13 These are the rules.

Chapter thirteen.

It had been a long night for the group of classmates, most of them having to perfect their grasp around the technique required to utilize the Spirit Core. The last one of them to finish his own training was Ichigo, mostly due to the fact that he had a greater spiritual pressure than his peers.

Once the night was over and the first beams of sun started to pierce through the once dark sky, the group gathered together at the surface, each of them already situated inside the immense cannon that was going to shoot them straight at the Seireitei.

Kuromiya, Ichigo, Orihime, Chad, Ishida, Ganju and Yoruichi were all together, their hands touching one single Spirit Core that would act as their cannonball in no more than a few seconds.

Putting their short-lived rivalry aside, Ichigo and Ganju were now on the same page, their chat regarding Ganju's dead brother managing to make the two of them understand each other a bit more.

''… I hope we get there safely.'' Orihime whispered to her classmates, not wanting to make Kukaku lose her focus on the task at hand.

''I know; we are about to get launched through an invisible barrier.'' Ishida replied, sharing her worries.

''I'm sure Kukaku knows what she's doing, things should be good unless we fuck it up ourselves.'' Kuromiya interjected, his blank face not revealing worries regarding their situation.

Kukaku had already finished most of the preparation required to fire the cannon, and so without making the group wait she started with the chant that would act as the detonator for the shot.

Piercing her sword through the platform for the canon, the beautiful black haired woman used her left knee as support while her voice started uttering the chant.

''In the distance! Copper-hued greed desires thirty-six degrees of dominance! Seventy-two pairs of illusions…'' Her voice reached the group, and so Yoruichi gave them the order to feed their spiritual pressures inside the Spirit Core.

''It has begun! Pour in your spiritual energies!'' She declared while sitting on top of the sphere, surrounded by the rest of the team. None of them doubted, pouring their spiritual pressures into the small core and being instantly surrounded by that transparent sphere that would act as their shield.

''Listen here.'' Yoruichi told them while Kukaku reached middle part of her chant, smashing her left hand covered in fire against the ground. ''Once we are in the Seireitei, we have to stick together.''

'Fat chance of that happening.' Kuromiya thought, never for a second he thought it would be a good idea to warn them about their imminent separation, it was in his best interest to be with as few of them as possible.

It didn't matter if he ended up with one or two of them, but it was almost mandatory for him to have them separated in order to be able to move around the whole place without being delayed. If that meant that he needed to sabotage their landing, then so be it.

''If you encounter a captain, don't look back and just run.'' The black cat continued informing them about their plan, though it was quite hilarious to Kuromiya, he was planning to do almost the exact opposite after all. ''Our goal is to save Rukia, nothing else. Don't take useless risks, minimize the fighting to the best of your abilities.''

''… Held in the embrace of twenty-five suns, the cradle of sand will flow with blood!'' The trail of fire that had been previously surrounding Kukaku's arm had moved almost on its own, travelling at insane speeds until it reached the top of the cannon.

''Flower-Crane cannon launch method two!'' Kukaku said, raising her voice as a thunderous explosion was heard all around the place. ''Kagizaki!''

In a mere instant the group was gone, leaving a trail of smoke behind them as the cannonball was launched at incredible speeds towards the most dangerous place inside the Soul Society for some intruders like them, the Seireitei.

''You've done it, Lady Kukaku!'' One of her henchmen complimented while the woman picked up her sword from the ground, her two green eyes never leaving the cannonball until it was no longer visible.

''Go with care… Ganju.'' She offered some last words to her little brother, her worries making themselves known deep inside her heart.

. . .

''… You know, this feels quite comfy.'' Kuromiya commented to the group, it felt to him as if he was levitating inside the cannonball. ''Almost feels like we didn't even get launched.''

''Yeah, I expected more of a shock, you know?'' Ichigo agreed while looking downwards, right now the group was well above hundreds of meters from the ground.

