this unless you were prepared for all the consequences.” She closed her eyes as if in deep thought.

“I must stress this though; if you lose, you will probably die. Be prepared to fight with everything you have, I will not play around with you here.” Her eyes snapped open and there was a surge of energy, before it settled into a distant presence.

“I have sealed off an area of this room as our arena. Needless to say, you cannot leave the boundaries of the barrier. No one can get within a 200 meter radius of where I stand, or see what is going on in here.”

A wave of her hand, and Shin had his zanpakuto back in his. Something felt off about it though.....

“That sword is a representation of a fragment of your soul. It’s up to you to figure out which fragment it is.”

“So my test is?”

“Make me.”

Shin stared at her for a few moments, waiting for the clarification. Seeing that it wasn’t coming, he asked the obvious. “.............what?”

“You want bankai? Convince me to hand it over. Until you do, I’m going to keep attacking you until the day ends.”

Well that was incredibly vague, and open for her to do whatever she wanted. So this wasn’t going to end until whenever she decided that she tormented him enough. Joy.

“Can I get bankai?” Why not, she was the one who put such a stupid test in the first place.

He only registered that she had moved when he felt the breeze on his face, long after the fact.

“You aren’t going to need that anymore.”

Before Shin could begin to wonder what she was talking about, his headband fell to the floor, the front part severed into pieces. Shin put his hand on his forehead and examined his fingers, and was not surprised to see four faint lines of red staining his glove.

“I told you, I’m not playing with you Shin. Next time, I will leave more than a scratch.”

[Darkoda]

Shin spun around and ran at Kumori, who was completely uncaring for his charge, examining her claws. Shin swung his blade, aiming for her head, and watched in shock as the blade stopped on her head. That hesitation cost him, as not a second later, Kumori was gone again, and there were four deep gashes across his chest, just short of his ribs.

“Don’t allow yourself to get distracted.”

She was at his right this time, still completely calm, this time licking his blood off her claws. How could she pull that off without slicing her tongue open anyway? So apparently whatever she put into the sword was something he was currently lacking. The question was what was it? Until he figured it out, it was best to keep some distance between them before she decided to go on the offensive again. He vanished in a flash of Shunpo, fully intending to appear at some distant corner to think through this little problem, but Kumori had other plans. Shin had the wind knocked out of him when something hit his gut like a sledgehammer and sent him flying into the side of one of the many mountains in the area mid step.

“Running away will get you nowhere; you’re still like a snail to me.”

She didn’t seem at all surprised to see him right in her face, foot aimed for her head. This time, her claws raked across his back, carving a bloody path just under his ribcage straight down to his pelvis. Shin couldn’t hold out a hiss of pain this time; she cut much deeper this time, there was definitely going to be internal bleeding from that. He didn’t have much time to dwell on the injury though, as Kumori was once again in front of him, claw aimed for his face. He blocked her hand with the sharp edge of the blade - that still wouldn’t cut – and grabbed the wrist of the other hand, squeezing it to snap the bone, while twisting it to throw her.

Like that was going to end well. Kumori grabbed him by the neck, dragging his hand along, and effortlessly lifted him into the air. Her claws were digging into his neck, just missing anything vital, but if she squeezed any tighter, that was going to change.

“You aren’t stronger than me either Shin.”

Shin struggled to break her grip on his neck, but the fox simply tightened her grip slightly, making her point quite clear; she was going to snap his neck if he kept it up.

“Well that was over quickly, you should consider giving up about now before I end up killing you.”

Shin’s response was to kick her in the chest, which served only to irritate her. “You aren’t going to get anywhere like that. How hard is it to call it quits and try again when you get stronger? Just say the words, or I’ll kill you.” Kumori accentuated her point by starting to slowly squeeze Shin’s neck tighter.

“I choose to die over giving you the satisfaction. Besides, you won’t kill me; that would mean killing yourself.” It was somewhat impressive that he was able to get all that out while suffocating.

With a sigh, Kumori simply tossed her stubborn partner away. “I already told you, I don’t particularly care about that.”

Shin rolled on the ground, flipping to his feet to see his zanpakuto spirit walking away. “It seems that you still have some ways to go before you grow up.” She sounded a bit disappointed. “Obviously, you failed; I suggest that you don’t try again until you can at least get your sword working properly around me.”

