Interlude collection 1 version 4
All of this is set before chapter 23.
Nicole Von Levenshtein, Sixth Seat of the 13th Division, stretched in her seat at her work table, trying to work the knots out of her back. She had been working hard on improving the conversion rates on some of the old Imperial spells, trying to adjust the old familiar magical toolkit to this world's system of spellcraft.
Unfortunately, Nicole doubted that she would ever fully convert the spells of her previous life. Sure, they could give those spells numbers and such, but there would always be an issue of the power cost exceeding the amount implied by said numbers.
Her best estimate put artillery spells somewhere around 80 on the Kido scale, and she guessed that none of the former Imperials except Tanya would be able to use such a resource-intensive spell..
Leaning back in her chair, Nicole wondered what her family would think of her now. She had joined the Imperial army thinking it was her duty as a noble and had worked herself to the bone to the point that she had been accepted into the prestigious 203rd. If she had lived, she most likely would have been a celebrated member of the family, and perhaps would have found a nice nobleman to settle down with and have a family.
But none of that had happened. Instead, she had died during the war and had come to this world. Though she was still excelling, thanks to the training Tanya had instilled in her, Nicole still found herself wondering what she was going to do with her new life. Fighting monsters and sending the dead on their way was not what she had expected, nor what had been ever been expected of her.
"Deep in thought?" A familiar voice came from the doorway to her office, and, looking up, Nicole smiled. "Kajōmaru, good to see you. Is the Captain doing alright?" 5th Seat Hidetomo Kajōmaru had been the first friend she had made in the division, and Nicole had come to trust him enough to share the few Imperial spells she thought he could use.
Nicole was thoroughly convinced that her swift rise through the ranks was thanks to her sharing that handful of spells. After she'd shared her carefully parcelled out secret knowledge, Hideotomo had also been promoted, rising a seat in the Division, and Nicole was certain that was thanks to her decision to share as well. What was the saying, a rising tide lifts all boats? Well, the years of Imperial spellcraft locked in her head was doing good things for both their positions in the Division so far. A profitable friendship, for both sides.
"The Captain's fine. He goes through these spells of illness pretty often, but, come now, you can call me Hidetomo, Nicole. The 13th Division is family, unlike some of the others." Kajōmaru walked into the room as he talked, the sunlight streaming through the window glinting off his glasses and earrings for a moment as he passed through the beam.
The Captain of 13th was… well sickly would be the best word. His condition reminded Nicole of Consumption, but the few spells she knew that helped energize the airways hadn't seemed to improve his condition in the slightest.
She wondered if there was anything in the world of the living that might help, but she doubted it. It was unlikely that living diseases were capable of infecting souls, after all.
Considering the fact that the Captain had access to 4th Division care and still showed no improvement, Nicole doubted she'd just be able to walk in and figure out how to get rid of his affliction, though some apparently her spells had seemed to help relieve his symptoms a bit, from what Kiyone Kotetsu had told her, so she was at least doing something helpful.
"Sorry Hidetomo, it's just… My last commander ran things differently. She liked to keep things professional and always used our last names, and it's a habit that's hard to break." Nicole patiently explained for at least the third time.
"Ah yes, the rising star of the 11th," Kajōmaru piped up "Kinda surprised she didn't want to be in this division, considering how much she seemed to care for her soldiers. She seems like the type to have a big heart."
Nicole chuckled at that; He didn't know Tanya well so that probably was not a joke. "Though I'm sure she cares for us, I don't think she has a big heart, she only cares for us because we proved ourselves worthy of her standards."
"Ah, she's more like the 6th, then." He mused, before turning to look out the window, "So, how's your research going?"
"It's going… so so," Nicole said, with a wry look over the paperwork covering her desk. "I've been working on spells I can convert from our system, and I've come up with a few, but most of the more powerful offense spells require a medium like a rifle and bullets or the like, and it's pretty hard to figure out how to replicate them with bladed weapons. I've tried to have some weapons brought in from the world of the living, so I can have something to use in tests, but I don't know if that can be done. Considering the sheer cost of the more powerful spells, , they'd likely only be usable by stronger reapers, which kind of defeats the intended point."
Kajōmaru was interested in the possibilities her offensive spells offered their division. If they could prove that her form of spellcasting could kill Hollows without removing them from the cycle of life and death, they could be a powerful tool, which ideally would help keep division members alive in combat situations.
Kajōmaru nodded along as she spoke before calmly responding "I'm not sure myself on the matter. I'll have to talk to some people, maybe the 12th can get me the proper clearances, but I'll let you know what I find out. What about the other thing I asked you to look into?"
