A/N: Really sorry for long delay, I have been pretty busy lately and also had a fairly severe case of writers block. Hope you enjoy this chapter.

Disclaimer1: I only own the boring kind of bleach…
Disclaimer2: I don't own Shingeki no Kyojin (Attack on Titan)…

Attack on Seireitei

Chapter 7


After purging all traces of her embarrassing conversation with Yoruichi from her mind, Tsume made her way back over to where the rest of her friends were bombarding Kyokan, Levi, and Shinji with questions.

"What is it like beyond the walls?" Armin asked eagerly.

Levi gave him a dull look before Shinji answered "It doesn't look much different than it does within the walls. The only thing is that there are no people and lots of Titans."

"Excuse me." A cheerful voice came from behind Tsume; she turned and saw Urahara standing behind her with his eyes closed. He pointed at Eren "Your name is Eren Yeager, correct?"

"Yeah." Eren said, turning to face him.

"And your father's name is Grisha Yeager?" Urahara asked, Eren nodded and he continued "Grisha was a close friend of mine, I was wondering if you had any idea where he went."

Eren shook his head "No, I saw him once a few days after the wall fell but then he left and I haven't seen him since." He paused and seemed to think for a moment before reaching into his shirt and pulling out a key "He gave me the key to the basement of my house and said that I needed to take care of it."

Urahara's face became serious "I see, thank you for telling me."

"How did you know my father?" Eren asked.

Urahara scratched his head "I'm sure you know he was a doctor. The two of us used to do a bit of research together; he was a very intelligent man." He saw a worried look come over Eren's face and he pulled a fan out form his Haori, unfolded it, and held it out in front of his face "Well I'm sure he is fine wherever he is." Urahara bowed "Nice speaking to you Eren, now I am off to go find Yoruichi, I think she said she needed to talk to me." Urahara folded up his fan and seemed to skip away.

"There is something wrong with that man." Levi commented dimly.

"Maybe, but you can't deny that he has done a lot for all of us." Shinji replied before turning to Tsume and her friends "Well, been nice speaking with you guys, but I think the only way to really find out what it is like to be in the Survey Corps is to actually join us. I hope to see you guys soon." He stood up and stretched "I'm off to go find some food."

Tsume's friends all seemed to agree with his idea and they also stood up to go search for food. As they were leaving Tsume grabbed Ichigo by the shoulder and pulled him away.

"What's up?" He asked once they were alone.

"There's something you need to see." Tsume said with an unreadable expression, continuing to pull him away from the crowd.


They had soon reached an extremely isolated corner of the Masamune Clan Family Manor.

"Ok Tsume, what did you want to show me?" Ichigo asked, looking confused.

"I meant to show you this morning, but I just couldn't." She took a deep breath and closed her eyes, reaching her hand up to her face and placing the backs of two of her fingers lightly against her lips. Black and blue Reiryoku began to form around her hand and she quickly slid her hand to the side. As her hand passed over her face a white, bone-like substance began to form starting at her chin and extending until it covered her entire face.

When the substance had finished forming Tsume opened her eyes once again, which looked the same as they usually did but now with black sclera. More importantly there was a Hollow mask on her face. The mask had rather jagged edges and extended to cover the top of both her ears, giving them a slightly elongated and pointed appearance. Down the center of the mask was a line of 'V' shaped, electric blue markings. Overall the mask had a very reptilian look to it and gave off an aura one would expect to feel from the fire-breathing, scaled beasts of the air only seen in myths and legends.

Perhaps more shocking than her appearance was the raw volume of Reiatsu she was putting out. Ichigo could tell she was keeping it mostly contained to their immediate area and also holding a fair portion of it back, but it was still enough that for a moment Ichigo had trouble standing.

"I should have told you about this before we became a couple." Tsume's voice had a distinct rippling to it and the jaw of the mask opened and closed in unison with her own mouth "I have an Inner Hollow, I am not fully human."

"Do you really think that this will change anything?" Ichigo asked, leaning forward and flicking her on the forehead of the mask "Thanks for telling me, but it doesn't change anything. You can't get rid of me that easily."

"You don't care?" Tsume asked, her voice laced with disbelief.

"Well not really, obviously I am worried about how it affects you. I just mean that it will take a lot more than this to change how I feel." Ichigo explained.

Even through the mask on her face Ichigo was able to tell that Tsume was looking at him like he had lost his mind "I don't know whether to punch you or kiss you."

Ichigo smirked "I vote for the second option."

Tsume jumped into the air and wrapped her arms around his neck, her mask shattering in the process. Before Ichigo could so much as process what was going on her lips were against his and they had fallen to the ground. If there had been an outside observer they would have laughed at the situation, which was nearly a perfect reversal of the accident that had occurred during the hand-to-hand combat training almost four years ago.

