Chapter 6: First Day of School
On the first day of school, Shunsui did not want to get up.
"Shunsui, wake up, wake up. It's time for school." Takashi was shaking Shunsui's shoulder.
"Uurrgh . . . Just let me sleep a little longer." Shunsui rolled over and pulled his blanket over his head.
"You'll be late if you don't get up now."
"Five more minutes, mother."
Takashi was fed up with Shunsui, so he brought his hand down on Shunsui's head.
"Get up!!! And I'm not your mother!!!"
"Ow! That hurt!" Shunsui ran to Jūshirō, "Takashi is hitting me."
"Takashi, don't hit Shunsui, but Shunsui, you have to prepare for school."
Takashi just sighed while Shunsui went to change his clothes.
"Aren't you excited for the first day of school, Takashi?"
"Yeah! I can't wait to learn all kinds of cool attacks."
After everyone was all ready, Jūshirō took out the map.
"We're having an all-school assembly back in the courtyard where we first met the Captain-Commander."
"Where we met that old man? I hope there won't be another test."
"It's an all-school assembly so probably not."
The three friends continued chatting all the way to the courtyard. When they arrived, they saw the courtyard was nearly empty, with only a few people standing around. Takashi quickly counted and found out there were only 48 students, including themselves. Eleven people had a Zanpakutō and one person even had a Shikai.
They stood around for a few more minutes before the Captain-Commander and three other people appeared on the podium.
"Welcome to Shinigami Academy, first years, and welcome back, to the rest. We," he gestured to the people standing behind him, "will be your teachers. Shinigami Academy has been open for three years, and I plan to keep it open for thousands of years into the future. To do that, I need the graduates to become stronger. Understood? Become stronger and live, or fall behind and die. Questions?"
All the first years was struck dumb for a moment, as the speech was incredibly short, but several hands quickly went up. One of the teachers stepped forward and pointed at a student.
"When will we graduate?"
"Your teacher will decide on when to graduate you."
"What time does school start and end?"
"Your teacher will decide when it starts and ends."
"When will we get our Zanpakutō?"
"Right after this."
There were more questions, but most of them were answered with "Your teacher will decide __"
'This Shinigami Academy is really different from what it will be like in the future, just like Yamamoto is totally different from how he is in the future. It will be hard to use my knowledge to get ahead now. Hopefully, my talent is enough to keep me alive until I can start using my knowledge.'
Afterwards, the second and third years left to go to their classes with their teacher. The first year teacher appeared in the courtyard. He had short, messy, black hair, and brown eyes. He was clean-shaven and had a youthful look.
"Gather round, gather round!! Form a semi-circle around me! I have some things to say!"
There weren't that many first years, so they easily formed a semi-circle.
"My name is Yoichi Hatano, and I'll be your teacher until you graduate. I'll start things off with a warning; less than half of you will make it to your second year."
There was an uproar at those words.
"Now, now, before you accuse me of lying or anything, how many people do you think were in what is now second year when they were in first year? Don't bother answering, it's a rhetorical question. The answer is 28. Only nine people survived to their second year. What about the third years? Rhetorical question again. They started with 16 people, eight people moved onto their second year, and only three managed to get to third year. What about the fourth years? All of them are dead. So you see why I say that less than half of you will make it to second year. There are 36 first years right now, but I predict there will be less than 15 next year. Because I'm a nice person, I'm still giving you guys one more chance to leave, but once I give you a Zanpakutō, you won't have this chance any more. If you want to leave right now, then you can walk away. You have five minutes to decide."
The students shuffled around, quietly speaking with their friends.
"Four minutes left."
"All right, I'm out. I don't want to die when I can still live for so long. I have a wife and family and I want to continue living for them. There's no point in throwing my life away for nothing. I'm sure they'll understand when I tell them those statistics. Goodbye."
He walked away, and with that, the floodgates opened. People started trickling away, one by one, until only 27 people remained.
"Every year, as our number of students grow, so do the cowards. In the first year, we only had 7 students, but none of them left."
A black haired girl raised her hand and he pointed at her.
"You, speak."
"Was the person who left first a plant?"
"What makes you think that?" Yoichi raised an eyebrow.
