17 - First Attempt

When Rumi got to the sparring spot Renji and she frequented to, she saw Renji, Rukia and Kira talking. 

"Hey, Rukia, long time no see." Rumi waved. 

"Rumi." Rukia looked at her and said, "I've heard from Renji that you keep skipping classes." 

"Yep, I'm definitely guilty of that." Rumi replied with a chuckle. "What can I do? I hate most of the lectures." 

"And I can't believe you're in class one. Isn't everyone in Class One working their ass off everyday?" Rukia scoffed. 

"Heh, we're all working hard, of course, with the exception of idiot Rumi." Renji said, "Honestly, how the heck do you not get into trouble with how many classes you're skipping?" He turned to Rumi asked in exasperation. 

"Maybe they let me off the hook because they believe I was doing well in my studies regardless of my attendance." Rumi shrugged.

"I think it's because you're really good at Kido, Fujiwara." Kira guessed, "I've been hearing people talking about your talent in Kido and I guess the instructors think you might even get into Kido corps after graduation."

"Huh? Me into Kido corps?" Rumi was a bit taken aback by that, surely just because she was a bit more interested in Kido, that didn't mean she wanted to only do Kido. That was just boring and also contradicted her very reason to focus on Kido on the first place for versatility. 

"You're not interested in Kido corps?" Kira asked, a bit surprised at Rumi's reaction as well. He thought given her exceptional talent in Kido, Rumi would be interested to go to Kido Corps. 

"Nope," Rumi replied, "Haven't given much thought about after graduation plans, but I definitely don't want to do Kido as my main or the only thing I'm good at." 

"Then, what do you want to do?" Renji asked with a huff, "You aren't bad with Zanjutsu and others but you aren't the most talented with those either." 

"But it's still enough to beat you up in a spar, isn't it? I'd say I'm pretty tablented seeing I'm not even one year old in Soul Society." Rumi said playfully. 

Again, Kira was shocked, his mouth was wide open and his eyes widened in disbelief.

"You...you're less than a year old?" 

Rumi grinned, this was too amusing, "Yep, I've crossed over like a month before the entrance exam." 

"But, that would mean you can use reiatsu in less than a month after being in Soul Society. Normally, it takes longer to even realize your own reiryoku and even longer to be able to use reiatsu." Kira said.

Renji pointed to Rumi and said, "She said she got hungry the day she got to soul society. We still don't know how the heck she even used her reiatsu without even realizing or know about reiatsu." 

"You got to be joking.." Kira muttered in disbelief. 

"Nope, it's all true, and that's why I like to think I'm pretty amazing!" Rumi said, "It's not everyday you see the level of my talent, right?"

"Seriously, you're just too..." Rukia was finding the word to describe Rumi's extreme confidence but Rumi beat her to it, "Confident in my talent and abilities?"

"More like arrogant," Renji scoffed.

But, Kira didn't exactly agree, "I think it's really  amazing that you can achieve this much in a short time, Fujiwara." 

"Thanks, Kira." Rumi gave him a thumbs up. "That said, I'm here to talk about something." 

"Oh?" Renji looked interested, it wasn't a daily occurrence that Rumi would take initiative in talking about serious things so he was curious on what it could be. 

"How are you guys' progress with the Asauchi? Have you guys been able to connect with it?" Rumi decided to get to the point once she'd seen everyone was listening. 

Renji was the first to talk, "Asauchi? You mean about connecting with a Zanpakuto spirit?" 

Rumi nodded.

"Well, we've been meditating for a while but I have yet to see anything similar to a spirit." Renji replied.

"Same," Kira said.

"Rukia?" Rumi asked.

"I have been to a place like a innerworld but I haven't found anything that resemble a Zanpakuto spirit." Rukia replied.

"Damn, there goes my hope." Rumi muttered, if these three had no experience with encountering their Zanpakuto spirit, she wasn't optimistic in them being able to help her. 

"Why're you asking this, Rumi?" Renji asked with a frown.

Rumi shook her head, "It's just that I've been having dreams about..my Zanpakuto spirit. Apparently, it wants me to find her in the innerworld or something." 

"Wait, your Zanpakuto spirit is already talking to you?" Rukia asked, feeling that was too outrageous. 

"Uh, yeah, it's been doing that for a while." Rumi replied, "It just kept popping up in my dreams and laugh at me most of the time. Honestly, if you think I'm a menace, she's like 10 times worse." 

