34 - Level Ups

Rumi returned to the division with a heavy heart that day. She tried to distract herself with more sleep and sparring with Kazehime and maybe because her coping mechanism for dealing with negative emotions and events was to ignore it completely until she can't anymore or finally had the energy to process and deal with it on a good day, although it rarely happened and she often found herself with a ton of unprocessed emotions and negative events. Still, Rumi kept herself busy for the next month, busying herself with patrol, paperwork, training and sleeping so that she wouldn't be able to fall into the deep hole of self-blaming and doubts regarding her friendships. 

On the bright side, after a month, her stats had improved quite well. 

[Name : Fujiwara Rumi.

Age : 211 days. (Soul Society).

Race : Enhanced Soul (Shinigami).

Relationships : Abarai Renji (Close Friends), Rukia (Close Friends), Hinamori Momo (Close Friends), Kira Izuru (Friends), Hitsugaya Toshiro (Mentee), Shiba Kaien (Mentor). 

Reiryoku level : High.

Stored reiryoku : 2190/ 100,000

Spirit class : 4. 

Skills : Sloth (Passive), Guradian's Vigil (Passive), Fire Resistance (Passive), Cold Resistance (Passive), Mind's Momentum, Falsifier.

Abilities : Zanjutsu(Advanced), Kido (Intermediate), Hakuda (Intermediate), Hoho (Intermediate).

Tools : Zanpakuto, Disguise Pendant.

Zanpakuto : Kazehime (Shikai).]

She had managed to level up the proficiencies of Zanjutsu and Hakuda, Zanjutsu to Advanced level and Hakuda to Intermediate level. It was a huge progress so naturally, Rumi felt quite proud for it. Maybe distracting herself with training was a good idea all along. 

Lost in her own thoughts, Rumi walked into the hall where she saw a familiar scene of crowd surrounding a new Shinigami.

"Have you heard? That newcomer is from a noble family."

"Really? And she just joined the division directly without exams?"

"I know, right? We had to try really hard just to be here...yet.." 

Overhearing the conversation, Rumi became curious on who the newcomer was and if nobles were actually that outrageous. 

As she approached, the non-seated Shinigamis made her way and soon, Rumi saw who exactly the newcomer was.

Turned out the one sitting in the hall with clenched fists was none other than Rukia. 

"Rukia?" Rumi muttered. 

Rukia turned around once she heard the familiar voice and her face lit up once she saw Rumi, "Rumi!" 

"So, it was really you! I was wondering who the noble newcomer was!" Rumi said. "So, it's Kuchiki Rukia now?"

"Yeah..." Rukia nodded.

"It suits you." Rumi smiled.

"Thanks.." Rukia replied, "It's good to see you again. I mean I was really nervous coming here and.."

"It's good to see you too. Now, I won't be bored here." Rumi said, putting her arm around Rukia's neck.

"Right." Rukia nodded. 

"Welcome to Thirteenth Division, Rukia." Rumi smiled, "I don't know what seat.."

"Oh, I'm not a seated officer." Rukia replied, "Not everyone's a monster like you, you know." 

"Right..." Rumi bit her lip. 

Just as Rumi was about to change subject, the door opened again and Kaien walked in.

"Yo, Fujiwara, you know our newcomer?" Kaien asked. 

"Sir Kaien!" Rumi turned to Kaien and replied, "Rukia here is my friend, we went to the academy together." 

"Hmm, I see," Kaien looked interested and Rumi nudged Rukia to greet Kaien. 

"..Pl..pleasure to meet you, sir Kaien." Rukia greeted. "I am Kuchiki Rukia. Please take care of me from now on."

Kaien laughed heartily at that, "Good, good. I'm Shiba Kaien, Lieutenant of Thirteenth Division. You can call me Sir Kaien like your friend or Lieutenant Kaien. Because our captain's health is not good, I'm usually in charge around here. So I won't be mad if you mistakenly call me Captain Kaien haha."

"I..I will think about it." Rukia replied. 

"Great, nice to meet you, Kuchiki." Kaien said, "Oh, and Fujiwara, show Kuchiki here around our division and her duties." 

"Understood, sir Kaien." Rumi gave him a thumbs up before taking Rukia's hand. "Come on, Rukia. Get moving." 

"W-wait, Ru..Rumi!"

"Idiot Rukia, you don't realize I just saved you, do you?" Rumi said once they were away from the hall. 

"Save me? What?" 

"Do you know what he did upon meeting me the first time? and the first day of my official duties?"

"Uh..no?"

"He took me to Rukongai and ask me to fight with him!" Rumi said, exasperated. "How did you think it go?"

"You..lost?"

"Obviously I did." Rumi sighed, "My pride was wounded, you know. So, I figured I'd save you from it." 

Rukia laughed, "I think only you'd feel like that."

"What?"

"I mean it's a given that we'd lose. He's a lieutenant level. Losing is only normal." Rukia pointed out, "But being a renowned genius made you unable to accept defeat, is it?" Rukia teased her.

