Ichigo paused on his way to the library when he heard his cell start to play Nickelback's If Everyone Cared.
There was only one name with that ringtone assigned to it.
"What's up?" asked Ichigo.
"Nanoha and Fate need back up. The current case we're on has some powerful guardians, and your book is the closest we have to counter them!" said Amy.
"Beam me up," said Ichigo. He had found that mages used teleport spells, so he would have some time to call his dad and tell him he would be late tonight.
Ichigo caught the hand of the masked figure that had caused so much trouble.
"Aren't you a little old to be sticking your hand in a ten year old's chest?" asked Ichigo a little too calmly.
After talking to Fate and Nanoha, he decided to treat them the same way he treated his little sisters. They were a little younger than Yuzu and Karin, but his overprotective brother instincts didn't care.
"Let go!" hissed the stranger.
"Like hell!" said Ichigo, kicking the man hard. The man threw a card, which Ichigo tried to dodge. It hit him and he felt bindings on him.
Ichigo struggled...and suddenly he felt his natural power skyrocket as it shattered the bindings.
"Impossible! A newly awakened mage couldn't break those binds! Unless..."
"Unless he had SS-rank in sheer power inside of him," Ichigo finished.
The initial scans of his Linker core had yielded over 8,000 units in magical power (twice the amount Nanoha had when she initially started out) but in overall power it was well over 30,000. Ichigo couldn't access half of it because he still had bindings on him, but if he ever broke through those he would be a literal powerhouse.
And that was before he activated his Intelligent Device. As a result, Ichigo had termed his barrier jacket 'God Mode'. Considering how strong he was with his book fully activated, the term had stuck.
Ichigo didn't hold any punches, since this jerk had hurt someone he considered like a little sister. The reddish pink haired woman (the same one who nearly spotted him that night his book first awakened) went to Fate, holding her from the ground. She didn't look happy about how things went either. She may have absorbed the linker core, but she wanted to do it after a fair fight.
And to be honest that ticked Ichigo off something fierce.
It was soon clear that Ichigo was beating the intruder, badly. Without warning, the man teleported. Signum (Ichigo had asked her name) gave Fate to Ichigo, and she looked upset about how things turned out. Ichigo touched her arm, and she paused.
"Why are you gathering the linker cores?"
Sensing she could at least tell him (considering she had spotted a similar book to the one she carried) she looked him in the eye and said "We're doing it to save our Master."
She left before he could ask more.
"This is very worrying," said Chrono.
"How so?"
"It's very possible from what we do know that their Master might have no idea what they are doing. There has never been an instance of where the Guardians have acted on their own without their Master knowing what they were doing. And they are acting out of character for them. In past cases they drained the linker core damaging it permanently."
"Is it possible the book is broken like Gesshoku was before I came to you? That it is actually hurting it's master?" asked Ichigo.
"If it had been with the master shortly after birth, it is highly likely. But that would make the Master barely Nanoha's age!" said Chrono.
"So?"
"What is with this planet?" muttered Chrono.
Ichigo left, and waited until his day off to go to Uminari city. He claimed to be turning in a book he borrowed from the library. His family didn't question it, but his father had an odd look in his eyes.
It didn't take long to figure out who the Master was. All it took was the general effects of a binding caused by a Lost Logia encroaching on it's master, and Ichigo found the girl. It was someone Nanoha had heard of, but had yet to met personally. Ichigo went with Nanoha and Fate to meet Hayate alone, and since Hayate had mentioned it to her guardians (who were definitely avoiding the hospital if Fate or Nanoha were going to be there) they got to meet her in private.
"Hello Hayate-chan. My name's Ichigo and I'm Nanoha's cousin."
"Hello again, Ichigo-san..." giggled Hayate. It was funny that Nanoha had a male cousin whose name meant strawberry.
"Hayate, how would you like to walk again?"
Seeing her surprised look, Ichigo explained.
"I think your book has some defective programming. If you trust us, we can get it fixed and it might help you. It will take some time, but you would be able to walk without aid. There's also a chance the guardian program is broken too," said Ichigo.
Her eyes widened.
"How do you know about them?" she asked.
Ichigo brought out his book.
"Because my book was damaged too, and they fixed it for me. According to Chrono, our books were part of a pair."
"Will it hurt Vita or the others?"
"As far as we know, it shouldn't hurt them," said Fate. Ichigo had asked the same thing.
Hayate came to a decision.
"I'll have them bring it next time they come to see me," she said.
The Guardian Knights were understandably nervous. They had been completing the book without Hayate's permission, and now they were handing it over to Amy. Ichigo had convinced them to let them at least check the book for broken programs in exchange for holding his own hostage. Vita swore she would burn his book if they tried to take it away from Hayate.
