— — — — — —
Clang~
At a white wall towered nearly fifty meters high. A bell rang out.
Several figures appeared beneath the massive white barrier, Ryo at the front.
"We're here. This is the game field," he said lightly.
Unohana Retsu, who had appeared behind him, stared up at the giant wall made of killing-stone and murmured, "Seireitei…"
"Is this the Soul Society?" Orihime followed behind, her eyes darting curiously around.
But the more she looked, the more something felt wrong.
Too quiet.
The districts around Seireitei, the Rukongai, were supposed to be relatively safe. There should've been countless wandering souls living here.
Yet the entire place was empty.
Leticia examined the buildings, voice tinged with surprise. "Looks like this is a fully constructed miniature world."
"A manufactured world…"
Black Rabbit's expression stiffened. Her eyesight was sharp enough to see the faint edges where this artificial Soul Society ended.
"How much would this cost…"
Her voice cracked in that familiar poverty-stricken way.
Artificial worlds in Little Garden weren't anything new. Most five-digit communities had the capability. They were everywhere, used for training, agriculture, even industry.
Artificial worlds were wonderful. Their only flaw was the price. Most five-digit communities couldn't afford to build even one.
Which included their current Arcadia.
Black Rabbit did a quick mental calculation and immediately grasped the horrifying truth.
Arcadia's resource vault was probably so empty not even a mouse could survive there. Maybe they were even in debt.
"Ryo… you didn't touch our resources vault, did you?" Black Rabbit stared at him with desperate hope.
"Resources? What resources?"
Ryo raised an eyebrow in genuine confusion. "Black Rabbit, did you oversleep? Since when do we have anything like a resource vault?"
Leticia sighed, patting Black Rabbit on the shoulder. "Relax. Ryo only did this for the good of the community. Just forget there was a vault."
"It's fine, Leticia-sama… I'm very relaxed. Truly…"
Leticia stared at Black Rabbit's trembling legs and clenched fists.
"I knew this would happen," Black Rabbit sniffed, tears brimming, "If this ends up losing money, I won't forgive you even after I die!"
"After you die?" Ryo raised a brow. "That works out. This Seireitei still needs testing. Black Rabbit, why don't you be our first customer?"
"First… customer?" Black Rabbit blinked, not quite understanding.
Orihime helpfully explained, "Um, Black Rabbit-senpai, Seireitei has facilities for training the souls of the dead to become Shinigami."
"You mean the Shin'o Spiritual Arts Academy. The one Yamamoto founded. The place where souls with spiritual potential are trained into Shinigami. I taught swordsmanship there once."
Unohana looked at the massive wall with a complicated expression.
Her spiritual sense told her something surprising. This Seireitei might actually be one or two times larger than the original.
And that wasn't even counting the Rukongai districts and the wilderness beyond them.
Building a world the size of a continent in under two hours… so this was the power of Little Garden.
"Shinigami…?" Black Rabbit paused, then suddenly realized what Ryo had implied earlier.
"You're not planning to sell the 'qualification' to become a Shinigami, are you?"
"What else?" Ryo smiled. "You didn't think we still had spare specialty products lying around, did you?"
"Well, sure, but passing down a spirit-type Gift… shouldn't we use that to train our own members…?"
Before she could finish, Black Rabbit slumped in defeat.
"Who am I kidding. Even if we had talent, we couldn't afford the training resources. Our main fighters aren't even supplied… ha. Haha…"
Seeing her accept reality, Ryo smiled a little and turned to Unohana. "Your main job is to train the souls into proper Shinigami. I'll have Aizen send some people to help you. At least build the basic Academy Curriculum."
"Teaching, hmm?"
Unohana smiled warmly. "Come to think of it, I was once a kendo instructor at the Shin'o Academy."
"By the way… are we still calling the academy that?"
"Name it whatever you want." Ryo shrugged, then turned to Leticia.
"Leticia, for this kind of structured, profession-type Gift, what's the usual entry-level price?"
"That depends on the system's upper limit," she said thoughtfully. "And that upper limit is whatever an ordinary person could theoretically reach with effort."
Ryo frowned a little. "If that's the case… then probably the six-digit ceiling."
Which was also the ceiling for standard Shinigami. The limits of soul bodies.
Leticia considered it, then said, "If that's the limit, entry-level training would only cost one gold coin."
"That low?" Ryo frowned. That was not what he'd hoped for.
He thought it'd be at least a thousand coins.
"Wait, Leticia, Shinigami training requires a Zanpakuto from the very beginning. What about the cost of a Zanpakuto?"
"A Zanpakuto… by itself would be at least five hundred gold coins. The exact price needs a Thousand Eyes appraiser."
Leticia then looked toward Shiroyasha.
"Oh? Remembered me now?" Shiroyasha put her hands on her hips proudly.
"Let me tell you, the appraiser profession is something I—"
"Can't do it?" Ryo cut in immediately.
Shiroyasha's mouth twitched. She glared at him.
"Don't interrupt! I'm saying I passed the certification exam to be an appraiser!"
Ryo blinked.
"Wait. Are you sure you didn't take the wrong exam? Sounds more like the 'pornography inspector' test."
"Ryo!" Black Rabbit yelped, voice rising. "Don't joke about that right no—"
Before she finished, she heard Shiroyasha's cheerful voice:
"Oh, the porn inspector test? Yeah, I passed that too."
Black Rabbit's face spasmed so hard she bit her own tongue.
.
.
.