Welcome to Gaia! ::

The day had started like any other days in the life of a Shinigami rookie stuck with Jigokuchō duties: wake up, check on the critters, clean the cages and restock whatever form of nourishment they needed, release a portion of them for duty and lock up the ones that had been active the previous day. Easy, peasy. All signs pointed towards another boring day at the heart of the Seireitei.

Unfortunately, or fortunately for the few that were dying for some form of action, halfway through the day, the Hell Butterflies started acting up, fluttering frantically. They slammed themselves repeatedly against the netting keeping them within their cages and those that were flying freely outside of them started harassing their keepers by swarming them. The Shinigmi would catch bits and pieces of some jumbled messages, but nothing more.

Then, as suddenly as the creatures had started assaulting their cages, the Jigokuchō within the compound had dropped dead leaving behind nothing more than an eerie silence and confused Shinigamis attempting to catch their breath among the corpses of thousands of their precious messengers and guide across the Dangai.

As clear as the day and as sharp as a zanpakuto blade, a soft voice broke the shocked silence that had settled,"Oh my, what have you done to my poor babies." Slowly, as though encumbered by her old age, a frail-looking woman dressed in regal clothing walked into the room. A disappointed frown decorated her wrinkled face as she surveyed the dead Jigokuchō, but, as unhappy as she may seem, her gaze and tone held no animosity.

Few were usually authorized within the compound and even less so civilians, but at the sight of her family crest, the nearby Shinigami immediately started stuttering a greeting and more than one sigh of relief were let out. She was an Amatoki, a member of the only family that had been given the task of breeding and raising Jigokuchō for the service of the Gotei. However, the family's history with the Jigokuchō ran deeper than that: their founder had been the one that had discovered the small insects' numerous ability. Surely she could shed some light on their current predicament?

The elderly woman's expression remained unchanged at the Kenpachi's arrival, but the same could not be said of the rest of the room's occupants. The majority of them had not served more than a decade within the Gotei and all had heard of what the eleventh division's haori implied. The more experienced Shinigami immediately readied themselves to take the brunt of Captain Yamamoto's Reiatsu while a few rookies simply passed out from a combination of spiritual pressure and shock.

"As you may see," the elderly Amatoki started before any of the 7th division Shinigami could say anything, serene as ever except for the initial disappointment she had shown. "Great misfortune has befallen these mystical beings." She was referring to the Jigokuchō corpses littering the floor. The woman had immediately recognized who had barged in and, though nothing betrayed her feelings towards Nanashi, anyone with keen instincts would detect that something was very off. Slowly, she reached into her robes take out a Jigokuchō. Unlike the ones the Gotei used, this one was particularly large and of a crisp white. "My own companion had been acting odd while I was visiting so I had decided to check up on my dear children," she explained, motioning at the rest of the room. "I must say that I am quite shocked at this tragic turn of events."

As she spoke, she released some Reiatsu of her own to let the captain know that she, indeed, had spiritual powers. Though it had been eons ago, Amatoki Yuki had once been a Shinigami herself until she retired to better care for the Amatoki family. "More importantly, you mentioned something about a disturbance, correct? I am a tad bit surprised to see the Kenpachi out of the battlefield." She had taken on a thoughtful look, eyes narrowing in confusion and head tilting sideways. The motion, along with her posture and mannerism would look particularly familiar to the Kenpachi even if she had only see it in one other individual and for an extremely brief period of time.

Suddenly, as though an epiphany had struck, the elder took a step back, hands coming up to her chest so that she would radiate anxiety. "Unless, the battlefield is here already? My goodness, I didn't bring any weapon and Aiki is with my husband. How am I supposed to fight in these. Is there some form of blunt object around I could use?" thus, she began gesticulating wildly while looking around for any form of weapon, long sleeves flapping and flailing about with every move.

"Small...fry," the elder woman repeated, blinking almost owlishly as she tried to associate such a modern term with her knowledge of Japanese. She had appeared unfazed even when Kenpachi had grabbed onto her though she had directed a pointed look at where the lithe woman's hands had made contact with her.. "Oh my. What a relief then. I would have been a catastrophe had something extremely dangerous had happened while the Hell Butterflies were put out of commission."

Before the old fox could say anything else, two other presences made themselves known in the room: an impassive man looking about the same age as the elderly woman and a younger man that looked as though he had a stick up his arse so hard was he scowling.

"Yuki, my dear, are you being bothered by such unruly manners?" the older man asked, looking directly at his wife and completely ignoring the other shinigami in the room. Some of the smarter unseated Shinigami had started inching out of the room as discreetly. It was never wise to insult the Kenpachi and throw in a couple of stuck-up nobles in the mix and it was one of the best recipes for disasters.

Fortunately, the aforementioned Yuki brought up an hand to cover her mouth and let a short, embarrassed laugh. "Oh, darling, be at ease." The petite little lady dragged herself up to meet her not so impressive full height and gave Nanashi what was supposed to be a friendly pat on the upper back area. "Lose some weight! It's not very cold to be stumbling on such old stuff." There would be a moment of awkward silence that followed the jumbled mess of words Yuki had used, but, not losing a beat, she continued on.

"Our siblings of the Gotei 13 are in deep fecal matters. We must get to the base of this riddle and reconnaissance the headscarf. Ya, ya, and ya!" she pointed at three unfortunate Shinigami that had not evacuated the premises in time.

"Y-Yes?!"

"Come with me to harvest the Hell Butterflies that croaked. Misato will be our honcho." A large, white Hell Butterfly, presumably Misato, flew into view as the elder woman finished her sentence. With a somewhat clumsy move, Yuki removed the cumbersome outer layer of her clothes and tossed it at her husband's attendant that quickly caught it with practice ease, scowl still in place. "You two, bring some of our stash over, statistic. And recall to be cold."

With that said, the woman marched out of the room in a whirl of robes, 3 stunned Shinigami at her heels, leaving her sighing husband and attendant alone with the woman that had supposedly killed their son and heir.

((OoC: A lot happened so I'm gonna stop here xD I had a blast looking up slangs and trying to figure out how completely butcher them.))

There would be a tired sigh as the older man closed his eyes for mere fraction of second to recompose himself. "My apologies. My wife is...extremely fascinated by today's youths," he said in lieu of explanation and apology. In reality, even he had trouble deciphering what his wife had just said. "I am sure you do, Kenpachi-san so we will leave you be. Be safe."

His last farewell wish had been said offhandedly and bland, more out of habit than anything, despite how ominous it may sound. "A new batch of Jigokuchou should arrive within the next few hours. Communication and travel schedules to the human world should be re-established by then," he said to the few remaining Shinigami before he and his attendant left. They still another person to visit, however, but without their Kido specialist and a broken network of Jigokuchou, it would be like finding a needle in a haystack especially considering what type of work the woman did.

The woman they had wanted to visit were not related to them by blood, but may as well be due to how close they were. In fact, Nagato had had the intention of adding her to their family, but unfortunate circumstances had put a damper in their plans. At the rate things were going, only adoption would be possible, but the heartbroken woman had not been the same ever since she had received the unfortunate news.