Chapter 6: A little bit of progress
Sado "Chad" Yasutora was confused. A moment ago, he had prepared to eliminate a stray hollow he had encountered in the city. And from one instance to another, the hollow just disappeared, without even having tried to attack him.
The most irritating aspect of the hole thing was that the hollow didn`t harm any of the humans it came across, it just minded it`s own business. Chad had at first been worried that it would wreak havoc, so he had followed it via his Bringer Lights.
But nothing in that order had happened.
Chad dispelled his Fullbring and turned around to walk back into the city. He was glad that this hollow didn't do any harm, but he was also worried. Just because it didn`t do anything didn`t mean it might not be up to something.
He would be more careful in the coming weeks.
Kiara woke up in one of her hideouts. Today was finally the day that Makoto would return. Just thinking about all the things that she could do with the simple basics that he would teach her already got her excited.
She put on her uniform and tied back her slightly dark red hair into a ponytail. She kept it at around her upper back. She would have liked it longer, but then it would get harder to tie up properly so it would get in the way during a fight.
She got out of her little sleeping place and started to walk to the entrance of the squad 11 grounds. On the way there, she was greeted (flipped off) a few times by her fellow squad members in a cheery harmless way, to which she replied in the same manner.
It was a fun little game that squad 11 had going on division-internally. Flipping eachother off was more of a provocation, an aggressive challenge to a fight. If one accepted, they had to yell at the offender and ask them out on what their problem was, to which the offender reacted with a snarky insult, to which the offended had to react accordingly until the whole thing escalated into a full-on brawl between the two.
If one wanted to decline they simply had to flip the offender off back. The tricky thing there however was that the person who had previously been the offender, was now the offended and could therefor react accordingly.
If one wanted â fight, it was an assured possibility to get one. On other occasions it was just a hilarious thing to do. Kiara had fallen for it quite a few times in the first few days that she had lived here and had to bleed a little bit for that since she was pretty foulmouthed at times.
When she had improved a lot through Makoto`s training however, the tide slowly turned and people didn`t really flip her off to provoke her anymore, but simply for the heck of it, because sometimes it was just funny.
When she arrived at the entrance, she climbed up the giant doorframes and waited on top of it. That way she had a better view and would surely get a hold of him when he got back, so that they could start training immediately.
After an hour she started to get irritated. He normally arrived late in the morning and the sun was already close to noon.
Damn it, did I miss him?
(Bleach OST 3 Track 21: Cop's Robbers)
Just as that thought came to her mind, a voice resounded by her right side in a cheerfull and mocking manner: "What are you doing up here?"
She screamed in surprise, immediately getting up and turning around, loosing her balance in the process. As she was about to fall over the ledge down on the ground a hand that belonged to a figure of slim but muscular build, in a normal Shinigami haori, with brown short hair, strange line tattoos all over his arms and a yellow belt instead of a white one reached out and a laughing Makoto Souken caught her arm.
"I cannot believe that this still works", he said laughing and pulled her up.
"Leave me alone. You know it`s not fair to just sneak up on me like that", she pouted angrily.
"And that`s why it`s so damn funny", he replied still snickering a little. "But jokes aside, what were you doing up here?"
She looked to the side, a little embarrassed that she had been caught. "I wanted to wait for you so we could start to train the moment you got here."
"Oh really?", he said a little surprised. "Well, that`s a new one. You`re usually not even close to this enthusiastic regarding this topic."
(Track stops)
"Yeah, well that`s because usually training involves me getting beaten up, me getting beaten up and me getting beaten up", she shot back and looked at him accusingly. Even though he had given her an explanation and an apology for his… questionable methods, she was still a bit sore.
He raised his shoulders a bit and smiled apologetically. "Yeah, can`t deny that. I gotta warn you though, it won`t be much different from what we`ve been doing so far. Some of the time will just be devoted to training how to use your Reiatsu."
"Yeah, sure that`s great. When do we start with the new training?"
"You did hear what I just said right? That some parts will be the same as before?"
"I got that, now let`s get started already", she said, almost bursting with excitement.
Makoto sighed and sat down. "Allright, ready for your first lesson in our new subject?", he asked.
"What, like, right here?", she responded a little perplexed. "Don`t you wanna go to the dojo for that?"
