Kidō class ended, and the students headed to the dining hall together.
Moriyasu’s little group had just gotten their food and sat down.
Rukia turned to Renji beside her, mouth curling to one side.
“You didn’t manage a single Kidō spell the whole class, and you can still sit here eating without a care in the world?
Idiot.” “I’m just a little rough when it comes to controlling my spiritual power, that’s all.
I’ll go put in extra practice after I eat.” Renji didn’t argue further.
He just grabbed a meatball and shoved it straight into his mouth.
The moment it hit his tongue, his eyes fell shut, his head tilted back, and a single tear even rolled down the corner of his eye.
“Coming to the academy was such a good idea.” Rukia sighed in agreement.
“Seriously.
Back in the Rukongai, when would we ever have eaten food this good, this packed with spiritual power?” Moriyasu Tokoyo took a couple of bites and immediately noticed today’s food was completely different from the past few days.
He spoke up too.
“The Reishi’s at least doubled.
The concentration in this food is way higher than I expected.
Guess they switched up the ingredients because of the lesson today.
If every meal from now on has this much Reishi packed into it, it’d be strange if our spiritual power rank didn’t go up at all.” “Hahaha, speaking of rank going up, I can already feel myself pushing toward fourteen.
Caboose, sure, your Reishi control’s impressive, but you’re still stuck at nineteen, aren’t you?” Renji had finally found something he could beat Moriyasu at, and he laughed as he said it.
But before he’d even finished, his eyes went wide.
Because right at that moment, the spiritual power coming off Moriyasu had noticeably jumped from before.
He said, not quite able to believe it.
“You…
your rank went up?” Moriyasu picked up a meatball and popped it into his mouth before answering.
“I never really ate anything before this, so after eating food loaded with this much Reishi here at school, it’s only natural I’d see some progress.” “Huh?
You never ate anything before?” Momo’s eyes went wide with surprise.
Kira thought it over, then picked up his own meatball and set it on Moriyasu’s plate.
“Moriyasu, you were probably stuck way out in one of the far districts of the Rukongai before, weren’t you?” Moriyasu didn’t turn it down.
He popped the meatball straight into his mouth.
The food at the academy really wasn’t bad, he had to admit.
He nodded.
“Yeah, real far out.
There was nothing there at all, not even grass to eat or water to drink.
I spent a good few years out there.” Truthfully, he had no idea how much time had actually passed in that dark space, or how long he’d been there.
In total darkness like that, there was simply no way to track the passage of time.
Maybe it had only been a couple of days.
Maybe it had been over a decade.
Not until he’d fully absorbed the old man’s power did Eternal Eyes awaken in him.
Only then had he found the seam in that space, torn through it, and arrived in Soul Society.
“I had no idea you had it that rough before.” Rukia murmured after hearing it, staring down at the meatballs on her plate, jaw clenched.
She reached out with a trembling hand, picked up a meatball with her chopsticks, and slowly moved it toward Moriyasu.
But her wrist just wouldn’t straighten out, and her lips kept trembling up and down the whole time.
Crunch.
Moriyasu snatched the meatball right off her chopsticks and popped it into his mouth, chewing away.
“What, you don’t like meatballs?
Or are you on a diet?” “Argh!
You jerk!” Rukia shouted, spinning her face away and furiously demolishing the rest of the food on her own plate.
Momo spoke up then.
“Here, have mine too.
If Moriyasu hadn’t explained it in class today, there’s no way this many people in our class would’ve managed to cast Kidō.” She’d actually meant to say that, out of this whole year’s new students, all nine in their class had managed to cast Kidō, putting them way ahead of everyone else.
But since Renji was right there at the table, still unable to do it, she changed course at the last second.
Renji cleared his plate in a couple of bites, then shot to his feet at once.
“I’m going back to practice.” Just as he took his first step, Moriyasu’s voice came from behind him.
“Red Baboon, your problem isn’t that your control’s clumsy, and it isn’t that you’re not putting in the effort.
