Ever since Isuzu transferred to the Thirteenth Division, Jun had found their life together more harmonious.
Their schedules were now much the same. Back when Isuzu was still in the Twelfth Division, whenever a tough research assignment came up, that bastard Kisuke Urahara simply wouldn't let anyone leave. No wonder most of the Twelfth Division cursed him.
In fact, Kisuke Urahara didn't like that batch of Twelfth Division members either. He thought they lacked motivation and talent for research. Research really did demand talent, so Urahara later recruited a large number of annoying people from a place he knew well into the Twelfth Division.
That place was the Maggot's Nest prison, where Isuzu had nearly been thrown. It was the Second Division's special prison and a top secret. Ordinary people couldn't get thrown in at all, and getting in was second in difficulty only to the First Division's secret prison, Muken, which was where Aizen was thrown.
Urahara's original post in the Second Division had been as a guard at the Maggot's Nest, so it really was the place he knew best.
Without those disruptions, Jun and Isuzu's daily routines were much the same. Jun also enjoyed going on patrol more, because Isuzu had patrol duties too. Unlike the Tenth Division, the Thirteenth Division had fixed patrol districts, and its members could return to the division once they finished. But after Isuzu finished her patrol, she could go for a stroll with Jun, and no one could easily stop them.
Everyone knew how Isuzu had ended up assigned to the Thirteenth Division, and most people had plenty to say about Jun and Isuzu being punished, especially Kensei Muguruma! Jun had saved the entire expedition force, but Kensei was the one most resentful and least able to speak up. He had been the captain leading the team, yet Junichi had knocked him senseless in a single move and saved him.
If Kensei Muguruma had been the one left behind in Hueco Mundo, there was a hundred percent chance he wouldn't have made it back. Ask anyone in Soul Society, and every last one of them would give the same answer.
Besides, as the Ninth Division's lieutenant, he had been taken out in an instant by a sixth seat right before the battle. That was embarrassing enough. Later, though, someone had gotten word from the three First Division Bigwigs that Jun's Kidō prowess was unfathomable. He didn't just know Space Kidō; he had also created his own Kidō.
Central 46 couldn't control self-created Kidō. As mentioned before, Soul Society was still a society with a strong sect mentality. One could look at it this way: Space Kidō was a power exclusive to Central 46. Central 46 controlled that sect and didn't share its techniques with outsiders, but Jun had secretly learned them. That was essentially why he had been punished.
Now that Jun had created his own Kidō, the Shimizu-style Kidō belonged to him, and no one could demand it from him, much less make him hand it over. Of course, it would be another matter if Jun wanted to hand it over himself.
The same went for Jun's Hakuda techniques. More than a hundred years had passed, but Jun himself couldn't feel any progress in his Hakuda. As for whether he suffered from the same lack of self-awareness as Kōga, Jun had no way to verify it. Hardly anyone in Soul Society placed much importance on Hakuda; only the Shihoin still stuck with it.
Of course, Jun didn't care much about any of that anymore. Every day, he strolled around with Isuzu, went fishing or had tea when he had nothing else to do, and did a little—ahem, use your imagination. Life couldn't have been better.
In the evenings, they ate together. Since they both had time, they could go shopping for ingredients and cook together when they got home. Jun would show off his stir-frying skills for her. Perfect.
When they had nothing to do at night, they cuddled together while Jun told Isuzu little jokes from his previous life. Before long, he would slip in a few dirty jokes, and Isuzu would blush bright red, looking every bit the young maiden. Jun loved that innocent quality and never tired of it.
They also chatted about interesting things that happened in their respective divisions or gossip they had heard about other divisions. Occasionally, they talked about the past. After all, they had been in love for nearly a hundred years. That was how, one day, they ended up talking about Captain Hikifune's figure...
Jun still missed it, and Isuzu angrily wrapped her arms around him.
As they kept talking, they returned to the happy days in the Twelfth Division. The difference between the Seireitei Research Institute and the current Research and Development Institute really couldn't have been greater.
Perhaps Captain Hikifune really didn't have as many ideas as Kisuke Urahara. That was one aspect; another was the difference in how the two captains ran things. Urahara seemed easygoing, but he actually had a strong desire for control. Perhaps that was thanks to the damn Second Division and the Shihoin's all-too-painful lesson.
It wasn't until Urahara and the Shihoin fled Soul Society and he became a shopkeeper that he got much better. In fact, just like Jun and Aizen, smart people were more likely to get fixated and go to extremes when faced with a profound lesson.
Returning to their private conversation, when Jun heard the name Seireitei Research Institute again, he suddenly felt a sense of déjà vu. The name "Research Institute" was just so... well, compared with the Research and Development Institute, it sounded so old-fashioned that it was especially easy to remember.
"Hey, darling, didn't your institute have a huge accident a long time ago?"
"How did you know? That's a secret our division doesn't share with outsiders. Ah, come to think of it, you really do know a lot of Soul Society's secrets. Darling~~ how do you know?"
Jun lightly brushed his beloved wife's nose. "Take a guess~"
Isuzu pouted and looked up at the sky. "Hmm~~ your mentor told you."
"How could he have? By the time he instructed me, he was already at the end of his life. Didn't I tell you everything that happened back then? You little dummy."
"Mm~~ then how do you know? Did Aizen tell you?"
