Post by Shizuko on Jan 5, 2008 0:10:12 GMT -4
Shinigami
Name: Matano Nekomi
Gender: Female
Age: 124
Division: Squad Eleven
Rank: Captain
Physical Description:
Matano Nekomi’s appearance is quite distinct from her counterparts within the Thirteen Protection Squads. It isn’t strange clothing, distinct tattoos, scarring, or peculiar hairstyles that make her easy to pick out among her comrades, but rather the fact that she appears to be only a child. She stands a mere 3’ 11” tall. She possesses large, brown eyes with brown locks to match. Her hairstyle changes in time with her impulsive mood; sometimes she sports pigtails, braids, or just a headband to keep the wild mess away from her face.
Her dress is typical of any shinigami, usually consisting of traditional sandals and black robes. Overtop her traditional shinigami garb, Nekomi wears a white jacket, clearly bearing the number eleven across the back, signifying leadership of her squad. The bottom few inches of her overcoat drag across the ground when she walks, the result of purposely wearing tall shoes to her fitting for the jacket, much to her own amusement.
Aside from her extremely youthful appearance, Nekomi is well known to always carry a small staff in her hand. Hardly more than a plain stick to anyone else, she bears this perfectly sized staff with her at all times, using it to poke the occasional sleeping comrade, crack open nutshells, reach items on tall shelves, and smack insolent subordinates. Unlike many of her fellow shinigami, Nekomi does not have a katana or similar bladed weapon on her person. She claims that carrying one would make her look short.
Personality: There are a good many descriptions which could apply to the personality of Matano Nekomi. She is volatile, playful, silly, and impatient. There is more going on in her mind than she allows others to believe. While she often portrays herself as an immature trickster with a very short attention span (quite befitting of her physical appearance), she is an excellent observer, taking in and processing much more information than one would guess.
Nekomi is a very confident little girl, using her youthful appearance and behavior as a tactic to feel out others’ personalities. She’s an excellent fighter and she knows it, so it would be unusual for her to allow anyone talk down to her regarding the topic of combat. She certainly didn’t make it to her current position by merely being cute, after all.
Her tactics can be ruthless but effective. Her manners can be crude but friendly. While she may have a hard time earning the respect of her subordinates and comrades, she does not have difficulty keeping it.
History: Matano Nekomi’s entire existence, both in life and after, has revolved around combat. She was born as the youngest child and only daughter of a family defined by fighting skill. Her father led the police force in her small town, and her brothers all served under his watchful eye until he retired and Nekomi’s eldest brother took his place.
Nekomi’s childhood often involved sparring with her brothers as they learned different fighting styles and methods of combat. Nekomi’s father hadn’t taught her much in the way of warfare aside from the basics of self defense. Her brothers, however, felt she should learn just as much as they knew, in case something happened and they were no longer around to protect her (though in all honesty they just wanted her to be a better sparring partner).
The young girl appreciated the lessons of combat, because as long as she could remember she’d had the ability to sense the presence of entities that the people around her could not. At night, she could hear the screams of huge, masked monsters wandering outside her town. She could see and speak to distraught people with chains connecting them to the earth. She even caught glimpses of peculiar, robed figures roaming the streets at night, fighting with swords right in front of townspeople who didn’t know they were there. It was a terribly confusing scenario for such a young child, though as time passed, she began to understand.
Nekomi became a skilled fighter able to use a very diverse assortment of weapons, though she generally preferred some type specialized for hard impact as opposed to a blade. After years of watching the fascinating people in robes dash across rooftops and slay the masked monsters, she began to gain enough confidence to begin trying to figure out this “invisible” world that only she seemed able to sense.
