Office Hours [JTT/Kazura]

[Raphael Laurent]

Raphael stalked the halls of Uzaki Enterprises, heading back towards the computer lab that he’d semi-taken over and turned into his office. No one, in so far as yet, had questioned where he’d gone for the few days he’d been in the Soul Society, nor had anyone protested in his conquest of the computer lab. People still came in to use it, so it wasn’t like he was just keeping people from using it, he was just using it as a makeshift office. Irina hadn’t seemed to have cared that he and Luca snuck into the Soul Society, and he began to wonder how Kazura would take it, unless Irina had told him already; it wouldn’t have surprised him.



Something yelled at him, though. He had a strong desire to know how strong Kazura actually was, learn what kind of techniques the man knew. How much he could learn from such a man and how far he could push his own abilities… Oh, the thoughts of it were titillating, in a way. Unlike Luca, Raphael was determined to push the limits of his own humanity in his own way. While one would transcend the powers of humanity, the other would break the very limits of that humanity. He didn’t want to destroy foes, he didn’t want to get rich… No, all that Raphael wanted was to protect those that couldn’t defend themselves.



He found his feet guiding him towards Kazura’s office, and before long he was standing before it, ready to try and keep moving forward in his own way. He reached out and knocked on the door, his own head swirling with what he’d learned of the other side and with what he’d learned of himself while fighting Irina. There was so much that he wanted to talk about, and yet, at the same time, he wasn’t sure that talking would do him all that much good. Maybe simply training would put his mind at ease.



“Excuse me, Mr. Uzaki? It’s me, Raph, and I was hoping to talk to you for a bit, if you had the time.” He would begin with, what was effectively, his report before moving on to why he’d truly come. The file was already typed up on his desktop, it was just a matter of emailing and printing it. Still, he was having doubts of his own. He didn’t understand why Luca wanted the power of the Shinigami, or why he even thought that going there was the answer instead of trusting in himself. He needed advice, or at least a way to reconcile his friend’s thoughts…he needed a third party perspective and Kazura could offer just that, much as Irina had.


((trainin' for dat sweet ttp))

[Kazura Uzaki]

Kazura awoke with surprise when there was a knock at his door. He had actually been sleeping well for once. Feeling bittersweet, partly bitter as he was interrupted from good rest which was rare and partly sweet for the same reason, that he was getting good rest which was rare. Adjusting his tie, he moved to the door, disengaged the physical and spiritual lock, and opened the door and let Raph into his office. "Of course, Raph. Please, come in." Kazura tried to always make time for his employees, especially those in his Spiritual Department. He knew that those in that department were under the heaviest stresses. They had the most hazards in their line of work, so naturally they needed more attention than the other employees. Kazura offered Raph a nice chair and sat down back at his desk. "How can I help you today?"

{Training for CTP}

[Raphael Laurent]

Raphael stood there, holding his little manilla envelope that contained a typed up report that he was going to give in person. While he was a bit nervous, he had gone over it enough times in his head that he was could easily give this report without any major fears. After all, his part had gone over well enough, despite it being unintentional, and he felt confident enough. Now, some of the things that had happened…well, he didn’t want to go over them but he knew that he realistically needed to in order to make the report complete.

He heard a lock click before the door opened, Kazura looking quite tired, but also very well dressed. Raphael entered quite quickly and sat down in the chair offered to him, before putting the envelope down on the desk and pushed it lightly towards the man. “I’m sorry to have to bring this to you, so late, but now’s as good a time as any to go ahead and report on this, I suppose.” He took in a deep breath, knowing that he needed in order to do so. “The report has a few more details on what I’m about to go over.”

“Several days ago, nearly…a week if I recall right, Luca and I executed a plan to infiltrate the Soul Society, him for their power and myself to watch his back. We utilized a doorknob and I had a special item made that allowed us to disguise our reiatsu signatures in order to keep our heads down. For the first little while, we were able to completely evade their patrols. There’s a giant city that surrounds the Seireitei…” He opened the folder and pulled out a rough map that he’d made of the locations that he and Luca had gone through while trying to get to the Seireitei itself. He gestured to the map itself, along the road that he’d made. “So, as we were far out in the farther districts, we saw next to no actual patrols of Shinigami, but as we went higher up in the numbers, their numbers increased. Luca and I largely saw this from a cart of travelling actors that we joined up with. Apparently, not all in their city are very happy with the Shinigami; the plays we performed were often of the city being attacked. It wasn’t until probably the fourth day that we ran into Shinigami. I surrendered myself to the care of two of their vice captains, Ken’ichi of the twelfth and Kaen of the seventh.” He sighed. “Unfortunately, the method that we’d used to get there was confiscated when I had to confess that I was a fullbringer, but the reiatsu masking device I still have. I won’t lie, Luca made me leave him behind, hellbent as he is on making himself stronger and believes that gaining Shinigami power, somehow, is the trick to it.”

