"...Gasp…" Byakuya opened his eyes, his chest heaving heavily as his eyes looked around rapidly before he quickly put his hand over his chest to feel where a sword had run through his heart.

"I'm still alive…?" He whispered to himself, confused as he put his hand on his chest but couldn't feel any pain, or wound, not even a bandage.

'What's going on…?' He thought to himself and realized that he was in his bedroom in his manor when suddenly a woman wearing maid clothing opened the doors to his room and saw him and then quickly turned back to shout to someone behind her,

"The Clan leader is awake…!" she said loudly to someone behind her before another voice sounded from behind her, shushing her.

"You don't have to scream so loudly, Mina…" an aged voice responded to the maid's loud cry as an old man appeared behind the maid.

"You can leave now… and remember, not a word about this to anyone…" The old man said sternly to Mina as he walked in and turned to close the door behind him,

"Yes sir, my lips are sealed…" Mina responded as she made a "zipping the lip gesture" and then threw the key away while nodding so quickly it felt like her head would fall off.

The old man closed the door behind him and then turned around to look a Byakuya before giving a bow and asking,

"How do you feel, Byakuya-sama?"

"...What happened to me…?" Byakuya asked as he ignored the old man's question.

"You were found adjacent to the room where Hisana-sama was placed, and you were found there by Mina, passed out on the floor."

'...passed out…?' Byakuya thought as he heard this explanation.

"You must be working too hard, Byakuya-sama, with all the new issues and all… are you sure you still don't want me to call a doctor…" The old man continued.

"...No…" Byakuya responded immediately with a sharp look at the old man.

"I apologize for my rudeness, Byakuya sama…" The old man apologized quickly with his head down.

"What about the attack on the clan by the ryoka…?" Byakuya then asked,

"Ah that… it seemed one of the ryokas blasted through the gates and faced off with some of the guards and defeated them before suddenly disappearing some minutes after you arrived… he was probably scared off by you." The old man quickly responded before then saying something else,

"The only strange thing is that for some reason… nobody recognizes the intruder… they can't even give a description of how he looked like even though they all fought with him…"

"Strange indeed…" Byakuya answered back while thinking, ' I still remember what he looks like though… was it all a dream?'

"What about where I was found…?" Byakuya asked again

"There was nothing wrong there… though some people claim they heard vivid sounds of battle in the area, but we didn't see any signs of such things." The old man answered back.

'Hmmmm… was it really just a dream… but still, something sounds wrong…' Byakuya thought until he finally remembered to ask,

"...What about Hisana…?" Byakuya asked,

"...Uh… Byakuya sama… I don't know how to tell you this…" The old man began stuttering at the mention of Hisana's situation.

"...What happened…!?"  Byakuya jumped off his bed as he noticed the old man's delayed response and grabbed his coat as he began to speed walk out of his room, almost running to where Hisana's room was with the old man quickly following behind him, keeping up with Byakuya despite how old he looked.

Byakuya stormed inside the room where Hisana lay in a coma and quickly ran over to her bed and looked at her body for any visible sign of injury but didn't notice anything except for the fact that she looked a bit paler than she did this morning.

"He quickly looked over at the old man who was standing behind him and asked, " What happened to Hisana?" he asked with worry in his tone.

"The doctor said that since sometime today her vital signs started deteriorating… it seems to be only a little problem but if it keeps up like this then her life is in danger… It's like whatever was keeping her alive for this long… suddenly disappeared."

'Suddenly disappeared how…? Something is very strange about all this… I can't just let this matter go… I need to find out what is going on and how to save Hisana…'

'... and it seems like the only way to do that is to find that ryoka again and find out what he did… he must be behind all of this…' Byakuya resolved himself to do whatever it takes to find how to save Hisana.

Somewhere else in seiretei…

Houryu followed the trail of Yoruichi's spiritual energy to find her secret cave somewhere on the cliff that he now stood in front of.

"She just had to make a safe house inside a mountainside cave, I thought she was a cat and not a badger…" He said to himself as he jumped up onto the side of the cliff and ran upwards the wall until he reached the well-hidden opening on the walls of the cave and then used his sensing ability to find the way into the opened area below him.

He quickly found it, opened it, and went in and slid down the ladder into the cave only to hear loud battling noises coming from the area.

'Oh… it's Ichigo's Bankai training time… huh?' Houryu thought as he looked around to see swords stabbed into the floors and walls everywhere.

Houryu quickly moved with high speed and appeared behind Yoruichi who seemed to be lost in thought,

"Boo!" Houryu suddenly said from behind her startling her into a jump,

"...!" Yoruichi turned around with a flying kick at whoever was behind her, but Houryu quickly caught hold of her leg before her kick even rose past his waist and went closer to her grabbing her kicking leg by the thigh and moving very close to her, to the point that their bodies were already pressed into each other, and their lips were mere centimeters apart.

"Love the new look…" Houryu breathed out as he kept his hands grabbed onto those assets

Yoruichi blushed with her mouth open as if she wanted to respond before quickly pushing away from Houryu and then asking,

"What happened to you… You're bloodied all over…" Yoruichi asked as she looked at his bloody appearance.

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So, which do you think it is...?

I'll be dropping clues in the following chapters and if you guys can guess right and also what actually happened before I do the big reveal at the end of the arc... I'll tell you the world I planned for the Multiversal arc and you guys also get an extra chapter.

So, get those brains thinking people... Muhahahahah