What's up, guys? So I will actually be killing off Yhwach because I have made an executive decision to not do the Blood War Arc. The way I will kill him off will make sense if you have read the part of the manga where Isshin and Masaki's backstory were explained.

Also, I hope everyone is staying safe during this crisis. Don't do anything unsafe that will get you sick. We all want to be healthy and alive. So stay safe, people.

Hollow speaking or thinking

Zanpakuto Spirit speaking or thinking

Normal speaking or thinking

The boys told him what happened last night and what they experienced in their Inner Worlds as well as the women Randy and Bennett interacted with. Isshin looked surprised when Randy told him Nel had a mask fragment sitting on her head, but offered some fatherly advice about Nel and Tia to him and Bennett, basically telling him to accept them for who they were if they had feelings for them. Then he dropped a bombshell on the boys. And were they ever shocked.

According to their father, he was the former captain of Squad 10 and his name before coming to the World of the Living was Isshin Shiba of the Shiba clan, they had cousins and family in the Soul Society as well as in Karakura Town, their mother was a Quincy, a spiritual aware human who had powers that destroyed hollows instead of purified them, who was infected by a extremely powerful hollow which was passed on to all of them by the hollow being split up between them when the boys were born, resulting in them gaining hollow powers, and they were naturally-born hybrids of all three spiritual factions, which confirmed what their Zanpakuto spirits had said. The man had also told them the backstory behind how he left the Soul Society which involved a treacherous captain named Sosuke Aizen and his experiments on other captains and lieutenants as well as the Hollow that became part of his sons' Zanpakutos.

However, at the same time, they were also livid. Isshin had never thought to tell them anything in case they were attacked growing up. Unfortunately, he dropped a bombshell on them that Aizen was partly the reason why Masaki was dead.

He revealed to Ichigo, Randy, and Bennett that the traitorous Soul Reaper had sent a Hollow named Grand Fisher after them when they were younger, but seeing as they were all split up at the time, the Hollow went after Ichigo and their mother saved him by shielding him, but dying in the process.

Ichigo was confused about something. "If Mom had Quincy powers, then why did she not use them to protect herself and me?"

Isshin held up his hand in an effort to stop the boy from continuing. "There's a reason for that. You see, all Quincies hold a portion of the original Quincy's soul. and he is able to take it back to empower himself. While pure blooded Quincies only lose their powers, non-pure blooded Quincies die from the process. Yhwach, the first Quincy, was an extremely powerful man and first tried attacking the Soul Society a little less than 1000 years ago but was defeated. A Quincy legend was born from this, foretelling that he would take control of the world 1000 years later. Boys, when Ichigo and your mother were attacked by that Hollow, Yhwach stole her powers, leaving her defenseless. She died protecting you, Ichigo. If I had been mad at you for that, your mother would have been disappointed in me."

"But since we have Quincy blood, how is it that we survived Yhwach taking back his soul? Shouldn't we be dead too?"

"One of the captains that was banished from the Soul Society, Kisuke Urahara, a good friend of mine and an absolute genius, found proof why. He theorized that because you three were part Hollow, there was something about you that caused you to survive. Eventually, he figured out that Hollow spirit energy is essentially poison to Quincy, since he had actually seen it happen with your mother. It stopped Yhwach from killing you because it infected him and turned him into a hollow, essentially stopping the prophecy from coming true. Kisuke actually journeyed to the Quincy stronghold to see what had become of the Quincy forefather and found him as a Hollow and purified him. Since Yhwach committed many sins during his life, he was sent to Hell when purified. You technically got payback for your mother, so you don't need to worry about him."

The three brothers relaxed at their father's words. At least the man who killed their mother was dead and it gave Ichigo a sense of peace that she was avenged.

Randy murmured, "You know then that we unlocked our powers after siphoning spiritual energy from Rukia Kuchiki. And you probably figured out that we were fighting that Hollow last night."