After a few minutes they got up from the ground. After Ichigo dusted off his back he spoke "So what ever happened to not acting too close?"

Tsume rolled her eyes "I let it slip for a little bit, just follow my lead and we will be fine."

Ichigo nodded, as they walked back to where everyone else was likely eating dinner he spoke again "Is there anything I need to know about you having an Inner Hollow?"

Tsume frowned for a moment "Yeah, I can keep it under control most of the time." Ichigo gave her a strange look at the word 'most' and Tsume laughed "I only lose control of it when I get really upset. It has only happened once."

"When was that?" Ichigo asked curiously.

"I'm not really sure when it was because I don't remember any of it. From what I hear my brother said something that really annoyed me and I ended up chasing him around the house trying to kill him." Tsume explained.

"You tried to kill him because he said something annoying?" Ichigo questioned, looking slightly scared.

"I have a lot more self-control now than I did back then. Honestly I don't think there is a single thing you could say that would get me to lose control." Tsume replied with a reassuring voice.

Ichigo smiled "Well I won't try to push you that far just in case."

By then they were back at the main area of the Manor. All of the guests seemed to have split up into smaller groups while they were eating. In one corner Tsume saw Anima, Shinji, and Levi chatting about something. In another area were Rein, Senna, Saiden, Ryuga, Amber, and Tachikiru. Kyokan and Urahara were sitting together off to the side looking like they were discussing something very important. Yoruichi was lying back lazily in her chair next to Sui-Feng, who was sitting perfectly upright. Finally, the rest of the trainees were sitting together, Tsume and Ichigo went and got some food before sitting down next to them.

Nothing of much importance happened for the rest of the night; after the guests had left the trainees went back their rooms and fell asleep quickly.


The next morning Tsume opened her eyes and slowly pulled herself out of her bed, going through her usual morning routine. Once she was dressed she checked the Reiatsu from around her to determine if anyone else was awake. As it turned out everyone had already headed downstairs for breakfast.

After Tsume had sat down with her food Rein spoke up "Alright, now that everyone is here I can explain what is going on." He waited for everyone to look at him and continued "Right now the Seireitei is on high alert, based on the predictions the Titans that broke through wall Maria should be arriving at Wall Rose sometime between tomorrow and a month from now. Needless to say the Third Division is going to be mobilized at the perimeter of the wall to face them. In addition to this almost all of the First Division's forces as well as most of the Survey Corps will also be there to defend the wall." He paused "Senna and I will be leaving at noon today in order to oversee the defenses and Anima will be joining us after he finishes up his business with the Training Corps. All of you are more than welcome to stay here until you need to return to the Training Division or you can return with Anima tonight; either way, it has been a pleasure meeting all of you and I certainly look forward to having you in the military, whichever branch you decide to join." He stood up with Senna and they went to go pack their things, Anima followed shortly after.

There was silence for a few moments before Armin spoke "Well I don't really mind either way."

"I think we should head back, this has been fun but I would like to get back to some training." Uryu stated.

"Good point, we can't afford for our skills to get rusty if we are going to join the Survey Corps." Eren pointed out.

"We should probably go pack up now then, this way we don't end up being too rushed later." Armin suggested.


The rest of the day was fairly laid back. Tsume and her friends got onto the boat with Anima later in the night and slept through most of the six hour ride. When they woke up they stepped off the boat and back into the Eighth Division's territory. After a bit of a walk they were back at the Training Corps' Headquarters unpacking their things. Afterwards they headed out to eat breakfast with the rest of the Trainees who had decided to stay.

"Wow, now I get what everyone else was talking about when they said that the cafeteria food was bad. The food at your house was way better." Eren commented.

"Don't worry; Anima said that it gets better once you get out of the Training Corps." Tsume assured.

Jean walked over to their table with Connie standing next to him "Where did you guys go?"

Ichigo turned his head to look at him "We were with Tsume and her family."

"It must be nice to be able to take a break in the interior whenever you want to." Jean observed with a strange expression on his face.

Eren stood up from the table "This coming from the guy who is going to join the Royal Guard."

"Well I'm so sorry that I don't have a death wish like you do." Jean shot back.

"The only thing I have a death wish for is the Titans." Eren replied angrily.

Before Jean could retort Connie stood in his way "Jean, you didn't come over here to start an argument."

Jean shook his head quickly as though trying to snap himself back into focus "Yeah, sorry about that; I don't know what got into me."

"So why did you come over here then?" Armin asked, hoping to move the conversation on.

Jean scratched his head "I wanted to say something to Eren."

"What is it?" Eren asked cautiously, clearly preparing for another argument to start.

"I wanted to say I'm sorry about all the arguing we did. I've been thinking about it a lot lately and I realized that you aren't wrong." Jean paused "You're not a bad person, even though I could never imagine myself joining the Survey Corps with you I think you are doing the right thing. You are going to have enough things to worry about when you join so you don't need random arguments with me holding you down."

