Chapter 25
With great care Tanya extracted herself from the bed she shared with Visha, who was still asleep, having had a long day at the 11th Division the evening before. Thankfully, Tanya was not as hungover as she could have been from the night before. Her years of building up her alcohol tolerance had finally started paying off and as a result, the celebration of Visha's promotion to her old 7th Seat had not left her so drunk that the rest of the night was a blur. She'd even remembered to drink a glass of water before stumbling into bed.
Cracking her neck, Tanya moved over to a nearby closet and began pulling on clothes for the day. Despite the changing times and her more intimate experience with Soul Society culture, her uniform had remained rather consistent through the years: Standard soul reaper pants and shirt, her Silver Wings Assault Medal over her left breast, good boots to protect her feet from the dirt roads, though those would wait till she got downstairs, and her favorite cap to finish off the ensemble.
Smiling at the neat and efficient professionalism of it all, Tanya quickly finished up by wrangling her unruly hair into a ponytail, noting that it had grown a little bit and that she would probably need to have it cut back to just below her shoulders in length. Tanya had considered experimenting with longer hair, but every time she put more than a few minutes of dedicated thought into it she just came to the repulsive conclusion that she'd look like a hippie. Even now, at its current length, it felt like it was pushing the boundaries of her comfort zone, but longer hair was something Tanya felt she needed to fit in with societal expectations of the Soul Society.
Silently Tanya moved into the kitchen and started preparing her morning meal. She was not as good of a cook as Visha, but she knew her way around a kitchen well enough and was able to create something adequate, even if her coffee was not up to par.
Tanya was quite glad they had finally managed to get the power situation in their home fixed. She still was not sure what the 12th's problem was with this particular district. Perhaps some Noble had pissed them off? It was not out of the question; she had heard rumors of a supposed blacklist but, be that as it may, they had brought in enough money with the coffee houses to grease the correct palms in the end. Ah, the wonders of the free market!
Normally, Tanya disliked engaging with what felt like corruption in the system, but if the system wasn't working as intended… Well, speeding things up with a well applied infusion of lucre often worked wonders, at least for those with enough disposable income to manage it. Anyways, a little self-correction through proper capitalism was a good countermeasure to her problems, but how she wished the system actually worked as intended.
The 12th seemed to be very stubborn about actually doing anything, it seemed, and as a result Tanya had ended up falling back on her decades of experience in bureaucracy and taken to just filing the proper paperwork and complaints whenever she came across an issue. Somehow, enough paperwork filed in large enough quantities seemed to grease the wheels of whatever stubborn force was controlling that division, forcing the rusted gears of progress into actually moving for a change.
Finishing her rare foray into cooking, Tanya loaded her plate with about half of what she had made and took a seat at the table. As she made to start her breakfast she saw Visha stepping out of their bedroom and carefully walking over to the kitchenette. "Morning Tanya." Visha said sleepily, grabbing a plate from the cupboard and loading it up with food.
"Morning Visha" Tanya replied with a smile before taking a bite of bacon. "How was your sleep?"
Visha's face broadened into her usual sunny smile "It was great, I'm a bit excited about today. My first day as the Seventh Seat will involve dealing with all the new forms of paperwork." She finished with a slight chuckle.
Tanya smiled and returned the mirth "Oh it won't be too hard, you just have to deal with Seats six through three challenging you to fights and even then you should be fine."
"Sixth Seat Abarai is too busy working himself to the bone for the chance of being a lieutenant. Fifth Seat Ayasegawa is too busy making sure no one unworthy takes Fourth Seat and the Third Seat is too busy training Renji and me alongside his regular duties to make too much of a fuss either.'
"Really the job should be a lot easier than when I had it," She said with a nonchalant shrug, "and even if they're not completely satisfied with the people they're fighting with I'm sure you can handle yourself."
Visha seemed to still for a second before replying, "By the way what are your plans for the day oh glorious Third Seat of 10th Division?"
Tanya let the silence hang as she finished swallowing her food before haughtily responding, "Well dearest 7th Seat of the 11th Division, my plans include a series of training exercises, which reminds me, that I have to thank you for renting that cabin up in the hills. I would much rather sleep in a good bed than a tent whilst being bombarded with Ikkaku's never-ending demands for a fight."
"Sounds like a fun day really, does Ikkaku have anything interesting in store for you?"
"Perhaps, he said he wanted to talk to me about something private so we're going to be going out into the woods. The man probably just wants to take me somewhere where our fight won't render anything of value into a total mess, but there honestly isn't much I can do to appease my fellow Third Seat so acquiescing to his inane demands every once in a while is just part of the job."
Vishna nodded as she finished her own plate "And what about that training you mentioned? You told me when it was happening and never mentioned what it actually entailed?"
