The Double Edged Sword

08

Across Karakura town we watch as the sky begins to crack and shatter until a large hollow beast pushes its way through into the peaceful blue sky. It's head is the only part of its body that is exposed is its large masked face before an arrow comes out of nowhere smashing into its face completely destroying it. Following the arrows trail we see Ishida congratulating himself for managing to destroy the first hollow to appear. 

"First one down." he mumbled more to himself until the side of his shirt was grabbed and he was hurled to the ground by a very angry Ichigo. "What's with that look Kurosaki Ichigo?" he questioned calming with the seething boy brought his face a mere inch from his own. 

"Return it to normal. Drive the hollows back!" he ordered sweat coming down his face. 

"Don't speak rashly, you saw it didn't you? What I just did? The 'death is cast' one could say. Soon hollows lured by the bait will flood this town, with that being said. Instead of grabbing me, I think you should run. If you wish to protect as many people from hollows as possible. And who knows, maybe the missing Yamamto Izumi may also appear to protect your beloved town too. Or wait, she would be protecting you, just like she always has right?" he snickered as he pulled himself from the ground and walked behind Ichigo. 

"You bastard!" Ichigo yelled wanting to punch the boy and just destroy him all together for putting them into this mess but his next words threw him off is train of thought. 

"Oh, and you should be careful, you should know by now that hollows have a tendency to prefer humans with high spiritual power as their targets." Ishida said not looking back at him as Ichigo sucked in a breath thinking of his sister who he knew had a high pressure since she was the very first person who the first hollow he had seen went after. 

"Shit!" he screamed before darting off completely forgetting about the Quincy standing before him. Right as he was almost out of sight Kon darted off after him screaming his name. 

"Just as I thought, he hadn't realized it.-" Ishida paused for a moment as he watched the soul mod sprint off after its master. "-Search well Kurosaki Ichigo, among the people close to you, it's not just your family who have high spiritual pressure. If you haven't noticed that , then you'll surely be defeated by me. Then because of your failure the disappointment will kill you; you'll be aware of the low level of you abilities, on the other side of defeat. However, I doubt Yamamato Izumi will allow for you to have such a crushing defeat." He glanced off to one of the roof tops to his left feeling a very faint spiritual pressure lingering there; giving evidence that someone had been watching them this whole time. He almost didn't notice it until it had spiked slightly when Ichigo had ran off in the direction of his home. Slowly Ishida pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose before a small sigh left his lips and he began to head in the direction of his home once more.  

...

"Haah." Tatsuki sighed heavily as she took a break from her club practice. She thought about her victory in Tokyo and how she was in good condition physically and that her preparations for nationals were looking good. She thought about all the positive things happening for her and her team yet she was still lethargic and she couldn't pin point why. Actually now that she thought about it she did know; but she didn't want to tell anyone. She took a large sip of her drink then sighed to herself aggravated. 

"Dammit, they've been flirting all day. Don't they realize they're just damn ghosts!?" she glared over to two floating bodies of a man and woman and watched as the woman ghost giggled at something the man had said. 

"Hey Arisawa! Break time is over! Time for your next round!" one of her teammates called from within the school building catching her attention.  She paused for a moment and sighed pulling her sweat towel from around her neck.