Chapter 1: Awakening

He came to while standing, spine straight and with an intense sense of heat and danger radiating off his wiry frame. It was the same position he held even after being split in half by Yhwach's deceptive blade; he hadn't known the pup had it in him.

His first act was to breathe in the scent of an unfamiliar plane of existence. His muscles held tight and coiled under his seemingly aged frame as half-lidded eyes opened slowly, flitting around, taking in everything under the blue sky—barely noticeable under his heavy white eyebrows.

His single arm rested on the cane that hid his blade from the world and saved the three planes of existence from the calamity that was his bankai. His left sleeve remained empty—a testament to his misbegotten pride and noble sacrifice.

The wooden grip of the cane was almost as familiar as the hilt of Ryūjin Jakka at this point. He noted as his hand held the barely perceptible grooves Age had carved into the wood.

He had known peace for longer than he had known war. Even if he rarely had an actual use for the cane, he was still old, and the presence of something familiar was grounding. The fact he could feel the physical manifestation of his soul hidden beneath the wooden facade almost drew a smile on his weathered face.

The concept of an Old shinigami was vastly different from a simple old man. The weight of over two millennia and two genocides hung heavy on his aging frame. His stooped back and slouched shoulder were more of a facade than an actual sign of age if he was being honest.

Yet the fact he had fallen victim to Yhwach's trickery burdened him more than he cared to admit. The thought of Ywach lighted an inferno in his heart and sent molten fire-like blood pumping through his veins.

But he was not a fresh shinigami to be ruled by anger and emotions. Smothering the furnace of his anger, he allowed it to shift back into bare coal, never truly extinguished but nothing more than a smolder. Discipline over Emotion.

He could blame his loss on nothing but the long peace Soul Society had experienced. It had reduced the inferno of his youth into bare wisps, and dulled his blade.

Even his brief bout against Aizen and his band of unnatural revolutionaries could only be considered brief. He was still power incarnate, and not even the son of the Soul King would've dared face him without trickery.

But even with his trickery, Yhwach had not truly won, had he? It was not the end. Yhwach's goal remained the Soul King, and as long as squad zero remained by the Soul King's side, He was not going to have an easy go of it. If squad zero was to fall… Maybe that child would be able to pull off another miracle, for Yamamoto was too far away to even consider rendering aid.

He was somewhat diminished, he noted with a barely distinguished frown on his weathered face. His loss against Yhwach and his presence on this plane reduced him to something that he could not quantify. Even after ten minutes post-awakening, he had not moved or twitched a single muscle.

No, not diminished, simply not in sync in this new realm. He had no idea what his limits were. What he could truly do, and he would never be certain until he was pushed. But he was Genryusai Shigekuni Yamamoto. Did this new and sudden realm truly possess an equal?

Comparting his thoughts easily, he focused on the now. His eyes remained half-lidded—a thin line on his face—as he finally allowed his spiritual pressure to spread out, coiling out from his rigid control and whipping his waist-length beards to the side softly.

He was on another plane, he decided with certainty now as his reiatsu reached out and felt for his surroundings. The reishi emanating from the earth spoke of an untouched earth.

He had been to the human world before, even if, unlike most, he was old enough to predate most of it. He was one of the few who came to as balancers without going through the process of a human life.

He had dug the foundation of Soul Society with his own blood-stained hands. Had planted the first plants and trees alongside Unohana and watered them with the blood of rebels and dissidents in millennia past.

Walked under the fiery skies of Hell with the unfathomable and lumbering Kushanada beside him, the heat of the realm a comfort and welcoming memory of his beloved Ryuujin Jakka.

Fed the withered sands and in between the crystal trees of Hueco Mundo with seas of blood while single-handedly cutting down enough Vastro Lorde that by the time Aizen started recruiting, he could barely get a handful.

Stepped on the white-paved condensed reishi that was the ground of the Soul King's palace. Climbed the stairways that excluded enough pressure to kill most lieutenants and laid black eyes on the trapped and dismembered form of God.

Yet, he had never been here. This was a new plane. A plane he knew not of, even with his multiple millennia alive. A plane that surely held its own rules and laws. A plan that was not connected and held up by the Soul King in any way. An outsider plane.

They were rumored to exist—the ancient shinigami noted even as he continued observation with half-lidded eyes flitting around, categorizing where he found himself. But it was never something that drew his interest. He was a shinigami, the captain commander of the thirteen court guards, and he knew where his duties started and ended. The protection of souls and the eradication of anything that posed a significant threat to the balance of the world—that was where the origin of their first name came from, Balancers.

A twitch of his senses refocuses him. The gruttal sound of a locomotive tears its way through the confines of the vegetation and reaches him in the depth of the forest he found himself in. The sound of a car driving past was not something he was overly familiar with, but he knew enough about the transportation humans used.

It takes barely an effort to solidify the reishi beneath his feet before he discards the law of gravity like waste and moves to stand mid-air. With a flex of will and millennia of experience, he flash steps higher for a better view of his newfound location.

Surrounded by nothing but clouds and held up by his own will and reiatsu, he looks straight ahead in the direction the car had been heading. In the distance, he sees a bustling city placed at the edge of the sea—a strange city, he notes as half-lidded eyes pick up a strange shivering bridge of light and energy extending from the city to a rig in the water. Another glance down shows a tarred road leading to it. A cracked and run-down road occupied by the sole overburdened car that drew his attention in the first place.

With another flex of will and masterful control, he finds himself on the road, dissolving the platform of reishi and stepping on the heated pavement with delicate-looking socks-covered sandals.

Then he walks. A simple and pedestrian feat that he would not have usually bothered within an unfamiliar city and while breathing again after dying barely an hour back, but for some reason, he felt more un

burdened than he had in millennia. Even his usual stooped posture had straightened somewhat once more, and the familiar feeling of his white haori over his black Shihakusho was more comfortable than he remembered.

So he walked. With a slow pace that fitted his age and with the aid of his cane, he moved in a straight line towards the city he had sighted ahead. Looking up at the signboard, he noted the name of the city. Maybe he would find some answers as to why he was here, maybe he wouldn't.

Brockton Bay.

Maybe he was wrong. He noted as another car drove past him, its inhabitants a man and woman duo with a single child at the back that peered at him wide-eyed.

There were humans on this plane. A city ahead with the accompanying structures. Other than the unfamiliarity of the reishi, he could not say for certain. Was this truly the human world?

His continued walk brought him ever closer to the city as he continued to muse, another car sped past him before slowing down for a bit and reversing to him. He stopped and turned to them as they stopped by him.

"Do you need a lift Jiji?" The boy in the driver's seat called out.