As a teen, Nekomi began staying up later at night, sneaking out of her room to sit on the rooftop, watching and listening for commotion of the spiritual variety. There were times when she would meditate under the peaceful night sky. It was as she was meditating one evening that the world of spirits had come closer to her than it ever had before. It wasn’t terribly uncommon for her to see an example of what she later discovered was a hollow, though the one that appeared that night appeared to have its sights upon her. No sooner had it appeared that it let out one of its signature, haunting cries and lumbered in her direction. Nekomi was startled at being interrupted during her meditation in such a manner. Her first instinct was to hide from the great beast, hoping that one of the robed fighters would emerge. Just as she had hoped, a muscular young man appeared atop a building directly in front of the creature and swiftly sliced it clean in half using his katana. He glanced around, seemingly looking for the monster’s intended target, but he saw no one.
When Nekomi pondered the events in retrospect, she began to think that something she had been doing somehow attracted the beast’s attention, as it was clear it had intentions of coming after her. The next night, she attempted to meditate again, though this time it was atop another building. As she had predicted, another masked creature appeared with its sights set upon her. This one didn’t cry out like the last one had, but rather called out in common speech that it sensed something delicious nearby. It had set its sights upon Nekomi as had happened the previous night, and again she hid as the same hooded figure returned in time to slay the new monster.
Thus it was that Matano Nekomi came to understand she could somehow control the appearance of these odd, masked monsters with giant holes in the center of their chests, and thus also the emergence of the mysterious black-robed people who dispatched them using their swords. Nekomi became much bolder in her impromptu research as time progressed, sometimes performing her meditation trick in the middle of crowded streets (though she later admitted that this hadn’t been her greatest idea). She was fascinated with the robed figures and wanted to know more about them, and the crowd offered her a chance for anonymous observation. She wasn’t nearly as afraid of the beasts that came after her as she had been when she was a child. She heard various terms being thrown around in her experiments by both the monsters and the mysterious robed figures. She learned of hollows, shinigami, and her own spiritual power, known as reiatsu, which she had inadvertently learned to control in her meditation and made her seem so “delicious” to evil spirits.
Over many years, Nekomi pieced together the mysterious world she could see that went unnoticed by everyone else she knew. The robed figures, or shinigami, were tasked with regulating the balance of souls in the world and beyond. She learned a bit more about their responsibilities, their weapons, their reiatsu-based abilities and their home, Soul Society, by watching and listening. She came to understand details about the creation of hollows, why she’d seen people chained to the material world, and why she could sense it all.
During this long period of spiritual education, Nekomi carried on through her life, regarded as a talented but quirky girl. It seemed that she was constantly distracted by something otherworldly. That is, unless, she was engaged in a fight. A match with another person was the only time Nekomi would become intensely focused. Shinigami had opened her eyes to even more styles and methods of combat, and it came to pass that Nekomi became a better combatant than all of her brothers.
As an adult, it became Nekomi’s responsibility to train the next generations of the police force hopefuls the advanced arts of combat. Once a student had trained under Nekomi’s brothers for the usual stances and styles, Nekomi herself would evaluate and select candidates to begin the grueling lessons of advanced technique. There were only a handful of students who ever completed her program to a satisfactory degree, but eventually their town could boast the lowest crime rate in the country. It was an accomplishment for which Nekomi could and would pat herself on the back.
Though Nekomi had amassed a wealth of knowledge warfare and abstract worlds beyond her own, it came at the expense of her “normality.” Alas, she never married nor had any children, as most men found her to be a little too strange or too intimidating for their tastes. Thus, Nekomi lived a life of solitude, content to learn and teach until the end of her days.
As an elderly woman, Nekomi was forced to take a more observational approach to teaching her young students. Her body simply couldn’t move the way that it used to, much to her disappointment. She was forced to stand by and comment while her more agile assistants aided the instruction. Nekomi had begun to hate her aging body as it deteriorated with each passing day.
It seemed her mind was becoming less able to control her reiatsu as time went on as well, since hollows sniffed her out routinely. It was when she slept and the hollows appeared that strange things happened in her dreams. Nekomi would have visions of a huge cat surrounded by smoke and red hot embers, and then she would wake up to sense hollows nearby. She could hear the shinigami speaking to one another from time to time after slaying the hollows, wondering how an old woman had that much free-flowing reiatsu and they hadn’t noticed her until recently. Nekomi merely pretended as though she couldn’t hear or see them. They wouldn’t understand her any more than the people in the living world did.
