Ok I need to answer this first and foremost since several people have asked. I thought I had explained it pretty good in the first chapter but I guess not.
What Tsukishima did was basically what's known as a Character Assassination. Which is a "Deliberate and sustained process that aims to destroy the credibility and reputation of a person, institution, social group, or nation." Essentially its a smear campaign. Tsukishima used his Fullbring to basically rewrite the memories of everyone that knew Ichigo. In my story Fullbringer's have their normal powers, and then they have their final power, something like a Bankai for them and instead of them following what their pride dictates when using their Fullbring they use the opposite.
In Tsukishima's case, Instead of him adding or removing himself from peoples memories, he does the opposite and adds or subtracts other people from EVERYONE ELSES memory or in other words anyone who knew Ichigo. However just like all final powers they have a drawback. For Tsukishima he had to 'sacrifice' his memory. Essentially erasing his memory from the mind of everyone who knew him. That was something that went against his pride. his 'Sacrifice.'
For someone like Ginjo it would be using Bankai, which is a soul reaper power. Ginjo in my story and from what I've seen in canon detests soul reapers so it's an insult to his pride to use soul reaper powers. However to use his fullbring to its fullest he has to use his Bankai. Which is his 'Sacrifice'
They are sacrificing their 'pride' to power their attacks, since Fullbring is a power based on the pride you hold for the object you're using. The object is basically the symbol in which you take pride in. For instance Ichigo takes pride in his soul reaper badge because it symbolizes his time as a soul reaper, as a 'Guardian' of the innocent.
As for what Tsukishima made everyone think? Anything and everything, I answered this in a PM to a curious reviewer.
"Imagine a father seeing his son commit crimes, murder someone and get away with it. Imagine a friend who betrayed your trust with your worst secrets. Imagine someone defiling the most priceless artifacts that Soul Society has and gets away with it."
(Those are just examples but you see where I'm going with it) cont.
"Tsukishima cursed Ichigo by making people think he did something horrible, their minds creating the worst thing they can think of at the time. And they wont try to kill or arrest Ichigo because they either still hold feelings for him or think he couldn't be caught. Compare it to a trial where a murderer walks free because of lack of evidence. Everyone knows he did it but they cant pin him with it.
And even if their thoughts don't coincide with other accounts of what Ichigo did, they'll all just assume he did ALL of it. They don't need evidence because in their mind he was already guilty, there just isn't any evidence to convict him.
Like I said in the first chapter, it is the most powerful character assassination ability in existence. Even I was surprised at the Idea when I first wrote it. Tsukishima COULD have just used the reverse of his ability and erased Ichigo from everyone's memories, but that still left physical evidence of Ichigo being who he is. Like written reports in soul society or family pictures. and he could eventually build those bonds back up. Tsukishima didn't do that. Instead he chose to something much much worse to Ichigo."
That's basically what happened.
Also for the reviewer Benikaze no shi: I use what's known as Third Person Limited in this story. It's basically more freedom than First Person, but it has less freedom than Third Person Omniscient. I slip between TPL and TPO often to suit my needs. I know it's a bit creaky and some people don't like that sort of thing but I feel it fits how I write more comfortably. Although I do love writing in First Person sometimes because I like to be part of the action. In some cases this is in a literal sense as First person is usually the POV that people write themselves into a story as an OC or Self Insert. Though there are stories that use first person POV for established canon characters that the Author only want's the protagonists viewpoint realized. To each their own I say. I like how I write and that's all that matters in the long run.
For the guest who's spell checker fucked up: Zangetsu may show up in one form or another at some point but I'm not sure when, I've really only got the story planned out till about chapter 6, I'm working on it as I go :/ The one thing I will say is that Ichigo isn't a soul reaper and most likely never will be again while he's alive. Right now he's a Fullbringer and proud of it.
Douglas Baily 7946: That's a secret 3, However I will say you'll never guess who it is... Well. You could guess I guess, there are only 108 of them so you're bound to get it right at least once if you go down the line, BUT I AIN'T TELLING!
She'll be getting winged in the next chapter though I can tell you that much :3
Now that that's out of the way.
Fic o' the day: Who in the world is Menma Uzumaki by vanorkt A cute litte deuce-shot story, two chapters of Hinata and RTN Hinata fighting over Naruto. There's a citris fruit (lol) in the second chapter so be warned, M-rated for a reason.