"No not really. We will afterwards, since we still have the usual to go through", he said with a smile that was a little bit too ominous for her taste. "But no, it doesn`t really matter where we are for this, since we won`t be doing any physical exercises. That comes later, when you`re able to somewhat competently control your Reiatsu and Combine it with your Zandatsu. Until you can do that however it`ll be more of a training for your mind rather than your body."
"Yeah I get that, but I mean shouldn`t we move away from here, since we are kinda, you know, sitting on top of the entrance of our squad grounds?", she asked, still somewhat puzzled.
He looked at her a little amused and said: "Ok first off, we are the 11th division, nobody gives a shit. We are actually ordered, by our captain himself mind you, to do nothing when we have free time. Second off, who`s gonna come by and complain, the Captain-Commander? The dude`s probably dozing off somewhere himself, with a bottle of booze in arms reach."
On the 1st division grounds, in the area of the higher-ups, somewhere on a rooftop, Kyouraku Shunsui, the Captain-Commander of the Gotei 13 suddenly had to sneeze.
"Relax, we`ve got nothing to worry about." Kiara dropped her complaints and sat down opposite of Makoto. She said nothing, just looked him in the eyes and waited for him to speak.
He raised an eyebrow and asked: "You ready?"
"Of course I am let`s get started", she replied still guiddy.
"Alright, here we go. Remember what I said about Reiryouku and Reiatsu last week?"
She nodded.
"Good. You see, the thing is, even when we don`t control it or don`t know how to control it, we all emit a little Reiatsu. It`s faint, but it`s there. You can imagine your Reiryouku as kind of a well, with small outlets where it can flow out and through your body. By doing that, it becomes physically manifested and therefor Reiatsu. When you can effectifely control your Reiatsu, you can shut those outlets off completely, or turn them up by a wide margin, when you need to perform complex Kido for example, or when you want to overpower your opponent."
"What do you mean by overpower them?"
"When you spiritual pressure is higher than your opponents, you can intimidate them. You know, invoke fear, despair that kind of thing. You can kind of compare it to this: You how it feels when your ears have pressure on them? When you can`t breathe whatever you do?"
"Yeah I do, thanks to countless stomachpunches", she muttered under her breath.
"What was that?", he asked with a little sharpness in his voice.
"Nothing", she quickly responded. "I know what it feels like yes." She knew that she could hold the brutality of her training over his head a little, but she also knew that she shouldn`t push her luck.
He continued with a very faint smile on his lips. "That`s the feeling that you can create in your opponent when your spiritual pressure is higher than his. If there is only a small difference, then the effects won`t be that big. But if you are worlds apart, then you can completely paralyze him by just standing there and doing nothing. Also, when you raise your spiritual pressure, your `Presence` becomes stronger as well. In other words, at some point, your opponent starts to sense your emotions. That becomes really effective when you`re pissed."
As he kept talking, an everwidening smile built itself on her face. That. Sounded. Awesome. "That`s so cool. How do I do that?", she asked full of joy.
"Wow, wow, wow, calm down little warmachine", he said laughing. "Before you can do any of that, you need to be able to bring out your Reiatsu out of your own will first. Which is what we`re gonna practice starting with this day. Still know how I said how to picture your Reiryouku and Reiatsu?"
She nodded. "Does it matter how you imagine that?", she asked.
"No, not really", he answered. "It`s not really about how you picture it. It`s just easier when you have a visualization for it. If you imagine a pool within a nice little forest full of fairies and magical creatures or just the pool itself in a black void has absolutely no effect on it. Personally, I chose the pool in the black void until I could steer it without having to visualize something. It gives you less to imagine and you can spend your focus better. Of course, if you have something else that works better for you, you can choose that", he concluded.
"Wait you don`t have to visualize anymore to use your Reiatsu?", she asked baffled.
"No, I don`t. Think of it as a jumpstart until you get the hang of it. You know what i`ll show you the difference. This", he closed his eyes and concentrated. After a few moments he started to erupt a red aura, like he did a week ago. "Is the time it`ll take you to focus and bring out Reiatsu when you get the hang of it with visualizing. Now watch this", he said with an ominous smile. The aura disappeared again, only to reappear much quicker than it did before. The difference was on a whole other level.
"This is how it looks when you`ve got the hang of it without having to visualize. It`s basically the same process with one less step", he concluded with a statisfied tone.
She couldn`t say anything, she was simply too amazed. Her eyes were on the verge of becoming stars.
