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"Rukia" – Normal Speech

'Ichigo' – Thoughts

*Kaien-dono* - Zanpakutō speech/thoughts

"Bankai!" – Spiritual Technique

Chapter 25: Kariya's Plot and Yoshino's Will

Later That Night

Underground Training Area, Urahara Shōten

Shihōin Yoruichi had lived for over two centuries, and during that time, she had taken on a number of students; with Kuchiki Byakuya (that too-stiff little kid that had been oh so fun to tease) and Soi-Fon (oh-so-serious little Fon-chan) only being the most prominent of them. But Kurosaki Kirika had managed to wiggle her way past the usual teasing affection she held for her students; to the point that Yoruichi would admit (even if only to herself) that she loved the young Soul like a daughter.

Which was why being forced to watch as Tessai worked to heal a serious stab wound to said girl's shoulder, along with a slightly-less grievous gash running down her back, was setting off a wave of protective fury that was quite unlike anything she'd experience in her multiple-century-long life.

"What happened?!" she growled out at the despondent-looking Ririn, whose eyes were locked on her female friend.

"I...we came across two of the Bount." the Mod Soul offered weakly. "I sensed one activating their powers, so we moved to investigate and found them in an alleyway. One was that Sōma Yoshino woman, while the other called himself Koga Gō. They seemed to be arguing about something when we first arrived before they suddenly started fighting each other. Koga's Doll looked like a woman made of metal, I think he called her 'Dalk', and she could disassemble and reassemble her body as she pleased, as well as freely reshaping any part of herself, attached or detached."

"Makes sense that someone with that kind of ability would be sent to hunt down this Sōma woman." Urahara remarked thoughtfully. "Normal fire, up to a certain point at least, would not be effective against a construct made entirely of metal like this 'Dalk' creature; all her Doll's flames would do was heat up its metal body which would likely only empower it further. It would take someone with at least Captain-level power to create flames strong enough that they'd be able to melt something like that, and even then, there's no telling if the Doll's control over its form would be curtailed by that."

"And then?" the werecat pressed, mostly ignoring her partner-in-crime's ramblings.

"They fought briefly before Sōma ran off." Ririn continued. "Then Kirika decided we should step in before he could pursue her. I...it was my first taste of actual combat, so I froze up when Dalk attacked me...that's when Kirika got that sword wound, protecting me."

The girl's face was already stained by tears, and the look of guilt and self-loathing was already enough to tell Yoruichi that the girl was punished enough. Doing anything more was pointless.

"How'd she get that shoulder wound then?" Urahara asked.

"She...managed to freeze the Doll using a Binding Spell, Geki." the young Mod Soul answered quickly. "Then she moved to attack the Bount directly...but the Doll hadn't recalled all of her metal parts, she used one she'd kept hidden to attack Kirika while she was focused on the Bount. After that, I…I lost control and shifted to my Martial Form and managed to kick the Doll away from her. Kirika then used Sekienton to cover our retreat while I used my illusions to hide us, before she forcefully removed the metal spike from her shoulder so the Doll couldn't use it to track us. After that I managed to carry Kirika and use Shunpo to escape."

"Hmm…well, at least we've gotten more information on our opponents and their respective abilities." the Shōten owner mused. "And once again, Kirika-chan has proven that no injury, no matter how severe, will limit her ability to hold her own in a fight."

"Ririn." Yoruichi stated severely, her eyes still sharp and slitted like a cat's. "You screwed up, and it looks like you've already realized it."

The Mod Soul wilted, sniffing slightly. "Yes."

The Shihōin Princess unbent enough to sigh and pat the blond girl on the head. "And I doubt Kirika-chan would like me scolding you for something you've no doubt already torn a strip off yourself for. But this will be the last time you freeze in combat. Understood?"

"Hai, Yoruichi-sama." Ririn nodded, a determined glint in her eyes, before looking at Kirika uneasily. "Her brother's gonna blow his stack when he finds out."

"Eh, Kurosaki-kun's got no room to complain about getting hurt in a fight, considering that Aizen almost bisected him." Urahara offered with a lazy shrug. "And Kirika-chan's always been a far more careful fighter than he has; hopefully, he'll simply take this as proof that the Bount are a bigger threat than he'd previously thought they were."

"We can only hope." Yoruichi sighed, knowing it wasn't going to be that easy. Logic had little place in Ichigo's head when it came to his sisters' safety.