Nekomi eventually passed away, miserable in her old age.
Finally, Nekomi reached Soul Society. It was a world about which she’d heard a good many details here and there, but it was far different than she had imagined. It seemed more like a destitute village of lost people than it did a haven for spirits. Nekomi scolded herself for allowing her mind to paint an idealistic picture. Now she’d have to live an afterlife of disappointment. The realization was heartbreaking at best, and she didn’t know what to do. Her hands moved to cover her distraught face, but she noticed something very, very strange. She had the hands of a child!
Suddenly she realized that her body didn’t ache. Her eyes weren’t straining to see clearly. Her joints moved freely. She actually felt great. Nekomi finally recognized that her rebirth in Soul Society had placed her in a resilient young shell once again. Her joyous reaction to her new discovery was befitting her new appearance. She ran down the dusty streets, jumping and yelling as she went. For so many, the introduction to Soul Society was a stressful, frightening experience. For Nekomi, this was an occasion of absolute delight.
In her sprint driven by elation, Nekomi approached an immense wall with a huge gate. The (newly) young girl searched her memory for an explanation of such a barrier. After a moment’s thought, the realization hit her like a lightning bolt. This was the wall surrounding Seireitei, where the shinigami reside.
Glancing around, Nekomi quickly came to the conclusion that becoming a shinigami would really be her only option now that she was in Soul Society. Fighting had been her life, and she figured it might as well be her afterlife, too. Having made up her mind, the girl approached the gate with great confidence.
She was stopped short of the immense portal into the shinigami world by a large man. Nekomi was swift to notice that he was actually a large shinigami. He told her to run along and find some friends with whom to play. In response, the young girl was quick to tell him that she was there to become a shinigami. His laughter was loud and long, and caused the ground to tremble beneath her feet. She was not exactly thrilled with his reaction and told him to open the gate so that she may enter. He promptly replied that she was crazy and that one didn’t become a shinigami simply by desire. Nekomi, thinking about it for a moment, understood what he meant. A shinigami needed reiatsu, which not just everyone had. She, at one time, had excellent control over it when she was in the living world, it was possible that this large fellow simply couldn’t sense it in her because she’d regained the control that she’d lost as an aging human. She closed her eyes for a moment to see if she still knew the trick, and suddenly the air was thick and heavy with her radiating reiatsu. When she opened her eyes again, she found the large shinigami guard’s mouth agape as he struggled to remain on his feet. As quickly as she’d let it pour out from her, Nekomi reined in her reiatsu, and waited for the guard to open the gate.
The gate opened, though it was not by the guard’s will. A man and a woman emerged quickly from the gate, a look of great concern apparent on their faces. It seemed that they had been nearby inside and felt Nekomi’s reiatsu, and, thinking it might have been a threat, they came to check on the guard.
Nekomi was ushered inside immediately and enrolled in the Shinigami Academy. The girl knew that she had an advantage over other “children” in this world. She had studied these people her entire life and knew a good deal more than even her classmates in the Academy. She excelled far and above everyone else in her class when it came to combat, much to the annoyance of some of the other students. Indeed, she became a “child prodigy” as well as one of the best combatants the School had ever seen.
The genius child had no qualms about setting herself apart from other shinigami. Her knowledge and abilities continued to soar above that of her fellow students. Her zanpakuto was not similar to that of her classmates, being a sort of staff rather than a blade. While she was often a topic of discussion (not so different from her “quirks” in life), she no longer cared. Nekomi was not shy. She had little concern about what the others thought of her. She knew she was going to be a great shinigami, so she figured that they might as well get used to the idea. She was far to interested in conquering everyone and everything using her vivacious young body, free of the decrepit shell in which she had been trapped.
During her years at the Academy, the visions of the great cat surrounded by smoke and embers became more frequent. Nekomi finally realized that this feline may have had some connection with her zanpakuto, since it continued to periodically appear in her mind. Though the girl knew she had to somehow speak to the cat and that the images were becoming clearer as time went on, she struggled to learn the cat’s name.