"Ah yeah, the spiritual energy separation processes. I've got some theories, but without samples, I don't know if I'd really be able to cast the spell." Nicole was working on very little concrete information, but from what she'd learned, a member of the division had been exposed to some kind of body-snatching Hollow at some point. This anonymous division member had been a friend of Kajōmaru's, and being a good friend, he didn't want it to happen again to anybody else. Kajōmaru had been looking into a way to disentangle his friend from the Hollow for years, but nothing in this world's magic had yielded any positive result. So when Nicole had told him about a spell used for separating breathable air from toxic gasses, Kajōmaru had brought her in on his little side-project.
Nicole had found it hard to refuse his earnest request for assistance, so here she was, working on a niche spell for separating Hollow energy from spirit energy. So far, she'd learned that her current spell killed Hollows, but she had no idea if it could do so without killing their hosts as well.
Kajōmaru shook his head, remarking that he hoped they would never have to use it in earnest, but thanked her for her continued efforts. "I would really like another option besides having to kill our friends." On that grim note, the 5th Seat turned and exited the office, leaving Nicole to her research.
"Will do," Nicole said to the air, as she watched him leave. Sitting back in her seat with an exhausted sigh, she reflect that, while she might still not know her place in this new world yet, this calm Division could be a good place to start her search for a niche to fill.
Vooren Grantz carefully navigated the walkway as he carried a veritable tower of boxes down the street. 'Who would've thought that I'd end up doing manual labor instead of killing Hollows' he groused internally as he followed the Lieutenant of the 6th, Ginjirō Shirogane, down the street.
"Just a few more minutes, Kid, and we'll be there. Don't worry." The old man remarked, his gray hair and seeming frailty counterbalanced by the three large boxes he casually carried with the ease of a much younger man.
"No worries sir, I'm used to worse," Vooren grunted, trying to put the older man at ease.
"Hah! I'm sure that's true. Most of the young ones in the Division would rather be practicing and getting stronger than helping me move stock from my warehouse to my shop. No respect for their elders, I tell you."
Grantz hadn't known what he was volunteering for when he'd agreed to help; He had just seen the lieutenant asking for an extra hand and had volunteered, thinking that he needed help with some Hollows or something similar. Though, to be frank, carrying boxes was a much safer option, so he didn't really mind.
He liked doing his job as much as the next soldier, but Vooren had fought enough battles in his life that something like this was simple and peaceful, and everyone needed to do something like that every once in a while.
"Here we are Kid, my pride and joy, the Gin Tonbo!" The Lieutenant of the 6th proudly announced as they rounded the corner and saw the shop in question. Said shop was well kept and looked surprisingly modern, with an ornate silver dragonfly painted above the name above the door.
The windows boasted a full display of the store's primary stock, which appeared to be a wide variety of sunglasses. Some of the pairs on display looked a lot more modern than the simple set Vooren'd seen starting to take off just before the war started.
"Nice place" Vooren offered politely as he hefted the teetering boxes.
"Sure is! Took a long time to get it set up, but finally the shinigami will have proper eye protection from the damnable sun." Ginjirō enthusiastically replied, leading the way to the front door. As they got in sight of the door, it was opened by a young bespectacled woman with brown hair.
"Father, you should have told me you were getting stock! I would have gone with you." The woman said, sounding rather annoyed at the lieutenant.
"I'm old, not handicapped, and you were needed here to mind the shop, Mihane. Besides, this young lad was more than willing to help me bring the new stock in."
Mihane looked Grantz over and sighed. "You can put the boxes over in that corner; I'll sort through them in a bit and see where they're meant to go." Shaking her head with irritation, she returned to her post behind the counter.
Vooren nodded and staggered over to the corner of the shop before carefully putting the tower of boxes down, and counted his blessings that he didn't have to talk to Mihane any further. After all, Mihane Shirogane was the 9th Seat of the Division, meaning he was now in a room with two officers who could decide he needed extra training if he fucked up.
Ginjirō walked over and put his boxes down too, before pulling out a knife and cutting one open and fishing out a pair of sunglasses, which he tossed to Grantz. "Here's a free sample for helping me out kid."
"Um thanks, sir," he said looking over the large aviator sunglasses.
"Father! If you keep giving away our stock like that, we'll never make a profit!" Mihane noted annoyed from behind the counter.
"And if we don't get some people wearing them no one will need to come here to get replacements or new sunglasses, one freebie now and then will help us get the word out."Ginjirō calmly responded with a smile, "Besides kid's put up with me fine enough, he deserves a pair for helping."
