I'm booking a flight with delta that will come to around 1900$ round trip. I am limited to this because this flight is the one that worked best with the friend group I'm traveling with. So Delta is my only option here. With that said, I have around 70k Chase points and 90k C1 miles.
I have looked into trying to transfer points into Delta, and the only options I see are to transfer into Air France or Virgin Atlantic Flying Club and book flights there. However neither of these portals seem to have the Delta flight I am trying to book.
Is there a way to best redeem my points for this flight? Is there some other way to transfer that I am not thinking of? My options right now are:

• Book on portal with Chase points with my CSP (1.25 multiplier so I would be using fewer Chase points)
• Book on portal with Capital One points with my Venture X. (1:1)
• Pay full cash on either portal to get 5x points back in respective currency
• Pay full cash on Delta to get 5x points and goes towards status upgrade.

I guess this question should be on me depending on what I want (status / miles for delta vs points / cash with my cards). However, I am just curious what reddit thinks I should do. Chase seems to save the most money but I also view UR points to be the highest value and idk whether I should save for another big flight in the future. This sub + youtube has repeatedly said the highest value of these points is to transfer them out. And I'm wondering if I should just pay cash now instead (I will likely be doing another international flight at the end of the year)

Hi. First time posting here.
My husband and I take a couple of trips a year and we both have the MileagePlus Explorer card, but we don’t ever reach any special status. Most of the time we each have enough miles for a free domestic trip once a year. Every now and then we save up and take a free international trip.
We have a vacation booked for Nice, France in July. We’re in Economy. We’ve each got around 45k miles, but we’re saving in the hopes of going to Germany for free at the end of the year.
Our Nice trip has two flights I would consider upgrading:
• Chicago to Brussels on a 787-10 (8h) • Munich to Denver on a 787-9 (10h30m)
My question is this: If I’m going to upgrade our seats to Premium Plus on one of these flights, which should it be?
My gut says the longer Munich to Denver flight, but maybe there’s a reasonable argument for the other.
Bonus question: Do I spend the 17.5k miles (each) and deplete my miles, or do I just cough up the $275 (each) and save my miles for Germany?
Bonus bonus question: Is there an even better upgrade situation I’m not considering that would be worth the miles or the money?
Thanks!

We’re flying Wichita to Chicago on United. Then Chicago to Narita, then Narita to Bangkok both legs operated by ANA. Return flights are the same (Bangkok-Narita-Chicago on ANA and last leg on United).
Booked with United and all flights start with UA.
Wondering which airline’s carry on policy applies? Because United doesn’t have a weight limit but ANA does at 10kg per person.

I'm a graduate student in my mid-20s, so I don't make a ton of money but I definitely have a consistent income. I only have 1 card that I regularly use at the moment (the Discover It Student Chrome) and am looking to upgrade, though I will still keep that card open for a while; my credit history is much longer, though. I will probably start traveling more for research conferences/conventions in the near future, so I strongly would prefer a Visa/Mastercard (especially one with no/limited international fees, since I might be traveling internationally during the summer). Otherwise I don't travel internationally or domestically very much, maybe once/twice a year at most, and I don't make/spend very much either, so for me, high cashback rewards + $0 (or low) yearly fee > no international fees.

• Current cards: (list cards, limits, opening date)
  • Discover it Student (Chrome), $3600 limit, opened July 2018. Only card that I use regularly; pretty much only keep it for the good grade reward.
  • BPme Visa Gas Card - no idea on the limit, I was added to this card when I was ~16 as an authorized user by my parents for gas money/various college expenses when I was still an undergraduate. Opened in 2014 or earlier (by my parents), but I don't use this now unless I have to, even though I believe I'm still on it as an authorized user, so it may influence my credit score.
  • CareCredit - no idea what the limit is (haven't used this card in years), I think ~$10,000? Opened in ~2016 for one non-insured surgery and have never used it since. My oldest personal card.
  • I believe I had a TD Bank Visa card that was converted from an (old) Ally Bank credit card, but it expired last year and I haven't renewed it/never got a new card in the mail for it, so....no idea on any information about that one.
• FICO Score: about 780
• Oldest account age: 6 years, 9 months
• Chase 5/24 status: N/A
• Income (pre-tax): currently ~$28,000 / year, will be ~$34,000 / year starting on October 1st
• Average monthly spend and categories:
  • rent + utilities: ~$900 / month [don't currently put this on my card due to a 2.75% fee for using credit cards, but I would if my cashback was 3% or higher, since this is my biggest expense]
  • dining: usually $0, ~$25/month at most
  • groceries: ~$250-300 / month
  • gas: $0 (I don't have a car at the moment), but in ~3-4 years I expect this to change)
  • travel: usually $0 for flights/hotel outside of the holidays, $0 - $100 for local travel/Zipcar rentals. May increase slightly but not significantly for the next few years.
  • other: up to ~$150 / month at Amazon, ~$50 - 200 on misc items at Target/Ikea/Joann (craft store) or concert tickets
    • I don't typically spend more than ~$250-350 per month outside of groceries and rent, but exactly what/where I spend it on is quite variable.
• Open to Business Cards: probably not, I don't really need one lol
• What's the purpose of your next card?: Mostly for high % cashback, primarily on groceries - other categories like Amazon/Paypal usage (or anything >2.75% for paying rent/utilities) would be nice, but not necessary. (I am planning on traveling a bit more in the next year domestically, but not more than 3x a year, so it shouldn't be a priority.)
• Do you have any cards you've been looking at?: A few:
  • SavorOne Rewards from Capital One - not sure if this is Visa or Mastercard, but the 3% on groceries + 8% on entertainment + no foreign transaction fees is really nice
  • Chase Freedom Unlimited for the intro 5% grocery offer + travel rewards
  • Chase Freedom Flex, for the same reasons as the Unlimited plus the flex categories
    • I also want to get in on the Chase ecosystem if possible, so that I can potentially be approved for their other cards in the future
  • Discover it Balance Transfer: not really for international use, since it isn't accepted most places outside of the U.S., but 5% on local groceries/Amazon is nice. Would replace my Chrome card for daily use if I went with this.
• Are you OK with category spending or do you want a general spending card?: Category spending for groceries/Amazon/Paypal/Zipcar is ideal, otherwise general spending is best since I don't buy things anywhere consistently. General spending is better if the cashback rewards are 3% or more for any category but I have no idea if those even exist.

I'm open to a multi-card setup as well, especially if there's anything that has a 2.75% or more cashback that would let me earn cashback on rent. Anything is better than the 1% I get most of the time right now with my Discover, and I don't spend enough monthly to really worry about limits for certain categories.

First, thank you for the kind words and thoughts on my first post. I’m pretty isolated (not close with family, really no friends) so anonymous internet sympathy and positivity is great.
I knew it wouldn’t last. She was going to react the same way she always does to conflict: fight or flight. I was hoping she’d just move in with her sister, but no such luck.
She’s pissed and feels blind sided. I should have discussed things with her before coming right out and saying I want a divorce. It was very disrespectful of me. I didn’t bother to mention that she initiated the conversation by telling me she wanted a separation, and that I could feel blinded sided and disrespected by that. Because how dare she say she wants a separation without first discussing it with me. Very disrespectful of her 🤦‍♂️
Told her again I’d like her to start therapy. That pissed her off. She’ll do what she wants and it’s not my business anymore.
Hoping we can keep the status quo in the house for the kids sake.

Apply → https://jobboardsearch.com/redirect?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=bot&utm_id=jobboarsearch&utm_term=www.localjobs.com&rurl=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cubG9jYWxqb2JzLmNvbS9qb2IvbG91aXN2aWxsZS1reS11cHMtZmxpZ2h0LWZvcndhcmQtdWFzLXRyYWluaW5nLW1hbmFnZXItMC8/cmVmPWpvYmJvYXJkc2VhcmNo

