Serious Shinigami Shenanigans

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A young girl with pale brown hair tied in a ponytail, wandered down the hallway of the Shin'ō Academy (or as the locals called it: the Shinigami Academy) in her white and red uniform. Her destination was the board upon which the school posted important messages and information. She was incredibly nervous. After taking the entrance exam for the academy, she was about to find out whether or not she had gained a place at the school.

With the board finally in sight, Kiyomi stopped walking all of a sudden. She couldn't quite see anything that was written, but her nerves seemed to have gotten the better of her. What if she didn't get a high enough score? What if she would have to wait to retry the entrance exam? She was never this nervous about anything and it felt unnatural to her. But her mind focused on one thing; if she didn't get into the academy, what if she hurt her friend again?

As these thoughts crept into her already nervous mind, a group of other students wandered past her, evidently headed for the board. Kiyomi stood for a moment and watched, waiting to see what their results were. Judging from the large smiles that were passed around the group shortly after, they had succeeded. With a small sigh, Kiyomi closed her eyes, still standing in the middle of the hall.
"Alright, pull yourself together Kiyomi," she thought to herself, trying to pluck up the courage to move forward, "You'll never find out how you did if you just stand here."

Opening her teal blue eyes and nervously twisting a hand through her wavy, pale-brown ponytail, she took a few steps forward until she was stood in front of the large board. Glancing at it, she scanned all of the pinned up papers, looking for the correct one. Finding the list of students who had taken the exam, she scanned down it for her name:

Shiratori Kiyomi.... Pass

All of her former nervousness evaporated instantly and a wide grin spread over her face as she read the result. The sheet neglected to mention scores, possibly out of respect for those students who had failed, however Kiyomi didn't really care. She had passed!
There was a small note pinned to the entrance exam results telling everyone who had passed to find their name on one of the class lists and prepare for their first lessons. Nodding to herself, Kiyomi began to scan each of the lists, looking for the class she had been put into.

On this story moves to where the two shinigami receive their teachings in Hakuda, Hand-to-Hand Combat. As the groups moved on, the souls were now forced to participate, and pairing after pairing ended in someone's miserable failure. Rake was happy that he was not paired with the big student he shared his Kido class with, though ever since the large student had been glaring at him menacingly. He began to wonder just what was going through the student's mind the wasn't ripping him limb from limb. He was snapped back to reality when the teacher announced that they had paired Kiyomi with Rake...today was not his day.

Kiyomi promptly stood up when her name was called and grinned menacingly when she was paired with Rakeshisu. She wondered how he was at Hakuda now... after all he suddenly excelled at Kido, perhaps he'd be a good opponent in this class too.
"So how about it Keshi? Want to take the first move?" she challenged, a glint of amusement in her teal eyes. It was as if she became a different person all of a sudden as she challenged him, determined to beat the taller individual in this as she couldn't at Kido.

Rake sighed in depression, even with his improvements he was still not so good at Hakuda. He knew he was going to get beaten, and wondered just when the heck Karma was going to give him a break. He decided to at least try and give her a run for her money. Rakeshisu ignored the comment about being a Keishi, since she was probably just trying to get him riled up and attack foolishly.
"They usually say ladies first, but i'm just not that kind of guy."
He gave her a bit of a testing jab, trying to measure her agility and reaction time.

(I have no knowledge in Hakuda...)

(Nor me. It's supposedly a mixture of a bunch of martial arts so yea just run with it I guess |D)

Kiyomi quickly blocked the jab with her arms before retaliating with a swift kick to Rakeshisu's upper body. She was remarkably agile and flexible for how small she appeared, but decided to at least give Rake a chance to make another move; the kick being little more than a light tap.
"C'mon Keshi, you can do better than that," she grinned.

Rakeshisu ignored the comment about being called an eraser once more, and decided to give the girl a kick of his own, except he meant to swipe her legs out from under her. He moved his leg in a sweeping arc as he attempted to knock the girl off her feet. He was quick himself, but not THAT quick. He attempted to block any attack that came near him, hoping he was not looking like a COMPLETE and total fool in front of his class mates.