Later

Kirika, Yuzu and Karin's Room, Kurosaki Residence

"Stupid Aniki." Kirika grumbled as she lay on her bed.

As she had half-expected he would, Ichigo had blown his top when he discovered that she had been badly hurt by the Bount, Koga Gō. Fortunately, he had very firmly laid the blame for what had happened at the Bount's feet rather than Ririn, which had made the young Mod Soul feel grateful to him. The look on her face...

Kirika had seen that look on Orihime's face before, and she knew exactly what it meant.

'And he gets another one crushing on him.' she thought with mild disbelief. 'Orihime, Rukia and now Ririn? What is this, an eroge? Since when did Aniki set out to capture heroines?'

Although joking somewhat, she was also being more than a bit serious. Ichigo had always been fairly popular with girls, once they'd gotten past his initial 'delinquent' exterior anyway, but had always been mulishly ignorant of it in favour of looking out for his family and friends. It had actually started to worry her that he had deliberately been prepared to ignore his own happiness in exchange for looking out for the people he cared for.

It would totally fit her stupidly noble brother to do exactly that.

Now that two, very possibly three, girls who liked him were going to be around him on a constant basis, his usual 'ignore it until it goes away' strategy when it came to emotional entanglements wasn't going to work anymore. That it had worked up until now was mostly due to how shallow the feelings of the girls in question had been.

Kirika hoped that he let one of the girls into his heart...as she wanted to know he was okay and had someone to take care of him once she was gone.

Tonight's little incident had been a harsh reminder that, despite being lucky enough to deal a minor wound to a monster like Aizen, she was far from bulletproof. Very literally in the case of that damned metal Doll, Dalk. She could be overcome and defeated just like any other Soul Reaper, and it drove home the likelihood that she had, if not been ignoring, had simply chosen not to acknowledge until now.

She, Kurosaki Kirika, was likely going to die facing against Aizen.

She didn't want to, she didn't plan to, but this was a monster of a man who had outplayed Urahara Kisuke, an acknowledged genius, on several occasions; who had planned in exacting detail for at least a hundred years on how to betray the Soul Society, who had a Zanpakutō which could confound and control even the most powerful of Soul Reapers.

Against all of that, she simply...wasn't good enough. She was good at the Zankensoki, but she knew there were dozens of people who exceeded her in skill at any and all of them. She was an extremely capable swordsman, but there were several Soul Reapers who not only had greater talent, but had also been wielding blades for decades, if not centuries, longer than her. She had a Kidō affinity and no small skill in the various Kidō Arts, but so did at least two other Soul Reapers and there were likely many more who could easily trump her skills in that area through sheer weight of experience alone. She had a powerful Zanpakutō...but several Soul Reapers had ones which eclipsed Nejibana significantly.

There were only two advantages that she had. First, something she shared with her brother; she wasn't under the influence of Kyōka Suigetsu's hypnotism. That only meant that he couldn't affect them though; other people were still fair game to him, and she knew he wouldn't hesitate to hurl her allies into her path.

The second was something that she hadn't told anyone, especially her brother, but she suspected that Yoruichi-sensei, Tessai-sensei and Urahara knew it...the fact that she was more than willing to die in order to even inconvenience Aizen, let alone kill him. She needed that kind of resolve in order to even come close to harming the bastard, especially now that he knew of her existence and could factor her into his future plans.

In order to protect her adopted family from Aizen and his machinations, her life was a cheap price to pay, in her opinion.

"Kiri-nee? Are you OK?" Yuzu's soft voice asked from the door. Blinking, Kirika looked up at her.

"I'm fine, 'Zu-chan." she answered. "Just thinking deep thoughts. Only a couple of years 'till college after all; I have to think what I wanna do, you know?"

"You could be a nurse." the softer of the Kurosaki Twins suggested.

"Nah, I'm not the nursing type, unlike you." the oldest of the Kurosaki Daughters grinned at her sister. "I'll leave that as your career, I think."

"Muu. It isn't like I'm definitely going to get the grades necessary to do that." Yuzu blushed.

"You will. You're a natural when it comes to helping the old man in the clinic, and you look cute as a button in that nurse's outfit." Kirika said with a teasing smirk. "Come high school, you'll be beating boys off with a stick. Or girls if that's your preference."

"Kiri-nee!" the young girl's face lit up like a beacon.