With his entire spiel over, Raphael exhaled slowly, and settled back a bit before looking back at Kazura. He didn’t know how the man would react, though hoped that it would be something akin to Irina. If so? Then he’d simply be able to relax, for the time being. After this report, though, he had other questions, as well as a request. It all was in Kazura’s court now.

[Kazura Uzaki]

Kazura took the report offered to him, but he didn't open it yet as he wanted to give Raph his full and undivided attention. His skills at Analyzing people were mastered, so he gained a lot of information from reading Raph's deep breath in and his verbal report. He remained quiet throughout the report, taking it all in and processing all of the verbal and nonverbal information with nearly instantaneous speed. Raph seemed worried about Luca and quite frankly Kazura was worried too but he tried not to let it show too much. Didn't Luca know he would have to die to gain the powers of a Shinigami? And who knows what would happen in between the human world and the Soul Society if Konso was performed on him. Sure, Zeich could probably do that if Luca was desperate enough, but what would that solve? What would be gained? At what cost?

As for the doorknob and the reiatsu scrambler, Kazura was intrigued by those items. It was a shame that the former had been confiscated, but the latter could be very interesting to work with. Kazura had collected reiatsu samples from every race in the Human World and Soul Society, also a little bit of Hell reiatsu from Nakabakki. He hadn't collected reiatsu from a Hason nor a Saika, but their reiatsu had to be enough resembling the Akki reiatsu he'd collected that it would register on his Uzaki Enterprises Detection Network. He'd never tested it on different Hell races, as they weren't very common in the World, less so in Karakura, but if a Hell anomaly did arise in Karakura, Kazura was confident in his ability to detect and react to it. All this to say, a reiatsu scrambler that had the programming of pretty much any race in existence would be highly interesting to study and or create.

Kazura also studied the map that Raph offered with just a glance, processing it all in moments. He'd never been to the Soul Society before, so having a layout of some of it was interesting to him. He made a mental note to increase Raph's paycheck for this report once he'd finished reading the entirety of it due to the information gathered about the layout of the Soul Society and identities of two Vice Captains. So far, Raph hadn't divulged any information about those two Vice Captains, but that could easily come out later and would similarly increase his pay. Raph looked tense as if he was waiting for Kazura for something. Approval? Kazura could give that.

"Good work, Raph. I'm impressed. I've never been to the Soul Society before. What was it like? If you'd like, I can show you the Third World, that of Hueco Mundo. I've a sort of base set up in a long forgotten, long buried cave there. As for Luca... I've no intention of telling him how to life his life, but I don't necessarily agree with his idea that Shinigami power is the power to be sought after with such... fervor."

[Raphael Laurent]

He felt some degree of anxiety as Kazura decided to not look at the report and merely focus on Raphael and what he was saying. He did his best to not show any kinds of concern, but he’d already begun thinking of several things, ways that he could improve on the design for the doorknob for use in the real world. Raphael couldn’t help but wonder if Kazura was trying to think of a way to get Luca back, or if that was something he was even considering. Even Raph couldn’t find a way to actually do anything about that, he had tons of ideas, but none that would help Luca. He was at the mercy of the Shinigami, at this point. He only hoped that Kaen and Ken’ichi would find him.

Raphael smiled, as Kyo asked what the Soul Society was like. “It…honestly looked like…I’d say Japan between the thirteen and fourteen hundreds, perhaps a little earlier but not by much. There isn’t much in the way of technology being utilized, hell they aren’t even using electricity in order to keep their streets lit at night! The farther that you are from the Seireitei the less and less…civilized that the surrounding city is. The closer that you get to it, things start looking more put together and greater luxuries, restaurants for instance, become much more common.” He listened a bit more, nodding at Kazura’s offer to show him the third world. He enjoyed the experiences that he was gaining. The amount of intelligence that this afforded him was the important aspect. Yet, as he continued, Raphael nodded again, staring at the folder that he’d laid on the desk. “I agree. Using the power of the dead samurai… I don’t get the purpose of it. Unfortunately, I’m having to work hard to try and figure out anything and everything that I’ve learned so far…” He chuckled. “It has not been easy, I won’t lie to you.”

He sighed, feeling his shoulders heaving down a bit. “Realistically, I allowed myself to be captured by Kaen so that Luca could get away.” He waited for a few seconds. “I was wanting to test their reaction time, personally. Rather impressive.” He paused for a few seconds. “In all honesty, I want to learn more power that other people have made, at least as much as possible…” Then, as if on cue, he laughed just a bit. “I, uh, also need to find some better materials to make stuff with. Normal wires and processors can’t exactly handle the kind of energy output needed for reiatsu storage and utilization.”