She faded away, the pulse in the sword Shin was holding telling him that she had returned to his inner world.

[Darkoda]

Well that was a bit embarrassing.

After getting patched up at the fourth division, Shin thought the puzzle Kumori left him with. He knew that she wouldn’t tell him exactly what she did until she got something out of it, which Shin didn’t feel like giving her. So that left solving it on his own, but he had no means of knowing what Kumori did to his zanpakuto. You would think that she could at least give some hints; he wasn’t a mind reader after all.

The next few attempts at fighting Kumori ended quite similar to the first; the fight ending quickly without Shin making so much as a scratch on Kumori. After the latest attempt, Kumori finally hit her limit with his stubbornness and decided to stop being so mysterious.

“Just why do you keep trying to fight me? You know that you can’t stand up to me in a fight.” She asked him.

“You know why, because I can’t just give up.”

“Why not? Isn’t it better to admit defeat, train some more and try much later when you’re stronger?” Kumori was using her serious voice again, which meant that she was going to say something that he definitely would not like.

“Or are you so unwilling to admit to yourself that you’re not that strong?”

Shin simply glared at the fox demon while she smirked in response. “Your issues with perceived weaknesses are just getting bothersome now.” She added, walking over to him. “No matter how hard you try, there will always be someone stronger than you are, you really should know that by now.” She gripped the front of his robes and pulled him off the ground.

“It isn’t as if it makes you weak you know.” She said, a more concerned tone in her voice. “But being self destructive isn’t going to help you.” She observed Shin’s face, seeing that he was actually thinking over her words, despite how much he likely didn’t want to.

“If you really want to get stronger, to overcome someone, you first need to acknowledge that the person is superior to you, otherwise you aren’t going to be able to focus on how to work past that disadvantage. For example, if you actually thought about what I keep telling you every time you try to fight me, we would have already moved on from this.”

She put him back on his feet, and faded into his inner world again, but not before giving him a warning. “Think about what I just said; if you call me out without actually having a proper plan after this, I’m snapping every bone in your body.”

Shin just stared at where Kumori was wide-eyed, before finally sighing, and heading back to the division; now he had to actually listen to Kumori’s words lest he tick her off and she really did carry out her threat.

[Darkoda]

Shin’s eye was in its’ usual twitch as he watched his half-asleep zanpakuto spirit. It was one thing that she didn’t take him seriously, but she could at least wait until the fight actually started!

“What are you so steamed about already?” She yawned out, leaning on one of the towers of stone in the training grounds. Granted, it wasn’t the disinterest that was bothering Shin, it was more along the lines of her still being in what was essentially her sealed state.

“Take a wild guess.”

“You have given me no reason to fight you with any amount of effort. Work your way back up to full power. On topic, have you actually learned anything from when I last beat you up?”

Ah yes, back to that topic. When he actually thought about it properly, exactly what Kumori was doing became painfully obvious. “For some reason, every time we fight, you completely overwhelm me without even trying. Considering that we’ve fought before I tried getting bankai in my inner world, and that you certainly didn’t have such an enormous reiatsu advantage over me then, then that means that either you became incredibly strong practically overnight....”

By this point, the tick in his eye shifted to a full on glare. “Or you’ve been draining my own reiatsu to mess with me! You cheating little demon, you’re using my sword to drain my power!”

“Yeah, that’s about right.”

If looks could kill, Shin would need a new zanpakuto spirit by now, many times over. Even Kumori was mildly interested in her oblivious wielder’s death glare. Emphasis on mildly.

“What are you so irritated about? You should have figured that out from the beginning, I mean really, my ability is corroding reiatsu, how obvious could it get that I was draining yours? If you weren’t such an egotistical ass, you would have realised that you were the one who was much weaker. Didn’t you notice that when I destroyed your headband, your reiatsu didn’t rise at all? As if something else was holding it back perhaps?”

Kumori glared right back at Shin, as his own death glare faltered under the logic that Kumori was beating him down with. “This is why I kept telling you to stop and think about things, instead of constantly trying to fight me with power that you didn’t have. I was wondering if I was going to have to spell it out for you eventually, but really, if you turned out to be that stupid, I would have killed you and save myself the trouble to putting up with an idiot.”