Shortly after Nekomi’s graduation from the Academy, the young girl spent nearly two straight days in meditation. She was determined to learn the cat’s name. As the figure of the large feline created of smoke, embers, and ash spoke its name, Nekomi shouted it as if she already knew it. Kaijin nodded and smiled… in some sort of smoky feline manner. When Nekomi opened her eyes and looked at the zanpakuto in her hands, she realized that the same type of smoke, ash and embers that created Kaijin in her mind had now surrounded one end of her staff, making it more of an immense hammer. Oddly curious, the child took a swing at a nearby tree. The unfortunate tree was nearly snapped in half as well as charred and smoking at the point of impact.
Nekomi was shocked to realize that Kaijin wasn’t just a weapon of frightening proportions. Its power was actually something different. While fighting with shikai, the small combatant realized that all of her senses were more alert. She could hear her enemy with unbelievable sensitivity. Hardly anything could escape her vision. She was able to sniff out her opposition if necessary. Her feet could feel the vibrations of her prey through the ground. All of this led to Nekomi becoming an even better fighter, as the heightened senses granted by Kaijin allowed her to more accurately anticipate her opponent’s actions.
Nekomi was well aware of her path within Soul Society. She joined the famed Eleventh Protection Squad. It was as though Nekomi had trained throughout her entire existence to be a part of that Squad, sharing its responsibility, and surrounded by those people. She’d finally found the place where she belonged. It was in this time, just as she had graduated, joined Squad Eleven, and discovered her zanpakuto’s name, that she truly became happy. Her joy was apparent in every aspect of her new life. She loved being a child prodigy. She loved her comrades. She loved fighting. She loved her newly named weapon. Everything finally felt right.
Matano Nekomi developed quite the reputation beyond being a child genius. She was known for her frightening combat ability, though after a while, few dared challenge her. She was rumored to be quite the trickster, having conned at least one unfortunate member of Squad Eleven, making him trade his higher rank with hers.
The Captain of Squad Eleven in those days found the squad’s smallest warrior to be quite amusing if for no other reason than the fact that she wouldn’t let anyone talk down to her. He told her to work hard, because someday he could see her leading her own squad. It was a comment that opened the young girl’s eyes, and she suddenly realized how much she missed leading and teaching her peers as she had done in life.
A few years passed and Nekomi struck down countless hollows in her climb to the top of her Squad. If she wasn’t playing tricks on her fellow shinigami, she was training alone with Kaijin, becoming more attuned to the great feline. As expected, she did eventually attain bankai, though she did not show it to anyone for several more years, until she became very comfortable and confident in using it.
It wasn’t until recently that Nekomi began to be rather ruthless in her climb to the top. The Captain of Squad Eleven was slain in an immense fight. After a period of mourning, turmoil ensued within the squad as they all awaited the Commander’s decision about who would take his place. The time had come for Nekomi to act. She knew it would be a struggle to claim her fallen leader’s position and the time had come far earlier than she had anticipated, but the child prodigy had already attained bankai, unlike several of her fellow shinigami. It seemed that the current Captains were content with their positions, so that left a handful of the lieutenants as possible promotion material. Nekomi began to talk to each of those rumored to be in consideration, and found that most of them were unwilling to transfer to the infamous Squad Eleven. Those that were willing to lead Gotei 11 were swiftly challenged to a fight by the pint-sized combatant. It seemed that there were fewer still willing to meet Nekomi in battle. Actually, there were none. Thus it came to be that Nekomi was appointed Captain of Squad Eleven because no one was willing to take the position and then be challenged to fight a little girl and lose in front of all of Seireitei.
Matano Nekomi remains the playful, unpredictable child prodigy she was when she first came to Soul Society. Her attitude has become more lighthearted and friendly as the years have passed, as she’s reached the pinnacle for which she’d unknowingly yearned for her entire life as well as her afterlife.
