Bleach: A Grand Adventure

Following their encounter with Ichigo Kurosaki, and confirming that he had the power to see souls, Baiken and Pinkie spent a week and a half doing the same thing, as in they opened their mornings with breakfast and training in the underground area with either Ururu and Yoruichi. This allowed them to build and improve their reflexes, even though they found that facing off against the latter was definitely far harder than the former, as Yoruichi was much faster and much stronger than Ururu was, even though she happened to be holding back. It did make Baiken wonder if they would ever get a taste of her full power, to see just how strong she really was and see what sort of gap existed between them, but for the time being they focused on avoiding attacks and learning how to use their fists in combat, in case they were ever disarmed. Kisuke watched over them while Tessai focused on maintaining the store, in case someone happened to show up while they were down here, and so far it seemed like no one really came to this place, but Kisuke insisted that he had customers.

On their second day learning from Kisuke they got confirmation of that fact, as there was a young man who visited the shop once, who seemed to be about Ichigo's age, though he wore trousers, a plain shirt, and a tie, with a newsboy cap and a long coat, almost like he was in hiding or something similar to that. Baiken was of that opinion because of the fact that the young man seemed to notice them standing in the background of the shop, they had been interested in seeing some transactions from this world and Kisuke was willing to humor them, and there was the fact that the young man avoided eye contact. It was as if he was trying to hide who he was from those that he deemed to be threats or those he didn't know, and right now she assumed they were the latter to him, but he kept to himself and spoke a little while they were in the background. All he bought were a few items from Kisuke that were for Shinigami, items that neither of them knew anything about since this was the first time they heard of him mentioning fuel and fibers, which meant there was more for them to learn about.

The other thing that Kisuke taught them was how to use Kido, where they found that there were two types of Kido that could be learned, Hado for offensive spells and Bakudo for battle support, like barriers and seals, and to do that they had to tap into their Reiryoku and channel it into specific hand gestures, with or without an incantation, to unleash a spell.

Baiken found that it was literally the same as using magic, drawing on their inner power and using it to cast spells, though at the same time they learned that one could use two different types of power, a lesser one that didn't require the incantation and produced lesser power, or the full incantation that was much stronger. Of course it wasn't a simple matter to wield this power, Kisuke even told them that prodigies took some time to master the spells they knew, but he was surprised when she started to weave together the weaker versions of the various spells. Kisuke happened to have a few tomes from his time in Soul Society, he didn't deny it since Baiken knew his crew had to be from the Realm of Souls, it was the only way he could realistically know all of the stuff he knew, and Yoruichi confirmed it. Pinkie, on the other hand, simply had fun doing this for the first time, because unlike Twilight most of her friends didn't have magic, or at least not in the sense of throwing magic around all day long, so she simply went through using red flames, pale lightning, and everything else Kisuke taught her.

"It's fine... it's just Pinkie being Pinkie." Kisuke had said, showing them that he understood the pink haired girl and that she was capable of doing insane things, even though he did look like part of him wanted to observe her as she tackled the rest of her training, to see if this was going to be the norm for the rest of their training.

Baiken and Pinkie continued to tackle their training for as long as the pair gave it to them, though at the same time Yoruichi brought them out into the city every night, allowing them to work on flashing from roof to roof, building their speed as they tried to match pace with her. It was an interesting challenge for Baiken, especially since she was an alicorn and was used to the power she had back in Equus, though she was more interested in doing her best in this world, focusing on the here and now instead of the ancient past that had lead to her imprisonment. The constant training also allowed Yoruichi to regain her own powers, as they found that she had gone without training for at least a hundred years, at the very least, but constantly changing between Baiken and Pinkie as training partners allowed her to regain her own speed. This also allowed them to get used to all sorts of terrain, something that allowed them to build their endurance in certain fields and prepare for whatever the future might have in store for them, and for the most part it looked like Yoruichi was pleased with their results.