​

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Okay, here’s my attempt at a NOP fanfic.
The Nature of Predators is made by u/SpacePaladin15
Just a few tidbits before we get started. I’m not sticking close to the cannon, so don’t be surprised when groups operate differently from their real NOP counterparts. I’m going for a “dark time line” kind of situation. There are going to be war crimes and lots of devil’s advocate nonsense, so this fanfic may rustle your jimmies. The start of this story takes place on Sillis and is only told from a single Arxur supply officer’s POV.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Memory transcription subject: Varce, Cattleship Δ1242, Sillis
Date [standardized human time]: December 4, 2136
Finally… After mindlessly double checking and triple checking weapons and herbivore feed inventory it was time to get some fresh air. The raid itinerary had originally slated us to landfall 36 hours ago, but then a small human fleet lurched into our FTL disruptor grid. The grid was deployed with the intent to prevent prey ships from escaping, but hey, happy accidents.
I looked around the squad that I would be overseeing during prey extraction. Their faces ranged from agitated to giddy, all hungry. Starvation prior to deployment was standard practice for lower enlisted. It made them extra violent which was perfect for propaganda. Having a full relaxed Arxur on shift wouldn’t be near as terrifying for the pseudo-sapient snack bags.
Of course not all were starved, officers like myself needed to keep a cool head while procuring desperately needed food for the people of Wriss. It is my job, as one of the Dominion’s loyal servants, to ease the suffering of sapient lives throughout the known universe. I should clarify, that while I am somewhat defective, I’m not some delusional prey loving nut-job. I just care about sapients more that the average Arxur, that’s all.
The cargo doors of the craft hissed open as eye burning natural light entered the space. After I recovered from my temporary blindness, I barked out orders to my subordinates and began driving the refrigeration cart out of the ship. Its anti-gravity motors hummed as Arxur marched alongside it. Except for Tarth, lazy ass was perched on the cart’s lid with a ranged rifle shouldered. He says he does it to “be a lookout”, but we both know that’s bullshit. I let him get away with it though, what’s the point of having authority if you don’t use it to let your friend do stupid crap?
We had been dropped off at ground zero of a conventional bombing zone. Ruble from buildings with twisted bit of chitin sticking out covered the ground. Troops passed any worthwhile pieces to the cart for preservation. Eating of scraps was forbidden. It would spoil the squad's appetite prior to any engagements with the tilfish survivors. Thinking about the impending carnage reminded me to activate the 360’ camera fixed atop the cart’s driver compartment. Maybe some of my footage would go into one of the hunting compilations that gets forcibly broadcast onto the media channels the prey’s young watch. I let out a throaty chuckle thinking about the fearful cries one of those forsaken abominations would make.
Tarth looked over to me. “What’s so funny blubber tail? All that prime officer food finally melt your brain.”
“No just thinking about the prospect of one of our hunts being used for entertainment, now get back to work “look-out”.”
“Eh… I’m not too sure any footage is going to be used from this raid. None of the Gojid Cradle footage got used since the brass didn’t want Arxur to be associated with killing sapients.”
“...True. Well I’ll film this anyway, maybe it could be used as b-roll footage for future human engagement training.”
“I’d prefer we didn’t run into any humans boss-man”
I grimaced at the thought, the chatty Arxur had a point. I’ve never killed a sapient before. I had pushed the idea out of my head before, but it all came back to me. The whole reason Chief Hunter Shaza deployed 8000 of her ships to Sillis was to fight the humans, the tilfish were an afterthought in truth. I don’t really get why the humans were so keen on picking a fight with the Dominion. Chief Hunter Isif saved their entire species and in turn they started rattling a saber at Chief Hunter Shaza’s initial raiding group. Do they want to be at war with both the Federation AND the Dominion. Surely they understand that that would be a death sentence for such a small race with no backup colonies. It’s just so frustrating, we finally meet another sapient race and all they want to do is fight. We should be working together to wipe out the genocidal maniacs in the Federation.
“Hey Varce. Varce. Looks like that building over there is ripe for hunting. Just say the word.”
I perked up after being pulled from my dark thoughts. We were no longer surrounded by rubble and were at our first scheduled stop. A eugenics clinic that was likely filled with eggs that would top off the cart I brought along. I glanced at the life detection hardware built into the driver’s panel.
“Listen up. We’re here for the eggs in that building. It has 33 adult tilfish life signs inside. Don’t bother taking any of them alive, just put a hole in their heads and dump them in the cart. Eggs are our priority. EGGS. Don’t get too bite-y. There’s a bomb shelter down the road for that kind of behavior. Now get to it and make the Prophet proud!”
I stood by with Tarth and several auto-turret technicians as the rest of the squad swarmed all sides of the clinic. Per standard procedure, I had the techs set up an auto-turret for any surprise runaways. After a couple of minutes a tilfish on the second floor desperately crawled part way out of a window trying to escape. It fell to the ground after Tarth took out one of its weight bearing feet. The impact ruptured it chitin and it died shortly after. As Tarth began strolling over to retrieve the soon to be refrigerated carcass, several more tilfish landed on top of the now flattened meat pulp. Tarth threw himself to the ground as the auto-turrets made there tell-tell beeping noise. Now Tarth had to carry back three piles of meat pulp.
Tarth sat the meat piles down in front of the cart while laughing. “Prophet help me. My life just flashed before my eyes. That would’ve been such an underwhelming way to go. Thank the prophet I’m a master at dodging.”
“I wouldn’t exactly call collapsing to the ground in terror “masterful”, but yeah sure. At least your not dead. Now lets get this slop cleaned up and preserved.”
“Your just jealous of how awesome I looked. Also, that ankle shot I did was glorious. Admit it.”
Tarth went on stroking his ego for the next half hour as the cart was filled with delicious nutritious eggs and gooey bug parts. The cart’s driver panel indicated that we had gathered about 10,000LBS of food in total. A good haul so far, that would be enough to feed roughly a 140 Arxur for a week. I sent the cart back to the ship with an escort while everyone else headed to the nearby bomb shelter.
--------------------------------
Once we arrived at our next scheduled location, courtesy of garbage prey internet security, I had the auto-turret techs set up a perimeter around the shelter entrance. It’s not likely that someone would pull a fast one on us, but I’ve never been into gambling. While we waited for fresh empty carts to arrive, I went ahead and had the squad look around for any material to block up the bomb shelter’s ventilation ports.
After even more waiting, four refrigeration carts and some shelter cracking materials arrived. The plan for shelter cracking was tried and true. First, we would have a drill bore out a hole through the blast door. That would then rapidly be followed up with a flash bang to scare off anyone smart enough to shoot through the hole. This is then followed by several tear gas canisters and a smoke machine. The smoke would exit any ventilation ports and they would be subsequently sealed. After all that we then pump the place full of nitrous oxide, wait about 20 minutes, and breach the doors.
Often times there will be one or two prey smart enough to wear self-contained breathing apparatuses. For this reason, once the door is opened we send in something similar to what a human would refer to as a “Claymore Roomba”. About 20 seconds after activating the device I heard a loud BANG and sent in the initial breaching party. After the all clear, the carts and myself entered.
Oh no.
Near the entrance to shelter was what was left of four humans. SAPIENTS. I killed sapients. I gave the order. They are my responsibility. I’m effectively a murderer now. I know that it’s “war”, but still. That doesn't un-kill them.
I choked down my horror remembering what would happen if other Arxur saw me like this. I turned to Tarth. “Inspect these four for any useful equipment or identifying information. After that, bring it all to me”
I turned away and kept walking. I couldn’t look at their mutilated faces anymore, shards of clear poly-carbonate lodged in their skulls from the breathing mask they were wearing. Blackened blood peppering their bodies and surroundings. Those were someones kids, friends, lovers, and I took them away. I just destroyed families in one foul swoop.
I cleared my head as i walked into the auditorium filled with drowsy and unconscious tilfish. I ensured the cameras on all of the carts were on and gave the order. What came next was quite the sight.
The little abominations screeched and squealed as my squad tore into them. Ripping the young away from the dazed brood-mothers, tearing the monsters apart like they deserved. Loyal and dedicated soldiers finally filling their stomachs after days of hunger. This is what it’s all about. Bringing smiles to the faces of sapients. At this moment I could finally forget about the atrocity that happened to those four in the previous room. I started to salivate myself a little, I shouldn’t indulge though. This is a reward to the Arxur people, not me.
I cheerily hummed as the weak tilfish were tossed into the refrigeration carts. The cold would slow them down to nothing, but it wouldn’t kill them. Perfectly convenient for filling the cages back on the cattle ships. Watching over the cart’s weight readouts I guesstimated that this would be enough to feed about 680 Arxur for a week. It makes me so proud thinking about all the young wonderful Arxur that will get to enjoy these meals. How they’ll go to sleep with full bellies and grow strong. No deformations from malnutrition. Perfectly formed jaws with clean straight teeth. Unlike mine, jagged, crisscrossed, and malformed. I’ll make sure that they have better lives then me. It’s the least I could do.
These thoughts were short-lived unfortunately. Tarth approached me with a bag crafted from the same materials as the pelts the humans wear. I took it silently and he went off to go get his fill.
I dug through the “backpack” as I would later identify it. The pack contained weapons, ammo, and holopads. Turns out the holopads required biometerics, but Tarth was kind enough to attach the associated severed thumbs to each. I went through and altered the security preferences to myself on all of them and glossed through one’s photo album.
I knew what I was going to see, but I punished myself anyway. The dead human had a mate. Whether or not it was a temporary relationship, I don’t know. They had pictures of themselves standing in front of various earth locations. Monuments, beautiful scenes of nature you’d never see on a federation planet, relaxed on furniture with a furry quadrupedal predator. Things I’ve never seen in person and likely never will. I robbed the human of all of this.
I put away the holopad and steeled myself. If I was going to have a breakdown, it would be in my quarters.
I quietly waited for the final stages of the shelter raid to wrap up and began planning the next step of today’s festivities. The entire squad would escort the refrigeration carts back to the cattle ship and we would then exchange them for one refrigeration cart and two cargo carts. After that we would search a nearby tilfish military base for heavy munitions and any high value ship related equipment and materials.
--------------------------------
There was a bit of a delay at Cattleship Δ1242. The other squads were as successful as mine, so we had to wait for a refrigeration cart to be freed up. I took the opportunity to drop off the human pack in my room and check the current raid situation. Thankfully there weren’t any notable hiccups in the raid from a global perspective. The human FTL clusterfuck only shorted us a few ships and part of the fleet was in process with salvaging them for FTL drives, fuel, FTL disruptors, inertial dampeners, shield generators, and databases containing flight logs and encryption keys.
After the update, I reconvened with my squad and gave them a run down on the status of the raid. Tarth already hopped up onto the refrigeration cart before I even got to it. Lazy ass.
--------------------------------
We were still about a half mile out from our destination when Tarth perked up and swung his rifle around toward a concrete building. I trailed his the direction his rifle was pointing to see a rather peculiar sight. A white human pelt that was tied to a stick by the arms was being waved around. However, who was holding it was hiding behind part of the building.
Before I could say anything Tarth already sent a round through the pelt.
“OH SHIT. Uhh… Hey in human culture white flags are a universal symbol of “I give up. Please don’t shoot me” okay?”
My thoughts shot back to the four mutilated corpses I left back in the bomb shelter. Icy guilt crept down my back and left my tail with pins and needles. I sighed for a moment and waved Tarth to lower his gun.
“Alright human, come out slowly, we won’t shoot you.”
A fleshy claw-less hand poked out from the wall and waited.
I grumbled as the weak predator peaked out. “When I said slowly, I meant some time today. I have a schedule to keep.”
“Sorry. Was just taking it slow. Figured if someone with a hair trigger got any ideas, it’d be better to lose a hand than a life.”
The human was one of the paler variants. It had a smashed in muzzle like the rest of its kind. Not exactly what I’d call an apex predator, but I’d tolerate it. (It… He I think?) He carried two large green storage cylinders on his back and was wearing the standard blue helmet uniform. At his hip was a belt carrying various bobbles and oh that’s a gun.
“If your surrendering, why do you have a gun?”
“It’s for the crazy murder bugs with the flamethrowers. As long as you bunch are on the ball with killing them, you can have it.”
I grunted at Tarth and nodded him over to the human. He drew the sidearm from the humans holster and inspected it. Tarth being Tarth, then proceeded to start jabbing the human with the weapon gleefully. The human looked over to me pleadingly. He clearly wasn’t thrilled with having a gun poking into his gut.
I spoke up. “Tarth do you intend on wasting our time as well? Get over here. Human, you will stay within ten feet of him or me at all times. Don’t try to run off, I don’t need to explain what will happen if you try.”
“Understood”
Well, at least the human seems to be disciplined enough to not have an attitude.
Our procession continued as I introduced our first official human captive to Tarth and myself. The weaker “social predator” was just as chatty as my slightly defective friend to my disappointment. However, once the topic of our destination came up, my mercy started to pay off.
“You guys are going to the base? Yeah. Fuck that. Don’t go there. That place is an absolute shitstorm. Some empathetic dumb-asses started to let tilfish in so we could protect them from the scary Arxur. I naturally raided supply of their MREs and got the fuck out of there. Lo and behold, before I was even out the gate the tilfish started shooting and burning dudes. Never trust a fuckin’ bug.”
Tarth and I both chuckled at the idea of some empathetic prey lovers getting their comeuppance.
“Despite that, we are still going human. I was assigned to raid the base for goods and you already know where everything is. So try not to get shot or burned until after our objective is completed.”
The human looked dejected. “Well fuck… I should’ve stayed behind that wall. Are you absolutely sure you want to go there. All the functional ships evacuated early yesterday during your surprise attack on the planetary defenses.”
Tarth spoke up. ”Wasn’t much of a surprise really. Not even an hour into the assault and a human fleet of a thousand some odd ships popped in behind us.”
“The UN had an entire fleet show up within an hour of you guys arriving?
“Yes. Although it was pretty short lived. They disabled a few of our shields with some kind of bombs, but it really didn’t matter. We outnumbered them 8 to 1 and just threw a wall of plasma at them. Not a whole lot of defensive positions to be had out in space. Most of them tried to run, but we catapulted FTL disruptor buoys at them and burnt them all. I have no idea what their strategy was there.”
“...Cool. Good to know.”
“You should have seen it. Ships full of foolish humans turning into molten slag. Their corpses ejecting into space and bloating up from the vacuum. Some of them holding onto their pet prey. Maybe we’ll gather up the tasty prey carcasses later, the cold of space preserves meat nicely I hear. I swear I could hear the screams even in space. That’s what it’s like when weak predators try to pick fights with the Arxur. They weren’t smart like you, human.”
The human shut up after that. I suspect the thought of so many of his kin dying likely saddened him. To be fair, I would be too if those were my people. I mean, it sucks that so many sapients died, but I didn’t have a hand in it.
--------------------------------
The entrance to the base was finally in sight. Tarth and the human lounged on the top of the refrigeration cart despite the irritated side glances from the others in the squad. I could smell the stench of burnt flesh wafting towards us from somewhere deeper in the base. It served as a good confirmation that the human wasn’t feeding us bad intel.
I was looking over to the human pleased when gray blood splattered out from the back of his helmet. It took me a second to realize we were being shot at. It took another for me to order my squad to take cover behind the sturdy carts. I ordered the auto-turret techs to deploy their toys to protect our flanks and rear.
Tarth, the human’s corpse, and I all crouched together behind the refrigeration cart. I’d never seen a dead body convulse in such a weird way before, desperately pulling off its helmet and cursing… Wait. What? The air suddenly reeked of burnt hair and small wisp of smoke coming from the doffed helmet. Tarth gave the living corpse a weird look and shrugged. Questions later, not dying takes precedence.