[Kazura Uzaki]

Kazura listened to the description of the Soul Society, nodding along at key points and just taking it all in. It sounded like a place that wouldn't be as fun to be at compared to the land of the living, especially if there wasn't the same level of technology that he was used to. His powers wouldn't function very well there as a result, if he ever needed to go there as a fullbringer for some reason. As for the comment that Raph needed better materials, Kazura's face lit up. "Oh, where we're going have I got something to show you!" Kazura was visibly excited by this topic.

Kazura would lead Raph into a private elevator at the back of his office, leading directly down into the Spiritual Department's laboratories. "There is a group of souls known as 'Mod Souls', created by the Soul Society and existing inside shells of reiatsu fortified material. Combined with research into their 'pills', orbs that could restore reiatsu if crushed, and research into the Spiritual Steel of Shinigami Zanpakutou, I created a material that can both transfer reiatsu through it as well as hold onto elemental souls through a binding process."

Kazura walked up to a seemingly dead end wall where a scroll of yellowed paper was hung. On it was a series of characters that didn't appear to be made up of any earthly language. "Dākugēto ga shira rete inai mono ni tsūro o hiraki, natte mimashou" Speaking a series of words that was like if a child ran "Embrace the path of what is neither black or white, Open Sesame" through Google Translate into Japanese eight years ago and failed miserably, Kazura hoped that this phrase sounded more arcane than Japanese, because it was poorly Japanese, at best.

Anyways! The scroll sunk into the wall and formed a stone archway. Speaking the embarrassing phrase again, the innards of the archway dissolved into a black starry portal. Not skipping a beat, Kazura strode into the portal and just dropped out of sight. He was used to this by now, but Raph may not have as much of an easy time just walking off the edge of a cliff, so to speak. If he did muster up the courage to just walk off, he'd find that his feet would hit sand after just a foot of falling. Still jarring if not expecting a large step down, but not even painful.

Once hitting the sand, Raph would find himself in Hueco Mundo, in a very large underground cavern that Kazura had taken up residence in as a base of sorts. There wasn't a lot to see here, save for a little bit of manufacturing equipment and a large stone altar of sorts. "I created this crystal matrix out of the aforementioned research. I have equipment here that can create circuits that can transport reiatsu, as well as create raw crystal with which to enchant with elemental souls. I call it 'Lacrima' and while it has produced limited results so far, I'm very close to a breakthrough that will keep it more stable. It doesn't explode or anything, just turns into this soulless goop."

Kazura paused to let Raph take in the environment of Hueco Mundo, the base, and the existence of Lacrima. He waited for the other man's input to see what ideas there were for this set of technology.

[Raphael Laurent]

Even as he gave his explanation of the Soul Society, Raphael couldn’t deny that it wasn’t exactly a place that he wanted to go again. While nice, it’s technological capabilities were locked almost entirely behind the walls of the Seireitei, from what Ken’ichi had told him. No videogames, no tv, hell no cars! They’d taken days – DAYS – to walk around the outside of the wall towards one of the gates. He still couldn’t deny that some of the people were interesting and he had enjoyed acting in the plays, with the final one being the most fascinating.

Something seemed to bring a smile to Kazura’s face, however, and he suddenly said that he wanted to show Raph something cool. He seemed incredibly excited, much more so than he’d been for the information on the Soul Society and quickly led Raphael to a private elevator at the back of his office. As they rode down it, Kazura explained about mod souls. He recalled Taka saying that she was a mod soul and that they were those that had been marked for death by the Shinigami after being created by them. Kazura further explained that he’d researched the spiritual steel that composed the Shinigami zanpakuto and created a material that could transfer reiatsu and hold elemental souls via a special binding process.

He followed Kazura to what appeared to be a wall that led to nothing, but when the man uttered a strange grouping of words, the scroll suddenly sunk into the wall to form an arch of stone. Then again and the inside warped as well, turning into a portal of darkness, studded with specks of light. It was almost like looking at the night sky… Then he watched as Kazura just walked forward and disappeared. For a second, Raphael nearly panicked.

He stood there for a few seconds and stared at the portal with wide eyes. He stepped forward gingerly, and then, closing his eyes, he fully walked in, dropping down himself. For a brief moment, he felt his heart drop but, after only about a single stair’s worth of a fall, he felt his feet hit something and the world shifted beneath him. It was like sand and he very nearly fell flat on his face, struggling to maintain his balance on the shifting soil. Not much to look at, realistically. He was in an enormous cave with what almost looked like equipment to manufacture things and an odd stone altar. Raphael felt his breath increase a bit, the air felt heavy in his lungs, though he adjusted fairly quickly.

