There weren't a lot of things that peeved Nimaiya, the number one zanpakuto creator in the world.
In fact, there were only two things that really pissed him off.
One of those things was watching someone use his or her zanpakuto as if it were just a sword. Just another weapon in their arsenal to use against an enemy. A zanpakuto wasn't just another sword, it was the very extension of one's soul! As practically the father of the zanpakuto, it felt like seeing his children being mistreated by their babysitters. Not a good feeling.
The second of those things, unquestionably the more recent of the two, was the fact that Yoriichi Tsugikuni, the most recent and most powerful member of the Zero Division (seriously, none of them could even touch him when they fought with him during their morning sparring sessions. Not even that one time when Senjumaru tried summoning twenty royal guards on him as a "distraction" that one time), did not use a zanpakuto.
Part of that peeve came from the question of how the hell could someone possibly be so powerful without a zanpakuto.
At first, Nimaiya didn't believe it when Yoriichi said that his katana wasn't at all a zanpakuto, so he asked Senjumaru to steal it from his room one night while the slayer was fast asleep. Senjumaru was more than happy to commit deeds of petty evil to the slayer, who she still didn't really like much, or at all, actually.
After a whole night's worth of thorough analysis, the zanpakuto creator found that the katana was exactly as Yoriichi said it was, just a katana (a nichirin katana, as he called it). Other than its unusual durability (it wasn't anything really amazing, but easily four or five times more durable than a normal steel katana and somehow only a teeny bit heavier), Nimaiya could find nothing special about the blade. He definitely didn't find anything that could possibly light the blade in bright orange flames on its own like he had seen it do so many times before. It was literally just a katana.
The second part of that peeve came from the fact that Yoriichi insisted on not using a zanpakuto.
Nimaiya was aware that swordsmen created emotional bonds with their weapons after using them for long periods of time. But seriously, did Yoriichi not see that he could be so much stronger than he already was with a zanpakuto?
He had tried so many times to convince the slayer to use the specially-made zanpakuto that Nimaiya had made solely for him, but the red-haired man was stubborn as a mule on the matter.
It wasn't until one day though that he thought of a clever (at least he thought so) way to get the slayer to finally use a zanpakuto.
"Hey, so ya guys know how today's Yoriicheerio's birthday?" Nimaiya says one morning as the Division Zero members were sat around the large table within Hikifune's food palace, enjoying their breakfast for the day (with the exception of Yoriichi who had already finished eating his one bento's worth of food).
"Wait, it's the newbie's birthday t'day?" Tenjiro asks, biting into a chicken leg.
"Yeah, it is!" Ichibei bellows. "I already know what I'm givin' to'em later today when Hikifune makes him his birthday lunch!"
"Birthdays, what a waste of time," Senjumaru says.
"Aw, don't be like that!" Ichibei says. "We did celebrate your birthday two days before your actual birthday after apologizing profusely for it. And I thought you liked the sewing needle I gave you."
"It's not about the gift, it's about the fact that you forgot about my birthday!" Senjumaru exclaims.
"Guys, we're gettin' off-topic here!" Nimaiya cuts in. "What I wanna discuss is how I'm gonna get Yoriicheerio to stop usin' that dingy old katana and actually start usin' a zanpakuto!"
"Dude, if the guy doesn't wanna use a zanpakuto, don't make him," Tenjiro says.
"But it's gettin' on my nerves how he could choose a plain ol' katana over a zanpakuto!" Nimaiya exclaims. "So I made up my mind to switch his katana out with an exactly identical-lookin' zanpakuto."
"First of all, how the hell do you propose to steal the man's katana a second time?" Tenjiro asks.
"Can't I just ask Senjumaru to do it a second time?" Nimaiya asks.
"No, he's extra careful about guarding his katana now," Senjumaru says. "The man goes to sleep hugging his katana like a super sharp teddy bear. It's actually pretty creepy."
"And I anticipated this!" Nimaiya exclaims. "Which is why I'mna hafta ask one of y'all to keep him occupied!"
"Not so loud, idiot!" Tenjiro exclaims. "He could probably hear that all the way over at his palace."
"So that's the plan!" Nimaiya says, clapping his hands together. "Who wants to do the occupyin'?"
Everyone but Senjumaru almost immediately shouts "NOT IT!" The puppet lady, who was raising a wooden mechanical hand to offer a suggestion in a way that a grown adult would, puts down her hand.