Hayate herself was being checked over to see if there was any way to help reverse the damage already done. Shamal and Zafira had chosen to go with her.
"It looks like we caught it in time," said Amy.
"Caught what in time?" asked Signum.
"According to this, there are four broken programs and a virus in the Tome of the Night Sky. One of which is the reincarnation program which caused all that trouble over the years. It looks like the virus was unintentionally installed into that program, which caused it to go out of control. The defense program was also set to take over the Master should the book ever be completely, and the chances of the Master being able to stop it are 13%. If you had continued to add pages without fixing these two programs, the painful cycle would have been continued again."
"What were the other two broken programs?"
"The synchronization with the Master...and the Guardian Knight program. According to this, the memory was damaged pretty badly, but it can still be fixed."
"You mean Hayate wouldn't have had to go through all this pain if they had been fixed?" demanded Vita.
"We have the ability to fix or replace the broken programs, but that reincarnation one has to go. It's the biggest problem with the book," said Amy.
~Signum, Vita? It looks like Hayate will be fine. They found the bindings that were encroaching on her body and removed them.~
"Good news?" asked Ichigo.
"Shamal said that the bindings that were hurting our master were removed," replied Signum.
"Well that's always good, right?"
"It would seem we are in your debt, Kurosaki," said Signum.
A week after the Tome of the Night Sky was fixed and renamed, Ichigo helped Signum and the others set up a trap for the two who had made things needlessly complicated.
It turned out to be a pair of familiars, who hadn't been informed that the book was no longer broken. Their master turned out to be an Admiral in the TSAB, who retired after learning the cursed history of the Book of Darkness would now never be repeated again.
Of course Ichigo has his own problems to deal with at home...
"Alright son, what exactly have you gotten yourself into?" asked Isshin. He had felt the bindings on Ichigo weaken more than they should, and he knew something had to be up.
Fortunately Ichigo had Lindy on speed dial.
After a few explanations, Isshin revealed he was a former Soul Reaper captain, though he had given it up to help an old friend of his. Karin and Yuzu looked excited that Ichigo could use real magic, particularly Karin.
Lindy had smiled and mentioned that if Ichigo had that much magic, it was possible the girls did too, which made Karin's day. Finding out that the barrier jackets were made according to whatever the user thought up, Karin started to watch more magical girl anime for inspiration.
And with that, the chapter closed on Ichigo's first magical adventure, but another one would soon open, and it would drag him into a much more dangerous world...
Ichigo beat up the punks who had knocked over the funerary offering to the dead girl who died recently. He had seen them knock it over while he was walking home from sword practice with Signum. Upon learning that he wanted to learn more about swords, she had offered to teach him. As a result, Ichigo was learning how to summon up a sword and amplify it using the Belkan style magic. Apparently he was more of a close up and personal fighter compared to the long range Midchildan style Nanoha originally used.
When he made his way home, he ducked under his dad's attack. He had been ten minutes late, and he hadn't bothered to call ahead.
As a result, he had to deal with his idiot father.
"Dad would you knock it off already? I've got headache as it is!" snapped Ichigo.
"Speaking of headaches, you got a new one," said Karin calmly.
Ichigo's head snapped to his right, and sure enough another spirit had attached itself to him. He gathered some spirit energy in his palm, and slammed it on the guy's head. He had found a way to make spirits forcibly pass on by using his spirit energy directly.
It was something Isshin's friend Urahara had found by accident while experimenting with Ichigo's new magical powers.
The guy faded into the floor, before turning into a black butterfly. Ichigo didn't know where the souls went when he did that, but he could care less as long as they went away.
He went to sleep with a monster headache, and awoke extremely crabby. He had been feeling off for weeks now, and it was only getting worse.
Ichigo felt a new spirit attach itself to him, but he was feeling so bad he didn't bother to exorcise it. He ran into the girl on his way to place fresh flowers in the vase...and she was running from what Lindy had called a hollow. At least it fit the description she had given, and his father had confirmed it.
"Keep running!" he hissed. She made no motion that she heard him.
Without warning, the hollow screamed in pain, and Ichigo turned to see a girl in a samurai outfit slashing it in half with her sword. She fit the standard description of a soul reaper.
She glanced at him, before vanishing.
Ichigo was laying in his bed, trying not to think. His head was absolutely murdering him. He only half noticed the black butterfly come into his room, but he sat up when the girl followed it.
He didn't know what a soul reaper was doing in his room, but he sure as hell wanted her gone, now.