Shin resisted the urge to shudder at how close he apparently came to Kumori really deciding to kill him. You have no idea boy….

With a sigh, she stretched herself out on the pillar, bending her back far enough to make a contortionist green with envy. “Well at least you worked it out on your own, so we can move on. You still need to actually impress me enough in a fight for me to acknowledge you as worthy.”

His sword glowed purple for a moment, before he felt his reiatsu rise back to its normal levels. Now at least he could stand a chance against the kitsune in a fight. She seemed to have something else on her mind though.

“What is it this time?”

“Why are you fighting me in here anyway? Don’t you think that Tsuno’s going to freak if we wreck the training room. Not that I have any problems with ticking him off but you’re the one who’s going to have to deal with the aftermath.”

“It’s not like I have much choice. If we fight here, we’ll likely end up burning the place down. If we fight anywhere outside, we’ll end up causing an even bigger mess. At least the damage here will be contained, I don’t want to know how Tsuno would react if we burned down a District or a portion of Seireitei.”

“Ah, good point. Well, shall we begin?”

Shin answered by charging right at her with a roundhouse kick, that she blocked with a shoulder before countering with a punch to the stomach, that Shin deflected, before catching her jaw in a right hook. She rolled with the punch, using her leg to stop the kick Shin followed up with, before using the opening to punch him straight in the face.

Pushed back slightly from the force of the punch, Shin barely ducked under Kumori’s own roundhouse, before rushing her with a punch. She had the same idea, and their fists clashed, their reiatsu surging across the arena before the pressure blew them both back into the rocks.

[Darkoda]

Shin pulled himself out of the pillar, diving to the side as the rock was crushed by Kumori’s fist. A quick sidestep gave him the opportunity to send a kick at her side, which he would later regret taking, as Kumori easily caught his leg. Not missing a beat, he sprung on his other foot, snapping his leg at the demon’s neck. This blow connected, and from Kumori’s muted gasp, she felt it. From the force she slammed him into the ground with, she wasn’t happy about it.

Shin braced himself for the pain, as the loose rocks dug into his skin. Right after, all the air rushed out of his body as Kumori’s foot sank into his stomach, propelling him away. In the second it took him to regain his breath, she was behind him, snatching him out of the air and piledriving him back into the ground.

She’s being more serious than she lets on…that’s going to leave a mark

“Are you going to lie there all day?”

Shin answered by flipping off the ground, trying to catch Kumori’s chin in his ascent. She vanished just before his blow could connect, and Shin immediately drew his zanpakuto and stabbed backwards. The feel of resistance as his sword met flesh told him that he had guessed correctly.

“It isn’t healthy to be predictable.”

A quick stomp to the chest pushed Kumori right off the blade, and into a pillar.

“Why….didn’t you just cut me open there?” She was clutching her wound, although it wasn’t really doing much to stop the bleeding. She did just get stabbed through a kidney most likely.

Shin fixed Kumori with a rare, serious gaze, and he inwardly smirked when he noticed that she was visibly paying attention. A far cry from the beginning of this fight…

“If I had just ended it there, all it would prove is that I can take advantage of your carelessness. I want total victory, to prove that I can stand up to you under my own power. When this is over I’ll leave you with no doubts that I can take care of myself.”

Kumori’s expression changed from wariness, to surprise, until finally, she gave him one of the biggest smiles he had ever seen from her.

“You really managed to grow up when I wasn’t looking, huh?”

Her reiatsu started to rise, as her body shifted into its more feral form. “Alright then, show me your will to win.”

Shin obliged, jumping towards her with his left hand cocked back. Kumori waited for him to come closer, and reacted with some surprise when Shin shot his fist prematurely. The shock was blended with pain when she felt a hard force slam into her chest, sending her right back into the pillar and cracking it. She didn’t have time to figure out what he did, as Shin vanished from sight, and she was sent airborne by another blast of force to her side.

“Enough of this…”

Flipping in mid-air, Kumori performed a shunpo of her own, which was not lost on Shin.

“How did you do that!? You can’t stand on reishi in here; we’re still in the Seireitei!”

The flashes of darkness around him as Kumori dashed around the field gave him an ominous feeling. “You got bigger problems then me getting around trivialities, Shin.”