"Oh yes, I'm taking a significant portion of my subordinates in the 10th out on a small expedition to the hills just outside of town later today, putting them through their paces and introducing them to the glories of the humble shovel. Once I whittle them down to a reasonable number that can survive a fight I'm going to ask the Captain if I can take them on an extended expedition out into the outer districts, really push their limits and make sure they come out of my training better than they went in."
"You're not going to go too far with this are you?" Visha asked, looking at her with what Tanya could recognize as suspicion in her eyes.
"Seeing as I don't even have access to artillery and I can't exactly go around using up all my energy throwing too many kido spells at them I'm honestly more worried that it won't be adequate enough!"
"No no, I will simply be putting them through some training I've been working on in my spare time at the office, something to improve their abilities without putting their lives at risk too much."
Visha nodded in a slow way that showed she didn't quite believe her "Well don't take too long with them, I mainly rented the cabin out there so we could have a little date night with just the two of us."
Tanya nodded at that, trying hard to keep her slight creeping blush down, "I wouldn't miss it for the world." before quickly finishing the rest of her food and getting up from her seat.
"See you later tonight Visha." She said with a little bow before walking towards the door and stepping out into the stairway leading down to the coffee shop. Doing a few morning stretches she walked down the stairs, laced up her boots and exited the shop heading in the general direction of the 11th Division barracks.
It was time for another one of those training sessions with the bald madman. With a steady Pace, she made her way towards the 11th Division district which had an exit into the outer districts.
Continuing in that direction, for what by reaper standards would be considered a decent run, led to a surprisingly dense forested area of untamed wildland which a few hunter-gatherer communities called home. No major towns or cities that usually lay around the outside of the other division territories could be found for leagues and so the area had become somewhat of a favored stomping grounds for the more secretive and destructive amongst the 11th fighters.
It was not hard to find the Third Seat of the 11th Division from there. Ikkaku Madarame
was waiting by one of the less used training clearings the 11th had actually spent the time creating. He was leaning against a tree, his eyes closed, appearing to be resting.
Most of the Soul Reapers in the 11th division would rather train inside the walls, considering the travel distance it was understandable, but officers and other divisions frowned at people who released their more devastating attacks within the walls of the Seireitei and repeated violations had led to the Captain-General ordering these grounds to be prepared and even then most of the Reapers prefered the closer clearings, to show off and interact with each other under the guise of training...
It was Ikkaku's demanding of the furthest clearing that finally clued her in that there might be something else going on than just a normal training bout, either way she would soon find out what the man wanted. Ikkaku Madarame smiled his customary broad grin as he noticed her, sat up from where he had been resting against the tree and waved Tanya over.
"Tanya, good to see you, you don't come by enough anymore, how long has it been since our last session?"
"Two weeks," Tanya said with a casual shrug walking closer, "though I am not entirely sure why that matters. We still train quite often."
"Oh no reason in particular, just making some small talk. I want to put your Shikai to the test today, really put your Shirubātitania through its paces to see what it can do against something above its abilities." there was an odd gleem to his eyes as he made his pitch.
"I think we saw plenty of that when I fought Kenpachi." Tanya mused out loud as she crossed her arms under her chest.
"Oh that's not fair, Kenpachi is on a different level of what I'm talking about. That fight was more about dealing with overwhelming raw power. I'm talking about higher skilled power versus your current abilities."
"So you mean we should have a shikai versus shikai fight?'' Tanya assumed raising one hand to indicate his already released spear.
"Something like that, just a fight where we can go all out and not worry about bringing down a building."
"I don't know whether going all out here in the sticks would be a good idea, sounds like we could injure ourselves pretty badly from the description you're giving."
"Nah it'll be fine, you're a competent medic, why else would the 4th Division let you volunteer? "
Tanya felt her left eye twitch slightly as she made a humming noise from her throat. She had not expected her medicinal volunteering to come back to bite her in the ass in this way but she probably should have, bloodthirsty maniacs clearly only valuing the skill to fight more.
She would just have to be careful and limit whatever damage was caused to herself and hold back on injuring Ikkaku, it did not matter that she had been working to improve her skills with kido considering she'd be the only medic for miles out in the woods like this. Hell, she wouldn't put it past her luck that a group of wolves would find them bruised, battered and beaten and eat them, probably dire wolves, no! dire wolf hollows just to make it even more of a hilarious joke on her.
"Fine fine full power, tch~" Her usually well contained annoyance slipping out in the privacy of the forest, drawing her blade and beginning the release chant "Entfessel die Gewalt des Krieges, Shirubātitania."
"Oh, this is where the fun begins!" came the unbidden voice of her particularly annoying sword, there was an odd tone in her voice that she couldn't quite discern before her thoughts were interrupted by Ikkaku..
Smiling wildly, the Third Seat calmly walked across the field calling her as he went "Full power Tanya, don't forget and don't hold back."
