"You can say as many things as you like to convince everyone else that you're strong, but if you think you can fool me, you're sorely mistaken." Sode no Shirayuki's gaze swept over Muten Natsu and Orihime Inoue. "If you had truly found your direction, you wouldn't be making the same choice you always have."
"Just as I thought..." Rukia Kuchiki lowered her eyes slightly. "Just as I don't completely understand you, you don't completely understand me either."
"You don't want to rely on Muten's strength, so you chose to face me alone, just as you've always done." Sode no Shirayuki raised a hand as ice and snow swirled around her. "Because you..."
"Because I like Muten." Rukia Kuchiki stopped and turned to look at Muten Natsu behind her. "I've always... always liked you."
"Rukia..." Muten Natsu's breath caught. Looking into her slightly uneasy eyes, he answered without hesitation. "I know. Because I've always liked you too."
She... she finally said it!
Orihime Inoue watched with relief.
As Rukia Kuchiki's close friend, the fact that Rukia liked Muten Natsu had never been much of a secret.
Although Orihime Inoue didn't know the exact reason, she could clearly sense Rukia Kuchiki's struggle with those feelings.
Rukia Kuchiki had been avoiding her own affection, doing her best to keep her distance from Muten Natsu.
Now that Rukia Kuchiki could finally face those feelings directly, Orihime Inoue was genuinely happy for her friend.
Her best friend had just confessed her feelings to her lover, and the two of them had openly admitted how they felt about each other. Watching them, Orihime Inoue had already begun imagining their life in the future.
Her best friend would be beside her, and so would her lover. They could eat together, sleep together, live together... Huh? Wasn't that pretty much what they had already been doing?
Orihime Inoue found herself understanding Muten Natsu's reluctance toward change more and more.
After all, happiness had been beside them all along.
But unlike Muten Natsu, Orihime Inoue had always looked forward to the future.
What was wonderful now could become even more wonderful.
The happiness they had now could lead to even more happiness.
Actually, Muten Natsu was probably the same, Orihime Inoue thought. What Muten Natsu hated wasn't change itself, but change for the worse.
It was simply because most of the changes he had experienced were bad ones that he had come to hate change itself as well.
But as more and more good changes entered his life, Muten Natsu had begun to change too. He no longer resisted change as strongly as he once had.
Then...
Orihime Inoue looked toward Rukia Kuchiki.
Why had Rukia Kuchiki been avoiding her feelings for Muten Natsu in the first place? And what had changed now, allowing her to finally face them?
The wind and snow around Sode no Shirayuki froze for an instant before surging even more violently.
"Rukia Kuchiki, what are you thinking?! Before, you clearly..."
"...Clearly kept denying my own feelings." Rukia Kuchiki tightened her grip on her Zanpakutō. "Muten saved my life, so I've always wanted to repay him for that. But I didn't want my feelings for him to become a form of repayment. I wanted to repay him for saving me first, and only then be with him. I didn't want to be with him because he saved me. I wanted to be with him because I love him."
Rukia Kuchiki didn't want her love to come from a sense of indebtedness. She didn't want to be with Muten Natsu before she had repaid what she owed him.
Because even she couldn't tell whether her love truly came from that sense of debt, or whether being with Muten Natsu meant that deep down she simply wanted him to protect her as he had before.
That was why she had always avoided her feelings for Muten Natsu.
More precisely, she had been avoiding being with Muten Natsu.
And because of that, she had avoided her feelings for him as well.
Only after repaying Muten Natsu for saving her could she be certain her love wasn't born from indebtedness.
Only after becoming strong enough to protect herself could she be certain she wasn't with Muten Natsu because she wanted his protection.
With that goal guiding her actions, Rukia Kuchiki had eventually become exactly the person Orihime Inoue saw.
Whenever Muten Natsu needed help, Rukia Kuchiki would reach out without hesitation. But whenever she herself needed help, she chose to face the problem alone.
When faced with ordinary problems, Rukia Kuchiki could almost always find the right direction because she had spent so long training herself to solve things independently.
But when it came to her feelings for Muten Natsu, Rukia Kuchiki would become completely lost, because the very independence she had built for herself rested on avoiding that issue.
But love wasn't so easily suppressed.
The more Rukia Kuchiki loved Muten Natsu, the more she avoided being with him before she could truly stand on her own. Yet the more she avoided him, the harder it became to suppress the desire, born from that love, to be with him.
She desperately needed some reasonable and legitimate excuse to let those feelings out.
