Yoji scratched his hair with barely contained irritation and left the Ninth Division barracks at a brisk pace, following the river alongside Rurin'an westward through the Seireitei.
His destination was the Detention Unit — or more precisely, the Second Division barracks that bordered it.
He was done taking his time. The situation had gotten away from him.
The Soul Society's Most Beautiful Zanpakutō reputation had already been causing problems — unwanted attention, the occasional idiot looking for a fight. And now, somehow, Most Beautiful Distinguished Young Nobleman had attached itself to him as well.
They might as well have painted a target on my back.
The thing was, Yoji had no noble blood whatsoever. He'd clawed his way to fifth seat in the Ninth Division, which by the standards of the aristocracy made him a slightly elevated servant at best. A commoner wearing a title that sounded like it belonged to the upper classes — he didn't need to do the math to know exactly how many thin-skinned nobles were going to feel personally offended by that.
The Commander-General's authority kept the noble houses from causing overt trouble within the Gotei 13's walls. That was the ceiling. It said nothing whatsoever about what they might do quietly, in the dark, through channels that didn't require signatures.
Noble private armies were not weak.
And Yoji, whose real reiatsu hadn't reliably cleared lieutenant-level yet, could not afford to get complacent about that gap no matter how much practical combat experience he'd accumulated.
The new book needs to happen. Getting stronger is the only answer that matters.
But before that — there was something he needed to check on first.
His feet had already carried him to a set of barracks that felt distinctly different from the others. Higher walls. Guards positioned in ways that suggested they were meant not to be noticed. The particular atmosphere of a place that conducted its business without wanting anyone to look.
The Second Division.
The two members on gate duty had clearly heard the recent gossip. They tracked Yoji's approach with the frank assessment of people trying to figure out what the fuss was about, then exchanged a look and resumed their commentary at a volume they apparently considered private.
"...His skin is just a bit pale and he's got that vaguely melancholy look about him, that's all..."
"Right? I don't see it. Honestly I think I've got a better jaw."
Yoji didn't spare them a smile. He walked past them without slowing down.
The Second and Ninth had a natural working relationship — the Second handled arrests, interrogations, covert operations, and executions; the Ninth ran the detention facilities. One organization caught people and extracted information, the other kept them contained. After enough years of shared logistics, the members of both divisions recognized each other on sight.
Yoji moved through the Second's corridors with the ease of someone who had been here before, his gaze moving casually over the shadows beneath the walls, the angles where the rooflines met.
Of course they're watching me. Even here. Especially here.
He ignored the unseen eyes and kept walking until he reached a corner of the barracks that received clearly very little official traffic — and stopped in front of a door that looked like it might fall off its hinges if someone breathed on it wrong.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
Immediate sounds of frantic activity from inside. Something was knocked over.
The door flew open.
The person standing in it had hair that looked like it had lost an argument with itself, dark circles suggesting several consecutive nights of not sleeping, and a shihakushō that was wrinkled, stained, and could generously be described as worn.
Urahara Kisuke.
"Oh! If it isn't Yoji-senpai! What brings you all the—" He started to invite Yoji in, glanced back at the room — layers of components, scattered parts, empty snack wrappers creating a kind of archaeological record of the past two weeks — and visibly reconsidered. He laughed in a way that communicated genuine embarrassment.
Yoji didn't bother with pleasantries.
"Urahara. The thing I commissioned. Is it finished?"
He let the weight of the next part land clearly.
"That was forty thousand kan. You personally guaranteed me it wouldn't be a problem. Don't tell me it's not done."
Urahara's body went stiff in a way that was impossible to miss.
He turned his head slowly. His eyes started finding interesting things to look at that were not Yoji's face.
"...It's not done, is it." Yoji's voice dropped to something considerably colder. "It has been ten days."
Urahara Kisuke was, at this point in his career, an entirely obscure member of the Second Division with no particular standing. Yoji had originally assumed he'd ended up here because of some connection to Yoruichi — that turned out to be completely wrong. When they'd first crossed paths, Urahara hadn't known Yoruichi at all. He'd ended up in the Second the same way most people ended up in places they didn't want to be: no other division had taken him after graduation, and the Academy had simply assigned him somewhere.
Putting a research genius through interrogation technique drills and stealth operations training was, predictably, a miserable use of everyone's time.
It had been Yoji who'd mentioned him to Yoruichi, suggested redirecting his abilities toward developing interrogation equipment and specialized tools — which was how a small and entirely unofficial research corner had come to exist in the Second Division, sparing Urahara from field assignments.
The Second didn't allocate much budget to nonstandard projects. Urahara was always broke.
Yoji strongly suspected the forty thousand kan he'd advanced had been partially redirected toward whatever Urahara considered a personal priority this week.
"Senpai! It is done, I swear!" Urahara raised both hands, reading the temperature of the room correctly for once. He pointed toward a corner of the room covered by a large black cloth. "It's right there! Everything you asked for, completely functional!"
Yoji crossed to it and pulled the cloth off.
What was revealed was a machine of considerable visual ambition and questionable aesthetic achievement. It resembled a large iron drum with visible rust in places, bearing exactly two buttons and radiating what could only be described as Urahara's signature philosophy of I will make it work and I will not make it pretty.
"If it's done, why were you making that face?" Yoji frowned. The appearance didn't concern him. Function was what mattered.
Urahara hurried over.
"The reishi isolation field works exactly to specification! Once it's active, it generates a complete barrier against spiritual energy leakage across roughly a room-sized area — nobody outside could detect so much as a flicker of reiatsu from anything happening inside, no matter what!"
Yoji nodded. A room-sized range was enough.
"Good. I'm taking it."
He moved to lift the machine.
"WAIT — Senpai, please, one moment—" Urahara stepped in front of him, wearing the expression of someone about to deliver news they have been dreading delivering.
"The field works perfectly. It's just that... the machine itself..."
He paused.
"It can't be moved."