"Anyway, I don't really know what I wanna do." Kirika said, allowing her younger sister to recover her composure. "Aside from noping the medical professions, I've also noped the hell out of being an office lady. Urgh, I'd be bored out of my skull in the first couple of days. How people can stand it is beyond me."

"Karin-chan's the same." the gentle twin said.

"Eh, 'Rin-chan's more patient than most people give her credit for." the redhead said wisely. "Honestly, I dunno what she wants to be once she's all grown up, but whatever it is, it'll be something she enjoys. So long as that's true, I'll support her in it, just like I support you, 'Zu-chan."

"Aw, Kiri-nee!" Yuzu rushed in and hugged her older sister tightly.

"Ack! Careful, you aren't getting any lighter as you grow up!" Kirika faux-grumbled as she hugged Yuzu back, a smile on her face.

'Yup, protecting Yuzu and Karin is so worth living and dying for.' she concluded.

The Next Day

Sōma Yoshino's Hideout, Karakura Town

The last fertile female Bount scowled as she paced back and forth in the room. It wasn't much, just a bed with a few nicknacks that she had picked up over the centuries out of sentimentality.

She knew that she was running out of time. Whatever Kariya was planning was going to start soon, and all she knew was that she and the Last Quincy, Ishida Uryū, were key components to it. Exactly what that entailed she didn't know, but she did know that he didn't care if every last Bount other than himself died in the pursuit of it.

She shuddered when she recalled the time when she had caught her ex-husband devouring the soul of a living human. It was the one absolute taboo among the Bount to do such a thing, yet he hadn't hesitated.

'What would the world be like, if that Jōkaishō (Emblem of a Pure Land) hadn't gone into meltdown?' the Bount woman wondered. The Jōkaishō was an old type of energy generator once used by Soul Reaper scientists to power their experiments. It was especially useful for the scientists who had created the Bount. When that one Jōkaishō had detonated, the souls they had been experimenting on had been cast into the Wheel of Reincarnation, eventually birthing the race that would be come to known as the Bount.

The female Bount shook her head. There was no point in wondering what might have happened. The Bount existed, and had inspired all sorts of legends among the humans; vampires, werewolves and the like.

Yoshino had been working against Kariya for centuries, refusing to obey his orders and undermining his plans. And now, when the Goteijūsantai was severely weakened, somehow losing three captains all at once, her ex-husband had chosen to come to an area with higher Reiryoku than anywhere than she'd ever been before, where the Last Quincy just so happened to be.

And now, just to make things more complicated, there was a mixed group of spiritually aware humans and Soul Reapers in this place that made it impossible for her to feed on living souls. Without feeding on living souls, she couldn't increase her Reiryoku quickly enough to deal with Kariya.

She could taste the ashes in her mouth from being forced to perform the same taboo that had started her separation from Kariya in order to stop him.

'I have to find that Quincy.' Yoshino determined. 'If he knows what Kariya plans on doing with him, he'll be able to avoid helping him.'

Path determined, Sōma Yoshino straightened her shoulders and headed for the door to her hideaway. It wasn't her main apartment in Karakura, as she'd been forced to abandon the place after the fight at the docks. Utagawa Ryō had been close enough to track her Reiryoku should he have wished to, so she had grabbed what little she needed and fled to this backup location she had prepared for when the inevitable happened. Only after pushing down and concealing her Reiryoku as much as was possible, of course.

'I can only hope I am not too late.' she thought as she closed the door behind her.

In the empty room, on the edge of the bed, was a picture frame that was flipped face down that Yoshino had been looking at a short while ago. It slipped off the bed and landed on its side, shattering the glass, before landing face-up on the ground. Featured in in was an old sepia picture of a smiling man and woman on their wedding day. Carved on the bottom were their names in Western Format.

'Kariya Jin and Yoshino Sōma'

Later

Ishida Uryū's Apartment

Scowling as he entered the apartment, the Last Quincy quickly changed out of his uniform to more casual clothes before taking more of his empty Gintō out and starting the process of converting some of his Reiryoku into liquid form.

Creating Gintō was a surprisingly simple process, and it made the Last Quincy curse himself that had overlooked such a useful set of abilities for so long. While not nearly as numerous or flexible as the Kidō of the Soul Reapers, the Gintō Arts were a valuable sub-skill for a Quincy, his grandfather had even emphasized it in the notes he'd left for him, where Uryū's father didn't think to look for it.