"That's right, plus Kisuke was the one to help her with setting everything back to normal. You'll meet him at his shop, the Urahara Shop today after school. If what he told me about your reserves and pressure is correct, then you'll need help controlling and suppressing it. And you and Bennett should tell him about your soulmates since he will understand who they are and not judge them for it," Isshin said. "Also, don't tell Yuzu and Karin about this. I know you want them to always be safe, but they are too young to be dragged into this world. Maybe in time, or if they figure it out on their own, but not now." He looked at the clock. "Well, you three need to get going to class, you're going to be late."

They sighed and got up from the table which they were sitting at. All of them packed their bags and bid farewell to their crazy old man. The walk to school was silent. No one wanted to say anything because they were still reeling from the revelations Isshin had dropped on them.

When they reached the school, they steeled themselves to act like nothing had happened to shake their grasp on reality. They walked in side by side, nothing interrupting them. Bennett was the first to reach their group of friends standing in the hallway, followed by Ichigo, then Randy. Their circle of friends consisted of Tatsuki Arisawa, Orihime Inoue, Yasutora "Chad" Sado, Mizuiro Kojima, and of course, Keigo Asano.

The moron of the group, the short and highly perverted Keigo, started his usual routine of greeting the brothers, which was usually charging at them and yelling out their names. That is, before Bennett palmed the brown-haired idiot by his face while still running, holding him still until the wannabe ladies man stopped. The taller teenager sighed at his stupidity.

"Keigo, what have we talked about?"

Keigo paled and gained a nervous smile. "Not to do what I just tried to do to you three."

Bennett nodded and grinned wickedly. "That's correct. Are you going to do it again or are we going to have to do something about it, like clotheslining you to the ground?"

The offender whimpered. He knew what the Kurosaki brothers were legendary for: their inhuman strength (which, unknown to him and the others, was from their mixed heritage which enhanced their human body to awesome proportions), which they used to mercilessly beat up thugs and people who harassed them. The pervert did not want to be demolished by the human wrecking crew known as Benetto Kurosaki and got scared just thinking about it. He scampered to hide behind Mizuiro, who looked up from his phone in slight interest and moved away from Keigo.

"I told you to stop doing that, Mr. Asano."

"AAHHHH! Why are you not trying to hide me, you've left me to the wolves! I don't want to die! And stop calling me Mr. Asano!"

Randy laughed. Count on Keigo to be the comic relief they needed to bring their minds and worries away from their father's words.

Tatsuki asked, "Hey, did a truck or something hit your house last night? The side of your house looks kind of smashed up. Is your family okay?"

And back the worries came. Ichigo looked at her, then at his brothers. "Something... went down last night. The house can be fixed, but... we'll tell you later, Tatsuki." They walked into the classroom and sat down in their seats. Their teacher, Ms. Ochi, came in and did the roll call. She looked at her clipboard and made an announcement.

"Class, we have a new student joining us today. You can come in now." In walked a face that was familiar to three particular students, prompting them to narrow their eyes at the new student.

"Hello, everyone. My name is Rukia Kuchiki. I hope we can get along." said the Kuchiki princess.

The thought that passed between Ichigo, Bennett, and Randy's heads was, 'What the hell is she doing here?'

Ms. Ochi set down her clipboard and got the lesson started, unaware of the tension between Rukia and the three Substitute Soul Reapers.

"Okay, why are you here? From what I understand, we did your job when we purified that Hollow last night, so you should not be here in our class at our school." growled the blond teen. After class, they had pulled Rukia aside into an unpopulated area, demanding some answers from her.

The Soul Reaper sighed. "I no longer have my powers, which means I cannot return to Soul Society. When you gained Soul Reaper powers, you took away mine. So you three have to do my job for the time being until I get them back."

Ichigo groaned. This just became more complicated. Plus, they disagreed with what she said. "Okay, two things. First, we never stole your powers and according to a trustworthy source, your spiritual energy unlocked our latent Soul Reaper abilities. And second, just how could everyone in the class see you? Last time I checked, you were a spirit!"

Rukia started to explain. "I'm in a gigai, it allows Soul Reapers to be seen by normal humans— wait, did you just say that you had dormant Soul Reaper abilities?"

