With a quick shift of his foot, Silas vanished from the store.
Walking high above the clouds, on the very air itself, he scanned Karakura Town beneath his feet with each step taken. His destination is the Kurosaki household.
Things didn’t seem out of the ordinary. Forgotten characters like Orihime and Tatsuki were still young—hardly the age to enter high school yet. Uryū was also around their age and still found solace in his abode. Chad himself hadn’t been sensed due to being in Mexico with his grandfather.
Silas took into account this piece of information, understanding that Bleach’s main story still hadn’t taken place yet.
After passing by the bustling streets under him, he finally arrived at the familiar estate of Ichigo’s residence. When he kneeled down to enhance his visual senses, he discovered that Masaki Kurosaki wasn’t present.
There was a reason why he took his time getting here. If she were out and about doing motherly things, Silas would know. But since there was no sign or trace of her Quincy spiritual pressure, that could only mean one thing: she died exactly like she should have.
Silas, finding no more reason to linger here, left.
His steps took him through the familiar streets towards Kisuke’s shop. Kisuke, whose story was not truly expanded on after he was exiled from the Soul Society, shouldn’t have made contact with the slain Visoreds. The two had similar goals in mind, but Kisuke, at the end of the day, was still a Soul Reaper. And Visoreds didn’t mingle with Soul Reapers.
Silas, always the opportunist, was never one to pass up a chance to acquire new knowledge, especially if it could be used as leverage.
The weathered wooden doors of the shop slid open with a welcoming creak. Kisuke stepped out, yawning, a fan obscuring half his face. A slow, knowing smile spread across his features as he basked in the daylight.
He seemed to have just woken up from a nap.
"Tessai!" he yelled, his voice deceptively soft. "You ever get the feeling someone’s watching you?"
“There was this woman who wanted to stalk me until—”
“Okay! Forget I asked!”
A shadow of amusement could be seen in Silas's eyes as he looked below. There didn’t seem to be anything odd. Characters like Jinta and Ururu weren’t present due to not having been created yet.
If this was the case, everything had been following the course that would unfold in later years. Silas hadn’t disrupted the timeline in the slightest, meaning that the demise of the Visoreds was evident.
He descended to the shop, softly planting his feet on the ground. Kisuke, who was directly in front of him, couldn’t see, smell, or sense a thing. It was ironic to believe that two of his own inventions would be used against him—the Hōgyoku and the cloak.
Silas casually walked inside without being acknowledged. He ignored the two as he searched for any devices that might prove valuable.
The last time he was here, after Kisuke and him fought, he could barely make out anything in the store. The former had constructively planted an unknown seal on him, rendering Silas weak to the point he couldn’t even read.
Now that he was taking a closer look at the store with a clear mindset, a lot of the devices could be useful. Perhaps not for Silas, but maybe an Arrancar of his choosing.
Kisuke had a lot of prototypes, all of which Silas knew he could finish. There were things like the Anti-Iron Skin Armour invention. It was unfathomable that Kisuke would think of creating it so early. Never could anyone say this character wasn’t a genius, seeing through people’s schemes beforehand.
‘Never trust anyone but God,’ Silas thought to himself, knowing what led to the shopkeeper’s demise.
After a while, he took his leave, a subtle shift in his demeanor marking the end of the pedants. Opening another portal, Silas stepped forward.
He had a new path to explore, a trail of clues to follow that could help him achieve his goals. The precipice world trickled its goo as normal, but something felt odd. The blur of shifting colours made the landscape seem distorted.
Silas concentrated, focusing his intent on the desired destination. When he passed through the light on the other end, he arrived back in the Soul Society. Only, he wasn’t exactly where he left; he was somewhere deep within district eighty of East Rukongai.
This was strange. And what was that feeling he got while in the precipice world? It had to be analyzed. Perhaps he might find a breakthrough.
As a result, he opened another Senkaimon, which he was certain would lead him back to Karakura Town. When he entered through the portal, the same occurrence happened. The precipice world seemed distorted. Something like this wasn’t the cause of the street sweeper.
Disregarding these thoughts, he decided to wait a little for the distortion to stop. Things didn’t settle, so he lowered his spiritual pressure. Only then did the substance on the walls start to act normally.
Despite wearing the cloak, Silas, believing he was the cause, decided this could be useful for him one day. As such, he exited the other portal of the tumultuous space between worlds. And when he stepped foot on land, he found himself in a modern city.
The air felt oppressive and heavy, and though he concealed his spiritual pressure, a lingering sense of unease prickled along his skin. He surveyed his surroundings, his eyes narrowing in suspicion.
This was not Karakura Town. No, he was in America!
Houses and structures littered the horizon, but any sign of life was conspicuously absent. The streets were deserted, cars were abandoned haphazardly, and an eerie silence hung over the place.
‘How did I end up here?’ Silas thought to himself.
Had he miscalculated and arrived in a different realm, devastated by some unknown cataclysm? Or, was this the real world?
The place he was in was undoubtedly Boston, Massachusetts. And how did he learn that? Because this was his hometown.