In Class

At the same time, a very different scene was unfolding in the kendo hall of Shin'ō Academy.

The kendo hall was on the west side of the main building. Its interior was three times larger than a classroom, and its wooden floor had been polished smooth enough to accommodate sixty people and give them room to move.

Three classes were attending, sixty students in all. Each carried an Asauchi and a wooden sword. The Asauchi had been issued to everyone on the third day of school, while the wooden swords were for sparring.

The atmosphere was completely different from the Kidō class.

Of the sixty students, at least forty had handled blades in Rukongai, all kinds of Reishi-made weapons and—

And Rukongai's rules of survival were simple: either you were stronger than others, crueler than others, or faster than others.

Those who had trained with blades carried a natural unruliness. Their kneeling postures were far more casual than those in the Kidō class next door. Some sat cross-legged, some stretched out one leg, and some spoke in low voices.

Then Nobutsuna Shigyo pushed open the door and entered.

"I am Nobutsuna Shigyo, captain of the Seventh Division."

His voice was not loud, but the wooden floor trembled faintly beneath it. "Starting today, I will be teaching your swordsmanship class."

Silence.

His gaze swept from the first row to the last. He was not inspecting them. He was evaluating them.

"I heard some of you learned swordsmanship in Rukongai?"

Among the kneeling students, several straightened their backs. Nobutsuna's eyes lit up, and the corners of his mouth split into a grin that showed a row of teeth. It was exactly like the grin of those Rukongai thugs scraping by day to day—the grin only possessed by those who had seen blood, killed people, and survived to the end.

"Come on!" He crooked a finger at the crowd.

"Those who have learned it! Step forward!"

No one moved.

Nobutsuna's smile did not change. "Where's your courage from Rukongai?"

The words were like throwing a ladle of water into a pan of boiling oil.

A tall male student stood up. He was half a head taller than those around him, with thick knuckles. "North District Twenty-Nine. Trained for three years."

A second student stood. "North District Fifteen. Five years."

The third said, "South District Thirty-Three. Four years."

The fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh...

One after another, they rose. Nobutsuna looked at them. "I know Rukongai swordsmanship."

Nobutsuna lowered his voice slightly. "Some of what you learned came from fragments taught by wandering Soul Reapers. Some of it was folk killing techniques. It isn't wrong, but it isn't entirely right either."

He smiled.

"Show me what you've got."

Not "please instruct us," but "show me what you've got."

The seven exchanged glances.

"Come at me together," Nobutsuna said.

The tall student moved first, gripping his wooden sword as he slashed diagonally at Nobutsuna's left shoulder.

Nobutsuna did not even draw his sword. He shifted slightly. The tall student's blade came down less than an inch before his shoulder, and Nobutsuna extended a hand. The student's wrist slammed into his palm.

[Advanced Hakuda]

The student was immediately sent flying. His wooden sword flew from his hand as he crashed into the wall.

The remaining six charged at him simultaneously.

Nobutsuna used the wooden sword that had been knocked away.

In the next instant, all six froze. The wooden swords in their hands halted in midair, then all shattered.

He looked at the broken sword fragments scattered across the floor, then at the seven students.

His voice was filled with boundless contempt. "Your swordsmanship does not even rank fourth-rate."

In the Soul Society's known ranking of swordsmanship, he ranked third.

"The first lesson of swordsmanship is not holding a sword. It is taking a beating. Who's next?!"

At the same time, inside Shin'ō Academy's combat arena—

It was the most brutal sight of the day.

Sixty students were scattered across the grounds, sprawled, lying, and curled up in sixty different positions.

Some clutched their stomachs. Some hugged their knees. Some lay on their sides with both hands covering their faces, letting out broken groans. Others lay flat on their backs, gulping air. Every breath sent pain through their ribs; after confirming nothing was broken, they continued breathing. No one stood up. No one even tried to stand up.

All sixty of them were on the ground.

Shihōin Qianri stood in the center of the arena.

He was not sweating. His breathing was steady, and his expression was as calm as though he had just finished a cup of tea. He had not even rolled up his sleeves. Today's lesson had not officially begun yet. This was merely a "warm-up."

All sixty students had been beaten flat during the warm-up.

"Do not think knowing how to throw a punch means you know Hakuda."

His voice was not loud, and his tone was not harsh, yet every word reached the ears of everyone present with perfect clarity.

"You are nothing."

The sixty students lay on the ground. Some were still groaning, some gritted their teeth in silence, and some buried their faces in their arms, their expressions hidden.

No one argued.

It was not that they did not want to. They could not. Forget arguing—most of them had not even recovered enough strength to lift their heads.