Kiyomi neatly hopped over Rakeshisu's leg as he attempted to knock her off her feet. She then dodged around him, attempting to get behind her classmate so that she could launch a spin kick at his back. She was smaller than Rake and knew that she was most skilled at using kicks. With punches being especially ineffective on those bigger or bulkier than her, she avoided using her hands and arms unless it was to block.

Rake was surprised by the kick, but had known an attack was coming and that he was too slow to stop it. The kick knocked him onto the ground and he sighed, "F**k it, you win."
He despised giving in to Kiyomi, but he just didn't enjoy Hakuda or had much spirit for it. He preferred attacking from some kind of distance, instead of being face to face. At a distance, even at some kind of distance, he had more time to react, and the danger of being hit was low.

"Tch. Even you could do better than that, Keshi," frowned Kiyomi quietly. She relaxed her pose as her opponent yielded and grabbed Rakeshisu's arm, promptly pulling him to his feet.
"We need to talk," she blinked quietly, her voice barely more than a whisper so that the rest of the class would not hear. She then wandered over and took a seat near the edge of the classroom whilst the next pair were called up to spar in front of the class.

Rake followed Kiyomi despite her remark, replying with, "I'm not Keishi, and I loathe close combat, what do you expect to happen?"
He followed her near the seating area, "So, what did you want to talk about?" he grumbled.

"I asked around for information earlier, despite you chickening out like that," she replied, deciding not to antagonise Rakeshisu further by continuing to talk about Hakuda. Personally Kiyomi had always thought it best to have a second way to fight, just in case something ever happened to seperate you from your blade.
"I found someone who was not attacked and had time to focus on their surroundings. They sensed a foreign reiryoku too, but not just in one place. They sensed it at regular intervals, spread all over the city as if being used to bait the hollows into appearing," she explained, keeping quiet just in case anyone decided to try and eavesdrop.

"Call me another name and see what happens," Rake mumbled too low for anyone to even here, even Kiyomi. He watched the two new sparring students on the platform, "So, who is it? Got a plan in mind?"
Rake would make his own suggestions, but his "cowardice" was too busy saving his hide from the crazy muscle man, who was STILL glaring at Rake, making him uncomfortable. He began to wonder if the student was planning on jumping him once they go to rest....he guessed he would have to sleep with one eye open from the look on his face.

"I... don't know," she replied, a nervous half-smile, "All I know is that there were four sixth year acting-instructors there at the time and a bunch of students and I don't even know where to go from here," she sighed, leaning back against the wall as if in defeat, "It could have been a sixth year or it could have been someone else. Unless I can test everyone's reiryoku against my memory of the reiryoku from that night, we've hit a dead end, already." she frowned, "We need a new angle."

"Wait...four? There was five weren't there?" Rake asked. He had counted five instructors during the trip, why had Kiyomi said four? He looked to Kiyomi in confusion. Was she just not paying attention? The students in the ring climbed off as the next pair climbed on, one was the burly student that had been glaring at Rake this entire time. Rake felt his gaze still on him and shivered a bit, he glanced back to see the student's expression pretty much say "This is what i'm going to do TO YOU" and begin to beat the living day lights out of his unfortunate partner....

Kiyomi blinked, "I only sensed four instructors both before and after the incident. You could tell who they were because their spirit energy was stronger than any of our class...." she paused, teal eyes widening as she thought back in an attempt to support Rakeshisu's correction.
"But... you're right. When we passed through the senkaimon there were definitely five older students waiting for us and giving out instructions.... but that must mean one of them was hiding their reiryoku the entire time."
This might be just the new lead they needed! What reason would a student have to hide their spiritual presence if not to avoid bringing attention to themselves? This mystery fifth instructor could be the one who attracted the hollows to the area in the first place, and thus by association, the murderer of Tora and Yujin.

"Do you know which one it was? Did they come with us back to the academy?" Rake could not remember much of that day, other than the part where the hollows had attacked. He kept himself from being dragged back into the pit of depression that had formed within him when Toraburu had died. If they had remembered who had been there before the trip, and who was there after the trip, then they would be able to snag their guy. There must have been a reason for them to cause the hollows to appear, and if they did it once it would probably happen again...