General Info
Name: Matano Nekomi
Gender: Female
Age: 124
Division: Squad Eleven
Rank: Captain
Physical Description:
Matano Nekomi’s appearance is quite distinct from her counterparts within the Thirteen Protection Squads. It isn’t strange clothing, distinct tattoos, scarring, or peculiar hairstyles that make her easy to pick out among her comrades, but rather the fact that she appears to be only a child. She stands a mere 3’ 11” tall. She possesses large, brown eyes with brown locks to match. Her hairstyle changes in time with her impulsive mood; sometimes she sports pigtails, braids, or just a headband to keep the wild mess away from her face.
Her dress is typical of any shinigami, usually consisting of traditional sandals and black robes. Overtop her traditional shinigami garb, Nekomi wears a white jacket, clearly bearing the number eleven across the back, signifying leadership of her squad. The bottom few inches of her overcoat drag across the ground when she walks, the result of purposely wearing tall shoes to her fitting for the jacket, much to her own amusement.
Aside from her extremely youthful appearance, Nekomi is well known to always carry a small staff in her hand. Hardly more than a plain stick to anyone else, she bears this perfectly sized staff with her at all times, using it to poke the occasional sleeping comrade, crack open nutshells, reach items on tall shelves, and smack insolent subordinates. Unlike many of her fellow shinigami, Nekomi does not have a katana or similar bladed weapon on her person. She claims that carrying one would make her look short.
Personality: There are a good many descriptions which could apply to the personality of Matano Nekomi. She is volatile, playful, silly, and impatient. There is more going on in her mind than she allows others to believe. While she often portrays herself as an immature trickster with a very short attention span (quite befitting of her physical appearance), she is an excellent observer, taking in and processing much more information than one would guess.
Nekomi is a very confident little girl, using her youthful appearance and behavior as a tactic to feel out others’ personalities. She’s an excellent fighter and she knows it, so it would be unusual for her to allow anyone talk down to her regarding the topic of combat. She certainly didn’t make it to her current position by merely being cute, after all.
Her tactics can be ruthless but effective. Her manners can be crude but friendly. While she may have a hard time earning the respect of her subordinates and comrades, she does not have difficulty keeping it.
History: Matano Nekomi’s entire existence, both in life and after, has revolved around combat. She was born as the youngest child and only daughter of a family defined by fighting skill. Her father led the police force in her small town, and her brothers all served under his watchful eye until he retired and Nekomi’s eldest brother took his place.
Nekomi’s childhood often involved sparring with her brothers as they learned different fighting styles and methods of combat. Nekomi’s father hadn’t taught her much in the way of warfare aside from the basics of self defense. Her brothers, however, felt she should learn just as much as they knew, in case something happened and they were no longer around to protect her (though in all honesty they just wanted her to be a better sparring partner).
The young girl appreciated the lessons of combat, because as long as she could remember she’d had the ability to sense the presence of entities that the people around her could not. At night, she could hear the screams of huge, masked monsters wandering outside her town. She could see and speak to distraught people with chains connecting them to the earth. She even caught glimpses of peculiar, robed figures roaming the streets at night, fighting with swords right in front of townspeople who didn’t know they were there. It was a terribly confusing scenario for such a young child, though as time passed, she began to understand.
Nekomi became a skilled fighter able to use a very diverse assortment of weapons, though she generally preferred some type specialized for hard impact as opposed to a blade. After years of watching the fascinating people in robes dash across rooftops and slay the masked monsters, she began to gain enough confidence to begin trying to figure out this “invisible” world that only she seemed able to sense.
As a teen, Nekomi began staying up later at night, sneaking out of her room to sit on the rooftop, watching and listening for commotion of the spiritual variety. There were times when she would meditate under the peaceful night sky. It was as she was meditating one evening that the world of spirits had come closer to her than it ever had before. It wasn’t terribly uncommon for her to see an example of what she later discovered was a hollow, though the one that appeared that night appeared to have its sights upon her. No sooner had it appeared that it let out one of its signature, haunting cries and lumbered in her direction. Nekomi was startled at being interrupted during her meditation in such a manner. Her first instinct was to hide from the great beast, hoping that one of the robed fighters would emerge. Just as she had hoped, a muscular young man appeared atop a building directly in front of the creature and swiftly sliced it clean in half using his katana. He glanced around, seemingly looking for the monster’s intended target, but he saw no one.