"Before I teach you Hakuda, I have decided that you should first learn how to take a beating."

The combat arena fell quiet for a moment, then someone made a sound somewhere between a groan and a laugh of despair.

"Rest for half an hour. Then we continue."

The bodies of all sixty students stiffened almost simultaneously.

Outside the combat arena, several Shin'ō Academy instructors without classes stood at a distance watching. Some shook their heads, some sighed, and some merely watched without any expression.

No one said, "That is too much," and no one said, "This is a good way to teach."

Shin'ō Academy's Shunpo training ground.

The atmosphere there was completely different from the other two places.

There were no screams, no groans, no one sprawled on the ground unable to get up, and no one clutching some part of their body while wondering whether their ribs were broken.

Sixty students stood on the training ground in six rows of ten.

Their formation was somewhat loose. Some stood farther forward while others stood farther back, but no one yawned, no one whispered to their neighbors, and no one wore the expression of someone thinking, I already knew this in Rukongai.

Because Shunpo was something one truly could not learn in Rukongai.

Zanjutsu could be practiced alone. Grab a sword and swing it every day; swing long enough, and eventually one would gain some feel for it.

Hakuda could be practiced alone too. Punch sandbags, walls, trees. Punch enough, and eventually one would gain some strength.

Kidō at least had fragments of Reishi techniques to study. They might be unstable, but at least they existed.

Shunpo was different. It required precise control of Reiatsu and an instantaneous shift in one's center of gravity. There was no way to teach oneself either of those things in Rukongai.

There were no teachers, no textbooks, no precedents to follow. Before entering Shin'ō Academy, someone from Rukongai might never even have heard the word "Shunpo."

Chikiri Shijima stood before the formation.

"Shunpo." Chikiri spoke, his voice neither too loud nor too quiet, neither rushed nor slow, as though he were reciting a passage he had read countless times.

"It is a technique that gathers Reiatsu beneath the feet and releases it in an instant, creating explosive movement. The principle is not complicated, and it is not difficult to execute."

He looked at the sixty blank faces before him.

"Begin."

There was no demonstration, no breakdown of the movements, no "I will do it once, then you watch."

He simply said, "Begin," and stood there without moving.

The sixty students looked at one another. Their instructors had taught them a little, and they had assumed a captain would teach something profound first. This was it?

Still, some tried to direct their Reiatsu toward the soles of their feet. Then their feet flashed briefly, but they did not move, because their Reiatsu control was blank paper as well.

Some stood rooted in place until their faces turned red, unable to even scrape a spark of Reiatsu from the blue-brick floor.

Chikiri watched them without urging or correcting them. His face showed no expression. He was neither impatient nor annoyed nor disappointed.

At last, one student vanished from his original spot. Strictly speaking, he had not vanished. He staggered two steps, slipped, nearly fell, then realized he had moved forward about an arm's length.

Even he was startled. He looked back at where he had just been standing, then lowered his head to look at his feet, as though confirming whether those two legs truly belonged to him. The people beside him watched with undisguised envy in their eyes.

Chikiri glanced at the student. "Mm. That is it. Keep going."

That is it. The three words were like a needle, lightly pricking the student's joy before it had time to swell too much—not too much, not too little, just enough to keep him practicing.

More people began trying.

Some fell. Some remained in place the entire time.

Sixty people, sixty different rates of progress. Some were already attempting two consecutive steps, though their bodies tilted drunkenly when they landed the second. Others were still wrestling with whether they should push off the ground at the same time as they sent Reiatsu to their feet.

Some could not even direct Reiatsu to their feet. They stood there again and again pressing spiritual power downward. The blue bricks beneath their feet grew hot from their Reiatsu and emitted faint white smoke, yet they did not budge at all.

Chikiri walked slowly along the edge of the grounds. He corrected no one's movements and gave no individual guidance to anyone.

It was not that he was neglecting them. The time had simply not come.

When it came to Shunpo, failing to learn it at the beginning was normal. Not "it is normal for some people to fail at first," but "everyone fails at first."

That was the rule, just like babies learning to walk. No baby ever learned to walk because someone told them, "You should step with your left foot first, then shift your center of gravity."

They simply fell. They fell many times, and then one day they stopped falling. Then one day they could walk. Then one day they could run.

So Chikiri did not teach. He merely watched from the side, occasionally saying, "No rush," "Take it slowly," or "Try again."

The classrooms for the other subjects each had their own scenes as well.

An indescribable tension filled the theory classroom.

Entetsu Kumenoi sat in a chair behind the lectern.