Eren was speechless, he stood completely still with his mouth open for at least thirty seconds before he managed a response "Huh?"

Jean's eyes narrowed "I guess that was too complicated for you, let me rephrase it." He thought for a moment "Good luck in the Survey Corps. Your skills are a valuable asset to humanity so try not to die." With that he walked away mumbling something that sounded like 'idiot.'

A few minutes later Shadis walked into the cafeteria "I want all of you to meet me outside in five minutes, we have something important to discuss."


"I understand that this is your time off, but there is a fairly urgent matter at hand." Shadis began once all the trainees were in front of him "I am sure most of you are aware that the majority of humanities forces have mobilized to the south in preparation for the Titan attack that is sure to come, this has left us fairly short handed in other areas. There are a number of maintenance jobs that need to be done in the nearest outlying district and we are too short on manpower to complete them and are thus turning to you trainees to help us out." He paused for a moment "I will be dividing you into two groups; one group will be in charge of tasks within the city itself and a smaller group will be performing maintenance on the cannons on top of the walls." He began to shout out assignments for each trainee.

Tsume, Ichigo, Eren, Connie, and Sasha were assigned to cannon maintenance while everyone else was assigned to work in the city.


Tsume, Ichigo, Eren, Connie, and a few other trainees were currently standing atop Wall Rose performing some maintenance on the cannons used to defend against oncoming Titans. She bent down to the cannon she was currently working on, reaching into a pouch hanging at her side and pulling out a small, pale green crystal and placing it inside a hatch on the rear of the cannon. The cannons on the Walls didn't function like other firearms used by humans but rather used Kido to fire a highly condensed mass of Reishi at extreme speeds. The small crystals were actually entirely composed of Reiryoku and functioned as a power source for the weapon that could easily last for a thousand shots. The biggest downside to the crystals was that they required vast quantities of Reiatsu to create with a Captain-Class Shinigami acting as a focus to actually form the crystal. Once the crystal was created it would be shattered into a few hundred separate pieces and then distributed as ammunition.

"Why can't they just use normal cannons up here? These things are such a pain to load." Ichigo complained whilst glaring angrily at the device he was currently working on.

"Normal cannons wouldn't have enough accuracy to actually hit the fatal spot on a Titan at long range. Using Kido allows us to basically guarantee a kill if the operator is at least semi-competent." Connie explained.

"Regardless, how can you possibly be finding these things difficult to load? All you need to do is open the hatch at the back, put a crystal inside it, and close the hatch." Eren asked.

Ichigo grumbled "Yeah, but every time I touch one of these crystals they start to melt in my hand like some kind of ice cube." To demonstrate he reached into his own pouch and retrieved one of the crystals. As the group watched the highly condensed Reiryoku began to dissolve in his hand and within a few seconds it was a pile of steaming, mint green liquid near his feet.

Tsume sighed and walked over to him "You're letting out too much of your Reiatsu and causing the structure of the crystal to become unstable. Try holding it back a bit."

Ichigo nodded and began to clench his face as though he was trying to concentrate intensely on something. His Reiatsu output dropped significantly and he once again reached into the pouch at his side and retrieved a crystal, holding it in the palm of his hand. This time, it didn't melt.

"Hey guys." A voice called excitedly.

Ichigo's eyes snapped open and the crystal instantly dissolved, this time it did not even turn into a liquid, simply evaporating and blowing away in the wind. He just looked down at his hand with a disappointed expression.

"Look what I got." The same voice continued. The rest of the group faced the source of the voice to find Sasha. She reached into her uniform and pulled out a large chunk of meat "I got this from the seated officers' stockroom."

"You mean you stole it!?" Connie asked incredulously.

"We can all share it later." Sasha continued, seeming to completely ignore what Connie had said. She walked over to a crate and placed the meat inside.

Eren laughed and stretched his arms out behind his head, looking off towards the interior of the wall with a smile on his face.

There was a massive flash of yellow light from behind him. He slowly turned around and found himself face to face with the Colossal Titan. On its face was a Hollow Mask shaped like a human skull, creating a strange contrast with the rest of its skinless body. Without any warning the colossus brought one of its arms to bare and swept it across the top of the wall, destroying all of the cannons and sending the trainees plummeting down to the city below. Without any delay the Titan slammed its foot through the gate, completely obliterating it.

Tsume, who had been the furthest to the left, had taken the brunt of the attack. She shook her head, snapping herself out of the half-conscious state she was stuck in and fired off a hook into the wall, halting her descent. She looked around her, to the right Sasha was also hanging from the wall by one of her hooks. Her other hook was lodged into the leg of one of the trainees who seemed to have been completely knocked out. A short distance below her Connie was attempting to wake the trainee up and get him to safety. Above her she saw Ichigo and Eren just reach the top of the wall with their weapons drawn. Eren fired one of his hooks into the Colossal Titan's shoulder and was attempting to swing himself around to the rear of its neck; Ichigo was doing the same in the opposite direction.

