Chapter 6

/Tatsuki POV\

She might have overreacted a bit when she had tried to kick Cain, in her defense she had been more than a bit pissed off when she realized there wasn't school today where he was supposed to tell her about the shit that happened yesterday.

That was the part she had every right to be angry about. She and Orihime almost had been eaten by a monster out of the kind of book Keigo would read, what the fuck?!

And even more importantly, that bastard Cain had copped a feel damn it! Sure whatever he did while he was touching her chest had also healed her but her feminine anger ignored such tiny details.

So yeah, she was kind of pissed at Cain, sue her.

Though she probably shouldn't have just followed him to his home, he might be a classmate and he had saved her life but she still didn't know him very well. And…

"You are overthinking." Something cold touched her cheek and she jumped in surprise, only to see Cain with cans in his hands, offering one to her.

"You didn't even realize me get near you like that, you really are overthinking." He deadpanned at her and she could feel herself blushing.

"So, I did promise you answers didn't I? Ask anything you want." Cain said as he took a seat in front of her, calmly sipping from his can. She knew exactly what she wanted to ask.

"What was that thing?" Because if she was attacked by a hentai reject monster, she deserved to know EXACTLY what it was.

"Hmm, ok but there are few things you need to know before that. First thing first, ghosts are real." The transfer student said that like he was talking about the weather and continued talking before she could make her disbelief about that known.

"When someone dies and doesn't go to the Soul Society, which is pretty much heaven but shit, their spirit reside in our world. That isn't much of a problem for a while but if they have regrets or other negative emotions then things get a bit messy." Cain said and took another sip, letting her process what she heard before continuing.

"When a spirit stay in this world with those pesky negative emotions, they gradually lose their hearts and become soul eating monsters known as hollows."

"Was that what that thing was?" Tatsuki asked and Cain simply nodded.

"Yep, a pretty weak one though so it was probably young." Cain said and Tatsuki almost did a spit take, that thing had wrecked her and could control people and it was supposed to be weak?!

"Don't look so surprised, I saw those teeth marks on it's tentacle which I believe was a gift from you." Cain said and she blushed as she remembered that.

"The fact that you could see it means that you are somewhat above normal humans when it comes to spiritual world but you are still a baseline human. A baseline human shouldn't be able to leave a mark on a hollow with their teeth, hence that thing was weak." Cain explained his reasoning and even if it felt kinda humiliating Tatsuki had to accept it.

"How did you kill it so easily then?" Accepting it didn't mean she wouldn't make an issue out of it though.

"And there comes the second phase of your lesson. The other races of our world." Cain smiled down at her in a way that felt like he was mocking all of her life choices.

"Firstly there are Shinigamis…"

"SHINIGAMI!" Tatsuki cut him off with her shout but as far as she was concerned her reaction was perfectly normal. Shinigami, the reaper of the souls, was supposed to be real and there was more than one?!

"Yes, Shinigami." Cain picked his ear, not exactly happy with Tatsuki's volume.

"They are special souls that help spirits in living world pass on and purify hollows. They are pretty much a military and most of them are useless." Death gods were useless, Tatsuki wasn't sure what her life was supposed to be anymore.

"Then there are Quincies. They are humans with high spiritual powers who learned how to kill hollows. But their method was faulty so most were killed by Shinigami somewhere around two hundred years ago. A decision that came naturally to Shinigami since the king of Quincies tried to wipe them out a thousand years ago, give or take a few decades." Cain calmly explained the near genocide of a race of humans like it was a simple chore. How had her life came to this?

"What do you mean by 'faulty'?" She might be new to this whole spiritual world thing but why would killing monsters be wrong in anyway?

"That's because when a Shinigami kills a hollow, they are cleansed and the soul within goes to Soul Society or to the Hell based on their deeds while alive." That made sense to her, it wouldn't be good to send murderers or rapists to 'heaven' after all, even if Cain had claimed it to be 'shit' for some reason.

"But when a Quincy kills a hollow, the souls are destroyed. No afterlife for the hollow and any of the souls it might have eaten." And didn't that sound terrifying.

Tatsuki didn't really care much for religion. As far as she was concerned it was something that was supposed to teach people to be 'good' but then twisted later on. But she still believed that there would be something after death, maybe not the way priests describe but surely there was something. And now knowing that there was a way for one to die in a way that there wouldn't be an afterlife for them… it was terrifying.

"And… you are a…" she trailed off, not exactly sure what to say.

"Well I guess I could be called a Quincy but I am also bit of a freak by their standards." Cain calmly said as he finished his drink and crushed the can in his grip before throwing in trash from afar.

"There are some factors that I have no interest in talking that means the hollow I kill aren't destroyed like with a normal Quincy but as I said, it's complicated." He said and Tatsuki found herself believing him. It was a bit weird but he just didn't seem to be the type to lie about something like that.

Now there was only one thing left.

"Is there any way I can fight a hollow?" She said and Cain look at her with something she couldn't exactly place.

"Why do you want to know?"

Because she didn't like being weak. She wasn't entirely sure whether asking that from him was right but she also didn't know any other options. The feeling of weakness against that hollow at school… she wouldn't say she was traumatized but she was self aware enough to know that it was close.

"That… hollow at school almost killed me. It almost killed Orihime and Chizuru. It almost killed those other students too. I don't want something like that to happen in front of me again." She admitted to him and clenched her fists.

"I want to be strong." She declared with her very soul crying out loud and Cain smirked at her.

"Then by all means, let us make you strong."