The order formally appointing Kisuke Urahara captain of the Twelfth Division had yet to be stamped and issued, but in the shadows of the Second Division and the Onmitsukidō, rumors had already spread like spilled mercury.
Over tea after meals, around corridor corners, even amid the quiet breathing of the Punishment Force as they changed shifts, someone was always whispering in a lowered voice, with curiosity, contempt, or concealed unease:
"The Third Seat... the new captain is pushing him into the captaincy of the Twelfth Division."
"Have you heard? Lady Yoruichi herself nominated him to the Commander-in-Chief."
Each time those words passed another corridor pillar or changed mouths, they took on a slightly different shape.
Eventually, they had even become this: the new head of the Shihōin Clan found that slacker a nuisance, but was too mindful of their relationship to dismiss him outright, so she had simply taken the opportunity to kick him out of the Second Division.
Shaoling Hachi believed that version. Or rather, she almost stubbornly wished it were true.
In her eyes, a man who spent his days with his neck hunched and his eyes as murky as stagnant water had no business remaining beside the noble, radiant, unattainable Lady Yoruichi Shihōin.
It was a desecration of purity.
Since Lady Yoruichi intended to send him away, it had to be because some unspeakable depravity was etched into his very bones.
She would tear away that disguise herself.
For the past two weeks, Shaoling Hachi had watched Kisuke Urahara relentlessly, pouring nearly every spare moment she had into this net woven from shadows.
Whenever Urahara stepped through the Second Division's heavy vermilion gates, she was already lying silently behind the tiles of an upturned roof three streets away, her breathing in rhythm with the morning breeze;
Whenever