I'm back! And man does it feel good! I know I haven't written in a while, and too be honest; I have no excuse for it. However, I don't plan on having a pause that long, but I can't tell you when the next update will come either. If I get a decent amount of reviews for a chapter than I will try and get a new chapter out soon after.

Anyway, I've got a few announcements to make.

First, I will NOT be using anywhere near as many Japanese terms as I did in chapter seven. I just was trying to get used to using them and showing you how I would translate them (However I will only translate a term ONCE).

Second, I will probably go back and redo the first few chapters in time. Not now but maybe after I get this story going again. I won't change anything major; I'll just make it more realistic (in bleach terms anyway).

Finally, up until a point, it will be almost an exact retelling of Bleach canon. There will be changes but it is almost entirely unchanged (minus Masamune's evolvement) up until just a bit before the Quincy arc. The reason is, is that I want this story to be able to be picked up by someone that has zero to little knowledge of Bleach and still be able to understand it, for the most part at least. Also your patience will be rewarded.

And now for the disclaimer: I don't own Bleach. If I did, Aizen would have died in the last Manga chapter. I also don't own any brand-name merchandise that appears in this story. I do, however, own my OC.

On with the show! (AN: and time for another horribly cliché title!)

Chapter 8: And so Fell the Sword of Fate

In a world parallel to that of the living, ominous shadows stretched across endless plains of stark white sand; broken only by monolithic stone mountains and an occasional dead tree. These shadows, thrown by the pale light of this world's moon, stretched and twisted as though they were alive, and if anyone who could were to look into the shadows long enough, they would notice that the shadows would look back.

By some unseen force, large tendrils of inky blackness rose from these shadows and high into the sky, towards their ultimate goal; a meal.

Back in the plain of existence we all know and love, the same shadows as before emerged from the rolling clouds above the town of Karakura. They dropped like enormous raindrops and hit the ground like meteors, kicking up clouds of dust large enough to conceal all but their silhouettes and their sickly yellow eyes. And like a whisper in the wind they were gone, invisible to all but the most sensitive of onlookers; two gone to find sustenance and the two more gone to find souls that will meet their standards.

After all, even Hollows can by picky eaters.

With the second group, they decided to walk the nearly abandoned streets in search of adequate souls to feast on. Unfortunately, it seemed as though every living being they passed barely had enough spiritual pressure to keep them alive, never mind being considered an apitizer to the two monsters of the night. That is, until they felt it.

It was faint, and far away, but they could feel it all the same; compared to the energy of those they have encountered so far, it was like comparing a bathtub to a lake, no comparison. Lost in their hunger they rushed towards the source of the power they felt, not noticing the lack of both living and dead spirits as they got nearer.

Within moments they were where the origin of the reiryoku (spiritual energy) was coming from and it nearly made them howl in glee; this energy was delicious! The surrounding environment was absolutely saturated with raw power! They lapped up the reiryoku like a cat does to milk, and completely lost themselves in their indulgence. So gone were they that they didn't even notice the being walking calmly between them; garbed in clothing similar to the ninja of days long past, black baggy clothes for the lower half and a tight fitting shirt and gloves of the same color; it's head covered near completely by a black mask. All that remained visible were the eyes, or rather; they would be visible if this silent figure was not in the shadow of the creatures before it.

With a flicker of surprise and rage from the two hollows, they rounded on the smaller figure between them, murder on their minds for the being who had interrupted their meal. They noticed too late that they were attacking the source of the reiryoku flooding the area.

Right before the human (for he was indeed human) was flattened between the two beasts he disappeared in a blur of speed and rush of air, only to reappear high above them. The hollows noticed the disappearance of their pray and looked up. Suspended in the air the figure gave a mocking wave, eliciting a pair of growls from the monsters below, and vanished in another blur; this time appearing in front of the largest of the two (an ugly thing reminiscent of a certain giant reptile from a old monster movie series) at head height and let loose a ferocious kick the hollow's jaw, sending it careening in to a building, it was followed shortly by its partner (an even uglier crab/spider hybrid) who was hit by a devastating uppercut that sent it head over heels over heels over heels over… I think you get the point.

With the newly created space between the hollows and the human, the later descended towards the ground. The hollows rose and rushed back toward the human jaws open in their hellish scream. With a near inaudible sigh, the smaller of the three beings channeled a portion of his reiryoku to his limbs and waited for the hollows to come to him.

With a massive leap the reptilian hollow closed the gap only to be met by a right jab to the nose which knocked him on his back a few yards away. Meanwhile the many-legged hollow was scuttling around his prey in a laughable attempt to confuse him. In fact, the smaller fighter did let out a small chuckle and was further amused when the hollow roared in frustration. It decided to use one of the signature abilities of a hollow to teach the human before it a lesson. It's mouth open; the hybrid creature charged a blood red orb of reitsu (spiritual power/force). Just before it fired however, the fighter below jumped and forcefully closed the mouth of the hollow. The resulting explosion from the blast incinerated the majority of its head while leaving the human virtually unharmed.

