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This article, First Farewell is a chapter in Bleach: Sun and Moon Chronicles. It follows the beginning of Shiju Shūdō's journey to solitary mastery over Zanjutsu after finishing his training with Yoshiaki Hiroshi.
"Looks like we're done here, Shiju." Yoshiaki Hiroshi, an older-looking man with brown hair said to a slightly shorter and younger man in front of him. "I've taught you all I can. Now get out of my face before I kick you out, y'hear?"
The younger man, Shiju Shūdō, sighed in response to Yoshiaki's statement. "Thanks for the sentiments, sensei." He said as he turned his head around. "Well, I'll see ya later sensei. Next time we meet, I'll be sure to be stronger than you!"
"Hah, keep trying kid." Yoshiaki responded with a small smirk, watching as his student left with a leap towards the sky.
"You know, what I said is all fine and dandy but...where am I again?" The blond-haired traveler inquired. He knew he was in the Rukongai, but where in the Rukongai? From what he remembered in class, there were at least 240 districts, of course split into the four cardinal directions. "I should have known his bad sense of direction rubbed off on me. How is one supposed to become a master if they can't even find their way around the place!?"
The man's moaning continued as he walked across the rather empty district. The sun glared towards his direction — it was obviously summer — and the heat was unbearable. In response, Shiju stripped off the top-half of his kosode, leaving it dangling near his waist.
He continued to walk in the excessive heat, beads of sweat rolling down from his head all the way to his exposed torso. "This is ridiculous. How long does this empty district go for?"
It appeared that his question would be answered by a sudden spike of spiritual energy in the surrounding area, prompting Shiju to turn around to see what the commotion was about.
Much to the man's surprise, a group of Hollow had come to the area, despite it being in the jurisdiction of Soul Society, no doubt attracted by Shiju's strong spiritual energy. "Oh great, just what I needed on this blazing day."
The Hollows all charged towards Shiju at the same time in a valiant attempt to consume him. Such attempts were soon scorned by Shiju, who released his spiritual energy as bright gold reiatsu, before leaping upwards to evade the simultaneous assault.
"Let's just finish this." Shiju groaned. He quickly flipped a hundred-and-eighty degrees while in midair before pushing off with a stomp of his feet. The sudden acceleration from the air was accompanied by a swift draw of his blade, releasing a crescent slash with enough speed that the victim to the slash had disappeared even before Shiju stood on the ground.
Roars could be heard from the other Hollow, both of whom sent their massive fists towards Shiju from both sides. This hardly mattered to Shiju. He quickly changed his grip into a reverse-grip, using the flat side of the sword to completely block the punch of the Hollow on his right. Similarly, he outstretched his palm and intercepted the punch of the beast on his left.
"Right, time to finish this." With surprising strength, Shiju threw the Hollow on his left towards his right. He disappeared from their sights after shifting his footing slightly and, within the next instant, both masks of the Hollows were cleanly cut in two, disintegrating them in the process.
"Well, that was a nice warmup, I guess. Where were we...ah, that's right. Let's try to find water." Shiju came back on track, continuing his journey through the district.
On foot, across the distances, Shiju had found several abandoned homes. As expected, none of them had a supply of water, causing Shiju to continually groan about the heat. In what seemed to be days (although it was realistically a few hours), Shiju had finally come across something resembling civilization.
"Hey! You there!" He called out to the people, before briskly running towards their direction. Briefly scanning his environment, he noticed a temple a short distance away. He looked to the man whom he called out to previously. "Does that temple have water and accommodation for someone like me?"
The man, slightly surprised by the sudden appearance of Shiju, calmed down slightly. "That temple? Yes. It is the Ōryū Temple. A temple of -!"
His speech was interrupted by Shiju suddenly running towards the direction of the temple — after properly dressing himself — all the while he shouted "Water!" as if he hadn't drunk water in days.