"I doubt even he knows about it. Maybe his father knew, or maybe he didn't either. Come to think of it, Shunsui and Jūshirō might know."
Isuzu stopped guessing and suddenly asked, "Then, darling, do you know what happened?"
Jun's face twitched. "Wait, you don't know what happened!?"
Isuzu squirmed with a charmingly innocent look. "Of course I don't. I only know there was a huge accident a long time ago. Wow! Darling, do you really know what happened!?"
Isuzu sat up in bed and crawled onto Jun, her face flushed. "Um, if you tell me what happened, how about it?"
"You said it!" Junichi immediately perked up. Isuzu was a very traditional kind of woman. In fact, everyone in Soul Society was still very traditional, so there were many things she couldn't bring herself to do. Jun didn't particularly mind, of course. As mentioned before, Soul Reapers had little desire in that respect, but he couldn't pass up an opportunity placed right in front of him.
"Mm~~ yes! I said it."
"Hmm, I won't tell you here. How about this? In two months, we'll take a teaching assignment together, and I'll introduce you to that child I have high hopes for. Then, after New Year, we'll take an assignment in the World of the Living together, and I'll take you to find someone left over from back then."
"Huh? There's still something left from back then!?"
"Not something. Someone."
"Ah!!? Really!?"
"Really!"
"All right, then let's do that." Isuzu's curiosity was satisfied, and she returned to her spot.
Jun hurriedly crawled over. "Ahem, darling."
"Hehe, let's talk about that after you take me to find that person."
"Hey~ that's not fair!"
"Hehehe, you're not being fair either. That's what you get for keeping me in suspense instead of telling me now."
"Whoa! Then I'll tell you right now!"
"Get lost! I don't want to hear it anymore! If you dare ruin my surprise, you'll be sorry!"
"Ah~~~~!!! Damn it!" Jun sank into deep frustration.
In the blink of an eye, half a year passed. Four months earlier, Jun and Isuzu had taken a teaching assignment together and both become Kōga's mentors.
Perhaps Aizen's earlier words had given Jun the idea. Jun felt that investing in Kōga really was a good move, so he paid more attention to him. Isuzu, meanwhile, was very fond of children. The two had no children of their own, so she took care of the students, not just Kōga. But with the two of them together, Kōga really did experience something different.
Thus, by the end of those three months, Jun could feel a particularly noticeable change in Kōga's attitude toward them, and he was very gratified by it.
More than a month later, Isuzu recalled their conversation from half a year ago one day and urged Jun to get on with it. Only then did Jun remember too, having forgotten all about it. So they took an assignment in the World of the Living together, and Jun also requested an extension. Such things were handled casually, and it was extended to three years.
To Soul Society, three years passed in the blink of an eye. Some people liked assignments in the World of the Living, while others didn't. Besides, Central 46 couldn't do anything more excessive to the two of them, or it really would look like undue punishment. Central 46 cared about its reputation too, even if that reputation had long since gone to ruin.
Their exceptionally long assignment in the World of the Living surprised their friends. Jun explained that the two of them wanted to have some fun and relax there. The others readily believed him and offered the couple their blessings.
After saying goodbye to their friends and family, the couple passed through the Senkaimon, walked hand in hand through the Dangai, and arrived above a landscape of green hills and clear waters.
"Wow! This is the World of the Living?"
"Mm. You haven't been here before, have you?"
"Mm-hmm, mm-hmm." Isuzu nodded eagerly. The Twelfth Division generally didn't have assignments in the World of the Living.
"Come on. Soul Society has plenty of scenery like this. Let's go see how people live in the World of the Living."
"Okay~~" Isuzu was curious about everything now and followed Jun wherever he went.
After they had traveled through the wilderness for a while, Isuzu remembered the purpose of their trip. "Darling, you can tell me now, right? The truth about that accident, and who are we looking for?"
"Bount! Do you know about them?"
"I don't know what Bount are."
"It's normal that you don't. That name probably hasn't been used for hundreds of years."
What Jun was about to discuss was an original arc from the anime: the Bount Arc, also known as the Bount Arc. Jun hadn't been sure whether it existed, so he had asked about it. To his surprise, it really did, and that made things interesting.
Jun had also found some interesting things in the Journal Hall. As he spoke, he showed Isuzu several interesting journal entries he had secretly taken.
What Isuzu saw was a messily written journal entry, with enormous gaps between the characters and sentences that didn't make sense. But when Jun took it back and overlaid two entries, one horizontally and one vertically, the gaps in the text were filled in.
"Ah!! It says there was an explosion here! A huge noise! And~~ and~~ oh my heavens! Someone was actually taken away for experiments!?"
"There's no way to know who wrote these entries anymore. Actually, there are very few entries from this period. Most were probably destroyed. But this person's unusual entries were preserved because of the special way they have to be read. He was also very clever. These entries weren't kept together; he probably deliberately gave them to many different people to preserve them."
"Wow!! That's amazing!"
"It really is. This person was also very well liked. Do you know how many boxes I sorted these entries out of?"
"How many?" Isuzu was especially curious now.
"Nineteen. In other words, it took nineteen graduations to gather up the entries this person distributed, fifty-seven years, all to keep certain people from finding them and to pass down the truth about this accident."
"Oh my heavens~ this senior was amazing!"
"Yes, amazing! So now I'm even more certain. I want to find these people, these Bount."