Tarth and I ensured the aim assist in our rifles was toggled on and proceeded to dispense suppressive fire from behind the cart. Ideally, we could just point our weapons in our adversaries general direction and the rifle’s computer would do the hard part.
The human started panicking when a metal ball dropped next to us. He kicked the sphere away and started cursing in pain while holding his foot. No surprise there you moronic primate, those black leather foot coverings aren’t going to protect you when you punt a metal ball down the street. Wait... Did that ball just explode? Oh. Yeah. We got briefed on those things come to think of it. Good call monkey-man, your foot didn’t go bruised in vain.
As Tarth and I lowered ourselves back down to reload, we suddenly felt the smaller predator forcibly sandwich himself between us. He tightened himself into a tiny ball while wide eyed. I looked around our perimeter. There weren’t any hostile humans so what was his deal. Tarth’s breathing seized up as well, what the hell was going on?
Beep Beep.
It occurred to me at that moment the auto-turrets haven’t been updated to recognize any humans as friendly. I froze up and slowly looked at our flanks. Both turrets were pointing at us. I’ve never pissed myself before… But I got damn close.
The three of us just stayed there perfectly still for what felt like hours. It gave me enough time to think about many things in my life. All the things I haven’t done yet. I’ve never had the opportunity to sire my own clutch, the closest thing I have to a friend is a psycho that gravitates toward me because I’m the only one that tolerates his non-stop yapping, and how nice is it to finally feel the warmth of another pressed up against me. Holy crap what is wrong with me? Prophet, I’m sorry for being so defective. If you bail me out of this, I’ll do whatever you want, just give me a sign.
And the Prophet answered my prayer indeed. Some foolhardy humans finally went for our flanks and drew the ire of the auto-turrets away from us. As the BRRT of the turrets sounded off Tarth, being the absolute bastard that he is, dived away from us.
This left me and the human exposed to the turrets. My initial thought was to push the human over and dive away, so I pushed him over. As I readied myself to dive, I thought about those four in the shelter. How I robbed them of their lives and families. I just couldn't do that again. I can’t just pretend that it’s not my problem. The human’s eyes showed such sadness from that impending betrayal. So I dived, hoping that I’d be able to hide him from the sensors on the auto-turrets.
Luckily, he was still balled up so it wasn’t terribly difficult to cover him with my body. I never felt so exposed in my life, doing this. I just laid there thinking, waiting, and wondering if my empathy was about to come back to bite me in the ass. This was all so off putting, being this close to another person. I wanted nothing more than to get up and walk away. I could hear his breath and the light tensing of his body. This wasn’t something that really happens with Arxur.
Eventually, the sound of gunfire died down. I heard people milling about, the hiss of medical foam being applied, and the louder hiss of angry Arxur having gunshot wounds treated.
“Uh. Sir?” I heard the confused words of one of the auto-turret techs.
“No no no. Leave him be. Can’t you see our dear leader is in love. Although, that is the UGLIEST woman I’ve ever seen.”
I’ve never wanted to smack that annoying lazy ass more than at this moment.
I cleared my throat. “Solider, would you kindly deactivate the auto-turrets so our guide to the base doesn't get shredded by an angry machine.”
“Oh..? Yes. Right away sir.”
So I laid there, feeling a smug ass staring a hole into the back of my head. I recapped the events of the skirmish and lamented how I did so little. I only burned through one magazine with some sprayN’pray and that was it. Hell, the human saved a lot of our asses with that grenade save.
Speaking of the human. “Hey human? Why aren’t you dead? You just took a bullet to the head.”
“Uh. The helmets we wear are really good. They have this non-Newtonian fluid laced with perovskite crystals. Basically, the helmet is a fluid sack that hardens in response to physical trauma. It then converts kinetic energy into heat and electricity. These helmets can eat a .308 point blank. Only downsides are that they are one and done armors and that they’ll burn the shit out of you if they stay in contact too long.”
I’d never heard of such a thing before, but clearly it worked. I’ve seen prey attempt to use helmets with varying degrees of failure. Problem is, usually the brain gets shook around and they die anyway. I decided that this fluid would be beneficial to the Dominion.
I spoke up to get Tarth’s attention. “Tarth. Order anyone that isn’t busy to strip the human’s of their armor pelts and headgear. Place everything in the cargo cart next to the human’s green storage bags.”
Shortly after I gave out the order, the auto turret tech returned. “Varce sir. The auto-turrets have been deactivated.”
I Immediately popped up to separate myself from the smaller predator. Looking around it seems we had fared well enough against the ambush. Heh. Arxur being ambushed. Crazy times. We only lost 3 soldiers and have a handful of injuries. It could have been a lot worse. Even Tarth has some med foam sticking out of his arm. The Arxur bodies were being loaded into the refrigeration cart. We’d look into harvesting their organs for transplants later.
The human looked over the bodies of his fallen kin. I decided it would be appropriate to talk to him about their deaths. The bodies had been stripped as ordered, although it appears someone got overzealous and stripped one of them of all there pelts. Wow. That is super gross looking. It’s just like, dangling around on the outside. What happens if it gets caught on something? Does it just tear off and regenerate? That’s just downright terrible design.
Getting myself back on topic. I turned to the human and spoke up. “So… Did you know any of these humans?”
“Uh… Yeah. To be honest. They were fucking elitist assholes. Doesn’t mean I wanted them dead though. It’s just well... This is all a fucking mess. They did shoot me in the back of the head though. So it’s kind of hard to not feel schadenfreude about the whole thing… Can I get a new helmet? Mine’s kind of busted right now.”
“Go for it. There should be some next to your stuff in the cargo cart.”
“Thanks. I mean… As in thanks for everything. You saved my ass in a big way. Not a whole lot of people would of done that for me… So thank you... Yeah.”
--------------------------------
The inside of the base had seen better days. Some buildings had been destroyed either by the original raid or the human’s occupation. It also appeared that the exterminator’s fires got out of hand and had spread to the tent city the UN made for their troops. There were quite a few chard human bodies mixed in with the debris. I could certainly understand why the human had no desire to come back.
I got out of the refrigeration cart and announced to my squad. “Apply fire retardant measures. There may be exterminators in this base.”
My fellow Arxur and I pulled out small aerosol canisters and began dousing ourselves in the gelatinous contents. This substance would greatly reduce the flammability of the fuel the exterminators typically use, though the films covering us would oxidize and become useless after about 20 minutes. We needed to make a clean sweep of our travel path and secure the nearby maintenance hangar before then. I placed the spent canister back in my tail pouch and began driving again.
“So you’ve got one of those spray bottles for me, right?” The human looked over to me pleadingly. “Just sayin’. I’d like to not burn to death if at all possible.”
“Are you willing to strip naked and shave yourself?”
“What?”
“This stuff only works if it forms a solid layer on you. It won’t work on fur and pelts.”
“Shit… Can I have my gun back then?”
“No.”
We continued moving for about ten minutes per the human’s instructions. The intersection that would take us to our loot was finally in view. There were large industrial style buildings surrounding us from all sides. This was where minor ship parts like valves would be stored or milled out for ships. Lots of little doors and tight alleyways for the diminutive insectoids to scurry through. As such this was the perfect environment for exterminators to hide. I kept my eyes peeled for even the slightest movement.
My suspicions paid off immediately when I noticed some dumpsters that were conveniently lined up between two buildings. I know a barricade when I see one. I brought our caravan to a stop just out of weapons range of the prey’s fortifications. I checked the driver’s panel for life signs and smiled knowing my caution was justified.
I stood out of the drivers seat, silently motioning towards the dumpsters. Half of the squad formed up around the carts. The other half broke into groups and approached the dumpsters from multiple angles. My group consisted of Tarth, the human, and three other Arxur.
My group and I shouldered our rifles and began unloading into the dumpsters. The foolish prey actually thought they were going to get one over on us. In moments tilfish started scrambling, desperately spraying the flammable contents of their weapons in the air towards us. Most of it fell short with only a few stray droplets touching us. We stood back at a comfortable range as the last few bugs dropped to the ground bleeding out in a pool of their own accelerant. One of the little abominations used the last of its pathetic strength to immolate the remains of it group.
A burst of flame pushed towards us, showering us with embers and half burnt debris. Our groups backed away from the intense heat and rapidly pawed off any unwelcome remains of the explosion. Well, except for the human, his left forearm was very on fire. With a surprising level of calmness, my human pulled a water bottle from his belt and doused the flame away.
He looked over to me and grumbled. “I probably should of stayed at the carts.”
“Probably. How did you even get that much fuel on your arm?”
“I didn’t. These uniforms are made out of acrylic and cotton. Very flammable. The UN thought it would be a good idea to have us peace keep against guys who almost exclusively use fire. I have many words about the UN. None of them are nice.”
“At least you handled being on fire pretty well.”
“I’ve seen about twenty people get caught on fire in the past week. I know the drill. Also, I’m gonna need some medical attention for this by the end of the day.”
--------------------------------
Fantastic, we’ve arrive at the maintenance hangar the human recommended and what do we find? More barricades and a bunch of life signs. Maybe I shouldn’t complain. I might be able to top off all my carts in one go.
I ordered my squad to surround the structure just as I had with the eugenics clinic. Though I had to stop the auto-turret techs before they accidentally lit up my human. I quietly pondered how I was going access the hangar with minimal gunfire. I didn't want to run the risk of accidentally damaging a spare FTL drive or something. I ultimately landed on the idea of just ramming through the door with the cargo cart to draw attention and then have the squad flank the inhabitants.
As one of my troops lined up their cart with the doors a shaky human voice called out. “Wait! We have missile warheads rigged to blow if you try anything!”
My human looked over to me and motioned he was going to the door. I allowed him to do so.
“Hey Lee, is that you?” My human questioned. “How are you holding up?”
“Hall? What the hell are you doing with the space nazi crocs?” (Who the hell is Hall? Oh, okay, that’s my human’s name. I should probably remember that.)
“You know. Trying to not die. Things are all kinds of FUBAR right now.”
“Things get rough and you just bail? All we had to do is hold down the fort and wait for rescue. And what do you do? You immediately defect to them. They literally eat babies. You abandoned humanity.”
“Lee. A UN fleet jumped into system one hour after the Arxur arrived.”
“So they tried to save us and you decide to run off?”
“No no. How long would it take for a fleet going FTL to get here assuming a distress signal was sent out the second the Arxur arrived?”
“… Are you saying that they knew the Arxur were coming and didn’t give us a heads up? But…”
“Look man. You’ve got to make your own decisions, but from where I’m standing you really only have two choices. Either commit suicide by Arxur or walk away from what your doing and survive. The Arxur are going to eventually try to trade us to the UN. I intend on living.”
“But what about the tilfish? Are you seriously fine with them being cattle?”
“If you want to die for some bugs that burnt Clark alive two days ago, then that's your call. See you later… Or not.”
“Wait. Wait!”
My human didn’t respond. He just walked back over to me. After that brief exchange, he looked completely used up. It did help me to better understand his willingness to work with me though. All these humans planet side had effectively been left to die before we even arrived at Sillis. Most of them didn’t even know they were fighting for a government that withheld knowledge that could’ve saved them. They could have evacuated and saved so many sapient lives. So much for 5 humans for every 500 million xenos.
I waited long enough. It was time to crack this egg. As I gave the order to breach, I heard four consecutive gunshots come from the hangar. The cargo cart broke open the door and the side entrances were forced as well. I walked in behind the cargo cart and took stock of the situation. A somewhat tanned human was standing over three tilfish carcasses while brandishing its rifle towards a crowd of prey.
The human was seizing up saying. “Don’t move. I… I… I don’t want to die, okay! I… I’m sorry. It’s just that…”
The human trailed off murmuring nonsense. My human got his attention and led him out of the building. Given the degraded mental state of the disheveled human, that was probably best given what was going to happen next. I gave a quick look around, there was no “rigged warhead”, the “Lee” human had given us an empty threat.
The weak prey didn’t stand a chance as my fellow Arxur snatched them up, forcing them into the refrigeration cart. Shrill cries escaped the grotesque creature’s mouths as they were pressed against the Arxur bodies that were already in the cart. Perhaps more refrigeration carts should’ve been brought. The cart reached what was the “comfortable capacity” and there was still a third of the tilfish to go. So naturally, we just started pushing them in harder. Pops and cracks could be heard as chitin bent and broke from strain. Ear piercing noises echoed throughout the room as the little mindless bugs wailed. With one final push, we managed to load all of the bugs into the cart. The readout said we had collected about 18,200lbs of food. While the cart’s recommended weight limit had been exceeded, the thought of 250 Arxur getting to stave off starvation brought me so much joy.
I walked about the hangar inspecting all of the available loot. While I was disappointed by the lack of any FTL related equipment, there was however, an abundance of components for inertial dampeners and shields. My squad got to work loading up the two cargo carts as I went to check up on the two humans. I found them a short walk away from the hangar sitting together under a shade. The humans looked over to me when I approached them. Lee must have gotten more ill. His face was inflamed and red with looked to be signs of leaked fluid on his pelts. Wonderful. I’m going to have to take both of them to medical since this one is developing some kind of infection.
My human looked between Lee and me for a moment before speaking. “Lee. This is Varce. He is a supply officer on his ship and is currently in charge of retrieving ship parts from this base. Varce. This is Lee. He was in training to become an air force mechanic prior to being transferred to the UN to be cannon fodder.”
Seeing that Lee was hesitant to talk, I took the initiative. “Hello Lee, I’m Varce. We’ll be heading back to our ship here in a minute. I’ll run you guys by our doc and get you some acceptable sleeping quarters. As for food, we have two bags of human meals ready to eat available for you since you guys have certain dietary restrictions. Also, I’m going to need you to forfeit your firearms for now. Armed humans can be somewhat distressing for Arxur. I hope you understand.”
Lee glanced up to me. “Are we going to be traded back to the UN?”
“Yes. While the exact terms haven’t been decided yet. I’d hazard a guess that Chief Hunter Shaza will likely be trading you for artificial meat. We don’t eat people.”
The human scrunched up his face at that and handed over his weapons. The three of us then headed back to the carts so that we could depart. I did have to shoo Tarth off the overburdened refrigeration cart. He then started to try to pester the mentally unwell human. Luckily, my human lured him away before any harm could be inflicted.
--------------------------------
Once we had returned to Cattleship Δ1242, the humans and I fished out the MREs and armor from the cargo cart. We went to my room to deposit the goods and then headed towards doc. I may have made a miscalculation on my path unfortunately. We passed by the caging area that was established for any captured enemy humans. It already housed several residents. Lee began to panic thinking that I was going to be placing him in there.
I stopped him and explained. “No Lee, listen. That’s for humans that try to kill us. I’m going to be re-purposing a supply closet for you two. Okay? ...That sounds worse than it actually is. It’s a nice supply closet. I’ll get you some nesting materials.”
My human started snorting and chuckling uncontrollably. I wasn’t certain if it was me or Lee that caused this.
We paid doc a visit and got my human patched up. The other one’s swelling had reduced back down during the trip back to the ship.
We would be departing soon. The ship had collected everything that it could for the time being, so our next destination would be a cattle farm on an old thafki colony planet. I hoped that things could go smoothly with the temporary integration of two humans. I’m going to need them for the ungodly big pile of ship components I’m about to have to enter into Dominion inventory.
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That’s it for the time being. I’m not certain if I’ll do a follow up on this. This whole fanfic idea ended up happening thanks to Marcel’s magic helmet. I make no claim of being a decent write or proofreader. If you read this, it’s your own fault.