You’re just too impatient.
When you’re practicing, try working through the incantation one line at a time.” Renji shouted back, “Got it!” and ran off alone toward the training grounds.
Rukia watched him go and sighed.
“That guy’s always been like this, rushing into everything.” Momo asked quickly, “Rukia, you and Renji have known each other a long time, haven’t you?” There was something loaded in her eyes as she went on.
“You two seem pretty close.” “Yeah, Renji and I met back in the Rukongai.
We used to go steal stuff together all the time, actually.” Rukia crossed her arms, memories of those days flickering through her mind, the corner of her mouth curling up without her meaning it to.
“Whoa, really?” Momo’s eyes practically lit up with stars.
“So are you two, like, that kind of relationship?” Rukia tilted her head.
“What kind of relationship is that?” Momo leaned in close and whispered, “You know, the kind where you get married someday.” Rukia shot her a sideways look.
“What are you even talking about?
Renji and I are just playmates.” Momo studied Rukia’s face closely, and once she was satisfied Rukia wasn’t lying, let out a long, disappointed sigh.
“Aww…” Then she slumped back down, elbows on the table, chin propped in her hands, eyes drifting up toward the ceiling.
“What do you all think of Captain Aizen?” The sudden question caught Rukia off guard, and she missed whatever was behind it, answering plainly, “Captain Aizen’s great.” Kira Izuru, sitting nearby, spoke up.
“Setting your sights on Captain Aizen as a goal, that’s not going to be easy.” As he looked at Momo, something faint and hard to catch flickered through his eyes, a trace of disappointment.
Moriyasu Tokoyo chewed his food in silence, watching the three of them interact.
It really was quite the show, he had to admit.
Thinking back on today, Sosuke Aizen had stepped in for Gengoro Ounahara to teach the new students Kidō, and Moriyasu still had no idea what the man was actually after.
Eternal Eyes could only show him the flow of Reishi, it couldn’t read anyone’s thoughts or expressions, and it certainly couldn’t tell him where someone’s attention was focused.
So who exactly had Aizen been watching?
Going by what he remembered from before, several of this year’s new students were people Aizen had taken a particular interest in.
First and foremost, obviously, was Momo Hinamori, who would go on to become the Fifth Division’s lieutenant.
Kira Izuru beside her would become the Third Division’s lieutenant.
And Renji Abarai would end up as the Sixth Division’s lieutenant as well.
Come to think of it, Rukia was actually the one who’d end up holding the lowest position in the Gotei 13 out of all of them.
But thinking it over more carefully, that seemed strange.
Going by the current situation, Rukia’s rank of eleven gave her an overwhelming advantage.
After the exam less than a month from now, she’d almost certainly make it into the Advanced Class.
Even if all of them ended up in that class together, receiving the exact same starting point and education, given where Rukia was starting from, barring something unexpected happening, there was no way she wouldn’t become a lieutenant after graduation.
Could it be because she’d end up in the Thirteenth Division?
Moriyasu turned it over a bit more, then thought back to today’s Kidō training.
Having someone as skilled as Aizen demonstrate it in person had made a difference.
Watching it through Eternal Eyes had let him grasp the basic principles of Kidō clearly and directly.
If it had just been Ounahara up there, it definitely wouldn’t have worked out the same way.
He could only hope Aizen would find the time to keep coming by to teach over the next few days.
This kind of hands-on, practical knowledge was exactly what he wanted to keep learning.
“Alright, I’m done too.
I’m heading back to the training grounds to practice more.
What about you all?” Rukia’s voice cut through Moriyasu’s thoughts.
Moriyasu turned his head and found Rukia looking at him.
He answered with a slight twist of his mouth.
“I’m thinking I’ll take a walk by the river.
A stroll after eating, you know, live to ninety-nine and all that.” “But Moriyasu, we’re going to become Shinigami, beings who can live a thousand years.
What’s this ‘ninety-nine’ business supposed to mean?
You trying to get yourself killed?” Moriyasu blinked.
