Heavy Reishi

A few more days passed.

The cleanup of the battlefield was nearing its end. The ruins throughout Seireitei had mostly been cleared away. The collapsed buildings had been dismantled, broken tiles and shattered wood hauled off, and the charred ground dug up and repaved. Lines had been drawn around areas that needed rebuilding, and materials had been piled up beside the buildings to be reconstructed. Seireitei was still far from recovering, but at least signs of recovery could now be seen.

Captain-Commander Yamamoto issued a new order.

A funeral would be held.

The fallen Soul Reapers needed to be buried, and the fallen Quincy also needed to be dealt with.

Those who had been dug out of the ruins over the past few days, identified from the piles of corpses, or crossed off the casualty lists submitted by the various squads would all receive their final rites at this funeral.

But the funeral was far larger than anyone had expected.

Because it was not only Soul Reapers who needed to be sent off.

Although the Central 46 was still short of members, the few remaining Sages had no disagreement on this matter.

They consulted the oldest texts in the Soul Society and confirmed a rule that had been forgotten for many years: after a spiritual body with Third-Class Spiritual Might or higher died, the Reishi composing it would automatically transform into Heavy Reishi.

Heavy Reishi could not enter the Reishi atmosphere's circulation in the Soul Society. It would sink like a stone into the gap between the World of the Living and the Soul Society, gradually becoming an earthbound spirit, then a vengeful spirit, and eventually something even more uncontrollable.

Thus, since ancient times, the Soul Society had maintained an ironclad rule: spiritual bodies with Third-Class Spiritual Might or higher, whether Soul Reapers or Hollows, had to be sent to Hell through a special funeral rite.

That was the only place Heavy Reishi could go.

The archives of the Great Spirit Library were retrieved. The Tsunayashiro Clan had not participated in the nobles' infighting, but they did not shirk matters involving the foundation of the Soul Society.

The records were clear. Although spiritual bodies with Third-Class Spiritual Might were occasionally sent to Hell, the last large-scale dispatch of spiritual bodies with Third-Class Spiritual Might or higher had taken place two thousand years ago. The previous one had been five thousand years ago. Anything before that could no longer be verified.

Captain-Commander Yamamoto personally selected the funeral site.

Sōkyoku Hill.

It was the highest hill in Seireitei. Almost no one visited it under normal circumstances; it was used only for executions and major ceremonies.

The hilltop was flat and spacious, offering a view over the whole of Seireitei.

At the highest point of the hill stood the Sōkyoku, a massive execution apparatus whose white frame looked particularly glaring beneath the daylight.

The day of the funeral was clear.

Everyone attending the funeral had arrived.

They stood arranged in squad order. The First Division was at the front and center, with Genryūsai Shigekuni Yamamoto standing at the very front and Chojiro Sasakibe one step behind him. Shuichi stood among the First Division's ranks.

The Second Division and Third Division stood in order on either side, followed by the Fourth Division, the Fifth Division...

The captain of the Twelfth Division was an unfamiliar face to both the squad members and the Lower Nobility.

She was Senjumaru Shutara, standing at the very front of the formation with her hair neatly coiled and a golden crown on her head.

Behind the new captain stood Okutano, the Kidō expert who had only recently been appointed vice-captain. Behind him were the survivors of the Twelfth Division.

The Thirteenth Division had only a few Seated Officers and Squad Members.

Only some of the nobles had come. They stood scattered behind the various squads.

Coffins had been placed in the center of Sōkyoku Hill.

One belonged to Zenteiji Yūbin and had been provided by the Zenteiji family. It was made of the finest wood, its surface polished smooth as a mirror. His Zanpakutō, Quake Calamity, had been placed inside, while white chrysanthemums filled both the space around the coffin and its interior.

The other belonged to Saizo Sakigane. It was a coffin of the same quality as Zenteiji's. His Zanpakutō, Nightmare, rested on his chest, and white chrysanthemums likewise filled the space around and inside the coffin.

There were also the bodies of several Quincy placed in ordinary coffins.

They had already been handled according to the rules of the Soul Society. Their blood had been washed away, their bodies wrapped in white cloth, and they had been arranged neatly beneath the sunlight.

Some of them had still been fighting the Soul Reaper captains to the death in Seireitei's streets just a few days earlier. Now they lay quietly on the stone slabs of Sōkyoku Hill, side by side with their enemies.

Yamamoto turned to face everyone. The sunlight came from behind him, stretching his shadow long across several of the squad formations in the front row.

"The Soul Burial begins." Yamamoto's voice was not loud, but every person on Sōkyoku Hill heard him clearly.

The members of the Kidō Corps began chanting.

It was an ancient Kidō prepared specifically for the Soul Burial.

The incantation was long and obscure, with no discernible pattern between its syllables. It sounded like a lost language forcibly dredged from piles of old documents. Reishi gathered above Sōkyoku Hill, Reiatsu grew denser and denser, and the light in the air began to twist.

Flames ignited around the coffins and began to burn.

The coffins began transforming into points of Reishi light before vanishing into the air. The visual effect resembled the return of Reishi to the Reishi atmosphere, but anyone sensitive enough could completely sense that something was wrong.

