'Coyote Starrk...' Asuka silently repeated the name in his heart.
"We will meet again."
The two stepped into the Garganta, their figures disappearing into the darkness.
The rift slowly closed, and the cave returned to its usual tranquility.
"They're gone..." Lilynette muttered, looking at the empty entrance while somewhat dejectedly fiddling with the cards in her hands. "You should have made them stay a little longer. It's rare to have someone to play with."
"Yeah," Starrk replied softly, his eyes closed in a perfunctory manner.
"Starrk."
"What?"
"That guy named Asuka... his sword has a strange scent."
"Yeah, I know. So even though it's a pity... we couldn't keep him around for too long, or there would be trouble..."
Starrk rolled over, opening the eyes he had just closed.
"That is... the scent of a powerful kin."
The World of the Living, Fuyuki City.
Above Miyama Town, the originally calm space suddenly began to churn.
Soon after, a pitch-black, irregular rift tore open in the sky, resembling a giant maw ready to devour everything.
Thud! Thud!
Two figures leaped out of the rift, landing nimbly on the rooftop of a tall building.
"...That old man really kept his word. Are all Vasto Lordes like him?" Kaien Shiba muttered, brushing the residual white sand off his clothes.
Asuka sheathed his Zanpakuto and walked to the edge of the rooftop, looking down at the city below.
Neon lights flashed amidst the bustling traffic.
In the distance, the Fuyuki Bridge spanned across the Mion River, its red steel frame connecting the two banks completely intact.
There were no ruins waiting to be rebuilt from the Holy Grail War, nor was there that uncomfortable sense of depleted magical energy.
"It seems this really is our Fuyuki City."
Asuka murmured to himself, withdrawing his gaze.
"Hey, Asuka! Look over there!"
Before Asuka could think further, Kaien suddenly pointed at a massive electronic billboard on a distant commercial street and shouted, "Is that date broken?"
Asuka looked in the direction Kaien was pointing.
It was an LED screen playing a cosmetics commercial on loop. In the bottom right corner, the current time and date were clearly ticking away.
Asuka froze.
Even Kaien, who was usually oblivious to the flow of time in the World of the Living, realized the problem, let alone the fact that he remembered the year he had worked for that shady merchant...
He gripped the hilt of his sword in disbelief.
Since the day they had barged into this city and fought those Mutated Hollows, since the day they were sucked into that spacetime crevice...
A full eighteen years had passed.
"Eighteen years... Eighteen years have actually passed." Asuka's voice was somewhat dry.
The smile on Kaien's face stiffened. "Huh? How is that possible?"
He scratched his head, trying to mask his inner panic with a lighthearted tone. "That sign must be broken, right? Or maybe the humans in the World of the Living are doing some weird abstract event again?"
"We were in Hueco Mundo... it felt like less than a day had passed!"
"...It's not an issue with Hueco Mundo," Asuka analyzed as calmly as possible, even though he was equally shocked inside. "I've experienced something similar before... We crossed between two different dimensional worlds, and the flow of time on both sides is completely different."
"Zouken told me before that when he accidentally stumbled into the World of the Living, he spent decades here, but less than half a day had passed over there."
"It seems that even Zelretch of the Jewels couldn't accurately pinpoint the timeline we existed in. Being off by only eighteen years can already be considered a controlled margin of error..."
Looking at the time on the electronic screen, he realized that after he and Shinobu Kocho had separated, she had spent such a long time alone in the Soul Society...
'I broke my promise again...' he suddenly realized.
Kaien also dropped his playful demeanor. "Eighteen years..."
He murmured softly, "That brat Ganju should be a man capable of standing on his own now, right? And Kukaku, that girl... she's definitely going to be mad at me."
"And Captain Ukitake... his health was already... I wonder if everyone has been doing well these past eighteen years..."
He let out a breath and slapped his cheeks hard, forcing himself to cheer up.
"Regardless, our top priority right now is returning to the Soul Society! Since so much time has passed, everyone must be worried sick!"
He turned to look at Asuka, the light returning to his eyes. "Asuka, we need to quickly contact the Soul Reapers stationed in Fuyuki City."
"As long as we find them and send a message to the Soul Society via Hell Butterfly, they'll open a Senkaimon and we can go back!"
Kaien's proposal was perfectly reasonable. It was the most official and fastest way to return.
As the Captain of the Tenth Division, as long as he revealed his identity, the Seireitei would open its gates for him, even after eighteen years.
However, Asuka did not move.
His brows were tightly furrowed, his eyes full of concern.
"What's wrong, Asuka?" Kaien asked in confusion. "Don't you want to see Miss Kocho sooner?"
"I do."
Asuka spoke slowly, "But I want to know, if we contact the Soul Society through official channels, where will our location and message be sent first?"
Kaien thought for a moment. "The Department of Research and Development... or whoever is in charge of rescue missions..."
He stopped mid-sentence, suddenly realizing something was wrong.
"...The Fifth Division." These words slipped through his gritted teeth.
After spending time with Asuka, he had basically confirmed that the Captain of the Fifth Division, Aizen, was truly a dangerous man.
Even the parasitic Hollow he had encountered back then, and the Hollow Uncle Isshin had faced... might have been his doing.
"The moment we expose our whereabouts, what awaits us..." Asuka added coldly, "...might be immediate arrest and execution to silence us."
"He wouldn't dare! No matter what, I'm still the Captain of the Tenth Division..."
But Kaien lacked confidence even as he said those words, rubbing the back of his neck.
Asuka spoke up directly for Kaien, "I finally managed to return. I absolutely cannot die easily from such negligence."
"Eighteen years have passed. We know absolutely nothing about what the Soul Society is like now."
"I don't dare to gamble on it, nor do I want to."
Kaien remained silent for a long time before finally letting out a long sigh, frustratingly ruffling his hair.
"Argh! This is so annoying! I hate conspiracies and schemes the most!"
He looked at Asuka. "Then what do we do? Aside from finding Soul Reapers, how else can we get back?"
Asuka cast his gaze toward the north, in the direction of Karakura Town.
"There is one other way."
"We go find that shady merchant who scammed me so miserably."
"Kisuke Urahara?" Kaien's eyes lit up.
He had asked Asuka about Urahara before.
In his impression, wasn't that guy the great villain behind the Hollowfication incident? How could he be connected to Asuka and Isshin? Asuka couldn't explain that clearly either.
However, judging from his descriptions, Kisuke wasn't as heinous as Central 46 claimed...
"That's right! If it's that guy, he definitely has a way to sneak us back!"
"Exactly," Asuka nodded. "Besides, he owes me a huge favor."
That night, he had used the true release of White Shadow to sever Fuyuki City's Chain of Fate, saving so many Soul Reapers.
The least he could do was give them a free ride back.
"Alright! Then it's settled!"
Kaien slapped his thigh, his enthusiasm restored. "Destination: Karakura Town! We'll have him send us home!"
The two did not linger in Fuyuki City.
To avoid drawing the attention of the stationed Soul Reapers, they moved like two ghosts weaving through the night, sprinting rapidly toward Karakura Town.