The Titan caught on to their strategy fairly quickly and shrugged in an over-exaggerated manner, causing both trainees to lose control and collide with the top of the Wall. Tsume quickly began scaling the Wall, drawing both her wakizashi in the process. Once she had reached the top she shouted to both Eren and Ichigo "Get behind me." They both complied quickly, realizing that the situation was too serious to argue.

After they had moved away Tsume brought both her swords out in front of her, placing the edges against each other. She quickly slid the blades along their lengths as though she was trying to split each one down the middle. When the points of the blades made contact she threw the both to either side of her and spoke "Rake, Ressho." There was a sudden gust of wind from her location, kicking up the small amount of dust scattered on the ground around her and blowing her hair away from her right eye. An intense blue aura formed around her small form. Both her swords dissolved just as they were about to touch the ground along with the sheaths on her back. The blue aura around her began to condense itself around the blue trim on her clothing, seeming to replace it with blue flames. The aura intensified even further at her back where her sheaths used to hang, seemingly out of nowhere segments of black metal materialized in the air behind her and began to drift around in midair. The entire transformation took no more than a few seconds and when it was complete there were a set of two massive arms with five fingers that ended in razor sharp claws about the length of her own arms.

Ichigo and Eren barely managed to follow her movements as she fired off one of her hooks directly into the bridge of the Titan's nose and launched herself off the top of the wall. As she neared the face of the colossus one of the arms hovering behind her clenched its hand into a fist and slammed itself directly into the center of the Titan's head. The punch carried enough force behind it to create a spider web of cracks across the surface of the monster's skull-like mask in addition to actually lifting it a few meters off the ground. Almost in slow motion the giant fell backwards with Tsume still clinging to its face. She brought back her other arm and slammed it into the Titan's face, causing its mask to fragment even further, as it fell the colossus opened its mouth and let out a bone-chilling wail.

"Shut up." Tsume said quietly. She took both her arms and shoved them into the Titan's mouth, grabbing hold of its upper and lower jaws and pulling as though she was trying to break it in two. Tsume nearly succeeded, there was a sickening sound of bones cracking and the Titan went silent as it crashed into the ground. She felt a massive surge of Reiatsu from the colossus below her and quickly jumped away, not eager to be caught in whatever attack it was going to attempt. There was an explosion of insanely hot steam from the Titan's skin, forcing Tsume to bring both her own arms and the arms of her Shikai out in front of her face to avoid being burned. The wave of steam sent her flying back much farther than she had intended she twisted around in midair, firing a hook into the Wall behind her and reeling herself back up to the top. When she turned around the steam completely blocked her view of the Colossal Titan so she waited for it to clear.

The wind picked up and began to blow the steam away, by the time they could see through the smoke the Titan had vanished entirely, leaving no trace other than a large depression in the ground.

"Where did it go?" Eren asked, completely in shock.

Tsume released her Shikai, the blue flames surrounding her condensing themselves back into a pair of wakizashi hanging at her back "It's exactly like what my father said. It appeared, destroyed the gate, and then vanished into thin air."

"Tsume, you have Shikai?" Ichigo asked with a strange look.

She looked up at him "Yeah. We can talk later; right now we need to make sure everyone else is ok and report that the wall has been breached."

Ichigo nodded "Right."


Words: 3,962

Translations:
Ressho: Laceration

A/N: This chapter took me a long time to write but I finally got it done. I have been really busy lately, and the little bit of free time I did have was spent on some other things. I have been getting my younger brother into Bleach recently so I wouldn't be the only person in my family who likes anime and he seems to enjoy it. In addition to that, I have also watched three new anime series in the past week or so, Black Bullet, Gokukoku no Brynhildr, and Sidonia no Kishi (Knights of Sidonia). I highly recommend all of them if you can handle a bit of blood (Nothing all that horrible, but Gokukoku no Brynhildr can get pretty creepy.) This brings me to my next point, I am considering starting yet another story, this time a crossover with Bleach and Sidonia no Kishi. I know it is probably a bad idea to attempt to write four different stories at the same time but the idea keeps popping up in my head so I am going to try to write it. Regardless of whether I choose to go through with my idea I highly recommend you go and watch Sidonia no Kishi. The animation style is a bit weird to get used to but it is totally worth it, not to mention that they are already working on the second season. If anyone has any suggestions or thoughts about my story idea then feel free to PM me or something, I am still really open to ideas.

Anyway, leave a review if you liked/disliked/had questions about this chapter. The next chapter of this story will be up relatively soon depending on how much time I spend on my new idea.