"Ouch," Kira said, "That must be..difficult."

"I know right?" Rumi sighed, "So, I'm trying to find a way to get into innerworld." 

"Why don't you just meditate?" Renji asked a but impatiently, he was a bit jealous at the progress Rumi had been making in even connecting with the Zanpakuto spirit. Seriously, why did she have to beat him at everything? and the worst part was Rumi didn't even seem to be trying.

"I haven't seen you meditate for once." He pointed out.

"In my defence," Rumi said, "I meditated once. It was too boring, so I gave up." 

"You can't just give up on-" Rukia said but then sighed, after remembering who she was talking to, "Nevermind." 

It was Rumi, and she was mostly known for only doing things that interests her or that she finds worthy to put an effort in, otherwise, she was the laziest person Rukia had ever seen. In fact, in the past two months, Rukia had seen Rumi napping in the academy grounds without even bothering to go to class and heard from Renji that she only paid attention in a few of Zanjutsu classes and Kido classes. Other classes, not so much. Rukia didn't know how Rumi still passed the exams they had in Class One or got into the top 5 with the level of effort she was putting in. It was simply outrageous.

"So, any ideas on how else I can get to innerworld?" Meanwhile, Rumi asked her question even if she wasn't confident that her friends would know. 

As she expected, everyone shook their heads.

"I'm afraid meditation is the only way I know." Kira said, "But maybe you could ask the intructors. I'm sure they'd be happy to help."

"I guess," Rumi sighed. "Thanks, Kira."

"Hey, where're our thanks?" Renji and Rukia said at the same time.

"Do I neee to? I thought we're bestfriends!" Rumi said, while physically pulling Renji and Rukia into a hug.

"Ugh, let go of me, idiot Rumi!" Renji shouted.

"What're you doing, Rumi?!" Rukia said.

"Pfft, it's just a hug. You guys are so funny." Rumi laughed at them after letting go. Seeing the two flush red in their faces made Rumi laugh in amusement. 

---------

Rumi finally decided to go to the library to read a few books and see if she could find something useful before she headed to the instructors and ask for help. It just wasn't something she'd prefer to do if she could manage without having to do so. 

So, Rumi decided to skim through a few books but she found no other interesting way. 

"I guess I'll just try sword meditating." Rumi muttered. Maybe this was just what the Zanpakuto spirit wanted, which was to torture her. Given her mischievous personality, she probably would enjoy seeing Rumi frustrated. 

"God, I need a nap." Rumi muttered, turned out being the one at the receiving end wasn't nearly as funny as when she was the one pestering others. 

Rumi took a quick nap to cheer herself up and fell asleep quickly with her face in the books. 

After a few hours, she woke up, feeling refreshed. 

"I might've just found another perfect space to nap." She muttered. Who knew the library was such a good place for a nap? 

"Right, I gotta do the sword meditation."

Rumi headed to an outdoor secluded spot in the academy and sat down under a tree. She then placed her Asauchi on her lap and closed her eyes. 

After struggling to focus for a while, Rumi found herself in an amusement park, the same one in her first dreams upon crossing over to Soul Society. 

Rumi started walking to the streets in the amusement park, just exploring since she had to find the Zanpakuto spirit. She walked through the streets and even looked into the rides in hopes of finding the spirit but it was just way too quiet without any form of other presence in the empty amusement park. 

Rumi didn't know how much time had passed but just when she was starting to lose focus, she felt a gush of strong wind rushing towards her.

Then, she heard a series of laughters as she struggled to stand properly with the strong wind pushing her in random directions.

"Stupid Rumi, you're so stupid hahaha." The voice was making fun of Rumi as her hair was in her face and Rumi couldn't see where she was even going anymore.  It didn't help that the wind kept pushing her and making her lose balance. 

"Stupid wind." Rumi muttered in annoyance. Then, with a sigh, she activated Mind's Momentum to keep her calm and come up with a solution.

With Mind's Momentum, she calmed down and her head became clearer. 

"Right, don't I also have wind elemental reiatsu?" Rumi slapped her own forehead. Afterwards, she decided to manipulate her own reiatsu to cancel out the effects of the other wind pushing her in random directions.

"Seems like you passed the first part. Not that bad but you could've done better, heh." The little girl's voice said. 

Before Rumi could reply anything or relax a little, the wind turned into a tornado and it was heading straight towards her.