"Yes, yes,'' she muttered darkly, drawing the sheath from her side and tossing it in the air, shattering it to create additional silver flakes that would make up her cloak. "If you want me running at full power you're going to have to give me a few minutes to generate more than what my sheath can give me." She yelled over.
"Alright sounds good, I'll wait." The Third Seat called from across the field sounding way too cheerful for Tanya's liking.
Carefully she let the silver flakes gather around her shoulders forming into their natural cloak as they condensed and whirled around her, with care she channeled more of her spiritual energy into her weapon resulting in the blade at the end of her polearm generating a fine layer of more flakes. The stored energy would float off the blade and accumulate as part of the cloak slowly growing it till it reached well beneath her shins just barely touching the ground.
Flexing her shoulders, Tanya twirled the polearm in a one-handed maneuver more theatrical than practical, enjoying how light the thing was compared to a rifle.
Oh sure it actually probably weighed the same amount if not more, but because of the odd way spirits would strengthen and how the blade was part of her spiritual energy it became much easier to maneuver for her. She assumed it was the same for all soul reapers really, the weapon was a part of them and as a part of them, they should have full and easy control no matter how absurd the shape and form of some of the more impractical blades she'd seen were.
However when comparing Shirubātitania to a rifle there was at least one clear advantage when it came to launching spells and other magic in that it created its own ammunition for the launch vector, even if the speed left much to be desired. Ammunition would be something dreadfully hard to come by in this world after all, the cloak and her polearm on the other hand were far less of a logistical problem at least.
"Oh Tanya, please do stop comparing me to your past partners, I might get jealous."
The polearm provided an excellent aiming mechanism for some of the kido she had learned over the years allowing her to launch some rather devastating attacks. Why, with enough flakes she could create a few fancy mechanisms that could be used to launch some of her other spells.
She had never tested some of these ideas to their full potential but if the bald annoyance wanted her to go full out… well she never was one not to punch a gift horse in the face when it was offered, at least all this was a golden opportunity to test out some of her more interesting theories on what she could do with her weapon.
Once she noted that additional flakes just started to float around her instead of growing her cloak she carefully raised the polearm into a neutral starting stance and pointed it at Ikkaku "Come on then."
The Third Seat didn't need much, launching into a quick thrust after rushing towards her and closing the distance. Tanya, aware of how inefficient blocking the segmented weapon was, sidestepped the blow, the spear tip passing to her right, before brutally battering Hōzukimaru upwards with the blunt end of her polearm and taking a few steps back getting some room.
Of course this was what Madarame wanted as moments later the spear seemed to defy gravity and split apart into its three components connected by a chain, wrapping around her polearm and nearly slicing her ear off, thankfully her cloak moved up to block the strike deflecting it down to her shoulder back onto her weapon and catching the chain on her bill.
Even using both hands to maintain control of her polearm there wasn't much she could do to untangle the mess. Oh sure she could attempt to kick him, but he still had a hand free and with his reach it would just give him an opportunity to grab her by the ankle and throw her around.
so it was time to try one of the newer tricks she had been working on. With how close they were there was not much distance for her cloak to gain momentum but that mattered little to spiritual physics as it moved at an appreciable speed with a little direction from her spiritual pressure and the left corner of the cloak raised itself around the pair and slammed into Madarame's chin.
There wasn't much power to it but it was a solid hit and forced him to take a step back loosening his control over her polearm and allowing her to wiggle it free from the chains.
"You should have pressed the advantage and gotten up close, you haven't quite figured out how to use me at range Tanya." Her sword chimed in as she quickly stepped back and aimed her polearm at Madarame, grunting in annoyance at the distraction as she swiftly let out a few spells to try and force him away from her. It only showed limited success, Ikakku took a few steps back to dodge the piercing energy strikes with his adept footwork whilst remaining firmly within striking range with his own polearm.
An impressive feat but to be expected with how slow most spells velocities were. That was one of the major downsides compared to rifles, the velocities of most Spells often falling short in comparison to bullets, luckily she had been working on a solution to that problem which Madarame became intimately acquainted with as a smaller clump of flakes she'd been directing floated behind him and exploded, in an admittedly pathetic, "Hadō #31: Shakkahō" .
The explosion barely seemed to singe the man but the startling was enough for her to create some more distance and regain her composure, instead of rushing her however Ikaku decided to take the respite as a moment to talk.
"Well, those were a few neat tricks! Did your cape just punch me?" Ikkaku blithely commented as he eyed the silvery cloak with an appraising look.
"It's a cloak, and yes, it's something I have been working on." Tanya said keeping Shirubātitania pointed towards him expecting his next attack to come when she let her guard down.
Madarame nodded his head in understanding "Let me guess because the individual flakes are made up of your spiritual energy you can control them like you can any other part of your body right? And that explosion back there was you casting through them, bit weak though for a Shakkahō."