"What am I even going to do?" she grumbles. "We have no hobbies in common."
"Doesn't matter as long as you somehow part him with his katana so I can get my mitts on the thing!" Nimaiya says.
"Fine," Senjumaru says, getting up from her seat at the table. "I'll go fetch him then."
"Oh no you don't!" Hikifune exclaims, bonking the top of Senjumaru's head with her large ladle and making her fall back onto her chair. "It'll be a long day for you and you're gonna need an extra hearty breakfast!"
The lady just stares at the large plate of large steam buns right in front of her.
Hikifune's probably right, this will probably be a long day, Senjumaru thinks to herself, a mechanical wooden arm with a pair of chopsticks in its hand protruding from her cloak.
"Senjumaru? I'm outside your door, do you need something?"
The lady turns from the embroidery quilt she was sewing at the sound of the slayer's placid voice. Even after all these months, she still wondered how something so plain-sounding could grate on her ears so much.
"Please come in," she says, setting down her sewing needles.
The door opens to reveal Yoriichi. He pokes his head through the doorway to take a look around before withdrawing his head and taking one step into the palace. Then he takes another step before stopping again to take another look around.
"What's the matter now?" Senjumaru asks, slightly annoyed.
Suddenly, the man withdraws his katana from its sheath and holds it out in front of him, as if ready to defend himself from an attack.
"What are you doing?" Senjumaru asks. "Put that away!"
"You hate my guts," Yoriichi simply says. "Why else would you invite me into your palace than to finally take me out?"
"What?! No!" Senjumaru exclaims. "Why would I do that?! We're part of the same division!"
"That apparently wasn't reason enough to stop you from stealing my katana that night."
"You can't hold thievery and murder at the same magnitude!"
As the two of them bickered for the next fifteen minutes, Senjumaru couldn't help but think that Hikifune couldn't be any more correct in saying that this would be a long day.
Nimaiya sat in front of his large forge underneath his palace, the recently stolen crimson red katana of his fellow Division member laid on the ground in front of him.
The zanpakuto creator taps his chin with his fingers, deep in thought about what zanpakuto he should make for the man. At first, he thought about making some absolutely off-the-top. Something that would remind his enemies of the very sun itself, taking off the namesake of the fighting style ("breathing style," Yoriichi had insisted on calling it) he took pride in. But if that were the sake, Yoriichi wouldn't have been so persistent about having a zanpakuto. Instead, Nimaiya thought about making him something simple. Something that was more powerful than the average zanpakuto, but not something that would make him akin to a god.
"Nimaiya-sama," he hears Mera, his assistant, say. "The others are waiting for your word."
"I'm aware, just gimme a second," Nimaiya says, rubbing his chin.
Then an idea comes to him.
"Actually, y'know what?" Nimaiya asks. "Call the gang to gather now. Let's get forgin'."
"Why did you steal my katana again?" Yoriichi asks, upon seating himself at the table within Hikifune's food palace.
"We'll discuss that later," Tenjiro says. "Anyways, let's get to eatin' supper then."
Seated around at other places on the table were the other members of the Zero Division, save for Nimaiya. They were all looking at Yoriichi expectantly as he looks down at the food on his plate.
The first thing he noticed was that it both looked and smelled better than Hikifune's usual (it wasn't that he thought Hikifune's food was bad, on the contrary, she thought her cooking was almost outworldly). And for once, she had gotten the exact quantity of food that he preferred to eat, which was exactly one bento box's worth of food. On the plate in front of him were noodles with vegetables, drenched in some kind of orange sauce, with chunks of charred meat scattered all around the plate. It looked like a dish made by a god, which it might as well have been.
"Um, is there something special about today?" Yoriichi asks, looking up from his plate.
"Whaaaaat?! Please don't tell me you forgot that today is your birthday!" Ichibei bellows.
"Oh, it is my birthday today," Yoriichi says. "I almost did forget. But wait, how'd you find out about that? I don't recall telling any of you when my birthday is."
"That doesn't matter!" Hikifune, who was in her lean form, says. "Now dig in! I spent a lot of work on your birthday dinner dish! It was especially difficult to make something really special into something that would fit into a single bento box, but I'm proud of what I made! What do you think?"