"Yeah, that's right."

"Well... how?"

Bennett said, "We did not ask to be sucked into your world and apparently we were already part of it before we were even born. Let's just say we are a special case and leave it at that, alright? Anyway, how are we supposed to do your job, we don't know how to get into spirit forms." If they were to do her job, then how were they supposed to do it in their human bodies.

Fortunately, Rukia had a solution for that. She pulled a fingerless glove and smacked all three of them in the gut, pushing their soul forms out of their bodies. The three tumbled out of their human bodies and fell backward. "This glove enables me to push your soul form into the real world. Anytime you need to fight a Hollow, I just need to hit you with it and you can do my job without normal people seeing you. And if you guys don't do it, do you really want all those Hollows devouring people on your conscience, giving you massive guilt from them dying?"

'I do not think I would be able to handle that on my conscience.' thought Bennett. "Okay, I guess we'll do your job, when we are not going about our daily lives, got that?"

"As long as you help me do my job, that's fine."

They went back to class after the conversation. The day went on as normal for the brothers. During a break in between classes, Ichigo asked his brothers if they should tell Tatsuki everything that had happened, including the spiritual side of it. Randy responded, saying that if they told her, they should also tell Chad, seeing as that he had fought and bled with them, making them brothers-in-arms and he deserved to know something like this. Randy knew that Chad would be able to keep a secret and most likely Tatsuki could as well, seeing as that she was the ginger's oldest friend. His brothers agreed to that and decided to tell them.

However, they decided not to tell Orihime, Keigo, or Mizuiro because Orihime was somewhat of a ditz and had too much of a good heart to handle it and they thought she probably would not be able to handle all the deaths. Keigo? Definitely not, the reason being he would not take it seriously and think they were secretly hanging out without him and he was very foolish and moronic. Mizuiro, it was a toss-up because while he was a lot more mature than most of their classmates, Bennett felt that he might lose his grasp on reality since Mizuiro was very down-to-Earth and could freak out at hearing there was an entirely different realm connected with their planet.

Lunchtime came and they asked Chad and Tatsuki to talk with them in a quiet area. They explained to them what they had experienced as well as what their father had told them this morning. The look on the spiky-haired girl's face was incredulous. Chad, on the other hand, maintained his calm demeanor the entire time. When they were finished talking to them, Tatsuki said what she thought about this revelation.

She breathed in deeply. "I know that you guys can see dead people, but Soul Reapers? Hollows? You three being hybrids of three different species while still being human at the same time? It's kind of farfetched. I'm not saying I don't believe you but I need to see concrete proof with my own eyes."

"I believe them. Ichigo, Bennett, and Randy have never led me astray and they would never lie to me." rumbled the giant teen. Chad had been one of their closer friends since middle school who, just like Bennett, Ichigo, and Randy, was a target for thugs and wannabe gangsters because of his looks. His dark skin and enormous height, being an inch taller than Bennett, came from his Japanese-Mexican parents and it stood out, leading for said thugs and wannabe gangsters to try picking fights with him.

Tatsuki, unfortunately, disagreed. "Look, I want to believe you three's story, but it sounds crazy."

Ichigo said, "You two are the only people we can trust to keep this a secret and I know you wouldn't want us to keep things from you. This is us trusting you because you two are some of our closest friends." This was a little frustrating, but he understood where his oldest friend was coming from. She needed to see it with her own eyes to acknowledge that what they told her was true.

Tatsuki sighed. "Yeah, I know," She got up from the table. "Look, I'm heading back to class. I'll see you later."

Chad left for class a couple minutes later, followed by the Kurosaki brothers when the lunch bell rang. Class went by slowly the rest of the day and the boys waited impatiently for the final bell to ring. It did and the boys walked out of the building and moved quickly toward the shopping district in Karakura Town where the shop was. It was not that far from the house and they reached it within a short amount of time.