Tanya blinked then smiled remembering that the man's own zanpakuto had a similar tendency to move in ways that defied ergonomics, even changing course mid swing likely through the same or a similar principle, it shouldn't have surprised her that he'd figure the underlying mechanics out so quickly considering the similarities. "Correct, though I've only recently started getting the hang of casting through the flakes, it's… difficult without a significantly large clump of them to ease the burden of casting, which is a problem in itself considering how noticeable they are.'' she confirmed, rather bemused by this development."
'Damn too bad those flakes barely cause any damage on their own otherwise you could give the Captain of the 6th a run for his money, I wonder who would win silver flakes or pink cherry blossom blades. "
"That is not a question I'd want to find an answer to," Tanya said, shaking her head. "More likely or not my money would be on the Captain though." hoping to dissuade such speculation. She didn't know much about Captain Kuchiki but if he was anything like the Captain of the 11th…
Well, she'd rather not have to fight him. She would rather not have to fight anyone above the third seat in the future. She was at a perfect position in her mind, not too far up, for all the responsibility to fall on her head if anything went wrong and far enough up the chain that she didn't have to deal with some of the worst jobs in the Soul Society, she had enough subordinates to delegate most tasks too and finally had a decent amount of sway in what missions she had to undertake, a nigh perfect rear position if she could say so herself.
"Ah I think you're underselling yourself," Ikkaku said as he spun his weapon in a circle faster and faster obviously preparing for some sort of counterattack, "Not many people can even touch Kenpachi when he's in a fighting mood and you even managed to draw some blood."
Tanya shook her head in denial "I'm afraid you must be overstating it. The fight was hard but not impossible. The Captain clearly wasn't trying his hardest and I just so happen to have a skillset that counteracts his main defense." After all most fighters obviously didn't consider just taking sword blows to the chest a valid defensive strategy and her experience at applying spirit energy through mage blades was hardly the norm.
The Third Seat laughed "You really are something else, you know that?" before he sprang towards her attempting to swipe at her legs with the spinning chain-linked blade of his Hōzukimaru.
With some fancy footwork, Tanya managed to maneuver herself into a position that she could stop the flexible weapon by catching the blade with her bill on the back of her polearm, Successfully having locked the weapon down for once she pulled him towards her, let go the polearm with one hand and attempted to use a few quick short-range spells cast from her fist.
Tanya realized she made a miscalculation as Ikkaku disconnected the lower end of his polearm and made to bash open hands with it, failing to injure her but succeeding in sending the spells off in another direction and in an impressive feat of dexterity taking back control over their entangled weapons, freeing Hōzukimaru, allowing him to fall back.
She was able to step back as well, wishing she could use some of the more devastating spells in her repertoire after that embarrassment but taking solace in the fact that Ikkaku's weapon was slowly getting coated in her flakes, more and more of which were sticking to the chains and wood and blade, hopefully she'd be able to direct the flakes to interfere with his handling.
Tanya also honestly doubted that she would have be able to fire off any of her heavier spells in the short exchanges even with Shirubātitania taking over some of the mathematical calculations necessary for it, her shikai gave up in simplicity and ease of use what it gained in versatility and micromanagement, having very few automatic or simple abilities that most other blades seemed to gain a lot of her training since achieving shikai was mastering the shear multitasking required to direct all of the blade's peculiarities.
This was also meant to be a friendly spar so firing off a guidance formula or a directed explosive spell like that would be a little unprofessional.
"This all seems pretty standard for our matches so far," Tanya mused, deciding to voice the unspoken question that had been forming in her mind for a while now. "Why bring us all the way out into these woods if you're just going to fight me like normal?"she asked, keeping her eyes on the Third Seat in case he pulled anything while they were talking.
"Oh don't worry, I just wanted to make sure you were warmed up, No doubt you've heard that I've been giving Renji some special lessons from your girlfriend." he asked, returning his blade into its base naginata form once more after carefully trying to shake off as many of the flakes as possible to limited success.
"I believe I have heard something to that effect, yes?" she said, her brow raised in confusion, wondering when her relationship with Visha had gotten to the point where the public was willing to admit it out loud.
"That rumor has persisted for a good long time, however I stopped training him years ago. I stopped training him because I didn't want him to end up mimicking my fighting style. Something I've noticed you do for a while now, you've been doing it ever since we started sparring together, granted part of that is simply due to the similar release forms so some overlap is expected and you have a few different tricks with your shikai in addition to relying more on kido in direct combat than I think anyone else does in Division 11. But I find the fact that your style is dependent on mimicking me concerning."
"So what? Is this an attempt to tell me to find my own style?" Tanya asked a bit confused by where this was going, "I mean we could have done that back in the city so I doubt that's the reason we've come all the way out into the wilderness to fight."