Seemingly defeated, the girl muttered something Vooren couldn't quite make out then sat down on a stool behind the counter.
"Sorry about that, business has been slow since we opened and she's worried that this will end up being a big mistake." Ginjirō said as he put his hand on Vooren's shoulder and led him towards the door.
"I doubt that sir, sunglasses can be a useful tool, my former commander tried to get us some goggles to use as sunglasses during the war, since during air combat the sun can be more trouble than it is on the ground." He offered.
"Hmm really now, that's interesting, never thought about that use, too bad we don't have any officers like that, it would help set the trend if I could get someone other than me wearing my glasses" Ginjirō mused as he opened the door.
"Well my former commander is an officer in the 11th, I could see if she'd be interested in paying your shop a visit," Vooren said with a shrug, honestly just trying to help his superior officer.
Ginjirō stopped suddenly then looked at him. "She is? What rank?"
"7th seat I believe was the last rank she attained sir" Vooren recalled.
"Huh, well then kid, if you can get this girl to come to my shop and buy a pair of sunglasses, I will give you permission to date my daughter."
"Wait what?" Vooren confusedly questioned after blinking.
"She's spending too much time with her books and tending the shop and most of the men who come asking are not to my standard, you're a good kid, you meet my standard and you helped me with my shop. If it doesn't work out, it doesn't work out but either way, you'll be doing my daughter a favor if you at least asked her out on a date."
Completely taken off balance by the way this conversation had gone, Vooren simply fell back on what worked for him in the military, nodded, and said "Yes sir."
Tanya Lerghen stood at attention at the end of her bunk in the barracks in the soul arts academy as Miss Degurechaff reviewed her coursework sitting on the bunk across from her.
It had taken a few years for Lerghen to join the academy so she had a higher than average spiritual pressure, but Miss Degurechaff had felt she needed to increase it if she wanted to have a good chance at the academy. To this end, she had been given a curriculum revolving around using up all her spiritual pressure during training, a feat that had left her truly and fully exhausted at the end of each day she kept it up.
She had thought that once her training regime was over and she had been assigned to the academy she would have much less contact with Miss Degurechaff. Contrary to her expectation, however, the woman had made it a point to show up at least once every couple of months to look over her coursework and point out things that she could do to improve.
She once asked why Degurechaff was looking in on her since this behavior did not seem to match the stories her father had told her about the Ace of aces. But all she got in response was a curt "You're my responsibility now." Which technically answered the question but still did very little to actually answer the question.
Miss Degurechaff had gone out of her way to make sure she knew her letters which thankfully her father had taught her but it had not been something she had really used out in the boonies.
The Argent pointed her away from a few of the students who had emblems representing connections to the nobility as according to her they were the "bad crowd" and taught her some more of the empire's magic, she'd even learned the flight spell, though she'd yet to master it.
But today she had a question she really wanted to ask the older girl, something which she admittedly had some trouble coming to terms with considering she already towered over her benefactor. "Miss Degurechaff, my father always said that this was not the afterlife he was meant for. Do you have any idea what he meant?"
The blonde stopped looking over her coursework, calmly set it aside, and met her eyes. "Are you familiar with the 'Many Worlds' interpretation of quantum physics?"
Lagrande shook her head
"Well I was never a physicist but, rather simplified, the theory postulates that each action you could possibly take is in fact taken due to a universal constant, if you for example chose to go left at a crossing there is an alternate version of you that chose to go right in a different plane of reality.
This spreading of different possibilities is theoretically infinite and would then have been going on since the dawn of time resulting in differences ranging from incomprehensibly large to minute changes such as taking a right turn where you instead took a left turn.
Your father believed that when the enemies of the empire used a weapon of mass destruction that they didn't quite understand on the capital of our nation, we were displaced from whatever afterlife we were meant to go to and instead sent here. In which the living world at the very least is an alternate world where our nation never existed in the form we knew it as.
Lerghen pondered the explanation but noticed that Tanya didn't seem very invested in the theory from the way she spoke, deciding to confirm her suspicions she voiced her question "Do you believe that's what happened?"
The blonde rubbed her chin with her thumb for a moment before responding "No, though magic is strange, it's consequences are easily measured and understood. I may also be responsible for this, though it may have just been a fever dream as I lay dying in the mud ."
"You, how so?" Lerghen asked, slightly confused.
"An entity with unknown powers I refer to as being X approached me as I was dying and we had a conversation. The results of this conversation may have led to me and those close to me ending up in this world."
