Shin’ō Academy, the training grounds.
Rangiku Matsumoto left in high spirits, heading straight for the tavern to drink.
On her way out, she’d fleeced Ounahara for sixty thousand rings of his salary.
Facing down a Gotei 13 lieutenant, Ounahara, nothing more than an academy teacher, had no way to push back, and meekly handed over every last coin.
A corner of the training grounds.
Rukia stared at Moriyasu Tokoyo ahead of her, eyes filled with something like awe, and spoke.
“I’m counting on you, Moriyasu.” Moriyasu nodded with a smile and answered.
“Alright, let’s see where you stand tactically first.” Rukia’s gaze sharpened.
She gripped her wooden sword with both hands and shouted, “Oraa!” She pushed off hard with both feet, launched into the air, and brought the sword down in a slash.
Moriyasu dodged the strike without the slightest effort.
As he stepped aside, he even lifted a foot and kicked her clean off her feet.
Right as his kick sent Rukia flying, he suddenly sensed something off.
He glanced out of the corner of his eye toward the wall surrounding the training grounds.
There it was, that familiar pink-tinged red pathway, out past the far side of the wall.
That captain-level presence had come sneaking around to watch again.
And just now, the moment he’d attacked Rukia, that pathway had visibly reacted.
Which meant this captain-level figure was here specifically to watch Rukia?
Let’s test that.
Once Moriyasu had decided, he extended his right hand and beckoned Rukia forward with a small curl of his fingers.
Rukia had just finished spinning backward through the air three times, hit the ground, and plowed a four- or five-meter furrow through the dirt before finally coming to a stop.
She dropped to one knee, a hand pressed to her stomach, her face full of disbelief.
Back in the Rukongai, when they fought, it had always been all-out, one hit to finish an opponent off before the thugs could come back for more.
Over time, Rukia had come to understand that her own strength was well beyond what any ordinary thug could match.
It wasn’t until she’d enrolled at the academy and tested at spiritual power rank eleven that she finally understood why.
Her Reishi concentration ran high, which meant her body itself was simply stronger than most.
By rights, given her rank eleven Reishi concentration, a kick from someone at Moriyasu’s rank eighteen shouldn’t have even broken through her defenses.
But the pain radiating from her stomach right now told her plainly, trying to overpower Moriyasu on the strength of a rank eleven number alone simply wasn’t going to work.
She took a deep breath and got back to her feet.
When it came to tactics, she was completely clueless, but in raw fighting experience, she actually had Renji beat.
So she gripped her wooden sword tight in one hand, stepped forward to stop two meters in front of Moriyasu, and fixed her eyes on his body, shifting her feet slowly.
Moriyasu said with a smile, “At least you’ve got more sense of tactics than Red Baboon.
Come on, then.” This time Rukia drove off hard with her right foot, her whole body becoming a blade in motion as she rushed at Moriyasu, sword gripped one-handed in an upward slash.
Moriyasu simply tapped a foot back and dodged the strike with ease.
But that was exactly what Rukia had expected.
The corner of her mouth curled up, and she pointed her free left hand’s finger at Moriyasu’s chest, reciting fast.
“Hadō #1, Shō.” But in the very next instant, her triumphant smile froze on her face.
Just as Rukia extended her finger to cast the spell, Moriyasu, across from her, had extended a finger too, casting his second but landing first: “Shō.” Rukia’s Kidō had been cancelled out, just like that.
She had no idea what had just happened.
“No spacing out, Rukia.” Having neutralized Rukia’s spell, Moriyasu shifted his finger slightly to aim at her forehead, and recited again.
“Hadō #1, Shō.” A crack sounded as the pellet of compressed air struck her square between the eyebrows, sending her tumbling backward through the air in two full flips before she landed.
She dropped to one knee, a hand rubbing her forehead, her mind still replaying what had just happened.
Why had her own spell just disappeared?