"Watch out or you`ll actually start drooling", he said mockingly.
"Less mocking more tutoring. Now", she demanded, which got her a scolding look from her mentor. "Please?", she added in an apologetic tone.
"That`s better", he said with a smile. "Alright we`ll start with the basics. First off, calm down"; he ordered. "You need to be focused for this part." She pouted her cheeks a little at his comment but gave it up quickly, because she knew that he was right.
She calmed herself down and listened closely to the next thing he said.
"Now, reach within yourself and search for the power that dwells inside of you. In other words", he quickly added, because he saw that that statement would not help her in the least; "meditate until you find your inner power."
"That`s it?", she asked baffled. She had expected a little more.
"For starters yes. For now it doesn`t really make sense if you try to do anything if you don`t even have the groundwork for the basics", he answered.
She sighed, took a proper sitting position and started to meditate.
Hours had passed and nothing had happened. So, since she couldn`t get any results, she started to think about various things. For example, about what Makoto had said about the captain-commander.
Was he really that lazy of a person to just lay around and do nothing? As the head of an organization sworn to protect the balance that kept all worlds together, that seemed extremely irresponsible to her. She had heard some things about him, for example how he was already an… unproductive captain, when he was still captain of the 8th division.
Then, when the former captain-commander had died, he of all people had been the first choice as his successor. The decisions he had made were strategic and well-thought out, completely in contrast to the kind of person he was but she was still sceptic about him.
Then there was her own captain, who was kind of a riddle for himself. He was mad for fighting; he loved nothing more in his life. When he didn`t have anything to do however (which happened a lot since he was ditching most of his dutys on a whim), he did just that. Nothing. Dozing off somewhere on the squad 11 grounds or in his own quarters.
Every now and then some suicidal idiot thought i`d be a fun idea to flip him off, just to see what he would do. Those idiots always regretted it moments after they`ve done it. Because those moments later were usually when the captain turned in their general direction with a shit-eating grin that could freeze bones and his sword already in his hands yelling: "A`ight, show me what you`ve got!"
When she had first seen that she had quickly made a mental note to never flip him off. Because fighting the captain would bring all pain and no fun.
Pain. Kind of what she was feeling right now. Her body was still a little… tense from all the fights she couldn`t avoid over the past week. That got her an idea.
Since she wasn`t doing anything else, she could just as well try and feel out the areas where she was hurt specifically so she could maybe massage them a little when she was done with her day.
She started to concentrate on different parts of her body, her feet, her arms, her upper body, until she noticed something. It was faint, very faint. But she did feel something flowing from her body, like a stream. Something like a flow, a flow of-
"I`ve got something!", she yelled in excitement.
Makoto, who was lying on his back and clearly taking a nap, suddenly snapped wide awake, on his feet and yelled confused: "Hold on!-, wait what?" He looked around until he noticed Kiara standing upright on her feet.
"What`s going on?", he asked a little sleepy.
"I felt something", she said, still overflowing with joy. "I started to feel different parts of my body and-"
"Stop right there, I don`t need that much info about your private life, gross", he interrupted her sarcastically.
"Not those parts you idiot! I checked my body by meditating", she accentuated on that last word because Makoto was already preparing another one; "and felt energy flowing from it."
He dropped his sarcastic attitude and put on a sincere one. "Really? That`s great. Didn`t think you`d feel something this fast. I thought it`ll take you weeks. Looks like we`re progressing faster than I thought. Did you find the source?", he asked.
"The source?"
"…"
"…"
"You jumped up the moment you felt something and didn`t go any further didn`t you", he concluded.
"Kinda?", she said with a shrug.
He put his hand on his face and sighed. "Premature celebration, the enemy of all success", he said, almost a little disappointed.
He put a more uplifting expression on and said: "Well don`t worry, a little progress is still progress."
Her mood took a light turn upwards after hearing those words and she smiled.
"Let`s call it a day for now. We`ll continue tomorrow. But worry not, we still have our usual training regiment to go through."
Her smile dropped upon hearing those words. Oh god, why.
Author's notes:
Another one done. And i'm think i starting to get better with the Humor, but that's just my own self-absorbed opinion. (I do hope i'm right though)
Not realy much to say here sooooooo...
If you`ve got your own opinion, PM me, or, better yet, review the Story. I`ll always welcome consturctive criticism.