Once word spread through the Seireitei that Kaien Shiba had achieved Shikai in his second year at Shin'ō Academy, the divisions reacted with greater urgency than in any previous recruitment scramble.
The Sixth Division moved first.
The Kuchiki Clan and the Shiba Clan both belonged to the Five Great Noble Houses. Relations between them were neither good nor bad, but recruiting Kaien Shiba, a pure-blooded grandson of the main family, into the Sixth Division would have been a good thing for Kuchiki Ginrei.
Of course, the offer was no good thing for the Shiba Clan.
When a retainer of the Kuchiki Clan visited, he presented an impeccably worded letter, full of courtesies such as hoping that young master Kaien would join the Sixth Division to further his training, and that the two clans might serve the Seireitei together in the spirit of their generations-old friendship. The Shiba retainer who received him accepted the letter and politely promised to pass it along, then turned around and tucked it beneath the corner of a table in the side hall, with no intention of sending it any further.
Kaien Shiba himself was even less interested. After hearing the servant's account, he merely smiled, said, "Thank the Kuchiki Clan for their kindness on my behalf," and went back to the hill behind the estate to practice with Nejibana.
The Second Division sent no one to recruit him.
Yoruichi knew, of course, that cooperation between the Shihōin Clan and the Shiba Clan was unlikely. Their relationship was not bad, but neither was it particularly warm. Besides, the Shihōin Clan already had a self-sufficient network of retainers, so there was no need to poach anyone from the Shiba Clan. She mentioned the matter in passing during a division meeting, but Marechiyo Ōmaeda asked in all