# May 20 - Child Park, Yumisawa - 08:30 a.m. #
There are no classes today and waking up early was certainly not in my plans. Too bad that wasn't Rukia's plans. She woke me up at about 7:00 am, asking me to go over to Ichigo's house and call him while she went to buy some things.
Obviously Ichigo was annoyed but he ended up going anyway…and complaining all the time until we got there. Lucky for me, Rukia was already waiting for us. She was sitting reading something.
Rukia: "Finally you two showed up."
I approached where Rukia was and sat on one of the benches and surreptitiously glanced at what she was reading.
Yato: "Is that my horror manga? I didn't know you liked that kind of thing..."
Rukia: "This is for my studies."
Ichigo: "Can you explain to me what is so important that you have to drag us here?" he spoke impatiently.
Rukia: "You now have my powers and you need to be prepared so that no Hollow surprises you. Not all of them are as simple to deal with as the ones you've encountered. I've prepared a basic training for you to understand how to deal with them."
Ichigo: "Give me a break..."
Without warning, Rukia threw a baseball bat at Ichigo and this caused him to do several awkward poses just so he could catch it.
Ichigo: "Damn you…"
Rukia: "Pay attention!"
She pulled out from under one of the park tables a strange pitching machine.
Rukia: "All you have to do is hit the balls that have a head drawn on them. Now focus!"
Without giving Ichigo much time to process what he heard, she turned on the machine, which started shooting at him.
Despite being surprised, Ichigo managed to react quickly enough to hit the balls.
Yato: "Wow…I'm sure I couldn't hit any." - I told myself.
Meanwhile, Rukia gave a brief explanation of how spirit energy works. Everyone has a certain amount of reiryoku but each has unique traits. My training was basically getting used to feeling Ichigo's spiritual energy as he trained, as it was the easiest to detect at the moment. Then I had to get used to Rukia's spiritual energy, which despite being close, was very weak.
It took me so long to understand how it worked that it took time for Ichigo to finish his training.
Again, Ichigo and Rukia started to argue, since his practice was to hit the balls with a head drawing, but because the drawings were made by Rukia, he ended up hitting them all.
I stayed out of the discussion and went back to focusing on spiritual energy and thanks to that I could feel someone approaching…at least it means the training was working. I already imagined it was Orihime and how she gives Ichigo a scare…I just waited for it while I laughed beforehand.
Orihime: "Hello, Kurosaki-kun!!!" she shouted happily.
Ichigo: "Wah!!! I-Inoue, eh!? W-w-what are you doing here!?"
Orihime: "Eh heh heh, I'm just shopping for dinner. I bought onions and butter and bananas and gelatin!"
Yato/Ichigo/Rukia: "…"
I got a little closer to Rukia.
Yato: "Before you ask, this is Orihime Inoue. She's from our class."
Rukia: "Oh."
Orihime: "Kuchiki-san!? Yasakani-san!?"
Yato: "Hey."
Rukia: "Inoue-san! It's an honor to make your acquaintance!"
Orihime: "Eh…yes…it's an honor to make your...what?"
Yato: "Hmm…Inoue-san, what happened to your arm and your leg?" - I asked to speed up that conversation.
Orihime: "Oh, last night I got hit by a car. Eh he he."
Ichigo: "You got hit!? By a car!? You shouldn't be laughing at that! This is a serious accident!"
Rukia: "That mark on your leg…can I have a look?"
Orihime: "Sure, go ahead."
Yato: "And from the way it was scarred, I imagine your leg is hurting more, isn't it?"
Orihime: "Now that you mention it, my leg really hurts a lot more than my arm!"
Ichigo: "Aah!? Inoue, you've got to go see a doctor."
Upon mentioning this, Orihime started to blush.
Yato: "Ichigo…you have to be more careful with what you say…"
My comment made the girl even more nervous and she ran off saying she was late for…I don't know what.
Rukia: "That girl, are you two friends with her?"
Ichigo: "Not exactly, she's best friends with someone who's lived in my neighborhood since 8th grade."
Yato: "And I just met her from high school but we didn't talk much."
Rukia: "Does she have a family?"
Ichigo: "She had an older brother, but he died 3 years ago. It was a car accident… there was blood everywhere and we couldn't do anything with our equipment so… he ended up dying before the ambulance took him to a bigger hospital."
Rukia and I remained silent throughout the entire story.
Ichigo: "By the way, what did you mean before?"
Yato: "About what?"
Ichigo: "When you told me to be more careful with what I say."
Yato: "You suggested that Inoue-san go to a doctor."
Ichigo: "And?"
Yato: "Your house is a clinic…you were basically inviting Inoue-san to your house. Do you understand now or do you want me to ask Rukia to draw?" - I said, no longer holding back my laughter.
Ichigo's face turned redder than a tomato when he realized what I meant
Rukia: "Heh…I didn't know you were that kind of man, Kurosaki-kun"
Ichigo: "....You bastards..."