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Unohana Retsu's eyes held steady on Su Li, their depths shifting like the still surface of a pond disturbed by unseen winds, quietly studying him as though peeling back layers not visible to the ordinary gaze, trying to glimpse whatever truths might lie veiled beneath the serenity of his demeanor. Su Li, in turn, met her gaze with a soft, almost indifferent smile, his posture unhurried and his expression composed—glass-clear, betraying neither nervousness nor fear, nor even the faintest trace of deception.
The silence between them thickened with a kind of ambient weight, like steam rising from hot stone—not oppressive, but undeniable—until at last, Unohana's shoulders loosened with a near-inaudible sigh. Though her poise remained intact, her expression carried the quiet conflict of someone internally shaken, her features betraying a turbulence she had long ago mastered the art of hiding. Then, in her low, measured tone—the voice of a woman whose hands had held more blood than most healers dared dream of—she finally spoke.
"Since assuming command of the Fourth Division, I have dissected, analyzed, and documented more corpses than most will ever encounter in their lifetimes, internalizing every nuance of death: the subtle variations in spiritual decay between the races, the distinctions between hollow corrosion and Zanpakutō trauma, the micro-fractures in soul sleep, the collapse of the spiritual knot—this is not knowledge acquired through theory but etched into my bones through decades spent in the silence of the morgue."
Her voice, once known as a balm even amidst pain, now carried a precise edge—a whisper of unease barely hidden beneath layers of clinical authority.
"When I examined Captain Aizen's body, everything appeared routine. No anomalies in his internal organs. No unaccounted-for wounds. No lingering traces of Kido. The spiritual knot was cleanly severed, his soul sleep utterly obliterated, and the pierced heart bore every hallmark of a surgical, textbook execution. All signs pointed to a death as final and unambiguous as any I've ever recorded."
Yet as her words flowed with professional detachment, a subtle tremor passed through her gaze—a flicker of hesitation betraying the undercurrent of doubt she could no longer suppress.
"And yet… the sensation was wrong. Fundamentally, irreconcilably wrong."
Her eyes returned to Su Li, not with accusation or suspicion, but with a piercing kind of focus—the look of someone trained to trust her instincts only when they refused to be silenced.
"I conducted multiple reexaminations. I told myself it was exhaustion, residual stress from the battle, the chaos swirling around Soul Society's hierarchy. I gave it every excuse logic could provide. But no matter how many times I repeated the process, the knot of wrongness remained—subtle but immovable. I kept my silence before the captains, believing it nothing more than a phantom flicker in my perception."
She leaned forward just enough for her voice to drop, narrowed to a line.
"But then you… voiced it too."
The tension between them deepened—not adversarial, but threaded with shared unease now given a name.
"So tell me, Su Li—where does your certainty come from? What exactly is it you've seen that confirms the doubt my instincts have refused to release?"
Su Li's smile deepened—not out of condescension or self-importance, but with a quiet weight that suggested his certainty stood on foundations no one else could see. There was a stillness in him that soothed and unsettled in equal measure, like a young man wrapped in riddles too ancient for his apparent age.
"Captain Unohana," he said, his voice soft, "you seem to forget—I'm a suspect. Are you sure you wish to lend credence to the words of someone under such scrutiny, especially when the smoke of suspicion still clings to me?"
Her voice answered, calm and crystalline, without hesitation or ambiguity.
"I know murder. I know murderers. And you… are not one."
She didn't elaborate because she didn't need to. Once the First Kenpachi, Unohana Retsu's history with death ran too deep for doubt. She could read the guilt of killers in the quiet of their breathing. It wasn't deduction—it was instinct refined by a river of blood no theory could replace.
The judgment, once given, was final.
"You're right," Su Li admitted after a beat, his voice shedding the soft veil and becoming denser, weighted. "Your instincts are right."
Unohana's pupils constricted as if bracing against the sound of an unsheathed blade.
"What?"
"What I'm about to say will challenge everything you've accepted. Prepare yourself."
At once, her spine straightened, her presence shifting into that of the warrior beneath the healer—poised, serene, and wholly alert.
"Captain Aizen," Su Li said with deliberate slowness, "is not dead."
She didn't flinch or speak in disbelief; instead, a sudden stillness overtook her, sharp and absolute, like the center of a maelstrom before it swallows everything whole.
"I examined the corpse myself," she said, barely above a whisper.
"That body," Su Li replied, "was nothing more than an illusion—an elaborate projection conjured by Kyōka Suigetsu."