"Are you kidding me? Even if I have wind elemental reiatsu, I can't withstand a whole fucking tornado now!" Rumi cursed under her breath and started using her Shunpo to boost her speed and get away from the scene. Since her Shunpo was only advanced beginner, her speed wasn't that fast. Rumi knew she would get caught up in it soon enough. 

"What else can I do? I can kind of use Shunpo but it isn't fast enough yet. I can't maintain it that long yet either. Once my Shunpo fails, I'd get caught up in it." Rumi muttered. 

While her wind reiatsu should theoretically boost her speed, Rumi realized she had never really tried it out in practice. She was caught up in learning Kido for versatility so much that she wasn't paying much attention to other aspects. 

"But, it's worth a try." Rumi decided quickly and started her attempt to combine her Shunpo with her wind reiatsu for a boost. 

After nearly getting caught up in the tornado for more than ten times, Rumi finally got the trick. Her speed had become much faster and the distance between the tornado and her started to  widen as it continued to chase her. 

Rumi didn't know how long she had been chased but she realized her Shunpo was getting better and so was her control over wind reiatsu. That led her to think maybe, just maybe her Zanpakuto spirit was training her.  

"Boo-boo, you're wrong, Rumi. I'm simply enjoying your misery." The little girl's voice said, "Too bad you're starting to enjoy it." 

"...." Rumi was speechless. Was that spirit a sadist?! Wasn't Zanpakuto spirits a bit similiar to their Shinigami? Rumi didn't think she was a sadist, even if she enjoyed beating Renji up and making Rukia feel headaches everytime she saw her. No, Rumi wasn't a sadist at all. 

"You're just in denial." The voice said.

"No, that's not true." Rumi replied.

"Whatever," The little girl's voice said, "I'm bored now. Bye bye."

"Wait, what about.."

"You didn't find me. I chased you off without even giving you a chance to see me, although I doubted you could see me even if I'm right in front of you at this point." The little girl's voice replied as if she knew what Rumi was thinking.

"Damn it," Rumi cursed, how did that little brat know what she was thinking? 

"...Hmph. Come back next day, Rumi. And you better be prepared." The little girl's voice said and the tornado vanished without a trace. 

"Did she know what I was thinking or something?" Rumi muttered. 

Anyway, Rumi knew her attempt to find the spirit was over for the day. She was also pretty tired herself after using Shunpo and wind reiatsu to her maximum so she decided to leave. 

After leaving the innerworld, Rumi opened her eyes back in the real world. It turned out that she'd been in the innerworld for at least an hour and a half. No wonder she was this tired. 

And she probably looked like she was hit by a tornado in real life, despite it kind of chased her around in the innerworld.

But, then, Rumi realized that she had read in a book, "All injuries sustained in the innerworld will reflect in real world." 

Suddenly, Rumi was glad she actually didn't get swallowed in the tornado back then or she might just not even make it out here. 

"Was my Zanpakuto spirit supposed to be trying to kill me?" Rumi muttered.

Probably not, she quickly guessed. 

But, somehow, Rumi could see why that spirit would be doing things this way. It was kind of scary that Rumi could understand her a little even if she was the one who came up with this torture challenge. 

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

When Rumi went back to her room after her sword meditation, she saw Momo in the room, she had probably come back from the library or classes. 

"Rumi, you're back." Momo said. She looked like she had something to say.

"Yeah, what's wrong, Hinamori?" Rumi asked.

"Well, today after classes, our class one instructor, Ounabara sensei, said you've been missing too many classes and told me to tell you to come and meet him tomorrow morning before classes." Momo said.  

"Wait, seriously?" Rumi groaned. She thought she was doing the bare minimum attending classes to not get into trouble but clearly it needed a bit more work, or in this case, attendance. 

Momo nodded, "I think it's better to..umm..mentally prepare yourself." 

"I know," Rumi sighed. 

She was thinking of refining her Shunpo a bit more tomorrow but with the instructor on her tail, Rumi wasn't sure how she could manage to fit into her schedule. After all, she needed (more like wanted) to have at least 18 hours of rest every day. 

----------

A/N: Another chapter before I lose motivation lol

I'm writing as much as I can for now and so far, the drafts are done for a few more chapters so yeah, I think it's a lot of new chapters.

I've also finished coming up with her Shikai and Bankai ideas (although Bankai's still in draft stage) so kinda excited how you guys would react to it later on!