Walking around Karakura alone and with sight was a strange experience.

There was a humanity in the action that I realised I’d been missing. I had been pulled out of touch from the world around me so quickly, in no small part due to the introduction of this mysterious other world that I was slowly being dragged towards.

It was relaxing to walk the streets without fear of walking into anything, or the worry of bumping into others around me. I let myself revel in the odd sonder of walking by someone and wondering what their life is like, trying to flesh out a story behind them.

A young woman and a little girl, a toddler even. She was only twenty some years old, but it was possible that it was her child. The child would have been born while she was a teenager, likely. Howe had her family reacted? Was she even the mother at all?

In the slow walking, something that could hardly fatigue me, I found a proper absolution from the intense training I had been pushing myself through. The responsibility and pressure slowly lessened, like a shaken soda bottle as you slowly opened the screw top. Instead of being so focused on only myself, I tried to push my mind outwards onto other people.

Shamefully, it was harder than I would have liked it to be. I’m not a people person, really, Suzumi had me beat in that field and I can find it exceptionally difficult to relate to others—no doubt a holdover from my childhood.

But as I slowly released my attention onto others around me, I began to recontextualise my life. Step after step, I was coming to understand that I was both with aim and without it at the same time. I had the aim of getting stronger, more powerful, fixing my soul, learning spiritual sense, gaining spiritual pressure, so on and so forth…

But why?

Why did I want those things? I was scared; that was the easy answer. I was doing it all because I wanted to feel safe and secure at night, and I wanted to make sure that nothing could simply walk into my room and kill me while I slept. But I couldn’t guarantee that. I could probably never guarantee that.

So, if being scared and self-protective wasn’t a good enough excuse—something I had been caught up in for so many years as a child—what was a good reason? What was strength and power without a good reason for it?

Was I nice enough, or selfless enough, to want power to protect others? For Suzumi and Uyu, maybe. For the tens of random souls we’d saved out on our Hollow hunts? It lacked the same reality or levity. To do that, I’d have to be an astronomically better person than I think I actually am and sacrifice a great deal to do so.

I just don’t think I could do that to myself.

So, what reason should I search for power? Self-preservation seems like a slippery slope, the end being self-destruction, and selfless pursuit of protection for others seemed almost as bad. It was a painful topic to internally consider. I was trying to tear my thought processes from the base instincts that I held, fear and protectiveness. All the same, I kept coming up short with good moralistic arguments for trying to gain as much power as I am.

I had berated myself so heavily not a month before for not understanding myself, and yet I now tried to distance myself from my own base desires, to give myself good reason to move on and upwards without becoming something I didn’t want to be.

Quickly enough, I had found myself walking within the darkness of night, my limited vision obscured further by the lack of sunlight to aid me with silhouettes framed by the golden sun’s rays. I must have been walking for hours, contemplating this strange moral and philosophical conundrum in my mind on repeat.

I found myself unperturbed by the darkness, despite being far outside my element. I had fought enough Hollows at night to feel at home in the faint moonlight above. Where in Karakura was I now? Probably in Kitakawase, the north-western most suburb. A nice area, all things considered, one of the nicest amongst the western suburbs in Karakura.

Almost as instinct, my senses were wide open, seeking any sound, movement, spiritual activity or even discernible souls. I hadn’t noticed it happening, but I was a professional now, my mind running through a script as it scanned my surroundings for threats and anything else that might either harm or need help. It was funny how becoming good at something crept up on you like that—one day you begin, totally inexperienced, and then one day you wake up and realise that you’re starting to get really good at what you’re doing.

I felt a minor disturbance just outside of what I was setting my ribbon sense to. I immediately widened my range, focusing a little as I did, and found a conglomeration of bright white ribbons, all within one stretch of street. There weren’t any other souls nearby, so I could only assume that there was something going on.

Without my direct input, my legs launched me to the top of a nearby roof just within my sightline. The bombastic movement gave me a pang of pleasure, experiencing the freedom that I’d crafted with my power. I flew across the rooftops, my feet easily pushing off from the uneven surfaces—spiritual energy allowing me to cling to the surfaces ever so slightly.

The subtle destruction of conventional physics delighted my mind, coming as close to legitimately flying as I might ever be capable of aside from instant movement. My regular clothing was holding up surprisingly well, despite the large and powerful movements I was performing in them.