But it no longer mattered, because those spiritual bodies had already fallen into Hell.

Sōkyoku Hill returned to tranquility.

The sunlight remained just as bright, and the breeze remained just as gentle.

Yamamoto turned back to face everyone. Sunlight came from his left, illuminating half of his face while the other half lay buried in shadow.

"The funeral is over. Everyone is dismissed."

The funeral had ended.

The crowd on Sōkyoku Hill began to disperse.

The squads slowly moved along the road down the hill. The black of their Shihakushō formed a slender river beneath the sunlight, but the captains did not leave immediately.

The members of the First Division also gradually dispersed under Chojiro Sasakibe's leadership.

"Shuichi, stay behind."

Yamamoto's voice came from behind. Shuichi, who had been walking near the rear of the formation, stopped and turned to face him.

The captains' gazes swept toward him in unison, but Yamamoto did not immediately explain why.

Shuichi could only walk calmly to his side.

"Shuichi."

After seeing that most of the formation had dispersed, Yamamoto spoke. "Are you interested in becoming a captain?"

Shuichi froze.

It had not been long—perhaps only two or three seconds—but during those two or three seconds, his mind held nothing at all. It was completely blank.

It was as though someone had shoved him from behind. His body remained where it was, but his consciousness had already flown away.

"I..." Shuichi's voice caught in his throat. His lips moved twice, but no complete syllable came out.

He glanced at Yamamoto's face, then at the captains standing around them.

Every gaze was fixed on him alone.

Shuichi fell silent.

It was not that he did not want to answer. He simply did not know how to answer.

A captain? How long had it been since he became a formal Soul Reaper?

What right did he have to say "yes" in front of these Soul Reapers standing at the very top of the Soul Society?

But he also knew that Yamamoto would not ask the question without reason.

The Commander-in-Chief was not the sort of person who spoke casually.

If he asked, it meant that in the Commander-in-Chief's mind, this was a question that could receive an affirmative answer.

Shuichi lowered his head and remained silent for a long time, so long that the wind blew his hair into disarray and then smoothed it back down.

Yamamoto did not urge him. "Demonstrate your Bankai for the captains."

Shuichi's mind raced.

He hesitated over whether he should demonstrate it here.

He had completed his Bankai amid utter chaos. He feared he might not be able to release it at all, that everything that had happened on the battlefield that day had merely been a coincidence caused by his Reiatsu running wild, and that he would disgrace himself in front of so many captains.

But he feared even more that if he backed down now, he would never again have the courage to draw his sword.

His hand closed around the hilt.

The silver-white blade slid from its sheath, reflecting a dazzling streak of white light beneath the sun.

Shuichi tightened his grip. Reiatsu surged within his body, just as it had that day, just as it had when he faced Haschwalth amid the ruins.

"Bankai! Higan Heaven: Underworld Blossoms!"

The blade turned into translucent glass, while four-colored threads of light intertwined and spread from the hilt toward the tip.

Four-Colored Spider Lilies spread outward from Shuichi as their center, covering every inch of ground on Sōkyoku Hill.

Bakuzan Katori stood amid the sea of flowers, looking down at the Four-Colored Spider Lilies swaying beneath her feet. Unable to resist, she crouched and reached out to touch a red petal.

The petal trembled lightly against her fingertip.

"What a beautiful Bankai."

Yachiru Unohana lowered her head to look at the sea of flowers without saying anything.

"So this is it. You stabilized your Bankai on the second attempt. Not bad, kid." Furoufushi Saito's voice rang out.

The other captains nodded as well.

Yamamoto spoke next.

"The basic requirement for becoming a captain is learning Bankai. Spiritual Might is not a strict requirement, because anyone capable of learning Bankai will not have low Spiritual Might."

Shuichi stood in the center of the sea of flowers, his Zanpakutō held horizontally before him as he looked at it. Four-colored threads of light flowed slowly along the blade.

Yamamoto's gaze swept over Shuichi's face.

"The Fourth Division Captain is gravely injured. The Tenth Division Captain remains unconscious after suffering severe injuries. The Thirteenth Division Captain has fallen. More than one position needs to be filled."

Shuichi knew what Yamamoto meant.

The captains of the Fourth Division and Tenth Division were still alive. One day, they would awaken, recover, and return to their squads.

But the Thirteenth Division Captain, Saizo Sakigane, had died in battle. His body had already been sent to Hell.

Shuichi also knew why Yamamoto had kept him behind.

It was not because his Bankai was particularly powerful, nor because he had made some great contribution to the war. It was because the Thirteenth Division needed a captain, and as Yamamoto's student who had already learned Bankai, he seemed to be the most suitable candidate at present.

Shuichi sheathed his sword, searching for the sensation he had felt when releasing his Bankai so that he could dispel it.

The blade returned to normal. The sea of flowers transformed into Reishi and scattered, returning to the Reishi atmosphere.

"Teacher."

This was the first time Shuichi had called him that.

"I'll go to the Thirteenth Division."

Yamamoto's expression did not change. He looked at Shuichi and calmly uttered a single word.

"Good."