There were many theories on what happened when a life reached it's end. Some believed there was nothing; that the soul died along with the body and made its way back into the earth. Others believed in reincarnation - in which a soul would pass on in perhaps a few minutes to even years down the line, into a new body where it would attempt at another life without memories of its previous one. Then there were those that thought the soul continued to live after death, either in some otherworldly place specifically for diseased or they were trapped to wander forever with the living.
For Hinata, she'd never been big on thoughts of what it would be like after death. For her, if she were to die, then she would die. Whatever happened after was of no concern to her, she simply looked to the present and worried about staying alive. So when she did finally die, at the hands of Pein, she was ill-prepared and utterly floored to find herself in a small worn-down village, with little huts lined in messy rows and people in dirty yukatas scattered here and there.
The place looked so dreary, so void of any life or action, that she couldn't call it "heaven."
She wouldn't call it hell, either.
There was no perfect word to describe the place she landed herself in. It was just... a worn down villlage with inhabitants that were just as weary, with so little energy that they looked every bit dead inside as they were outside.
A life of nothingness.
It was a punishment for her failings in life, even if mild in comparison to what she believed appropriate for herself, and she would have been every bit ready to accept it with open arms. After all, she deserved this and ten times worse. She had failed her friends and her family, and such a failure could not go unpunished. Yet...
Yet she didn't get that chance.
Only weeks into her life in this lifeless village, a man with a dazzlingly warm smile and eyes so filled with care and compassion extended his hand to her in an offer for a better life; a life he believed she deserved. He was so patient and so understanding with her, and took all the time he had to teach her about where she'd landed and what she could do with her striking abundance of energy and talent. So charismatic, so sugary sweet, so- so...
So fake.
And she accepted that hand; that offer to become better and to do anything this man asked of her. Because, deep down inside, no matter how much she loathed herself and cried over her failings, she still yearned for a better life where she could become someone her younger self and her loved ones would admire. She yearned for the praises and the affections of another - for someone to want her. So much so, that she did not notice what she was signing up for.
What Aizen really wanted of her.
Hinata followed behind him, like a little puppy much too loyal to its master and ready to please him in whatever way he desired, and in return, he taught her how get stronger and cared for her even when she stumbled and fell short of what he asked for. Because he was so compassionate and so patient and so understanding.
Because he wanted her.
Because she wanted him to want her.
She really was just a foolish little girl chasing after something she knew would not end well with her.