As its brethren dissolved into the night, the reptilian hollow rose once more and ran towards the human in a frenzy. The target of the rush turned towards its attacker and raised his hand in a gesture leaving his palm facing towards the oncoming hollow. In a blinding flash the human was bathed in a silvery light. The light, his reitsu, coalesced into a point floating just ahead of his palm. As the hollow drew closer the human started the countdown '50 feet… 40 feet… closer, closer NOW!' all the pent up energy in his palm surge forward and hit the large reptile dead center on the mask.

As it was fading, the hollow finally got a good look of the eyes of the one who killed it.

They were gold.

"The hell's wrong wit' you?" a skate-punk asked, "You suddenly kick down Yama-chan and tell us 'outta the way?'" Ichigo Kurasaki sighed; he really didn't have time for this. He ran a hand through his spiky orange hair and closed his brown eyes for a moment to relax.

"Say somethin'! You little-," the skate-punk went to punch Ichigo, but met Ichigo's foot instead, face first too. With a bored expression, Ichigo proceeded to stomp him into the ground while the rest of the "gang" looked on.

"Wah! Toshirin's getting-," he trailed off as he watched his "boss" being beaten.

A second punk interjected, "This is bad," and began backing away.

The first summed up the gang's collective thought, "That's so messed up."

"Quit yakkin!" Ichigo commanded while he, literally, stomped Toshirin's head into the asphalt. "All you temes, (bastards [singular: teme]) look at that!" Ichigo yelled as he pointed behind him, the gang (or at least those who were conscious) looked to where he was pointing and saw a small bottle with a few flowers in it, the vase however; was on its side.

Ichigo turned back to the skaters and got their attention, "Question one, what is that? You, in the middle!"

The third punk nervously answered, "Ano, (um, uh, er, etc.) a tribute for a kid who died recently…"

"Absolutely right!" Ichigo punctuated this with a kick the third punk's chin. "Okay, why would that bottle have fallen over?"

The first punk answered, "Well, we were skate boarding and knocked it over…" With a few more fast kicks he had knocked both remaining punks on their backs.

"I dare you to do that again!" Suddenly Ichigo seemed to be backlit by flames, "I'll make it so people have to lay flowers for you too!" At this threat all the punks screamed like school-girls and ran off saying "We're sorry!"

Ichigo waited until they left, and then sighed again. "If I scared them that badly, they probably won't come back here," he said to thin air. He turned around just as a girl with pigtails appeared. Not special in itself but when the fact she's floating over the ground and has a chain coming from her chest, it leaves only one option.

"I'll bring you some new flowers tomorrow," Ichigo said.

The girl smiled, "Thanks for chasing them away; now I can rest peacefully o-nii-chan (big brother)

Ichigo put the bottle right-side-up again, "You're welcome" He looked towards the sky and grimaced 'looks like I'll be late,' he thought. He started walking away and said over his shoulder, "hurry up and go to heaven," just as the little girl faded away.

I'm Kurosaki Ichigo, Age fifteen, high school freshman. My family runs the town clinic. We save and don't save lives. I don't know if that's why but…, ever since I can remember, I've been able to see ghosts.

Ichigo kicked off his shoes as he arrived home and made his way to the living room, "I'm home." He was instantly cut off by a kick to the head, courtesy of his father, Isshin, along with a "You're late!"

As Ichigo landed painfully on the wooden floor Isshin decided to rant, "You punk of son; you know our dinner time is seven o' clock every night."

Ichigo recovered and retorted with, "Is that how you greet a son who went out of his way to help a ghost on his way home!"

Isshin got in his son's face, "Disrupting our family time no matter what the reason deserves punishment!" At this, father and son broke out in to an argument/fight (firgument? Argight? Which is it?)

After Yuzu's(Ichigo's empathetic little sister) failed attempts of breaking the two up, a solid punch to his father, a ghost popping up in his home, and Karin (Yuzu's apathetic, sarcastic twin sister) getting more food and admitting her permanent denial of seeing spirits despite the fact she actually can see spirits, Ichigo decided he had had enough and went to bed.

The next day, Ichigo was on his way to school, worried about the news report from that morning. A few nearby houses had outside walls that exploded into the street. No one was injured but Ichigo just couldn't shake that uneasy feeling sitting in his gut.

As he passed by the little girl from yesterday's makeshift shrine he pulled a bottle with new flowers out of his book-bag, "Hello," he called, "You there?" a few feet away, the girl reappeared in a distinctive shimmer of the air.

"Ohayo (Good Morning) o-nii-chan," she said. She saw the flowers and smiled, "You know, you're the second person to give me flowers this morning."

