The Mystery of Kurosaki Ichigo

It was only that, unlike the confusion Aizen Sōsuke had experienced inwardly...

Although Chiba Makoto had vaguely sensed that something was off with Aizen Sōsuke at the time, when he saw Aizen Sōsuke again the next day, he found nothing unusual.

Thus, aside from reserving part of his attention for Aizen Sōsuke, Chiba Makoto devoted more of his time to the internal affairs of the Thirteen Divisions.

With the unresolved threat of Aizen Sōsuke hanging over them, Chiba Makoto continually urged the Thirteen Divisions to place greater importance on training.

Having just suffered a defeat, the many Captains and Vice-Captains had also shed their formerly stagnant, lazy atmosphere. Instead, they treated Aizen Sōsuke as a hypothetical enemy and devoted more time to training.

This was especially true for the Captains who had mastered Bankai, as they had suffered an even greater shock than the other Soul Reapers!

After all, for the vast majority of Soul Reapers, mastering Bankai almost meant reaching their limit. Becoming a Captain also meant there was nowhere further to advance.

Externally, neither Hueco Mundo nor the Quincy of the past could pose a true threat to the Seireitei. Internally, once one had mastered Bankai and become a Captain, there was ostensibly no more room to rise.

Therefore, throughout the thousand-year history of the Thirteen Divisions, genius Soul Reapers had emerged time and again, but almost all of them began to stagnate after becoming Captains.

Now, with the urgency that Aizen Sōsuke might launch another war against the Seireitei at any moment, the Thirteen Divisions under Captain-Commander Unohana's leadership instead seemed to have been revitalized, brimming with an intense atmosphere of training.

Even the Captains standing at the pinnacle of the Thirteen Divisions, after fighting Aizen Sōsuke and coming to deeply understand that the gap between one