NITL

Volume One

World of Remnant

Chapter Ten: Character – Ichigo

(Background)

Ichigo Kurosaki is a young man of the age of 17. Standing at the height of 5 feet and 11.5 inches – which is 181 cm in the metric system, Ichigo is the tallest member of his team. Despite the rumors of his youth, Ichigo is a natural orange haired young man with brown eyes and always seemed to have a constant scowl on his face. Something that even he isn't aware of.

Being born under a retired Hunter and a clinical surgeon, Ichigo was trained in his youth to fight and get stronger. Inspired by the stories of his mother, who was the Hunter of the family, Ichigo thrived to be strong enough to protect, not only his family, but also his close friends.

However, when he was a child and during a sudden rainstorm in the town he lived in, there was a large Grimm attack. With the help of the Hunters and any retired Hunters, the Grimm attack was left with very minimal casualties. Among the casualties was, with many unfortunates, Ichigo's own mother. Drowned in depression, Ichigo would soon immerse himself into training. Under the tutelage of his father and family friends, Ichigo would soon master the way of the sword, prompting to use two blades in a wakizashi fashion. Despite all this, however, Ichigo never managed to find out what his Semblance was, something that greatly frustrated him.

During his years as a student in Sanctum Academy, Ichigo was ridiculed for his bright neon orange hair, which was thought as abnormal and unnatural. This caused Ichigo to be a lone wolf during a good majority of his studying years. Added to Ichigo's hard earned training, he quickly rose to be one of the top students to have attended Sanctum Academy.

One day, Ichigo was surprised to find himself enrolled to Mistral Regional Tournament without his consent. Despite having no say to the situation, Ichigo relented and began attending the tournament. With his training and his weapons at his side, Ichigo breezily tore through the tournament. It was at this point, where Ichigo met Pyrrha Nikos, a fellow fighter within the tournament. The fight ended with a draw, and from then on, the two saw each other as rivals, even more so after discovering that they both attended same school.

During their second term of the tournament, at the age of 15, Ichigo finally managed to awaken his Semblance. At that time, Ichigo began to be known as the Unstoppable Sword, while Pyrrha as the Unmovable Shield. The two were a relentless rival duo, and stopped at nothing to get the one up over the other. A year after Ichigo's victory in his second year in the tournament, Pyrrha won the third match. Among the rivalry and fights within Mistral, the rivalry between the Sword and the Shield was among the most praised and most heavily discussed. It went to the point where there were rumors of fraud and of conspiracy. Elsewhere, there would be fans cheering on either Ichigo or Pyrrha, eager to see which would be stronger, the unstoppable force or the unmovable object.

Intending to end the tiebreaker, Ichigo and Pyrrha both attended their fourth and final year of the Regional Tournament. Fortunately or not, the fight ended with a tie. With the fight over, and both unable to break the draw between the two, it felt as if it would be their last fight as well as their last chance to see who was the stronger of the two.

Or was it…?

(Appearance)

Ichigo is a tall man with orange hair and brown eyes. His skin is lightly tanned and his face is narrow. Upon Ichigo's face is a scowl etched onto it. Having been training as a child preteen, Ichigo has maintained a good sculpture of an athlete. Added with his Semblance, Ichigo considers himself to be speed-type fighter, despite his powerhouse techniques.

Dress-wise, Ichigo wears a white dress shirt as his top with a long, amorphous black hooded coat with ragged ends. On the left chest of Ichigo's coat is his symbol, a pentagon with a stylized skull. On his back, tied from his left shoulder to his right hip is one part of Ichigo's weapon sheathe.

For his bottom, Ichigo wears black pants and brown dress boots. Tied to his belt is a red omamori fashioned by his mother and given to him by his father on his 15th birthday. On his right belt is another sheathe to Ichigo's second part of his weapon. On the right side, in the meantime, is a Dust cartridge used to store Ichigo's storage of Energy Dust. Chained to his pants, Ichigo holds a crest in the symbol of a "卍". What it means, Ichigo has kept it a secret for many years, not even his younger sisters know what it does.

(Weapon)

The Interlocking Dust Swords, a two-part weapon wielded by Ichigo.

The first part of this weapon is the Dust Rifle Sword, named "Hollow". The "Hollow" is a short blade, the size off Ichigo's own arm, with a rifle barrel on the unsharpened part of the sword while the bladed edge is sharpened with Energy Dust. The handle of the blade is enclosed and has a trigger attached to it. The magazine to the rifle part of the sword is located just before the blade and part of the enclosed handle, being able to be detached and reattached with a different magazine.

