Meetings, But Not Really (2/2).

"Ichigo Kurosaki, the man who helped me and Kushina with containing the Kyuubi."

"The man has told us about himself and his reason for coming to Konoha unannounced, but let's start from the beginning for those who still don't know about the full incident."

Minato proceeded to tell them about the place where Kushina gave birth, the masked man showing up and killing the Anbu guards, the nurses and Biwako-san, taking his newborn son hostage to force him away from Kushina, extracting the Kyuubi and vanishing. Him taking Naruto and Kushina away from the site, fighting the man, transporting the Kyuubi away and the sealing process.

After which Minato explained about Ichigo, how he appeared out of nowhere, punched a hole through the Kyuubi's chest without any sort of ninjutsu and only using his physical strength.

As soon as he finished talking, there was a sudden pin drop silence in the room. Everyone was giving him their full attention. And so he started talking once again.

"What most people don't know is that the price for using Dead Demon Consuming Seal is the life of the one who used the hand signs and as you can see, I am right in front of you."

Everyone, including the still sullen Uchiha patriarch, was impressed with the readiness of the young Hokage to give his own life for the safety of the village. While it was their first time hearing about such a seal, it was enough to portray a picture.

Everyone also understood that the human sacrifice he chose for sealing the Kyuubi was his own son. The only one who seemed dissatisfied with the happenings was Danzo, but no one was paying any attention to him.

"This is something I am also very curious about Minato-kun. I know about the price for using the Dead Demon Consuming Seal, what I want to know is how you came out of it alive. I know you are talented but circumventing that Seal cannot be done on the spot. If you had time, probably a few years, I'm pretty sure you could, but you didn't have any time to waste."

Hiruzen asked. This was as far as Minato had told him and Jiraiya.

"That is something I'm still not sure about. One thing I'm sure of is that our guest played a role in me coming out of it alive. I was ready to damn my soul for eternity the moment I finished the sealing but the reaper went away after the sealing was done without taking the price."

At this point everyone else was confused. Their leaders went from talking about paying the ultimate price to damning the soul for eternity in a single sentence.

Seeing their confused faces, Hiruzen started to explain the intricacies of the seal to everyone else. He didn't explain everything of course, but enough for them to understand what was going on. To say they were even more impressed was an understatement. The two civilian elders, who were always skeptical about making Minato the Hokage were throughly convinced.

"Our guest, who has given us the name Kurosaki Ichigo, told me that he could not only see the reaper but was also able to converse with him. According to our guest, the reaper said that meeting someone with such a high death affinity was enough price for the seal."

'Death affinity?', all of them thought at the same time.

Hiruzen spoke up, "We know the five Elemental affinities and while being documented only once or twice, there's also the Yin and Yang affinities, but death affinity, this is the first time I've heard of it."

"It could be a mutation of Yin affinity, Hokage-sama.", Shibi said.

"It could very possibly be. We know very little about Yin and Yang affinities, only that yin affects the spiritual side of chakra while yang affects the physical side.", Hiruzen replied.

"From what I've been able to gather, he himself did not know about his affinity. I made him use chakra paper and the paper was not affected at first. Then the paper started to slowly turn yellow, after which it started flaking at the edges and finally it completely disintegrated after a minute or so.", Minato explained.

"That is what a piece of paper would do if left unattended for a few years. It would decay. I believe, it's safe to say that either he has one of a kind mutation and that he may be the first one to have it or he has a bloodline limit." Shikaku added.

He was not one to jump to conclusions so easily but his wife had just given birth few days ago and she was still grumpy. It was the same for nearly all of them. Inoichi had a daughter, Choza had a son, Tsume also had a son recently so she was absent, the Uchiha patriarch had a second son while the Hyuuga clan head had his first daughter.

It was supposed to be a month of happiness. The village was stable and prospering under the new Hokage. So many children were born one after the other. They were finally starting to move on from the bloody war. They were not ready for this incident. If it weren't for this stranger, the new Hokage would have died and that single thing alone would have destabilized the whole village. Not to say there weren't any casualties, a lot of ninjas had died and they were still not sure about the number of civilian casualties.