Flying for work for the first time in a long time (no status). Thanks to the t-storms around ATL my flights are being moved around and it’s going to be a late night. Current price to upgrade to C+ is $249 ATL-LAS. Should I expect that price to decrease, increase or remain the same?
A long flight in the center seat of the back row is not my idea of a great time.

I booked a paid J fare January 2024 ORD-NRT-HAN returning SGN-NRT-ORD. UA/NH code share. In both directions my flights stop in Tokyo. This is a bucket list trip so I’m springing for the good seats. As an aside, I’m not sure yet if I’ll be on the NH equipment with The Room. Keep your fingers crossed for me.
I’m also planning a trip to Tokyo a few months later (ORD-any airport in Tokyo) and while looking for fares I discovered that the fare to Tokyo and back is thousands of dollars more than the fare to Vietnam. I even removed the Vietnam legs from my flights in January 2024 to see how that fare compares and the airfare went up by $2000.
How does this make sense?
I just popped my Reddit cherry….this is my first post!

UA re-assigns seats after manually selecting the exact seats I wanted! On every leg of the flight!
https://imgur.com/gallery/XJlxDGi

Killer name: The Alukite
Lore: Little is known about the Alukite's origin. It' clear it was once a human being. After dabling in the forbidden arts this once normal woman became a Long. A fierce, immortal being with power few could ever dream of attaining. At one point in her life she met a fellow Long with whom she fell in love and had a child. The one thing immortals were forbidden from doing, for she was now destined to commit the vile crime of the sky. Everyday her hunger grew, her mind twisted, her will waned. The day her child was borne she ate it whole. In the next moment pain overtook her. She could feel her body morphing. Growing mighty wings and raven feathers, she became a fallen immortal, an entity cursed to forever scream, cry, thirst, hunger and suffer. The remaining vestiges of her strength, her maddening hunger and the gods' lack of care for her made her the perfect pick for the entity.
Power: Skinstealing: The alukite can change her skin to that of an old woman making it easy for survivors to think her a survivor from afar. The alukite cannot attack while wearing a skin. All survivors within 24 meters scream when you remove your skin.
Flight: After a few second unlesh a horrifying scream and take to the skies. This automatically removes your skin and drains your ability power. Restore 25% power after hitting a survivor and 50% after hooking one.
Lightscorch: Passive: Looking at a repaired generator will blind you at 10% the speed of a flashlight. Flashlights blind you 50% faster. Shriek and stunned if wearing your skin.
Perks: Bloody satisfaction: You gain power from drinking blood. After hitting a survivor gain a token. Each token increases your movement speed by 0,01/0,02/0,03. At 16/13/10 toens all survivors suffer from the exposed state.
Mother's blood. The obbsession suffers from the exposed status effect. After hitting the obsession your vision blurs from tears for 60/45/30 seconds.
Hex Worms in the world. Every 1 minute/50/40 seconds a generator becomes worm touched. A survivor repairing the generator will be infected with the worms. After 200/180/160 seconds the urvivor will die, unless the other survivors beat drums, equal to the number of survivors left, of a survivor dies a drum disappear. The drums are randomly spawned after the survivor is infected. The auras of the drums are visible to all, but the infected survivor, upon the drums getting beaten lightning will strike the survivor and put them in the injured state, while curing them. The totem is always worm touched. Any worm touched obeject including the totem can be cleansed with a flashlight.
First killer concept. Might make a survivor one later

I booked a flight with Gold status for myself and 2 others. I reserved 3 seats together in advance - which I would have paid for normally, but got for free with status. I checked in the night before - still had the seats. However, 4 hours before the flight, it was notified that one of us got moved (from aisle 13 to middle seat 30). At check in, they claimed it was because somebody paid for the seat that morning but we "didn't". That effectively means that I would have been better off NOT having status and paying for those seats. What recourse do we have here?