Rumi coughed, being called out on her bullsh*t and replied, "What'd you expect? I praise myself every single night before I sleep as a mantra, do you think I don't have ego issues?" 

"Fair enough." Rukia nodded seriously, before laughing again as she remembered what Rumi's mantra was. 

"So..you're still doing that sh*t?" She asked after a series of giggles.

"Yep, why wouldn't I be praising my awesome self?" Rumi replied, which only made Rukia laugh harder. 

Rukia was glad, that she ended up in Thirteenth Division. 

Renji might not be here, but Rumi was, and it helped Rukia feel a sense of normalcy. 

For that, Rukia was grateful. 

-----------------

After showing Rukia around, Rumi made her way to the training spot in Rukongai. Today, she was planning on sparring with Kaien and hopefully, she could finally win this time. 

"Fujiwara, seems like you're optimistic this time." Kaien said with a laugh as he saw Rumi's face. 

"I've been training for over a month now, sir Kaien.." Rumi replied, "I don't know, that seems like a pretty long time for me." 

"One month's a long time? Don't joke around, Fujiwara. We all know one month's nothing compared to how old we are." Kaien said. 

"Right...." Rumi hummed, deciding not to point out the fact that she wasn't even a year old in Soul Society age. After all, it felt weird to be seen as someone that young when she physically looked like she was twenty in human years. 

"Anyways, let's get started." Kaien said, "I'm now curious to see how much progress you've had in one month." 

Rumi caught the wooden sword Kaien threw easily as usual and charged towards. 

This time, Rumi swore she would win. 

----------------

Kaien blocked the wooden sword quickly but as the wooden swords made impact with each other, Kaien felt that there was a much stronger power burst behind it. It was as if his first pointer to Rumi had been a long time ago, because it was quite outrageous to see how powerful a single attack had gotten in a month. 

Rumi was also fast, he knew she was, because he had seen it multiple times. A month ago, he noticed how fast she was yet how it was still a little rough and less refined, but now, Kaien could barely see the same weakness. 

Now, Rumi's Shunpo movements were much smoother and flowed seamlessly with each move of her sword. The speed, the power, and the accuracy, it was everything an assassin type fighting needed. 

Kaien started to feel a bit of pressure as they exchanged more blows with each other. He reminded himself that Rumi was lacking in endurance so if he could hold on for long enough, he could turn the tides quickly. 

But as time went on, Kaien was surprised to see that Rumi was still going strong, her reiatsu wasn't fluctuating much or showing signs of depletion. Her stamina also seemed to have got better and her sword swings still carried the same amount of power. 

At that moment, Kaien actually realized that Rumi had improved more than he thought. Rumi had gone from needing to use everything she had, Kido, Shunpo, Zanjutsu and Shikai just to match with him to being able to pressure him this much with Zanjutsu and Shunpo alone, using a wooden sword at that. 

Kaien had a content smile on his face as his wooden sword fell to the ground at one point and Rumi's wooden sword aimed at his heart. 

"I have lost." He said with that same content smile. 

Kaien was content with the outcome. Ever since he decided to guide Rumi in Zanjutsu, he knew that she would one day surpass him.

It was just that Kaien didn't expect it to happen this quickly. 

-----------------

Rumi felt a little surreal as she knocked Kaien's wooden sword away and aimed her wooden sword at Kaien's heart.

"I have lost." Kaien admitted with a content smile and Rumi's heart swelled with pride. 

She had finally done it. After a month of training, she had managed to win against Kaien even if it was a spar without their Zanpakutos. 

Rumi was proud of it, so much so that she was smiling ear to ear. 

And, the feeling was only enhanced by the System notification.

[Congratulations for defeating Shiba Kaien, lieutenant of Thirteenth Division in a spar. Please choose one of the rewards. 

Option 1: Reiryoku Level Up Card (consummable, only applicable until your natural cap).

Option 2 : Reiryoku Replenishing Pill (Quantity 10, Consummable)

Option 3 : Water Pressure Resistance. 

(Short description : The heightened resistance to water pressure.) ] 

Seeing that the options were back, Rumi was a little relieved. Although she couldn't figure out why she wasn't offered choices the last time, the fact that there were three options this time made her feel a sense of normalcy again and this made her a bit more relaxed. 

As Rumi went through the options after leaving the sparring spot, she noticed that two of the options this time were consummables. 

First one was the same reward option from graduating the academy. Although it wasn't directly related to Kaien, Kaien still had high reiryoku level that would only lose to captains if Rumi was right. So, it still could be said that reiryoku related options were related to Kaien. 

Second option was reiryoku replenishing pill, which obviously was great for emergency situations where she would be running low on reiryoku. But, Rumi felt that it wasn't quite comparable to reiryoku level up as the latter had more permanent effect on her power level rather than simply restoring what she had lost. 