But the death of the new Hokage would have given outside forces a chance to get in the village and some of them would have happily done so, even at the cost of their own lives, to cause more chaos and death in the village. But he also knew that they could not dismiss that guy so easily. From what the Yondaime had told them, he was strong, very strong, on the same level as the Hokage, if not stronger.

"What have you planned for this individual, Hokage-sama?", Hiashi questioned.

"First, let me tell you what he has told me and Sandaime-sama about himself."

After Minato told Ichigo's story to the council, Shikaku spoke up,

"Hokage-sama, you said he punched a hole through the Kyuubi and currently he is looking to recreate a legendary weapon that will most likely make him even stronger. Did you ask him why he wanted to be so strong?"

Sarutobi spoke after indicating he had something to say,

"From what I could gather from looking at him, he has recently gone through a tragedy, most likely during the war and is constantly melancholic and drawn in. He is a seasoned fighter but from what I could see his strength is new to him as well."

"I could see that as well. After he saved me, he had a sudden outburst while conversing with the shinigami but when he surveyed the damage caused by his outburst, he looked surprised by the extent of it. Me and Sandaime-sama have concluded that the more pieces of the sword he gathers, the stronger he gets and the effect seems to be very quick." Minato added.

"By the time he gathers all the pieces, how strong do you reckon he will be?" The civilian councilor asked.

"We don't know yet but that is why Sandime-sama has accepted his request for some swordsmanship lessons, so he can personally gauge his strength. We will decide what to do after we have more information on his strengths, weaknesses and goals. Till then, no one is allowed to antagonize him."

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As the meeting was happening, Ichigo was thinking about what to do while collecting the pieces. He thought about travelling but that would require a lot of stuff and money, both of which he had very little of. He could make a base for himself in this village and return here after every excursion.

From looking around and talking to Minato, he understood that there were no advanced transporting vehicles in this world. The civilians traveled mostly by foot or on horse driven carriages, the nobles or rich people also traveled by carriages and the ninjas, they simply ran to their destinations.

According to this, the landmass they were living in was not very large. Also the village he was in was known as the largest most prosperous one and it's population still didn't exceed 100,000, that was barely equal to the medium sized cities on his own world. There were only four other villages like this one, the remaining were all smaller.

He was pretty sure that when he found all the pieces of Zangetsu in this world, he will be sent to another world but should he just leave this place, find all the pieces as quickly as possible and leave this world alone. It was clear to him that he was not supposed to be here, he was too powerful and that was without his zanpakuto.

On that topic, without his zanpakuto he couldn't release his more powerful attacks and while he could handle a sword without any trouble, he didn't have a lot of techniques nor a formal style of fighting. He couldn't exactly learn any Shinigami techniques like Hado or Bakudo, but he could learn the ones that came with his heritage. Like his Quincy and Hollow abilities. Could he combine his abilities? He was a one of a kind hybrid.

While he could use his Hollow abilities quite nicely, his quincy abilities were basically untouched. If he could use the quincy's ability to absorb the surrounding spiritual power consciously he could gain a massive boost to his durability and his stamina.

Thinking of this, Ichigo sat down and started concentrating on the surrounding spiritual power before suddenly realizing that he was no longer a spiritual entity but had a physical body and the power coursing through his body was not entirely spiritual in nature. 'Ugh, I need a proper teacher for this kind of stuff.'

He left the technical things alone for now, he could ask for someone to teach him the intricacies of chakra later. For now he focused on things that he could already do and improve or combine them with others. He knew three movements techniques, Shunpo, Sonido and Hirenkyaku. Well more the first two than the third, but what if he could combine all three to make something better.

Shunpo, he could perform very well, Sonido was more instinctual and he had used it when hollowfied but Hirenkyaku required extreme control of spiritual powers, which he didn't have. He left the apartment and asked around for the biggest opening the village had. Finding one such area called training ground 44, he found it in little time. He knew there were some people following him, but he let them, they were far enough and he was sort of an intruder.

He entered the forest and tried using Shunpo, pushing all the new power he could control to his feet and jumped. What he didn't expect was to create a sonic boom and crashing into a few trees hard enough to break through all of them. Before this he hadn't really put his all into anything because he didn't need to. He also knew that he had created enough noise to alert his followers. He stood up, cleared the dust and wood chippings off of himself and waited for them. 'Huh, not even my clothes are damaged.'