He listened to Kazura’s explanation of the process. Circuits that could transport reiatsu? Crystalline elements that could be enchanted with elemental souls?! He stood there for a few seconds, mind racing with different possibilities. For how long had he hoped for materials like this? Too damn long, that was the answer.

“So, effectively, you’ve made it so that one could actually utilize reiatsu like a form of electricity? The things that could be done with something like that… Especially if you’re close to a breakthrough! You could craft weapons…armor…” He chuckled a bit. “Though, I actually had an idea for something more…utility wise. I really wish we had the interdimensional doorknob, as I don’t know enough about its construction for how it had a matter to reishi converter. I was however able to get the gist of its spatial connection features and I was thinking that we might be able to make a knob that connects two separate points of space to one another, decreasing travel times.” Realistically he was thinking of eight different things they could use sucha thing for, but he wanted to keep it minimal and think on what they could do. But he slowly stopped his overactive brain and looked around. “But…this is Hueco Mundo, huh? Is it safe to be here? You’d think that hollows would be able to smell us…” Then again, he was with Kazura who was one the more powerful humans he knew of… Maybe it would be ok?

[Kazura Uzaki]

As Raph came through the portal, Kazura watched him catch his balance and catch his breath quickly. He adjusted well to the different atmosphere. Kazura nodded as Raph commented on his having made reiatsu into a form of spiritual electricity. That's exactly how his reiatsu circuits worked. They were fragile, for sure, at the moment, but once he had finished mastering the conversion of Elemental souls into the Lacrima items he was sure that a solid stone soul would be able to reinforce the crystal and keep it from shattering on too heavy an impact.

If only he could figure out how to bond the souls without it turning out like a mess of burnt goop. So much of his own energy had been poured into making crystals that could store elemental souls that he felt like his lifespan certainly had been reduced by a year or two. Not that it mattered too much given he could effectively live for hundreds of years for as long as his Willpower could hold onto. Raph mentioned that the Lacrima could be used for weapons or armor, then trailed off for a moment, so Kazura interjected slightly. "My thoughts exactly. Spiritual weapons for spiritual threats."

Raph also lamented the fact that they didn't have the interdimensional doorknob any longer. That was a shame, because Kazura could have easily Traced it with Soul Command, his mastery of Analysis, and his Instincts to be able to explore its inner workings and how it accomplished what it did. Raph had seemed to understand how it worked though, well enough to attempt to replicate it. "Any materials you need can be fabricated. Let's see what we can come up with?" When Raph mentioned the Hollows being able to smell them, though, Kazura just chuckled.

"In all my years of coming here, I haven't once seen a Hollow. This cavern is very secluded deep beneath the sands. It was once the battleground of a large Shinigami force, as there were broken Zanpakutou I found here, but there hasn't been anything here but myself, you, and Irina in a very long time." Moving over to the altar of stone, Kazura ran his hand across the channels made for absorbing souls and binding them to crystal. He had spent a lot of time here in this cave, unsuccessfully working on his Lacrima. But he was so close to a breakthrough.

Then it came to him. What if he was just trying to bind it too quickly? He was forcing it in like a metric ton of water through a straw and it was causing it to burst before he could get it to bind? That was certainly worth looking into... But for now, he needed to first procure some raw material for Raph to look at and experience. Heading to the fabrication unit, he let it run for a little bit, forming just a tube of reitasu circuits. A spiritual wire, in essence. "This is fairly fragile in combat, but I'm sure given enough time and energy it could be improved with the Soul of a Rock to become sturdy enough to use in any situation."

[Raphael Laurent]

Raphael nodded at Kazura’s mention of spirit weapons to deal with spiritual threats. It made sense, of course; he now knew that they made things for people that were more spiritually inclined and it only made him even more curious as to what could be done. After all, if they could get weapons specifically to attack the spiritual elements, then there was no telling what else could be done. He had a moment where he wished that the rest of the world didn’t have to be kept in the dark about this kind of thing, but at the same time he didn’t trust the entirety of mankind to not lose their shit and want to attack the Shinigami. That was one of humanity’s most dangerous aspects, one that was shared by the Shinigami, somewhat.

“Huh… A battleground? I wouldn’t think that the Shinigami would actually attack the hollows in their own land. I mean, it’s like the hollows attacking the Shinigami. From what I’ve seen, either action is devoid of purpose since they just wind up back here and they will eventually replenish numbers.” He sighed but shrugged and went back to looking around; there were all kinds of things that he was looking forward to trying and potentially, learning. And the fact that only he, Kazura and Irina had been here made him smile a little bit. He was proud of such a fact and momentarily forgot about Luca’s plight.

