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It had been centuries, millennia of war. Stepping in for small armies, villages banding together and ragtag groups banded together to defend themselves and those in need. He didn’t need to step in for the overwhelming side, the conquerors, the invaders.
The gods chose their favour without regard for consequence or any consideration for the mortal lives ripped asunder—families torn apart in appeasement to the gods, friendships and loves and camaraderie sacrificed for the gods’ petty amusement.
Ichigo was not a fan. Though he never spoke of it, his ascension from human to immortal hadn’t changed his character at the core. The gods hadn’t been killed before; when they got to experience their reincarnation cycles to the fullest, knew what it was to be reborn, and were humbled, then Ichigo hoped they might change their ways. Until then . . . It wasn’t worth imagining, Ichigo knew that would never happen. They would sooner cling to their old ways and die prioritising their whims and minor squabbles. It was hard for someone like Ichigo who knew what it was to crawl and claw yourself along the ground back from death’s grip. To be downtrodden and suffering and spit on. Ichigo knew in his heart that they would die; fade away reluctant and in denial.
The world was changing. Or it needed to. His continued presence wouldn’t help; he’d only preserve the status quo and he knew humans to be capable of anything in defence of their loved ones.
The first protector need not worry as much as he was used to. It was time for him to slip away.
He relinquished his power, pouring all of that energy and age and strength into his sword. He held the hilt to his forehead, closing his eyes as he felt all of that strength and his experiences leave his body. He held the sword backwards, and plunged it into his heart.
There was darkness. It enveloped him, but Ichigo felt comforted. After so much time spent in anguish, Ichigo finally remembered peace. (He’d only glimpsed it in fragments when he’d reunited a daughter with her family, and returned a man to his lover, who’d promptly cuffed him around the head for leaving, then hugged him so tight to his chest he could scarcely breathe. He remembered those moments as clearly as if they’d been reflected to him as in a still pool of water).
Wait. Where did all the water come from?
Ichigo’s drowsy eyes snapped open and a breath exploded from his lungs into the water around him.
“Wha-?”
The water was moving. It had extended well into the darkness beyond his vision but now he could feel it rushing past his face. Ichigo slipped down and suddenly his face was cold. The water level drained below his face. His ears popped and he was lying on ground. A floor. Was he in a building?
He turned his head. And stared into the eyes of a being unlike any he had known. It was a god, he could tell. But this one, this one had a greater domain. This one knew responsibility, knew the burden of caring.
“Ichigo.”
It spoke straight into his mind.
“Do not be alarmed. I wish to speak with you. I seek your assistance.”
“With me? You need my help?” Ichigo didn’t trust anything that would pull him from the afterlife to fulfil its wishes.
“Yes. I am desperate for someone to help. You have protected long past any could expect in one lifetime and continued to for so much longer, even though you knew you had no need to rush anymore. I am sorry to have taken your peace.”
Ichigo sat up and rubbed a hand through his waterlogged hair.
A moment of staring into the being’s eyes and he was dry.
“Carry on.”
Reincarnation was tricky. Somehow you were you and yet so different. Nothing was the same but the soul and even then souls were like energy. Some remained but only in that it kept changing in the same way.
Some part of him touched at a man, Shiba Kaien, who reminded Ichigo of himself in so many ways. But the being communicated that it was not his destiny. He need not force himself to the wrong mould. And so, the being’s words pushed him further through time, part of him broke off, but he continued onwards, letting the lack of weight propel him.
(His darker parts fell, screaming into the void. The screams were of glee, they always were. But something inside it broke when a being more evil than it had yet seen picked it up from the sands where it nested and fed. Ambition combined with competence in a way that had means to devastate all the worlds. If only it could return to Ichigo and warn him).
When Ichigo finally landed, there was red hair. He knew he was home. Black hair and smiles. Red hair and smiles. He felt there was more but it had yet to be born. He knew those warm auras would return to him soon.
The knowledge would have broken him. And the being promised peace. He lived for a decade of suns and smiles and red hair and black hair and brown and black all entangled together and he was happy.
But his burden was his. His responsibility had always been inevitable; it was just his character. No matter the events that caused it last time; this time it was the death of his mother that placed the plaque of protector and tied it to his shoulders more firmly.
(The whiter, the darker parts of him shone as they wrapped themselves together with him as he grew in the womb. It didn’t matter that Ichigo’s colours had been bleached from them. No matter the lack of resemblance they were home and together with Ichigo as intended. Cut off until he needed the darker but whiter parts of himself again. When his mother died, they erupted, but were still unable to do anything but circle his soulscape, indignant in fury on his behalf. Sure, they were something different to when they were just Ichigo, but that didn’t mean they saw themselves as anything less than his defender against the world).