When they reached the shop, they were surprised at its appearance. The Urahara Shop was quite small, wedged in between two larger buildings on a small plot of land. And it looked like something out of the feudal era of ancient Japan. Needless to say, Ichigo wasn't impressed while Bennett thought it looked stupid and Randy already wanted to smack Urahara before he had even meet the man simply for choosing a design that was centuries out of date.

Bennett pulled open the doors and they walked inside. "Hello? Isshin Kurosaki told us to see someone named Kisuke Urahara here." He looked at his brothers and shrugged. If this was a Soul Reaper product outlet, then where were the employees?

A voice said, "Well, this is a nice surprise. Isshin's boys finally unlocking their powers and jumping into the world of the supernatural? Can't say I didn't expect it to happen," The man Rukia had talked to from the night she met them walked into the front of the store and greeted them and a large mustached, dark skinned man wearing glasses, simple clothes, and an apron entered beside him. "Let me properly introduce myself. My name is Kisuke Urahara and that is my associate, Tessai Tsukabishi."

The man next to Kisuke said, "Hello, it is a pleasure to finally meet Isshin's eldest children. Boss, shall I get Lady Shihoin from her room?"

"Yes, go get her please."

A feminine voice purred, "There's no need, Tessai." Ichigo widened his eyes when a drop-dead gorgeous woman that looked to be in her early twenties came to the front. She had cocoa skin, golden eyes, and long dark purple hair tied back in a ponytail. Her clothes were black leggings on her shapely legs, an orange jacket around her upper body, which concealed her impressive bust but still flaunted it, and brown shoes. The woman looked like a goddess in his opinion.

"Hello. You three must be Benetto, Ichigo, and Randi."

The strawberry thought, 'Oh man, is she beautiful!' "The blond is Randi, he usually goes by Randy, the mohawk-wearing guy is Benetto, just call him Bennett, and I'm Ichigo." he said.

The woman gained a saucy smirk. "I'm Yoruichi Shihoin. I'm a old friend of Kisuke's." 'So they are the famous Kurosaki brothers. I'll definitely get a kick out of teasing them, especially Ichigo. I wonder how he would react to seeing a naked woman for the first time?' wondered Yoruichi, definitely wanting to get some blushing out of them.

The shady shopkeeper interrupted. "So, your father told you to come here, right? Funny you should mention that, I already knew of the incident last night. I'm the one who helped Rukia Kuchiki get a gigai as well as remove your sisters' memories of the event."

"I'm not sure what to say about that," the blond said. "But at least they're not going to have nightmares, especially Yuzu. I worry about her safety because she's way too innocent to be dragged into our problems. For someone of her age, I don't want her experiencing danger like this. God knows she worries about us all day. It's high time we worried about her and Karin."

Bennett said, "Anyway, Randy and I each met someone in our Inner World that was not one of our Zanpakuto spirits. Randy's spirits told him the teenager he met, she is his soulmate and she had a mask fragment on top of her head and we suspect it's the same for me and the girl I met in my Inner World."

Kisuke and Yoruichi froze. Mask fragment? Oh boy...

The tallest Kurosaki was shocked. "You know something, don't you? Damn it, tell us! I don't need more secrets being kept from me!"

Urahara sighed. "Yeah, we do. But you need to understand, will you two judge them solely because of their species?

"Hell no! We don't judge someone just because of something like that. We judge someone based on their actions."

"That's good to know. We'll tell you but not right now."

The boys asked Urahara if he or Yoruichi could train them, seeing as Isshin told them the three adults were former Soul Reaper captains. He agreed and moved down to his underground training area and they sorted out the details after showing them the area.

"Alright, so since you will be training here after Rukia brings you up to speed with her training you a little bit or gains her powers back, Yoruichi will be your mentor along with me. She will be training you most of the time, teaching you Soul Reaper techniques and trying to help you three unlock your Shikai."

"Oh, I can teach them so much more than that, especially Ichigo, in, shall we say, 'other' areas. We can have some other types of training if you want." the woman said, gaining a seductive smirk and a half-lidded gaze and waggling her eyebrows suggestively, mostly at the strawberry.