This is a short summary of how various Bleach characters could be fused into the Avatar universe, with regards to their powers and abilities, and how they would fit in the world of Avatar. Additionally, snippets about how the lore of the Bleach universe might fit in with the lore of the Avatar universe. Note that this is a fanwork and there are elements that I have changed slightly. Also this does allude to certain elements in the Thousand Year Blood War arc that have not been released in anime format.

Yamamoto

The most powerful firebender in recorded history whose strength surpassed the Avatar's. His unmatched prowess with flame allows him to not just produce vast quantities of fire, but also directly manipulate the volatile element (similar to how a waterbender bends water); additionally, he can control his inner flame to allow him to maintaining his mental and physical state (in a similar manner to how Kyoshi lived hundreds of years). He left the Fire Nation and founded the Soul Society during the reign of Fire Lord Yosor, during this time of great upheaval many people, from all nations flocked to the Soul Society, under the protection of the most powerful and dangerous warriors at the time. Since that day, the Soul Society has remained as a neutral fifth nation, despite many external attempts to "unite" it with both the Fire Nation and the Earth Kingdom.

Soi Fon

The Fon Clan were originally a group of Air Nomads who were captured and subjugated by the Shihoin Clan before the era of Avatar Szeto, when the Soul Society was founded the Shihoin Clan brought along the Fon Clan as their retainers. As the centuries pass nothing remains of the Fon's nomadic heritage other than their bending, with Soi Fon being one of the last remaining air benders and the 9th clan head. She utilises her bending to manipulate the air currents and pressure around her body, allowing her to move at speeds faster than the human eye can see. She carries a short blade on her back, and wears a black and gold gauntlet with a middle finger stinger; the stinger contains a poison which can kill with two stabs. Her most powerful technique involves encircling her body with a hyper-sonic vortex of air, once created she can maintain this vortex indefinitely.

Gin Ichimaru

An incredibly cunning earthbender; without warning he can rapidly move the ground under his opponents feet, which he uses to create openings to strike with his blade. However, his blade is where his true power lies, he claims that he has mastered metalbending a particular alloy which forms his blade. It appears as though he thins and stretches his blade allowing him to lunge and strike at opponents from great distances. However this is a lie, he has actually mastered bending a the dust of a rare substance, which is both extremely poisonous and capable of being compressed into a dense blade. During battle, he earthbends his blade expanding the dust at incredible speed to slice through his opponents before returning all of the substance to it's original blade form (to keep the poisonous nature of the blade a secret). The top-speed of his dust expansion technique is faster than the human eye can follow, however he only unleashes the true speed in the last moments of a strike, to keep his opponent's off-guard and guarantee a hit.

Unohana Retsu

The first and most brutal bloodbender in history, in every nation she was regarded as the most heinous villain alive, bringing slaughter and death wherever she went. In battle, her used a large curved blade to slice open her opponents, before draining the blood from their body through the newly formed wound; she would then use this new blood to create razor thin sweeping arcs of blood to carve through yet more opponents, thus repeating the cycle. Additionally, she used her bloodbending on herself, forcibly moving her body at incredible speeds to make her one of the deadliest swordsman in the world. However, as the decades passed (after the Soul Society was formed) the stories about this monster faded over time, eventually becoming myth and legend. This is because Unohana forsook her murderous ways and instead utilised her bloodbending with her natural waterbending healing to become one of the most powerful healers in the world. As a consequence over this mastery of healing and self-bloodbending Unohana has successfully extended her lifespan by hundreds of years and granted herself eternal youth.

Sosuke Aizen

A charismatic and intelligent waterbender who has completely mastered spirit bending and seeks to use this ability to transform himself beyond his present human body. As a water bender his control over the element is so fine that he can create illusions to manipulate his opponents. He controls the water vapour in the air to diffuse and reflect light to create a visual component to his illusions; he vibrates the water molecules in the air to produce pressure waves to either create false sounds or mask real sounds. However, it is his studies into the spirit realm and spirit bending are what make him exceptionally dangerous; Aizen came to the conclusion that there is no single spirit (other than Vaatu) which is stronger than Raava. Therefore, to surpass the Avatar he would need to forge a new spirit by amalgamating the souls of humans and lesser spirits. Through the process of creation, this forged spirits will would be subjugated by Aizen's own will, thus when he merges with the amalgam Aizen will retain his sense of self.

Byakuya Kuchiki

A calm and collected metalbender, who is renowned for his absolute control over the substance Cobalt. Cobalt is a light pink metal with a silvery white surface; the blade of the Kuchiki clan hereditary weapon is made from this substance. In battle, Byakuya separates his single blade into hundreds of razor thin slices that float around him, these blades have the appearance of cherry blossom petals dancing in an invisible breeze. He swarms his opponents with the petals, killing them through thousands of cuts, all the while using metalbending to maintain the edges of the blades. His skill with manipulating the metal is so great that is he capable of controlling and generating lightning using the magnetic properties of the metal. The Kuchiki clan are one of the founding bodies of the Soul Society, they were once a noble clan from the city of Tienhaishi, but fled as the city was razed to the ground by the vengeful spirit, General Old Iron. Several years ago, Byakuya defied his clan elders and married a refugee waterbender who was originally from beyond the Soul Society.

Sajin Komamura

A loyal and kind-hearted member of the Wolfman Clan, Koamura is regarded as one of the most powerful earthbenders in the world. His signature technique is to earthbend a colossal earthen golem, over three-hundred feet tall, which copies his movements. Among all mortal creatures, there is no other capable of moving that amount of earth for hours on end. The Wolfman Clan originated during the Era of Raava, and were humans who were cursed by spirits with a beastly appearance because of their sins in life. The clan has remained hidden for many years; however, a young Komamura left his clan to explore the wider world. However, he was deeply scarred by the times when he was spurned by humans for his appearance; forcing him to wear armour which covered his entire body. His travels eventually lead him to the Soul Society, where he was greeted and accepted by Yamamoto. Finally, with a place to call home, he became close friends with the blind-man Tōsen.

Shunsui Kyōraku

A laid-back and flamboyant swordsman, who merged with Kemurikage, a dark spirit of a grieving mother who lost their child to the violent warlord, Toz. Shunsui’s abilities are not elemental based, but instead derived from the spirits yearning for the lost days when her child would sit with her and play games. Shunsui can make children’s games a reality, through this he can conjure illusions, travel through shadows, and turn non-lethal blows deadly. He is originally from the Fire Nation, and traveled to the soul society when he was young, at the behest of his brother’s widow, the then current head of the Ise Clan. Through his deep connection with the dark spirits, Shunsui sealed away the Ise Clan’s legendary artifact to prevent anymore deaths. Shunsui remained in the Soul Society as steward of the Ise Clan artifact, training his spirit bending abilities under Yamamoto and mastering the skills of swordsmanship.

Kaname Tōsen

A blind earthbender who is a master of neutral jing, he can controls the vibrations of all earth and dust within his vicinity. His signature technique is to use his earthbending to grind the ground in the area to dust, then lift the dust into the air and hold it perfectly still. The dust forms a dome which blocks all light and the stillness of the particles means that sounds are dampened to nothing; thus rendinger all inside the dome blind and deaf. He even dampens his footsteps thus becoming invisible to those who sense using tremors in the ground. The airbourne dust becomes an extension of Tōsen’s senses, allowing him to feel the minute movements of his opponents in all directions. This ability can be used offensively, moving the dust particles rapidly to create high pitched resonating sounds and small shockwaves. He has dedicated his life to battling injustice and corruption, after his dearest friend, Kakyō, was murdered by her husband.

Tōshirō Hitsugaya

One of the most powerful waterbenders in the world, Hitsugaya was blessed by the great heavenly ice dragon Hyōrinmaru. Hitsugaya can control the water in the surrounding atmosphere, cooling the vapour to form fearsome dragons of ice and water. Hitsugaya’s immense power is eclipsed by both his intellect and potential, he utilised the principles of thermodynamics in conjunction with his bending, to form fire resistant barriers made from thin layers of ice separated by a vacuum. His greatest achievement is using his waterbending to lift and control a large set of ice wings which are connected to his back, allowing him to fly. Thus he is the Soul Societies most powerful aerial combatant. He was born in the Soul Society, and alongside his close friend Hinamori he was raised by his grandmother. But once she left to train her firebending, he found that his power was growing wild, and that it was hurting the ones closest to him. He began training as a way to gain control, help those around him, and protect the Soul Society from attacks.

Kenpachi Zaraki

The most dangerous non-bender in the world, similar to how the Avatar merged with Raava and became the embodiment of balance and harmony, Zaraki Kenpachi is a human who has merged with a nameless malevolent oni spirit, who is the embodiment of battle and slaughter. Through this union, Zaraki became stronger, faster and more durable than any other mortal alive, although the spirit could not reincarnate, he could slow the rate at which Zaraki aged. As Zaraki fights, he enters into a euphoric frenzy, merging closer with his spirit; the stronger the opponent the closer Zaraki merges with his spirit. The origins of this individual are unknown, even to himself, however he has wandered the world seeking a battle that will finally bring him joy. In the beginning of the Hundred Year War, Zaraki had made his way to the Soul Society, and finally found his fated opponent; Unohana Yachiru’s bloodbending enhancement allowed her to survive against Zaraki’s onslaught. However, as the battle progressed, he realised that if he were to win, then he would never again be able to experience the extasy of battle like this again. He subconsciously weakened the connection with his spirit and eventually lost that battle.