As if to prove her point, a stone pillar suddenly collapsed, the base burning away. Shin barely rolled out of the path, only to have to jump to avoid the second. The entire area was falling apart, Kumori having corroded away all the bases. And just to make sure that they didn’t fall randomly, she was busy kicking them all at him.

Two words summed things up quite well.

“Oh shi-”

[Darkoda]

As the columns collapsed, Shin sprung into action, using the falling pieces at footholds to jump up above the danger zone, chasing after Kumori. All things considered, he appeared to be quite calm about the situation, despite having to jump and dash constantly, lest he be crushed.

@##&@&$@%*##%%&#@^%@!!!!

Well, he was keeping a decent mask of cool anyway.

“Ooh, Shin-chan’s mad!”

Or maybe not.

Shin’s reiatsu started flaring, the purple aura visible around him as he used a shunpo to close distance for a palm thrust, which Kumori evaded by jumping back, only to get blown away a blast of force. The sudden hit made her lose her footing in the air, blowing her back on top of a small mountain. Shin landed soon after, crouched low with his reiatsu still wrapped around him.

“Just what are you up to? You normally don’t make such a flashy appearance in a fight.”

Shin didn’t answer, instead using shunpo again for another force palm thrust. She was expecting it this time though, and rolled with the force, her leg glowing with black flames before she released a wave of energy mid-flip.

Shin cart-wheeled out of the path, as the wave cut a gash into the ground past him. He didn’t have time to relax though, as Kumori used a shunpo in mid-air again, bouncing about in random patterns until Shin couldn’t keep track of where she was coming from. He gritted his teeth, knowing that he couldn’t avoid a blow at this rate, and sure enough, he felt Kumori’s claws sinking into his shoulder from behind. Before he could counter, she was back to running circles around him.

“It’s odd, you have some odd force attack, and you’re moving faster than usual….”

Then she was in front of Shin, her finger stabbed into his chest. Shin didn’t even have time to react – he didn’t even see her move, again.

“I wonder….. Tobihi.”

A blast of dark energy shot out from her finger, sending Shin across the ground. As soon as he righted himself, a few more shots slammed into him, exploding like bullets.

It’s like a bala from an arrancar, but with more force behind it.

He was breathing harder now, as he steeled himself against the pain and used shunpo again, moving even faster this time, his fist cocked back.

Kumori intercepted him with a rising slash, which forced Shin to bend back, just barely getting clipped on the chin by the claws. Kumori wasn’t done there though, spinning around and slamming her foot into his exposed stomach.

All the fluids flew out of Shin’s mouth as he went flying, and Kumori took full advantage of the opportunity to spray him with Tobihi blasts, sending him further away. Shin hit the ground hard, panting heavily, as his reiatsu started to die down.

“I thought so. You’re focusing all your reiatsu in your feet when you move, speeding up your movements to keep up with me. Then when you attack, you shift your reiatsu to your hands, and fire an overcharged thrust hado with your strike.”

Shin was back on his and knees now, still trying to catch his breath. Kumori figured out his new idea quite quickly – that wasn’t expected, but still, he had nothing to lose by keeping it up.

“There’s a big problem with doing that though. You’ve trained enough to keep up with the improved speed, but you’re burning through your reiatsu far faster than usual. Your body can’t keep up with the strain, which explains why you haven’t gotten back up yet with all the time I’m giving you. You might want to study a certain technique to help you with that.”

Shin was at least in better condition than he was a couple of minutes ago, although he probably shouldn’t do that again for awhile. “What are you talking about?”

“I’ll tell you if you win. Got anymore tricks lying around?”

Shin pulled himself to his feet, drawing his zanpakuto. “Heh, I’ve only begun to fight! Embrace the darkness, Kumori!”

“You’re really going to use my own power against me? This ought to be good.”

The blade started overflowing with smoky flames, as Shin swung the kodachi forward, releasing a gigantic wave of fire. Kumori just stood there, as the flames engulfed her, doing absolutely nothing to her.

“Did you really expect my own flames to drain me? If that was your best bet -!”

The rest of her sentence was cut off as a gigantic wave of condensed energy slammed into her. The sheer force of the attack destroyed a section of the mountain, throwing her through a rock face and into the air as blood sprayed from the large gash across her chest.

