26 Training

Laying flat on his back, Rei was positive that sweat was dripping from every part of his body. As the breeze from the windswept over the grassy plain he was lying on, he felt a slight bit of a relief as he slowed his breaths. "That was horrible…" He couldn't describe how boring and tiring it was to sit in one spot concentrating on the same thing for hours.

Alongside that, he had used so much of his body's Reishi it would probably take a couple of days to recover fully. Taking another moment to regain his will to move, Rei slowly sat up. Hearing the sound of running behind him, he didn't even have the energy to turn around.

"Woah…"

"That's where we're staying?"

Listening to their reactions, Rei tried to get the full scope of what he had just made. When he came up with the concept, he had combined all of the things he had seen up till now, along with his previous home's style, to make it. Taking its full scope in, Rei could understand why he was so tired.

First of all, it was massive, a lot bigger than what he was going for. If he had to compare it to some of the larger buildings he had seen on his travels, it was only slightly smaller than the large red building he saw in the Leaf Village some time ago. 'I must not have been focusing on its size as much as I should have…' Because of that single mistake, he was left in a completely drained state.

"I call dibs on the biggest room!" Before Rei could even say anything, the three of them left him outside and began to make their way up the stairs leading to the main entrance. Watching them run off, Rei couldn't even be bothered to tell them anything. 'Sleep first and then I'll deal with them.' With that, Rei let himself go and wisped into a deep sleep right there on the ground.

For what felt like hour's Rei slept in peace without a single dream or sound interrupting him. Eventually, Rei slowly opened his eyes only to see he was staring at the ceiling. Yawning, he sat up and was surprised to feel something soft under him. "A bed?" He couldn't remember the last time he slept comfortably on something soft.

Despite not needing to sleep for days on end due to his stamina and how his body worked now, it still helped. It allowed him to recover faster, and most importantly, it felt great. Stretching his body, he got off of the bed and looked around the room. To his surprise, it was mostly furnished.

'Well, at least my bodily sacrifice was nice enough to furnish everything for me.' Looking towards the wall closest to the bed, Rei spotted Ryujin Jakka leaning against the wall. Grabbing it before leaving the room, he walked out into the hallway. Before he had even taken a step or decided which way to go, he saw two figures blast past him.

"Beat ya!" Rei heard Fuyumi's voice as he looked down the hall slightly. Sure enough, both Seiki and Fuyumi were the two figures who had rushed by him. In fact, they were racing around the entire place. "You cheated, you ran before I said go." It was while the two of them argued that they finally noticed Rei was awake.

"Big Brother Rei you're awake!" Thoroughly brushing off Seiki's excuses, she ran over to him. "This place you made is awesome. It's huge and has so many rooms although we don't know what most of them are for." Walking over to Fuyumi, Seiki continued. "Ya, we even made sure no one else was in the area for the few days you were asleep."

Listening to them, Rei could only shake his head. The moment they all got the powers, they had been messing around for a while now. He knew the issue was they had zero discipline. It was like that for a lot of kids in his clan. The parents took lax views regarding punishments, and even rules could be bent from time to time.

In fact, even Rei has been keeping that lax attitude when it came to watching over them. He let them do almost anything they wanted. 'Guess it's time to change that. They have way too much energy to waste it racing around.' With that being the case, Rei clapped his hands together to get their attention.

"Alright, you guys can consider the time I was asleep as your break it's time to get to work." Hearing that, the two of them looked at Rei in confusion before Seiki asked him a question. "What do you mean a break?" Smiling at him, Rei cracked his neck. "You guys kept begging me for training right? Go find Ren and meet me outside in five minutes."

Soon their eyes began to shine the moment Rei said he would be training them now. They had been waiting for this for over a month now, and it was finally time. "Alright, we'll get him now! Let's go!" Seiki almost dragged Fuyumi by her arm as they raced to get Ren. On the other hand, Rei turned the other way and began to walk.

He planned on getting the layout of this place while he asked Ryujin Jakka some questions. 'So what do you think?' Looking at all the minor details, Rei thought for his first attempt; this place looked fantastic. It was big, spacious, and had plenty of room for future improvements. "It's adequate and impressive for your first attempt. Thought I wouldn't have chosen you if you didn't have talent."

Listening to Ryujin Jakka give him half of a compliment, he didn't even bother trying to refute it and took it as it was. 'Well in that case what do I do now? I'm guessing spirits won't just gravitate towards this place just cause I built something here.' It was what Ryujin Jakka said next that stumped Rei.

"For a place to become spirit compatible the entire area needs to be filled with spiritual energy and Reishi. Along with that, there has to be a special type of barrier set so that the energy is never dispersed." Placing his hand on his chin, he had to think about what Ryujin Jakka had said.

He understood the part about filling the area with spiritual energy and Reishi. Reishi typically becomes part of the air around him before thinning out and entirely disappearing. But if he set up a barrier, eventually, the area would become rich in spiritual energy. But the thing that he didn't understand was precisely how spirits would arrive.

Sensing Rei's thoughts, Ryujin Jakka answered him. "All Soul Reapers are capable of sending Souls and spirits to the location deemed as the Soul Society. Considering the number of spirits that are roaming and looming across this world the barrier would have to be quite large." It was the mention of the word large that caused Rei to ask a question.

'Exactly how large are we talking?' Pausing for a moment, Ryujin Jakka responded. "For a start at least over ten miles." At a moment's notice, Rei's face twisted as he spoke out loud this time. "Setting up a barrier that big would take months and then filling it with Reitsi could take over a year."