Even one that only appeared reasonable and legitimate would do.
That excuse... was Orihime Inoue.
Even without being lovers, Orihime Inoue could still live together with Muten Natsu.
Then Rukia Kuchiki felt she could do the same.
So after Orihime Inoue began sleeping in the same bed as Muten Natsu, Rukia Kuchiki naturally allowed herself to sleep with Muten Natsu as well.
Orihime Inoue's strength had improved. Part of that was due to the influence of Muten Natsu's ability, while another part came from how growing closer to Muten Natsu had strengthened her resolve to gain power.
Rukia Kuchiki, however, was enjoying the feeling of being with Muten Natsu while simultaneously denying that she was truly with him. She avoided her own heart while satisfying its desires at the same time. That contradiction shook the conviction she had maintained for so long, and as a result, her strength had barely improved.
But in Rukia Kuchiki's eyes, the three of them sleeping together meant she was the same as Orihime Inoue. She and Muten Natsu were friends, so it didn't conflict with the principles she had set for herself.
Only once her wavering heart settled did her strength begin to improve.
The same thing happened afterward.
Orihime Inoue and Muten Natsu hadn't officially become lovers, but they had kissed.
So if Rukia Kuchiki kissed Muten Natsu too, that didn't mean they were truly together.
Muten Natsu and Orihime Inoue hadn't officially become lovers, yet they had already gone further with physical intimacy...
Then letting Muten Natsu touch her... still wouldn't mean they were truly together.
In some ways, Rukia Kuchiki looked forward to Muten Natsu and Orihime Inoue becoming more intimate even more than they did themselves.
Because every step they took meant that she could naturally take the same step with Muten Natsu without violating her own principles.
So, while clinging to her convictions and deceiving herself at the same time, Rukia Kuchiki drew closer to Muten Natsu again and again, only to push him away whenever she felt those convictions beginning to waver.
Just like in her inner world, where she repeatedly caught sight of Sode no Shirayuki, only to distance herself from her again and again.
Sode no Shirayuki had materialized long ago, just as Rukia Kuchiki had long since realized that she loved Muten Natsu.
But she couldn't tell Muten Natsu how she felt. Doing so would mean abandoning the principles she had clung to and choosing to be with him.
Just as she had been unable to face Sode no Shirayuki directly, because doing so would mean clearing away the wind and snow, ending her self-deception, and facing her true self.
It was only natural that Sode no Shirayuki would hate such awkward, twisted thinking.
But now, Rukia Kuchiki had finally found the right direction.
["You were never a burden to him. You're the candle flame he carefully shields through the night. He protects you, and you warm him in return. He saved you, but you too, again and again... pulled him back from the brink of death."]
Retsu Unohana's words had finally allowed Rukia Kuchiki to let go of the conviction she had clung to for so long.
She didn't believe that unintentionally pulling Muten Natsu back from the brink of death could possibly equal the many times Muten Natsu had saved her.
In her eyes, she still hadn't repaid everything she owed him.
But Rukia Kuchiki suddenly realized something.
Just as she believed Muten Natsu had saved her, Muten Natsu believed that she had saved him too.
Then, while she had been avoiding her feelings for him because she felt indebted to him...
Could Muten Natsu have been thinking the same way?
She wanted to repay him. He wanted to repay her.
If they kept trying to repay each other, it would never end.
Feelings were as complicated as swinging a katana.
Gratitude, indebtedness, help, conviction, encouragement... The countless ties between people could never be completely untangled or cut apart.
But feelings were also as simple as swinging a katana.
There were many things that needed to be done, but only one thing that needed to be thought about.
Being together.
Thinking too much didn't help. It only got in the way.
I love you.
You love me.
We'll be together.
It was that simple.
"How ironic..." Sode no Shirayuki tightened her grip on her Zanpakutō. "While I was still inside your inner world, you kept deceiving yourself. Yet now that I've left, you can suddenly face your own feelings without running away."
"Precisely because you're standing right in front of me. No matter how much I try to deceive myself, there can be no wind or snow here to hide you from me."
Rukia Kuchiki looked at Sode no Shirayuki's breathtakingly beautiful yet sorrowful face, her voice calm.
The conviction she had maintained for so long hadn't been meaningless. Through it, she had trained herself to handle problems independently and developed a strong heart.
"Sode no Shirayuki, before this, I didn't understand why you were so sad. It wasn't until I finally faced my own heart that I understood what all that self-deception had meant. You felt every bit of my persistence and struggle. My confusion and sadness became your helplessness and pain. If I were you, I would have left that version of me too. But now I'm standing here in front of you. A different me from before, someone who can hold tightly to happiness and share that happiness with you..."