"Second?" Ichigo was confused, he didn't know of anyone else who was spiritually aware other than Yuzu and Karin, "what did this other person look like?"

The little spirit put on a thinking face, "Ano, he was about your height, maybe a little taller. He had spiky hair; kinda like yours but it was this neat silvery color. He had really pretty gold eyes and… oh! He was wearing a uniform like yours o-nii-chan"

Ichigo was even more confused than before; there wasn't a kid in school that fit that description. 'Silver hair and gold eyes? He'd stand out even more than me,' Ichigo put that thought aside for the moment. "Well, here's the flowers I promised you," he put the flowers next to a similar bottle with white flowers, "I'll drop by tomorrow to make sure they're still here, okay?" The little girl smiled even wider and nodded, "Hai (Yeah, yes, etc.) o-nii-chan." Ichigo grinned and walked towards school, he gave a wave over his shoulder just as the little girl faded into thin air again.

"Good morning, Ichigo!" Ichigo moved to his left and held out his arm to clothes line his friend Keigo Asano, why Ichigo puts up with the hyper active brunette the world may never know, just before his tackle hit him. Following Keigo in a more sedate manner is Mizuiro Kojima a black haired boy that looks younger than he actually is, "Morning Ichigo," Ichigo grunts in response and shakes Keigo off his arm.

"Aw man, Ichigo you can be really cruel sometimes, right Mizuiro?" the boy looked at his overly dramatic friend, "What did you say Asano-san (semi-informal honorific used with those you don't know that well or those of a slightly higher position than you)?"

Keigo face-faulted and jumped up with waterfall tears. "Not you too Mizuiro," Ichigo shook his head and opened the door to his classroom. "Ichigo," a deep voice said as soon as the door opened. Ichigo look beside the door and saw another of his friends, "Chad" Yasutora Sado, standing by the door. The half-Mexican, half-Japanese giant looked at him with one eye hidden behind his wavy brown hair, nodded, then looked away. That's one of the things Ichigo liked about Chad, Hey could say in one word what others needed three, and a tackle apparently, to get across.

"Hey Ichigo," Ichigo heard just before someone slapped him on the back. Ichigo turned and looked down at the scruffy head of black hair that belong to his best friend and resident tomboy of the class, Tatsuki Arisawa. Ichigo let a small smile on his face but as soon as it was there it was replaced with his usual indifferent scowl but he knew Tatsuki saw his smile.

"Kurosaki-kun (honorific showing affection [usually male])!" Ichigo turned yet again to see a mutual friend of Tatsuki and his, Orihime Inoue. Her long orange hair and grey eyes might be found weird by some but they were quickly "convinced" otherwise by an angry Tatsuki.

"Inoue-san," Ichigo greeted Orihime in a manner most would consider cold. The fact of the matter is that Ichigo honestly doesn't know all that much about Orihime so assumes that he should say –san with her name.

"Orihime-chan (honorific showing affection [usually female])!" Ah, the last of this merry troupe has arrived. With a flying tackle mixed with a hug; the red-headed master of the glomp, Chizuro Honsho, all but molested Orihime. Poor Orihime, cursed with having large breasts along with her other looks; she is wanted by most of the male population (except for the ever oblivious Ichigo) and even some of the girls (mostly Chizuro).

Lucky for Orihime, she has a fool proof defense that should kick in right about, "Chizuro!" was all the warning she had before Tatsuki grabbed her by the collar of her school uniform and forcefully threw Chizuro of Orihime and across the class room.

Chizuro hastily sat up and rubbed the back of her head, "Oh, Tatsuki-chan. Why did you…do…," she trailed off as she looked up into Tatsuki's face. Tatsuki was smiling madly and had an evil glint in her eyes as she cracked her knuckles.

"You know Chizuro; most people would have given up by now, so you are persistent. I'll give you that," Chizuro chuckled nervously, "Oh come on Tatsuki-chan, let a girl have some fun."

Tatsuki was about to reply but their teacher, Misato Ochi, decided to enter the room at that moment, "Sit down class." Tatsuki shot Chizuro one last glare and got to her seat.

Ichigo and the rest of his friends each got to their seats when Ochi-sensei (used to classify someone as a teacher) tapped the chalk-board to get everyone's attention, "Class, We've got a new student joining us today so I'm supposed to tell you to be on your best behavior…; however, I know that there is no point in saying that so why don't we just bring him in."

That ought to do it.

I planned on doing more than I did in this chapter but oh well.

Anyway, before I get the question on what the difference between reiryoku and reitsu I might as well tell you. To my understanding, Reiryoku is the energy you have stored and reitsu is the energy you can exert. Essentially they are the same but they get different names depending on if the energy is being used or not.

Anyway, next chapter Masa is officially reintroduced and Ichigo becomes a substitute Shinigami!

Please review!