Sorry for the wait! But I'm sure you all know how hectic life can be without really trying. I would just like to say thank you to those who reviewed the first chapter! Actually it was more of a teaser than an actual chapter to be honest. I'd like to address a question that was actually brought up in one of the reviews.
mr I hate znt nobles kill em: Its my understanding that Asauchi were invented by a member of the Zero Division, Oetsu Nimaiya. He was promoted to the Royal Guard because this innovation, as it let even those with the barest amount of shinigami powers capable of obtaining a full-fledged Zanpakuto, given enough time for the shinigami's power to 'imprint' upon it so to speak. When a shinigami unlocks their Shikai the sword itself fundamentally changes, hence why all their swords are slightly different from each other afterwards. However Shinigami before this invention, of sufficient power, still had swords and its stated how sword size can correspond to spiritual strength, when they aren't trying to compress it to manageable size. With this in mind it stands to reason that, after the first release is obtained that the sword becomes essentially comprised of the wielders spiritual energy and the original Asauchi ceases to be an Asauchi anymore. At least that's how I see it. Hope this was helpful!
Also I'm sure you noticed but I changed the name of the story! It was never meant to be a permanent title. More of a blatant hint for all of you to get an idea of where I wanted to go with this story. May change it again if I come up with a better one, if anyone has any ideas I'll be happy to hear them!
Disclaimer: I do not own or profit from anything Warcraft or Bleach related!
'How long have I been down here?'
That has been the singular thought passing through Ichigo's head for some time now, lying on his back, staring up out of the Shattered Shaft that has been mocking him for close to three days. At least… he thinks it's been at least three days. It's kind of hard to tell how much time passes when your only scenery are the steep walls of a dirt pit with a perpetually daylight sky above it.
Ichigo stared down at his chest to look at the only gauge of time he has, a chain sticking out of his chest with the links slowly eating away at each other. There were only a handful of links left at this point, while at the start he had had over several feet to work with.
'Either way it doesn't matter. If I don't awaken my Shinigami powers now I never will!'
Looking up towards the top of the shaft Ichigo yells one last time at the one who put him in this position. "Damn it Hat and Clogs! Give me a hint will you! You can't just expect me to magically figure out how to get my powers on my own!"
A face peeked over the edge of the pit. It was a pleasantly smiling man with shoulder length blonde hair and his eyes shadowed by a green and white striped hat. He was currently fanning himself with a paper fan acting as if he didn't have a care in the world. As if he wasn't the entire cause of Ichigo's current predicament.
"Maa Maa Ichigo-kun I can't just tell you what to do. Where would the fun be in that?" Ichigo's annoyance at the man increased even more at this point, much to the man's apparent pleasure.
"Fun! What do you mean fun?! I could become a Hollow you bastard!"
The man, known as Urahara Kisuke, suddenly closed his fan, narrowed his eyes and settled a stern gaze on the orange haired teen, his demeanor now a complete one-eighty from how he was before. With a grave voice he spoke, "If you become a Hollow it would be because you lacked the resolve to grasp your own power. The strength of a Shinigami is inside you Ichigo, they are a part of your soul. You just need to look inward and grasp it."
As quickly as it appeared, the serious demeanor left Urahara and the smiling face was back in place, as if the moment was all just an imagination.
"That's all the help you're getting Ichigo! Good luck, and remember if you fail when you turn into a hollow we'll have to purify you!" All this was said with the same pleasant voice and smiling façade, as if he was saying something incredibly funny.
Ichigo groused quietly to himself, "Dammit Hat and Clogs, you could've said something before, and with more information than that!"
Regardless of his irritation at the blonde standing on the ledge Ichigo nevertheless considered the advice he had been given. 'The power is inside my soul huh? It's a lot more obvious now that he's said it. Maybe meditation will work?'
With that Ichigo closed his eyes and tried to turn his concentration inwards. He put aside his growing worry at the shortness of the chain, the slight pain constantly emanating from his chest, and his irritation at the one who put him in this predicament. Slowly he calmed and started descending into his inner world.
When Kisuke saw that Ichigo closed his eyes and started to relax he let out a slight sigh of relief. 'Good, he isn't too stubborn to not take my advice. We are cutting it close but unfortunately he needs to be close to hollowfication for this plan to work.'
With this in mind he turned to Tessai, a tall muscular dark skinned man with a large mustache and hair put into cornrows, and gave out an order, "He seems to be in his inner world now; we need to cast the spell now, before he has a chance to obtain his Zanpakuto." Tessai just silently nodded, understanding the urgency in the order, and jumped into the shaft to do as he was told.