I as I drew closer to the group of five bright soul ribbons, I did another sweep of the street and found exactly what I was bargaining for. The faint trace of a Hollow’s ribbon.

My body pushed itself harder towards the Hollow’s location, keeping tabs on the other ribbons that surrounded it. No doubt they were high-spec humans, maybe even in Jinta’s crew—though I hadn’t ever met any of them where we usually patrolled.

With a final flip off a roof, I was within the same street as the other ribbons, and I let the ribbon sense drift into the back of my mind—letting other senses take precedence for the moment.

Immediately I smelt blood, a sickening metallic smog filling the air with a severe pungency—assailing my nose as I surveyed my senses like a checklist. I could hear others around me, lining up perfectly with the bright white ribbons. There was a lot of yelling, and some screaming, but I was focused—searching for signs of the Hollow itself.

“Fuck! Call Jinta, this thing is way stronger than we bargained for!” One voice called. The voice belonged to a young man who was quickly backpedalling from where I assumed the Hollow was, further down the street. He entered my little bubble of sight, allowing me to see the man in full clarity. He was probably in his late teens, wrapped in a dark cloak that seemed like it hid padded armour beneath it. He was a fairly average looking Japanese guy, and aside from the speed of his movements, you probably could never guess he was strong at all.

“What’s the situation?” I called out to him, taciturn as I could manage as I let my ribbon sense scour the area for a clearer view of the Hollow’s ribbon. The man’s head whipped towards me, his hand suddenly holding a decently long sword of western design. He pointed it at me and it glowed with spiritual energy, though not much.

“Who the fuck are you?” He warned, resetting his stance to face me properly in the ensuing moments. I looked away from the man, refocusing my ribbon sense as a deeper scan of the surroundings caught on something.

“I’m here to help. Tell me what’s going on, and why I smell someone bleeding out—then I can help you beat the shit out of a Hollow.” The man hesitated, the emotion so strong that I could see it in his ribbon as it cringed in on itself, “Now, would be nice.”

“Fucking tell him already, Reo.” A pained voice called from a few metres away, where the bloody smell was emanating from. None of the others made to comment, they were too busy being on watch. The Hollow wasn’t out in the open, then. An ambush predator.

“Alright, fuck. We got called out here ‘cause some of the soul sensitives in the area were picking up minor signs of Hollows. They didn’t seem real worried, so we went out without talking to Jinta or Ururu. This Hollow is crazy strong, it keeps popping out of fucking nowhere. What are we even supposed–”

I tuned the younger man out as I focused in on my ribbon sense once again, the new wave of my scan grabbed a hold of the Hollow’s ribbon in truth now, letting it appear in my vision atop a roof nearby. The man, who was still rambling—probably trying to cope with being truly terrified—had stopped paying attention altogether.

In a split second, I felt the Hollow move, it’s wide, bone-white ribbon flicking from side to side like a cat’s tail. I grimaced as I strained my legs, pushing in a tremendous amount of spiritual energy to support the ridiculous movement. I reached the man, who only just realised I was racing towards him, and slammed a palm into his chest—sending him flying a few metres to the side.

The Hollow appeared within my vision, blurring with the sheer speed of it’s movement. It’s small, bug-like form blurred with the speed inside my vision, but it’s outstretched, lancelike arm passed through the air harmlessly—right where the chest of the man had been only a fraction of a second earlier.

I saw a black and empty eye stare at me for just a second before it’s clawed foot struck against the ground, resulting in a loud bang and the Hollow disappearing from my sight entirely.

“W-what the fuck, man?” Reo accused, the young man I had pushed was fine, thankfully. However, with the Hollow appearing so quickly, I expect he hadn’t even seen it. I ignored the man’s squawking as my mind returned to my ribbon sense.

I had a good handle on the Hollow’s ribbon now, a long and fat thing—far to strong to be any old Hollow. Though it was nothing in comparison to Phantom’s ribbon, not even close. This Hollow was still simply a Hollow, but far more potent than the regular, mindless thing that we so casually slay.

“You know,” I called loudly, my voice enhanced ever so slightly with spiritual energy, “you’re far too powerful to be playing games with runts like these. You could have taken them out twice over before I even got here.” The surroundings went silent, the attention of the other four high-spec humans who I’d paid no attention to were now placed solely on me. All of them were weak, though they had some potential for strength in them—they were nothing in front of a Hollow like this.

