At Karakura First High School, a boy with orange hair stood at the school gate, shouting at the top of his lungs in a fit of rage.
Beside him, a tall, broad-built boy with a cold, expressionless face was holding him back with both hands, trying to stop him from doing anything rash.
"Chad, don't stop me! I'm definitely beating this bastard up today!" the restrained boy yelled furiously.
"Ichigo, calm down. Who pissed you off this time?" Tatsuki Arisawa asked curiously from the side.
Her voice carried a slightly androgynous edge, and she looked at Ichigo with concern as he wore the expression of someone ready to commit murder.
"Keigo!" Ichigo pointed angrily at the boy opposite him. "I've already told you a hundred times! My hair color is natural! I didn't dye it because I'm some delinquent! Stop calling me a dyed-haired punk!"
"Tch. Like I'd believe that. You look exactly like a delinquent," Keigo retorted with a face full of disdain.
"All right, Ichigo. If you keep this up, we're going to be late. It's the first day of school, remember?" Tatsuki tried to soothe him.
After a round of persuasion, Ichigo finally managed to calm down and decided not to lower himself to Keigo's level.
The three of them entered the school together, thinking the matter had ended there.
Then another discordant voice rang out from behind them.
"You there, the yellow-haired one! Stop right there!"
The angry shout echoed across the school grounds.
Ichigo turned around, already preparing to fire back, only to discover that the person who had called him was an uncle-looking man wearing glasses.
With an irritated face, Ichigo replied, "Who are you, old man? Don't you know it's rude to call people yellow-haired?"
The man stared at him sternly and said in a strict voice, "This is a school. Dyed hair is not allowed. Also, I am this school's dean of discipline. Do you have a problem with that, yellow-hair?"
Ichigo's eyes widened.
"Ah! Ah! Ah! I already said I'm not yellow-haired! My hair color is natural! I didn't dye it!"
The dean of discipline frowned and looked at him doubtfully.
"I don't believe you. Prove it."
Ichigo shook his head helplessly.
"How am I supposed to prove something like that?"
Just then, the dean suddenly moved.
He grabbed Ichigo and dragged him straight toward the school's water basin.
Before Ichigo could even react, the dean picked up a bottle of some unknown liquid, poured it over his head without hesitation, and began scrubbing wildly.
Then he shoved Ichigo's head into the water and dunked it several times in a row.
A little while later, the dean finally let go.
He carefully examined Ichigo's hair, then nodded.
"Mm. The color didn't change. Looks like your hair really is natural. All right, hurry inside! Although you seem to be close to being late."
With that, he turned and left, leaving Ichigo standing there soaked from head to toe, his face full of speechless fury.
"Ichigo, are you okay?" Tatsuki asked worriedly as she looked at Ichigo's dripping wet hair.
Ichigo waved a hand.
"I'm fine. My hair's just wet. Why are you still waiting for me? We're already about to be late."
"That dean is terrifying. He suddenly grabbed you and dragged you away before any of us could react. He was seriously fast!"
The irritated Ichigo shook his wet hair.
"He really was fast. Forget you guys, even I didn't react in time."
His father, Isshin Kurosaki, had put Ichigo through hellish training ever since he was a child, claiming that the son of a doctor needed a strong body.
Although the training process had been painful, it had produced real results.
And yet today, Ichigo had been grabbed by an utterly ordinary-looking dean of discipline and shoved into a water basin without even the slightest room to resist!
"Who exactly is that guy? He's ridiculously strong. Even Ichigo couldn't fight back against him…" Tatsuki said, looking frightened.
"Who knows? But since he's the dean of discipline, he probably won't seriously hurt students," Yasutora Sado said, trying to comfort her.
Ichigo took a deep breath. After calming down, he began analyzing what had happened.
"That dean's movements were too fast. I didn't have time to react at all. And his strength was terrifying too! He suppressed me so easily... Looks like I'd better be careful if I run into him again."
Chad and Tatsuki both nodded in agreement.
"But he's still the dean of discipline. As long as we don't break school rules, he probably won't do anything to us, right?"
The three of them walked toward the classroom while continuing to discuss what had happened.
"What rotten luck. First day of school and I already ran into something like this," Ichigo complained helplessly.
"All right, stop grumbling. Hurry up and get to your seat. Class is about to start." Tatsuki patted Ichigo on the shoulder.
When they reached the classroom door, the school bell rang.
The three hurried inside and found their seats. Soon after, the teacher entered and began class.
Ichigo sat there listening absentmindedly, his thoughts still stuck on what had happened earlier.
How could a school's dean of discipline be that abnormal?
It truly made no sense.
Just like that, the distracted Ichigo passed through his first day of school in a daze.
...
After school, Ichigo, Tatsuki, and Chad walked home together, still discussing the incident from that morning.
"Why do you think that dean treated me like that? I don't think I did anything to offend him," Ichigo said with a frown, completely unable to understand.
Tatsuki raised her head and glanced at Ichigo's hair, but she said nothing.
"Seriously, all this just because of my hair color? It pisses me off!" Ichigo said angrily, reaching up to touch his orange hair.
"All right, all right. Don't think too much about it. How about you dye your hair black, Ichigo? That should stop the trouble, right?" Chad said with a faint smile, trying to calm him down.
Just then, a black sedan slowly drove past them.
The car window rolled down, revealing the face of the dean of discipline from that morning.
The dean glanced at Ichigo.
The corner of his mouth lifted slightly, revealing a mysterious smile.
Then he drove away.
Seeing that, an ominous feeling rose in Ichigo's heart. He kept feeling that this dean of discipline was not normal!
Ichigo stared after the car as it slowly passed.
"Seriously, today was awful. I ran into something like this on the very first day of school. And that dean of discipline… I feel like he's deliberately targeting me. Just now, he even smiled at me."
Tatsuki did not think so.
"Ichigo, I think you're just being paranoid. Isn't it normal for a dean of discipline to smile and greet his own student?"