The slayer picks up his chopsticks and takes some of the noodles into his mouth and slurps it up.
It tasted so good that for a moment, Yoriichi's perfect poker face almost broke. He gladly took some more noodles and brought them up to his mouth, gladly slurping them up.
"So? How is it?" Hikifune asks.
"They're amazing," Yoriichi says, setting down his chopsticks. "Thank you for putting the effort into making this for me."
Hikifune jumps and up down, clapping excitedly.
"Now, before we continue dinner…"
Yoriichi turns to Senjumaru.
"Why did you steal my katana again?"
"If you haven't noticed, Nimaiya isn't here," Senjumaru casually says. "For your birthday, he wanted to refine your katana since he's not creative enough to think of anything else. Since we all knew that you were going to say no to that, we decided to just steal it from you."
Yoriichi just stares at the puppet lady. Senjumaru knew he was using his all-seeing sight to see if she was lying or not, but she wasn't afraid of being detected. After all, what she had said wasn't really a lie, just not a complete truth.
"Well, he was ticked by the fact that I was fine with just using my nichirin…" Yoriichi says, finally looking back down at the plate of noodles in front of him. "I guess that there is reason enough."
"C'mon, don't be like that!" Ichibei exclaims. "He should be almost done right about now."
Yoriichi continues digging into his noodle plate.
"But while he's getting finished up, I've got a gift for you!" Ichibei bellows.
The monk reaches into his robe and pulls out a thin, wooden-handled brush. He tosses the brush at the slayer, who deftly catches it with one hand.
"I've heard that you liked calligraphy a lot, so I got you this brush!" he says. "It automatically materializes ink on the tip of it whenever it nears a surface that can be written on! Pretty cool, right?"
"Yes, thank you," Yoriichi says. "But...it doesn't seem all that useless."
"It's a gift! It's not meant to be useful!" Ichibei says.
"Um, I don't completely trust the validity of the statement."
"Oh, well!" Ichibei exclaims. "Just don't expect any gifts from anyone else. Senjumaru still hates you and Tenjiro is too lazy to bother making birthday gifts for anyone!"
"I'm not lazy!" Tenjiro exclaims.
"It's fine," Yoriichi says. "Thank you, Hikifune, Ichibei. None of you had to do any of this for me."
"Of course!" Hikifune says. "Anything for a fellow Division member!"
"Plus, the sole reason for why I make gifts is because I didn't have to do it!" Ichibei says.
"...How boring is your daily life?" Yoriichi asks.
"Who wouldn't be bored with doing calligraphy every damn second of your life?"
"Then do something else."
"I would if I could!"
Yoriichi just gives Ichibei his best exasperated look, which didn't look too much different from his usual blank facial expression except for his eyes squinting slightly.
For the next half an hour, the five Division Zero members enjoyed their dinner, talking about pointless, random topics (except Senjumaru, who wouldn't stop talking about how painful spending alone time with Yoriichi).
"Hey, uh, Yoriicheerio, may I come in?"
Yoriichi sets down his tea cup and turns to the door of his small hut, which slowly opens and reveals Nimaiya, who had poked his head through the door.
It was rare to ever hear the zanpakuto creator ask for anything (actually, no, it wasn't just rare, the zanpakuto creator never did ask for anything), but Yoriichi knew the particular reason for why.
"Yes, please come in," Yoriichi says.
The zanpakuto creator takes a step into the house, scratching the back of his head sheepishly. In his right hand was Yoriichi's katana, in its sheath.
"So, uh, I kinda-"
"Asked Senjumaru to steal my katana for you?"
"Um, yeah."
Yoriichi sets down his cup of tea before picking up the tea kettle to pour the zanpakuto a cup of tea.
"Please sit,"
Nimaiya sits himself on the seat near Yoriichi's while setting the katana on the table. The slayer takes it and draws the katana from its sheath. He takes a moment to analyze the blade.
"Since I couldn't really think of anything else to give ya for your birthday, I decided to refine your katana!" Nimaiya says. "You've been using that for a while without switchin' to a different weapon, so I thought I'd give it a little do-over. Y'know, sharpenin' it a bit, givin' it a polish-"
"No, you changed something, didn't you?" Yoriichi asks.
Nimaiya stops.
"Here, take it and grab it by the handle with both hands," he says, offering the katana to the zanpakuto creator.
