GODDESS OF ICE: CORRUPTING BLEACH - Chapter 6

Chapter 6: Getting to know the Crew








Chapter 6: Getting to know the Crew

"Hello, my name is Kuchiki Rukia."

After introducing herself and getting a few encouraging words from the teacher, Rukia took one of the empty seats in the classroom.

However, when Rukia entered the room, Yuna, Hinata, and Naruto's eyebrows rose as they looked at Rukia with interest.

'Although she appears to be extremely weak, she certainly feels like a Shinigami. Why is she attending school in the human world? Additionally, did she possess that body? She better has not snatched that from someone else, or things will get a little rowdy soon.'

[Her first day at a new school, and someone is already planning to bully her. Human society sure is cruel.]

'It is, Kurama. It is.'

While Yuna finished her mental conversation with Kurama, Rukia took the empty seat next to Yuna and smiled at her kindly, which she returned with a smile of her own.

Just like that, the first two lessons began and ended, resulting in today's first break. While everyone was either eating or chatting, Yuna overheard a rather interesting piece of information from Tashigi, who was talking with a young man whose name Yuna didn't remember.

"There is a good chance that Ichigo won't come today."

"Oh? Why do you think so, Kohima?"

"I walked past his house this morning, and there was a huge hole in the wall. His mother told me that a truck apparently crashed into the wall last night."

Hearing the word "truck", the image of an almost naked man wearing white speedos briefly flashed through the mind of Yuna, Hinata, and Naruto, but the trio swiftly shook their heads to get rid of the idle thoughts while the conversation continued.

"Eh? A truck!? Is he injured?"

Before Kochima could answer that question, a bag hit the back of Tashigi's head, drawing her attention.

"No need to worry; I'm not injured."

"Ichigo! Good to hear you are fine. Guess you must have helped with the clean-up."

Ichigo simply nodded his head and sat down with a thoughtful expression on his face.

"Are you Kurosaki-kun? Nice to meet you."

Suddenly someone formally talked to him, and as soon as Ichigo looked at the speaker, his face stiffened.

Before Ichigo could unravel why the Shinigami that appeared at his house during a Hollow attack yesterday was suddenly sitting in his classroom, Kohima delivered an explanation.

"This is Kuchiki Rukia. She was transferred into this class today due to unavoidable circumstances."

"Y-You, why..."

"Kurosaki- kun, I don't have the textbooks yet. May I look at yours?"

Ichigo was about to ask what Rukia was doing here when she talked over him and showed him her palm as if she wanted to receive the textbooks. However, the words "Say something and I will kill you." were written in bold letters on Rukia's palm, causing Ichigo to sweat a little.

Yuna looked at the whole interaction with a certain amount of curiosity. She could easily tell that these two knew each other to some degree. Additionally, she could also feel that Ichigo suddenly possessed Shinigami powers.

'Yeah, Pretty obvious what going on. The truck explanation must be a cover, so the real story should be something along the lines of a Hollow attacking Ichigo's house and Ichigo somehow saving the day by taking over Rukia's Shinigami powers.'

[Is that even possible?]

'Well, apparently? The real question is, why she hasn't taken her powers back yet? Is it a slow process, or is there something else?'

While Yuna was pondering the situation, Ichigo dragged Rukia out of the classroom, causing quite a few eyebrows to raise.

Naturally, Yuna noticed these two leaving as well, so she quickly made a decision and started talking to Hinata and Naruto quietly.

"I'm going to stalk these two. Want to come as well?"

Hinata and Naruto briefly thought about Yuna's question before shaking their head in denial.

"No, I'm not too interested."

"I agree. Just tell us if anything interesting happened, nee-san."

Yuna nodded her head and quickly got up from her seat to follow Ichigo and Rukia and find out what exactly had happened.

Meanwhile, Ichigo and Rukia arrived at an empty space behind the school, and while Ichigo was dragging her along, a fearful expression appeared on Rukia's face.

"Oh my, what do you want to do after bringing me to such an abandoned space?"

Ichigo's eyebrows twitched in irritation due to Rukia acting like a delicate maiden. Nonetheless, he pushed his irritation down and started talking instead.

"What the hell are you doing here? Now that your job is done, shouldn't you return to that Soul Society place?"

Hearing Ichigo's words, Rukia dropped her act and sighed deeply.