That also allowed them to clash with the couple of Hollows that were occasionally invading Karakura Town, where Baiken did make sure to let Pinkie have a few chances to fight as well, otherwise her companion's skills would rust, though at the same time she also fought some of the Hollows as well. Such a thing also allowed them to actually track down and save some of the souls that were scattered throughout the city, where Baiken used the base of her Zanpakuto to tap the foreheads of the ones they found, causing them to vanish into thin air. Yoruichi informed them that this was common, perfectly normal in the grand scheme of things, while Pinkie just smiled and tapped them in the same area with a finger, since her Zanpakuto wasn't like Baiken's, and it had the same effect, where she assumed that it was simply her power at work. Other than that there wasn't too much else for them to worry about, since it seemed like the city was fairly peaceful despite the Hollows, though it did make her wonder when Soul Society was going to send someone to replace the last one that had been slain.

By the end of their second week in Karakura Town, and at the start of what was going to be the third day, Baiken, Pinkie, and their newfound friends felt the change in the air as a gate opened, the way between the World of the Living and the Soul Society, the official opening, something that caused Baiken to sigh.

"It's about bloody time... it's been, what, two weeks since we arrived and at least a month since the last Shinigami was slain by Hollows?" Baiken remarked, though this made her annoyed with the Soul Society, she and Pinkie were fairly new to this world and even they knew that this was insane, that it would take this long for someone to be picked to replace the one that had been slain a month ago, and a lot of souls had been claimed by the Hollows due to their negligence, "This this normal for the Soul Society?"

"No, it isn't. I'm assuming that they were picking someone that's stronger than the last two that were sent." Kisuke stated, but at the same time he shared Baiken's disappointment, there was no reason for the Soul Society to take so long in picking someone to replace the last Shinigami they sent, even if they were picking someone above the unranked Shinigami that had been sent previously, before he, too, frowned, "Based on what I'm feeling it seems like a fairly high ranking officer has been selected this time... feels like a 10th Seat, maybe 11th."

"They don't feel very strong... my Pinkie Sense is telling me something bad is going to happen to them." Pinkie said, in fact it felt like the Shinigami was incredibly weak, like an unseated officer, those below the 20th mark to be exact, and that made her worry for whoever it might be, while at the same time Yoruichi seemed to be focused on sensing the figure as well, "So, shall we go meet them and see if they're willing to do their job?"

Kisuke and Yoruichi nodded their heads, it was wise for the girls to head out and interact with the Shinigami that came to the city, because it was time for the pair to get to work, for real, since Kisuke was of the opinion that things were going to get much busier than what the girls were used to. With that in mind the pair finished their breakfast before heading outside, all while Baiken found Yoruichi returning to her cat form for the time being, since there was a chance the newcomer might be by for Shinigami supplies in the future. After leaving the building Baiken and Pinkie flashed onto the nearest roof before they glanced out at the city, where people were going about their mornings, unaware of the Spiritual World and it's dangers, while the remaining scattered souls waited to move on to the next world. Both located Ichigo's power easily, even though he had no idea he had it, and that brought them to him beating up a couple of people for tipping over a vase full of flowers on the side of the road, where the spirit of a girl stood, who looked like she had been run over recently.

The strangest thing was that the newcomer Shinigami was nowhere to be seen, they were simply hiding themselves while no doubt looking over their assignment, confirming that they had to be a lower ranking officer, one unsuited for this mission, to which they simply continued to go about their day like normal. With that in mind they decided to follow Ichigo, because if the two of them could feel his latent untapped power than it stood to reason that other Shinigami might be able to sense it as well, though they stayed on the roofs to avoid being seen. The boy seemed to go about a normal day, he went to school with the rest of his classmates, he had lunch at school, got pestered by people who didn't like his hair color for some reason, and seemed to do quite well in school, at least from what they were able to observe. Baiken noticed that the glasses boy was in the school as well, though there was a tall buff boy that seemed like a fighter, with his hair covering one of his eyes, and a girl that had burnt orange hair and a rather large bust for someone of her age, but the others weren't terrifying interesting, at least not from a glance.

