Bleach Hereafter RPG

"...I'm sorry, I can't give you any promises."

"Hibano Schwarzwald." Anya stared back at him and said his name in response to his impassioned speech. His name. Just his name. And let it dangle in the air for a few tantalizing seconds before continuing.

"You're a pretty damn heroic boy, aren't you?"

She gave a wry grin. "That's much appreciated of you. But I have no need of a hero, nor does the Wandenreich. My mental state aside, I am here to help you get acclimatized to your new life here, and here, we live like soldiers rather than heroes. We remain fewer than the Hollows and possibly even the Shinigami, and thus we learn to survive by cooperating with each other and working as a team. Besides, the Emperor promised you our support in your quest, and it would be quite rude to disobey His Majesty by toughing it out on your own in a suicidal crusade and losing us one of our best recruits."

And as an afterthought, the silvery-haired girl added, "Oh, and you really shouldn't be worried about me too much. I still have my pride, y'know, and I'd much rather die with purpose than live meaninglessly. And what better way to go out in style than by claiming for the Quincy the weapon used against us in the first place?"

"It's just..." Hibano briefly muttered, intending to correct Anya on calling him a "Schwarzwald" when he himself was not certain how he was related to that family yet. The girl moved on, however, answering his concern for bringing her by his side, stating that he should not forgo cooperation with the Wandenreich when it was offered to him. Not only that, but she declared that it would be disrespect to the Emperor to refuse his aid and die alone, too.

That got Hibano to briefly stammer. "I'm... I'm not going to die just because I'd rather go alone. I... think I can bear the struggle that I expect, but I'm not so sure about everyone else." It felt natural, to shield others from the danger he would experience in his journey. After all, his powers and talent had to come with some sort of duty.

Anya was insistent, however. She even declared that for her, dying in the name of the Wandenreich would be more preferable to the peace that Hibano would provide by keeping her out of the journey. The teen blinked a few times, and declared in a more stern tone:

"Please don't talk about wishing to die. Your life is more important than you think, and the same goes for everyone else."

Afterwards, he sighed. There was no helping it, as he figured.

"You're gonna have to get a lot stronger, then. We'll have to train together, too, so that when we leave the safety of Schatten Bereich and end up having to fight everyone who wants to stop us from collecting the Hogyoku, neither of us slows down the other."

Anastasia was reminded that despite the boy beside her being a fresh recruit who could barely control his Spirit Weapon, he had been living on Earth as a Fullbringer before then and had grown to possess incredible power. According to him, he was confident enough in his own abilities to survive whatever stood between him and the Hogyoku, a confidence that did not extend to any companions he might have in his journey.

"But you do know that the power of the Hogyoku was enough to make even His Majesty retreat, right--" Anya started, only to realize that it doubly applied to her. While she was relatively gifted in terms of ability, her relative lack of experience as well as simply lacking the vast power Hibano had, at least for now, would definitely lead to her dying pointlessly instead of the glorious exit she believed she deserved.

"N-never mind that," she said, pouting. "But that doesn't mean I'm not going with you!"

"Please don't talk about wishing to die. Your life is more important than you think, and the same goes for everyone else."

Hibano's words once more caught her by surprise, and the Quincy girl briefly made an expression as if Hibano had summoned his gun and shot her through the chest, but was quickly replaced by a strangely tsundere countenance.

"It's not like I want to die right now or anything, idiot! I meant that when I do eventually die like everyone and everything in the universe, I want my passing to mean something significant. And if I die before you do, I want to be in your flashbacks like what they do in those silly Japanese cartoons."

It seemed as if Hibano relented, and instead he told Anya to train hard so they wouldn't slow each other down. This brought a smile to her face.

"Like I'd have it any other way! Now, part of a good training regimen is getting enough sleep. In that case...

...is there really only one bed in the house?"

Hibano's words briefly shocked Anya, but she quickly retreated back to her usual demeanor, first correcting herself to explain that she was not being as nihilistic as he assumed, and then poking fun at him by claiming that she will be able to motivate him in "Japanese cartoon flashbacks". Though he had heard of the word "cartoon" before, he didn't remember ever watching any one of them, nor could pin down what any of their tropes looked like - so all he could do was nod along in confusion. "Uh, huh..."

So, he will have to take Anya with him to his journey, it seems to be settled. Though Hibano wasn't happy with the ultimate decision, now that she finally bent him to accept her, the next best thing was to ensure that the risk to her is as minimal as possible. She was prepared to do as much herself.

Then, her thoughts suddenly went to sleep. This briefly caught Hibano surprised - he was not sleepy at all, though he was still adapting to the rhythm of this dimension and its lack of a day-night cycle.

"Oh, uh..." he turned around, then glanced to the other rooms. No beds there. "Seems so... Are there any unfoldable couches here, maybe? I doubt the Wandenreich would actually give two people only one bed."

"Oh right, you probably don't know what I'm talking about..."

Hibano's confused expression reminded Anya that due to his mysterious case of amnesia, which according to Leonina was likely caused by an incident involving the Shinigami, he likely wouldn't know what a cartoon was, or, if he was especially unfortunate, where Japan was. Or was he more confused that his new housemate was getting sleepy? The young man's next words proved this was evidently the case as well.

Anya yawned, then turned to look around the house. Oddly enough, there was indeed a couch there that wasn't visible before, resting against one of the walls. Whoever had arranged the furniture here seemed to be overly fond of optical illusions, or was this some kind of new technology that could materialize Reishi constructs in the same way as the Quincy did? Schatten Bereich was made of Reishi after all, so rearranging its contents did not seem too far-fetched.

"I'm still used to the Earth timezone I came from earlier, you see," Anya explained. "Besides, my sleep cycle was also kinda almost nonexistent back then, so this is the first time in a while that I'm getting proper rest."

She got up and walked over to the couch, which, thankfully proved not to be an illusion when she lay down on it. It was actually very comfortable, causing her to yawn yet again.

"Goodnight for now, Hibano. I'm glad to have met you."