Old Acquaintances

Orihime stuck her right arm out and clenched her fist. She had managed to repair her whole arm, but the chaotic energy still wasn't cleansed. Therefore, she left her fingernails ungrown and, in their place, was a thick layer of concentrated purple energy that resembled painted nails. She had to continuously maintain the healing on her hand to prevent it from corroding her again, but that was acceptable. She even considered the possibility of using it as a weapon.

As soon as she exited the Dangai, Orihime began refilling her spiritual power. Using the Quincy powers, she developed, she turned everything that contained spirit particles into energy for herself. As she walked toward the battle in the distance, everything was left in wastes. She should be able to completely recover her drained energy in time to interfere with the fighting. However, a few minutes later, she saw the explosion in the distance. And then after ten seconds, heard the deafening sound.

Orihime could naturally tell this was Yamamoto's Reiatsu. However, the explosion would mean that he was likely dead. She didn't have time to be sad, nor would she have if there was time. Seeing that Yamamoto was likely dead meant that Yhwach had already made his move. That would mean he is infiltrating the Soul Palace right this moment. Although Orihime wanted to go defeat him immediately, she decided that it would be better to deal with some of the Sternritters down here first.

As long as she could steal Yhwach's power within his subordinates, he would naturally be weaker. Yhwach would naturally keep some of his stronger subordinates by his side when attacking the Soul Palace. However, this would be the perfect time to let the girls take revenge. Since the beginning, Ulquiorra, Nelliel, and Grimmjow were in charge of dealing with Askin. Hopefully, Urahara attempts to contact them to use in his plot. Even if he doesn't, they are on standby and will team up with her Unohana clone.

Orihime used several Shunpo to make it to the walls of the Seireitei and then opened a garganta in the sky above. When the girls saw the portal open, they knew what was coming. They had been waiting for this day since Orihime bestowed them with power. When the girls arrived, the Soul Reapers prepared for another battle, but they were ignored. The girls ran straight toward the Sternritter that were attacking.

The Quincy were matched one to one so Orihime didn't need to worry about them. Her first target was elsewhere. She quickly made her way to the first district. As she approached the large underground area with various pillars that led deeper, she took the one that lead to the bottom floor. After thousands of stairs, she appeared in a dark room with a single occupant.

"So, you've finally come, Orihime Inoue."

…

Urahara was digging through the various antiques and objects that the Shihoin family had locked away in their treasure vault. Yoruichi was simply leaning up against the wall watching him, occasionally shaking her head at his behavior. When the two of them heard about the attack, they began formulating a plan to deal with the Quincy right away. However, no matter how much he looked through the antiques, it all seemed like junk.

"It's not here. Wasn't your family in charge of one of His body parts?"

"It seems to have escaped sometime within the last thousand years. Apparently, they can gain sentience on their own."

"Yet another problem to deal with."

"Let's head back and finish the other project. This is a pointless search anyway. I already told you there was nothing but junk here."

"Yes, it took about a year but we finally managed to get everything prepared…"

Flashback a year ago.

"Urahara, sir, I've brought Miss Inoue and Mister Yasurtora as you requested. It seems their powers awoke and they fought off a Hollow as you predicted."

"Good work Tessai."

Urahara sipped on his tea and thought about Ichigo Kurosaki. This was the child between the two people he had helped all that time ago. Aizen had kept researching Hollowization and created White. When White was set free, he attacked Karakura town but was stopped by Misaki and Isshin. Due to certain circumstances, they ended up creating a child with four powers perfectly balanced within his human body. In a sense, Ichigo was Aizen and Urahara's greatest creation.

"Mister Yasurtora, please go into the next room, my boss wants to speak with you."

Sado opened the door and walked over. He seemed to accept the situation, but was ready to act if needed. Urahara found this admirable. This was one of Ichigo's friends and will make a fine trigger for his growth. Urahara planned to reveal the information about Hollows so that his human friend could push Ichigo to grow stronger by being in danger.