Kazura was quick to move to the fabrication machine and had it create a tube of spiritual wire. He took it in hand as Kazura gave it to him and examined it. There were tons of different applications for something like this, and the possibilities excited him. The first thing that needed to be done, however, would be to figure out how to pass energy through it efficiently and without wasting his own strength. He’d had that problem in the past, giving too much to a project that ended up being pointless.

Taking it in between his two hands, he began to slowly pour energy through one end and felt it pick up on his other finger. “So I’d say one of the first things that we need to do is to create some kind of battery, or other energy storage method. Not going to be much of a point to having the wires if there’s no way to save that energy. I mean, you could easily make powerful weaponry or even augment armor by weaving powered energy coils into it.” He chuckled a bit. “But then again I can’t really say much, I guess. I’ve still got a TON of things to learn. I only recently learned how to use my fullbring when some kind of creature from hell showed up in Karakura. It was insane!”

[Kazura Uzaki]

OOC: Italicized paragraphs are Effort in Lacrima Crafting, non-italicized paragraphs are not included in the IP.

"Ah, but destroying the more evolved Hollows keeps them from threatening the Land of the Living above and beyond what your average spiritually aware individual can escape from or handle. Reducing the ranks of the Adjuchas and the Vasto Lorde, which can take many years to achieve, is a win in my book. Not sure if that's what the Shinigami thought, after all, since this was all way before I found it." Kazura watched as Raph took the spiritual wire in his hand and began to smoothly run energy through it. This was good, something Kazura could work with, for sure, if he already could muster up the basics of energy transfer.

"Here, let me show you how the Soul Sealing device works."

Kazura decided to try his knew process for sealing on the spot by the seat of his pants, just hoping it wouldn't blow up in his face in front of Raph like all the other times he had tried this. He started by moving to the fabrication machine and collecting an assortment of tools and pre-fabricated crystal tubes and raw lacrima crystal. He could form a few new Soul Storage crystals, or work on something more delicate like a circuit to be used for a more complicated item. He had some ideas for how to improve the Omni-watch, so he opted for the circuit production.

Moving over to the altar-like device, with its various channels and grooves for liquifying reiatsu/crystal/raw ingredients and flowing them together, he set his supplies down and began to teach by example. He started with a square base of metal, no bigger than a standard watch face. He beckoned to Raph to come closer and watch him work. He first needed to form the motherboard and CPU for the watch, but instead of out of silicon and other mundane materials, Lacrima. First, the Motherboard, the hardware responsible for housing all of the additional components.

The motherboard didn't particularly have to be made of anything special, but Kazura was going to try and increase its durability significantly higher than the current durability of thin glass. Taking a lump of raw Lacrima and his bare hands, he began to work the material with Soul Command. Like a baker with a lump of dough, he began to pull on the Lacrima with his hands and his Willpower, shaping it the way he wanted it to look. When the material he had taken was flat and squared, he moved onto the next phase of the shaping process.

He sorted through his tools until he found the glass scoring tool. Making a small incision on the top of the glass, he was able to break off what he needed in the appropriate size for the motherboard. With a blowtorch he softened the glass-like material, readying it for the next phase of the process. With a clay sculpting tool he began to poke at the softened glass, supplementing his lack of masterful artistic talent with Soul Command to make it form the ridges, depressions, and raised areas he needed.

Having made the original Omni-watch many times by hand, he was familiar with where the pieces of the technological components were going to go when they were ready for the device. With a tiny bit of artistic flair he finished off the glass motherboard with a UE logo in an unused corner. "Sorry to make you wait, now let's move on to the actual enhancing." Scattering the sand beneath his feet, he revealed a bit of solid rock underneath. He Willed it to rise to his hand with Soul Command, and he broke off a good sized set of chunks of it.

Pressing the raw stone into slots in the sides of the device, he fired it up and it began to thrum with spiritual excitement. The stone began to soften. Not melt, not liquify, not magmafy, just break down on a spiritually molecular level. The fragments of stone began to absorb into the sides of the machine, coming out the top as a glowing brown liquid. This liquid pooled in the grooves on the tabletop, flowing down and around the Lacrima watch motherboard. He let it sit there for a moment and took in a deep breath. Slower this time, don't rush it, he told himself.

Pressing his hands into hand-shaped impressions on the device, he began to let out his reiatsu. His Aura flared as 25% of his reserves went into the machine. Slowly. Controlled. It took awhile to let it all out in a controlled fashion, and as sweat began to drip down his forehead he shook it off and continued to try to stay focused on the task at hand. When over two thousand reiatsu had been poured into the device, mixing with the stone Soul fragments, the channels began to glow even brighter.

With a kick of his foot, a lever was pushed underneath that opened up channel gates in the center. The mixed Soul/Reiatsu slurry began to wash over the Lacrima motherboard. This was the moment of truth. Now he needed to quickly get it to start binding and then take his time making it perfect. The liquid adhered quickly, a promising sign. He removed his hands from the indents and held his hands over the center where the item was affixed. Deep breath in, then let it out as he Willed the Soul to bind to the crystal.

