"Wakey wakey." Those were the first words Yoshino heard as the consciousness returned and something was ripped off of her eyes, causing her to scrunch her them close as the light invaded her eyes.
When she opened them back, she saw the black haired youth from before. With some sort of talisman in one hand a small smirk on his face. "Hope you slept enough."
"Quincy." She said as she tried to get up, only to stop as she felt her arms disobeying her. When she turned her head, she saw that they were wrapped with talismans and connected to the ground.
"Indeed, you seem rather focused on that." He said with a raised eyebrow as he crouched down to look at her in the eye. "I did say we were going to talk, so let's talk. Why are you so focused on that?"
"...because you are in danger." Yoshino said after a moment of thinking. There was a part of her that was very much against revealing her cards but that part was smothered in her sleep by her logical side that had accepted that she didn't have any other choices. The last Quincy was far stronger than she had imagined and appeared to be far more willing to use violence to get what he wanted.
"You're saying that like you know who I am?" The young man said with a raised eyebrow and Yoshino allowed herself to smile.
"Indeed I do, there are people with their eyes on Karakura simply because you are here." She said, her smile becoming a little more, at least she hoped it did, seductive. "Last Quincy of the Ishida bloodline."
"...what?"
"It took quite an effort to figure it out. The battle between Quincy and Shinigami two hundred years ago already had thinned your numbers and there have been several families who simply stopped being Quincies and then they slowly lost their power of their bloodlines." Yoshino admitted, it actually had been rather amusing how Kariya had thought he found a proper Quincy family about a hundred years ago only to find out the family he found hadn't been a part of the supernatural side for over fifty years.
What he did to that family had been far less amusing.
"But we finally found without a doubt, Ishida family resides in this city and the bloodline is still strong in you. Ishida-"
"Stop, just stop." The young man raised a hand and pinched the bridge of his nose, he looked like he was having the biggest migraine of his life. "I'm not an Ishida."
"...there is no reason for you to deny it at this point."
"I am not an Ishida." He repeated, this time with a glare. "The guy you people are thinking is Ishida Uryū, a nerdy looking guy with glasses, he's a Quincy too. My name is Cain Walter, I am from abroad and also a Quincy."
Well, this was certainly awkward for her.
"How did you people even confuse us?! Do I even look Japanese?!"
And embarrassing.
"...there are two Quincies?"
"There are quite a bit more but that's neither here or there." Cain, as this was apparently his name, rolled his eyes before looking at her. "What matters is the people being drained all across the city, and the fact that somehow I'm thinking that you are not the culprit."
"I'm not." She immediately said, and immediately felt how weak it was as a defense. "The man that you and those other two saved, he was the first person that I targeted. It must have been one of the others."
"So there are other Bounts in the city." He said with a smirk. "Any chances of you telling us their names, whereabouts and weaknesses?" Such straightforwardness, it made her want to laugh.
"Do you think that I would lower myself to go after living humans if I knew the last one?" She asked with a smile, though there was no mirth in it.
To go after living humans in order to suck their soul was a taboo for Bounts. It might sound ridiculous considering that they fed on wandering spirits, making one ask why sucking souls was okay depending on whether it was alive or not. The answer was simple, there were side effects.
Sure, sucking the souls of the living allowed a Bount to obtain a significant power boost compared to the souls of the deceased. There had been several who had done so in order to challenge Kariya for the leadership of Bounts. The only one of them still breathing was Sawatari, and that was because he had been affected with the side effects before he could challenge Kariya. He had gained an immense power, the only one who could defeat him among the Bounts was Kariya and maybe Koga, but in exchange he was now an old man. He had to walk around with a cane cause his body could no longer properly support itself, his great spiritual power was masked by a body as frail as an elderly human. And Bounts were ageless, meaning that Sawatari would spent the rest of eternity as a frail geezer unless someone killed him.
That was the reason Bounts didn't go after the would of the living. To do so was to turn their eternal life into a very miserable one.
And yet, she just couldn't see any other way to defeat Kariya. Her Goethe was strong, but whatever Doll that Kariya had could control the wind with a finesse that she couldn't get her head around. It would be easier for him to simply create a vacuum and defeat Goethe.
So she needed more power, pure power, in order to burn Kariya down to ashes before he could do anything. Except somebody else was also going after living souls.
Was it Ugaki? He normally would never go out by himself but did have the callous arrogance to do it. Mabashi wouldn't, he did have respect for traditions and rules of their race. Utagawa… that man definitely would, he would simply for the satisfaction of hurting others rather than gaining power.
"I'll tell you everything I know." Yoshino finally accepted her loss and bowed her head. "Please, help me stop them."
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