Swords And Fists Filled With Resolve [Erika, Shaoling]

While she hated to be back here so soon there was a scar on her honour at the news that Murasaki had succeeded in getting Kisuke Urahara to resume captaincy where she had failed. Even if there was nothing wrong with her failing in such a difficult task there was a personal feeling of failure in her position and while she could settle into old ways and become disheartened by her failues.

Succumb to them again and let them eat away at her person until she inevitably resigned from her position again to become a wandering sword without a purpose there was just one thing that though.

She refused to be that person again.

So back she was again to the Urahara Shop and this time in search for the other former Gotei Captain.

"I'd like to see Sui-Feng, if that's possible."

She informed the goliath of a shopkeeper.

Shaoling might not have cared to admit it to anyone, but there was something genuinely pleasant about the life she'd settled into here at the Urahara Shop. Training, improvement, guiding Yuujin toward greater heights, that was certainly enough for her not to feel as though she'd become without purpose.

However, she would be lying if she said that Urahara having returned to the Gotei did not fill her with a certain sense of ire. Not necessarily betrayal, but it was something close, something similar. Sure, he'd been justified in going. Her anger toward the Gotei wasn't anything attached to his. It was her own problem, and as she heard a familiar voice asking for a name she no longer cared for, Shaoling stepped downstairs, her gaze stern, hard, but not outright hostile.

"There is no one here by that name."

She had, after all, thrown it away. If the Gotei wished to ask for Sui Feng, there would never be an answer.

Her golden gaze moved to the new figure, reaching up to move the cap and give her a better look. Yep, that was Sui-Feng. Her stance shifted a bit to become a bit more relaxed now that she felt she had overcome one of the hurdles to even see the woman herself.

"Is that so?"

Leaving the rhetorical question to hang in the air for just a moment before she continued her spiel.

"What happened to her then? I never learned what became of her after I abandoned the Gotei."

She asked, genuinely curious as to why someone as dedicated and loyal as Sui-Feng would leave in the first place.

"There was no place for her in the Soul Society. The previous Captain Commander destroyed the Onmitsukido, and the Shihoin family became a mockery of itself. To stay there would have been a disgrace to her own dignity."

Shaoling spoke frankly, her voice plain and even, without any of the bitterness she still held toward what had happened. After all, she was a professional, and she represented the shop they currently stood in. Even if it was something far smaller than her previous life, it was still her sworn position.

"Sui Feng is a dead woman. You speak to Shaoling."

"Captains... They can be a bit of a handful."

She said, not bothered to specify Captain Commanders. Erika did resonate with it and far more than she wanted to admit which made her scowl a little bit at the old wound that made her stance a little more guarded.

"I felt the same when I spent so much time pouring all of my devotion to others only for everything to be paid back in abandonment and betrayal, so is that what drove you as well? Others? What of the achievements of Shaoling herself? It took me a while to take pride in my own work when I had viewed it all as for another person."

"My achievements are my own, regardless of whether they were done in the service of the Shihoin or the Gotei. Chaining myself to them, serving dutifully without a second thought, only made me weak."

Shaoling understood quite well what it was that Erika was saying, however. She certainly remembered Erika's time in the Gotei, and had considered her a more than respectable shinigami. She wasn't nearly so needlessly arrogant as to think that no one could understand her position now. She simply didn't assume anyone would, either.

"I take pride in everything I did. I don't think anyone else could have done it, either, and I'm confident in that. But I'm also confident that I can accomplish far more without them."

"So what are you accomplishing by your current situation? You're a delivery girl now, yeah? The Captain Feng I served in the Gotei 13 all those years ago would've remained steadfast in her position and adapt to overcome, all struggles to grow to further improvement, she'd have admonished me for leaving after Tsu disappeared and not finding a way to adapt like you did when you were left behind, right?"

Erika's words could've been taken as mocking, maybe the woman in front of her would've taken them as such... Not this woman though, the Sui-Feng she knew would no doubt have become enraged at such things being implied to her

If they were aimed as an insult though then they were a double-edged sentiment at herself. What had she accomplished when she left the Gotei? Nothing but an empty life of selling her abilities for hollow pursuits, living a shadow of her former self where she wasn't satisfied.

Even if it was wrong to interrogate Shaoling like this, Erika's was only so direct because that's the type of person Sui-Feng was and irregardless of how this woman felt about who she was now. She wanted to know what changed and why she changed, and she was willing to be a little rough in her venture to speak to the woman that she had known.

"The Captain Feng you served in the Gotei 13 wasn't half the woman that I, Shaoling, now am. Do you think it was strength to stay, letting my worth and my works be decided by those I served? Those who would just as quickly discard everything I put forward?"

Despite her efforts, her confidence in herself, her pride was still so intense that she could not let an insult like that pass unaddressed. Shaoling had typically thought well of Erika, and that was the only reason that she stayed her hand from attacking immediately.

"Tell me, Erika. What do you think is stronger? Following a path, or making one?"

While she'd avoided lashing out, she still wasn't such a self-restrained woman that she could entirely hide the tensing of her hands, the faint irritation edging into her body. How irritating.

"Eh?"

She was remaining remarkably confident and level-headed for the sensitive topics that were being spoken about. The vice-captain did ponder the question but not for too long, being indecisive was a habit she wanted to get rid of in her own personal matters.

"Making one obviously but I wonder, when were you ever following a path? Did Shaoling become Sui-Feng to follow or did she make that life as Sui-Feng? If Sui-Feng followed a path then why was she ever the leader of the onmitsukido in the first place - a position that was the ancestral seat of the Shihoin? Why wasn't it Yuushiro Shihoin or any others but you?"

Erika pouted when she said that, biting her lip before daring to say the next line which made her wonder if it was a little too far close to the line that provoked her. She said it anyway though because somethings needed to be said and she felt this was one of them because if anything she was able to convey these thoughts to herself and reflect on them.

"I think Sui-Feng made a very respectible path and when it was taken away, when enough obstacles wore her down she gave up on that path."

"Gave up?"

Shaoling's eyes narrowed, a scowl cutting its way across her face as her hand tightened into a more solid fist. She knew that Erika was walking the line, and that she must have been aware of it. But for a woman like Shaoling, for whom her pride was everything, it would have been cowardice not to address a slight like that. Her fist shot forward, and though she didn't strike Erika, the Eikyuukaiten Shunko accelerated for just long enough that a shearing wind shot past her and out the front door, before slowing and becoming silent once more.

"The path she made was always in the shadow of others. Always chasing those who came before, and striving to match them. But the day came that the path was gone, that those she'd chased were far behind her."

She stepped past Erika, her speed certainly not dulled in the slightest, and into the outside, her disdain only becoming more apparent in both her expression and her mannerisms. If Erika wished to test her patience, then by all means, she was welcome to do so.

"And now, here I am. Carving a path of my own, chasing no one but my own ambitions. If the Shihoin had been competent, I would never have needed to lead the Onmitsukido. But their incompetence saved them from the shame of leading it to its dissolution. The Captain Feng you knew would have cut her stomach at such a disgrace. But I, Shaoling, walk forward."