"I would like to go back, but I can't. Only Shinigami can return to soul society, and I'm currently not a Shinigami because you took all my power, and I'm even forced to use this artificial body."

"Artificial? No, that's not important. What do you mean by I absorbed your power? I'm clearly human right now."

"A Shinigami's power resides in the soul, not the physical body. Anyway, From today on, you will have to take over my duties as a Shinigami."

Awkward silence covered the duo as Ichigo processed what he had just heard. Moments later, he understood what Rukia wanted from him and looked at her in bewilderment.

"Haaa?! Are you crazy?!"

Naturally, he had no idea why he should suddenly start hunting after Hollows. Although he fought and defeated one yesterday, that was only done to protect his family. However, Rukia wouldn't give up so easily.

"How rude. Isn't that obvious? You are the one with the Shinigami power's now. Well, don't worry, I will still assist you. Additionally, you have no right to refuse because..."

"Nope, I refuse."

"Huh?"

Unfortunately, Ichigo couldn't care less about her words and rejected her request instantly, causing her to be dumbfounded.

"I said I refuse. I have no interest in fighting these monsters again."

After hearing Ichigo's refusal again, Rukia snapped out of her daze and glared at Ichigo.

"But you willingly fought one yesterday."

Ichigo rolled his eyes at Rukia when he heard her argument and casually waved it away.

"I only did that to protect my family. I won't fight monsters to protect strangers. I'm not a nice guy like that. Sorry to disappoint you."

Rukia's frown became even graver as Ichigo completely dismissed her request. After a few tense seconds, a look of determination appeared on her face as she put on a red glove with flames and a skull on its back.

"Very well. Then I have no choice."

Rukia was just about to attack Ichigo with her glove-covered hand when a teasing voice echoed over their meeting place.

"Ara, Ara~ You are quite the charmer, Ichigo. Rukia only joined our class a few hours ago, and you already have an intimate meeting with her behind the school. Quite impressive~"

The duo froze up as their eyes quickly wandered to the source of the voice, where they saw a young woman with red and blue hair smirking at them. When the duo realized what that woman had just said, Ichigo blushed a little while Rukia only rolled her eyes.

"Oh my, if it isn't Uzumaki-san. How can I help."

As soon as Rukia realized that one of her classmates was there, she switched back to a very traditional form of talking, causing Ichigo's eyebrows to twitch in irritation while Yuna couldn't help but chuckle.

"Mah, no need to continue pretending, Rukia. I heard the whole conversation, so there was no need to put up an act in front of me. Just call me Yuna."

Ichigo and Rukia froze when Yuna told them that she had heard their entire conversation. After all, that meant she must have heard them talking about Shinigami. While Ichigo decided to pretend that they were just talking about a game, Rukia took a more drastic action. Due to her artifact body, Rukia could run far faster than most humans, so she arrived in front of Yuna almost instantly and took out something that looked like a lighter.

Yuna's eyebrows rose as she saw Rukia take action, sparking her curiosity.

'Well, let's see what she will do with this.'

[*Sigh* Sometimes I really wonder why I'm stuck with someone who boldly walks into every trap they find.]

'Don't be like that, Kurama. Isn't the feeling of crushing someone's hope after they think they trapped you amazing?'

[Urgh, I do not even deny that, but how does that translate to boldly walking into every single trap.]

'Increasing the odds, obviously.'

While the duo was chatting, Rukia pushed the button on the lighter, resulting in a small fake chicken on a spring bursting out of it, which immediately blew a smoke cloud towards Yuna's face, engulfing it fully.

"Oioi, what are you doing, Rukia."

Naturally, Ichigo wasn't happy that Rukia suddenly "attacked" Yuna. Although he would want to keep this whole Shinigami business a secret, it's not like he was willing to get his classmates harmed to keep the secret.

"Don't worry, Ichigo. This is a memory replacer; it will just knock her out and replace her memories with dif..."

"*Cough* *Cough* Eww, this smells. What the hell was that? A bottled-up fart? Aren't you a little too old for stuff like that?"

[I'm pretty sure there were some instances where you pulled fart pranks as well. Don't you like stuff like that.]

'Yup, they are farttastic.'

[Urgh, fart jokes and stupid word games. This really is a low point.]

'Don't worry, Kurama. We can go much lower than this.'

[THAT'S NOT WHAT I'M WORRIED ABOUT!?]