The air grew colder around them, as if the Zanpakutō's name itself stole heat from the courtyard. Her mind reeled backward through memories, re-analyzing every test, every incision, every conclusion. Her brows drew close—not in denial, but in the rapid reassessment of a world subtly turned inside out.
"Kyōka Suigetsu manipulates perception," she began slowly, though the resistance was already crumbling under the weight of implication. "It misleads the senses—forces the mind to see false movements, phantom strikes. But to replicate an entire corpse? Weight? Texture? Biological detail?"
Su Li's tone, now edged and immovable, answered without pause.
"You were deceived, like all the rest. Kyōka Suigetsu's true ability isn't mere misdirection. It is Complete Hypnosis. Every sensory pathway—sight, sound, touch, spiritual resonance—is overwritten simultaneously. What you experienced was not a corpse. It was a fiction so intricately layered, even your mastery couldn't distinguish it from reality."
Unohana's fingers twitched, her knuckles whitening slightly as she murmured to herself, barely audibly.
"Then he's alive… hidden in the shadows… preparing for something far worse."
Su Li nodded, voice somber and tightly controlled.
"I don't know the full breadth of his ambition. But I do know this much—his supposed death marked not an ending… but a beginning."
Unohana fell quiet, her gaze distant as calculations tumbled rapidly through her mind. When she finally looked at him again, her voice had hardened.
"If what you say is true, then why should I trust you? Why would I risk the Fourth Division's silence for the word of someone cloaked in secrets?"
"You don't need to believe me," Su Li said simply, his voice unshakable. "What matters is that I believe… you'll come to see it yourself."
Before she could object, he stepped closer, resting his hand lightly on her shoulder with startling familiarity. His smile returned—gentle, unwavering, and hauntingly sincere.
"Because I trust you, Captain Unohana. I trust your blade to sever illusion. And I trust that your instincts—refined in blood and sharpened over centuries—will lead you to truth."
She blinked once, the gesture catching her off guard, though she didn't flinch. Instead, her gaze searched his with something tangled between awe and unease.
She had doubted the corpse from the start. Quietly. Silently. But now Su Li's words gave shape and name to the discomfort she could never explain. The pieces, long scattered, began to fall into place.
"How do you know this?" she asked at last, voice low and conflicted.
His answer came at once, smooth as a sealed door.
"Forgive me, Captain… but that, I must keep to myself—for now."
She did not push him further, though her eyes narrowed faintly. Instead, she allowed herself a smile—thin and touched by something darker.
"You're always so mysterious. Sometimes I wonder if dissecting you would be the only way to understand just how many secrets you're hiding."
There was a faint warmth to her voice, almost playful, but beneath it lingered something clinical and exact. Su Li's skin prickled, the unbidden image rising in his mind of scalpels, antiseptic, and a cold slab beneath harsh lighting.
He shook his head quickly, expelling the thought.
"Captain Unohana, please don't say things like that. I'm incredibly delicate."
That, at least, drew laughter from her—a bright, melodic sound that briefly dissolved the weight in the air, though it faded too fast.
She returned to silence, but her eyes remained on him.
"If you knew all this," she asked quietly, "why not speak at the captains' meeting?"
Su Li's smile vanished, replaced by something cold and knife-sharp.
"Because someone in that room… was working with Aizen."
The warmth bled from her expression, replaced by a readiness colder than steel.
"Who?"
"Tousen Kaname," Su Li said, without a heartbeat's hesitation. "Captain of the Ninth."
She drew in a slow breath, her expression cracking under the weight of betrayal.
As Su Li detailed his confrontation with Tousen in the Senzaikyū, Unohana's gaze darkened, the composure she wore beginning to fracture under the enormity of what she now had to accept.
"He's broken every law we stand for," she muttered, already rising. "This must be reported—"
"Captain Unohana," Su Li interjected softly, yet with absolute finality. "Do you remember the promise you made?"
Her hand, reaching for the door, froze mid-motion.
"This must stay hidden—for now. If we act too soon, we lose our only opportunity. Aizen will vanish. Tousen too. We must let the trap close around them first."
The silence returned as her fingers withdrew from the handle.
"…So we wait."
"Yes," he replied. "Until the moment is right. Then—and only then—will the truth unfold. Until then, everything remains under control."
There was a depth to his certainty that silenced doubt. He didn't sound hopeful. He sounded absolute.
Unohana turned back, nodding slowly.
"…Very well."
And then, in a voice as soft as silk and as sharp as a drawn blade, she added:
"But if you ever betray that trust… I'll carve the truth from your bones."
She smiled gently.
And Su Li felt the chill of it all the way down his spine.
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