He took up his mantle again, and no one, not even himself, sensed the difference between what Ichigo should have been and what he really was and always had been.
Rioting through Soul Society, long-forgotten parts of himself clawed back from the void, awoken by the rush of returning to death as he had trained (it was too soon for him to let himself die, and Ichigo’s badness hadn’t been so free to rampage in so long. It was more than ready).
Then he faced the man that so warped his most godly aspects and Ichigo the god shook himself. He was silent and cold in his judgement (but still so feeling), defeating the threat to his chosen people (he could feel how the man had been alone for so long and it was so much like he’d felt).
Zangetsu thought that Ichigo would use Mugetsu as he was resigned and determined to do what was needed.
Ichigo’s hollow knew better—Ichigo, the wandering swordsman, the protector god was close. But it was all wrong; he’d relinquished his powers once more and he couldn’t return to himself. Ichigo’s hollow cursed and spat as it was plunged into darkness once more without him.
A whole year had passed. Ichigo had no powers. In his dreams, he remembered. He missed his abilities but now he missed more the time he had lost. Awake, he knew nothing.
Something drummed in his soul when his own sisters held him back from Tsukishima and believed the liar over him. (“That’s why! I love these fruit the most. But I love you more, so it only makes sense to name them after you,” reasoned Yuzu. Karin held one berry away from her but, hearing Yuzu’s rationale, brought them right to her face. “I dunno. It looks pretty off-putting to me.” She took a bite. “Oh, wow. But so sweet on the inside.” She grinned—“Just like Ichigo”—and triumphantly ate the rest).
The Fullbringers weren’t the cause; his return was inevitable at this point. So when Rukia stabbed him full of reiatsu again . . .
Ichigo, the first protector was reborn.
The Soul King was relieved. It knew time. It knew Ichigo would always protect. But it could not have known Ichigo would choose to reincarnate himself to save the worlds as he had always done—it only knew it could depend on him.
His human side was all that he could process through his fight with Ginjō.
But he knew he was different.
It didn’t matter to him in that moment. He had one man to thank.
Kisuke couldn’t have known of his true nature.
Ichigo readied himself to fight (but in his mind, he smiled as he thought of the man’s surprise when he confessed the truth).
Yhwach thought he was a god.
But the winds whispered the truth.
He’s back.
Yhwach laughed, not understanding.
The man and the god. Mortal claiming his place in eternity.
“You see?”
He truly believed they meant him.
Ichigo. God of War.
The onlookers were stunned.
Of Chaos.
Ichigo breathed.
God of Calamity.
He moved.
. . .
The boy had fought beautifully from the moment he had met him.
Kisuke was indebted to him and owed more than his life and devotion to the man who had returned home from war; powerless.
Ichigo was calm when his powers returned, a smirk twitching at his face but good– at peace. Ichigo couldn’t have known it would happen, but Kisuke was glad to see it.
Then came Yhwach.
And the man was more determined than ever. When Ichigo called to relay his hurrying, Kisuke felt relieved himself. He truly depended on the man, but now much more easily than with Aizen. That had been desperation but now he felt . . . reassured? Comforted, by the idea of Ichigo’s return. To him. Ichigo’s return to him.
Oh wow. He didn’t see that coming.
Ichigo was beautiful in his heroism. He was glorious in battle. The violent parts Kisuke kept tamped down thought he looked sublime. Kisuke wanted to fight him as much as he wanted to pick at his brain (and take him to dinner and hold hands under the stars).
When Ichigo had won, Kisuke was his usual self, but Ichigo smirked, (it was like Ichigo could tell how he felt).
(Ichigo wasn’t that obtuse and quite frankly, he was surprised it had taken Kisuke this long to break through his denial).
When Ichigo explained what those titles meant, Kisuke was awed.
. . .
But not as much as when Ichigo picked apart his footwork mid-spar. Or when Ichigo cooked dinner for them alone, surrounded by candles. (Did you know he could bake? Urahara stuffed his mouth with cake and moaned, rewarding Ichigo by attacking him with smooches). Or as awed as when Ichigo sat all the way through Kisuke’s one-sided lecture about experimenting with a combination of Hakuda and Kidō like Yoruichi’s Shunkō, heavily annotated by wild gesticulating, and followed up Kisuke’s excited panting and tossing of sheets and equipment with a single question that turned Kisuke’s brain in circles.
Kisuke had found home.
And Ichigo had found peace.