''It's about to get much worse, I assure you.'' Ganju replied to them with a smirk, and before both of them could even question just what he meant, their speed doubled and tripled in no more than a few seconds.

'What the hell, I didn't remember the descent would be this strong.' Kuromiya thought, greeting his teeth as their direction shifted towards the Seireitei, the cannonball now skydiving its way down to the ground.

The rest of the group wasn't doing much better either, since Ishida, Inoue and Ichigo appeared to be screaming due to the violent push that was sending them down.

Ganju was prepared for this though, pulling something out of his shirt and opening it up for the group to see. The thing in question was some sort of long list with a massive text written all across it.

''What's that?'' Ichigo questioned, most of them managing to calm down by now, growing accustomed to the change of speed.

''The Flower-Crane launch method two isn't just the launching, that's just the start of it.'' Ganju explained, his gaze landing on the instructions that he had written down the night before. ''It involves two spells, the first one controls everything from the launch to the directional setting, while the second one controls the acceleration and axis adjustment.''

''That's what that list is for, then?'' Kuromiya inquired, his blue eyes attempting to sneak a peek on the content of the list.

''That's it.'' Ganju nodded at him, restarting his explanation once again. ''Now, you should be able to feel how much energy the others are releasing while touching the ball. I need all of you to adjust your energy release accordingly.''

All of them nodded to their new instructions, and so without having anything else to say, Ganju started his chant while clasping his hands together in some sort of hand sign.

''Flower Crane cannon launch method two! Secondary spell!'' While rapidly descending, he started with the chant. ''Fate of three sparrows, fate of four dragons blocked in from give directions, unable to return six miles…''

''K-Kurosaki-kun, Kuromiya-kun, you're releasing too much!'' Orihime was squinting her eyes, biting her lips at the amount of pressure she was being forced to pour into the sphere.

'I'm not even attempting to sabotage them just yet…' The blue eyed boy thought, he was releasing less than an eighth of his spiritual pressure right now, and that appeared to be overwhelming his classmates.

''I'll tone it down, then.'' Kuromiya replied, and so he decided to keep the flow down for the moment.''

''A-am i? I'm sorry!'' Ichigo apologized, surprised with the fact that apparently that was too much. Thus, closing his eyes he tried to concentrate in order to lessen the amount of power he was feeding the Spirit Core.

''Kurosaki! Lower it some more!'' Ishida barked, it appeared to be getting increasingly harsh for them to keep up with him.

''I-I know! I have lowered it a lot already!'' Ichigo felt slightly embarrassed despite the situation, it seemed like he was the one who struggled the most with these sort of things.

''Ichigo!'' Chad warned him too.

''I said I know!'' Ichigo barked back, lowering it to the best of his abilities.

''A thousand sprinkles of ash, a thousand bits of wisdom.'' Ganju was starting to have trouble with the chant due to their discussion, a trail of sweat falling down his face. ''… The measure of white clouds, a thousand sprinkles of ashes, a thousand bits of wisdom!?''

''You idiot! You made me read the same line twice!'' He panicked, turning towards the substitute soul reaper while screaming at him.

''So what!? How is that my fault too!?''

''Hey, guys…'' Kuromiya started, gaining the attention of them. ''… We are about to hit the shakonmaku.''

The group's gaze turned towards the Seiretei, and true enough their cannonball was closing the gap between the barrier and them in mere seconds. Then it happened, before someone could even attempt to give some sort of instructions, the cannonball clashed against the barrier.

The clash itself was incredibly violent in nature, the amount of energy released was more than enough to create lightning bolts from all around them, making their arrival known to every single soul reaper inside the Seireitei.

''Push all the spiritual pressure you have into it! Do it now or we will be obliterated!'' Yoruichi's words made everyone snap out of their shocked states, and every single one of them followed her words without pause.

'Finally.' Kuromiya thought, it felt incredibly awkward to be restraining his own flow of spiritual pressure for so long. With that in mind, he jumped eagerly at the first chance to release it, and so pushed the full force of his spiritual power deep into the Spirit Core.