Eventually it happened, a Hollow attacked an area that Ichigo was moving through, though they discovered that a young female Shinigami, with short black hair and a stern look on her face, slashed up the Hollow's mouth area before slicing right through it's mask a few seconds later, purifying it while Ichigo and the soul it was following, the girl, fled.

"So, you're not a total newbie... that's good." Baiken remarked, where they found that the girl turned and looked at them as she sheathed her Zanpakuto, though she was clearly surprised by their arrival, which wasn't too unexpected since she was likely assuming that she would have been sent here on her own.

"Who are you two? What Division are you from?" the lady asked, showing that she was definitely suspicious of them, since neither of them had been to the Soul Society before and she knew she hadn't seen them before, not that Baiken could really blame her since they were strangers.

"I am Baiken, this is Pinkie Pie... and we're not with the Soul Society. These are our uniforms and Zanpakuto." Baiken replied, as she knew the lady might suspect them of stealing what they had from the dead Shinigami, even though the clothing was definitely not from the slain, Kisuke had confirmed that when Baiken asked him about why he had two sets of Shinigami clothing, "You could say that we found them and have spent the last two weeks defending Karakura Town from Hollows."

"Why? It's not your job to do such a thing." the lady inquired, though at the same time she made no move to reveal her name to them, either because she was still trying to figure out if they were allies or enemies, which was the most likely course, or she was someone who didn't like giving her name to total strangers, Kisuke said those types of people existed.

"Well duh, but we had no choice. I mean, the Soul Society did take a month to select someone to send to this city, and in the end they sent an unseated officer." Pinkie replied, doing what she normally did, bounced around with a smile on her face, even though this one was tainted with a slight frown since the delay in sending an officer here had condemned many souls to be devoured by Hollows, or could have had she and Baiken not fought them off.

"What do you mean 'unseated'? Shouldn't you be thinking I'm a ranked member, like 5th Seat or even a Lieutenant?" the lady asked, showing them that she wasn't too happy about their thoughts towards her and her ranking in her Division, despite the fact that she had yet to introduce herself to them, but at least she did seem to be thinking about the delay it took for the Soul Society to send her in the first place.

Baiken started laughing at that, she couldn't help it, because this Shinigami thought they would consider her above her rank, far above really, and yet it made her wonder what in the world the Soul Society was thinking, sending someone so weak to a city that had a number of powerful Hollows that frequented it.

"Sorry, but if you were the Lieutenant, or Vice-Captain, or whatever you say that rank is, than your Division is screwed... you, my dear, are incredibly weak." Baiken remarked, she wasn't going to sugarcoat it, the Shinigami in front of them didn't have the power to fight off some of the known Hollows that came to this city, so she was sure that the lady was going to be dead in the week if the stronger foes came at her, "Seeing you up close I have to agree with Pinkie: you're an unseated officer, not even a 10th or 11th Seat like I initially assumed. So, do you have a name, or are we just going to call you 'girl' for however long you're in Karakura Town?"

"...Rukia. I am Rukia Kuchiki." the Shinigami replied, where she looked at the pair for a moment, clearly wondering if she was being disrespected or if they were genuinely concerned for her safety, and by being mean they were hoping to make her go home before she ended up dead, before she flashed up into the air and headed into the city.

"My Pinkie Sense is still acting up. Something bad is going to happen to her." Pinkie commented, speaking after Rukia left the area, though at the same time she found that Baiken was nodding her head as well, they both knew the girl didn't have the power to stand up to the stronger Hollows and that Soul Society's decision to send her might be the death of her.

Baiken decided to follow Rukia, because she trusted Pinkie's strange abilities and knew that the Shinigami was going to get herself killed in the near future, though at the same time she found herself wondering what the next couple of days might have in store for them, the new Shinigami, and the rest of Karakura Town.