'It's only a matter of time before I'm forced to go against grandfather's instructions once again.' Uryū thought grimly as he looked at the glove covering his hand. The Sanrei Glove, otherwise known as the Leiden Hant (Suffering Grip), was an old Quincy Relic that repelled Reishi from the Quincy, making even summoning the bow difficult.

Once the training was completed however, the Quincy would be on the same level as any Seated Officer between the 8th and 3rd Seats. The power of their regular Reishi arrows could shatter rocks, and their speed of Reishi gathering was vastly increased.

As a consequence, however, a Quincy could not remove the Sanrei Glove once it was put on; to do so would activate Quincy: Letzt Stil (Monk of Destruction: Last Style), which would push the Quincy's ability to control Reishi to far beyond their normal limits. The cost for such power, which was far beyond what the human body could handle, was that once the time limit elapsed, the human body of the Quincy would seal itself off from Spiritual Power as an act of instinctual self-preservation.

Fortunately, Spiritual Awareness wouldn't be affected, so he would still be able to see ghosts, Hollows and Soul Reapers, but he would be locked out of being able to use his Reishi Bow, even the basic Kojaku (Arc Sparrow). When that happened, he would have only a few options left to defend himself. One was the Silber Draht (Silver Wire) combat accessory, a special length of metal wire infused with Reiryoku that could bind and cut spiritual beings, while the other was the Gintō.

That being the case, Uryū was building up as large a supply of Gintō as was physically possible without damaging his combat ability. He had found over two-hundred Gintō casings in the inheritance his grandfather had left for him, and he had already filled over a hundred of them. He would have filled more but, while the process itself was rather simple, it was a long and mentally exhaustive to convert Reiryoku into its liquid form, so he could only manage a dozen or so per night without weakening himself.

Once he was finished with the Gintō, and had a light dinner to help bolster his recovery, Uryū moved on to checking over his Quincy outfit to see if any repairs were necessary. There wasn't, thankfully, but an ounce of prevention was worth more than a pound of cure, after all.

"Hmm?" the boy raised his head slightly. He'd just felt a slight disturbance in the local Reishi. That usually happened when a Spiritual Being, or a human with above a certain amount of Reiryoku, walked through the background Reishi, what little of it the Human World had.

Frowning, he deployed his bow from the Sanrei Glove. It was still his basic Kojaku, just solidified into his glove.

"Well, someone's nervous." a female voice said, making the Quincy move around, draw an arrow and aim it at the source.

"Sōma Yoshino." he said in a clipped tone. "Ordinarily, a guest would ring the doorbell to ask to be let inside."

"Yes, but these are hardly ordinary circumstances, are they Ishida Uryū?" the female Bount asked from her perch on his open window. He hadn't left it open, so he could only presume she had used a very minor spell of some sort to flip the latch and open it, thus causing the disturbance he'd sensed.

"Considering the members of your race have been causing trouble throughout my home, and you yourself have been preying on the souls of innocent townspeople, I would say that about sums thing up." the bespectacled boy agreed stiffly. "What business brings you to see me?"

"To warn you that the Bount are planning on using you in their plans, Quincy." Yoshino said seriously. "I don't know exactly what they're planning, but you are a key element in it. They need your cooperation, willing or not, in order for it to work."

"Hmph. That simply confirms the conjecture that I had." Uryū said, not lowering the bow or dropping his guard for an instant. "Why would a Bount betray her own people?"

"I'm the only Bount who resists the orders of the self-styled 'King' of the Bount race, Kariya Jin." Yoshino said grimly, bitterness in her words. "He's obsessed with his hatred, and desires nothing more than to gain his revenge against the Soul Reapers and all of Soul Society in general. To him, the lives of his fellow Bount are simply currency to be spent tin order to gain it. We used to number in the hundreds, but now there's only eleven of us. Eleven, out of over a thousand, and Kariya would gladly spend all their lives to cause as much suffering as he can for the Soul Reapers."

"He sounds like a fool." the Quincy remarked simply. "My team and I were able to infiltrate and almost escape the Seireitei, but that's because we had knowledge of its interior, and because we avoided combat as much as possible. He cannot even enter the Soul Society without a way to convert the physical bodies of the Bount into Reishi safely."