'Hehe~'

While Yuna and Kurama were bantering, Rukia looked at Yuna in bewilderment. She couldn't fathom why her knock-out gas did not affect Yuna.

'Impossible. Normal humans get knocked out by this instantly. The only reason this has no effect is that the target has great amounts of Spiritual Energy, but I can only feel the average human amount from Yuna. Impossible. Is she hiding her power?'

While Rukia was still in deep contemplation, Ichigo couldn't help but look at Yuna in bewilderment.

"Although I have no idea what that was, why didn't you faint from it?"

"Mhh? Faint? Why would I faint from a bottled-up fart?" The initial posting of this chapter occurred via Ñøv€l-B!n.

"Nonono, no matter how I look at it, that wasn't a fart, but some kind of knock-out drug."

"Oh? A knock-out drug? *Sigh* To think that the transfer student would be a sexual deviant that uses knock-out drugs so she can have her way with fellow students."

Hearing Yuna's words, Rukia came out of her daze and was about to complain about how Yuna was judging her, when something vibrated inside Rukia's pocket, causing her eyes to widen. Simultaneously, a frown appeared on Yuna's face as she felt the familiar feeling of someone watching her. Well, she was pretty sure that the one being watched was Ichigo and not her.

'So the peeping tom is a back, huh? They seem to have some kind of plan for Ichigo.'

Meanwhile, Rukia quickly pulled a vibrating phone out of her pocket and hastily read the content of the message she had just received. Moments later, her eyes widened as she hurriedly punched Ichigo in the chin, making his body fall to the ground.

"We don't have time for this now. We can talk about this later."

Although Ichigo's physical body fell to the ground, another Ichigo wearing the traditional black Shinigami robe appeared. Naturally, Ichigo was surprised due to suddenly being back in his Shinigami form.

"Rukia, wha..."

"As I said, we don't have any time; follow me."

Before Ichigo could ask what was going on, Rukia grabbed him by the arm and pulled him away, leaving Yuna and Ichigo's unmoving body behind. Seeing Ichigo's defenseless body on the ground, Yuna could only shake her head and squad down next to it.

"*Sigh* Another hard decision to make."

As she said that, she pulled out a black marker and removed its cover.

"Well, then, the classic mustache, glasses, and dick on the cheek, or should I rather get creative?"

[Creative?]

'Yeah, I could draw a naked woman on his face or maybe write "I love dicks" on his forehead.'

[While you are at it, draw him a pair of whiskers.]

'Ohh, nice idea.'

[Shit, what's wrong with me?]

'Let the darkness engulf your heart, Kurama. Stop resisting already.'

[Never.]

Meanwhile, Ichigo and Rukia arrived at a children's park, and before Rukia could explain why they were there, a loud howl echoed over the park, causing Ichigo and Rukia's heads to snap towards its source. There, the duo saw a huge black and white creature standing on six blade-like legs. His body was moving around, clearly looking for something, and moments later, it let out another howl as it had found its target: The soul of a 5-year-old.

Seeing that the small soul was about to be attacked, Ichigo was about to pull out his sword and fight the Hollow, but Rukia stopped him.

"What are you doing, Rukia!? Why are you stopping me!?"

Rukia scoffed at his word and glared at him.

"Why do you want to help him? Isn't he a stranger?"

"What the hell was that, Yuna?"

Hearing Ichigo's question, Yuna tilted her head in confusion.

"Nothing much. I was just messing with Mizuiro."

Ichigo glanced at Mizuiro and noticed that he was still a little dazed. However, he quickly shook his head and refocused on Yuna.

"That's not what I'm talking about. How can you change character so easily? I didn't know you were in the acting club."

She couldn't help but chuckle in amusement when she heard Ichigo's question. A mischievous smirk appeared on her face as she gave her answer.

"Hehe, this is already my third life, after all. It's only natural to pick up a trick or two after living that long."

While Ichigo only rolled his eyes at Yuna's "joke", Yuna nodded in satisfaction due to Hinata and Naruto not showing any reaction. She would have been somewhat disappointed if they had exposed that she was telling the truth by showing a big reaction.

"Since this is your third life, Naruto must be on his third as well, right?"

Hearing Tatsuki's question, which clearly intended to double down on the joke, a smirk appeared on Naruto's face.

"Hehe, nope. I'm only on my second life."