The liquid drained through a hole in the center and when it had fully washed over the motherboard and drained Kaura opened his eyes and looked at what he had created. He hadn't even realized he had closed them. When did he do that? No matter, he had to look at the initial component of the circuitry that he had produced. He examined it, picking it up off the altar and turning it over in his hand. It slightly vibrated with residual power left from Kazura's rinse cycle, but other than that it was cool to the touch and solid.

He pinched it with his fingers with increasing grip strength, testing its durability. He found it satisfactory for his first successful attempt and handed the part to Raph. "Test it not too gently, but not too rough either. I'm sure it will reveal itself to be much more sturdy than the tube in your hands." Making sure it was sturdy enough to hand over, Kazura placed it on his open right palm and extended it over to the other Fullbringer. This was just one component of the computer parts he needed for the smartwatch, but it was a start.

"Any questions on what I've just done? I know it might be confusing at first until you get a rythym for it."

((10 paragraphs so far on Lacrima yields 100 IP/Durability for the circuits so far.))

[Raphael Laurent]

“I see.” was really all that he could say. He’d never really given much thought to the overall spiritual ecosystem of Shinigami and hollow. To him, a human, that had only ever been between the two, it felt less and less that Shinigami were truly protecting and more just doing a job. Like a accountant would do math. While the overall scale of the fact that Shinigami would invade this hollow world and kill the more powerful creatures that could threaten his world did impress him, he had less of a scale for things like this than Kazura did. It was quite obvious that Kazura had a great deal more experience, though exactly how far that went was anyone’s guess. He followed Kazura over to the altar like device while looking over the assortment of tools, crystals and other raw materials. He understood next to nothing of what Kazura was going to do. The only thing that he could do was to take notes and hope he could understand it at a later date.

Raphael watched as he started with a squared metal the size of a watch face. Kazura took a lump of the metal like material and seemed to be using soul command to work with it, forcing it into a different shape flattening and smoothing it out. Once it was, he watched Kazura move on to the next part. With a small tool, he watched Kazura nick the glass on the top and then watched as it was softened with a blowtorch. Then, slowly, Kazura began to carve it out into the precise shape that he was trying to get it into. It was a fascinating project and, while Raphael’s pencil moved furiously on his small notepad, flipping only when needed. ‘How long did learning how to do this take?’ he wanted to ask, but his focus was too caught. The UE logo was a nice touch, though.

As Kazura apologized, Raphael simply shook his head not wanting to miss anything. There was a fascinating aspect to all of this that he simply couldn’t resist knowing. The rock that came next, that Kazura willed to break down at such a minute level of detail. When Kazura’s energy seemed to flare for a moment, Raphael took a step back, making sure that Kazura had enough room and that he didn’t get any major negative effects from the sudden outpouring of energy.

A brief kick and a lever pushed underneath that opened up gates in the center and the mixture of reiatsu began to pour out over whatever Kazura was making. The viscous liquid began to stick to what Kazura had been working on and, despite the sweat on his forehead, Raphael could tell that Kazura’s work was bearing fruit. Kazura was so focused on what was in front of him that the world itself was, no doubt, completely shut out from the rest of the world. Rarely had he seen such concentration.

Raphael took the part that Kazura had just made and looked it over a few times. Giving it a few decent tugs, he noted that it was fairly sturdy, indeed. Not what he was originally expecting. But…

“It definitely is, but what exactly are you making, if I may ask? I mean, that’s just the first of many questions to be honest. When you were working just now, you’d broken that spiritual rock down further. Is the liquid that came out a combination of your reiatsu and the remains of the rock? Sorry, there’s just a lot to ask about. This looks far more useful for most of my own projects than half of the things that I’ve been trying to work with. Real world circuitry only gets you so far and pretty much everything burns out in a heartbeat…”

[Kazura Uzaki]

It was natural that this piece of sturdy glass wouldn't look like much yet. Kazura was more than happy to explain what he was doing. "This is actually the basis for a motherboard made of spiritual crystal that will go inside my next Omni-watch model. It will have increased durability compared to that of regular circuitry, allowing for the channeling of reiatsu through it. The next goal is to finish up the CPU, then install this circuitry into the enchanted Lacrima that makes up the powers of the watch itself." He had skipped over the question about the rock breaking down for a reason. He wanted Raph to be able to get closer to the equipment and explore its surface with his hands before answering the question.