His pale Zanpakuto spirit cackled inside his mind. "Hahahaha! Looks like you met the Queen, King. And she's a tease, that is priceless!"

Ichigo blushed and shouted, "Not that kind of training!" Oh great, this woman was a huge tease. Who knew what she would poke fun of him about!

Yoruichi burst out laughing. "Thinking dirty thoughts, are we, berry?" He blushed even more than before.

"Okay, why don't you boys get going on home, it's getting late and you probably got homework you have to finish." chuckled Kisuke.

They bid farewell to Yoruichi, Kisuke, and Tessai and walked out the door. Soon as they were out of earshot, Randy and Bennett began laughing.

"Oh man! Yoruichi was eyeing you, dude! I cannot believe she started flirting with/teasing you! Haha!" snickered Bennett.

"I think she likes you, Ichigo. Women don't usually flirt with or tease you, man." Randy said.

Their brother blushed. "I mean, she is beautiful and... I kinda like her too." He smiled, Yoruichi was a hell of a woman, even if she teased him. Somehow he figured that was what she normally did and thought it just added to her charm.

"See? Take a chance with her, you need someone in your life, you closed yourself off from women ever since Mom died. Who knows, she might be the one who's made for you."

Ichigo said, "My identical Zanpakuto spirit called her 'the Queen' and me 'King'. You think that means she's my soulmate?"

Both of them grinned. "I think your spirit knows what your heart wants. Looks like you got a crush on Yoruichi." said Bennett.

Ichigo gained a goofy grin. "I do, don't I?"

The shady businessman known as Kisuke Urahara chuckled to himself as he walked back into the shop. It looked as if his oldest friends had taken a liking to the orange-haired Kurosaki boy. And he could tell Ichigo had developed a crush on Yoruichi as well. "It seems that Randy and Bennett might just unite the Arrancars and Soul Reapers together if possible, if what they told me was true. An Arrancar as a soulmate, it must be because of their hollow side."

His fellow ex-captain said, "Maybe their two Arrancar soulmates will come here from Hueco Mundo to finally meet and be with them."

"Maybe. And don't think I don't see you avoid talking about Ichigo, I saw him widen his eyes when he saw you. He likes you, I know that for a fact!"

"Oh, I don't know about that, Kisuke. He's cute, sure, but he was just surprised at seeing a beautiful woman like me. I mean, I'm older than him by quite a bit, he would be more interested in human girls his age." chided Yoruichi.

Urahara smirked. 'Don't be surprised if he turns out to be more to you than you think, Yoruichi. I've known you for years, you're fascinated with him, I can tell. If my hypothesis is correct, Ichigo also has a soulmate as well and I'd bet my shop that it's you, my friend.' "Alright, alright, whatever you say."

Ichigo, Randy, and Bennett were each walking and listening to some music by LINKIN PARK, Powerman 5000, and Hollywood Undead respectively on their phones when they bumped into Rukia walking from another direction, knocking her to the street. She got up and was about to spout off a rant when she saw it was the boys, who pulled out their headphones and apologized to her.

She shook her head at their carelessness and said, "Next time, just pay attention to your surroundings. Anyways, where did you three go off to?"

"The Urahara Shop." stated Ichigo.

"What?! Why?" exclaimed the Kuchiki princess. How did they know about that place?

"Remember our trustworthy source? They told us to meet the people who were there." Bennett said.

"At this point I'm not even going to begin to ask who or why." Out of the corner of her eye, the short Soul Reaper saw a curvy, auburn-haired girl walking down the road farther along. She was familiar to her, but didn't know from where.

She asked, "Who's that girl with the auburn hair and large chest? I know her from somewhere, do you?"

They all facepalmed. "Jeez, you really don't remember her? That's one of our classmates, Orihime Inoue, why do you ask?" droned Bennett, really not wanting to listen to her questions any longer.

"Do you see what's on her leg? That mark?" She motioned to Orihime's limb. They took a look and were confused at what they saw.

True enough, there was a mark on her leg, one that looked ominous and reminiscent of a clawed hand. It was dark and wrapped around her calf, looking as though someone had grabbed it and yanked.