He used the flames….to mask that? Tch, I’m getting careless….

[Darkoda]

When Shin fired the wave of fire at Kumori, he never thought for a moment that it would do damage. What it did do was block Kumori’s vision, so that she wouldn’t see the kumori-katsu that he was charging. The unguarded hit knocked her right into a lower mountain, with Shin jumping after her.

Kumori crashed into the rocky ground, her body forming a small crater as she pulled herself up. She held in a gasp of pain as she stood, her new cut still bleeding. It was clearly time to pick up the pace of this fight.

Taking advantage of the situation, Shin charged another kumori-katsu, sending the wave of energy at Kumori. The fox spirit easily dodged despite her injury though, running up a rock face and launching herself into the air at him. She stopped Shin’s slash with a reiatsu charged hand, flipping over the blade and kicking Shin in the spine with her heel.

The blow knocked Shin into the wall Kumori just jumped from, as Kumori fired more Tobihi blasts behind him. With a growl of irritation Shin ran down the wall, using shunpo to evade the shots and land on the ground again. Kumori grinned down at him from the air, her feet glowing black almost as if –

So that’s what she was doing, she’s using the flames to keep her afloat!

What he should have been paying attention too though, was the glowing claws.

“Hakubo katsu!”

“Holy shit!”

Shin ran for it as five condensed beams of black energy came crashing down where he was less than a second ago, and kept going, straight through the mountain.

Wait a minute…….

He wasn’t getting a minute, as the mountain started to collapse on itself, triggering a enormous avalanche, with Shin right in the middle of the chaos. He started half running, half rolling down the loose soil and rocks, whatever worked to get him ahead of the boulders rolling down behind him.

“Damnit Kumori, you did that on purpose! Gah!”

The entire mountain collapsed into a mountain of rubble on the edge of the sand pit, kicking up a cloud of dust, masking Kumori’s vision. Maybe she overdid it a bit…..nah, he’ll live.

“Hey Shin, still conscious down there?”

She got no answer, but then she wasn’t expecting one. She landed near the edge of the dust cloud, keeping her senses trained for Shin’s presence. With a sigh, she ducked as Shin’s foot sailed over her head, and rolled as he stabbed down with his kodachi. As Shin righted himself, Kumori grabbed him, slamming him into the loose boulders hard enough to cause some more to cave in on him.

“You can give up at anytime now; you proved that you thought about things properly this time.”

Shin struggled under the boulders, trying to free an arm. “Not happening.” [/color]

“Suit yourself.” Her claws were glowing with energy again, as she raised her hand to finish things.

“Hakubo katsu!”

“Hado #57 – Honryuu!”

A wave of water shot the boulders off of Shin, crashing through her attack and washing her away. Shin pulled himself out of the landslide, clutching his ribs. They weren’t broken, but those rocks hurt.

He raised his sword, stopping Kumori’s claws from piercing his neck, before swinging it to the side, pushing her away. He dashed at her, blade glowing with energy, as Kumori’s claws turned black, and they both released their attacks.

The resulting explosion knocked up another cloud of dust, and when it cleared, Shin raised an eyebrow as he saw Kumori spinning in place like a top. His amusement quickly turned to alarm when he saw the black flames engulf her, turning her into a vortex of fire as she shot at him, her body a flurry of claws striking out at him. Shin dodged and weaved the best that he could, until Kumori’s tail slammed into his side, launching him across the field.

He pulled himself to his feet, breathing heavily again. He wasn’t in the best condition anymore; his uniform was covered in tears, he was bleeding from multiple wounds on his body, and his ribs were at the least heavily bruised. Still, he wasn’t going to give up like that. Kumori had a stab wound and a large gash, and she was getting worn out enough from fighting him to start taking deeper breaths at least.

“Had enough resting time yet?”

“Funny, I’m surprised you had enough breath to get all that out. You’re going to end up with some permanent damage if this keeps up.”

“I told you already, I won’t stop until I win.” With a bit of effort, Shin had his reiatsu flaring again.

“So you say, but I told you about that already. The next time you fall, you won’t get back up.”

“Then I just have to make sure I don’t fall.”

