Heavy Reishi

A few more days passed.

The cleanup of the battlefield was nearing its end. The ruins throughout the Seireitei had largely been cleared away. Collapsed buildings were dismantled, broken tiles and splintered wood hauled off, scorched ground dug up and repaved. Lines had been drawn around the areas that needed rebuilding, and materials had been stacked for the structures that needed reconstruction. The Seireitei was far from fully recovered, but at least signs of recovery could now be seen.

Captain-Commander Yamamoto issued a new order.

A funeral was to be held.

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

The names dug out from the ruins over the past few days, identified from heaps of corpses, and crossed off the casualty lists submitted by each division would all receive their final disposition at this funeral.

But the funeral was far larger than anyone had expected.

Because it was not only Soul Reapers who were being sent off.

Although Central 46 had yet to restore its full membership, the few remaining sages had no disagreement on this matter.

They consulted Soul Society's oldest records and confirmed a regulation that had been forgotten for many years: after spiritual entities with Third-Class Spiritual Might or higher died, the Reishi forming their spiritual bodies would automatically transform into Heavy Reishi.

Heavy Reishi could not rise into Soul Society's Reishi atmospheric cycle. Like stones, it would sink into the gap between the World of the Living and Soul Society, eventually becoming earthbound spirits, vengeful spirits, or something even more uncontrollable.

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

That was the only place Heavy Reishi could go.

The archives of the Great Spirit Library were brought out. The Tsunayashiro Clan had not participated in the noble conflicts, but they did not refuse when it came to matters involving the foundations of Soul Society.

The archives recorded it clearly. While spiritual entities with Third-Class Spiritual Might were occasionally sent to Hell in ordinary times, the last large-scale sending of entities with Spiritual Might above the third class to Hell had taken place two thousand years ago. The one before that had been five thousand years ago. Anything before then could no longer be verified.

Captain-Commander Yamamoto personally designated the location of the funeral.

Sōkyoku Hill.

It was the highest hill in the Seireitei. Almost no one went there normally; it was only used for executions or major ceremonies.

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

At the hill's highest point stood the Sōkyoku, an enormous execution device whose white frame appeared especially glaring beneath the daylight.

The weather was clear on the day of the funeral.

Everyone attending the funeral had arrived.

The formations were arranged according to division order. The First Division stood in the center at the front, with Genryūsai Shigekuni Yamamoto 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 sequence on either side, followed by the Fourth Division, Fifth Division...

The Twelfth Division's captain was an unfamiliar face to the division members and lower-ranking nobles.

She was Senjumaru Shutara. She stood at the front of the formation, her hair neatly coiled beneath a golden crown.

Behind her stood Okutano, the Kidō specialist who had only recently been appointed lieutenant. He stood behind the new captain, with the surviving members of the Twelfth Division behind him.

The Thirteenth Division had only a few seated officers and ordinary members.

Only some of the nobles had come, standing scattered behind the various divisions.

Spirit coffins had been placed at the center of Sōkyoku Hill.

One belonged to Zenteiji Yūbin. Provided by the Zenteiji family, it was made from the finest wood, its surface polished as smooth as a mirror. His Zanpakutō, Quake Calamity, lay within the coffin, which was filled and surrounded with white chrysanthemums.

The other belonged to Saizo Sakigane. In a coffin of the same standard as Zenteiji's, his Zanpakutō, Nightmare, rested against his chest. White chrysanthemums likewise filled the inside and surrounded the coffin.

There were also several Quincy corpses placed in ordinary coffins.

They had already been handled according to Soul Society's customs. Their blood had been washed away, and they had been wrapped in white cloth, laid out neatly beneath the sunlight.

Some of them had been fighting the Soul Reaper captains to the death on the streets of the Seireitei only days ago. Now, they lay silently upon the stone slabs of Sōkyoku Hill, side by side with their enemies.

Yamamoto turned to face everyone. Sunlight streamed from behind him, stretching his shadow long and far across the formations of several divisions in the front row.

"The Soul Burial begins." Yamamoto spoke, his voice quiet, yet every person on Sōkyoku Hill heard it clearly.

The members of the Kidō Corps began to chant.