"He spoke a lot, strangely much. He also spoke about things dear to us, as if he was trying to remind us of the people we want to spend time with, and who would be sad if we were gone."
"That is some good reasoning. Anyway, let's start class. Let's start by getting Zanpakutōs. Wait a sec."
"Wait! You never answered my question!"
"I never did."
He disappeared, and when he returned, he was carrying a box over his shoulder. He set it down on the ground and pulled off the top. It was filled to the brim with Zanpakutōs.
"Alright, come grab a Zanpakutō. They're all the same, so it doesn't matter which one you grab, just grab one. Ok, everyone got one? Practice for ten minutes then attack me. Don't hold back when you do."
Takashi swung his Zanpakutō around for two minutes, then walked over to Jūshirō and Shunsui, who were also testing them out.
"Ok, we need to think of a plan to beat the teacher. There's no way we can beat him with strength, as we just got our Zanpakutō, and he already has his Shikai, so we'll need to use trickery. Do any of you have any idea what his Shikai is?"
They both shook their heads.
"Well, whatever his Shikai is, it's over if he uses it, so we should figure out how to stop him from using it."
They spoke for three minutes and figured out a plan.
They seperated and practiced for two more minutes, when Shunsui winked at Takashi and Jūshirō. Jūshirō suddenly started coughing and collapsed. Takashi picked Jūshirō up and placed his arm around his shoulder and walked him to the teacher. The teacher was reading a book.
"Teacher, my friend has a disease and it just started acting up. Could I bring him back to our dorms?"
"Be my guest."
Takashi walked past the teacher while supporting Jūshirō. Shunsui walked up to the teacher, with one hand hanging by his side and the other holding his Zanpakutō.
"Teacher, can I ask you several questions?"
"Sure."
"How can I achieve—?"
Suddenly, Shunsui swung his Zanpakutō at the teacher while simultaneously raising his hand that was by his side and pushing it inside Yoichi's mouth. His hand was holding a ball of cloth and now the cloth was in Yoichi's mouth preventing him from speaking. His free hand grabbed Yoichi's clothes to keep him from escaping while he continued swinging his Zanpakutō. At the same time, Jūshirō and Takashi swung their own Zanpakutō at Yoichi from behind. Just when the three seemed like they were going to win, blue balls of light blocked their attack and repulsed them. Shunsui tried to hold on, but was still thrown back. While in the air, six beams of light appeared out of nowhere and stabbed into them. They were immediately paralyzed and crashed onto the ground. Takashi stared at Yoichi with shock on his face. He recognized this Kidō.
'This Kidō is a high level one, and he used it without chanting on three different people at the same time. He's far stronger than I thought. I think it's likely that he has unlocked Bankai. How is this guy so strong? We never even had a chance.'
Yoichi spat out the cloth ball in his mouth.
"Impressive. Now let's see if anyone else can best that. Two minutes until the battle starts."
A student raised his hand and Yoichi nodded. The student took it as a gesture to start.
"Isn't it against the rules to attack before ten minutes had passed?"
Yoichi looked at him with a dumbfounded look.
"So you're saying that when facing an opponent far stronger than you, you should attack them when they're ready to defend? Are you stupid?"
The student immediately flushed red and grew flustered.
"N-No, that's not what I'm saying. An-And, I'm not st-st-stupid. It's just, it's just that this is school r-right now, s-s-so they should r-respect the-the rules."
Yoichi looked at the student like he was stupid.
"What's your name?"
"I'm M-Machido Kisho."
"Kisho, you truly are stupid. The entire point of school is to prepare you for the outside world. Do you think people are going to play by the rules in the outside world? Let me tell you from personal experience; they aren't. They'll do whatever they can to win, and because of that mindset, they'll be the winners. On the other hand, people like you will die without even knowing what happened. Because I've been annoyed by Kisho, I've decided to remove your last minute. Let's fight."
A few minutes later, all the first years had been knocked unconscious.
"I don't really get why everyone cares about the Kuchiki kid, but the black-haired girl wasn't bad. And those three"—he glanced at Shunsui, Takashi, and Jūshirō—"they have talent and intelligence. A very good combination. They'll definitely become some of the strongest Shinigami in the future."
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