The rest of the group was doing the same, each of them pouring all the power they could muster for the few seconds that the clash against the barrier lasted.

''!?'' All of them gasped when the cannonball that had the purpose of protecting them started breaking in pieces, though this would soon change when the sphere that once had covered them from the shakonmaku disappeared.

The rescue group had succeeded in getting past the shakonmaku, the problem didn't lie there though, but on the fact that the sphere had ended up leaving them levitating in midair, while still being hundreds of meters up in the air.

''What's going on?'' Ichigo couldn't help but ask, to perplexed to even rationalize their current situation. ''We got past the shield alright, but why aren't we falling?''

''Don't get separated! Akihiko, pick everyone up if you…'' Yoruichi tried to instruct, but before she could even finish Kuromiya was already jumping towards her, picking her up and moving onto the next person.

''Give me your hand, Ishida.'' Kuromiya kept using Bringer Light to step on the air, approaching the quincy who was the one closest to him. ''Jump up to my shoulder, Yoruichi.''

Yoruichi did just that, jumping on his shoulder while the boy carried Ishida under one of his arms, but just when he was about to move onto the next person, all of them felt a sudden pull pushing them to a certain area.

''It's already too late! We are going to get pulled into a whirlpool of spirit energy and it will explode, stick together or you'll die!'' Yoruichi warned the group, urging them to grab each other to the best of their abilities.

Knowing that this was his last chance to get rid of Ishida, Kuromiya decided to throw him straight at Chad and Orihime, it would be better for them to be in a group of three after all.

''Kuromiya, what are you…!?'' Ishida was interrupted before he could even argue back, crashing against Chad. Time for regrouping was now over, and so the time arrived.

Just like the black cat had explained, all of them were covered in what appeared to be a blue sea of sheer spiritual pressure, making them spin in circles all around the strange place. Then it happened, the sudden explosion separated all of them in three groups, resembling beams of light raining down to the Seireitei.

. . .

The fall wasn't too difficult to deal with, after all the only additional weight that he had to carry was in the form of a small black cat. It was easy for the blue eyed boy to stop himself from hitting the ground, Bringer Light allowing him to step on the air at the last possible second.

''Oh?'' Kuromiya landed on top of a two stored building, immediately noting that the place was infested with soul reapers glaring at them. ''That's weird, so many of them and we have just landed here?''

True enough, there were around fourteen soul reapers that had been already waiting for them to land, each one of them with their zanpakuto's already drawn.

''We landed at the ninth squad barracks, if memory doesn't fail me.'' Yoruichi added, despite the sheer number of soul reapers, most of them felt quite weak. ''We should move on and try to regroup…''

''Get down from me for a second, I'll go get some information before moving on.'' Kuromiya told her, allowing the black cat to jump down. This was more than enough to anger a few of the soul reapers down below, his calm attitude not sitting well with some of them.

''Just don't take too much time, we don't know if a captain is near the area.'' Yoruichi replied, taking a sit at the rooftop.

''Don't get too cocky, ryoka!'' The closest soul reaper to them barked at him, he was a blonde haired male in his mid-forties. ''You have the worst luck of all, landing here in our barracks!''

''I don't feel like wasting my time talking to you.'' Kuromiya replied, these soul reapers were nothing more than small fry after all. ''I'll ask once, who is the highest seated officer here?''

He jumped down from the building, now merely a few meters away from all of the hostile soul reapers, none of them doing even the slightest attempt to hide their hostility.

''You brat!'' The same shinigami that had addressed him at the start didn't seem to appreciate his reply too much, and so he ignored the call from his fellow squad members and jumped in for an attack, his zanpakuto moving its way right to Kuromiya's unprotected neck.

''… Again, it's almost disgusting what sheer spiritual pressure can do for you.'' Kuromiya lazily commented, having raised his index finger in order to block the sword before it managed to make contact with his neck. ''Guess I should experiment with this stuff later…''

''… H-how?'' The man muttered, taking a step back at the sudden realization that perhaps this one ryoka was more than what he could manage.