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

The incantation was long and obscure, its syllables following no discernible pattern. It was like a language long lost, forcibly dredged up from piles of old paper. Reishi gathered above Sōkyoku Hill, Reiatsu growing denser and denser as the light in the air began to distort.

The coffins were ignited, and flames began to burn.

The coffins began to turn into points of Reishi light, then vanished into the air. The sight resembled Reishi returning to the atmospheric cycle, but anyone sensitive enough could clearly sense that something was wrong.

But that no longer mattered, because these spiritual entities had already fallen into Hell.

Sōkyoku Hill returned to silence.

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

Yamamoto turned back toward everyone. Sunlight fell from his left, illuminating half his face while the other half remained buried in shadow.

"The funeral is over. Everyone, disperse."

The funeral had ended.

The crowd on Sōkyoku Hill began to disperse.

The divisions moved slowly down the mountain path, the black of their Shihakushō flowing beneath the sunlight like a narrow river. But the captains did not leave immediately.

The First Division members gradually dispersed as well under Chojiro Sasakibe's lead.

"Shuichi, stay."

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

The captains' gazes all turned toward him, but Yamamoto did not immediately explain why.

Shuichi could only walk calmly to his side.

"Shuichi."

After the formations had mostly departed, Yamamoto spoke. "Do you have any interest in becoming a captain?"

Shuichi froze.

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

It was as if someone had pushed 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 emerged.

He looked 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.

A captain? How long had it been since he became an official Soul Reaper?

Before these Soul Reapers standing at the very peak of Soul Society, what right did he have to say yes?

But he also knew Yamamoto would not ask such a question without reason.

The Captain-Commander was not someone who spoke casually.

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

Shuichi lowered his head and remained silent for a long time, long enough for the wind to blow his hair out of place, then smooth it back down again.

Yamamoto did not urge him. "Show the captains your Bankai."

Shuichi's mind raced wildly.

He hesitated over whether he should reveal it here.

His Bankai had been completed amid chaos. He feared he might not be able to release it at all. He feared that everything that had happened on the battlefield that day had merely been a coincidence caused by his Reiatsu running wild. He feared making a fool of himself before so many captains.

But what he feared even more was that if he retreated now, he might never find the courage to draw his sword again.

His hand settled on the hilt.

The silver-white blade slid from its sheath, reflecting a blinding streak of white beneath the sunlight.

Shuichi gripped the hilt tightly. Reiatsu surged within him, just as it had that day, just as it had when he faced Jugram Haschwalth amid the ruins.

"Bankai! Higan Heaven: Underworld Blossoms!"

The blade became translucent glass, and four-colored threads of light intertwined as they spread from the hilt to the tip.

Four-colored spider lilies spread outward from Shuichi, covering every inch of Sōkyoku Hill.

Bakuzan Katori stood amid the sea of flowers, lowering her head to look at the four-colored spider lilies swaying beneath her feet. Unable to resist, she crouched down and reached out to touch a red petal.

The petal trembled softly against her fingertip.

"What a beautiful Bankai."

Yachiru Unohana lowered her gaze to the sea of flowers and said nothing.

"So this is it. Stabilizing your Bankai on the second try—pretty good, kid." Furoufushi Saito's voice rang out.

The other captains nodded as well.

Yamamoto spoke next.

"The basic requirement for becoming a captain is mastering Bankai. Spiritual Might is not a hard requirement, because anyone who can master Bankai will not have low Spiritual Might."

Shuichi stood at the center of the sea of flowers, his Zanpakutō held across his body as he looked at it. Four-colored threads of light flowed slowly across the blade.

Yamamoto's gaze swept across Shuichi's face.

"The Fourth Division captain is severely wounded. The Tenth Division captain is severely wounded and has yet to awaken. The Thirteenth Division captain has fallen. There is more than one vacancy that needs to be filled."

Shuichi understood what Yamamoto meant.

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

But Saizo Sakigane, captain of the Thirteenth Division, 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 exceptionally strong, nor because of how much merit he had earned in this war. It was because the Thirteenth Division needed a captain, and as Yamamoto's student who had already mastered Bankai, he seemed to be the most suitable candidate at present.

Shuichi sheathed his sword, searching for the feeling he had when he dismissed his Bankai before, and released it.

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

"Teacher."

This was the first time Shuichi had spoken those two words.

"I will go to the Thirteenth Division."

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

"Good."