After Rina healed her arm, they returned to the camp site where the rest of the Spades crew were waiting.

Mihar noticeably relaxed when he saw them emerge unharmed. He did however look pointedly at Ace and ask, "why'd you order us to stay behind?"

Ace hesitated for a moment while he thought but muttered out, "uh, well-"

"The Captain isn't the only one with Devil fruit powers. I don't use them very often—I had a bad experience the first time I did. So I try to forget that I have them but sometimes—well-," Rina stumbled, ensuring that Ace wouldn't have to lie to the crew himself for her benefit, he'd just have to play along.

"Yeah, she's the reason we didn't crash the Piece of Spadille coming into the Grand Line. Also why she was exhausted after we made it through, she doesn't use her abilities much because they're a bit more dangerous than fire. She was scare about using too much of her ability and harming the crew in the process," he added.

Rina glanced back at him and gave a small smile. He just had to play along, not add to it. But she was grateful that he had.

One of the villagers then asked pointedly, "which devil fruit did you eat?"

"The Spirit-Spirit fruit," Rina lied.

"If she isn't careful she could literally destroy the souls of those around her by accident when using her abilities," Ace concluded, hoping that would be enough to satisfy their curiosity.

"How did that save us going up the Grand Line? That doesn't make any sense," Deuce argued.

"By summoning the spirits of those who lost their lives along that water way to move the ship away from the side of the canel," Rina countered. The rest of the Spades seemed to buy that explanation though, so that mini crisis was averted.

After a bit Ace set most of the crew to help the locals with establishing some kind of shelter. Whatever greedy pirates or poachers had been to their village had even burned down their homes. He sent Mihar and Aggie out to hunt down some meat for the dinner. This caused Deuce to bring up that Rina didn't eat meat, which Ace informed him he hadn't forgotten. He planned to go fishing with Rina and look for some kind of fruit or vegetable in the wilderness.

One of the local women offered them a woven basket for whatever they could harvest, which Rina carried. As they headed off to look for a nearby stream to fish while they gathered fruit or vegetables in the wild, Ace broke the silence between them, "I could've handled what you told me better."

"It's not every day a human finds out the end of this life isn't the end of life entirely," she offered.

He chuckled a bit as he agreed, "true enough, I guess."

Finding a good spot to sit and fish for a while they set the woven basket down, bating their fishing lines and then casting them into the stream. As they waited for a bite to catch Ace prompted her, "So tell me about where you're from?"

"Huh? That's a bit of a cheat, don't you think? Most people have no idea what's in store for them," Rina answered.

"Yeah, true. But not everyone knows someone whose been on that side of things," he argued. Rina gave a bit of a sigh, explaining that she wasn't supposed to tell humans anything about what the after life would be like.

Ace could understand that, but he still wanted to talk to pass the time. He then tried a different approach, "Well, what was your childhood like then?"

She was silent for a moment before admitting, "rough. One thing I guess I could tell you is not everyone there lives the same. The center of soul society—what some humans call 'heaven', it's the nicer part. The Seiretei."

She went on to describe the seiretei as being the upscale area, very low crime, everyone has a home, clothes, enough food. Living conditions got increasingly worse the further to the outskirts you go. She and Yoshiya were born in a place called Inuzuri, their mother had been young when they were born. She had friends who helped her care for her twins. As long as their mom could eat, she could feed them too. It wasn't easy—but they managed somehow. The nights were always cold. They'd have the heat of a campfire, but it wasn't always enough. They'd huddle together for added warmth. That was until her friend managed to get a house and invited the three of them to live with her. That's when they met the man they ended up calling Uncle. To be more specific, he wasUncle Byakuya, and the friend who became Byakuya's wife had always been Aunt Hisana. He was also the one who had routinely gifted her expensive bracelets ever since she turned 150, every year like clockwork for her birthday.

"Geez, and I thought I had it rough getting raised by a gang of Bandits," he joked, though he wondered to himself just how much money this 'uncle' must have to be able to afford gifting her expensive jewelery for her birthday for almost thirty years. Rina gave a small giggle before suggesting, "life is kinda like a deck of cards. You don't have to like the hand you're first dealt. You just have to play that hand the best you can until you get better cards."

"That's one way to look at it," he agreed.

"So where do your brothers come into this picture? And your Dad? You did say before that he wasn't around when you were born," the raven haired man pressed.

"You're right, I did say that. And he wasn't. Before I was born there was something that has since been dubbed 'The Rukongai Experiments', basically they were illegal experiments that were causing unexplained disappearances of Rukongai citizens. My Dad had been promoted to 12th Squad Captain just ten years prior to those incidents. He had used his love of science and technology to create the Shinigami Research and Development Institute, which is really just a fancy way of saying he turned squad 12 into a squad for science nerds," she began and went on to explain the circumstances of her father's exile, with her mother not having a chance to tell him that she was with child. Seven months later, Yoshiya was born and she had been a surprise a few minutes later.

At the start it was mainly her mother and Hisana, a seamstress, who had cared for them. But Hisana had a chance encounter with a shinigami apprentice who turned out to be Byakuya Kuchiki. Their lives began improving after that. Byakuya went against his clans rules and moved the four of them into his mansion after he married Hisana. Her mother attended the academy and upon graduation was given the rank of third seat, within a few years Byakuya requested she be the Elite Lieutenant for the sixth squad. Normally the sixth is a stickler for rules and there's one Lieutenant per squad, however, he made the argument that there's also elite fighters within the Sixth squad, which is what her mother would mainly command. The Elite combatants of the sixth aren't commonly known, and they essentially make up the Kuchiki family's personal guard.

Hisana had passed away nearly ninety years ago but the younger sister that she had abandoned was adopted into the Kuchiki clan, and raised by Byakuya. She was now the 13th squad Captain, married, and had a daughter of her own.

Along the way, her mother would come across children who were horribly neglected, injured, they'd sometimes sometimes sick or on the verge of starving to death. Four of the children like that were the ones she took in as her sons and raised with as much love, patience, and attentiveness as she gave to herself and Yoshiya. Then when she was 130, her father's exile had been lifted, and he crossed paths with her mother again. That's when he learned about his kids and was shocked at first, but also angry that he'd missed so much because of his exile.

After that, she looked to him and asked, "So, do you wanna tell me about your childhood now? Or is this a one sided thing?"

Ace laughed, admitting it would only be fair. So he began recounting his childhood adventures with Sabo and Luffy.