''Ah, I almost forgot about you.'' Kuromiya realized, watching the terrified man attempting to get away from him. The blue eyed boy swung his sword from the distance, slashing diagonally at the man from his left shoulder down to his right leg.

''Watanabe-san!'' One of the soul reapers screamed watching as the man fell down, one piece at a time. Right now there were two 'Wanatabe-sans' at the ground, that single attack had managed to split his body in half, making it quite a gruesome scene.

'Holy shit, did I just kill him with that?' Kuromiya thought, he wasn't planning to mutilate the man with that swing, but it appeared that he hadn't been able to restrain himself properly.

''You b-bastard!'' The same man that had screamed before charged at him, and after that, the rest of them followed the charge against the intruder. Much like a tacit agreement, every single one of them had decided to attack him at once.

''… Well, so much for talking a little.'' Kuromiya muttered, if possible he would prefer to avoid massacring them, killing all this people would end up causing more trouble than it was worth for him. Thus he decided it would be in his best interest to move on after dealing with this guys, Yoruichi wouldn't wait for much longer after all.

The first attack didn't make itself wait, and it was in the form of a descending swing coming from his left side. He contemplated just tanking the hit, since his reiatsu should be enough to make the attack bounce right back to the soul reaper, but he figured it was no fun winning a fight like that.

Kuromiya ended up deciding to outright grab the sword with his left hand, and before the soul reaper could even react he threw him alongside his sword towards three of the approaching enemies, sending them flying back against a wall.

'There's quite a few of them left still, around nine or so?' Kuromiya counted inside his mind, the fact that the system hadn't even bothered to give him a quest meant that each one of them was nothing but fodder. 'I just need one of them in order to get the information.'

With that in mind he casted Bringer Light and disappeared from the spot, moving too fast for any of them to properly block his attacks. The first strike he unleashed was against an unaware female soul reaper, who only managed to see his blade approaching her lower back until it pierced right through it.

Once again, he left that familiar trail of pale green light in the ground and unleashed a second attack against the closest soul reaper to him, that being a somewhat fat man around his thirties. This time he decided to go for hitting the man with the hilt of his sword, breaking his nose and knocking him out before he could even understand what had happened.

'I should wrap this up, attacking someone who can't even fight back is a bit of a mood killer.' He thought, tilting his head to the side just enough to narrowly dodge a slice that was meant to impale him through his head, aiming at his blind spot. The spiritual pressure coming from the man had ended up revealing his location, allowing him to dodge the attack.

. . .

'… This is no fun, at all.' The first two of them had been somewhat interesting, it was the perfect way to see the results of his training after all. The problem was that it was no fun killing someone who had no chances against him to begin with, and so after striking the fifth of them down he grew bored of it.

''That's around five of you down, two of those five are dead, and the other three can't move anymore.'' Kuromiya made a backflip, landing at one of the roofs behind him. ''Like I said before, I just need to know who's the highest ranked officer here, so…''

''Fifth seat of squad nine, Akio Yoshida.'' The only soul reaper that had yet to perform an attack against him presented himself. He had black short hair and brown eyes, and true enough his spiritual pressure was quite a bit higher when compared to the others around him. ''What the hell do you want, ryoka?''

''Right here? Nothing.'' Before the man could even comprehend what he meant by that, Kuromiya casted Bringer Light once again and landed next to the man. There was something different this time though, since he was holding a book in his free hand.

''First Page.'' Both of them were enveloped in a blinding light, and disappeared without leaving any sort of trail behind them.

. . .

''W-w-what is this place!?'' Akio Yoshida wasn't able to maintain his composure once he arrived at the strange looking white world, panicking at the bizarre environment that surrounded them.

''Listen up, Yoshida-san.'' Kuromiya started, his spiritual pressure was more than double the one of his opponent, which meant that the restriction in the rules didn't apply against him. ''These are the rules, so you better follow them, alright?''

