A World Without You[Hiroe][Open?]

Bloodied fingers gripped tightly around a hilt. A lone woman stood in a sea of bodies. Unfamiliar violence. An unsteady will. A vehement rage boiling beneath the surface. What could she have done better? Was this her penance now? To be left behind? Isolated inside her thoughts with no one to talk to? None of her teachers were here to impart their wisdom. Hana was gone. Kaito was gone. Ajora was gone. She was alone. Unequivocally so.

Furthermore, she stepped through the ruins of what was once a proud district in the Rukongai. Did her parents survive? Where were they? With each third-rate hollow she cut down, she continued to navigate and explore the ruins. Step after bloody step, one slash turned into another, and so forth. The sound of cold steel, the rent flesh, a pool of blood. At some point, the bodies were no longer hollow.

Since the Gotei was in disarray, criminals of variable ranks had grown bold, pillaging and robbing whatever was left behind in the catastrophic event --- in the piles of rubble and ruin she once called home. Those weaker than them were forced to listen. Nothing was off limits now. She once approached this act with a sort of heroism, some delusional fantasy wrapped within a gift box of self-serving dreams. Visions of flame roared back to memory. A crimson visage mocking her in its departure.

The defeated expression of a man who once sang her praises, who applauded her regardless of success or failure. What was his name? Did she truly believe she could perish the memory? Would she be judged for it? He was gone now. No one would remember him. His loved ones died in the flames. Did he have any other friends? All it took was one day to change everything. And now, she questioned if she would even survive the unwavering guilt blossoming in her heart, or the murderous rage that had been building in her heart.

"Kaito. That's right. That's his name. Don't forget it. Imprint it on your memory. I want it to hurt."

That's right. It needed to hurt. Otherwise, this would all be for nothing.

An eye for an eye. A tooth for a tooth. Blood for blood. There was nothing to lament. This was the aftermath of the invasion. Madness given physical form. A madness she no longer felt afraid of embracing. As long as her wrists kept moving, as long as she could still walk, she would cut any opposition she could handle down. Perhaps this was the true representation of her dream. A soldier's duty without any pleasantry.

If only she'd realized that sooner...

"No."

The response came as quickly as he posed the question. it wasn't a familiar voice, and it didn't register. She gazed straight ahead as she took a moment to register the damage to her fingers. Not good. She could tell the wear and tear on her hands was building up, but she didn't pay it any mind before, and certainly didn't pay it any mind now. Another hollow bolted forward, another flash of the sword followed. A clean and precise cut at its mask. Ruthlessly efficient. Good. Paying no mind to the young man, she continued marching ahead. What would she find? Another criminal? Another hollow? She needed to continue cutting something, to carry out her job.

"Hiroe Miyashiro."

Once again, she provided a terse answer. There wasn't any particular emotion to her tone, either. What did he want? Did he need something? If not, she would move past him and handle her duty. Nothing more, nothing less. A second wasted here could be a second used to kill any remaining enemies that still occupied the area.

"Do you need anything?"

"Hello, Kohaku."

Hiroe didn't intend on speaking to this man beyond the introduction, yet he seemed quite persistent so far. The moment he inquired about losing someone. Hiroe paused for a moment, biting into her lip, hard enough to draw blood. Of course, she lost someone. She'd lost plenty of people. And she knew she deserved every minute of her current torment.

"Yep. I did. He's gone now."

That was the truth of it. The simple truth. He was gone now. She didn't know where he was. For all she knew, he could be dead.

"Why?"

For a moment, Hiroe considered his option. It would've been a way of dampening the bitterness of her current state of mind. She wouldn't be alone, but this felt incorrect. He wasn't familiar. For all she knew, this could be an attempt at showing pity. She didn't need pity. She needed to bleed. She needed to kill. There was still a mission to complete. If she died, she died. There was nothing more to it. She'd simply be another memory in a sea of many. Another soul who died in this same place without realizing their full potential.

"We're strangers. What does it matter to you if I live or die?"