Tatsuki chuckled in amusement at how seriously Naruto answered her question and directed her gaze at Hinata.

"What about you, Hinata?"

Hinata, who had only quietly listened to the conversation until now, chuckled in amusement when she heard Tatsuki's question.

"Well, just like Naruto, this is my second life."

While everybody was amusing themselves, Rukia had a severe expression her. Unlike the others, she didn't completely dismiss the trio's words. After all, many Shinigami were on their second life. Although instead of a human, they were now Shinigami.

However, a second life is one thing, but what about a third? Rukia had never heard about that. Besides that, neither of the trio appeared to be Shinigami. Rukia pondered about that matter a while longer before simply shaking her head and giving up. There was no point in investing more time in something she hadn't any information about.

A while later, another young man entered the rooftop as well. He had medium-long brown hair and brown eyes. It was Keigo Asano, the person who would probably be considered the class's pervert together with Chizuru if it weren't for Yuna's presence.

He was just about to introduce himself when someone kicked his back, causing him to stumble forward.

"Yo, Kurosaki, you bastard."

Two thugs appeared, almost resulting in Yuna killing them instantly out of reflex.

'Damn bandits. Even when I'm in a different world, they bother me.'

[Are you seriously mad at bandits because you killed so many of them that it became a reflex that is now bothering you in this new world.]

'Yup.'

[That's pretty unreasonable... Which makes it something you would definitely do.]

'You know me so well.'

[Well, I'm literally stuck inside you, so it can't be helped.]

'Kinky. What was it called again? Knotting?'

[Sometimes, I'm really fascinated by how fast stuff like that comes out of your mouth.]

'Meh, I'm not sure about that. I'm more of the swallowing type.'

[Okay, I walked straight into that one.]

'Well, rather than straight, I pref...'

[Yeah, yeah, I get it.]

While Yuna was bothering Kurama, the lead gagster was sent flying through the air due to the arrival of another person: Yasutora Sado. He was an absolute monster of a man, standing at 1,97meters with a massive frame and well-defined muscles. He had dark skin with pronounced cheekbones and wavy brown hair with bangs that usually hung over his brown eyes. Despite his looks, Sado was a surprisingly gentle person and had been friends with Ichigo for a while now. Before meeting Ichigo, he wouldn't even fight back when attacked, but after Ichigo helped him, he was convinced by Ichigo to use his massive strength and giant fists to protect the people around him.

Sado sat down next to Ichigo and placed a small cage holding a bird inside in front of them, making everyone curious. However, Ichigo barely paid any attention to the cage due to the bandages wrapped around some parts of Sado's body.

"Chad, what's happened? Are you injured?"

Chad, which was Ichigo's nickname for Sado, only shook his head in denial.

"No need to worry; it's just a little injury. As for what happened, a steel beam fell on me."

"A-A steal beam!? Are you really fine?"

Naturally, Ichigo was dumbfounded by Sado's words. Most people would undoubtedly be dead after getting hit by a steal beam, but Sado's resilience was on another level, so he only had a light injuries.

"Yeah, and a motorbike crashed into me as well."

"What!? What the hell are you doing?"

"As I said, no need to worry. After the crash, I carried the driver to the nearest hospital, and they told me he would be fine despite somewhat severe injuries."

"Seriously, what kind of body do you have?"

While Ichigo and Sado were chatting, the other people fussed over the parakeet Sado brought with him. Like all parakeets, it could imitate human words, but talking to this one felt like talking to an actual human, surprising everyone greatly. However, those who were a little more spiritually aware immediately noticed something off about the bird.

"Chad, can you tell me where you got this bird?"

Ichigo quickly noticed that something off about this bird as well, so he promptly asked Sado where he got it.

"Yesterday... I got it."

"Hey! Don't skip the explanation because it was too much work. That's a bad habit of yours!"

Well, Sado was never a man of many words, so that was just how he was. Anyway, a few seconds later, Rukia whispered into Ichigo's ear that whatever that bird was, it was nothing malicious, so Ichigo dropped the topic for now.

'*Sigh* I will have to deal with this tonight, meaning my sleep time will probably be cut. Being a Shinigami sure is a bothersome job.'

