Deviation

Moments after Kisuke left, Rukia had done exactly what she did in the story: she erased Ichigo's family's memories of the events that occurred and healed their wounds with a spell. This was a standard procedure Soul Reapers would follow in order to prevent chaos and confusion.

Ichigo himself had been knocked unconscious after slaying Fishbone D, leaving this part of the story unfilled. Now things were different—Silas had returned to his body and was witnessing those unfilled scenes. Uryū and Rukia helped him place Ichigo's family in their respective rooms. When they wake up, they'll all believe a natural occurrence, like a semi-truck ramming into the house, took place last night.

As exhausted as everyone was, Silas was not going to have either of them leave just yet. So he gathered Rukia and Uryū upstairs in Ichigo's rooms to discuss things.

"What happens now?" Silas asked, feigning ignorance. He already knew what was going to happen. Because Rukia had lost her Soul Reaper powers, she would be unable to return to the Soul Society. Silas could probably have Kisuke return her, but Kisuke would never do something like that. If he were to, Aizen would be getting exactly what he wanted.

Now that Silas had taken Rukia's powers like Ichigo had, she was going to have him act as a Soul Reaper on her behalf until her powers recovered. Uryū was vexed when he heard the news. Albeit, he couldn't go against it since Rukia's powers were now part of Silas's soul. As long as this was the case, Hollows would continue to target both Rukia and him—Rukia on account that her artificial body would attract them periodically.

Rukia offered to assist him but was denied. "Why not?" she surprisingly asked.

"Uryū has been defeating Hollows before you came," he coldly stated. The answer was enough to make her feel inferior. Not only had Rukia been powerless, she also didn't know what a Quincy was!

Quincies aren't dead like Soul Reapers. Some, like Uryū, could naturally absorb spiritual particles from their surroundings to turn into their power. Most of the Quincies, however, were exterminated by Soul Reapers over two hundred years ago. This was primarily to ensure balance between the Souls in the world of the living and the Souls within the Soul Society, something the Soul Reapers governed over.

Quincies sought to completely destroy Hollows without purifying them. As a result, the world of the living became heavy with Souls, causing portions of the Soul Society to connect to it, mixing life and death together. To prevent the end of both worlds, the Soul Reapers nearly caused the Quincies to go extinct. This was the reason that Uryū hated Soul Reapers.

But this was only the small origin of Quincies. Their true tale lied in Yhwach, an antagonist who would not show himself for some time now. He was just as deadly as Aizen, if not deadlier.

Those things aside, Silas and Uryū took a brief moment to explain that Uryū had been slaying Hollows for two months before Rukia's arrival. Rukia questioned how Silas knew all these things. This also piqued Uryū's interest. Silas could only state that he read it in a book he found, which the two believed. They questioned the whereabouts of this book and its contents, but he claimed that it mysteriously disappeared one day.

Suspicious and questionable, yet Silas continued this act, making his tale believable. And he wasn't lying; he truly had known all these things because he had read them. By no means was he going to reveal that their world was just a made-up fairy tale that truly had been designed in a book. Even if he did, they wouldn't believe something like that. Who could blame them? They ate, talked, and lived as if this world was real.

Then there was Aizen. He was more or less spying on them now. If Silas were to say something abnormal, Aizen's plans for Ichigo could change if they hadn't already. The best thing to do was to remain as covert as possible.

"It'll be some time before your powers come back, right?" Silas asked. His tone became serious. "Until then, I'm indebted to you for having saved Yuzu and the others. But once they do come back, you're to return to where you came from."

Despite how cold his attitude was, it only caused Rukia to get upset. She reprimanded him, saying that she would have gladly let the Hollow eaten Ichigo's family's souls. Whether this was true or not, her empty threat didn't faze Silas in the slightest. Uryū could only watch, trying to determine if this was a good idea or not. Only when Silas reminded him that this "Soul Reaper" had helped him did he reluctantly agree.

The three spent the rest of the night discussing how Rukia was going to be following Silas around. Just like in the story, she would secretly be staying in Ichigo's room and even attending the same school as them. How she was going to register in the middle of the semester was not Silas's concern. She managed to get away with it, like last time, so she should be able to do it again.

Ichigo's family would be unaware of her existence, and the many adventures the two would go on often ended with her erasing people's memories. Though none of these were going to be a problem for Silas to handle; it was whether he could be convincing enough for Aizen. Aizen meticulously calculated the right people Ichigo would have to fight in order to become stronger. Assuming he knew Silas was stronger than Ichigo at this stage, he would send in even more powerful combatants, making Silas's own plans abstruse.

• • •

The next morning, Silas was seen standing atop his balcony, watching Isshin repair the giant hole left behind by Fishbone D's attack. Rukia had successfully altered his and the rest of Ichigo's family's memories into believing a truck hit their house.

After Uryū's departure that night, Rukia had gone to sleep inside his closet—just like in the story. Silas himself hadn't gone to sleep. How could he when Zangetsu's power was surging inside him?