"Yeah, what about it?" questioned Randy.

"Does Orihime have any relatives or family?"

Ichigo gained a solemn look on his face when she asked the question. "She used to live with her older brother, Sora. Unfortunately, he was hurt badly in an accident a couple years ago. She brought him to my father's clinic to get him some help. We did not have the resources to help him entirely, but we tried anyway. We had to call an ambulance to take him to the local hospital when we could not do anything else for him. He... died on the way. Orihime's been living alone ever since and my oldest friend, Tatsuki, goes to check up on her sometimes since she is her best friend. Why did you ask about her family?" He narrowed his eyes, wondering why Rukia would ask such a strange question. What was she getting at exactly?

The raven-haired girl hesitated. "It's... nothing really, I just wanted to know." 'If I'm right, Orihime may be in danger, but I don't know for sure.'

Orihime continued walking to her house, none the wiser to any of the conversation that just occurred. The boys and Rukia parted ways after and they went on home.

Night had fallen on the town and the Kurosaki brothers were discussing with their father about what they talked to Kisuke about at his shop. Kisuke had called Isshin earlier in the day after the boys had left to tell him that they had stopped by his shop and talked about certain subjects.

Isshin had chuckled when Urahara told him the interaction between Ichigo and Yoruichi and what the mad genius had gleaned and suspected from his observation of the two. Leave it to Ichigo to have her as his potential soulmate.

Right now, he, Bennett, Ichigo, and Randy were all gathered around the kitchen table and finishing up their conversation.

"So that's basically what happened." finished Randy.

"Okay. Based on what he said, I think Kisuke believes that the Soul Society may come for Rukia if they find out she lost her powers, and that they see you using your own unlocked powers, they may get the wrong idea and think her powers were transferred to you," said the former Shiba, scratching his bearded chin. "That's probably why he and Yoruichi would train you after Rukia trains you three, so you could at least get your feet wet before you take on bigger challenges."

They shrugged, taking his word for it. They supposed that he was right.

Truth be told, Isshin could not predict what Kisuke was up to at all or what he was thinking. He was a mad genius and his mind operated on a whole other level compared to everyone else. The one person whose intelligence could even compare to Urahara's own was Aizen and Aizen was only close to his level of smarts, not even at. The ex-captain of Squad 10 couldn't even begin to comprehend what Sosuke Aizen had up his sleeves or was planning or how his diabolical mind worked, so what chance did he have of understanding how his old colleague's crazy mind worked? None.

"Well, we're going to our rooms. I need to relax for a bit." Ichigo yawned. All four males trudged upstairs to their respective bedrooms and shut their doors.

Each of the boys relaxed for a bit to unwind from the day. Bennett listened to music, Randy played by himself on Lego Universe, and Ichigo read some American comics. It was a quiet evening so far, nothing disturbing the boys from their relaxation time.

"Ichigo! Randy! Bennett! We've got orders from the Soul Society!" shouted a certain midget Soul Reaper who had jumped out from Ichigo's closet.

"GAH! What the hell are you doing in my closet?"

"Not important. There's three separate Hollows that just appeared in Karakura Town. Get your brothers and I'll get them into their soul forms and tell them where to go!"

Ichigo ran down the hall to both of his brothers' rooms, opened their doors, and told them to come to his room. They came in and Rukia smacked them each with her special glove on her hand. Their soul forms tumbled out of their bodies and hit the floor.

"Ouch! Hey, what is she doing here?" both Randy and Bennett said.

"Again, not important. There are three Hollows that we need to take care of. See?" Rukia showed her Soul Pager's screen to the boys. The areas two of the dots were in were very familiar to them.

"Shit, one's near Chad's house and the other's near Tatsuki's! They might be after them. Ichigo, you got Tatsuki's place. Bennett, you got Chad." cursed Randy. If they were lucky, they would be able to get to the monsters before their friends got hurt.

"We're on it." affirmed Ichigo. They jumped out the window and started running across the rooftops, then split up after a few seconds.

"Alright, where's Ugly Number 3?"

