Make New Friends (Shin, Semi-open)

Shin did not expect Kuro to make knives with his blood, in fact, he didn't even know it was possible, there wasn't much he could do as his blades were all deflected aside and 2 came straight at him at extremely high speeds. Shin could tell that one would miss and that the other he would be unable to avoid, so he focused heavily on that blade and tried to time a swing to knock it out of the way. Unfortunately it was traveling a lot faster than he had anticipated and sunk into his shoulder, Shin let out an exclamation in pain, as the force knocked him back a little bit and he crashed into the ground and rolled onto his feet, his arm wasn't doing too well but he could still use it, luckily the blade wasn't too thick so it didn't do too much damage, it just penetrated well.

He charged Kuro once more, throwing the last blade towards him as he ran, then doing a flurry of attacks, trying to channel his reiatsu physically while incorporating physical strikes with his sword slashes.

Kuro didn't wait for Shin to reach him this time, stepping into the clash as he came upon him after swatting the thrown knife aside with his blade. What started when they met was nothing less than a loud chorus of blades ringing as they were brought together again and again. Sparks of reiatsu flew as both combatants brought out their reserves of energy to boost their bodies' performance and endurance. Kuro's feet moved constantly, changing his position as he circled around their point of combat and skillfully threw additional attacks in between Shin's strikes as he dodged and parried them. Neither one of them was willing to back down from this fight. Kuro decided to step it up a notch and took a closer step to shin as their blades came together again. He swung extra hard to knock Shin off balance and brought his free hand forward in the opening he'd made to throw a heavy punch at Shin's stomach.

Even though he was attacking as fast as he possibly could, Kuro was dodging or parrying every single blow, while easily managing to launch his own attacks in between shin's strikes. Shin at this point realized that Kuro had merely been humoring him this while time, he could tell, Kuro could have easily ended this contest with those attacks, but was purposefully aiming of skimming hits as to not hurt Shin that badly, it was insulting, depressing, devastating even, he realized that there was no improvement since last time, almost no difference in their comparative power since Kuro had last pummeled Shin into the ground. His morale and purpose started to waver, and his strikes became a little weaker and a little slower as he the realization started to hit him.

At this time, Kuro stepped in and swung harder. It all seemed to happen in slow motion... their blades collided... Shin's shattered under the blow... The blade bit into his flesh... then a tremendous blow to the gut sent him flying.... tumbling across the ground before rolling to a stop face down in the dirt. Shin was not only hurting physically but mentally as well, why couldn't he win? why couldn't he improve? He had trained so hard... but he hadn't improved at all... He slowly stood up, as blood seeped through his clothes a bit, and looked forward at Kuro, who hadn't moved, and thought, Why are you so far away from me? Why can't I catch up to you?

"Do you wish for power?" Shin blinked, he was back in the castle, in the throne room with the dark entity before him again. He look forward at the entity, battered and bloody. The entity looked at him and said, "No strings attatched, just take my power, use it as you will." The creature raised it's hand and a giant weapon formed out of shadow materialized before it. It appeared to be a large double ended serrated sword, except that it had four sides instead of 2 on each end, more like a spear. Shin reached forward to grasp the weapon but it turned into shadow and flowed into his body. "Call me forth to do battle, Akumu, Devourer of Dreams."

Shin opened his eyes and realized he was back in the real world, he looked at Kuro and said, "Devour, Akumu." Shadows reached out from shin's hand and wrapped around his body and started forming a elongated shadow in his hand, soon it fully enveloped Shin and as the weapon the creature had extended to him finished forming the shadow covering shin retracted, leaving him standing there with the weapon in full shinigami robes. Shin looked down at the weapon in his hand, he knew how it worked, he didn't know how he knew, but he knew the properties of the weapon, it could extended and retract and he knew how to use it. He could feel the power flooding his body... He took a deep breath and charged Kuro again, spinning around and extending the weapon before him in a an attack, before retracting it at the end of the swing before it hit him and repeating it over again and again, as fast as he could, back and forth, all over the place, trying to land a single blow on the evasive Kuro.

Kuro felt his swing break through Shin's weapon. His following attack seemed to completely devastate the poor boy. He sank into what seemed like a deep fit of depression, consumed by his own powerlessness. Kuro stood by and waited. This was a crucial moment. Shin's choice of action here would determine how far his potential could go. As he watched, something changed in Shin's body. A faint power could be felt building inside of him. Kuro took a step back as this power spiked in a wave of pressure over the area. Shin's reiatsu was different now. His attire had transformed into a genuine shihakusho. Kuro smiled with satisfaction. "Well done. Your determination to improve has transformed you..." he held up his blade, resuming his ready stance as a surge of shadows sprung forth to swallow him and retracted leaving him with his zanpakuto in hand, "...into a true shinigami."

Kuro was forced to take his evasion to a faster pace as Shin swung this new and dangerous looking weapon at him. It was a remarkable piece of equipment with the ability to extend its length by splitting the blade into sharp shards connected by a thick wire. This whip sword's movement's were erratic and hard to completely get away from. Kuro took a small swipe across his right cheek as he cut one dodge a little too close. Determined to get a breather, he released his own zanpakuto. "Concentrate, Seishou-Seijin!" Kuro's small blade flashed with a bright yellow light, instantly reforming its shape into a black and gold ninja gauntlet on his left hand. Kuro thrust this newly clad hand forward and fired a blast of spiritual energy out of his palm at Shin's feet, sending up a large explosion of dirt and dust.