"You were summoned here by the soul King?" Lerghen asked in amazement.
The blonde shook her head and waved her hand. "No, no I do not believe this was the work of the Soul King"
"Then what was it."
"Most likely nothing more than a delusion brought on by blood loss but it is just as likely something actually happened there as it is that the magic nuke somehow breached dimensions and the fact that it's only seemingly transported those I'm tangentially related to is nothing more than a coincidence as your father believed. Now then, you have your answer, are you happy with it?"
Lerghen shrugged, not exactly happy but at least having an answer where before she had none, "Good enough, then I have a question of my own. When exactly did you start developing your abilities? When we first met I didn't sense any spiritual pressure coming off of you."
"Oh about five months after you left our home." Lerghen offered, not exactly sure why the blonde was asking her this question.
The blonde made a thinking noise "Just after I started training at the academy, funny coincidence." Then shrugged before continuing "Well, be that as it may, you seem to be improving at a good rate, I believe you should be finishing your time here along a 6-year curriculum. "
"Are there any ways to speed that up?" Lerghen asked, she knew the training was important but part of her wanted to go back to her hometown and see if she could find out anything about her missing family herself.
"No, if you want to be of use to those you work with you need to study and learn everything you can whilst here. A reaper needs to be able to adapt to changing situations, on the fly. Going out to higher districts without full and complete training will just result in an early death, something I'd rather you not have to go through." The bland way Degurechaff uttered it as she picked up the course work and handed it back to her felt oddly humiliating.
"Going off half-cocked may feel good but that's just instant gratification. Your father would not want that for you, he like most general staff understood when patience was a virtue and he would rather you were prepared and ready to go out there than not. You understand, yes?."
Lerghen nodded her head in affirmation to keep herself together a bit before responding with a curt. "YES MA'AM"
"Good, now keep to your schedule and I will see to it you're given a position that'll make sure you are ready to go out there" her face bore an odd smile as Degurechaff patted her on the shoulder before leaving the barracks with her usual purposeful walk.
Hidenao wondered if he had been cursed with bad luck, when he had been assigned to the 11th he thought he was getting off easy since he figured he would no longer have to try and learn the useless kidos he could not use. Instead of a career full of martial bliss, however, he'd found himself assigned the 10th Squad of the 11th Division which quickly seemed to become jointly run by Serebryakov, a woman who introduced herself by knocking him out, and Degurechaff, the girl he thought nothing of when he first seen her.
And worst of all he was not getting as many chances to fight under their care as he would have if he was in any of the other units. Sure, that arrogant bitch Degurechaff forced him to learn some of her strange kido, which didn't need any chants to use but he was not getting the action he craved.
All she ever did was beat his ass during training, force him to do paperwork, and teach him that strange kido. and it was driving him nuts. As he walked down the hallway carrying a stack of paperwork from some of the other squads, he asked the universe what he should do only to have some chump put a leg out and trip him.
Smashing face-first into the ground he stared vacantly as the accursed paperwork floated around him, mocking him as they scattered. The chump and two of his comrades were laughing at him, looking up he saw they were new members of unit 19 part of the latest batch of recruits that flunked anything but their fighting courses.
"Oh look, the paperpusher fell, what's the matter, get a papercut?" The leader of the trio barked out as Hidenao slowly got up off the ground, He was already having a bad day and at this point, he welcomed the opportunity to break the new guys in.
Before he could properly throw down however he saw the least helpful thing he could think of coming down the hallway. Degurechaff was walking their way, a book open in one hand the other playing with the hilt of her sword. The authoritative blond bitch was not going to let him take his vengeance on the group, he knew that. She was far too proper and uptight for that kind of fun.
"Paper-pusher, a charming term for the one who keeps your food supplies coming in." The girl said with an oddly whimsical tone, closing the book and sliding it under her arm.
The trio seeing her backed up, knowing their chance of pulling that shit with an officer was not good, though it would appear the leader had little backbone at least, somewhat lacking in the brains department perhaps but cowardice wasn't something he'd attribute to the dipshit "The worst thing you paper-pushers come across is a papercut, you cowards give a bad name to the 11th" the punk stated as proudly as if his proclamation was some kind of grand reveal.
"Hmm well, that's an interesting point of view." The girl reached down and picked up a requisition form, a fragile grin plastered across her face, "Uniform replacement request from the 19th, perfect, no one will mind a bit of blood then." she folded the paperwork into a winged thing still smiling at her handy work, then she made it glow with more of her strange kido he'd seen before, "Why is she using mage blade?" he wondered in horror just as she then threw the paper aircraft at the leader. The paper plane burrowed itself deeply in the man's shoulder causing him to scream and fall back against the wall.