The corner of Moriyasu’s mouth curved up again.
Right after his spell had landed on Rukia, that pink reiatsu off in the distance had stirred again.
Which meant the captain had come both yesterday and today specifically because of Rukia.
And in all of Soul Society, there was exactly one captain-level figure who’d care this much about Rukia.
Once he’d worked out who was hiding in the shadows, Moriyasu decided not to bother with the man any further, and turned to Rukia, smiling as he explained.
“Kidō was already explained pretty clearly last class.
If you counter with a force that’s exactly opposite and carries the same amount of Reishi, you can cancel a Kidō spell out entirely.
This technique is called Kidō Cancellation.” “Kidō Cancellation?” Rukia’s eyes went wide.
“The teacher never taught us anything like that.” She turned her head to look toward the corridor as she spoke, but all she saw was Ounahara sitting there cross-legged, both hands pressed to his forehead, not even looking their way.
She couldn’t help pouting a little.
In the few days since arriving at the academy, she’d started to feel like this teacher just wasn’t all that reliable, nowhere near as good as Moriyasu.
Rukia took a deep breath, reset her stance, and charged at Moriyasu again.
But the result was no different this time either.
She ended up on the ground once more.
Moriyasu held out a hand, palm open, signaling Rukia to stop, and spoke gently.
“I think your problem right now is that you’ve got all this powerful spiritual strength and no good way to actually put it to use.
What you need to learn most right now is how to control your Reishi.” Rukia nodded, expression serious, set her wooden sword down beside her, straightened up, crossed her hands over her chest, and bowed deeply.
“Please, teach me.” “No problem.” Moriyasu walked over to her with a smile, reached out, and pushed gently on her shoulders to straighten her back up.
Then he clenched his right hand into a fist.
“Let’s play a game.
Rock, paper, scissors.
You know it?” Rukia nodded.
“Then it’s simple.
Gather your Reishi into your fist.” Rukia held out her own small fist, closed her eyes, and carefully felt out the flow of Reishi inside her, guiding it to gather at her knuckles.
The Reishi wrapped her fist in a faint, cold white glow.
“Not bad.
First try, and you’ve already condensed it to something like rank fourteen.
You really do have talent, Rukia.” Moriyasu smiled and opened his own clenched fist.
In an instant, it too was wrapped in a layer of Reishi, though only at rank eighteen.
The next instant, his palm shot out and slapped Rukia’s fist aside.
A crack sounded, and the force sent Rukia flying clean off the ground.
She righted herself mid-air and landed on her feet, a flash of surprise in her eyes.
“I see.
If you concentrate too much Reishi in one spot, your overall defense drops off fast.” “Exactly.
Normally, we instinctively spread our Reishi out across the whole body, precisely to protect ourselves better.
Concentrate most of it in one spot, and sure, you get a real boost in attack or defense there.
But everywhere else on your body, the Reishi thins out, and you become that much easier to hurt.” Moriyasu bent down, picked up a few bits of gravel off the ground, tossed them lightly in his hand a couple of times, then pinched one between two fingers of his left hand, pouring Reishi into it as he looked at Rukia and continued.
“So you need to be able to gather Reishi into any part of your body, anytime, anywhere.
Let’s start with rock, paper, scissors.” “I’m going to throw pebbles at you now.
You’ll need to switch your Reishi between wrapping your whole fist, your open palm, and two fingers to defend.” “Got it!” Rukia answered loudly.
Moriyasu flicked his fingers, and the pebble shot toward Rukia, who cycled through rock, paper, and scissors to switch her localized Reishi defense in response.
Neither of them kept their voices down during the exercise; there was no attempt to hide any of it.
Momo, Kira, Renji, and the others training nearby had already had their attention drawn over.
Once they heard Moriyasu’s training method, they all started copying it without a word between them.
The three of them split into a group, one throwing pebbles while the other two used rock, paper, scissors to defend.