Kisuke Urahara had not stopped Amamiya from seeking out Ishida Ryūken for a simple reason: he had already dispatched Kurosaki Isshin to interrogate the stoic Quincy. Now, standing at the shop entrance, he finally saw Isshin approaching, his usual boisterous energy replaced by a heavy, pensive air.
"My, my, Isshin-san! You're finally here!" Urahara greeted with a forced cheerfulness, fan fluttering nervously. "So? Did our good doctor Ishida divulge anything?"
Isshin remained silent for a long moment, his expression unreadable. The truth he'd learned pointed to a threat that might eclipse even Aizen's ambitions.
Seeing his silence, Urahara's smile faded. He sighed. "I see. So even Ishida-san kept his counsel regarding Amamiya…"
"No," Isshin interrupted, his voice low and gravely serious. "I learned Amamiya Miyako's origins. And in doing so, I learned something else. If this other matter comes to pass… the devastation to the Three Realms could be far greater than anything Aizen plans."
Urahara's fan stilled. Isshin was not prone to exaggeration. "Inside. Now." His tone left no room for argument. "Tessai-san. Full barrier. Maximum isolation."
Tessai Tsukabishi, sensing the gravity, nodded and began weaving complex Kidō seals. A multi-layered barrier hummed to life, encasing the shop in a sphere of utter silence and spiritual opacity.
Seated within the secured space, Urahara fixed his gaze on Isshin. "Speak."
Isshin sat cross-legged, arms folded, eyes closed as if gathering painful memories. "Amamiya Miyako's true nature… is that of a Quincy."
"A Quincy… That explains the connection to Ishida. But for a Quincy's power to persist after death and through rebirth as a Shinigami soul… That implies the power is soul-deep, not merely physical." Urahara's mind raced with the implications.
"The Quincy aspect is just the surface," Isshin continued, shaking his head. "Think back. The first time you met Amamiya."
"Yes. Ishida summoned me. I performed the Konsō on his soul. If he was a Quincy, it makes sense Ishida would involve himself…"
"That's not the point," Isshin cut in. "The day you found him was not the day he died. Amamiya Miyako's true date of death was June 17th, 20XX."
The date struck Urahara like a physical blow. "June 17th…? Wasn't that the day…?"
"The day Masaki died, and Ishida's wife, Kanae, fell into her fatal coma." Isshin's face was a mask of grim fury. He had thought his son had avenged Masaki by killing Grand Fisher. But if Ryūken's investigation was correct, his wife had been rendered defenseless by a far more ancient evil.
"On that day," Isshin ground out, "every Gemischt Quincy across the world—Masaki, Kanae, Amamiya, countless others—had their power stolen. It left them vulnerable. For Masaki, it meant death by a Hollow. For Kanae, a slow decline. For Amamiya and others… various fatal symptoms. The cause was a specific ability: the Auswahlen."
"Auswahlen…" Urahara echoed, the term unfamiliar yet ominous.
"There is only one being recorded to wield that power," Isshin said, taking a shuddering breath. "The Quincy King from the war a thousand years ago. Yhwach."
The name landed in the quiet room with the weight of a falling mountain. Urahara finally understood Isshin's earlier warning. Aizen was a catastrophic present danger. Yhwach represented a resurrected, apocalyptic past. If the Auswahlen was active, it meant Yhwach was not truly dead, and was harvesting power for his return.
Urahara felt a profound headache brewing. 'Aizen seeks to overthrow the Soul King. Does Yhwach seek the same? Or something worse?' The current, sequestered state of the Soul King was a secret known to few. Aizen' knowledge of it had driven his rebellion. Yhwach's motives were a terrifying unknown.
"The Quincy King… To think Amamiya's identity would unravel a threat of this scale," Urahara murmured, a wry, tired smile on his lips. "It seems, Isshin-san, your vengeance remains incomplete."
"It does. But forewarned is forearmed," Isshin stated, his resolve hardening.
"Understood. I will begin discrete investigations immediately. However, Aizen remains our most immediate, existential threat. We cannot allow his Hōgyoku scheme to succeed."
"Aizen… Yes. He must be dealt with first."
"By the way, Isshin-san," Urahara shifted gears, his curiosity piqued. "Amamiya mentioned he was going to see Ishida-san. Did you cross paths?"
"Amamiya? Now that you mention it… something strange happened shortly after I left the hospital." Isshin's brow furrowed. "I sensed a massive, violent convergence of Reishi in the Human World, all flowing toward Karakura General Hospital. It lasted a short while, then abruptly stopped."
"Toward Ishida's hospital…?" Urahara's mind, already overloaded, began churning again. He knew of Amamiya's dealings with Ryūken. This anomaly had to be connected. 'Was he training? Pushing his Quincy abilities to some new extreme? But to draw ambient Reishi on that scale…' Amamiya had never displayed such overt Quincy power in Soul Society or around him.
The pieces refused to form a clear picture. Aizen. Yhwach. The Hōgyoku. Ichigo's Substitute Shinigami status and the lurking issue of Ginjō Kūgo. And now Amamiya Miyako—a Quincy-Shinigami hybrid with one foot in a millennia-old conflict, acting in shadows Urahara couldn't fully illuminate.
He ran a hand through his hair, feeling the phantom stress of future baldness. The board was getting too crowded, the players too powerful.
Taking a deep, steadying breath, Urahara forced his formidable intellect to prioritize. The immediate, calculable threat came first. "For now… we must focus on countermeasures for the worst-case scenario regarding Aizen." He met Isshin's gaze. "We must prepare for the possibility that the combined might of the Gotei 13 and the Visored… may still fail to stop him."