Song/vid of the day: There's going to be three today because fuck yeah! Jeff Williams - Red Like Roses Fucking love this song and the video that goes with it. IOSYS - 背徳の蕾 This song is sexy as hell, DnB ftw. Season 2 Finale of ERB Rasputin VS Stalin Because fuck you that's why. Gorbachev was awesome and Putin kills it in his last three lines. Period.
Word/s of the day: Kakorrhaphiophobia n. – fear of failure There's quite a few Kaka carrot cakes out there isn't there?
Disclaimer: Don't own Bleach or Sekirei. I do however own a package of pecan pinwheels, it's sitting right in front of me, taunting me. Clearly it doesn't know who it's messing with. HULK SMAAAA- *call lost*
-ooo-
"Talking"
'Thinking'
Flashback
Narration/machines talking
"Hollow talking"
'Hollow Thinking'
-ooo-
Chapter 3: Week's Paid Vacation
A week went by in a blur for Ichigo, though a few interesting things had occurred in that time. One of the first of them happened the very night Minaka had contacted them. A man from MBI had delivered a box of clothing to Ichigo's door and on top of the box was a card that the man had said was good for a million yen. When Ichigo asked the man, he merely stated that it was given to each Sekirei when they entered the game, Musubi had forgotten hers. Ichigo turned to stare at the girl behind him dryly. Yeah, he could see her doing that. But that wasn't the most important thing that happened that night. What happened later was even more important as Ichigo sat down to scan the city for the competition. What he found surprised him.
*Flashback*
Ichigo sat in Seiza, breathing in and out calmly. To Musubi, who was watching him do this it seemed like he was meditating but that wasn't what the Fullbringer was doing. No, he was relaxing so he could pull off something he hadn't done since he had lost his Shinigami powers.
He was trying to get a fix of all the spiritual presences in the city. Ichigo wasn't nearly as good as someone like Uryu who could just casually check his surroundings like a sonar. Ichigo had never had that kind of control over his Reiryoka. Sure, he could check his immediate surroundings like with the hollow earlier and his fullbring brought a measure of control but the man still hadn't really had that much practice with scanning an entire city. Which was why he was sitting still and focusing
'Let's see.' Ichigo's eyes fluttered for a moment. 'One, two, three.' Taking a few moments to count out the number of high sources of Reiryoka he finished his count on ninety eight. Musubi had told him there were one hundred and eight Sekirei in the game, that meant that there were already ten knocked out of the running. That was both good and bad news. Good news that there was less competition to fight and bad news that there was less competition to fight.
That meant there weren't as many people they had to fight but inversely it also meant trouble would be more likely to find them.
Idly Ichigo noticed that there seemed to be a certain level of classification in spiritual power among the Sekirei because he could distinctly feel the different levels of most of them. He put the majority of them around third to fourth seat in power, while a smaller minority were around second seat. And then there were the rookie captain class, of which there were about a dozen or so. He also noticed that there seemed to be several large concentrations of Sekirei in all but one of the cardinal directions of the city. But there were two signatures in particular... One was in the center of the city near MBI's headquarters, the other was in the north. Both of those were experienced and easily very powerful captain class Sekirei.
Hoping never to run into those two Ichigo then focused on another important thing he wanted to find out. Namely what level of Sekirei Musubi was.
Focusing on his Sekirei he found that Musubi's Reiryoka curiously fluctuated around the lieutenant to rookie captain level. But that wasn't what really got the Fullbringer's attention. What got his attention was the secondary source of Reiryoka inside of the girls body.
When he questioned her, he wasn't quite ready to hear just exactly what had been done to her.
"So you were captured then experimented on?" Ichigo frowned, like hell that was ever happening again, Sekirei might not be human, but the ghost like whispering of emotions coming through the link that he felt he had with Musubi were human and anything that felt as much compassion and love as she did was human enough in his eyes.
"Yeah, but Yume-sama saved me." Musubi smiled happily. "She gave me her Tama and saved my life. She's really an amazing person."
Ichigo lip twitched up in a small smile as well. He could feel the girls joy even now. He had asked what she knew about Sekirei in general and understood that the Tama was basically the 'soul' for a Sekirei. What Yume did was an extremely noble sacrifice in his eyes and all it meant was that Musubi had another soul inside her, that brought her into an amazing parallel with himself and his inner hollow. Except Musubi's inner Sekirei wasn't trying to swallow her soul and take over her body.
Or was it?