[Darkoda]

Shin steeled himself, channelling his reiatsu as his zanpakuto’s fox tail wrapped around his arm, holding the blade stretched outwards to the side like an arm-blade. He was getting tired, but he meant to end things, one way or another today. Digging his feet into the sand, he launched himself at Kumori, vanished a few feet forward. Kumori felt a hard force slam into her, knocking her back as she fired a few tobihi rounds at Shin.

Shin kept moving erratically, throwing off Kumori’s aim as he vanished again. Kumori couldn’t react in time, and was knocked to the side as Shin’s heel sunk into her skull. She reacted with a backhand, knocking him to the ground, before pouncing on him, claws extended. Shin reacted quickly, his sword shifting to point straight forward as he swung for her neck.

Both shinigami and spirit shifted, trying to avoid the other’s attacks as much as possible while making sure that theirs hit. After the exchange, Kumori reacted first, kneeing Shin before punching him in the face, knocking him away with the force of the blow. She ran a couple of fingers over the cut on her neck, licking the blood, as Shin flipped up, his cheek bleeding from the deep gouges her claws just put in.

“Don’t fall now Shin, this is just getting fun!”

Kumori rushed him, claws flying as the two got into an exchange of blows, Kumori using her tobihi at close range to counter his thrust shots. After an evaded snap kick, Kumori jumped back, using repeated mid-air shunpos to dash around above him before stopping right behind him, hand raised.

“Hakubo…”

Shin quickly started gathering energy, knowing what was coming.

“Kumori…”

“Katsu!”

The waves of energy slammed into each other before exploding. Kumori used the expected dust cloud to launch herself at Shin, coming down with an axe kick. Shin blocked the blow with his arm, throwing Kumori off him and stabbing at her, but Kumori responded by kicking his blade out of the way, and firing another wave of energy at him that he had to perform some impressive acrobatics to avoid.

Landing a distance away from each other, Kumori attacked first, both claws glowing with reiatsu.

“Hakubo katsu, Hayate!”

She started swinging her arms so fast that they appeared to be a blur, but what Shin was really paying attention too was the waves and waves of hakubo katsu slashes coming at him. The area they were covering was too wide to dodge, so he had to fight his way through.

“Hado #33, Sōkatsui!”

He fired a barrage of fireballs to counter Kumori’s attack, but the endless waves quickly overpowered him, and he braced himself, using his flames and his sword as a pseudo-shield to at least weaken the blasts. By the time Kumori was done though, he was littered in deep cuts, and bleeding all over his body.

“Still standing? You’re just being stubborn now.”

With a growl of anger, Shin shunpoed forward, sending a series of thrust fuelled punches at Kumori. She blocked and countered with her own claws, but in the end she was clearly taking the most damage from the exchange. A particularly strong blow sent her skidding back, coughing up blood.

“Okay that’s it. You’re getting the nasty stuff.”

As Shin moved to press his advantage, Kumori vanished, appearing right in his face and grabbing hold of his neck.

“Shokujin!”

A gigantic sphere of darkness stretched out from Kumori’s hand, engulfing Shin, and the majority of the sandy field. When the sphere eventually died down, the entire area had been transformed. What was once a desert was now a gigantic crater, the edges ablaze with black flames. Floating above it all was Kumori, holding the burnt, limp body of Shin.

With a flick of her hand, she sent his body out of the crater, digging a groove across the charred ground with the force of the throw.

“I didn’t expect you to actually make me use that. I’m surprised that you’re still conscious right now.”

Her eyes widened in some surprise when Shin pulled himself to his feet, his entire body a burnt, bloody mess, and still with intentions to fight her.

“You don’t know when to quit…” She raised an eyebrow as Shin pointed his sword hand at her.

“Bakudo #4, Hainawa!”

A rope of reiatsu shot out from Shin’s hand like a whip, catching Kumori off-guard as one end wrapped around her arm. Taking advantage of her shock, Shin pulled on the other end of the rope, dragging Kumori into a fierce punch to the gut, knocking the wind out of her. He followed up with an elbow to the spine, then a rising kick to her chin, snapping her head back and launching her into the air.

“Hado #33, Sōkatsui!”

Kumori recovered quickly, burning the rope off her and gathering a small vortex of fire in one palm, while slapping away the hado with the other.