Ryujin Jakka did not respond to him, showing it knew precisely how long it would take. 'Note to self don't make deals with a sword in the future.' Sighing, Rei backtracked his steps and made his way to the entrance of the building. Walking out the front door's Rei made his way down the steps and spotted Fuyumi, Seiki and Ren all waiting there for him.

Thanks to their location, they still had an entirely flat area to train in despite some space being taken up. As soon as they saw Rei, they immediately turned towards him." Alright since you all look ready we'll take this one at a time. I wanna see what you guys can do without me teaching you anything first."

Hearing Rei planned to fight one of the first; they all looked at each other. "Seiki you should go to the one who was most excited." Both Fuyumi and Ren immediately pushed Seiki toward Rei. Looking back at them with a glare, he turned to Rei. "So I just attack you? What if you get hurt or something?"

Rei smiled when he heard that. "Trust me I'll be fine. Put all that energy you have to work." Hesitating for a moment, Seiki drew his sword. He didn't have any form leaving him open to attack, and clearly, he was a little nervous. Noticing all of that, Rei decided it would be best if he let him attack first.

And so he stood there until Seiki finally charged in. "Hya!" Running at Rei, he slashed towards him and had a look of worry on his face when he saw Rei didn't draw Ryujin Jakka to respond. Instead, he took a quick step to the left and raised his hand. Before Seiki had a chance to regain his balance Rei chopped down on the blunt side of his blade, causing the sword to fall out of Seiki's hands.

Standing there dumbfounded with his sword lying on the ground, both Fuyumi and Ren, who were watching, began to laugh. "Aaha! He didn't even use his sword!" Fuyumi was the one laughing the most as Seiki looked up at Rei in confusion. "But how… I" At worst, he had thought Rei would beat him, but he never expected the sword just to get knocked out of his hands.

Rather than being angry or embarrassed, Seiki was more interested in how Rei did it. Before Seiki could say anything, Rei placed his foot under Seiki's sword and flipped it in the air before grabbing it by the hilt. "Let's try this one more time. This time don't hold back cause you're scared of hurting me alright?"

Giving the sword back to Seiki, he nodded at Rei, and all that nervousness in fear of hurting him vanished; instead, he was more focused and driven. "Now come." Telling him to attack, Seiki responded by engaging Rei, but this time, it was faster.

His dash had more power in his steps, and when he raised his sword above his head, he slashed down with all his strength this time.

Observing his movements, Rei looked down at Seiki's legs. 'He's pretty balanced when it comes to speed and strength. But he leaves himself in bad situations when it comes to balance and recovery. Gonna have to work on that.' Despite how fast he was, Rei was faster and quickly moved out of the way.

Then holding out one of his legs, he tripped Seiki, causing him to fall forward on his face. "Ow…" Though it isn't as loud as last time, the giggling didn't stop causing Rei to look over at Fuyumi.

"You wanna see if you can do better?" Immediately she stopped giggling and looked over at Ren, who was standing next to her.

Almost the same time she looked at him, he turned away, saying she was on her own. "Alright fine." With Seiki standing back up covered in the dirt, he switched out for Fuyumi. "Since she wanted to laugh so much, let's see her try and hit him." Sulking slightly, Seiki and Ren watched as Rei told her to begin.

Unlike Seiki, Fuyumi didn't bother hesitating and ran at Rei full speed. 'She's faster than he was.' Analyzing everything he saw as she ran at him, Rei didn't move. Drawing her sword the moment she got in range of Rei, she didn't try to slash at him like Seiki but instead thrust her blade directly at his chest.

'Oh?' Leaning back slightly, Rei dodged the first thrust, but just seconds later, she thrust again. She completely ignored the cutting uses of her sword and focused on her thrust. 'Well, I'll give her one thing she's extremely fast and precise. But it's easy to predict where she will strike.' Before Fuyumi even drew back her sword, Rei moved his left hand to his right shoulder.

Just seconds later, Fuyumi attacked again directly at Rei's right shoulder, but before her blade could make an impact, Rei caught it between his fingers. "Huh?" She looked dumbfounded as she tried to push and pull, but the blade wouldn't budge. Soon it turned into a tug of war as she tried her best to pull the sword from between Rei's fingers.

"Not so easy now is it Fuyumi!" Yelling from the sidelines, Seiki had a grin on his face. Looking over at him while continuing to pull, Fuyumi stuck out her tongue. "At Least I attacked more than tw-" Before she could finish speaking, Rei let go of the tip of her blade, causing her to fall backward onto her back. "You shouldn't get distracted."

Holding the back of her head in pain, she stayed like that for a couple of seconds. Finally standing up, she rubbed her head before looking at Rei. "This isn't fair, you're stronger than us." Listening to her, Rei shrugged his shoulders. "I know I just want to see where you're all at right now."

Turning to Ren, Rei called him over, but to his surprise, Ren shook his head. "I wanna learn how to do that other stuff." Rei knew he was more interested in the technical stuff like Kido, Barriers, and whatnot. He wouldn't stop him if he didn't want to use his sword to fight. "Alright, but if these two beat you in the future don't blame me."

Speaking to all three of them now, Rei said. "Alright from now for the next two years we're going to be training. If I'm going to trust you guys to be on your own at any time you need to awaken your Zanpakuto's and understand the basics in everything." Glancing at Ren, Rei made sure to highlight his next words. "Even when it comes to using it properly."

Fuyumi and Seiki glanced at Ren with smirks before all three of them nodded. "Good then let's try this again starting with you Seiki."