The second part of Ichigo's sword is the Dust Long Sword, named "Chain". It is a simple long sword with Energy Dust spread across the blade. The hilt is long and the hand guard is wide. By attaching "Hollow" to "Chain's" guard, the blade part of "Chain" slides to the back of the guard while "Hollow" now occupies the empty space, locking into place to form a large Khyber-like broadsword.

(Semblance)

Step

Ichigo's Semblance, dubbed as Step by many of his peers back in Mistral, allows Ichigo to be able to stand on any surface and walk on it as if it was solid ground. Depending on what he stands on, however, determines how much Aura Ichigo uses to stay afloat.

For example, standing on plain air spends almost a fifth of his Aura reserves for a good 10 minutes, whereas standing on water, which uses up to nearly a tenth of his reserves to stand on for the same amount of time. This is due to the fact that air is less dense than water, and as such, requires much more concentration and energy to stay standing on plain air.

On the other hand, by combining his Semblance with Aura-assisted sprints allows Ichigo to appear as if he is either flying or teleporting from one end to another. This also allows him to land many attacks in as little time as possible. By using this technique, Ichigo can wear out his opponents and quickly overwhelm them. It is also a double-edged technique, however, as it could quickly deplete his Aura with simply a ten-step dash in 11 seconds.

Despite how useful this Semblance is and its many applications to stressful battle situations, Ichigo still insists that his Semblance is still incomplete and he still needs to learn more on what it can do to further his fighting styles and more.

(Trivia)

Symbol: a pentagon with an "x" connecting the far corners, finished with a pentagon shaped cartoonish skull.

It was revealed that it was actually Isshin, Ichigo's father, who enlisted him into the Tournament. The first thing Ichigo did once finding out was to punch the man in the face, as per due to his promise to himself back during his first term in the Tournament. Soon after, Ichigo, very hesitantly, thanked his father.

Ichigo's first weapon of choice was actually a bow and arrow, after his mother. But after finding out how difficult it was for him to notch and shoot an arrow in quick succession, turned to swords as a second choice.

Because of his childhood ridiculing involving his hair color, Ichigo grew to be empathetic to those who have been cast out or discriminated against for something beyond their control. Especially so towards the Faunus.

Due to a dare during his final year at Sanctum, Ichigo and Pyrrha have kissed. Despite this, however, Ichigo shows no desire to deepen the relationship between him and Pyrrha.

Ichigo has trouble remembering faces. It took him nearly two months of constant contact at school to remember just who Pyrrha was just from looking alone.

The rivalry between Ichigo and Pyrrha mirrors that of the contradiction paradox, where a tale of the "spear that pierces through all things" and the "shield that defends against all things" are pitted together.

(If NITL was an Ultimate Ninja Storm video game)

Ultimate Technique: Lunar Heaven

Hurriedly combining his two weapons into its single form, Ichigo immediately sends out a Dust energy wave. Once it hits the target, the target is sent tumbling.

"I only got 11 seconds to finish this…!"

Once more separating his weapons, Ichigo vanished before reappearing before his target. Attacking it, Ichigo continues while vanishing and reappearing to attack in quick successions. Once hitting his tenth step, Ichigo heaves, and with both blades, sends the target into the air.

He then recombines his swords, both glowing in a golden hew, and swings it back behind him. The golden glow now intensifies and bursts from the blade, giving the illusion of a Dust bomb trying to escape its prison. Giving a good stomp on the ground to steady his stance, Ichigo roars as he then swings his golden blade forward.

"Lunar Heaven!"

And a brilliant wave of high concentrated Dust and Aura burst from the blade. It rushed towards the target, growing larger as it did, and with a strike, the skies glowed and exploded with brilliant golden energy. The explosion of the technique gave off the illusion of the sky being split into two before it dissipated.

As it all ended, Ichigo stood in the sky, his mighty sword over his shoulder. "It's over…" He whispered as he watched the explosion disappear.

A/N:

Another chapter of the World of Remnant and only two more to go before it'll be Reviewer's choice!

Remember, at the last Character World of Remnant, I'll be adding a list of what World of Remnant I'll be doing!

And with that done with, let's get to the next chapter!