"That's just it, my Pager said the Hollow was close to here, then it vanished," A beeping sound came from the device. "Oh no, it's right here!"

A large claw appeared in the wall, trying to scratch and grab Randy from his spot in the room. He jumped back and unsheathed his Zanpakuto, holding it in his hand and fending off the appearing clawed hand. A serpent-like Hollow with long arms, clawed hands, and brown hair slunk into the room, out of the wall.

It roared and lunged at Randy, grabbing at him to kill the Substitute. He held his weapon in front of him and blocked the grab by raising the katana horizontally and keeping it in place, then pushed back against its hands in an attempt to overpower it. It obviously did not work as Randy began getting pushed backward and down to his knees.

He let the Hollow push forward and rolled out of the way of the claws crashing down where he had been. Jumping around the room, the blond teen stayed away from its long reach, avoiding a flurry of swipes aimed at his head. He ducked under the swings, readied his sword, and slashed upward, hoping to purify the monster.

The slash connected, but not by much. The hollow leaned back at the last second, causing the mask on its head to crack and a piece of it to come off, showing part of a face of a man Randy knew to be dead. He froze at seeing part of the man's face under the mask. The Hollow clutched its face and screeched in pain. It retreated into the wall and ran off into the night.

Randy breathed out slowly, a flurry of emotions ready to break out at a moment's notice. He turned to the Soul Reaper, who had been avoiding the claws and attacks by staying in one corner of the room. She yelled in anger, "Why didn't you go for the mask? If you slash the mask, you purify the Hollow! So why didn't you?"

He spoke calmly, "Rukia, I did. And when I cut the mask, my weapon did not get all of it. I cut off a piece... and what I saw... was a man. A man who I knew was dead. So tell me, why did the Hollow... HAVE THE FACE OF SORA INOUE?!" yelling at the end, pissed beyond comprehension. Why didn't she tell them that this Hollow was Orihime's brother? Why did she hide that fact?

Rukia gasped. "I was worried something like this might happen," she whispered shakily. "If the face you saw was indeed the man you told me about earlier today, then that really was Sora Inoue, who is now a Hollow."

"How is that even possible? He's dead!"

"Just like spirits who are dead people that Soul Reapers help pass on with the Konso, Hollows are dead people too. Only they did not pass on because they had regrets from when they were alive or something keeping them there. The Chain of Fate that sits in the middle of a spirit's chest is where the hole of Hollow comes from. When a spirit's Chain erodes completely, they are turned into a Hollow and lose their heart. Hollows usually devour the person closest to them in life, not to ease their hunger, but to fill the holes where their heart was."

"Damn... wait, then that means..."

"Yes, that hollow is on its way to Orihime's house." said Rukia, worried about their classmate too.

"I got to get over there! Are you coming or not?"

Rukia nodded and got on his back. They jumped out of the window and ran on the roofs of nearby buildings like Randy's brothers had done before, rushing to get to the auburn-haired girl's home before she got eaten.

As fast as his legs could carry him, Ichigo darted from roof to roof to get to the location by way of the fastest route without obstacles. He would be damned if he let his old friend get hurt or killed because of a monster when he could have stopped it. It was not in his nature to let his friends get hurt on his watch.

He thought about what Tatsuki had said to them during the day when he and his siblings revealed their true nature to her and Chad. 'Maybe, if all goes well, she might be able to see the Hollow and my soul form and believe us. If she is not able to see spirits, then Tastuki can continue being a non-believer and keep out of this dangerous lifestyle. It might be better that way.'

From the day he had met Tastuki Arisawa, they were close friends. She had met him when they were kids at a dojo where they both took karate classes. She would always beat him in spars and he would tear up until his mother would come to pick him up. After she died, he stopped going to the dojo and was not as close to Tatsuki as before. He had always wanted to regain the closeness they shared when they were kids. They were still good friends, just not as close as he would have liked to be, although both of them had started interacting more than they normally did since they started high school, possibly igniting the sparks of a forgotten close friendship.