"Hmm, strange." Tanya said her voice pitched lighter and more playful than he'd heard before "I thought a big strong man such as yourself could handle a little papercut, you seem to think only weaklings get into my unit because they fight less… Well, that's strange I don't feel like offering someone as weak as you a position, so that can't be true." She methodically stepped closer, picking up another piece of paper, a … he absently noted, folding it into a knife-like shape and injected more of her reiryoku into it causing it to start glowing.
"Let me tell you what you're going to do, you will apologize to me for knocking down one of MY men, beg his personal forgiveness for the insult and then you will help him collect the paperwork, do you understand what I'm saying you utter failure of a soul reaper."
"Fuck you bitch!" Clearly, Hidenao had made the mistake of conflating bravery with stupidity or dutch courage as the leader of the group ripped the paper plane out of his shoulder and stepped forward, reaching for his blade before one of his clearly more intelligent friends stopped him.
"Ah, alcohol on the breath, of course." Degurechaff shaking her head, "oh well, what about you, you seemed less inebriated this early in the morning. " she said to the man who'd stepped up to stop his buddy.
The man seemed to rethink making himself a target for a second before responding with a slight stutter: "A-and if we don't do as you ask?"
"Well for one I will report your behavior to your unit leader and tell him your services will no longer at his disposal for a while and beyond that I will look the other way and let Hidenao here personally collect his pound of flesh, you've not only attacked and insulted him but you've disparaged the reputation of my unit, letting him crush you in fight would the best way to reestablish that reputation yes?".
Wait what, the crazy bitch would let him beat these punks up, that was somewhat unexpected but hey he wasn't going to look a gift whore in the mouth, he simply turned to the three punks and smiled, daring them to act.
"He's just a weakling Tenet, we can take him." The leader said though the other two looked rather unsure about that, perhaps the blood loss was getting to him, good. Hidenao was happy to see the moron convince himself of his superiority and charge him.
A rather poor move as Hidenao simply charged the enhancement spell Degurechaff forced him to learn and clocked him right in the nose, taking deep satisfaction as he felt the bone and cartilage break underneath his fist, the poor sucker flew back and crashed into the wall behind him bouncing off of it and landing on the ground with several deep echoing thumps.
"Anyone else care to try their luck?" Degurechaff asked, looking the two remaining reapers over. They shook their heads and quickly got to work picking the paperwork. Still wearing that creepy smile the blond midget walked over to him "If they try anything after this, beat the shit out of them then file a report, I'll make sure it all works out in our favor, but make sure they are aggressors got it?"
Hidenao nodded, a savage grin on his face watching Degurachaff walk-off, pulling her book back out and starting to read again. Turning back to the group of dillweeds he saw they were also done gathering up all the paperwork. Well he would give her this Degurechaff may be a crazy bitch but at least she was his crazy bitch and that was worth the trouble she gave him, not that he'd ever call her that to her face, he liked his testicles whole and his body parts where they belonged…
Writers note
And here is the last interlude I'll think be doing as 1000 words segments, the next interludes, was done as the 3000-word story, and I think that be what I'll be doing that in the future.
Please comment, review, and generally enjoy yourselves…
Edited by: starstuck,emberwing, Lord Feunoyr, readhead
reviews
Jctherebel: thank you
HLBRS-H: that... that a point of view... i wonder what your thoughts were on the more recent chapters.
EricFreak: hmm some more good ideas, probably use them in the interlude after the next one, which at the moment, is in the planning phase and look to be one largest interlude I created so far just based on the amount of content I have to work with might take me few more week to put it together then normal.
skrapsynneh: have some more and more is coming
Pixulior: I'll run that by my editors, one of them actually from Germany so I see what's up.
Scarlet Anne: welcome back, well that was the goal from that chapter, I'm deep enough in I need to start breaking parts of the canon or I'm just retailing of the story of bleach with Tanya there, which can work but this will be better. as for your thoughts about spirit guns, I gave them thought, and come up with an interesting way to appease both sides of the argument on that one. (there are folks who don't want guns at all)
PsylentFox: explanation at the end of the chapter is kind of a tell don't show sorta thing, I used to do that in fics, but in my mind, it's better to find ways to integrate it into the chapter. which why part of the interlude I'm working on now is meant to answer your questions without being told don't show. as for thought on possible interlude, it going on my interlude list might end up as part massive one I'm working on.