Yo everybody! I bet a lot of you are surprised to see an update. Well, unfortunately, it's not an update. As some of fans know, I more or less lost everything I had on all my stories over Christmas, which has been both a painful and liberating experience. Painful because I lost a LOT of stuff, but liberating because now I have an excuse to redo everything. Which for my New World, I had been considering for a long time now. Looking back on it, I feel that I could have done things a lot better and I have come up with a number of other new ideas for it. Which I'm going to use now in rewrite.

Now, much of the original stories will serve as the backbone of the story, but I will cut out material that I no longer like or wish to use, while patching and adding to parts that I feel could have been better. Also, while I'm keeping Naruto's and Sasuke's zanpaku-tos, I'm changing Kenshi's and Sakura's, as I've come up with new ones that I've grown to rather like.

Now, this is just a preview of the first chapter of the rewrite, which already has a few significant changes. Now, the new story won't be up until around the end of February, but it will be a number of chapters, spanning the beginning of the story to the end of Turn Back the Pendulum.

Now that I have all of that out of the way, enjoy the preview.

"Hello!! This is Squad Five Captain, Shinji Hirako! Can anybody hear me?!" Shinji called out as he and his Lieutenant waited outside the entrance to the Squad One barracks. "Man… Coming to the Squad One barracks is always such a pain… This is makin' me tense," he grumbled, annoyed that the doors had yet to open. "I never like comin' here."

"Is that really the face of a tense person?" his Lieutenant, Sosuke Aizen asked. "This all part of the ceremony, so please be reasonable Captain."

"Shut it Sosuke," Shinji snapped, looking back at his subordinate, not realizing that the doors had begun to open. "You can't even see my face from back there."

"It opened Captain. We can enter know," Sosuke replied.

Shinji turned his head back, only to have a foot hit his face, throwing him back head over heels.

"Hey Dickhead!" Hiyori Sarugaki, the Lieutenant of Squad Twelve, taunted. "Your face is just too ugly! I had to step on it!"

Shinji, nursing a bleeding nose, glared at the girl. "Hiyori! You little-"

"I ain't gonna apologize!" she shouted, cutting him off.

"I haven't even said anything to ya yet!"

Suddenly, fist hit Hiyori on the head. "Say you're sorry, you little brat," Captain Love Aikawa of Squad Seven said.

"Was that really necessary, Captain?" Keigo Asano, co-Lieutenant of Squad Seven asked.

"Of course it was," Keigo's older sister, co-Lieutenant of Squad Seven, Mizuho Asano replied. "Hiyori has always been a brat, and the only way to discipline a brat is with your fist. Like so."

Mizuho's fist hit Keigo's head. "Ow!!" he screamed, clutching his head. "What was that for?!"

"That's for slacking off and hitting on the girls of the Squad!" Mizuho yelled back.

"Hey! I wasn't slacking off! I was helping them refine their abilities!"

"In the Squad pool?!"

"Er…Yes! It's very useful for…Ah…Endurance training!"

"Endurance training?! Do you really think that anyone one would believe that bull-"

"Enough! Knock it off, both of you!" Love shouted, ending their argument, a vein twitching on his forehead. "Or I'll kick you back down to the unseated ranks!" Then he quietly muttered to himself, "Sometimes I wonder why I even bother putting up with the two of you."

Both Lieutenants quickly bowed their heads in apology. "Yes, Captain," they said in unison.

Hiyori on the other hand, wasn't going to back down from a Captain. "What the hell, Love?!" she shouted, rubbing her head. "You think it's okay to smack a Lieutenant that ain't yours on the head?!"

"Your Captain isn't around, so somebody's gotta keep you in line," Love replied.

"Don't talk to me like I'm a kid!"

"Then don't act like one and apologize."

Needless to say, the idea of apologizing to Shinji only enraged her more. "No way!" she shouted as Shinji started to make faces at her behind Love's back. "Look at that prick! I'm not gonna apologize! Just look at his face! He's showing his true colors!"

"Alright, alright," Love muttered, giving on the pair and heading towards the Captain's Meeting Hall.

"Captain, please stop that," Sosuke said, as always, trying to curb his Captain's inappropriate behavior. "Please don't make face in front of the other captains."

"Yeah, yeah…" Shinji grumbled, heading into the Squad One barracks. "Is everybody assembled already?"

"Pretty much," Love replied, placing the Squad Seven Captain's Seal in rack alongside the others.

The Squad One, Two, Four, Six, Nine, and Twelve seals were already there. After Love placed his in its spot, Shinji added his and paused. "So Squad Eleven's Captain ain't coming?" he asked.

"He's lazy. As always, he doesn't do what he's told." Love answered, less than impressed with his fellow captain.

"I dunno know much about the 10th 'Kenpachi', but he sure looks like a piece o' work." Shinji commented. "Why'd they even make a pig like that into a captain?"

"It's tradition. The Squad Eleven Captain has always taken the title of Kenpachi from the previous one," Love explained. "If anybody's fault, it's the previous Kenpachi for losing to him."

"Well now, it's not nice to talk about others behind their backs," a voice called out behind the group.