"We're just out here to put my mind at ease. I have a feeling you aren't using all your abilities. Aargh, my words aren't quite coming out right, what I mean to say is that in public you seem like the type to who doesn't show off unless you're certain it will work. so I thought the best way to get you to use those abilities is to put my mind at ease in a location where no one would interfere."
"So basically you want to see a few of my unused tricks to put your mind at ease that I am not just some sort of copycat?" Tanya stated, though she had the distinct feeling the man was holding something back.
"Show me something new, something you haven't shown anyone else and in return I think I'll do the same and let you in on a little secret I've been keeping up my sleeve." the Third Seat said with a lazy smile on his face.
"Alright then," flipping her spear back into a ready position, Tanya drew on the spirit energy her cloak had been gathering and focused it into the spear steadily going through the calculations for a flight spell.
It had been too long since she had a chance just let go and she had been apprehensive of using it inside the Seireitei, just needed one person looking up at the wrong time and then people knew you could fly, keeping that as secret as possible would be useful if she ever had to make a run for it. Though personally as the years went by she found that scenario less and less likely to occur.
After a few seconds her feet lifted off the ground about a foot causing her to have her about eye level with Ikkaku.
"Huh, I was not expecting flight to be what you were holding back." he said, sounding happy to see her floating in the air.
"It's not the only thing." she said before she charged him, swiping the polearm at his side as she went. Ikakku attempted to block her blade but the strike carried along by her momentum and hindrance by her flakes angled his naginata in such a way that it simply bounced off then slid along the shaft of his spear before sliding past his hand and cutting his side, only his quick reflexes saving his arm from a maiming blow.
Ikkaku made a sound of pain as he turned to follow her with his eyes quickly preparing for another attack. "Okay that hurt, but that's still simply a mobility trick in addition to my aggressive style."
'Well that's one way of looking at it." Tanya somewhat sarcastically remarked, while floating in the air until she was within range at about 10 feet of the man. Raising her hand in a slightly dramatic and mostly unrequired theatrical gesture she snapped her fingers as she activated the little flakes that were left behind in Ikkaku's wound.
After a few seconds his side started to glow as energy was gathered directly from his spiritual power. Unfortunately, she doubted the new drain would slow him down all that much. He was not as strong as the Captain but the Third Seat still had large enough reserves that her flakes would be less noticeable than the inflicted wounds were.
Individually the flakes only tended to be devastating to enemies with smaller reserves not draining at any reasonable rate, however even alone they did make for excellent spell-casting focuses.
Snapping her fingers again, each of the little shards exploded in a weak but concentrated Shō spell. Ikkaku took around six punches of expanding force directly into his wound causing him to stumble to the side and go down to one knee.
Deciding to gracefully allow him to recover she elected not to take advantage of his momentary weakness as was only proper in a friendly spar.
"Okay note to self for next time, don't let you get a wound in then, well I guess I'm convinced that you're not just mimicking my fighting style," he said, a manic grin starting to form on his face "well you showed me yours, so I guess it'd only be fair if I bared my secret in return." and then the atmosphere seemed to change as his spiritual pressure started bearing down on her. "Bankai!".
There was a flash of light and Tanya was forced to cover her eyes for a second with her left sleeve. A moment later though the blinding light receded and she was able to see what was going on again, there stood Ikkaku, but where once his spear had been there was now a massive spade head and guandao connected by a chain which were both connected to a third blade with what appeared to have a picture of a dragon engraved in steel.
"What the hell is that?" she asked, feeling waves of spiritual pressure coming off of the sword in a way that she had never felt before it was even disturbing her attempts to hold herself in the air, then the waves settled as if whatever power he just unleashed wasn't fully awoken yet.
"Ryūmon Hōzukimaru" Ikkaku said with a smile. This is the next level, this is what you'll need to be able to beat to really progress in any division outside the 11th."
"It's just a bigger sword though," she pointed out, ignoring Tasha's odd pitched laughter in the back of her mind.
"If you're so sure about that try to get close to me and lay one of those spells on me."
Tanya shrugged, if he was inviting her to try she might as well. Accelerating in a momentum defying manner she attempted to close the distance and get another slice on his lower right side. The strike however was battered aside by the shovel head that made up the right side of the weapon.
Sparks flew as the weapons met before Tanya was forced to break the attack off and retreat using her ability to abruptly change direction mid-flight to our advantage to regain control of the assault.
unfortunately Ikkaku was a lot faster with those weapons than she expected, considering their prodigious size she would have figured the zanpakuto would have slowed him down at least a little bit.
But no, Ikkaku was still fast. In fact, he was much quicker than he had been using the weapon in its previous form and able to block her second attack well when she swung the blunt end of her polearm in her attempt to disengage.
Taking advantage of her open guard, Ikkaku brutally swung his guandao into her midsection hitting her with the flat edge of the blade and sending her hurtling towards the nearby trees.