“Who the fuck are you talking to, idiot?” The stupid teenager yelled at me from his place on the street. Though I expected it was anger born out of a paralysing fear. From an alley nearby, a distorted and garbled laugh rang out, making the others around me panic—turning towards the sound.

But I wasn’t so stupid. I turned my body towards the sound but kept my mind open to the actual location of the Hollow’s ribbon, directly opposite where the sound was coming from. Just a second later, the Hollow moved towards the ribbon of the wounded high-spec human. The movement came first, then the bang of the sudden acceleration—but I was already moving, my legs already prepared to make a sudden, explosive movement.

This time, I couldn’t very well push the wounded person out of the way—something that’d likely kill them or do significant damage. I was left with a very unfavourable option, which was trying tank the hit head on. Now, I had realised I wasn’t going to be a selfless protector, but I couldn’t let someone die right in front of me just because I was being a fraidy-cat.

With a grit of my teeth, I inserted myself between the lance-arm and the wounded man on the floor, whipping my hands towards the oncoming strike to change it’s direction ever so slightly. I had expected that I’d be able to defend against the blow pretty well, maybe be sent flying from the force of it being dispersed across my spiritual shielding, and then the pressure and energy that cloaked my body.

However, even as I pumped it all up to maximum, watching the world slow to a crawl as my brain kicked into overdrive, I could only watch helplessly as the bug-like Hollow’s arm pierced through my defences and into my flesh.

The pain coursed across my body with a malicious abandon, the lance-arm piercing through the side of my abdomen and through the muscle and organs within. In this moment, as the world was slowed to almost no movement at all, I could see the Hollow properly.

It was maybe five foot tall, extremely small for a Hollow this powerful. It was covered in a chitinous armour, plated across it’s body to where almost none of it’s black flesh was even visible. On it’s back where two wings, fluttering quickly even within this slowed time. It’s mask was almost hornet-like in structure, it’s two black eyeholes almost making it look like the skull of an insect. Around it’s mask was a fuzzy hair, covering up any exposed neck from view.

As my eyes met it’s, a fire ran across me that I’d never felt before—a pure burning sensation within my chest, pushing away the severe pain from my mind almost entirely. The Hollow quickly pulled it’s lance from my abdomen, letting the bright blood pour from the wound—destroying my clothes.

A moment later, the Hollow was gone, claw marks the only evidence that it had ever been here.

“H-holy fuck.” The man behind me groaned as he put pressure on the wound in his thigh. I turned my head to look at him, the tall and muscled man was sweating heavily and bleeding profusely—he’d need medical attention and fast if he wanted to live.

“You lot.” I yelled, my voice booming with a strength I was surprised I could control while there was a hole in my gut, “Get out of here and get your friend to Kurosaki Clinic in Minamikawase. I’ll take care of the bug.” There was a long, malicious peal of laughter from the shadows of the street, a cackling, horrible thing that you’d swear was being played through a static-y television.

“You think you can get them away from me while I hunt?” The Hollow said, it’s voice nasally and filled with an intense primal hunger. I pushed out another scan of my surrounding, finding the Hollow’s ribbon right where I expected it to be. I started to laugh along with it, the fire within my chest burning brighter and brighter by the second.

“Oh yes, I do think so,” I said as I stared into the alley where the Hollow was hiding, it’s form cloaked. “Do you really think you’re the only hunter around?” I growled, an anger arising from the depths of my soul—an instinctive understanding that this was incorrect, that the right of power was mine.

“You say with a bleeding hole in your body, Human.” It snarled as it realised I knew it’s location. It sprang from it’s hiding spot, the speed so intense that it was difficult to track even when I was staring directly at it. However, this time I was prepared; I grabbed the Hollow’s lance, the blistering speed tearing the skin off of my hand as I clenched it. I whipped my hand towards it’s own stomach, piercing through the chitin with difficulty, but managing to put a hole in the thing with my bare hand and a great deal of spiritual energy.

It screamed, the air around the two of us shuddering with the clashing spiritual pressures. If the group of high-spec humans hadn’t dragged their friend away, then I wouldn’t be surprised if it had made the muscled man pass out.

“Two can play at that game, bug.” I snarled, my face warping into a predator’s smile. “Let’s see who of us is the real hunter, shall we?”