Kaien watched the silent boy as the boy"s eyes showed a hint of warmth when he approached his two friends. His curiosity kicking in, he really wanted to see what Itsuki looked like because he kept his facial features hidden, so he stayed behind and waited for Itsuki"s picture to be taken. A decision he would later come to regret.There was an old-fashioned camera to the side where another recruit was having his picture taken. When Rangiku"s turn came up, the males were deeply attracted to her as they tried to get closer to her. Just as one approached Rangiku, Gin hurriedly walked in front of him as an "amiable", yet dangerous smile came up in his face. The intruding party looked at the slight opening in Gin"s eyes, feeling some killing intent, cold sweat appeared on his back as he gave up on the idea of approaching her along with the others.
Unfortunately, one slipped through Gin"s defence as he made his way towards Rangiku. This time it was Itsuki who stopped him. But he wasn"t nice like Gin, so as the intruder number 2 try bypa.s.s him, he tripped him and quickly kneed his stomach. As the others were occupied by Gin, they suddenly heard a yelp and turned towards that direction.
Their attention was immediately drawn by the man on the floor. One could see that he was knocked out cold with some foam coming out of his mouth. They then saw the reason for his unconsciousness and a couple people recognised him turning completely pale. Knowing that the girl had two scary guardians, they immediately backed down.
Rangiku just went on and acted like normal, it wasn"t the first time this happened, and she knew her two friends would protect her. However, she hated this feeling of uselessness. One of the reasons she wanted to become a Shinigami was because she wanted to fight back herself and not rely on the two until one day it would her that protected them. Another reason was simply, Itsuki. She had come to terms with her feelings and knew that if she wanted to be by his side then she had to get stronger, a lot stronger.
To her, there was always a fog around Itsuki ever since she knew him. Remembering those eyes and the training he did, her and Gin knew he was hiding something, but both decided to keep quiet about it. If he wanted to tell them then he will tell them. Still for her it wasn"t enough, she wanted to penetrate that fog and she wanted him to trust her. So that one day they would stand beside each other and go against anything the world threw at them, because as long as he was by her side, she would be content.
There were still some thoughts plaguing her mind, as deep inside her heart, she knew that she won"t be the only one. Call it a woman"s intuition if you want, but with his future prospects and looks, she was bound to have a few rivals. She knew that although she had a head start, no one can say anything about the future, she just had to continue fighting.
Gin noticed Rangiku lost in thoughts while looking at Itsuki and knew the gist of what she was thinking. He couldn"t help her, but he silently pushed her on.
After Rangiku, it was Gin"s turn and a few more people took their pictures until it was finally Itsuki"s turn. Kaien kept quiet throughout the whole ordeal and started looking forward to what Itsuki looked like. For some reason, the others were also curious to what this "demon" looked like. As Itsuki sat down, he proceeded to take his hat off showing of his snow-white hair which was done up in a high pony tail, while a few strands fell down the sides of his face. They shuddered when they saw his eyes, not because of fear but due to the indifference present in them.
Itsuki then moved towards his mask. Time seemed to slow as his face was uncovered, the female recruits were instantly struck into a daze as their face got a deep shade of red, while an intense depressive aura was released from the males. Once his picture was taken, he turned around only to see the reactions of the room, for them it was like seeing an ice sculpture, beautiful from afar yet the closer you got the colder it was. You could only view it from afar as it was untouchable.
Itsuki quickly covered his face and the room returned to normal, not quite though, as Rangiku was protecting Itsuki from the females while Gin was protecting him for the questionable males. Kaien just left the room, complex emotions coming from his face
"Shouldn"t have stayed. WTF how is he so good looking."
As the day progressed more and more recruits came and had their pictures taken. At first, they were confused with the atmosphere but understood when the others told them. So now there were three types of looks that Itsuki was garnering, first was the ones filled with infatuation, the females that had seen his face (including some males), envious ones from the males, and lastly, the curious ones, this was from the ones that came into the room after.
Once all the recruits were finished, they were finally escorted into Seireitei. As they pa.s.sed the northern gate, they met with another group of people waiting for them. They consisted of 3 boys and 2 girls and were not Shinigami nor were they servants, they seemed like students.
The wore the Shin"o academy uniform which consisted of a blue s.h.i.tagi (undershirt), a white kosode (shirt) with blue stripes and blue hakama (trousers) with white socks and sandals. This colour scheme was for the males, where the female"s version had the blue replaced with the red. An emblem could be seen printed in on either side of the outer shirt, presumably of the academy. They also had swords strapped to their back, Itsuki couldn"t tell if they were asauchi or named zanpakutos
Asauchi were zanpakutos that didn"t have a name.
Once all the recruits were grouped, he saw Kaien talk with a girl who seemed to be the head of the group of students. They were quite familiar with each other and talked for quite a bit before Kaien handed her some pieces of paper and left with the examiners.
The girl then looked around, introduced herself as Shiba Aiko and led them to the academy.
The academy was quite a distance away as it took an hours" worth of walk to reach it. What greeted their view was a ma.s.sive multi-story building with eaves jutting out. A three-layered roof could be seen in the middle with the bottom floor extending out of either side. The building was surrounded by walls about 10 feet high with the emblem of the school littered across it. Once they had crossed the gate, they made their way to an auditorium where people were already waiting.
Upon entering, Itsuki noticed the people being divided by where they come from. The ones with cleaner clothes with bits of n.o.ble air could be seen of to one side, most likely residents of Seireitei, whereas the members of Rukongai were on another side. You could tell the difference with just the clothes as the former were wearing luxurious and expensive clothes while the latter were wearing tattered and simple ones.
Itsuki"s group were the last ones to arrive because as soon as they entered all the recruits were gathered and a group of teachers walked out.