Mayuri Kurotsuchi

One of the most intelligent men in the world, Mayuri Kurotsuchi is an earthbender who has mastered the art of bending pure rare metals, such as gold. He travels with a golden sword and a large golden golem in the shape of an insect-like monster. Mayuri utilises the non-reactive nature of gold to contain plethora of chemicals and poison within his sword and golem, with each substance being confined within it’s own sealed golden compartment. Should he require a given amount of a pure chemical, he changes the porosity of the gold, so that it may emit the substance. If he requires a mixture of substances, he bends an empty vial within his golem and then siphons off chemicals from the other containers into this new vial to react together (using substances like platinum as a catalyst). He is widely regarded to be a sadistic monster, who holds no regard for human life. In his youth he trained under the legendary Shutara Senjumaru before being imprisoned for his horrific experiments. He was eventually released by Kisuke Urahara, for his technical mind.

Jūshirō Ukitake

A spiritual Firebender who was blessed by the Moon Spirit Tui and has mastered the rare ability to energy-bend. When Ukitake was young he developed a fatal lung disease, his parents prayed to every spirit they knew till eventually the spirit of the Moon answered their prayers. This blessing healed his lungs, turned his hair white, and allowed him to feel the ebb and flow of the energy around him, bending it as if it were water. Ukitake is able to bend the flames as if they were water, regardless if he produced them or not. Additionally, Ukitake is the progenitor of lightning redirection, a technique that would be passed down to the Dragon of the West, Iroh, when the general travelled to the Soul Society in the aftermath of the Siege of Ba Sing Se. Ukitake’s kind nature and unwavering belief in good, has allowed him to develop a connection to the spirit world, where he mastered the ability to manipulate spiritual energy. Through this he bonded with his long-time close friend Kyōraku.

Chōjirō Sasakibe

An exceptionally loyal Firebender who has served Yamamoto since the foundation of the Soul Society. Despite his rank and appearance, he is a deadly warrior who has mastered and the art of lightning bending, and pushed beyond the limits of what was originally thought possible. Utilising heat-bending in conjunction with his lightning, he is capable of summoning vast thunderbolts from the sky, eclipsing any lightning generated by a mortal. Additionally, through careful chi control and artful lightning manipulation, he has slowed his aging so that he may serve alongside his commander.

Marechiyo Ōmaeda

A large but crafty non-bender, Marechiyo Ōmaeda is descended from a long line of professional hitmen. Prior to the formation of the Soul Society, the Ōmaeda family were a small time bandit clan in, what is known today as, the Fire Nation. However, upon the defection of Yamamoto and the formation of the Soul Society, the Ōmaeda family prospered and profited in the ensuring war. Eventually, they would come to serve as another vassal house for the Shihoin clan, alongside the Fon clan. Marechiyo Ōmaeda is the heir to the family fortune, and currently serves under Soi Fon, much to her chagrin. Despite his appearance, he is an exceptionally fast combatant and a cunning fighter, utilising his opponents assumptions about his size to bludgeon them in the head with a massive spiked iron ball, which is his signature weapon. However, he is exceptionally cowardly, and will utilising smoke and tear gas bombs to facilitate his escape.

Izuru Kira

An introspective and tactical earthbender who utilises a family technique to energybend. The Kira family were descended from a lesser prince of the Earth Kingdom royal family; during the Wars of Secrets and Daggers, the patriarch was killed and the remaining family fled out of fear. Pleading their case before the sages and judges of the Soul Society, the family was allowed to settle within the protective walls and hold some amount of political power, befitting their former status. Izuru Kira has mastered the family technique of the “earthen crush” whereby the user imparts their earthen chi into an object that they touch, allowing them to bend the object or person directly downwards, crushing them. This powerful technique requires the bender touch the target, so that they may impart their chi.

Isane Kotetsu

The protégé of Unohana, this waterbender is second only to her master in terms of healing capabilities. Her grandfather was originally from the Southern Water Tribe and fled to the Soul Society during the raids, bringing with him the tribes scrolls of healing, which were passed down through the family. She and her sister were originally split during their brief time in the slums; however, fortune smiled upon Isane as she was reunited with her sister within the Soul Society. Unbenownest to the pair, Unohana sponsered both of their entries, and holds a genuine affection for Isane, something which the ancient bloodbender had never felt before.

Momo Hinamori

An exceptionally clever firebender who has mastered the art of altering the trajectory of her fire mid-flight. Similar to how energybenders utilise the connections between all living creatures to search, Hinamori can utilise those connections as pathways to channel her fire, giving her a dangerous degree of accuracy. She was born in the Soul Society, and alongside her close friend Tōshirō she was raised by her grandmother. However, inspired by the powerful benders who defended the Soul Society and fuelled by her desire to protect her friends, she left to begin her firebending training. Her focus on academics and on connections within energy bending is how she was introduced to Aizen, a well established defender of the Soul Society; she grew enamoured with him, which only encouraged her to pursue her firebending techniques further, so that she may protect her family alongside such a powerful figure.

Renji Abarai

Renji Abarai was born in the slums outside of the Soul Society, the areas that consist of the refugees and families who are awaiting judgement on if they may be granted citizenship. The soldiers who patrol these areas are purely to deter foreign invaders, resulting in a lawless sprawl of shanty towns. After Renji’s childhood companion, Rukia was adopted by one of the noble houses within the Soul Society, he began training in one of the nearby valleys, where he encountered a wild spirit. The jungle this spirit ruled over was burned to ash by the Fire Nation, and it was left aimless and wandering. Renji began to bond with the spirit and promised a better life for them, if the spirit bonded with him. After this union, Renji was able to gain citizenship within the Soul Society because he demonstrated his immense physical abilities, that had been enhanced through the union. After training with Zaraki, who possessed a similar spiritual nature, he came to serve Byakuya Kuchiki, the adopted older brother of his childhood companion Rukia.

Tetsuzaemon Iba

A dangerous non-bender who specialises in swordsmanship and hand to hand combat. Originally he was the leader of one of the many gangs who ruled over the slums, having inherited the position from his mother. However, after an Earth Kingdom raid devastated his hometown, he vowed to protect those under his care, and enlisted in the army of the Soul Society. Iba’s loyalty to the Soul Society and his Captain are well renowned; his skill as a fighter is exceptional as he is always training to master all forms of combat. Nanao Ise
Nanao Ise is the last of a long line of matrilineal priestesses, who oversaw and carried out rituals and rites related to spirits. To accomplish this task, the Ise clan passed down a sacred blade which can reflect energy in all forms. It is regarded as the pinnacle of energy bending, and it is through this scared blade that Nanao is training to become a master of energy bending. Her superior, Kyoraku, was a close friend of the family, and was entrusted with the blade until Nanao was of age to begin training. Her tutors are the aforementioned Kyōraku and the affable Ukitake; her personality is diametrically opposed to these two, she is a serious and pragmatic person, yet she remains respectful to her teachers in the spiritual arts.

Shūhei Hisagi

Shūhei Hisagi is one of the few air-benders within the bounds of the Soul Society, he is descended from monks who fled during Sozin’s attack on the temples. However, as a result of the air-bender purges, Hisagi learned nothing about air-bending philosophy nor the cultural roots. Despite this, he is a master air-bender who has developed his own philosophy on the balance between life and death. It is this understanding of balance, that drives his unique, and aggressive, air-bending techniques, which are focused on manipulating air currents around a pair of chained scythes. He is highly respected within the Soul Society, and is the managing editor of the largest newspaper within the Soul Society … despite his inability to write a popular article.

Rangiku Matsumoto

Rangiku Matsumoto is a gregarious and lively Earth-bender, who grew-up alongside Gin Ichimaru within the slums outside the Soul Society. To gain entry into the Soul Society she trained to become adept at the art of dust and ash bending, she moves these particles at high speed to cut through an opponent as easily as a sword. The elders of the Shiba clan, one of the founding clans of the Soul Society, sponsored her entry and assigned her to assist the, then, head of the clan. Her outgoing personality has made her popular within multiple circles, and she is close friends with many other of the defenders of the Soul Society including Hisagi and Kira.

Yachiru Kusajishi

Yachiru Kusajishi is a dark spirit, bound to the mortal realm, that took the form of a human child. Initially, this spirit was formless without thought or body; however, the area that this spirit inhabited became the site for a series of violent and bloody conflicts. Out of the bloodlust and suffering this spirit began to grow and bond with the creature that exhibited the greatest lust for battle: that being the future Kenpachi Zaraki. Eventually, this bond became strong enough to allow the spirit to manifest within the physical realm. This juvenile spirit was adopted by Zaraki, becoming a surrogate daughter. Through interaction with humans beyond violence, the spirit grew into a person in her own right; becoming a bubbly and excitable child. Despite this, she is a dangerous combatant; her physical nature as a spirit makes her both faster and stronger than any mortal. Through her upbringing she associated violence with playing, her favourite game is “dodge”, wherein she attacks an opponent to force them to dodge. However, the trick of this game is that she has the ability to hit an opponent both “before” and “after” the hit, making dodging nigh impossible.

Nemu Kurotsuchi

Similar to Yachiru, Nemu Kurotsuchi is a dark spirit bound to the mortal realm who took the form of a young woman. However, she was artificially created by the mad scientist Mayuri, who captured and tortured spirits, forcing them into subservience and then manifesting those in a homunculus body. Through many repeated attempts Mayuri succeeded in the creation of Nemu; however, his experiments could not be kept secret for long. Under direct orders from both the governing body of the Soul Society, and Yamamoto himself. Mayuri’s ability to energy-bend was sealed completely and Nemu was removed from his custody. She has taken residence with Kyoraku, Ukitake and Nanao, and is regaining the free will that was so cruelly taken from her. Similar to Yachiru, whom she shares a kindred bond with, Nemu is faster and stronger than any mortal and has an incredible durability as a result of her Homunculi body. Additionally, there are several chemicals and aspects of her mortal form, which are only known to Mayuri himself.