A few hours later, Yuna was on her way home, and she was actually alone this time. While Naruto had another date... *cough* sparring match with Tatsuki, Hinata had joined the sewing club. Apparently, she will have some kind of match today. It was against a lanky guy with classes, who clearly was a Quincy, but he probably thought he was hiding it. Well, considering Rukia lost most of her Shinigami powers and Ichigo sucked at everything except for swinging his sword, at which he wasn't very good at either, so the duo probably hadn't found out yet.

While she was leisurely walking home, she noticed Ichigo running toward her in his Shinigami outfit. Additionally, she noticed another presence trying to sneak up on her, causing her to shake her head with a wry smile on her face.

'Seems like this will be a busy afternoon.'

"YUNA!!! HAVE YOU SEEN CHAD!?"

Before Ichigo made it half the way towards Yuna, he was already yelling loudly, asking whether she had seen Chad or not.

"HAVEN'T SEEN HIM!!!"

Since things seemed to be hectic, Yuna decided not to wait for Ichigo to reach her and yelled back at him. However, she felt a little weirded out. Not that the other presence was closer to her, she could clearly tell that it was a Hollow. By now, said Hollow was in the perfect position to ambush her, but she couldn't fathom why it wasn't doing so.

However, as soon as Ichigo got closer to her, she realized what was going on as the familiar feeling of being watched returned.

'This is another one of these staged events the unknown puppet master has planned. Don't tell me... He wants Ichigo to see me die in front of him.'

A dangerous glint passed through Yuna's eyes as she internally upgraded the unknown puppet master from annoyance to a target.

'That insect thinks of me as one of his puppets. I, Yuna Uzumaki, am nobody's puppet! They think they can just kill me to advance their plans? Laughable! I don't know who or where you are, but you will die.'

Meanwhile, Ichigo managed to get closer to Yuna, and just as he was about to continue talking to her, a Hallow jumped out of the bushes behind Yuna and attacked her, causing Ichigo's eyes to widen in shock.

"YUNA, DODGE!!!"

And this was precisely what she did as she squatted down to avoid the Hollows teeth that were about to bite her head off in a gruesome manner. The Hollow was confused that it couldn't taste his prey, and after realizing what had happened, it tried to grab her with its hand.

Yuna couldn't care less as she had already predicted what would happen, so while squatting down, she picked up a heavy, pointy rock she had already spotted before the ambush. She wanted to show off some of her power, but not all of it; otherwise, she would have instantly decapitated the Hollow with her ice.

She dodged the attempted grab by nimbly jumping on the Hollow's arm before catapulting herself on its head, which she briefly touched before jumping straight up with her legs spread wide and her hand, still holding the rock, firmly placed behind her head. After carefully controlling the momentum of her body, Yuna hovered in the air, slowly spinning forward.

While the Hollow was frozen in place due to having no clue what had just happened, Yuna folded her legs, resulting in her spinning speed significantly increasing. Just when she was about to collide with the Hollow's head, her arms moved as well, piercing the rock into the Hollow's head seemingly with all her strength.

"DIE, TRASH!?"

Blood splattered as Yuna's rock easily pierced into the Hollow head and turned its brain into mush, causing Ichigo to stop running due to shock. He had killed a few Hollows by now, but he certainly had never done so with a simple rock.

Seeing the corpse of the Hollow slowly dissipating, Yuna sneered at it in disdain.

"Pah, who does this thing think it is? A weakling that isn't even capable of measuring my strength wants to attack me? What a pathetic performance."

A few seconds later, Ichigo reached her and looked at her, completely dumbfounded.

"You... You can kill Hollows?"

"Mhh? What are you talking about? Can't you kill them as well? Why wouldn't I be able to do it?"

"W-Well, aren't you a human? I'm pretty sure that humans aren't supposed to be able to kill Hollows."

Yuna chuckled in amusement when she heard Ichigo's words as she casually waved his words away.

"Obviously, I'm not a normal human. Have you seen how handsome I am? How could I possibly be a normal human? A normal human could never be this beautiful."

Hearing Yuna's words, Ichigo couldn't help but facepalm. However, he quickly remembered why he was here, and since Yuna clearly had what it takes to fight a Hollow, he might as well ask her for help.

"Anyway, let's forget about that for now. Chad got wounded by what appears to be a Hollow, and instead of staying at the hospital, he ran away to protect that bird. Please help me find him."