When Nekomi pondered the events in retrospect, she began to think that something she had been doing somehow attracted the beast’s attention, as it was clear it had intentions of coming after her. The next night, she attempted to meditate again, though this time it was atop another building. As she had predicted, another masked creature appeared with its sights set upon her. This one didn’t cry out like the last one had, but rather called out in common speech that it sensed something delicious nearby. It had set its sights upon Nekomi as had happened the previous night, and again she hid as the same hooded figure returned in time to slay the new monster.
Thus it was that Matano Nekomi came to understand she could somehow control the appearance of these odd, masked monsters with giant holes in the center of their chests, and thus also the emergence of the mysterious black-robed people who dispatched them using their swords. Nekomi became much bolder in her impromptu research as time progressed, sometimes performing her meditation trick in the middle of crowded streets (though she later admitted that this hadn’t been her greatest idea). She was fascinated with the robed figures and wanted to know more about them, and the crowd offered her a chance for anonymous observation. She wasn’t nearly as afraid of the beasts that came after her as she had been when she was a child. She heard various terms being thrown around in her experiments by both the monsters and the mysterious robed figures. She learned of hollows, shinigami, and her own spiritual power, known as reiatsu, which she had inadvertently learned to control in her meditation and made her seem so “delicious” to evil spirits.
Over many years, Nekomi pieced together the mysterious world she could see that went unnoticed by everyone else she knew. The robed figures, or shinigami, were tasked with regulating the balance of souls in the world and beyond. She learned a bit more about their responsibilities, their weapons, their reiatsu-based abilities and their home, Soul Society, by watching and listening. She came to understand details about the creation of hollows, why she’d seen people chained to the material world, and why she could sense it all.
During this long period of spiritual education, Nekomi carried on through her life, regarded as a talented but quirky girl. It seemed that she was constantly distracted by something otherworldly. That is, unless, she was engaged in a fight. A match with another person was the only time Nekomi would become intensely focused. Shinigami had opened her eyes to even more styles and methods of combat, and it came to pass that Nekomi became a better combatant than all of her brothers.
As an adult, it became Nekomi’s responsibility to train the next generations of the police force hopefuls the advanced arts of combat. Once a student had trained under Nekomi’s brothers for the usual stances and styles, Nekomi herself would evaluate and select candidates to begin the grueling lessons of advanced technique. There were only a handful of students who ever completed her program to a satisfactory degree, but eventually their town could boast the lowest crime rate in the country. It was an accomplishment for which Nekomi could and would pat herself on the back.
Though Nekomi had amassed a wealth of knowledge warfare and abstract worlds beyond her own, it came at the expense of her “normality.” Alas, she never married nor had any children, as most men found her to be a little too strange or too intimidating for their tastes. Thus, Nekomi lived a life of solitude, content to learn and teach until the end of her days.
As an elderly woman, Nekomi was forced to take a more observational approach to teaching her young students. Her body simply couldn’t move the way that it used to, much to her disappointment. She was forced to stand by and comment while her more agile assistants aided the instruction. Nekomi had begun to hate her aging body as it deteriorated with each passing day.
It seemed her mind was becoming less able to control her reiatsu as time went on as well, since hollows sniffed her out routinely. It was when she slept and the hollows appeared that strange things happened in her dreams. Nekomi would have visions of a huge cat surrounded by smoke and red hot embers, and then she would wake up to sense hollows nearby. She could hear the shinigami speaking to one another from time to time after slaying the hollows, wondering how an old woman had that much free-flowing reiatsu and they hadn’t noticed her until recently. Nekomi merely pretended as though she couldn’t hear or see them. They wouldn’t understand her any more than the people in the living world did.