Despite the nausea, pain and disorientation Tanya was able to focus enough to regain some measure of control of her unintended flight path, righting herself to regain her composure when she realized she had made a miscalculation.
She had become so focused on breaking her fall that she hadn't noticed ikkaku racing after her in time to react, barely able to form an active shield to stop the blow only to despair as the strike almost effortlessly broke past it slamming into the side of her head and everything went black.
She didn't know how long she was out, but she knew she must have spent some time unconscious as her blade had automatically reverted back to its unreleased state similarly to ikkaku who was sitting beside her, looking down at her with mirth and a rather annoying chuckle.
"I guess flight has its advantages and disadvantages." Ikkaku said, taking a rather kind jab at her in her opinion.
"Yeah and that's the truth of the matter." She responded, rubbing her temple with her right hand as she slowly pulled herself off the forest floor.
Tanya was feeling unreasonably tired, an unfortunate side effect of how her cloak worked. What energy was used in its creation could not be returned and had to be used up, this usually meant that even a little training could tire her out for a couple of hours.
The energy intensive abilities of her shikai were obviously meant to be supplemented by what the flakes could drain from her opponents but the lackluster rate at which they affected whatever they covered meant that they often had to completely cover someone or be inserted directly into a wound in order for them to have a noticeable effect on stronger opponents.
Something she had to keep in mind and required proper planning to use her abilities actually in combat. If she released her shikai and was ambushed afterwards by another monster she'd be pretty screwed. Not only would she not be able to get up her abilities as quickly as they had been before but she would be down a lot of spirit energy to begin with and tired to boot.
"Well, you'll you have to work on that I think," The Third Seat said, getting back up before he continued "By the way no one really comes out here so whenever you want to practice some of those things you're keep secret feel free to use this clearing and maybe give me call if you need a sparring partner or the like."
Tanya nodded with a smile, "I might do that." she was not going to turn down a good location to practice some of her more questionable spell craft in private, the training yards for the 10th Division, whilst well maintained and supplied, were still rather public and untill she had a good understanding of what spells were not going to cause mayhem and chaos it was best to attempt them in a safe controlled environment away from any prying eyes.
Perhaps more importantly as that fight had shown she still had a few kinks to work out on her 'style' not to mention the somewhat soul crushing realization that she was clearly underqualified if that was what a Third Seat was expected to be capable of, so having a private area to practice was not a terrible idea.
Tanya Lerghen stood in line with the rest of her unit. A small section of the 10th that had been selected for training under Tanya. As a result, they had been forced to hike out into the wilderness surrounding the Seireitei. Once they had reached their destination they had been forced to endure what Tanya referred to as 'supplementary survival training'.
Heavy marching, dodging the occasional spell from the commander that landed far too close for comfort as well as a multitude of traps set to snare individuals if not several reapers.
Out of the twenty members of the unit that had started this day only about eight including herself were still actively trying to get through the pre-prepared training course. The other twelve had either been wounded or had given up and been left to find their own way back down the hills.
The few times she'd seen Miss Degurechaff this day she had seemed to appear out of nowhere to berate someone for failing a simple task. Now to be fair, most of the tasks she considered simple were far from it by anyone else's definition, the only reason she was doing as well as she was, was because Miss Degurechaff had gone out of her way to make sure she knew some of the kido spells needed for survival.
Hell, Tanya had even given her a notebook of information that the blonde third seat thought was important to her previous training she'd probably have flunked out of this grinding training hours before. Which in hindsight was probably the point wasn't it.
Miss Degurechaff didn't want anyone to work under her unless they met her rather exacting standards, so Tanya had done this whole thing to make sure that the chaff was rooted out of her unit.
What that unit would be she was not sure, she'd had chances to speak to some of the members of the 203rd over the last few years, mainly Visha, the woman Miss Degurechaff lived with, but also Nicole and Grantz
Their interactions tended to reveal little of the 203rd's time in the last world but from what she'd been able to determine from them and her father's stories Tanya's standard had always been the cream of the crop, an elite fighting force.
On one hand that sounded something out of her reach, she was just a simple country girl from the outer district, not a warrior by nature like her father had once been. But On the other hand, she despised the feelings of terror and powerlessness she had when hollows attacked her hometown, she hated the weeks of running, sleep deprevation and abject terror and that hopelessness was something she wanted to avoid feeling again at all cost, making those things pay for what had happened to her family was only an additional benefit, even if one that admittedly brought her a primal satisfaction.
If Tanya's training could help her reach the point where she was no longer afraid of the hollows and was capable enough to handle them on her own, then she would endure anything the blonde third seat would send her way.
Pressing the top of a hill she found that the seven other remaining hopefuls for Tanya's unit had started making camp and were discussing something amongst themselves.
Coming closer she overheard two of the recruits' discussions.
"So why are we doing this again? That bitch's got us running around these hills like we're animals."