Rukia Kuchiki

Rukia Kuchiki is a powerful water-bender with an affinity for manipulating ice and snow. She was a refugee from a Northern Water Tribe outpost, and was carried to the slums outside the Soul Society by her sister, Hisana. In a desperate attempt for survival, Rukia’s sister abandoned her within the slums when she was less than a year old. Rukia grew up alongside Renji within these dangerous areas; however, Hisana had not forgotten about her and upon her deathbed Hisana made her husband, Byakuya, promise to bring Rukia to safety. After Byakuya fulfilled that promise, Rukia began training her waterbending and developed her own style, distinct from the traditional Northern Water Tribe form. This new form is to waterbending what the dancing dragons is to firebending, an elegant form which alters the fundamental principles. Rather than the fluidity and change, Rukia focused on the rigidity and stillness of water. This philosophy was inspired by her earthbending step-brother, and allows Rukia to form structures of super-cold ice at temperatures that are unnatural even by spirits.

This is a short summary of how various Bleach characters could be fused into the Avatar universe, with regards to their powers and abilities, and how they would fit in the world of Avatar. Additionally, snippets about how the lore of the Bleach universe might fit in with the lore of the Avatar universe. Note that this is a fanwork and there are elements that I have changed slightly. Also this does allude to certain elements in the Thousand Year Blood War arc that have not been released in anime format.

Yamamoto

The most powerful firebender in recorded history whose strength surpassed the Avatar's. His unmatched prowess with flame allows him to not just produce vast quantities of fire, but also directly manipulate the volatile element (similar to how a waterbender bends water); additionally, he can control his inner flame to allow him to maintaining his mental and physical state (in a similar manner to how Kyoshi lived hundreds of years). He left the Fire Nation and founded the Soul Society during the reign of Fire Lord Yosor, during this time of great upheaval many people, from all nations flocked to the Soul Society, under the protection of the most powerful and dangerous warriors at the time. Since that day, the Soul Society has remained as a neutral fifth nation, despite many external attempts to "unite" it with both the Fire Nation and the Earth Kingdom.

Soi Fon

The Fon Clan were originally a group of Air Nomads who were captured and subjugated by the Shihoin Clan before the era of Avatar Szeto, when the Soul Society was founded the Shihoin Clan brought along the Fon Clan as their retainers. As the centuries pass nothing remains of the Fon's nomadic heritage other than their bending, with Soi Fon being one of the last remaining air benders and the 9th clan head. She utilises her bending to manipulate the air currents and pressure around her body, allowing her to move at speeds faster than the human eye can see. She carries a short blade on her back, and wears a black and gold gauntlet with a middle finger stinger; the stinger contains a poison which can kill with two stabs. Her most powerful technique involves encircling her body with a hyper-sonic vortex of air, once created she can maintain this vortex indefinitely.

Gin Ichimaru

An incredibly cunning earthbender; without warning he can rapidly move the ground under his opponents feet, which he uses to create openings to strike with his blade. However, his blade is where his true power lies, he claims that he has mastered metalbending a particular alloy which forms his blade. It appears as though he thins and stretches his blade allowing him to lunge and strike at opponents from great distances. However this is a lie, he has actually mastered bending a the dust of a rare substance, which is both extremely poisonous and capable of being compressed into a dense blade. During battle, he earthbends his blade expanding the dust at incredible speed to slice through his opponents before returning all of the substance to it's original blade form (to keep the poisonous nature of the blade a secret). The top-speed of his dust expansion technique is faster than the human eye can follow, however he only unleashes the true speed in the last moments of a strike, to keep his opponent's off-guard and guarantee a hit.

Unohana Retsu

The first and most brutal bloodbender in history, in every nation she was regarded as the most heinous villain alive, bringing slaughter and death wherever she went. In battle, her used a large curved blade to slice open her opponents, before draining the blood from their body through the newly formed wound; she would then use this new blood to create razor thin sweeping arcs of blood to carve through yet more opponents, thus repeating the cycle. Additionally, she used her bloodbending on herself, forcibly moving her body at incredible speeds to make her one of the deadliest swordsman in the world. However, as the decades passed (after the Soul Society was formed) the stories about this monster faded over time, eventually becoming myth and legend. This is because Unohana forsook her murderous ways and instead utilised her bloodbending with her natural waterbending healing to become one of the most powerful healers in the world. As a consequence over this mastery of healing and self-bloodbending Unohana has successfully extended her lifespan by hundreds of years and granted herself eternal youth.

Sosuke Aizen

A charismatic and intelligent waterbender who has completely mastered spirit bending and seeks to use this ability to transform himself beyond his present human body. As a water bender his control over the element is so fine that he can create illusions to manipulate his opponents. He controls the water vapour in the air to diffuse and reflect light to create a visual component to his illusions; he vibrates the water molecules in the air to produce pressure waves to either create false sounds or mask real sounds. However, it is his studies into the spirit realm and spirit bending are what make him exceptionally dangerous; Aizen came to the conclusion that there is no single spirit (other than Vaatu) which is stronger than Raava. Therefore, to surpass the Avatar he would need to forge a new spirit by amalgamating the souls of humans and lesser spirits. Through the process of creation, this forged spirits will would be subjugated by Aizen's own will, thus when he merges with the amalgam Aizen will retain his sense of self.

Byakuya Kuchiki

A calm and collected metalbender, who is renowned for his absolute control over the substance Cobalt. Cobalt is a light pink metal with a silvery white surface; the blade of the Kuchiki clan hereditary weapon is made from this substance. In battle, Byakuya separates his single blade into hundreds of razor thin slices that float around him, these blades have the appearance of cherry blossom petals dancing in an invisible breeze. He swarms his opponents with the petals, killing them through thousands of cuts, all the while using metalbending to maintain the edges of the blades. His skill with manipulating the metal is so great that is he capable of controlling and generating lightning using the magnetic properties of the metal. The Kuchiki clan are one of the founding bodies of the Soul Society, they were once a noble clan from the city of Tienhaishi, but fled as the city was razed to the ground by the vengeful spirit, General Old Iron. Several years ago, Byakuya defied his clan elders and married a refugee waterbender who was originally from beyond the Soul Society.

Sajin Komamura

A loyal and kind-hearted member of the Wolfman Clan, Koamura is regarded as one of the most powerful earthbenders in the world. His signature technique is to earthbend a colossal earthen golem, over three-hundred feet tall, which copies his movements. Among all mortal creatures, there is no other capable of moving that amount of earth for hours on end. The Wolfman Clan originated during the Era of Raava, and were humans who were cursed by spirits with a beastly appearance because of their sins in life. The clan has remained hidden for many years; however, a young Komamura left his clan to explore the wider world. However, he was deeply scarred by the times when he was spurned by humans for his appearance; forcing him to wear armour which covered his entire body. His travels eventually lead him to the Soul Society, where he was greeted and accepted by Yamamoto. Finally, with a place to call home, he became close friends with the blind-man Tōsen.

Shunsui Kyōraku

A laid-back and flamboyant swordsman, who merged with Kemurikage, a dark spirit of a grieving mother who lost their child to the violent warlord, Toz. Shunsui’s abilities are not elemental based, but instead derived from the spirits yearning for the lost days when her child would sit with her and play games. Shunsui can make children’s games a reality, through this he can conjure illusions, travel through shadows, and turn non-lethal blows deadly. He is originally from the Fire Nation, and traveled to the soul society when he was young, at the behest of his brother’s widow, the then current head of the Ise Clan. Through his deep connection with the dark spirits, Shunsui sealed away the Ise Clan’s legendary artifact to prevent anymore deaths. Shunsui remained in the Soul Society as steward of the Ise Clan artifact, training his spirit bending abilities under Yamamoto and mastering the skills of swordsmanship.

Kaname Tōsen

A blind earthbender who is a master of neutral jing, he can controls the vibrations of all earth and dust within his vicinity. His signature technique is to use his earthbending to grind the ground in the area to dust, then lift the dust into the air and hold it perfectly still. The dust forms a dome which blocks all light and the stillness of the particles means that sounds are dampened to nothing; thus rendinger all inside the dome blind and deaf. He even dampens his footsteps thus becoming invisible to those who sense using tremors in the ground. The airbourne dust becomes an extension of Tōsen’s senses, allowing him to feel the minute movements of his opponents in all directions. This ability can be used offensively, moving the dust particles rapidly to create high pitched resonating sounds and small shockwaves. He has dedicated his life to battling injustice and corruption, after his dearest friend, Kakyō, was murdered by her husband.

Tōshirō Hitsugaya

One of the most powerful waterbenders in the world, Hitsugaya was blessed by the great heavenly ice dragon Hyōrinmaru. Hitsugaya can control the water in the surrounding atmosphere, cooling the vapour to form fearsome dragons of ice and water. Hitsugaya’s immense power is eclipsed by both his intellect and potential, he utilised the principles of thermodynamics in conjunction with his bending, to form fire resistant barriers made from thin layers of ice separated by a vacuum. His greatest achievement is using his waterbending to lift and control a large set of ice wings which are connected to his back, allowing him to fly. Thus he is the Soul Societies most powerful aerial combatant. He was born in the Soul Society, and alongside his close friend Hinamori he was raised by his grandmother. But once she left to train her firebending, he found that his power was growing wild, and that it was hurting the ones closest to him. He began training as a way to gain control, help those around him, and protect the Soul Society from attacks.

Kenpachi Zaraki

The most dangerous non-bender in the world, similar to how the Avatar merged with Raava and became the embodiment of balance and harmony, Zaraki Kenpachi is a human who has merged with a nameless malevolent oni spirit, who is the embodiment of battle and slaughter. Through this union, Zaraki became stronger, faster and more durable than any other mortal alive, although the spirit could not reincarnate, he could slow the rate at which Zaraki aged. As Zaraki fights, he enters into a euphoric frenzy, merging closer with his spirit; the stronger the opponent the closer Zaraki merges with his spirit. The origins of this individual are unknown, even to himself, however he has wandered the world seeking a battle that will finally bring him joy. In the beginning of the Hundred Year War, Zaraki had made his way to the Soul Society, and finally found his fated opponent; Unohana Yachiru’s bloodbending enhancement allowed her to survive against Zaraki’s onslaught. However, as the battle progressed, he realised that if he were to win, then he would never again be able to experience the extasy of battle like this again. He subconsciously weakened the connection with his spirit and eventually lost that battle.