"Come closer and examine the Soul Sealing device. What happened to the rock was it was broken down to its Soul components then channeled through the device into the Lacrima on the top and given a push into the Soul state using my own reiatsu reserves." Kazura thought back to all of the times, of which there were many, that he had pushed too hard and broke the Soul bonding process, causing an awful soulless goop... He shuddered only very slightly and continued talking. "That is a double edged sword as it takes a spiritually inclined individual to be able to get good results out of the Lacrima, but it also can be a boon if one is strong in an area such as my own vast reserves. I may not have the sharpest well, but it's deep, if you know what I mean."

When Raph was done examining the device, Kazura stepped back towards the Fabricating equipment to create the CPU for the circuits. It was a mostly automated process, but needed Kazura's input in key places. The transistors for the CPU had to be smaller than could potentially be made by a 3D printer or the like if it wanted to keep up with the requirements for being a Smart Watch on its own, much less the requirements of being a spiritual circuit. Kazura took a pre-fabricated disk of Lacrima, pure as can be, and used Soul Command to remove any impurities from its surface. All dust, residue, water, anything. It had to be perfect.

A light was projected onto the disk that etched the required nanometer sized grooves for the transistors. Kazura had to soften the Lacrima with Soul Command again in order to allow the etching to take place. Too soft, and it would melt. Too firm, and the light couldn't etch it. Too loose a grip, and the etching wouldn't stick and would droop into the holes. Too strong a grip, and the light would simply be repelled... It just had to be perfect, and it was a process Kazura hadn't done enough to be perfect at it.

Still, he learned quick. It was easy enough to recalibrate the machine and Soul Command the Lacrima into a flat surface again and try anew. After a few tries, the Lacrima was engraved enough to be ready for the transistor components. This would be the most time consuming part, as he would alternate metal with liquid Lacrima every other hole. That would allow it to channel electricity and reiatsu both. This was a mostly mindless part, mostly automated in terms of the metal parts, so Kazura had plenty of time to chat with Raph about anything while this was going on. He raised his head from the work and nodded towards Raph, tired and with a bead of sweat dripping down his forehead, but non-verbally acknowledging the ability to talk now.

[Raphael Laurent]

Raphael nodded, listening as Kazura described what this component he was watching being made was for. Increased durability for better channeling of reiatsu. It was like the gods had come down and blessed Raphael. He was impressed at just how an answer to a lot of issues that he’d had in his own inventions had decided to simply drop into his lap. Making a CPU from spiritual components and then installing the circuits and channeling energy into the circuits themselves. Raphael had been right that scientific elements could easily be crafted from more mundane spiritual parts. As the saying went, “Magic is simply a science that we don’t understand.” And here it was, staring him dead in the face.

He got closer, at Kazura’s behest, and began to move his hands over what Kazura defined as the “Soul Sealing Device”. Slowly, he moved his hands over the grooves each touch something of a pattern of memorization. The methodical way that he felt the grooves, then the levers was therapeutic. It was scientific and mathematic, in a world that seemed hellbent on making it seem like said principals didn’t apply to the spiritual world at large. They did, and even quite similar to the world of the living, but there were ways for a body to utilize said energy to accomplish miraculous feats

He watched as Kazura used additional equipment to begin making the cpu to mount the circuits in. It was smaller than a 3D printer and he watched as Kazura took a pre made disk of this stuff he called Lacrima and used his soul command to remove impurities; anything that had marred its surface, including liquid, Kazura purged. As he placed it onto fabricator, Raphael watched as he began to use soul command to soften the creation, allowing a light to begin carving tiny grooves and Kazura seemed to once again be focusing to the point that he’d lost contact with the world.

Yet, as time went on, and Kazura kept at it, he was able to get it strong enough to finally be engraved correctly and ready to accept the transistor. Kazura seemed to be a bit more practiced with the next part, however, and after a few seconds, nodded to Raphael that they could speak. “So, you’re the one that made Lacrima, right? How in the world did you discover this? How long were you experimenting with it and what all have you tried to apply it to? There are…so many applications for something like this. Do you think you could pre-program like soul command into it?” The dam had broken and the questions were beginning to flow and, fortunately or unfortunately, Raphael wouldn’t be able to stop it now.

[Kazura Uzaki]

Raphael asked good questions. Questions that Kazura was ready to answer easily. "Yes, I discovered and created this crystal matrix. It came from a good portion of study." Kazura held a hand up and started generating raw reiatsu in his hand forming a shimmering liquid-like substance floating above his palm. "It started with learning to Trace items to explore their inner workings and spiritual enchantments. With a mixture of Soul Command, Energy Generate, and high enough mental processing power, I can direct my mind into things to find out how they work." The "liquid" started moving around in his hand upon command before being absorbed back into his body.

