Chapter 077: Collect Rewards!
The moment Matsushita Yusuke thought about his ultimate attack sailing straight into nothing, the frustration was physical.
Part of him wanted to fire another Kurohitsugi just to get the feeling out of his system.
Aizen seemed to catch something in his expression. He cleared his throat quietly.
"That's simply a habit of mine. Please don't take it personally."
The leader had spoken. What could you do? Take the loss and move on.
"I understand. So: how did I do, Aizen-sensei?"
"You passed, of course."
The smile on Aizen's face was notably different from his usual composed version. This one was closer to something genuine, something that might actually be called pleased.
"Your talent exceeds anything I had anticipated. Matsushita-kun, welcome to our team."
There it was.
The breath he let out came with a visible drop in tension, and the familiar notification appeared in front of him at the same moment.
[Quest complete... Reward acquired]
[Quest complete... Reward acquired]
Two of them. Not a glitch. Both quests resolving simultaneously, each delivering its corresponding boost.
Power.
Something was rising, steadily and undeniably.
He could not react to this right now.
Losing composure in front of his new leadership over a stat screen was not a good look. He needed to save it.
A covered cough. Expression managed. He turned back to Aizen.
"So, Aizen-sam--"
"Keep calling me sensei. No need to be more formal than you already were."
Fair enough.
"Aizen-sensei. Is there anything specific I need to be doing from here?"
"Nothing immediately. Keep the pace you have. Get stronger."
That was a more open-ended answer than expected, but when he actually thought it through, it made sense.
By the current timeline, Aizen wasn't a captain yet. Which meant the Hollowfication incident hadn't happened. After pushing Hirako Shinji and the others out of Soul Society, Aizen would take over as Squad 5 captain, and Tosen and Gin would advance at the same time.
In the coming decades, becoming captain-level was the target for all of them. And for that, Bankai was non-negotiable. So the next hundred years were, broadly speaking, a training period regardless.
"Although Matsushita-kun's situation is somewhat different, isn't it?"
"...Hm?"
"Shouldn't you be working out what to do about the Kijishi problem first?"
Matsushita Yusuke blinked, then made a quiet sound of recollection.
Right.
He had almost completely forgotten about that clown.
Two major quests completed, faction joined, substantial power increase in hand. Kijishi was nothing but a loose end at this point, a problem with an expiration date.
He kept that thought entirely off his face. Going from panicked to dismissive overnight would raise questions.
"Ahem. Right. Do you have any suggestions, Aizen-sensei?"
"Not immediately."
He had to be joking.
Aizen smiled lightly and said, in his most even tone:
"In my view, someone like that only became strong through circumstance. But even so: for him, that level is already his ceiling."
A beat.
"If you want my advice, Matsushita-kun, I only have one thing to say."
He let the pause hold for a moment, then said it clearly.
"Surpass him. Break him. Let that man become the material you build on, one small stepping stone on the road to something greater."
That was genuinely stirring to hear.
"So come out again tomorrow evening. I'll show you what real power feels like firsthand."
He adjusted his glasses.
"As for Kijishi: I'll use my own resources to push the timeline back. Half a month should be manageable."
Private lessons from Aizen himself.
The special treatment was real now.
And looking at it honestly: Aizen had been capable of stalling Squad 11 from the beginning. The whole situation had been a controlled push toward exactly this outcome.
He was in the club now. That commentary could stay internal.
"Understood. Please take care of me tomorrow as well, Aizen-sensei."
In the more formal phrasing: the gears of fate were beginning to mesh, and the path toward its fixed destination was starting to shift.
In the more honest version: Matsushita Yusuke had no idea what his continued involvement was doing to the original timeline.
Given the complicated set of circumstances that led to Ichigo Kurosaki's existence, was there any chance that one wrong step from him could erase the protagonist entirely? And without Ichigo, his mother never fell into danger, which meant no Hollowfication, which meant Uryu Ishida's story might never happen either.
The chain reactions from this were genuinely difficult to think through.
But those were problems for a future version of him. Right now the immediate issues needed to be dealt with first.
He followed Aizen back into Seireitei and said goodbye to Tosen.
The walk back hadn't been entirely comfortable, because at the moment of parting, Aizen had delivered one more instruction.
Once the Kijishi situation was resolved: graduate from the Academy as soon as possible.
Evidently, having witnessed the nerfed Kurohitsugi firsthand, Aizen had decided that keeping Matsushita Yusuke in the Academy any longer was a waste of time. Whatever else he had planned, the specifics were still unclear.
One year as a student, and graduation was already on the table.
It was a lot to take in.
But it also made sense for where things stood. The Academy's curriculum had genuinely started to feel like it wasn't keeping up with what he actually needed. The Squad 2 grounds had consistently produced better opportunities.
If Aizen's arrangement meant early graduation and a posting inside the Gotei 13, the rate at which he could develop would naturally follow.
Not a bad solution at all.
He washed up, lay down in bed, and ran through all of it in his head for a while, then turned to the more interesting question of which squad he should actually end up in.
Follow Aizen into Squad 5? Or was this the part where the boss had some other idea, something that involved going undercover somewhere?
The path ahead was becoming more defined either way.
He exhaled once and let that thought go.
Time to see today's haul.