Ichigo shook his head, that would be highly unlikely since Yume had saved Musubi's life to begin with. Also he didn't sense any ill will from the second source of Reiryoka, in fact he felt a similar feeling of love that he felt from Musubi. It was an odd feeling really and he blamed it partially on the way his Reiryoka had reacted in Musubi's body. For some reason when his Reiryoka and her's connected it acted like a reaction accelerator. When he asked her about it she had mentioned that she was already reacting to him a little bit before he had touched her shoulder but then when his energy entered her system it caused her to spike, which resulted in her near instant reaction.
Ichigo didn't know what to think of that really. The pragmatist in him thought to use that as a way to wing more Sekirei quickly and protect as many as he could, but then the honor bound man in him pointed out that method was little more than rape in a sense, forcing the girl to react to him so he could take advantage. It didn't help when Musubi said that winging could be an involuntary process if an Ashikabi forced himself on them.
There were still pressure marks in the wooden table where he had dug his fingers in anger, that someone would actually do such a thing. They were lower than scum in his eyes, to trample upon something as wonderful as this bond. Hell, he had winged Musubi for only a few hours and he already felt better than he had in YEARS. There was no way in hell he was letting some asshole force wing a Sekirei while he had the ability to stop them.
But right now he needed to sleep. He had been up for almost a week using only his Reiryoka induced meditative state that absorbed ambient Reishi. But now with using his Reiryoka in battle and the winging of Musubi, he felt drained enough that one night of meditation wouldn't cut it. He needed to sleep, and damn the dreams if they came.
The only problem...
There was only one futon...
The room may have been big enough for two but the room was most likely a couple's room, so one bed between the both of them... And Musubi didn't have any nightwear, so she had to sleep naked except for a pair of panties... they really needed to go shopping tomorrow...
The first half hour of that had been the most awkward time in his life, just surpassing the first time he had actually checked out Tatsuki naked in the shower when he had hit puberty. They both took showers together back then after they had finished their martial arts practice... Yeah, that was certainly an interesting week before they finally stopped doing that together, never mind that she was flat as a board back then and Musubi had a rack that was gifted by the gods...
Shaking his head, Ichigo stared at the sleeping Musubi on his right. She had snuggled under his arm and was practically fused with his chest. She made small mewling noises as she cuddled his side and it drew a small smirk to the man's lips. It was probably the cutest thing he'd ever seen, even surpassing Orihime's puppy dog eyes that she had used on him occasionally.
Again, the memories of his friends made Ichigo's heart ache but then Musubi snorted in her sleep, shifting a bit to get comfortable, breaking his attention away from the memories and onto the girl in his arms particularly on the girls massive chest pressed into his side. This would have been far more awkward had the link between them not been there and for once he was grateful there was something connected to his soul, feeding him random emotions. At least this one wasn't trying to devour his mind and take over his body, he was also glad he didn't have to deal with a color swapped psychopath Ichigo yelling at him in his head.
Relaxing with the comfortable weight in his arms, Ichigo dozed off into a dreamless slumber. It would be daylight in a few hours but that didn't matter, in the morning he'd soon wake up from the best night of sleep he'd had in almost ten years.
*Flashback end*
Ichigo yawned as he got up from the bed, extracting himself from the sleeping Musubi. Like the last half dozen times before the girl had started pawing at the space where his body had been moments before. At least this time she hadn't had his arm sandwiched between her breasts like the first time he'd woken up with her beside him. That had been an uncomfortable moment for him, and any effort on his part to extricate himself proved fruitless as the girl was just as strong unconscious as she was awake.
Yeah, his reaction to that on the first morning would have been priceless had anyone been watching...
*Flashback, Oh aren't I evil? Muahahaha*
Ichigo's eye's slowly opened, he was staring at an unfamiliar ceiling in an unfamiliar bed. Well, that wasn't as strange for most people since Ichigo was more or less a wanderer. What was really confusing was the odd weight on his right side that...oh.
Memories of yesterday floated back into his consciousness as his mind reasserted itself over his body. As feeling began to return to his limbs a strange softness seemed to be wrapped around his arm that he had never felt before.
Ichigo blinked, then turned his head to see Musubi had moved during the night, and had somehow extricated his arm out from under her to where she could hug the thing, hot dogging his arm between her breasts.
Now Ichigo may have been a virgin, he may also have been a bit of a celibate hero at times, but he was still a man dammit and like all men who had a beautiful woman's breasts around their arm, Ichigo reacted like all men would in that situation.