"Beats the hell out of me man, 11th Division is weird. They think everything's going to turn into a fight, she's just a little extra weird for what I've seen. I mean she went toe to toe with their division's Captain and actually managed to wound him, that's Division Commander material right there probably wants to flex her command skills with us, if I had to make a guess." The second man said, sitting on a nearby log.
"Flex her command skills?" the first one responded incredulously.
"Yeah, what better way to make sure that the other Captains know that there's a prospective replacement in case they need one, then to show that you know how to train and command soldiers."
"I don't know about that man? If she wanted to show that she was a prospective Division Commander why choose the 10th? Hitsugaya is damn good with his blade And Matsumoto may act lazy but she's not terrible either."
"I don't know, maybe she's got a thing for Hitsugaya? Think I heard she's Matsumoto's little sister or something so they've probably known each other for a while."
"They have different names, how could they be siblings?"
"Maybe they have the same dad, different mothers or maybe they have the same mother, different dads or are just close, I don't know. This world's weird and anything is really possible."
"Huh that might make sense I guess, though I doubt that'll work out for her. Pretty sure the captain has his heart set on Lieutenant Hinamori, that childhood friend of his."
Shaking her head Tanya moved on, deciding that the rumor mills around Miss Degurechaff were weird.
Moving over to a flat piece of land she pulled off her backpack and began unfolding her tent. Remembering what Grantz had told her about how to set up a tent when Visha had gifted this camping set to her and began setting it up, she was halfway done when she noticed someone coming over. Looking up she saw a familiar tall man with broad shoulders.
"Hey Hidenao" she greeted with a smile. The giant of a man simply nodded and let out a grunt that sounded like something sort of reply. She had known him a couple months now and she'd yet to hear him say a word.
He took the strong silent type to an extreme in her opinion as she wasn't sure if he was a mute or just didn't like to talk and let his body language do the talking for him. Either way though he seemed to be a nice guy and Tanya seemed to trust him since she had assigned him to escort her to the outer districts to see if they could find anything about her family.
The journey had not gone very successfully, the village had been burned to the ground and she'd found nothing, just sorrow, discomfort and haunting least the experience had done its part to harden her resolve and anger at the damn hollows.
Taking a knee, the mountain of a man got to work helping set up the other end of her tent. Soon, working together had the tents set up properly and ready for use.
"Did you see Miss Degurechaff? Will she be joining us?" she asked as they got up taking in their good work.
The mountain of a man shook his head no and then mimed holding a bottle to his lips. Nodding, she understood, most likely Tanya was not going to be watching them throughout the night and had gone home to Visha. They were in a relatively safe district so it made sense Plus everyone here did have a confirmed hollow kill or two under their belts they should be safe, why would she be needed to personally monitor them?
Shrugging, Tanya moved towards the main group which had been setting up a campfire, sitting down to listen to various stories from the other soul reapers and trying her best to get to know them.
At least that was the plan, sadly that was thrown out the window as soon as she felt a dark presence. Everyone stopped almost simultaneously as they all felt the dark presence of a hollow entering their immediate area.
"Why the hell is there a hollow this deep in Soul Society?" One of the recruits, Eiejiro she thought, growled out, getting up and drawing his sword.
"Well they technically can spawn anywhere outside the central districts, their ability to transfer between worlds is not limited to the outer districts, it's just very rare for them to pop up this close to the Seireitei without, you know, running into one of us and getting immediately killed." A fellow whose name she couldn't quite place with glasses mused out loud.
"Oh, so this is just an unlucky hollow that happened to appear within range of its worst nightmare. Hey, does anyone want to make a game of this? we all split up and try to kill this thing, whoever kills it wins." A third joined in.
"I don't think that's wise," Tanya tried to voice, knowing that there was an advantage to numbers if they stuck together.
However, she was cut off as a fourth individual spoke up. "Fuck yeah! That sounds fun!" drawing his own sword and getting up and walking into the woods soon followed by pretty much the other five members of the party. Leaving just her and Hidenao.
Looking over to him she asked "You don't want to wander off into the woods alone to fight hollows right?" Thankfully he shook his head and then pointed his thumb in the opposite direction the majority of the group went.
It took her moment to realize what he was pointing at but after concentrating a moment she noted that the spiritual pressure though rather all-encompassing did seem to have sort of a waveform originating from the direction he had pointed at.
"Yeah I think it's that way too. Do you think it's wise for us to work together to kill this thing or should we try and find a way to signal Miss Degurechaff?"
The silent man smashed his fist into his hand in response.
"Yeah that's what I thought, all right let's go see about killing this thing, don't want it to get out of these woods and causing trouble for the district, they're not used to hollow attacks."
Following the spiritual pressure of the monster they continued downhill making their way off the beaten path and into a wilder section of the forest.
