65

Ren and company had arrived in the outskirts of the Beast Realm. All around them was dirt and dust with a few trees on the horizon in some directions. Besides a few locations, this was what most of the Beast Realm looked like.

'This was not in the anime but luckily with my high position, I could get some information on it.'

The Beast Realm was indeed not in the anime so Ren had never heard about it. In fact, even the manga and wiki had very little information about the place. But the reality is different than entertainment.

Using the library that only captains had access to, Ren was able to learn about the beast realm while he was researching other types of souls and realms. In total, there were 6 different realms in the universe, only 4 of which most shinigami knew about. These realms coincided with the realms of rebirth. God's realm, human realm, demi-god realm, animal realm, hungry ghost realm, and hell realm.

The human realm is earth as well as the valley of the screams which lies on the outer edge of it. Soul Society is considered the demi-god realm and where most souls go when they die. Corrupted or kidnapped souls go to the hungry ghost realm or Hueco Mundo and end up as hollows.

Then there are the sinners. Most shinigami only know about Hell. But this is the place where sinners who have committed unforgivable crimes or cannot be redeemed. The animal realm, or Beast Realm as the shinigami call it, is where those sinners who have a chance for redemption go. This is a place that only captains or nobles have information about.

When a being enters the Beast Realm after death, it is given 2 choices. Those who go into the beast realm are tied there for 500 years. If they live for all 500 years, they are able to enter soul society in a beastman form as a permanent reminder of their sins. If they die, their soul is reborn as a savage beast the roams the realm and will never leave or recover their sanity. The other option is to simply go to Hell.

Surviving was much more difficult than it sounded. Reincarnated souls would have to battle the savage creatures in order to get food and survive but had none of the abilities that any other spiritually aware being had.

Within the beast realm, a person becomes one of the 4 types of beastmen but which were called the 4 major clans. The first are the werewolves. These guys have large frames that tower over most and incredible strength. Their most famous member became a shinigami captain within the anime.

There are also Kitsune. These are beings who have fox tails and ears. The more tails one is born with, the more spirit energy they have. Kitsune are mainly female with very few males among their members.

The Tanuki were similar to the Kitsune in their bodies' appearances. Instead of fox parts, they had raccoon-like tails and ears on their bodies.

There were also the Tengu who were part crow/raven were the ones who had the fewest members. They would have the wings of birds on their backs with the heads of crows/ravens.

Most of the time, these species would no interact due to several betrayals on one another in the past. The Tanuki were the most hated due to their plot that ended up killing 20 members of the other clans who were less than 10 years away from reaching Soul Society.

Ren summoned tree branches from under his feet and had them raise himself and his two companions into the air to get a better view. The entire realm was covered in a weird type of energy that disrupted Ren's ability to sense reiryoku.

Once they were high in the air, Ren got a better view of the place. He could not see all of the various bases of the other species from where he was at but he still knew about what to look for.

There was a mountain that seemed to have a large cave entrance behind several layers of walls outside of the cave in the south. There was also a city that was within the trees that was in the north.

In the east was a floating fortress that seemed to be composed of a large number of boats. They were on a huge lake that covered over a hundred kilometers.

Lastly was the western group. They had the strongest looking base out of all the others and appeared to be a city with 10s of walls around them on all sides. This was the only one Ren could actually see with his eyes.

Before starting on their journey, Ren decided to drop by the city and ask for advice from the natives before the group left for their task.

'Better to ask a native who lives there every day than to believe in the words of a book that is at least 400 years old.'

The trio ran through the air and approached the city at the fastest speed they could.

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Author's Note: God's realm is the Soul King's Palace