He kicked her in the arse, and she looked at him incredulous. She never expected him to be able to see her, let alone touch her as if she was wearing a gigai!
One short explanation by Rukia with crappy drawings later...
"Alright, let's say I believe you. That still doesn't explain what the hell you were doing breaking and entering my room," said Ichigo, eyebrows twitching. Her drawing was worse than a five year old.
"I told you, I was tracking a hollow and lost the signal in this general area. The block seemed to be strongest in this room, so I came in to find out what it was," she said impatiently.
"Well I don't know what to tell you. We don't have any equipment that could interfere with your soul pager or whatever it was called," said Ichigo annoyed.
"It can't be blocked by living means, you idiot. Something in this house is doing it."
Ichigo suspected it was his book, but somehow he had the feeling someone would have shown up months ago if that was the case. Suddenly he heard a low howl...
A hollow was coming close to his house again. They usually left after the barrier his father installed kicked in (courtesy of Urahara, who had found the concept fascinating enough to do it for free just to see if he could) but for some odd reason it kept getting louder.
"Hey Soul reaper, get your ass in gear! That damn hollow you were looking for is coming for us!" snapped Ichigo.
"My name isn't soul reaper, you peon!" she snarled back.
"I don't care, but that damn hollow you were after is heading straight for us! Or are you deaf as well as a crappy artist?"
Annoyed by the accusation, she used a low level binding kido to get back at him...but when she left the room she nearly felt her breath crushed out of her. This amount of spiritual pressure was absurd!
Ichigo squirmed, and when he heard the crash downstairs he cursed. Calling on his magic, he broke the spell with some difficulty. He grabbed his book and stashed it into his back pocket (he had learned it could shift it's form to become the size of a wallet by accident) he ran downstairs.
His father was bleeding heavily, and Yuzu was trying to make her way upstairs to get him. She had a nasty gash on her head, but she was uninjured aside from that. Karin, on the other hand...
Ichigo snarled when he saw his little sister being held by the hollow, fully intent on devouring her. Rukia was staring at the chaos...or the barrier, which was sputtering in and out at the moment...he couldn't tell which.
Ichigo ran outside, eager to kill the hollow before Karin got eaten. She jumped in when Ichigo got thrown into a telephone pole. Ichigo was dazed, but he still got up. He glared at the soul reaper, who had neglected to do her job right the first time around.
He flexed his right hand...and winced as his headache got even worse. He didn't know what was causing it, but he wanted it gone now.
"Oi, ugly! If you want someone to eat, come and get me!" yelled Ichigo.
She stared at him, thinking he was trying to spare his sister's life like an idiot. She went to stop him...and got injured in the process. Ichigo looked at her with disbelief.
"Are you insane? I had that completely under control when you jumped in!" he said annoyed.
"You idiot, what did you think would happen? It would eat you and go away? One soul won't fill a hollow for long, no matter how powerful it is!" she glared at him.
"I know that you pint sized twit! I was going to attack it with my spiritual powers when you got in the way and I had to stop my attack!" snapped Ichigo.
"What?"
The hollow went to attack them while they talked, and Ichigo gathered his spiritual pressure in his hand. It shot out like a bullet, putting a decent sized hole inside the hollow's arm.
She coughed up some blood.
"An attack like that...won't keep it hurt for long," she coughed.
"Well what else can I do, oh wise one?" he asked sarcastically. To be honest, he had yet to test his device on a hollow.
"You can become...a soul reaper."
Ichigo stared at her blankly.
"Take my sword...and pierce it through...the center of your being. It will either...turn you into a soul reaper...or it will destroy you. Either way...we don't have...much time..." she coughed. She had taken more damage than she thought.
"...Fine."
Ichigo centered her sword right over where his linker core was, not that she knew that.
"Try not to die, soul reaper."
"My name isn't soul reaper...it's Rukia. Rukia Kuchiki."
"My name is Ichigo. Ichigo Kurosaki."
The blast of energy let loose was felt all the way in Uminari. Nanoha and Hayate looked up in surprise.
"Looks like Ichigo finally broke those bindings his dad put on his power," mumbled Nanoha. Hayate, who was spending the night, nodded in agreement.
"Wonder what caused it though? I thought the doctors said it would dissolve on it's own when he turned sixteen?" asked Hayate.
"Something must have happened," said Nanoha.
"How can this be? I only meant to give him half...and he took almost all of it!" said Rukia in shock.
Ichigo stood there calmly wearing a soul reaper's shihakusho...and a giant sword. He took the hilt with both hands confidently...and completely destroyed the hollow with expert ease.
Before he passed out from the overload, he noted with some interest that the headache was finally gone...