The Fullbringer cleared his throat, The blush on his cheeks and his tightening underwear tipping off anyone in the room of how arousing that display was... and speaking of underwear.
Knowing from feel that his underwear were on Ichigo lifted his head slightly and sighed in relief. Panties, check. Ok nothing had wandered during the night except for his arm and Musubi's breasts, that was something at least. He really didn't want to start groping her in his sleep, that would have been uncomfortable to try to explain to Musubi seeing as she had no idea what that would even mean. The girl was just too innocent... not to mention she had no modesty to speak of, hell she'd stripped out of her gi last night like it was natural for her to expose herself to the world.
Again he thanked whatever gods above for emotional and spiritual links that made him more comfortable around the woman or awkward would have had a new definition in the dictionary and his ugly mug would have been the picture for it.
Sighing, he got up out of bed, spending a good five minutes extricating himself from the girls death grip. Once he was clear he noticed the girl had a frown on her face in her sleep as she reached for the body that was no longer there. Ichigo was actually flattered that the girl felt so comfortable around him that she would feel the loss of his presence next to her. Seriously, the speed at which Sekirei accepted their Ashikabi was just crazy but the Fullbringer wasn't complaining, it actually felt nice to wake up next to someone in the morning, he'd wanted that for so long that he'd almost given up hope of having a chance to experience it. Little wishes paid off in the long run it seemed, now he just needed to focus on the bigger ones.
But first. He was going to milk that MBI card for all it was worth, a bit of shopping was in order.
*Flashback end*
Yeah, Shopping. Ichigo groaned, his feet were still sore from all the walking he had to go through that day to find things for Musubi and himself, not only that but what had happened at the lingerie store... A blush bloomed on the man's face as a small drop of blood flowed from his nose. Yeah, that had been stimulating.
*Flashback*
"Here we are... the most important stop." Musubi had been given a box of her Sekirei clothing, but no underwear had come with it. Ichigo intended to fix that problem, as he stared through the window of the shop, the lacy nothing that was all but nonexistent on the mannequin out front did little to calm his nerves or reassure him of anything. He had never liked shopping. Like most men, he went in, got what he needed and stayed the hell away from the women's section of the store like his life depended on it. The only men who braved that danger were the married men and the men who were whipped by their girlfriends to go in for them. Which essentially was one in the same.
At least Musubi was next to him, so that gave him plausible deniability in case one of the women started giving him the evil eye. He'd been given that look before in a department store where the women and men's changing rooms were side by side. He'd been trying on clothes and so had she. They'd both walked out of the changing room, one to show their girlfriend who had been with her, one to go pay for his selection. He had his pant's and shirt on, she didn't...
Yeah, women were scary when they wanted to be.
And now he was going to brave the storm and enter the cavern of danger and lacy undergarments, Heaven help him because at this point Soul Society wouldn't.
Taking his first tentative steps in the building got him a couple of dirty looks from the women shoppers, at least until they saw Musubi next to him. Those looks turned to saucy little smirks as the saw another man had been whipped into the proper pecking order. Ichigo just shuddered and lead Musubi to the relatively modest underwear section and grabbed a few things that he thought would fit her.
Several size's up from his choices and a little help from the clerk and he'd found Musubi's proper cup size. Really now, he never knew how much of an art it was in determining a bra size. By the time he'd realized what had happened, the clerk and another of the workers had several tape measures wrapped around Musubi's body and were scratching things down on a tablet. Within minutes they had a pink, silk bra that hugged her breasts like a glove and a pair of pink panties, also silk, that seemed to be an extension of her skin with how form fitting it was.
With the skin tone colored undergarments and how well they fit, it really didn't look like she was wearing anything at all. Which had the undesirable effect of him blushing and having to hide YET ANOTHER boner lest some woman call him on it in front of Musubi. He shuddered to think if they ever brought out the more erotic versions of the clothing. He'd probably bust a blood vessel or something.
Karma must have had it out for him though since not a moment later Musubi came out of the dressing room clad in a skimpy set of lingerie that barely covered anything and even if it did cover something it was entirely see through. Ichigo's eyes widened comically and a hand flew to his nose to pinch off the nose bleed that was beginning to form there. He had seen Musubi naked just earlier in the day and was comfortable with it, but that wasn't nearly as erotic as the black, barely there lacy little number she had on now. After a few heroic seconds of holding back the flow, Ichigo's brain thought it better to just abort all functions than to risk massive blood loss.