"Sado Yasurtora, I see you are confused. I am a friend of Ichigo's and I know what he's been going through. We picked you up after you fought against that Hollow. I bet you're wondering what a Hollow is, well I'll explain it to you once Miss Inoue wakes up."

"Hm."

'This one is not very good with words. Hopefully, the girl will be the romantic tension in the group, pushing Ichigo and his friends to grow stronger and get into more dangerous situations.'

Orihime walked out of the room and confidently sat down. Urahara instantly noticed something was wrong with her but didn't let it show on his face. He began to explain the situation.

"I bet you are confused about what you saw today. So, allow me to explain to you. Those monsters are called Hollows, they are souls that have fallen to negative emotions or were devoured and turned into Hollows. Kurosaki Ichigo is a soul reaper whose job is to purify these Hollows."

While Urahara explained this, he was watching their reactions closely. Sado seemed to accept it, but Orihime seemed to want to ask him something. Her confident attitude and how comfortable she was in this situation made him suspicious.

When she asked to speak with Urahara alone, he naturally obliged. Suddenly, she released her Reiatsu which made him almost spit out his tea. He quickly released his own to cover hers up so that it didn't leak out. This unexpectedly caused her to be seriously pressured. Just as he was going to apologize, she started panicking and said something that caught Urahara off guard.

"…My… power… it… spoke… to… me… the… hogyoku."

Hearing this Urahara pulled back his Reiatsu. The first thing he thought was that she was from the Soul Society sent here to investigate him. However, there was nothing from her soul or body seemed to match their technology. The next thing he thought was that this was an agent of Aizen's sent to acquire the hogyoku. However, this was too blatant and simple.

"Even if something called hogyoku existed, what exactly do you want from me?"

"Mister Urahara, please transfer the hogyoku to me."

Urahara started wondering what the situation was. He went through countless scenarios in his head in the few minutes he stayed silent. Finally, he was able to come to a conclusion that seemed the most probable. However, he needed to confirm it. Therefore, he decided to let her do what she wanted while he monitored her.

"Do you know what you're asking for? It isn't something that can be controlled."

"I can suppress it with my power. If you don't believe that, test me. But you have to extract it before Rukia is taken away. But you already knew that."

Urahara heard the mention of future events it began to support his hypothesis. He opened the door and asked Tessai his opinion. Naturally, Tessai was good at reading Urahara's expression and played along. After Tessai 'convinced' Urahara to let Orihime have the hogyoku, he tried to have her stay. However, she left with the excuse of shopping. Based on the data he collected, Orihime was already not behaving like normal. Once she was gone, he sent Sado away and had a meeting with Tessai.

"I will go and retrieve the hogyoku from Rukia's soul. Keep an eye on this 'Orihime' person. I have reason to believe that this is the Soul King's pawn. She seems to know the future and is trying to acquire the hogyoku. We both know the origin of that object… perhaps he is trying to create a new body for himself."

"Why do you want to give her the hogyoku then?"

"She has a weak starting point compared to Aizen. I'd rather split his pawns into two than concentrate it all into one. This will also be an opportunity later to destroy him completely in the future and place a powerless dummy in his position."

"Should I notify Lady Yoruichi?"

"Tell her it's time to make a move. We'll push Ichigo to go after Rukia. We need him to grow strong for the final battle."

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(A/N: Firstly I want to apologize for the long wait on this chapter. I have been writing a new original story which takes a lot of the concepts and ideas I played around with in this fanfic. I do recommend checking it out. It is called Imposter System and it is currently a part of the writing contest for "secret identity."

Secondly, I have been feeling a bit down about this story because a long time reader dropped a review that I felt said some very correct things. He deleted the review and his first review because he was disappointed in the direction of the story. I don't really care about negative criticism but he said something that made me really think about what i've written. He suggested that I didn't intend the story to go this way and asked that I rewrite it with the correct story line.

At first, I didn't think much about it. But then I remembered how the negative comments had shaped the direction of my story a long the way. And also how people's begging for certain outcomes and scenes had changed some of the events along the way. I've decided to stick to the story I have and not rewrite it, but it took a bit of effort to get over that mental block.

Thanks for reading so far!)