As he saw the man do as he was told Kisuke just rubbed the bridge of his nose, closing his eyes, and letting out a tired sigh, the only indication of the weariness and stress he felt for the upcoming procedure. This was a key point in his plans involving Ichigo, and nothing could go wrong, otherwise everything will have been for nothing.
He had originally planned on turning Ichigo into a Visored, a Shinigami with the powers of a Hollow as well, and had been set on making it happen. However while he was looking through his old notes on the process in order to prepare he had stumbled upon an old paper he had wrote, one that he had originally been attempting which had then led to his discovery of the process creating Visored.
Urahara had been attempted to increase the quality of the spirits which Shinigami would call their Zanpakuto, in order to increase the effectiveness of Shinigami overall. Over the course of his research he had discovered that had been correct in his assumptions that Zanpakuto spirits did not originate from the soul of their wielder, but instead migrated from some other plane of existence to merge with the Shinigami's soul, with their reiatsu acting as beacon. It had been during Urahara's attempts at drawing out a spirit from this place that he had instead obtained material that eventually became the Hogyoku. From there he had abandoned the research and instead concentrated on this new and terrifying creation of his.
Looking back over his old work, so near completion, Kisuke decided that this option would be the better choice in the end. Without an inner Hollow to contend with there would be no threat of Ichigo losing control and he could instead concentrate all his time of mastering his Shinigami powers to their fullest extent. In addition it would eliminate the possible apprehension and mistrust that would be sure to form between the Gotei 13 and Ichigo should they learn of his Visored status. All of this while still offering him a similar, possibly greater, amount of strength, at least if the plan works out as it should.
The only thing problem was that this was not a natural process, as with how a Shinigami usually obtains its partner spirit. In order to bind the new spirit to Ichigo he had to, for all intents and purposes, break his spirit open, via the hollowfication. When the new Zanpakuto spirit merges with Ichigo's soul it will end the process with no detrimental effects, it was just that if Ichigo failed to unlock his Shinigami powers that problems would arise.
All this ran through Urahara's head as he stared down at Ichigo's motionless body, chains slowly eating away at each other and Tessai sitting cross legged, hands stretched over him and chanting. A single thought entered Kisuke's mind as he took in the entire scene, 'Everything rides on this Ichigo, don't fail now.'
Ichigo opened his eyes and found himself in a place very different from the ditch that he had been stuck in for the last few days. Where before he was lying on hard rock he was now lying on cool glass and the perpetual daylight was instead replaced with cloudy overcast skies. The strangest thing though was that now instead of the barren wasteland he was in before was replaced by a skyscraper filled city, a city that was turned on its side.
"What the hell?!" was the only thing that escaped Ichigo's mouth as he stared at the new scenery. It definitely one of the strangest things he had seen in the time since he became a Shinigami. It wasn't even the fact that the world was tilted on its side. Sure it was disconcerting at first, but the fact that he was safe on the side of a skyscraper and not in immediate danger of falling he quickly pushed that concern to the side. What was strange in his mind was how eerily quiet this new place was. There was no hustle and bustle that one would normally associate with a large city such as this. There wasn't even any wing blowing. Just dead silence, as if he was the only thing with life in this whole place, an urban wasteland.
"So, you've finally come… Ichigo,"came a resounding low, calm baritone voice, breaking the quietness surrounding the orange haired teen like shattering glass, causing Ichigo to immediately whip his head to the source right behind him.
There, standing on the tip of a flagpole, was a man who definitely wasn't there before. He appeared to be the same height as Ichigo, though it was hard to tell because of distance and the fact that he was standing on the pole. He had long brunette hair that seemed to be blowing in a wind that seemed to only be felt by him. He had a small amount of stubble in the form of a goatee and was wearing a long black cloak that was similarly swaying in some unknown breeze. He was also wearing a pair of sharp sunglasses that were purely the lenses which flashed in the light. Behind these glasses were a set of hard and steady eyes that were looking at the teen with unwavering intensity.
Just staring at the strange man inhabiting this abandoned city, Ichigo was almost too shocked to really respond appropriately. Instead all he could think to say was the one resounding question in his mind, "Who the hell are you?"
If the man was perturbed by the address, he certainly didn't show it. Instead he responded, almost as if thinking out loud, "Hmm, so you do not know who I am? I wonder if you are ready to hear my name, I am…"
Ichigo strained to hear the last bit of what the man had said, instead it sounded like a low buzzing filling his ears at the exact time that the man stated his name.