“Hiaburi!”

The vortex of fire shot downwards at incredible speeds, spreading out into a large blaze of flames on contact with the ground, the fire whipping around like blades, burning and cutting at the same time.

Shin took the damage, keeping his focus on Kumori as she shot from the sky, claws glowing. He rolled out of her path as her claws dug deep gouges in the earth. She spread out her fingers and her legs, spinning like a top on her hand. Shin instinctively dived for the ground, as Kumori released a circle of dark energy right after, just barely missing his head as he hit the ground.

Flipping forward, he locked his feet around Kumori’s head as she stood, driving her head into the ground. Kumori kicked his legs out from under him before righting herself, but Shin countered with a Hainawa bakudo at her legs, before trying to stab her.

She grabbed his arm, and blasted him across the ground with a tobihi. Shin quickly flipped back up and the two clashed, trading blows.

“Are you trying to make me kill you? Give it a rest already!”

“Do we have to go over this again? If you’re so worried about me, then you give up!”

“Keep dreaming! I’ll keep beating you into the ground for as long as it takes, until you realise that I will never submit to anyone, anytime! I’d sooner die!”

“Then you understand how I feel! Until you accept me, I won’t submit either!”

“Fine then, let’s see your will survive this!”

Having had experience that Kumori’s threats were very real, he immediately started to dash backwards, not wanting to get caught in anything else she had in store, only to get pinned in place as six beams of light slammed into him.

Kumori placed both her hands on his chest, panting with exertion. “I’ll crush your spirit with the strongest I have. Shokujin Hou!”

Pain.

That was all Shin could feel as a beam of absolute darkness ripped through his chest, the blast engulfing him and continuing forward, straight through what remained of the mountain range, completely erasing the scenery. Blood erupted from Shin’s mouth as he felt every one of his ribs crack from the force. The only thing keeping him from getting blown away was the kido pinning him down, which was making the damage even worse by forcing him to take the full blast.

When the beam finally died down, it revealed Shin’s upper body to be a complete wreck. It was obvious just from a distance that his ribs were broken, and the burns were second to third degree. Blood leaked freely from his mouth, as his eyes were dead to the world. The bakudo broke, allowing his body to fall, as Kumori tried to keep her body from collapsing under the strain. She would never admit it, but Shin came close to winning, forcing her to pull out everything she had. He was close, but not quite there yet….

“Its……hah…….it’s over Shin.”

Shin stumbled back as he was dropped on the ground, his body falling back as his vision became blurry.

Its over?

His zanpakuto fell from his arm as the blade resealed itself.

Can’t move anymore…..can’t…

More blood gushed from his mouth, as his broken ribs dug into his body. He might have pierced a lung….

How easy it would be to just lie back and sleep, get away from all the pain. It was probably the wisest thing to do considering that he nearly died on the spot from that blast. He wasn’t sure if he would ever wake up.

I can’t…..lose here…

But then, he never listened to his body’s limits before, why start now?

“Ye lord, mask of blood and flesh….”

Kumori looked on in shocked interest as Shin pulled himself back up just before he toppled over, muttering.

“Just what are you doing now?”

“On the wall of blue flame, inscribe a blue lotus….”

“I doubt you even have the reiatsu for that, but I’m not taking chances.” Reiatsu started pooling in Kumori’s hand, as she dug up the last of her reserves.

“In the abyss of conflagration, wait at the far heavens.” Streams of reiatsu pooled into his hand as he walked towards Kumori. For her part, Kumori put a few meters distance between them before firing her last attack

“Fall to the executioner’s blade! Gouka, Girochin!”

A truly gigantic wave of black and purple fire erupted from her hands, which quickly condensed into the shape of a long guillotine blade, before rocketing forward at Shin. He only had enough power for one action, dodge, or fight, and he made his choice long before.

“Hado #63, Sōren Sōkatsui!”

He charged right for the energy blade, blue reiatsu crushed within his fist as he punched at the blade, pouring all the reiatsu he had into breaking through, while Kumori channelled hers to slice straight through him. The energies clashed for a second, as Shin started to slide back, until he dug out reserves he didn’t even know he had, as he let out a feral yell, despite the pain, and forced his fist through.