Yuna could only roll her eyes when she heard about Sado taking the self-sacrifice-loving protagonist, but she nevertheless agreed to help Ichigo search. Neither Ichigo nor Sado had much friendship with Yuna, but they were at least above being superficial acquaintances, so she didn't mind helping.

After splitting up to search more efficiently, Yuna quickly noticed some kind of commotion going on, and after reaching the correct place, she couldn't help but let her eyebrows twitch.

Sado was currently holding one of those wooden poles that usually carried cables and was swinging it around wildly, trying to catch a flying Hollow, while Rukia was standing nearby, giving him instructions on where to swing.

'What kind of game are these three playing here?'

Shaking her head with a wry smile, Yuna decided to observe the situation for now. It didn't appear like Rukia and Sado were in any danger, so Yuna decided to see where this was going first.

The fight continued, somehow turning even goofier when Rukia decided that the best solution would be Sado using her as a projectile and throwing her into the air. Unfortunately, this didn't work out too well as some kind of disgusting maggots that were shot by a smaller version of the Hollow hit Rukia, causing her to fall to the ground, where Sado quickly caught her before crashing.

While Rukia was removing the insect from her body in disgust, the Hollow they were fighting revealed an unusual-looking tongue, and after blowing some air through it, the maggots still in touch with Rukia exploded, dealing a little damage to her.

Seeing that Rukia and Sado were still ready to continue the fight only caused the Hollow to laugh.

"Hehehe, you are rather persistence, but what about if I do this?"

One of the Hollow minions appeared, holding a cage with a bird inside, causing Sado's eyes to widen.

"Hehehe, how about this? You stay back, big guy, and nothing will happen to this bird."

Rukia was just about to tell Sado that she was fine a lazy voice rang over the battlefield.

"No, I don't think we will do it like that."

Before the Hollow could understand the situation, a rock crashed into the minion that was holding the cage, turning it into mush.

"Sorry, ugly, I'm not a fan of taking hostages."

Naturally, the person who freed the bird was Yuna, who sneaked up on it while the boss Hollow was monologuing. As always, monologuing is evil's greatest weakness.

"Yuna!? What are you doing here? This is not a battle you should get involved in."

Yuna couldn't help but roll her eyes due to Rukia's words.

"What am I doing here? Isn't that pretty obvious? I'm saving your asses, so shut up and get rid of that shitty freak."

Although Rukia had a lot of questions, she decided to do as Yuna said for now. Questions could be asked later.

Just like that, the fight continued somewhat evenly. Although a few mini Hollow tried to sneak up on Yuna, they were quickly eliminated by her trusty rock, and around another minute later, Ichigo appeared and made quick work of the Hollow, causing everyone to sigh in relief.

As soon as Ichigo landed the finishing blow, a massive gate opened in the sky, resulting in the Hollow flying towards it. As soon as it was in front of the gate, an enormous sword pierced through its back and dragged the Hollow into the gate.

Yuna had to say that a giant gate opening in the middle of the sky and a Hollow getting pierced by a gigantic sword was a rather interesting sight and a pretty hardcore way to go. Apparently, Hollow, who were criminals during their lifetime, wouldn't go to Soul Society but hell, which the group just witnessed.

Following the departure of the Hollow, Ichigo performed a Soul Burial on the bird, which apparently had the soul of a child trapped inside it so that the Hollow could torment it.

Meanwhile, a few minutes earlier, Aizen stood in the usual monitoring room with a minuscule smile on his face as he watched Yuna's acrobatic display and, following that, the kill of the Hollow he sent after her.

"Well, that didn't go according to plan. Despite that: Fascinating. To think a human could achieve something like that. What fascinating research material.

"Pah, who does this thing think it is? A weakling that isn't even capable of measuring my strength wants to attack me? What a pathetic performance."

It was only for a split second, but Aizen's smile had vanished from his face.

"Did she... just insult my competence?"

His spiritual pressure briefly leaked, but it was so short that no one noticed it as he immediately regained control.

"What a joke. What am I even getting agitated for? It's just an insignificant human that somehow managed to kill a weak Hollow. If I wanted, I could erase her with a wave of my hand."

Despite saying that, Aizen felt something terrible had happened today. He felt like things might not end as easily as he had planned them to end. However, Aizen was a man filled with confidence. His plans had succeeded for hundreds of years without a single major blemish. He was not someone so easily intimidated by a few insignificant setbacks.