"What was that old man? I couldn't hear you."
The man just sighed in disappointment, obviously annoyed that the teen was not able to hear him.
"I guess it is to be expected that you would not be ready to hear my name. If you do not even know what I am how could you be ready to know who I am."
This just confused the orange haired you even more. "What do you mean what you are? For that matter what is this place? How did I get here? I was just in a pit trying to regain my powers and when I tried meditating I wound up here. And why is everything on its side?" Questions that had been on Ichigo's mind since he woke up in this strange place just pouring from his mouth, now that he had possible answers in view.
The man just grunted and jumped from the flagpole he had been standing on and slowly started walking towards the young man. He stopped a few feet from him turned his head to the side to stare are the sideways sky.
In the same slow steady tone as before, Ichigo was beginning to suspect that he only had one type of tone, the man just stated, "It has gotten cloudier recently, it always gets cloudy when you are scared or unsure Ichigo, and when you are sad it starts to rain. I hate the rain, I long for the days when I can feel the sun shining."
Once again the man brushed aside Ichigo's questions and responded in the same cryptic manner as before.
"Don't just ignore my questions you bastard! Answer me! How do you even know my name in the first place? I've never seen you before in my life!" Ichigo could feel an aggravating tick mark forming. He had never met someone who riled him up so much in his life. As if the sky was responding to his aggravation, the cloud cover seemed to thicken just a little bit more and a slight rumble of thunder could be heard in the distance.
The man finally turned to look at the Kurosaki after the thunder was heard, the full piercing weight of his gaze upon him. It looked like the man actually was just slightly taller than him, though at that moment, underneath that stare, the man seemed to be towering over him.
"This place is you Ichigo. Everything you are, everything you feel, and everything you hide from the world. It is your soul and I am embodiment of what you hope to be and hope to gain. This is your inner world and I am the spirit of the Zanpakuto that you so desperately seek."
Ichigo was floored. He had actually managed to make it to his inner world and find his Zanpakuto! He almost felt like an idiot for not realizing it sooner, though to be fair he has been slowly dying over the last few days with no food or water provided so he was not exactly in the best state of mind. Also no one had ever told him that him that his sword had a spirit. That would've certainly been useful information to have earlier!
Excitedly Ichigo exclaimed, "This is great! Let me get back my powers then! I didn't have much of my Chain of Fate left before I came here."
Again the man, the spirit of his powers, just sighed; though this time he rested his face in one of his hands, as if Ichigo had just said something profoundly stupid. At that response Ichigo could feel the aggravation at the spirit returning. He really didn't like how the spirit was treating him like an idiot.
Again, the piercing gaze settled on the youth, this time in aggravation at the teen's apparent incomprehension. "I cannot give you what was never yours to begin with. Before your powers were borrowed. And I cannot give you what you seek now. You must find it for yourself, for you to be worthy to wield it."
Ichigo narrowed his eyes, "That's bullshit! How am I supposed to do that?! This place is huge! I don't have that much time; I'm kind of in the middle of turning into a hollow in the real world!"
Before the man could respond the whole world shook, as if an earthquake had suddenly struck and the sound of shattering glass could be heard echoing throughout the abandoned buildings.
Throughout all this the Zanpakuto spirit remained completely unbothered, staring at the scenery as if one was watching the rain fall. Not even looking the teen he simply stated, "It appears that you don't have time left. Heed my advice Ichigo. Abandon your fear. Look forward. Move forward and never stop. You'll age if you pull back. You'll die if you hesitate. Find your power, it will be in one of the boxes around you."
Before Ichigo could ask what that meant, the world suddenly righted itself and he felt everything move in slow motion around him as he started falling and all the skyscrapers that made up his inner world started turning into millions of tiny, identical boxes.
Back in the real world Urahara began to feel true worry that this may not have been the best course of action after all. Ichigo had been in his Inner World for several minutes already and Tessai was still in the process of casting the spell. It was near completion but it appeared that they may not finish in time, as Ichigo was already beginning the process of turning into a hollow. The white bone armor starting to rapidly encase his extremities and migrating towards his face.
It was too late to change plans now or halt anything. The spell would fix any damage done by the partial hollowfication but until it was done and Ichigo had reclaimed his powers he could not relax. All he could do was repeat the same mantra in his head that he had been thinking since ichigo first began.
'Don't fail."
He felt like he felt like he had been falling for several minutes now, the boxes increasing in number and falling with him. All the while the ground continued to get closer and closer. He knew that if he hit the ground it would all over.