He simply sat there, with a handout spread before him. Occasionally, he lowered his head to glance at it; occasionally, he looked up and said a few words. His voice was not loud, his pace was unhurried, and there was nothing unusual in what he taught.

Yet not one of the sixty students lost focus.

No one yawned. No one whispered. No one lowered their heads to draw little figures in their notebooks. No one secretly looked out the window at the scenery. No one even dared adjust their upright kneeling posture into a slightly more comfortable cross-legged position.

Sixty students, sixty upright kneeling postures, sixty pairs of eyes fixed on the lectern, and sixty pairs of ears perked higher than rabbits'.

Entetsu Kumenoi's face.

The overall impression of his face was not "fierce" or "vicious," yet it instinctively made strangers want to step back.

He was like a gang boss, the kind sitting at the far end of a dim room. You could not see his face clearly, but you knew he was watching you. You would rather face a Menos Grande that had gone hungry for three days than be alone in a room with that kind of boss.

Entetsu Kumenoi sat quietly above, teaching his class.

His voice was steady, calm, and unhurried. One could even call it patient. What he taught was clear, organized, and easy to understand. It was obvious that he had prepared seriously for the lesson.

But his face and voice created an enormous, unsettling disconnect. His voice said, "Relax," while his face said, "Go ahead and try it."

The students below were still afraid.

It was not the fear of "getting scolded by a teacher." It was something more primal, an indescribable dread.

The way Entetsu Kumenoi sat there was more terrifying than every villain they had ever seen. Not because Kumenoi did anything, but because he did nothing. He merely sat there, and they knew he was not someone they could afford to provoke. That unquestionable intimidation was more frightening than any threat.

The atmosphere in the arts classroom was a completely different world from that of the theory classroom.

Bakuzan Katori stood at the front of the room.

Her features were gentle, and there was a smile in her eyes. Her voice was neither loud nor soft, carrying a warmth that made people want to draw close.

"Today, we will arrange flowers."

The flower arrangement class was not meant to teach students to arrange flowers for its own sake. It was meant to teach them how to calm down, and calming down was a required lesson for Sword Meditation.

Bakuzan took a bamboo basket from behind the lectern. It held the flowers for the day: several sprigs of wild chrysanthemums, several branches of bellflowers, several unknown white flowers, and leaves in varying shades of green.

Sixty low tables had been placed around the classroom. On each sat a ceramic vase, flower scissors, and a kenzan.

The students sat around the low tables. Before them, the empty vases glowed with the plain earthen color of clay under the sunlight.

Bakuzan stood at the front of the room and began explaining the basic composition of flower arrangement: the positions of the main branch, secondary branch, and guest branch; the varying heights of the flowers; the coordination of colors and empty space.

Her voice was gentle, her speech leisurely, and every word seemed as clean as though washed by water.

By all rights, this should have been the easiest and least stressful class of them all.

There was no Reiatsu control, no danger of failed incantations, no pain from being beaten flat, no fear of facing a gang boss. There were only flowers, scissors, vases, and a gentle teacher.

Yet the sixty students simply could not settle down.

They were not causing trouble. They were simply unused to it.

These students came from Rukongai. There was no such thing as flower arrangement in Rukongai. There, flowers came in only two kinds: edible and inedible.

Putting flowers in a vase for display? The people of Rukongai had neither the leisure nor the time for that.

So when they sat at the low tables for flower arrangement, facing ceramic vases, flower scissors, and kenzan—tools they had never touched before—they did not show disinterest. Instead, they displayed a clumsy, bewildered excitement.

Some inserted the main branch too high, making the entire vase look like a utility pole.

Some crammed in too many flowers, making the ceramic vase look like a hedgehog covered in blossoms.

Some placed the kenzan crookedly. Once they inserted the branches, the entire arrangement leaned left as though blown sideways by the wind. Some cut their branches too short, leaving them too short to reach the kenzan. They looked at them in their hands, found no way to put them back together, and could only secretly stuff the branches under their tables.

Bakuzan moved slowly through the classroom, looking at each arrangement and quietly offering guidance one student at a time.

"Lower the main branch a little more."

"The secondary branch can be angled a little wider."

"Try moving this bellflower branch to the right." Her voice remained gentle throughout. There was no blame, no impatience, and not the slightest weariness even as the same mistakes appeared again and again among sixty people.

But the students could not calm down. It was not that they did not want to. They simply could not.

Their hands were used to holding blades, throwing punches, and scavenging for food amid ruins. They were not used to holding a flower branch for ages, measuring it carefully, then cautiously inserting it into a kenzan. Of course, the most important reason was Bakuzan herself.