Nekomi eventually passed away, miserable in her old age.
Finally, Nekomi reached Soul Society. It was a world about which she’d heard a good many details here and there, but it was far different than she had imagined. It seemed more like a destitute village of lost people than it did a haven for spirits. Nekomi scolded herself for allowing her mind to paint an idealistic picture. Now she’d have to live an afterlife of disappointment. The realization was heartbreaking at best, and she didn’t know what to do. Her hands moved to cover her distraught face, but she noticed something very, very strange. She had the hands of a child!
Suddenly she realized that her body didn’t ache. Her eyes weren’t straining to see clearly. Her joints moved freely. She actually felt great. Nekomi finally recognized that her rebirth in Soul Society had placed her in a resilient young shell once again. Her joyous reaction to her new discovery was befitting her new appearance. She ran down the dusty streets, jumping and yelling as she went. For so many, the introduction to Soul Society was a stressful, frightening experience. For Nekomi, this was an occasion of absolute delight.
In her sprint driven by elation, Nekomi approached an immense wall with a huge gate. The (newly) young girl searched her memory for an explanation of such a barrier. After a moment’s thought, the realization hit her like a lightning bolt. This was the wall surrounding Seireitei, where the shinigami reside.
Glancing around, Nekomi quickly came to the conclusion that becoming a shinigami would really be her only option now that she was in Soul Society. Fighting had been her life, and she figured it might as well be her afterlife, too. Having made up her mind, the girl approached the gate with great confidence.
She was stopped short of the immense portal into the shinigami world by a large man. Nekomi was swift to notice that he was actually a large shinigami. He told her to run along and find some friends with whom to play. In response, the young girl was quick to tell him that she was there to become a shinigami. His laughter was loud and long, and caused the ground to tremble beneath her feet. She was not exactly thrilled with his reaction and told him to open the gate so that she may enter. He promptly replied that she was crazy and that one didn’t become a shinigami simply by desire. Nekomi, thinking about it for a moment, understood what he meant. A shinigami needed reiatsu, which not just everyone had. She, at one time, had excellent control over it when she was in the living world, it was possible that this large fellow simply couldn’t sense it in her because she’d regained the control that she’d lost as an aging human. She closed her eyes for a moment to see if she still knew the trick, and suddenly the air was thick and heavy with her radiating reiatsu. When she opened her eyes again, she found the large shinigami guard’s mouth agape as he struggled to remain on his feet. As quickly as she’d let it pour out from her, Nekomi reined in her reiatsu, and waited for the guard to open the gate.
The gate opened, though it was not by the guard’s will. A man and a woman emerged quickly from the gate, a look of great concern apparent on their faces. It seemed that they had been nearby inside and felt Nekomi’s reiatsu, and, thinking it might have been a threat, they came to check on the guard.
Nekomi was ushered inside immediately and enrolled in the Shinigami Academy. The girl knew that she had an advantage over other “children” in this world. She had studied these people her entire life and knew a good deal more than even her classmates in the Academy. She excelled far and above everyone else in her class when it came to combat, much to the annoyance of some of the other students. Indeed, she became a “child prodigy” as well as one of the best combatants the School had ever seen.
The genius child had no qualms about setting herself apart from other shinigami. Her knowledge and abilities continued to soar above that of her fellow students. Her zanpakuto was not similar to that of her classmates, being a sort of staff rather than a blade. While she was often a topic of discussion (not so different from her “quirks” in life), she no longer cared. Nekomi was not shy. She had little concern about what the others thought of her. She knew she was going to be a great shinigami, so she figured that they might as well get used to the idea. She was far to interested in conquering everyone and everything using her vivacious young body, free of the decrepit shell in which she had been trapped.
During her years at the Academy, the visions of the great cat surrounded by smoke and embers became more frequent. Nekomi finally realized that this feline may have had some connection with her zanpakuto, since it continued to periodically appear in her mind. Though the girl knew she had to somehow speak to the cat and that the images were becoming clearer as time went on, she struggled to learn the cat’s name.