Then, the third option was water pressure resistance, which obviously could be resistance to Kaien's Shikai as his Shikai was literally water waves. It could be a very useful skill if Kaien was her enemy but he wasn't so, Rumi wasn't particularly too excited about it. 

What she had her eyes on this time was reiryoku level-up card. For this to show up two times, Rumi felt that it was a little strange. 

Rumi knew reiryoku level was important as it would also affect her reiatsu level and spirit class. She had witnessed it after all, when her reiryoku level had reached High level, her reiatsu stuck at a certain point became stronger as if it was released from a certain limit and her spirit class had also leveled up from 5 to 4. So, Rumi knew increasing reiryoku level was key to make herself stronger, in addition to mastering Zankensoki techniques and Shikai.

The reason she didn't choose the level up previous time was because it didn't help her increase her potential like enhancing her talent in one of the Zankensoki techniques and only drove her to her natural capacity limit faster.

But, now that Rumi wasn't particularly interested in other two rewards, she decided to choose reiryoku level up this time. 

'Well, the progress to level up this time is a lot more work with needing 100,000, ten times the amount earlier. I took a bit more than five months just to get it to 10,000 so it means I would probably take about four years to get it to 100,000.' Rumi thought. 

For her, it sounded like an extremely slow progress. So, if she could level it up using the card, she could save four years of time and progress much further in spirit class and Shikai training. Maybe she could even start Bankai training earlier that way as she would have enough reiatsu to spare. 

'System, I'll choose option 1: Reiryoku level up card.' Rumi finally made her choice. 

[Understood. You have received reiryoku level up card (Quantity: 1). Do you want to use it now?] 

Looking at her surroundings, Rumi shook her head.

'Not yet.'

Only after getting back to her room, Rumi told System to use the level up card. The reason for using it now instead of saving for later levels was quite simple. Rumi didn't know what her natutal cap exactly was and asking the System didn't exactly work, just like the time she asked about her natural potential in each of Zankensoki techniques. So, Rumi didn't want to risk wasting the card by trying to upgrade later on when she had already hit her limit. While using the card now would mean hitting her natural cap earlier, it was also an opportunity to start finding ways earlier to overcome that. Besides, Rumi felt that having higher reiryoku faster would be more beneficial at this point. 

[Are you sure to Reiryoku level card will be used now?] 

'Yes, use it now.' Rumi answered without hesitation. 

[Reiryoku level up card is used successfully. Your reiryoku level has been upgraded to Great level.] 

Hearing that, Rumi excitedly opened her Stats. 

[Name : Fujiwara Rumi.

Age : 211 days. (Soul Society).

Race : Enhanced Soul (Shinigami).

Relationships : Abarai Renji (Close Friends), Rukia (Close Friends), Hinamori Momo (Close Friends), Kira Izuru (Friends), Hitsugaya Toshiro (Mentee), Shiba Kaien (Mentor). 

Reiryoku level : Great.

Stored reiryoku : 2190/1,000,000

Spirit class : 3. 

Skills : Sloth (Passive), Guradian's Vigil (Passive), Fire Resistance (Passive), Cold Resistance (Passive), Mind's Momentum, Falsifier.

Abilities : Zanjutsu(Advanced), Kido (Intermediate), Hakuda (Intermediate), Hoho (Intermediate).

Tools : Zanpakuto, Disguise Pendant.

Zanpakuto : Kazehime (Shikai).]

"So, I still haven't hit the natural cap limit yet." Rumi muttered, after seeing the progress bar for the next level-up. It seemed that her progress of 2000ish was also transferred to the new progress bar. 

This was great news, although Rumi didn't really want to think how long it would take for her to level up to a higher level than Great level. Her spirit class had alao leveled up again, which was another great news. And apparently, it was supposed to be lower captain level, although Rumi was pretty sure she was nowhere near captain level yet.

She had yet to actually master her Shikai according to Kazehime and without a doubt, not even qualified yet to start training for Bankai. But, at least, her reiryoku level had met one of the requirements for it as even training for Bankai would use significant amount of reiatsu according to Kazehime.

"Alright, first things first. Now that my Zanjutsu had surpassed sir Kaien's and won against him, I can properly focus on mastering my Shikai now." Rumi muttered. 

The reason she couldn't properly train to master Shikai was because she was so focused on improving Zanjutsu so that she could stop losing to Kaien and finally win against him.

Now that she finally achieved it, Rumi felt that she could start becoming more lazy again and also train her Shikai.

All in all, Rumi was pretty excited about it.

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A/N: A bit of time skip and more progress for Rumi.

So, her beating Kaien in a spar only meant that she matched him or a little more efficient than him in swordsmanship and her Sloth's efficiency helped her win against him.

As she's yet to actually master her Shikai, if they fought with actual Zanpakuto, Shikai and all, Rumi might not necessarily win yet. Or at least, she won't if she doesn't bring out her OP Kido spells.

But, yeah, with all that said, she finally won in a spar and her reiatsu finally hit the captain level (albeit lower captain level).