Nimaiya grabs the katana with both his hands and holds it out in front of him, as if about to defend himself from something with it. He waits for a few seconds, expecting the katana to do something or change in a way, but it never does.
"Nichirin katanas have one very special quality that differs them from normal katanas," Yoriichi says. "When held by a swordsman in a combat position, the blade of it will change color depending on the breathing style he or she is practiced in. For example, the blade of my katana is crimson red like that because it is the color that corresponds with the Breath of the Sun. However, for you, who doesn't practice a breathing style, the blade should have turned black. You changed the metal of the blade, didn't you?"
Nimaiya sighs.
"Yeah," he says. "But the new metal is almost twice as durable as the old one and weighs exactly the same too."
"What else did you do?"
Nimaiya takes his teacup and takes a sip from it, trying not to meet the slayer's all-seeing eyes.
Well, even if he didn't, it wasn't like he could hide anything from him anyway. Trying to hide something from Yoriichi was as futile as trying to beat him in a sparring match. Might as well just tell him.
"I, um, kinda made it into a zanpakuto."
Nimaiya didn't know how to expect the slayer to react. For all he knew, Yoriichi might draw his katana and slice his head clean off.
However, all the slayer did was sigh and put the katana back in its sheath.
The action eased Nimaiya a little bit.
"What does it do?" Yoriichi asks.
"Well, you can use it as a normal katana, in which it shouldn't hinder how you currently fight," Nimaiya says. "However, because of that, it doesn't have a shikai form, which means it's the only zanpakuto in all of existence that only has a bankai."
Yoriichi just nods. He takes his tea cup again and takes a sip of tea from it.
"Thank you for your gift, Nimaiya," he says. "Especially for taking into consideration of my preferences. What does the bankai do?"
"Well, that's for you to find out," Nimaiya says, a cryptic smile creeping up to his face.
Again, Yoriichi just nods.
For the next minute, the two of them sit in silence, sipping from their teacups. After he runs out of tea, Yoriichi takes the teapot and refills his cup.
"If I may ask, why don't you want to use a zanpakuto?" Nimaiya asks. "I mean, it's been grindin' on my nerves for a supa long time! Don't you realize how much more you could do with a zanpakuto?"
Yoriichi just hums and sets down his tea cup before folding his hands across his laps.
For the next few minutes, the two of them just sit in silence, sipping from their tea cups. Nimaiya, who had never really been expecting an answer in the first place, was ready to just let it go when Yoriichi opens his mouth to speak.
"I was afraid of becoming too powerful," Yoriichi says. "Of becoming a tyrant because of it."
"You don't exactly strike me as the kind of guy who'd go crazy on power," Nimaiya says.
"Neither was...Kibutsuji Muzan," Yoriichi mutters.
"What?" Nimaiya asks.
"Nothing," Yoriichi quickly says.
For a moment, just a moment, Nimaiya saw a flash of anger on the slayer's face. However, it was gone just as quickly as it had appeared.
The thought of something that could anger even Yoriichi, the perpetually passive slayer, if even for just a second, really scared Nimaiya. So for the sake of his own life, he decided not to press on it.
"Anyway, thank you again for your gift, Nimaiya," Yoriichi says. "I will be sure to appreciate it for the rest of my life."
"Awww, that's so sweet!" Nimaiya exclaims, spreading his arms for a hug. "Come give yer bro a hug!"
"Come near me and you'll be the first person I test my new bankai on."
"...noted."
"Y...Yoriichee-"
"Hush, Nimaiya...just focus on healing…"
Softly, Yoriichi lays his ̶f̶e̶l̶l̶o̶w̶ ̶s̶q̶u̶a̶d̶ ̶m̶e̶m̶b̶e̶r̶'̶s̶ friend's injured body on the ground, careful not to touch his injured shoulder. A lean Hikifune rushes over to them to tend to the fallen Division member.
"Tenjiro, Senjumaru, go assist Ichibei with Yhwach," he says. "Hikifune, bring Nimaiya to your palace and make sure he's somewhere safe before going to fight Yhwach."
"What about you?" Tenjiro asks.
"I'll handle the Sternritter on my own," Yoriichi says.
A/N: The Division Zero probably don't celebrate birthdays, but I wanted to introduce a more childish side to them. Sounded like a fun idea.