"Don't underestimate Kariya. He is centuries old and a frighteningly intelligent man." the Bount woman warned him. "He's one of the only two remaining masters of Bount spells and is one of the scientists who helped develop the process that allows for new Bount to manifest their Dolls. His Doll is both powerful on its own and he himself is a capable fighter. Out of all of the Bount remaining, he is without a doubt the strongest."

"Which makes your rebellion against him pointless." Uryū pointed out. "Not only do you face an opponent who even you seem to acknowledge is vastly stronger than you are, but you also have an opponent in the opposing ranks who can flat-out neutralize most of your own Doll's combat abilities."

"Koga Gō." Yoshino growled.

"Precisely. As it is, it's only a matter of time before this Kariya person tracks you down and either kills you or forces you to submit." the Quincy stated bluntly, before pausing. "It...has been pointed out to me that doing my 'lone Quincy act' is detrimental to my ability to accomplish my goals and for the combat abilities of my comrades as a whole. I would suggest that you let me lead you to where my group meets, so we can combine resources and information."

"And trust people associated with the Soul Society again? That got my tribe massacred before, Quincy." the brunette scowled.

"The Soul Reapers have more important problems to deal with than a dying race that has no ability to self-propagate." Uryū shot back mercilessly. "Three of the most powerful and intelligent Captains have betrayed the Soul Society in general, and the Goteijūsantai in particular. Whatever this Kariya is capable of, they easily make him look like a spoilt brat having a temper tantrum by comparison, especially as their stated course of action is to first take control of Hueco Mundo, the Hollow World."

"Renegade Soul Reapers controlling their mortal enemies...it sounds like a bad joke." Yoshino scoffed.

"I wish it was simply a bad joke. The mastermind behind this betrayal has been playing the Soul Reapers like fiddles for centuries, apparently, and they didn't suspect a thing." the Quincy grimaced. "If it wasn't for the group I am with throwing a few spanners into his plan, more lives would have undoubtedly been lost before he finally deigned to reveal himself. As it is, the entirety of the topmost level of the Soul Reaper's civilian government, the Central 46, has been decapitated. They were the ones who ordered the deaths of your tribe, from what I gather. So in a way, your people have been avenged, just as mine have."

That took Sōma Yoshino a moment to process. "I suppose you're right." she said at last. "Don't blame the weapon used, instead blame the one who wields it. The Goteijūsantai were the weapon, and the Central 46 were the ones wielding them. It doesn't excuse the genocide of my people at their hands, but my anger for that is both ages old and second-hand. The deaths of the Central 46 in this manner, backstabbed by one they thought was their weapon, but who turned against them is almost...deliciously ironic."

At last, Uryū lowered his bow. "That very much mirrors my own opinion on the matter. So, what is your decision? I am due to meet with my allies tonight to try and find the base of the Bount."

"Very well. I'll put my trust in you, Last of the Quincy." Yoshino said after a moment of silence. "I hope you prove my trust is not misplaced."

After Uryū hurriedly changed into his Quincy clothes, he led Yoshino out into the street and towards the Urahara Shōten. But then...

"Schlagenflutschlag!" a cultured male voice said out of nowhere, and Ishida swiftly grabbed Yoshino up and executed a quick Hirenkyaku to avoid the flood of snakes that would have washed over their former position, landing atop a nearby roof.

"Utagawa Ryō!" Yoshino snarled at the dapper man wielding a golden snake-like whip on the street below them.

"Sōma-san, Quincy." the dapper man said affably. "I'm going to have to ask you to come with me."

"Who is he?" Uryū asked offhandedly as he re-summoned his bow.

"Utagawa Ryō, Kariya's enforcer." the female Bount spat. "A sadistic sociopath, but a strong fighter and a cunning bastard besides."

"My thanks for the compliment, but I am going to ask you both to stand down now." Utagawa said as he used his whip-Doll to ascend to the rooftops.

'Interesting. The Bount seem to lack any kind of rapid-movement technique similar to Shunpo or Hirenkyaku.' the Quincy mused as he prepared for battle. 'Given that their abilities seem to mimic the Soul Reapers, it seems an odd hole in their move set.'

"Not happening." he said aloud. "And if you think I'm easy to defeat, you'll have to try harder than the last Bount to face me did."

"Oh, I assure you, doing better than Hō and Ban..." the brown-haired man said as he lashed his whip in preparation to fight. "...is far, far easier than you might imagine, Quincy!"

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Next Chapter: Snakebite

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