Shortly after Nekomi’s graduation from the Academy, the young girl spent nearly two straight days in meditation. She was determined to learn the cat’s name. As the figure of the large feline created of smoke, embers, and ash spoke its name, Nekomi shouted it as if she already knew it. Kaijin nodded and smiled… in some sort of smoky feline manner. When Nekomi opened her eyes and looked at the zanpakuto in her hands, she realized that the same type of smoke, ash and embers that created Kaijin in her mind had now surrounded one end of her staff, making it more of an immense hammer. Oddly curious, the child took a swing at a nearby tree. The unfortunate tree was nearly snapped in half as well as charred and smoking at the point of impact.
Nekomi was shocked to realize that Kaijin wasn’t just a weapon of frightening proportions. Its power was actually something different. While fighting with shikai, the small combatant realized that all of her senses were more alert. She could hear her enemy with unbelievable sensitivity. Hardly anything could escape her vision. She was able to sniff out her opposition if necessary. Her feet could feel the vibrations of her prey through the ground. All of this led to Nekomi becoming an even better fighter, as the heightened senses granted by Kaijin allowed her to more accurately anticipate her opponent’s actions.
Nekomi was well aware of her path within Soul Society. She joined the famed Eleventh Protection Squad. It was as though Nekomi had trained throughout her entire existence to be a part of that Squad, sharing its responsibility, and surrounded by those people. She’d finally found the place where she belonged. It was in this time, just as she had graduated, joined Squad Eleven, and discovered her zanpakuto’s name, that she truly became happy. Her joy was apparent in every aspect of her new life. She loved being a child prodigy. She loved her comrades. She loved fighting. She loved her newly named weapon. Everything finally felt right.
Matano Nekomi developed quite the reputation beyond being a child genius. She was known for her frightening combat ability, though after a while, few dared challenge her. She was rumored to be quite the trickster, having conned at least one unfortunate member of Squad Eleven, making him trade his higher rank with hers.
The Captain of Squad Eleven in those days found the squad’s smallest warrior to be quite amusing if for no other reason than the fact that she wouldn’t let anyone talk down to her. He told her to work hard, because someday he could see her leading her own squad. It was a comment that opened the young girl’s eyes, and she suddenly realized how much she missed leading and teaching her peers as she had done in life.
A few years passed and Nekomi struck down countless hollows in her climb to the top of her Squad. If she wasn’t playing tricks on her fellow shinigami, she was training alone with Kaijin, becoming more attuned to the great feline. As expected, she did eventually attain bankai, though she did not show it to anyone for several more years, until she became very comfortable and confident in using it.
It wasn’t until recently that Nekomi began to be rather ruthless in her climb to the top. The Captain of Squad Eleven was slain in an immense fight. After a period of mourning, turmoil ensued within the squad as they all awaited the Commander’s decision about who would take his place. The time had come for Nekomi to act. She knew it would be a struggle to claim her fallen leader’s position and the time had come far earlier than she had anticipated, but the child prodigy had already attained bankai, unlike several of her fellow shinigami. It seemed that the current Captains were content with their positions, so that left a handful of the lieutenants as possible promotion material. Nekomi began to talk to each of those rumored to be in consideration, and found that most of them were unwilling to transfer to the infamous Squad Eleven. Those that were willing to lead Gotei 11 were swiftly challenged to a fight by the pint-sized combatant. It seemed that there were fewer still willing to meet Nekomi in battle. Actually, there were none. Thus it came to be that Nekomi was appointed Captain of Squad Eleven because no one was willing to take the position and then be challenged to fight a little girl and lose in front of all of Seireitei.
Matano Nekomi remains the playful, unpredictable child prodigy she was when she first came to Soul Society. Her attitude has become more lighthearted and friendly as the years have passed, as she’s reached the pinnacle for which she’d unknowingly yearned for her entire life as well as her afterlife.
] Reverse Demon - This technique nullifies an opponent's kidô by hitting them with a perfectly opposite surge of energy.