Kumori watched in a mixture of amazement, sadness, and oddly, some pride as her blade broke back into flames, and the column of blue fire rushed at her. The outcome if that attack hit was obvious, and she didn’t have the energy left to dodge. She felt an odd wetness running down her face besides the blood.

“Damn….”

The explosion likely attracted the attention of anyone near the area, as if the destruction littering the place wasn’t enough. The last thing Shin saw was Kumori’s body sailing through the air before dispersing into black flames, before he collapsed.

[Darkoda]

When Shin woke up, he was lying face down in a field of purple and green. Upon actually sitting up, he noted the night sky, endless fields of odd purple glowing flowers, and most importantly, the fact that he wasn’t horrifically injured anymore. He was definitely within his inner world again, and considering his body’s state, he had no desire to wake up right now.

The main question now was if he was in here, where was Kumori?

A few minutes of wandering answered that question; it was a good thing that they could always tell where everyone was in here, but then it was necessary considering that the plains went on forever. He found her sulking in the branches of one of the odd trees that littered the plains. He was fairly sure that he had misinterpreted that though; Kumori didn’t sulk. Or look depressed. She ranted, she got pissed, but sadness? Shin didn’t think that she even knew what the emotion was.

“You know, I can hear you.”

“Then why are you moping around? You can’t be that mad because you lost.”

She turned to glare at him, but it was missing its usual edge. “You should know the answer to that, mister high and mighty. In here to brag?”

“Oh come on, just what made you think that I’ll do that?”

“………………….” Her deadpan stare said all that needed to be said.

“Okay so I might have had some ego issues.”

All he got was a raised eyebrow.

“Okay, a lot of them, but still, I’m getting better.” He realised quickly that he wasn’t making any progress here, which meant that he had to actually act with his heart. Joy.

Kumori’s eyebrow rose higher as she awaited the rest of his speech, only for the other eye to shoot up when Shin wrapped her in a hug.

“Wh-what are you doing, you idiot!” Her face was quickly turning an interesting shade of crimson as her body started trembling, but she hadn’t blasted him away yet, so Shin took that as a good a sign as any to continue to disregard general safety.

“Besides, you’re my closest friend; I wouldn’t do that to you. I don’t want to force you to submit to me, the only reason I’m bothering with this is because I want you to see me as more than just a kid to babysit.”

“….I don’t think of you as a child.”


“Then what do you see me as? One moment you treat me like a friend, and the next you treat me like you’re trying to push me away. Just what is going on in that head of yours?”

Kumori leaned on his shoulder in silence, and Shin was beginning to wonder if she was ignoring him again, until he started to hear a light chuckle. It quickly progressed into full blown laughter as Kumori wrapped her arms around him.

“It’s funny how you can be observant and blind all at once. Don’t worry; if nothing else, we’re certainly friends.” In the end it was so simple, even though she was worrying about it for the past few months.

“I didn’t want to let you move on because shinigami tend to stop bothering with their zanpakuto spirits the moment they no longer need to keep in contact with them. You didn’t give me much reason to believe that you would be different so I wanted to keep you to myself for a bit longer.”

And the truth was finally known. Here he thought that he was the only one worried about the other’s feelings. It certainly went a long way to making him feel better. Her next words confused him again though. “It’s nice to know that you actually consider me a friend though; I suppose that will do for now.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“That’s for you to figure out dense one. In the meantime, I’ll lend you my power; you’ll probably need it. Anyway, congratulations, you pass my test.”

He got the distinct sense of exasperation for a second, but he chose to focus on the second part of her statement. “Thanks, but didn’t I already pass?” [/color]

“Nope, I said you’ll get bankai when you convinced me. I never said beating me would convince me. Besides, if it was a test of power, you only managed to get me to go as far I could without killing you; you still have a long way to go if you want me to really take you seriously.”

“You call all of that not fighting seriously? You nearly killed me!” Just what did she consider fighting properly anyway, nuking half the Seireitei?

“Quit complaining, you should save your strength for when 4th Division starts patching you up. Then there’s explaining the damages. Have fun with that.”

A vision of all the damage they caused flashed through his head. “…..I think that I should stay in here for a few weeks….”

The field was filled with Kumori’s laughter….