About a month had passed since Jūshirō entered the academy and he had gotten quite used to his classes.
He was sitting under one of the tress in the schoolyard looking over his assignment for a class when he heard footsteps come towards him.
He looked up and saw Shunsui along with two others.
Masaru Kuchiki was the heir to the Kuchiki clan, one of the great noble familes. He was between Jūshirō and Shunsui in height, had grey eyes and black hair in which he had a white headpiece called kenseikan.
The other person with them was Koji Shiba who was the heir to another great noble family. His hair was raven black and his eyes was an aqua-green color.
These were the two he had seen calling for Shunsui on the first day of school and despite them being from the great noble clans, the two had quickly accepted Jūshirō as a friend.
"What you doing Ukitake, Koji asked"
"Just looking over that assignment we got in the history class"
"Ah that one about the Soul King, right?"
"Yes.
-So what brings you three here?"
"It's almost lunch time so we came to get you, said Masaru.
-If we hadn't, you might as well have missed it because you were so deep into that assignment"
"Oh, thank you for reminding me then"
"Come on then, said Shunsui"
Jūshirō nodded and quickly gathered the books he had laying next to him.
"I'll meet you there. I'm just gonna leave these in my room"
"Sure thing, said Koji"
They walked towards the school building and once inside, they split up. Shunsui and the others went to get lunch and Jūshirō went to the dorms.
Once he had left his books, he joined the others.
"Hey, what's our next class after lunch is over, Koji asked"
"Zanjutsu and Kidō, said Jūshirō"
"Oh Nishimura-sensei is probably going to have us do spells with those long incantations, Shunsui said with a sigh"
"First of all Kyōraku, most Kidō have long incantations so there's no need for you to complain, said Masaru
-Second, Yamamoto-sensei is probably going to have us do those stances again and those were so annoying to do"
"Oh you're right"
Once lunch was over, the four of them made their way to the kidō practice field.
"Hello students"
"Good afternoon Nishimura-sensei"
"Today I'm gonna have you practice against each other in order for you to learn Bakudō #21 Sekienton.
-It's a usefull Kidō if you want obsure the movements of whoever is in the red smoke it creates and have a quick getaway"
He then looked over the rows of students.
"Kuchiki come up here"
"Yes sir"
Masaru got up and walked over to their teacher.
"Pretend that you want to attack me and come at me with all you got"
"Okay"
Masaru took a stance before charging towards Nishimura who placed his hands on the ground and red smoke appeared around them.
When it died down, he was no longer standing there.
"Do you students see now how usefull this spell can be"
Everyone looked around and saw him stand by the targets a bit away.
"You are all gonna split into pairs. One of you take the role of an enemy who tries to attack while the other tries to perfectly use Sekienton.
-Understood?"
"Yes sir"
All the students then began to split up. Shunsui was quick in grabbing the collar of Jūshirō's uniform.
Soon, everyone had split into pairs.
"Okay, three pairs at a time since the smoke is gonna cover this whole place if all of you do it at the same time.
-Ukitake and Kyōraku. Kuchiki and Shiba. Hazuki and Ichinose. You three pairs are up first"
"Yes sensei"
All six got up and spread out across the field.
"Begin!"
The students who had the role of attacker ran towards the other who tried to put up Sekienton.
It started off with just puffs of smoke that slowly and steady became bigger clouds.
When the three pairs finished their turn, they sat down with the others and three other pairs took their place.
Once that class was over, they headed to the dojo for their Zanjutsu class.
"Good afternoon students"
"Good afternoon Yamamoto-sensei"
"Today I want you all to go over the stances I taught you two days ago
-Everyone grab a Bokken and line up"
Some students sighed as they got up and picked up the training swords before lining up in two rows.
"You may begin"
They all started to do the stances Yamamoto had taught them as he walked between the two rows.
"These stance is the base of your training since by either your 2nd or 3rd year, you will use your Asauchi, the swords you were given quite recently.
-Unless you master what I teach you this year, you are all gonna be a danger for yourselves and others once you start swinging a real sword."
As he kept walking by the students, he stopped every now and then to correct their stances by using his own Bokken to straigthen their legs, backs or arms.
Over an hour later, class finished.
"Good job today everyone.
-Class dismissed"
With relieved sighs, the students left the dojo and walked into the school building for dinner.
"Man those two classes were tough, Koji said as the four sat down"
"No kidding, Old-man Yama could be a bit kinder when correcting the stances, Shunsui complained as he rubbed his wrist"
"Yeah and how come you two didn't get hit by his Bokken as many times as we did?"
The two looked across the table at Jūshirō and Masaru.
"Because we didn't makes as many mistakes as you two did, said Masaru"
"Kuchiki you bastard, Koji mumbled"
"If you get the stances right, sensei don't have to correct you as much, said Jūshirō
-I'm not saying that you two are bad or anything but maybe you should pay a bit more attention. He did teach us those stances yesterday so they should still have been fresh in your mind"
"I agree with him, said Masaru"
The rest of dinner was quiet and once they were done, they split up and went to their respective rooms.
As soon as they opened the door to their room, Shunsui threw himself onto his bed.
"This has been a tough day"
"Even though you overslept for the tenth time and missed the first half of history again"
"Hey, I need my sleep. I can't help that my body tells me to sleep for that long"
Jūshirō chuckled a bit and picked up an envelope from his desk before sitting down on his bed.
"Letter from your family?"
"Yes. I got it after class earlier today and decided to wait until the day was over before opening it"
He opened the envelope and started to read through the letter before picking up something else that was in it.
"What's that Shunsui asked?"
He got up and walked over to his friend and saw that the paper had childish drawings along with words of good luck and do your best.
"My siblings made this. The three oldest wrote the messages while the four youngest made the drawings"
"That's kinda cute.
-They must miss you alot"
"Yes. I remember that the day I left, my youngest sister held onto my leg and refused to let go until our aunt picked her up.
-We've always been together since we all were small so I guess it was different for them that I wasn't gonna be at home with them all the time like I used to"
"Well, I guess you look forward to the break in a couple of months then so you can see them again"
"I do and I'm sure they are doing the same"
Author's note.
Finally I'm done with this chapter after a month of no inspiration and being busy with other things but now... I'M BACK!
So look forward to more chapters of this story.
I tried to model Masaru a bit after how I believe Byakuya would have been if his father had been alive. Still serious like a noble man but having a sense of fun.