He awoke a half hour later to several giggling women and a thoroughly confused Musubi.
Never again...
*Flashback end*
Yeeeaaah... that. Ichigo shook his head to clear it and walked into the bathroom to get dressed in a dark orange T-shirt and blue jeans, he also threw on a gray jacket while he was at it. After he had gone though the morning routine he walked out onto the second floor balcony that lead to the first floor. He was happy to see that there weren't any thugs out there this time. It had been nighttime two days ago that Ichigo had finally had a chance to keep his part of the bargain with the apartment manager.
*Flashback*
Loud crashing alerted the tenants of the apartment complex that someone was again trashing the vending machines outside.
Ichigo groaned slightly, rolling out of Musubi's surprisingly loose grip this time and got up out of bed to see what all the fuss was about.
Opening the door to his apartment Ichigo blearily stared out over the balcony at the building on the other side of the lot. In his sleep induced haze he registered 4 male outlines, roughly sixteen to twenty five, probably that local gang that the manager was talking about. Lifting an arm over his head he stretched the kinks out of his shoulder and back, preparing himself for a fight even if it was a quick one, he wanted to get back to his bed and that warm, sexy lady that slept next to him.
Ichigo walked casually down the stairs and over to the thugs. Now most people would notice a six foot tall orange haired man coming up behind them, but Ichigo had a certain degree of stealth from doing work for less than reputable people, and he put that to use as he put his foot to use. Namely putting his foot in the back of one of the thug's head.
The man went down almost instantly, smashing against the wall across from him. The other three thugs turned quickly to face the man who had just axe kicked their friend.
"Who the hell are you?" One thug growled. This one had a number of piercing's in his face and a tattoo running down the length of his arm, he wore a hoodie and jeans that had several chains hanging from the pockets.
The other two were similarly dressed, so maybe it was something of an organized gang of some sort. If it was their official dress then they probably had a few other members under their name.
Not like Ichigo cared about that. He was tired, and these guys were ruining his sleep. Without another word he appeared in front of the one who had spoken and broke the mans jaw with a single punch. With a cry the man fell back in pain. He would have been unconscious had the pain not overrode that command.
The man crashed to the ground in a puddle of agony, holding his jaw in his hands. The other two thugs blinked and missed their leader getting his face caved in, the orange haired man now between them.
Ichigo leaned forward and brought a foot up and around in a back kick that caught the thug on his left in the face. The power of the kick broke his nose and flattened it against the side of his face. Again he would have been out cold had the searing pain not kept him awake.
Now down to just one, the last thug wasn't looking so sure of himself. Panicking the man pulled a switchblade from his right pocket. With a click the blade sprung out and the man lunged forward to stab Ichigo in the back.
The Fullbringer twisted in place, using his right arm to strike the arm carrying the blade, forcing it out and away from his body. Using his left arm to grab the same arm, Ichigo removed the blade from his hand, then a quick, powerful elbow to the face knocked the man onto his back, his head reeling from the pain. Ichigo just shook his head at the sad sight. They really didn't know how to fight at all, it wasn't even a warm up for him. Hell, Tatsuki could have taken the idiots.
The ex-Shinigami spun on his heel to walk back to his apartment, only stopped on the way back by the manager who looked from Ichigo to the four thugs and back, shook his head a couple times and laughed quietly before walking back into his room.
Ichigo had made it back up to the second floor of his apartment when the leader of the four thugs yelled through his busted jaw that he'd be coming back with his boss and that Ichigo would regret the day he messed with-
His rant was cut off by a flash of steel and a metallic thunk next to his head. The thug gulped and turned slightly to see his friend's switchblade buried up to it's handle in the wall next to him.
Ichigo watched in mild amusement as the four thugs ran off into the night, an arm over each others shoulder.
*Flashback end*
After that ass beating he had spent the next day repairing all the vending machines outside the building. Having a fullbring was actually pretty handy when you could pull on the soul of certain things and fix the damages like it never even happened. It was a trick Ichigo had come up with in his time as a repair man, he had fixed everything from broken watches to car engines and in doing so helped train himself in what he could and could not do with a Fullbring. On of his favorite discoveries had been the Velcro technique. It basically gave him the ability to stick to surfaces in a way that he wouldn't come off easily. Since he didn't have a spiritual body he could no longer easily stand on air or on the side of a building without using his fullbring on it first but even then he could be moved while standing on that surface. Unlike simply pulling on the soul of the air to allow him to stand on it, he literally stuck himself to the surface like Velcro, unmovable unless the force used overcame the Reiryoka he'd used to stick himself there.