When she met Orihime in middle school, he'd thought she found someone else to be friends with. No offense to Orihime or anything, but Tastuki knew him just as well as his brothers did and it was the same with her. They grew up together, they should know each other better than anyone else. It made him a little worried that she might just drop him as a friend entirely altogether.

He could worry about that later, right now he was coming up on the area where her house was situated. He stopped at the edge of a rooftop and looked at the streets. Coming down the road was Tatsuki, probably on her way back from Orihime's.

Ichigo felt a presence crawling around the area. 'Good, I'm not too late, but where is the Hollow?'

Tastuki walked down the road to her home, reflecting on what her old sparring partner had told her. She wanted to believe his story, but she had never seen anything like what he had described before. So why was she wanting to do so in the first place?

She heard a bone-chilling scream come from up ahead and froze. "What was that?!" Was there some psychotic machete-wielding killer stalking around and mercilessly killing teenagers? Oh hell no, she was not getting chopped up tonight!

Tatsuki started running to her house, only to see a pair of large legs crash down and appear in front of her eyes. She looked up and immediately regretted it.

A large creature in possession of muscular arms and legs stood in front her. It had a hole going through its chest and a creepy bone mask in the shape of a gorilla. It was horrific to look at and the Arisawa girl was terrified.

"Not good."

Chad had been heading home from a practice session with his band. The night was quiet, except for a creepy scream coming from another part of town that reverberated throughout the area, which Chad could not identify what it came from. He was not scared though, he had faced thugs and gangsters since coming back from Mexico to live in Karakura after his grandfather had died.

He had faced the instigators with Ichigo, Bennett, and Randy many times. They stuck together, they were fellow outcasts after all. Like him, Ichigo and Randy had looks dissimilar to a typical Japanese native and they were the target of the people they fought against (somehow, Orihime Inoue had an abnormal hair color and yet, did not have to deal with people like that. Talk about gender inequality. No, seriously. She and the notorious class lesbian, Chizuru Honsho, did not have black or dark brown hair, but they never got harassed for it, but throw in a male like him or his three friends and they would be hounded like no tomorrow). All of them became close friends with him, and he was grateful for that.

Unfortunately, a fish-like creature with a white bone mask, looking similar to what his friends described, had attacked him when he got close to his house, but instead of running, he started punching it to defend himself. Chad always had monstrous strength like his three friends, even when he was younger. And right now, he was using it to keep the Hollow away from him, but it was not working. It screeched and made a grab for him, hoping to devour the Japanese-Mexican...

SHING!

A long arm fell to the ground with a crash, a clean cut going straight through it. The hollow roared in pain at the loss of its appendage. The Sado boy widened his visible eye. He hadn't even seen the limb get cut or who did it. It was that fast. He looked to his right and saw further confirmation of his friends' story, not that he didn't believe them after he saw the Hollow.

With his katana held at his side was Bennett. Chad looked at him and was surprised at what he was wearing. His black kimono pants, black wrappings around his torso and face, white socks with straw sandals on his feet, and his trademark mohawk standing up straight with the colors prominent in the moonlight made him look like a demon straight out of hell. The Substitute Soul Reaper lifted up his head and grinned, not that his equally tall friend could see it. "Yo, Chad. I know you are built like a brick wall, but damn, it's not even a contest here. Is this Hollow giving you trouble?" He rested his sword on his back in a relaxed state.

"Bennett. So I was right, you weren't lying." said the giant of a teen.

"Tatsuki's probably being attacked by another Hollow by her home, which was probably attracted to her Spirit Energy, and if she sees the Hollow, she'll not doubt us anymore. Don't worry about her, Ichigo's taking care of it. Probably the same reason why you were attacked by this one here, since you can see Hollows and have some energy as well."

"I see, thanks."

"Not a problem," Bennett replied. "Now... let's get it crackin'! I'm feeling the need for some sashimi!"

Well, Chapter's three done. Again, please no flaming, I will not appreciate it. If you think the fish joke was cringy, then you just don't like my sense of humor. I just couldn't resist putting it in there!

Crash, out.