The officers glanced back. It was Captain Shunsui Kyoraku of Squad Eight, along with his Lieutenant Lisa Yadomaru and Squad Thirteen Captain, Jushiro Ukitake. "You're pretty early today, Captain Kyoraku," Love greeted his lazy comrade.

"Whatever do you mean? I'm always the first to arrive," Shunsui cheerfully replied.

"I had to kick his ass to get him out of bed," Lisa added, causing Shunsui to wince.

"Don't say stuff like that in front of the other captains…" he grumbled.

"I don't see Hikifune. Is she not coming today?" Jushiro asked, ignoring the pair.

Shinji shook his head in response. "Nah. She's probably already met up with the others."

"I'm nervous," the sickly Captain admitted. "This isn't exactly sudden, but if they had taken things a bit slower…"

Shunsui nodded his head. "True, true."

"Man… They're flippin' captains around left and right," Shinji complained. "They just made Rose the Squad Three Captain about a year ago and now Squad Twelve is getting a new captain. Are we really gonna be okay going on like this?"

A short distance away, Rojouro 'Rose' Otoribashi, Captain of Squad Three, sneezed. "Someone must be talking about you, Captain," his Lieutenant, Mizuro Kojima, commented.

"Now now, changes need to happen from time to time. And right now that's just what's happening to the 13 Court Guard Squads. Come to think of it, the only captains around from a hundred years ago are me, Ukitake and Old Man Yama," Kyoraku said, counting them with his fingers before glancing at Ukitake. "Right?"

"You're forgetting Captain Unohana," his old friend replied in a deadpan tone.

The normally laidback captain became nervous, realizing his mistake. "Oh! That's right! I totally forgot about her. I'm gonna get yelled at for sure…" He paused for a moment before seeking to change the subject. "But now… The Squad Three Captain retires; the Squad Twelve Captain gets promoted. They didn't die like the 10th or 11th Captains. This is a peaceful change."

Aizen perked up, his interest in Shunsui's words evident to everyone. "Promoted?"

"Hey! Sosuke!" Shinji snapped, visibly annoyed at his Lieutenant's interruption.

Sosuke bowed his head. "Forgive me, I did not mean to interrupt a captain."

Shunsui just shrugged, unfazed by the outburst. "It's fine. Don't worry about it, Sosuke. What did you want to ask?"

"I haven't heard anything about it. I thought that Captain Hikifune was retiring, not being promoted. In fact, I was unaware a captain could be promoted above their rank, save of course someone replacing Captain-General Yamamoto."

"Yup."

"Then there is a rank above captain…" Sosuke paused, pondering what that rank could be.
So she's joining the Central 46?"

Shunsui shook his head. "Nope. It's not the central 46. She's being promoted to Squad Zero, the Royal Guard."

Sosuke's eyes widened as they entered the Meeting Hall. Captains Yoruichi Shihoin of Squad Two, Retsu Unohana of Squad Four, Ginrei Kuchiki of Squad Six, and Kensei Muguruma of Squad Nine, and their lieutenants were already waiting there. "The Royal Guard?" Aizen asked, interested in this new information.

"Hey, is the new guy with you?" Kensei asked.

Shinji shook his head. "Nah. Come to think of it, I haven't even met the guy."

"Figures," the gray-haired captain grunted. "The only one late to this thing is the guy this whole ceremony is about."

"Indeed. I cannot help but wonder how worthy your man could be, Yoruichi, of becoming a captain if he can't even be on time for his own inauguration ceremony," Ginrei commented.

"You were there Yamamoto tested him, Ginrei. You accepted his abilities as that of Captain-level," Yoruichi replied to her fellow captain and nobleman, clearly annoyed by his comment.

"Having the abilities of a captain is not the same as being worthy of the rank of captain. The last five Squad Eleven Captains and as current one, have proven that."

"Well, don't worry about Kisuke," the dark-skinned captain said. "He's more than worthy of being a captain."

Ginrei was about to reply, when Kenshi spoke up, "Hey look! The new guy's coming."

"Well then, like Old Man Yama would say, let's get into position," Shunsui said to his fellows.

The Captains took their positions, their Lieutenants lining up behind them. Seconds later, the newly appointed Squad Twelve Captain, Kisuke Urahara, ran into the room, gasping for air. After regaining her breath, Urahara nervously glanced around. "Ah… I am the last one to here?"

"Eh? What a carefree lookin' guy," Shinji commented.

No one noticed Aizen's eyes narrowing as he stared at Kisuke. "Indeed…"

Now, I've taken out Kenpachi Zaraki and Isshin Kurosaki from the original. They're going to come in later. In fact, Kenpachi's arrival and killing of his predecessor will be in an upcoming chapter. As for Mizuro, Keigo and his sister, Mizuho being soul reapers, it was born out of a random idea I came up as a suggestion to another author and in just stuck in the back of my mind for months. So I decide to use it. Though whether they become visoreds or sneak off with Urahara and Tessai, and get caught up in everything, I haven't decided yet.

That's all everyone. See ya in February!