“Huh, good point.
‘Live to a hundred’ sounds more like a curse for a Shinigami.” Not quite sure why Rukia had reacted so strongly, he added, unhurried: “Training day in and day out isn’t much fun.
I’ve already got Kidō completely figured out, anyway.” “Hmph, is that so?” Rukia crossed her arms, the corner of her mouth curling up into a mischievous grin.
“On my way over here, I overheard some upperclassmen talking about Kidō.
I didn’t catch all of it, but they said Kidō can be cast without the incantation at all, straight out, no chanting.” “What?
Kidō can be cast without the incantation?
That can’t be right.
Isn’t the incantation supposed to be what changes the Reishi’s nature and opens the pathway for it?
How would that even work without it?” Momo exclaimed, startled.
Kira Izuru chimed in, backing Rukia up.
“She’s right.
Kidō really can be cast without the incantation.” His family had actually had a Shinigami before, and he’d seen it firsthand.
“So how does it actually work, then?” Momo’s surprise only deepened.
Rukia turned to stare straight at Moriyasu, a smug look on her face.
“Bet you can’t do it, huh?” Moriyasu stood up and started walking toward the training grounds without answering.
The other three hurried after him.
By the time they reached the training grounds, Renji was in the middle of shouting, “Hadō #1: Shō!” A shockwave burst from his fingertip, the range fairly wide, but it dissipated on its own after barely ten-odd meters.
“Still too wild.” Moriyasu picked out a target at random, took his position roughly thirty meters in front of it, and raised his finger without ceremony.
“Hadō #1: Shō!” A bullet of compressed air shot from his fingertip at once, striking the target thirty meters away with pinpoint accuracy and a sharp crack.
“You cast it without the incantation!” Rukia’s eyes lit up as she shouted.
“Teach me, teach me, quick!” She’d already guessed Moriyasu’s grasp of Kidō ran deep enough that he’d probably know all sorts of advanced applications, which was exactly why she’d deliberately provoked him back in the dining hall.
She hadn’t actually expected he’d pull out something this good.
Kira Izuru marveled beside her.
“Incantation-free casting is something even upperclassmen, even graduates, don’t always manage.
And Moriyasu just pulled it off outright.
That’s incredible.” “Moriyasu, how did you do that?” Momo asked loudly too.
Renji, having just barely managed half of Hadō #1: Shō, had been about to puff his chest out with pride.
But right then, Moriyasu’s incantation-free cast bent him right back over, and he clamped his mouth shut, not saying a word.
Moriyasu then spread all five fingers open at once.
“Hadō #1: Shō!” Fwip fwip fwip fwip— Five evenly spaced impacts sounded off from the target.
He turned his head to look at Rukia, whose mouth had fallen wide open and stayed that way.
“Casting without the incantation is simple enough.
You already understand the principle behind the spell.
So as long as you carve the pathway it runs along, how it condenses, and how it changes the nature of the Reishi, into muscle memory, you can naturally cast it without the incantation at all.
That said, this method’s generally faster, but it does tend to weaken the effect a little.
That’s the gist of it.
Good luck.” Out of the corner of his eye, Moriyasu spotted a pathway that had no business being at the training grounds, waved a hand in farewell, and left.
Rukia and the others immediately picked out a target and got back to practicing Hadō #1: Shō.
Moriyasu headed toward the small river out past the edge of town, but after walking a while, he noticed that the pathway that shouldn’t have been there wasn’t following him, and it left him puzzled.
That pathway a moment ago had carried a pink tinge within the red, dense and solid to an almost frightening degree.
It could only belong to someone at captain level or above.
He just had no idea which captain would sneak over to secretly watch the first-years training.
After turning it over, the most likely answer was that this was one of Aizen’s subordinates.
He’d already gotten a look at the pathway now, so the next time he happened to run into whichever captain it belonged to, he’d be able to connect the two without any trouble.
No point dwelling on it further.
And so Moriyasu strolled along by the little river at a leisurely pace, letting his meal settle.