Mayuri Kurotsuchi

One of the most intelligent men in the world, Mayuri Kurotsuchi is an earthbender who has mastered the art of bending pure rare metals, such as gold. He travels with a golden sword and a large golden golem in the shape of an insect-like monster. Mayuri utilises the non-reactive nature of gold to contain plethora of chemicals and poison within his sword and golem, with each substance being confined within it’s own sealed golden compartment. Should he require a given amount of a pure chemical, he changes the porosity of the gold, so that it may emit the substance. If he requires a mixture of substances, he bends an empty vial within his golem and then siphons off chemicals from the other containers into this new vial to react together (using substances like platinum as a catalyst). He is widely regarded to be a sadistic monster, who holds no regard for human life. In his youth he trained under the legendary Shutara Senjumaru before being imprisoned for his horrific experiments. He was eventually released by Kisuke Urahara, for his technical mind.

Jūshirō Ukitake

A spiritual Firebender who was blessed by the Moon Spirit Tui and has mastered the rare ability to energy-bend. When Ukitake was young he developed a fatal lung disease, his parents prayed to every spirit they knew till eventually the spirit of the Moon answered their prayers. This blessing healed his lungs, turned his hair white, and allowed him to feel the ebb and flow of the energy around him, bending it as if it were water. Ukitake is able to bend the flames as if they were water, regardless if he produced them or not. Additionally, Ukitake is the progenitor of lightning redirection, a technique that would be passed down to the Dragon of the West, Iroh, when the general travelled to the Soul Society in the aftermath of the Siege of Ba Sing Se. Ukitake’s kind nature and unwavering belief in good, has allowed him to develop a connection to the spirit world, where he mastered the ability to manipulate spiritual energy. Through this he bonded with his long-time close friend Kyōraku.

Chōjirō Sasakibe

An exceptionally loyal Firebender who has served Yamamoto since the foundation of the Soul Society. Despite his rank and appearance, he is a deadly warrior who has mastered and the art of lightning bending, and pushed beyond the limits of what was originally thought possible. Utilising heat-bending in conjunction with his lightning, he is capable of summoning vast thunderbolts from the sky, eclipsing any lightning generated by a mortal. Additionally, through careful chi control and artful lightning manipulation, he has slowed his aging so that he may serve alongside his commander.

Marechiyo Ōmaeda

A large but crafty non-bender, Marechiyo Ōmaeda is descended from a long line of professional hitmen. Prior to the formation of the Soul Society, the Ōmaeda family were a small time bandit clan in, what is known today as, the Fire Nation. However, upon the defection of Yamamoto and the formation of the Soul Society, the Ōmaeda family prospered and profited in the ensuring war. Eventually, they would come to serve as another vassal house for the Shihoin clan, alongside the Fon clan. Marechiyo Ōmaeda is the heir to the family fortune, and currently serves under Soi Fon, much to her chagrin. Despite his appearance, he is an exceptionally fast combatant and a cunning fighter, utilising his opponents assumptions about his size to bludgeon them in the head with a massive spiked iron ball, which is his signature weapon. However, he is exceptionally cowardly, and will utilising smoke and tear gas bombs to facilitate his escape.

Izuru Kira

An introspective and tactical earthbender who utilises a family technique to energybend. The Kira family were descended from a lesser prince of the Earth Kingdom royal family; during the Wars of Secrets and Daggers, the patriarch was killed and the remaining family fled out of fear. Pleading their case before the sages and judges of the Soul Society, the family was allowed to settle within the protective walls and hold some amount of political power, befitting their former status. Izuru Kira has mastered the family technique of the “earthen crush” whereby the user imparts their earthen chi into an object that they touch, allowing them to bend the object or person directly downwards, crushing them. This powerful technique requires the bender touch the target, so that they may impart their chi.

Isane Kotetsu

The protégé of Unohana, this waterbender is second only to her master in terms of healing capabilities. Her grandfather was originally from the Southern Water Tribe and fled to the Soul Society during the raids, bringing with him the tribes scrolls of healing, which were passed down through the family. She and her sister were originally split during their brief time in the slums; however, fortune smiled upon Isane as she was reunited with her sister within the Soul Society. Unbenownest to the pair, Unohana sponsered both of their entries, and holds a genuine affection for Isane, something which the ancient bloodbender had never felt before.

Momo Hinamori

An exceptionally clever firebender who has mastered the art of altering the trajectory of her fire mid-flight. Similar to how energybenders utilise the connections between all living creatures to search, Hinamori can utilise those connections as pathways to channel her fire, giving her a dangerous degree of accuracy. She was born in the Soul Society, and alongside her close friend Tōshirō she was raised by her grandmother. However, inspired by the powerful benders who defended the Soul Society and fuelled by her desire to protect her friends, she left to begin her firebending training. Her focus on academics and on connections within energy bending is how she was introduced to Aizen, a well established defender of the Soul Society; she grew enamoured with him, which only encouraged her to pursue her firebending techniques further, so that she may protect her family alongside such a powerful figure.

Renji Abarai

Renji Abarai was born in the slums outside of the Soul Society, the areas that consist of the refugees and families who are awaiting judgement on if they may be granted citizenship. The soldiers who patrol these areas are purely to deter foreign invaders, resulting in a lawless sprawl of shanty towns. After Renji’s childhood companion, Rukia was adopted by one of the noble houses within the Soul Society, he began training in one of the nearby valleys, where he encountered a wild spirit. The jungle this spirit ruled over was burned to ash by the Fire Nation, and it was left aimless and wandering. Renji began to bond with the spirit and promised a better life for them, if the spirit bonded with him. After this union, Renji was able to gain citizenship within the Soul Society because he demonstrated his immense physical abilities, that had been enhanced through the union. After training with Zaraki, who possessed a similar spiritual nature, he came to serve Byakuya Kuchiki, the adopted older brother of his childhood companion Rukia.

Tetsuzaemon Iba

A dangerous non-bender who specialises in swordsmanship and hand to hand combat. Originally he was the leader of one of the many gangs who ruled over the slums, having inherited the position from his mother. However, after an Earth Kingdom raid devastated his hometown, he vowed to protect those under his care, and enlisted in the army of the Soul Society. Iba’s loyalty to the Soul Society and his Captain are well renowned; his skill as a fighter is exceptional as he is always training to master all forms of combat.

Nanao Ise

Nanao Ise is the last of a long line of matrilineal priestesses, who oversaw and carried out rituals and rites related to spirits. To accomplish this task, the Ise clan passed down a sacred blade which can reflect energy in all forms. It is regarded as the pinnacle of energy bending, and it is through this scared blade that Nanao is training to become a master of energy bending. Her superior, Kyoraku, was a close friend of the family, and was entrusted with the blade until Nanao was of age to begin training. Her tutors are the aforementioned Kyōraku and the affable Ukitake; her personality is diametrically opposed to these two, she is a serious and pragmatic person, yet she remains respectful to her teachers in the spiritual arts.

Shūhei Hisagi

Shūhei Hisagi is one of the few air-benders within the bounds of the Soul Society, he is descended from monks who fled during Sozin’s attack on the temples. However, as a result of the air-bender purges, Hisagi learned nothing about air-bending philosophy nor the cultural roots. Despite this, he is a master air-bender who has developed his own philosophy on the balance between life and death. It is this understanding of balance, that drives his unique, and aggressive, air-bending techniques, which are focused on manipulating air currents around a pair of chained scythes. He is highly respected within the Soul Society, and is the managing editor of the largest newspaper within the Soul Society … despite his inability to write a popular article.

Rangiku Matsumoto

Rangiku Matsumoto is a gregarious and lively Earth-bender, who grew-up alongside Gin Ichimaru within the slums outside the Soul Society. To gain entry into the Soul Society she trained to become adept at the art of dust and ash bending, she moves these particles at high speed to cut through an opponent as easily as a sword. The elders of the Shiba clan, one of the founding clans of the Soul Society, sponsored her entry and assigned her to assist the, then, head of the clan. Her outgoing personality has made her popular within multiple circles, and she is close friends with many other of the defenders of the Soul Society including Hisagi and Kira.

Yachiru Kusajishi

Yachiru Kusajishi is a dark spirit, bound to the mortal realm, that took the form of a human child. Initially, this spirit was formless without thought or body; however, the area that this spirit inhabited became the site for a series of violent and bloody conflicts. Out of the bloodlust and suffering this spirit began to grow and bond with the creature that exhibited the greatest lust for battle: that being the future Kenpachi Zaraki. Eventually, this bond became strong enough to allow the spirit to manifest within the physical realm. This juvenile spirit was adopted by Zaraki, becoming a surrogate daughter. Through interaction with humans beyond violence, the spirit grew into a person in her own right; becoming a bubbly and excitable child. Despite this, she is a dangerous combatant; her physical nature as a spirit makes her both faster and stronger than any mortal. Through her upbringing she associated violence with playing, her favourite game is “dodge”, wherein she attacks an opponent to force them to dodge. However, the trick of this game is that she has the ability to hit an opponent both “before” and “after” the hit, making dodging nigh impossible.

Nemu Kurotsuchi

Similar to Yachiru, Nemu Kurotsuchi is a dark spirit bound to the mortal realm who took the form of a young woman. However, she was artificially created by the mad scientist Mayuri, who captured and tortured spirits, forcing them into subservience and then manifesting those in a homunculus body. Through many repeated attempts Mayuri succeeded in the creation of Nemu; however, his experiments could not be kept secret for long. Under direct orders from both the governing body of the Soul Society, and Yamamoto himself. Mayuri’s ability to energy-bend was sealed completely and Nemu was removed from his custody. She has taken residence with Kyoraku, Ukitake and Nanao, and is regaining the free will that was so cruelly taken from her. Similar to Yachiru, whom she shares a kindred bond with, Nemu is faster and stronger than any mortal and has an incredible durability as a result of her Homunculi body. Additionally, there are several chemicals and aspects of her mortal form, which are only known to Mayuri himself.

Rukia Kuchiki

Rukia Kuchiki is a powerful water-bender with an affinity for manipulating ice and snow. She was a refugee from a Northern Water Tribe outpost, and was carried to the slums outside the Soul Society by her sister, Hisana. In a desperate attempt for survival, Rukia’s sister abandoned her within the slums when she was less than a year old. Rukia grew up alongside Renji within these dangerous areas; however, Hisana had not forgotten about her and upon her deathbed Hisana made her husband, Byakuya, promise to bring Rukia to safety. After Byakuya fulfilled that promise, Rukia began training her waterbending and developed her own style, distinct from the traditional Northern Water Tribe form. This new form is to waterbending what the dancing dragons is to firebending, an elegant form which alters the fundamental principles. Rather than the fluidity and change, Rukia focused on the rigidity and stillness of water. This philosophy was inspired by her earthbending step-brother, and allows Rukia to form structures of super-cold ice at temperatures that are unnatural even by spirits.