Tatsuya and the others watched the two continue fighting. Well, Shin was fighting. Captain Akarui on the other hand was merely dodging and lightly countering. Those who knew Captain Akarui, knew that Shin had no real chance in striking the captain, even as fast as Shin was. That point was made more clear when Kuro stepped towards Shin and threw a heavy punch at him. "That should do it." Tatsuya said when Shin stopped sliding and lay face down on the dirt. "Let me go help him." Sumiko said in a low tone as she started to walk towards them; not surprised by what happened, but she didn't want to see Shin get hurt. "Give it a moment, Sumiko. Let us see what happens." Mika softly called out. "But..." Sumiko started but got interrupted by a reiatsu spike. All eyes turned to Shin, Sumiko's eyes went wide with surprise, Mika's eyes showed a piqued interest, and Tatsuya's eyes narrowed in uncertainty. Shin's reiatsu changed, and shadows began to envelope him. The shadows cleared and Shin stood before them dressed in a Shinigami's shihakusho. They were surprised when Shin charged Captain Akarui again. This time moving much faster then before and hitting harder. Tatsuya was debating whether or not to intercede when his mind was made up by Captain Akarui releasing his own zanpakuto. "Time to go!" Tatsuya hastily scooped up Hana and flash stepped back just before Captain Akarui hit the ground with the energy blast. Sumiko and Mika barely managed to escape the dusty explosion, just coming up behind Tatsuya. "A little more warning next time." Mika lightly snapped at Tatsuya. "Hey, don't blame me. I barely noticed just before he did it." Tatsuya replied with a chuckle as the girls dusted themselves off as best they could.

Shin was surprised at the amount of power that the weapon was giving him, but apparently it just wasn't enough to catch Kuro. Near miss followed by near miss, until one of the dodges was sloppy and he managed to score a slight gash across Kuro's face, it caught him slightly by surprise, he had finally managed to hit Kuro. However his extreme concentration was now broken and that slowed him down a little. In that moment Kuro yelled something and his blade turned into a gauntlet, and then he thrust it forward. It took shin a moment to realize that he had an energy blast headed towards him, thinking quick he tried to use his weapon to vault over it, however the blast was faster and more powerful than he would have thought. It collided with the part of his weapon that was connected to the earth, sending him and his weapon flying. Shin felt the blast send him flying though the air, dirt and rocks stinging his body and his wounds. He fell to the ground and bounced and rolled as the momentum from the blast expended itself. As he came to a rest he realized how badly hurt he was from the shock to his wounds, he tried to look around, but because of the dust cloud he couldn't see and he had no idea where his weapon was. He had managed to hit kuro though, that was his stated goal to himself, so he was satisfied with this as the end of the fight, and so he lay there waiting for the dust to settle.

Kuro smiled with a sense of pride at Shin's growth. He couldn't take full credit, but that he'd played a part in this small boy's improvement was clicking in his mind as an accomplishment. Reacting to Kuro's shot, Shin had done everything in his power to avoid it, not knowing that the blast wasn't aimed straight at him. When his weapon was hit and the explosion kicked up the dust, Kuro waited for a few moments to relax and prepare. He did not simply stand back however. His mind was focused on Shin's spiritual signature, confirming his location in the dust cloud. He took a deep breath to rejuvenate himself then shunpoed behind Shin in the midst of the dust. At this close of range, he could make out Shin on the ground.

"Checkmate."

Holding his gauntlet out with his open palm facing Shin, Kuro extended a blade of golden spiritual energy, stopping it with the point fractions of an inch from Shin's throat. Kuro stood there saying nothing further at the moment. He just stood by until the dust cloud finally settled, allowing the audience to see them again.

"Well I guess that settles that then." Tatsuya put Hana down as the dust settled to the ground and looked upon Shin flat on his back. "I think Captain Akarui went a little overboard." Sumiko worriedly stated as she took a few tentative steps forward. "You worry to much, Sumiko. It would have been overboard had Shin been seriously wounded." Mika replied. "Anyways, its over, so you can tend to him now." Tatsuya added as he walked over to the Captain. Hana quickly ran past him and straight towards the Captain. Sumiko made her way to Shin and knelt next to him, starting her evaluation of his body. "Not even a trained shinigami and he has already attained shikai. It would be a shame to let a talent like that go unrefined. Wouldn't you agree, Captain?" Tatsuya stepped next to Captain Akarui. "Well, aside from the scrapes and bruises, everything seems to be fine. A quick patch job and you'll be ready to go." Sumiko said to Shin with a light smile and quickly got to work.

Shin felt a sudden shift in the dunt and then Kuro was over him, blade at his throat. He was honestly surprised at the level of speed that Kuro now showed, it seemed nothing like the level of speed that he was using during the fight. It seemed that Kuro was still holding back a lot while fighting him, but right now he was more concerned with the blade at his throat, then Kuro said one word, "Checkmate" And with that single word Shin knew the battle was over, they waited in that position until the dust finally settled, then Kuro removed his blade and stood back.

The others came over and shin just stay lying there, Sumiko came over to him and began checking his injuries, he wasn't too terribly surprised, he must look really beat up, he felt really beat up. He was surprised however when she mentioned that he wasn't too badly hurt, he honestly thought he had sustained some bad injuries with how much they hurt. As Sumiko was tending to his wounds a man came running over at high speed and stopped in front of the captain and spoke to him for a moment, shin couldn't quite make out the words but both Tatsuya and Kuro both had a serious look about them from hearing the news. Whatever it was shin didn't know, for the man was speaking in a quiet voice so others wouldn't overhear. He was straining to hear when sumiko patted him on the shoulder and said that she was done, shin looked down in surprise that his injuries were gone, he still felt sore, but the cuts and such were gone. He glanced back over at Kuro and Tatsuya still engaged in conversation with the man, he decided that now would be a good time to leave as they would probably be busy with whatever that man and came to tell them about. He thanked Sumiko for healing his wounds and started to jog off, turning around to call out, "See you later", before heading back to the Rukongai.