They thought they were getting closer and were wondering what kind of beast had spawned when she heard a large crash followed by a scream.
"Shit, someone's in trouble out there." she said, drawing her sword and running as fast as she could down the hill, hopping over debris, fallen trees and other detritus as she did. Coming out of the woods she found herself standing across a small clearing with a cabin in the middle of it.
Said cabin was currently in the process of being smashed to bits as a large hollow three times her size had shoved its fist through a window and was trying to grab something by the looks of it.
Drawing her blade she looked back and saw Hidenao was just behind her, already drawing his blade she hadn't heard him make a sound but apparently he had already called the name of his shikai as his average looking if larger than normal katana had shrunk looking more like a large dagger with a distinct knuckle guard that he could thread his fingers through.
She didn't know if that was necessary. It looked like it was just a regular hollow and she'd been warned about releasing her zanpakuto within the confines of the Seireitei but they were technically outside of the walls and Hidenao did have a few more years of experience than her so she trusted his instincts and held up her sword and quickly spoke the release command. "Smile in the storm: Aoi Inazuma."
Her blade shifted into several burnt blue, straight throwing knives with large oval holes embedded in the pommels allowing them to be connected by a thin almost invisible line of metallic wire.
Quickly she tossed one out, embedding it deeply into the hollow's back causing it to scream in pain. The thing now having a threat turned to face her however its focus was quickly lost as Hidenao came from its left smashing its face in with the knuckle guard of his blade before slicing deeply into its side as he slid down.
Blown away by the punch the hollow was sent stumbling back a few feet. But it quickly reorientated itself and charged at her.
Sidestepping the hollow under its malformed and oversized limbs she succeeded in throwing another knife, embedding it in the front of the monster's chest before stepping back and yanking on the wire that now linked her to the monster on two sides.
Flexing her spiritual energy in a way that felt utterly natural to her with Aoi Inazuma she summoned an active current and sent it down the line, electrocuting the hollow as the embedded blades sparked and shook. Causing the beast to go down shaking to one knee.
This gave Hidenao the chance to hit the beast straight in the face as he rushed back into the combat, his blade practically humming with energy causing strange almost visible vibrations wherever it went, the impact sending the hollow smashing into the already damaged wall of the building. Before it got a chance to try and get back up Hidenao split its mask from chin to fringe. Finally killing the damn thing.
Breathing a sigh of relief Tanya pulled on the strings and caused her blades to release. Hanging them from her side as she looked at Hidenao "Well that went better than I expected, I hope we got here in time to save everyone in the house."
Hidenao simply nodded his agreement, the words "Well done." echoed in her ears in an odd almost synthetic tone, Hidenao's mouth had notably remained firmly shut even as he made eye contact before turning to look at the damaged window.
"Excellent work you two," came a familiar voice to their sides causing them to look over. Standing by the door to the house was Miss Degurechaff.
Rather surprised, Lerghen was wondering if this had been some sort of test when she noticed something off. Degurechaff was only lit by a single porch candle but her clothing seemed more roughly put together than normal and it looks like there was a red blotch on her neck which was more visible due to the shirt being more open than normal.
"Miss Degurechaff, what are you doing here?" was the best question she was able to come up with as a response.
"Oh I simply happened to be staying at this cabin during this little expedition, just to make sure I was in range in case anything went wrong. The Hollow seemed to have taken me by surprise as I was sleeping and before I responded to it you had already distracted it so decided to simply dress myself and see how you'd fare."
"Well an unfortunate situation but I've survived and you two haven't gotten yourself killed. I'll need to go make sure the others don't get themselves in any trouble today."
There was a noise that came from inside the house that Lerghen could only describe as annoyed, the sudden interruption caused Tanya to look into the home where Lerghen could not see.
"Yes I will check up on them in an hour, definitely an hour," Tanya said absent-mindedly before turning back to look at them. "Do me a favor and make sure the others do not get in trouble during that hour."
Snapping a salute that she'd been taught, Lerghen promptly replied with a crisp "Yes sir," before she started to back away towards Hidenao.
Noting that he was smiling rather broadly as she did.
Hmm this one was while coming but here, and this last of the pre canon chapters, after this was in canon, unforchelty i have two more interludes to get out before then, there short chapter so they should not take long, and once those are out, I won't be making any more since I now have other places to get out my writing creativity
Let me know what you all think, in reveiws and comments.
Edited by: Lord Feunoyr, Readhead, Emberwing
Support: Neso, Markus, Mackenzie Buckle, Silver Wolf, Daniel Martinez, Falk Hüser
polearm typo counter 8+ and counting
Review responces
PsylentFox: yep I would gotten around to explaining sooner or later so glad i got it down
skrapsynneh: here more!
EricFreak: perhaps...
blueys50:thanks for the review!
Nihatclodra: I hope you weren't to disappointed.
Mernom: yeah not great on description never have been