Ichigo was getting increasingly scared as he struggled on how he could possibly find the one box in the millions falling with him that would contain his powers.
'Come on think. Think!' The teen was sweating, whipping his head back and forth trying to see if there was anything that could help him.
'There's got to be some difference between the box I need and all the others!' And with that thought it was as if a lightning bolt had struck.
'There is a difference!' Was the only thing in his head right now, as he recalled something Ishida had told him. A shinigami's spirit ribbon was red!
With this in mind Ichigo closed his eyes and desperately expanded his awareness, willing the ribbons, keys to his survival, to appear. He only had a scant couple of seconds left before he finished falling.
In his mind's eye there were an uncountable number of white ribbons, each corresponding to one of the boxes, and he frantically searched for the lone red ribbon hidden somewhere within the mass.
Then it finally appeared, a brief flash of red, and with a loud cry of elation Ichigo quickly grabbed at it. As he felt the ribbon in his hand Ichigo opened his eyes and pulled and as he did so a lone box pulled towards Ichigo and its lid fell away to reveal the hilt of his old sword!
In excitement Ichigo went to grab the hilt. He wasn't going to die! He was going to become a Shinigami again!
Right before his hands could grasp the handle everything froze in place. Whereas before everything was falling they instead hovered in place, even Ichigo's hand, about to close around the handle of the sword, stopped moving. Time itself seemed to stop moving, though Ichigo was unable to register as he too was on pause.
In this unnatural stillness, a cold wind blew through the area.
Kisuke was waiting on baited breath, his hand gripping his cane so tightly his knuckles were turning white. The last few syllables of the spell were about to be uttered, if this failed then everything would have been for nothing.
Just then Tessai finished his chanting. The last words of the spell leaving a booming echo in its wake. And then a sound akin to tearing of fabric resounded throughout the area, followed by a cold artic wind.
The Twisting Nether is a very strange place full of contradictions. It connects all worlds that span the Greater Dark. It is both everywhere and nowhere at the same time, containing everything that can exist and nothing at all. It is where those with nowhere in the Greater Dark to call home reside, and the spirits of the damned imprisoned.
It is in this place that the soul of one of the strongest beings to ever grace creation resided. A being that was so powerful, and evil, that it almost brought an entire world to its knees resided. Its insatiable urge to conquer and dominate caused its downfall millennia ago, and its imprisonment in this harsh realm had not dulled its desires in the slightest.
Time had no meaning to this being, it was eternal. Its banishment to this plane was merely a hiatus for one day it knew it would be free once again, to revel in its dark urges and do as it was originally created to do.
As it slumbered, waiting, it felt a pull akin to a sharp tug of its very being, calling it to a new realm incessantly.
And so it moved.
Back in the in the training ground Kisuke and Tessai began to shiver and shake as the cold wind brought with it a dark aura, oppressive in its strength. It rushed down the pit and then disappeared without a trace. It happened so quickly that they both believed that they had imagined the whole thing. The results however were plain to see.
Whereas before bone armor almost completely encased Ichigo up to his neck, it began to quickly recede and disappear as if it had never been. His struggling against the bonds that held him ceased and he was calm and peaceful, almost as if he were sleeping.
Urahara let out a breath he did not even realize he was holding. The plan had worked. They had managed to summon a new spirit to be Ichigo's zanpakuto, and from the looks of it, it seemed to be an exceedingly powerful one at that.
So why then did he feel uneasy about that?
In Ichigo's inner world the hilt of his sword flashed with a dark light and the spirit ribbon connected to it turned blue. Time sped up and his hands grasped the blade. He would never notice the change that happened to either in that instant of time. However as he pulled the remains of the zanpakuto from the box everything ceased to fall and Ichigo felt a great power rush through him.
He began to fade away from the world of his soul, his last view was of the boxes reforming back into the scenery of the place. However instead the skyscrapers that had once been, they instead became towering snow covered mountains and in the very center, atop the tallest peak, stood a citadel of dark metal.
Authors Note: Well there you have it! A real bonafide chapter for all of you to get more of a feeling for how this story is going to play out. I welcome any critiques or thoughts any of you might have! And if anyone has any questions, outside of what's going to happen next of course, I'll be happy to try and answer them during the next update! I can't guarantee consistency in the timings of the update, but I'll try to get them out as soon as I am able!
Also sorry for any spelling or grammatical mistakes in the chapter. I don't have a beta and I posted this literally as soon as I finished it. If you want point out a mistake and I'll go in and fix it ASAP!
See you next time,
Feara