It was time for him to verify if the information he had hadn't changed due to his presence, Aizen was too unpredictable so it wouldn't hurt to make sure that the situation hadn't somehow changed due to his involvement in it.

''You must answer each question I make with nothing else but the absolute truth.'' The blue eyed boy declared, and that exact same sentence was now written in the air. ''First question, where's Rukia Kuchiki?''

''She's at the senzaikyū, it's a white tower at the center of the Seireitei.'' The answer was immediate, and it was clear by Yoshida's shocked face that he couldn't believe that he had just answered such a question to an enemy.

''Next question, when is her execution expected to be? Has it been reprogrammed once again?'' Kuromiya questioned, he needed to be absolutely sure that the information he had was still up to date after all.

''It was rescheduled once; the execution is expected to happen in less than thirteen days.'' Again, the man answered without any sort of resistance.

''That's good enough for now.'' Kuromiya told the man, if he ever needed to fact-check this information again, he could just find another person. ''Thanks for all your hard work, Yoshida-san.''

Without allowing the man any time to process his words, he made a single strike with his sword towards the man, aiming it at his heart. It was quite anticlimactic; the man had been under such a shock that he hadn't even attempted to fight back against him.

Once the man had breathed his last breath, the white world started to shatter, forcing him back out to the Soul Society.

. . .

The place appeared to be empty much to his surprise, he remembered that there were at least six soul reapers still capable of fighting, but the barracks appeared to be completely abandoned now.

''I presume you are done?'' Yoruichi's voice made him turn towards the same roof where she had left her not too long ago. The black cat didn't appear to be bothered for the scene he had caused, if anything it appeared that she just wanted to keep moving.

''Yeah, I've all the information I need already.'' He replied, jumping next to her. ''Rukia is at the senzaikyū, we have around thirteen days left too.''

''It wouldn't hurt to know how your abilities work; you know?'' Yoruichi told him, both of them moving away from the empty barracks. ''I'm having a hard time knowing just what will your next move be with so little information.''

''It wouldn't hurt not to tell you about it either. Due to the nature of this ability it's more effective when no one knows about it.'' He replied, both of them now moving away from the now abandoned battlefield. ''Where did the others go? I didn't expect them to abandon someone like their fifth seat.''

''It didn't seem to me like they had abandoned him, I think they mistook you disappearing for raw speed, thus a small group of them started searching around for you, while the others… Well, I think it's safe to guess that they are going to get some back up.''

''It won't matter, though.'' Kuromiya pointed out, right now both of them were miles away from that spot. ''It's not like any of these guys can even see us at this speeds.''

''If the information you have is accurate then we still have quite a bit of time left. I think it's better for us to regroup if it's possible, if not then approaching the senzaikyū while they still don't know about our motives should be a reasonable plan too.'' Yoruichi said, finishing her explanation while jumping onto the next roof.

''I agree.'' Kuromiya replied, both of them turning simultaneously towards the barely visible white tower. ''Plus with what just happened the ninth squad might not be too much of a problem until they clear the area out.''

Now on the same page and with a clear plan in mind, the two of them made their way to the white tower.

. . .

The captains meeting had been interrupted due to the recent events, and one of the captain was quite a bit more interested in the intruders than the rest, that one being no other than Kenpachi Zaraki, who had been running since the very moment that the ryoka had split up.

Behind his back, a pink haired little girl wearing the badge of a lieutenant in her right arm was hanging from the man's back, her innocent face barely visible from the captain's left shoulder.

''Ken-chan, you seem happy!'' Yachiru Kusajishi noted with a smile, watching as her captain kept running past the streets without wasting a single second.

''Do i? I guess it's because there are a few interesting intruders this time.'' The bloodthirsty man replied, smirking just at the thought of getting some sort of challenge after a long time. ''I just wonder which one is it… Which one is the strongest one?''

End of chapter thirteen.