Aside from that Ichigo had been surprised when the apartment manager walked out of his room and his jaw nearly dropped to the ground. The man had been so ecstatic that he'd even paid Ichigo for the work. A pleasant surprise in the Fullbringer honest opinion.
"Ashikabi-sama." A sleepy voice spoke up behind him.
Ichigo turned around to see Musubi sleepily rub her eyes, she must have finally realized that he wasn't next to her and had woken up to find him. It was one of those cute puppy moment's that just gave him warm fuzzies in his stomach. She looked absolutely adorable in the thin cream colored nightgown he had bought her to appease the crazy lingerie store workers, it was something tasteful and didn't quite flash everyone in the vicinity a crotch or nipple shot at every available moment, thankfully.
"Good morning Musubi and I've told you before, you can just call me Ichigo." He rubbed her head a little drawing a small pout from the girl.
"But you're my Ashikabi." she huffed, crossing her arms cutely.
Ichigo rolled his eyes. "Alright then, if you want to play that game. As your Ashikabi I order you to address me as Ichigo!"
Musubi snapped to attention, her eyes sparkling "Yes Ichigo-sama!"
Ichigo palmed his face. "You know what, fine" He lowered his hand and grabbed the girl, spinning her around to where she was facing the door. "Let's just get you dressed, you don't need to be walking around outside in nothing but a nightgown. Did you at least remember to wear panties?" He asked dryly.
"Does that have to do with modesty?" She asked curiously, holding a finger to her chin.
Ichigo made a small groaning noise at that. 'She is too innocent for her own good.' He pushed her back into the room to grab a fresh set of clothing. "Yes Musubi, wearing clothing out in public and not taking them off in public is called modesty. And doing the opposite of that is being immodest which isn't very nice, ok?" Ichigo hoped that the girl took his advice this time, this was like the third time he'd told her this in the past week and still the girl would strip at the most inopportune times.
"Mhmm." She murmur, almost completely ignoring him to put on her clothing. She was wearing her Sekirei outfit this time since most of her other clothing was being washed.
"Musubi... you didn't hear a word I said did you?"
"Mhmm." She responded again.
In one ear and out the other, she really needed to pay attention more.
"Musubi, you really should pay more attention to your-" Ichigo words cut off as he felt a large amount of Reiryoka coming from outside the apartment nearby. Running to the door Ichigo threw it open and searched frantically for the source of the energy. "That isn't good."
"HIYAAAAAAA!"
Ichigo's eyes widened as they went skyward to see a young woman with an absolutely massive hammer bearing down on the building.
"That's not good at all." Ichigo muttered, Leaping back into the apartment and grabbing Musubi before the entire roof caved in on top of them.
-ooo-
A small chuckle filled the air as a pair of glasses shined dangerously. The light from the computer screen illuminating a mans face in the dark room he sat in.
"And so it begins." Minaka smiled creepily, his white teeth gleaming much like his glasses. "Show me what you're made of Ichigo Kurosaki, I expect great things from you."
He pressed several button on the computer getting an aerial view of the destruction from one of his satellites.
"I expect great things from you and Musubi both." The mans cackling filled the room yet again as he watched the unfolding battle with interest.
-ooo-
I DUB THIS THE FLASHBACK CHAPTER OF DOOM!
To be clear, I'm not following the canon timeline exactly. Really, only a few days goes by before they go after Kuu in the Botanical Gardens. In this case It's been a week and that still hasn't happened yet, I moved the timeline ahead a few days so I could have more time for Ichigo to be with Musubi, mainly for character development stuff and to pad the chapter a bit, cant constantly have Sekirei battles back to back in the first few episodes...well I could but then the story would go to hell quickly lol.
And seriously, I had more fun writing the shopping scene than should be appropriate. I probably shouldn't have had the Access Denied remix of Guardians at the Gate playing while I wrote it huehuehuehuehue. It just made that scene feel more epic than it should have XD
Other than that I liked the humor I was able to plant in the chapter, since things might be getting a bit gloomy here in the next couple chapters. I'm going to try for a angst/comedy/angst/comedy routine so people don't get too overpowered by either. Next chapter should be pretty interesting.
Till then
Ciao