*Ring ring ring—*
As the school bell rang, the idle chatter came to an end.
Everyone returned to their seats and resumed the lesson.
“Hey—” Ichigo nudged the desk behind him and asked in a low voice, “Is something wrong?”
“Nothing,” Rukia replied flatly.
“This is class time.
Pay attention to the lesson, Kurosaki-kun!”
“You…
you never seem to remember I’m a student when we’re working!”
…
“How strange.”
As the final period of the afternoon ended, students began packing their things to head home or attend club activities.
The teacher on the podium suddenly murmured to himself.
“Hmm?
Is something wrong, teacher?” Orihime, who was sitting in the front, overheard the murmur.
“What’s strange?”
“This Kurosaki kid.”
“For the past month, Kurosaki has been asking to go to the restroom during class constantly.
Sometimes Kuchiki, Ishida, Chad, and you would follow along,” the teacher said, sounding puzzled.
“But today, not one of you did it once.”
“…”
“If you didn’t look so unlike a couple, I would have reported this already.”
“Um…
we were just using the restroom.
It’s just that we’ve been eating together lately, and we all got food poisoning or something…”
“Well, I don’t care about that,” the teacher said indifferently.
“As long as I know you aren’t doing anything bad and your grades aren’t dropping, it’s fine.”
“Hehe…”
As night fell, even the dense Ichigo noticed something was off.
Since resolving the long-nosed Gillian last night, the Soul Society’s communication device hadn’t made a single sound.
Compared to before, the frequency had plummeted.
“Hey—Rukia!” Ichigo pushed open Rukia’s door without hesitation.
“Is that communication device of yours brok—?”
As the door opened, he was met with an empty room.
The girl who had lived here for a month was nowhere to be found.
The room had been cleaned thoroughly, as if no one had ever lived there at all.
“Yuzu—” Ichigo walked to the stairs and called out to his sister.
“Have you seen Rukia?”
“Rukia-nee hasn’t come back at all today!” Yuzu shouted back from the living room downstairs, where she had started practicing cooking since returning from school.
“Maybe she went to play with Orihime-nee and the others?”
“Strange…” Ichigo returned to Rukia’s room. This chapter is updated first at g.com.
“She just disappeared on her own after school…
huh?”
Looking around, Ichigo spotted a piece of paper on the desk.
Picking it up, he saw the words: [Ichigo!
I’ve returned to the Soul Society!
Goodbye!] followed by a small drawing of a rabbit.
“What is this?”
Muttering, Ichigo flipped the note over and found more writing on the back: [Don’t come looking for me!
Remember!!]
“…What the heck?” Ichigo scratched his head.
“Telling me not to look for her…
does she want me to find her or not?
I hate people who speak in riddles.”
Crumpling the note into a ball, Ichigo tossed it into the trash can.
His Reiatsu shifted as the black Shihakushō manifested upon him, and his dual blades appeared.
“Don’t wait for me for dinner!
I’ve got something to take care of!”
“Okay—”
…
‘This should be far enough…’
Estimating the distance in his mind, Rukia was already far from the Kurosaki Clinic, but she still felt uneasy and quickened her pace.
*Whoosh—*
A light breeze sounded.
As if sensing something, Rukia looked back and saw a black butterfly fluttering in the air.
Set against the night sky, it looked ethereal and poignant.
“They’re here.” Her expression darkened as Rukia murmured, “That was too fast…”
*Swish—*
A traditional gate suddenly appeared in the air.
As the doors slowly slid open to the sides, a man dressed in a black kimono, carrying a sword on his shoulder, stepped out.
“Criminal Rukia Kuchiki!” A man with striking red hair, wearing black goggles and large tattoos on his brow, spoke with a fierce expression.
“For your collusion with the former Captain of the Twelfth Division, the great sinner Kisuke Urahara—who caused the deaths of several Captains and Lieutenants a century ago—you are hereby arrested and returned to the Soul Society!”
“Renji!” Seeing the newcomer, Rukia couldn’t help but cry out.
“Are you Renji Abarai?!”
“Tell the truth, Rukia!” Renji Abarai jumped down, his blade pointing directly at Rukia.
“Your contact with Kisuke Urahara…
what exactly have you done?!”
“I…”
“Have you spent too much time with humans?”
“What do you mean, humans…
even though I’m in a Gigai, I…”
“Otherwise, how could you make an expression that looks so human?!” Renji barked, before abruptly changing his tone. This chapter was taken from g.com without permission.
“Right, Captain Kuchiki?”
“Brother…
Byakuya?”
From behind the gate, another person slowly emerged.
He was similarly dressed in a black kimono with a sword at his waist.
He had black hair, a cold countenance, and wore unique ornaments on his head and a white scarf around his neck.
Unlike Renji Abarai, this man wore a white Haori.
If one were to look at the back, they would see a large character for ‘Six’ printed on it.
“Rukia…” The black-haired Shinigami looked down at Rukia, his voice a strange murmur.
“Nii…
Sama…” As if struck by terror, Rukia’s face turned deathly pale.
“How could it be you…
I’m just someone like me…”
“…You also carry the name of Kuchiki.” The black-haired Shinigami, Byakuya Kuchiki, said coldly.
“By both sentiment and reason, it is only fitting that I personally bring you back to the Soul Society.”
“…I suppose so…”
“Speak up, Rukia!”
The blade ruthlessly sliced across Rukia’s cheek.
The snowy white steel reflected her image as thin streaks of blood slid down her face.
“Stop resisting!” The owner of the blade, Renji Abarai, shouted.
“Confess now!
What exactly are you and Kisuke Urahara plotting!”
“Nothing…
at all.”
“Liar!!” Renji Abarai pulled several photographs from his robes.
“These are photos taken by the Twelfth Division of your meetings with Kisuke Urahara over the last few days!”
“…”
The photos were genuine.
Rukia knew it, and it was the truth.
The former friend before her was not lying, nor was he framing her.
“You…!!” Renji Abarai grit his teeth.
With that, Renji Abarai swung his blade.
Rukia stepped back just in time, narrowly dodging the strike, though the blade still expanded the wound on her face.
“You know very well that I only wanted you to dodge,” Renji Abarai said coldly.
“Next time, I won’t…!”
*Swish!*
A blue arrow of light struck with blinding speed.
Renji Abarai’s pupils shrank violently as he quickly brought his sword across his chest to block it, his body forced back several steps.
“I don’t know what you two are trying to do.” Holding a blue bow in his right hand, the Quincy Uryū Ishida said calmly, “But Kuchiki-san is barely my friend; I can’t let you two bully her like this.”