An Arcanist in Karakura Town 51 (Patreon)

An Arcanist in Karakura Town

Chapter 51

-VB-

Marris Alan

With the grandniece of our not belligerent local onmyoji out of the way after she got her ass handed to her by yours truly, I went back home and did what I normally did: experiment. As I have been doing so, I focused mostly on the space expansion tinkertech. I did promise Orihime that I would perfect it, after all. It was getting there. I still had to find out the minor kinks that led to 15% failure rate and the failures were simply when it refused to budge the space.

Or that was the plan.

“Been a while since we met,” I grunted when Kurosaki Ichigo of all people began to walk next to me. After I’d taken care of that onmyoji brat, he just appeared out of nowhere from around the corner and began walking with me without his usual previous belligerence.

I wondered where that attitude went.

“Yeah,” he grunted. “... Don’t you go to school or something?”

I glanced at the teen before realizing that, for all my actions and memories, I was biologically a teen as well so it sucked for me, too.

“No,” I replied. “I got better things to do than go to school that doesn’t teach me anything important.”

“What about friends?”

“Do I look like I’m here for friends?”

“... Hollows don’t appear as often anymore.”

“I might have something to do with that,” I replied.

“... Thanks.”

“Hmm?”

“You made the town safer. Whatever it is that you did, including that weird fucking thing that made me feel terrible.”

Kurosaki? Thanking me?

Huh?

“... You’re welcome,” I replied. And then I couldn’t help it. “Have you been getting training? It sounds like it.”

“Oh, fuck off.”

“As long as you don’t cause any collateral damage.”

“And you don’t?”

“Nope,” I replied with a pop. “I cause casualties.”

Ichigo scowled. “You kill way too easily.”

“A Hollow is also a human, Ichigo. The death of an ego, regardless of how it happens, is still murder. Besides, I never kill someone who doesn’t deserve it.”

“And who deserves it?”

“Someone who comes after me with the intent to kill.”

From the way he remained silent on the matter for the rest of our walk before he turned left to go home, he couldn’t argue with my flawless argument.

But I did wonder.

When I inevitably leave this Earth for another with my girls in tow, what was going to happen? It’s obvious that the Quincies were going to be the initial target of both the Espada and the Seireitei. However, with the spiritual particles needed to make the Key gone, there would be little Aizen could do to complete his goal. There was no guarantee that the natural condensation of spiritual particles would coalesce over another location within a reasonable timeframe. Hell, for all I knew, it might take hundreds of years. But then again, shinigamis certainly had that kind of timeframe.

-VB-

Soi Fon

“He’s planning something, I know it,” she grumbled.

“And if he is?” Yoruichi-sama asked from the front of the room. One of the prettier members of the 2nd Division was right next to her on his knees, feeding Yoruichi-sama grapes each time she beckoned. “He is not someone you can fight.”

“He is just a mortal human!”

“Yes, and he is also someone who survived multiple assassination attempts of this very division while it was under your care,” she replied without a change in tone. “We also have a treaty with him, and I would ask that you don’t blow up the town my cousin is staying at.”

Soi Fon looked away.

“... Yoruichi-sama, may I ask why Gotei 13 is taking him so leniently? Are his weapons not a threat to the balance of souls? Is not a few shinigamis worth taking him out?”

“We don’t know.”

“... Excuse me?”

“We don’t know if he has contingency plans. We don’t know the true strength of his defensive barrier around his workshop. We don’t know if that is truly his most powerful weapon. We don’t know anything about him except what he’s shown us.” She looked at her. “And assassins do not silence someone while going in blind into a job.”

“Yes, mistress.”

“Besides,” she grinned. “Kisuke actually likes the little shit. Says he’s got spunk and ingenuity.”

“Enough to let him roam freely…?”

“What exactly does he do?” she snorted. “All he does is play around with his two girlfriends and kick the ass of anyone who thought they could kill him. Have you not noticed that each time someone thought they could win against him, they ended up on their ass or dead?”

“So, what, we’re just going to wait for him to die?”

“... Essentially, yes,” she replied.

“Huh?”

“The boy is paranoid as hell. The scientists and psychologists are pretty sure that he’s not going to teach anyone how to make those bombs of his, not when they could be used against him.” The serving shinigami changed the grapes for strawberries at her mistress’s hand gesture, and handed her one with a toothpick. “At most, he’s going to live for a hundred years.”

“And the captain-commander is okay with that…?”

“Yes,” Yoruichi replied. “Especially since Karakura Town is no longer the center of the connection between the three realms. What he does in that city really doesn’t matter anymore unless he goes out of his way to constantly bomb the connecting locations like Karakura Town used to be.”

“... Irrelevant, huh.”

“Yes, but powerful enough that, since we don’t have to directly confront him anymore, we keep him at bay with treaties and agreements.” She then swallowed the strawberry on top of the toothpick she was holding and then pointed the toothpick at Soi Fon after chewing and then swallowing. “What we should be concerned about is the traitor Aizen, his followers, and the Hollows he’s empowered. And he is part of the reason why we are ignoring the human for the moment.”

“Why?”

“Because Aizen is definitely upset with him, if the way weaker Hollows still regularly visit the outskirts of the town,” she grinned. “But because of the way Karakura Town has been turned into a … spiritual desert, weak Hollows can’t survive long in there anymore.”

Soi Fon’s eyes widened. “A spiritual desert…?”

“Yes,” she hummed. “In fact, if Ichigo-kun did not have a human body of his own, then we would be feeling very parched all day every day. It’s why we don’t have shinigami there anymore. Aside from Karakura Town no longer being the connecting location, it is hard for non-seated shinigamis to remain there without being in pain from their reiryoku being slowly sapped.”

“I … did not know that.”

She nodded. “Not many do outside of 12th Division. That’s what they are calling it, by the way. Spiritual Desert Phenomenon, where spirits go to die. I’m not even sure if the boy knows what he’s created, and we certainly don't want him to make more of it.”

-VB-

A/N: essentially, an explanation as to why the shinigamis are leaving the MC alone. It ain't just because of the bomb but their aftermath. Kind of like actual nukes.