Kazura thought back at what had led him to the creation of Lacrima. "It started by Tracing a gift, an orb of sorts that when broken released raw reiatsu into the air to be used immediately or lost." That had been a gift from Taien Hadohou, a curious Shinigami who was very helpful, but then was never seen again. "Then I Traced a Mod Soul named Jem to explore how the Shinigami had made and programmed him. That was eye opening, for sure." Kazura hazily remembered the time stuck inside Jem's consciousness, but he had made it out with enough knowledge to create the crystal structure known as Lacrima from the two combined.

"The rest just kind of fell into place from hard work and trial and error. My work with it has been extremely limited, as for the longest time I was forcing the Soul in too hard and causing it to fail to bond. It would just turn into this awful black goop." He shuddered at the thought of that. Multiple times he had forced himself to the point of passing out from creating too much too quickly, well, failing to create too much too quickly. "As for pre-programming it, I'm not sure I've thought about that. Maybe in using a strong enough elemental soul it could do a single Command, but more than that would require... a lot."

Kazura moved his sleeve up his arm slightly to reveal a tattoo on his upper arm. It was a single black mark, shaped into the image of a broken mask. A glowing circle started to grow from beneath Kazura's feet as he channeled the ritual of the Black Mark Seal to Unseal the item that had been etched into his skin. The circle retracted back into Kazura's body and in his hands was a white bone mask. The Mask of a Hollow. "I can't keep it out too long or it might destabilize. But if that stone I used on the Reiatsu Circuits was effectively the baseline Grade 1 of a soul, this Hollow Mask would have about double the elemental soul energies, so I label it Grade 2."

"With this, a Lacrima enchantment has a greatly increased amount of power. Enough to create something impressively durable, or something similarly impressive in Rock-qualities or Earthen-production. It might even be able to generate steel from an enchantment using this Mask, but it might require something even stronger, I'm not yet sure." Kazura had yet to use something like that in his crafting, but he was convinced that it would take collecting "trophies" from fallen enemies of Humanity if he was to achieve better Humanity-protecting creations. He didn't yet show Raph the tattoo on his back.

The tattoo of the Beast Clansman Ant King's full corpse.

[Raphael Laurent]

It had been a thing that Kazura had learned and developed himself! That only made Raphael all the more intrigued and excited as he listened. This was an entirely new discipline, forged specifically by a human in the last few years! The simple things that he was seeing were fascinating to behold and the very fact that it offered some kind of ability to forge things that could contain spiritual powers. The applications for this were frightening, and at the same time exciting, there were multiple different things that could be done with something like this. For the first time since getting his abilities, Raphael felt like there was truly a way to make humans even more feared.

He did not voice these, though, and instead listened to Kazura intently as the man explained about two of such abilities: a way to trace items as well as something that he called Energy Generate. Raphael made a mental note of both. He’d need to ask about them later. Never could know too much. This trace, however, intrigued him the most and he began to wonder if it was something that anyone was capable of learning or if it was unique to his boss. He hoped the latter, but if it was then he would simply have to use the tried and true take it apart method.

Raphael’s head tilted a bit in thought. An orb that released reiatsu when broken? That was a fascinating invention, though if brought by a Shinigami, then it was probably something that could only be acquired in their world. But…that second one felt a bit more concerning. While Raphael couldn’t exactly say that he wouldn’t have done something similar, cuz he definitely would’ve, given the chance, the thought of doing something like that felt invasive. “That’s fascinating! I’ve always wondered how they work, given the way that they were made. If you’ve got any notes on specific insights you gleaned, I would love to see them.”

Hard work and the scientific method. That seemed about right… “I see, I see… So it’s as much an art as it is a science. It must be handled in a certain way or it just dissociates and falls apart.” Raphael nodded, in appreciation, as Kazura noted that he hadn’t thought much about setting in pre-programmed commands, or at least attempting it, with his lacrima. When the other man stated that it would take a lot, Raph couldn’t help but think to himself about how much energy it might take to do some of the things that he was considering and what would happen if he tried them.

That was when Kazura revealed a tattoo, a black mark shaped like almost like a broken mask. A circle began to grow from Kazura and Raphael took a few steps back, unsure of what was quite going on. When it finally vanished Raphael saw a hollow mask in Kazura’s hands. He explained that it couldn’t be out long but went on to explain how the different properties worked and that different objects had differently empowered souls, which the man had labelled appropriately a grade one and two.

But… “I see… Though you generated the mask from a tattoo on your arm. Is that another technique or something else? I’m going to guess that you use it to store things that otherwise might dissipate, correct?” He shook the unease off and decided to redirect the questioning. Reaching into his coat pocket, he pulled out the trophy he’d been given by his uncle: his brother Brian’s quincy cross. It bristled with energy as he held it out towards Kazura. “What about this? Do you think it would have any kind of, uh, properties? Kinda like the mask you were talking about?”