"You..." Sode no Shirayuki's hand trembled slightly around her katana, then abruptly steadied. "Don't think you can bind me again!"
The pure white blade swept across, sending several icicles flying toward Rukia Kuchiki.
With a series of sharp clashes, Rukia Kuchiki dodged aside while swinging her katana to deflect the few icicles she couldn't avoid.
"Controlling ice has never been your strong suit."
"But it's more than enough to limit where you can move." Sode no Shirayuki swung her Zanpakutō. "Some no mai, Tsukishiro!"
Light flared beneath Rukia Kuchiki's feet.
The next instant, an enormous pillar of ice stretching high into the sky formed in an instant, freezing her inside.
The previous barrage of icicles had never been intended to hit Rukia Kuchiki. Their purpose had been to force her onto a patch of ground already covered in ice, where Tsukishiro could form even faster.
"Rukia!" Orihime Inoue cried out anxiously.
"Don't worry," Muten Natsu reassured her. "Rukia was prepared for this."
Rukia Kuchiki shifted slightly inside the pillar.
The enormous mass of ice instantly shattered into countless pieces.
"H-how is that possible?" Sode no Shirayuki stared in disbelief. "You were already..."
"Frozen and unable to move." Rukia Kuchiki raised a hand. "Which also meant I could no longer maintain my Kidō."
"Bakudō #26, Kyokkō." Muten Natsu chuckled softly. "Rukia used Kyokkō to conceal the Hadō she had already cast."
"The Hadō she cast?" Orihime Inoue immediately asked. "What kind of Hadō could be that powerful?"
"Actually, it isn't a particularly powerful Hadō. She just used it cleverly," Muten Natsu explained. "Hadō #12, Fushibi. It turns Reiatsu into threads that can be used to capture and attack an enemy, but those threads can also be woven into a net around the user."
Understanding immediately dawned on Orihime Inoue.
"When Tsukishiro formed, Rukia already had a net made of Fushibi surrounding her. Those Reiatsu threads were frozen inside the ice along with her. Once Rukia herself was frozen and could no longer maintain the Reiatsu, Fushibi disappeared, leaving a network of empty channels inside the ice, like countless intersecting cracks!"
The once-solid pillar had effectively been reduced to a pile of ice blocks pressed together. The slightest application of force was enough to make it collapse completely.
As the wielder of an ice-type Zanpakutō, Rukia Kuchiki naturally possessed some resistance to freezing. Combined with the protection of the Tekkou her sister had given her, she regained her ability to move the instant she broke free from Tsukishiro.
Taking advantage of Sode no Shirayuki's momentary shock, Rukia Kuchiki rushed in and swung her katana.
Sode no Shirayuki flashed aside.
The tip of the katana clipped the bun at the back of her head, scattering strands of white hair through the air.
Rukia Kuchiki had always been somewhat curious about that bun.
Compared to an ordinary one, the bun at the back of Sode no Shirayuki's head had always seemed noticeably larger.
Now she finally understood why.
As the loose white hair fell away, it revealed a perfectly ordinary-sized bun beneath it.
Sode no Shirayuki had tied additional hair over her original bun, making it appear larger.
Sode no Shirayuki raised a hand to touch it, and her body trembled slightly.
"You actually..."
"So... you were hiding it." Rukia Kuchiki's gaze softened. "I should have realized long ago."
A pale purple hairpin came into view.
Small purple flowers adorned it, each blossom shaped like a bell. Between the upper and lower petals, the tiny stamen resembled a little fairy dancing in the air.
Rukia Kuchiki recognized the flower.
The 4th Division cultivated it.
It was called Decumbent Corydalis.
Like potatoes and sweet potatoes, its tubers grew underground. They were harvested when the shoots emerged in spring or early summer, then washed and dried for medicinal use. They could dispel wind and dampness, relax the tendons, invigorate the blood, clear the meridians, and relieve pain.
After summer, its stems withered.
Yet it survived through the winter and sprouted again when spring returned.
For that reason, it had another name.
Muten Natsu.
Its floral meaning was to clear away pent-up sorrow and set the heart free.
I can heal your pain.
So don't be sad anymore.
***
..
If you'd like to support my work and unlock advanced chapters, you can follow me on p-@-treon.
[email protected]/PinkSnake (50 Chapters Ahead).
You can also follow as a free member to read a few advanced chapters.
***