#bleach remake

I’m actually a little divisive with this.

I wanted to add in a concept of mine that…I guess could be considered a level 4 headcanon according to this post ^^.

Though, to be honest, with how the Bleach story and lore is, I wouldn’t be surprised if some headcanons probably fall into level 4.

Also…this is probably my longest post for the remakes, yet. (6 pages in Google Doc; SCREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE-)

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Entering Hueco Mundo

Virtually the same as canon.

Though…maybe add another guard along with Demoura and Aisslinger for someone Ichigo could fight.

And then, they meet Nel and her brothers before later when Renji and Rukia reunite with the boys to rescue Orihime.

Also, the trek to Las Noches takes about a few days.

The Menos Forest

I honestly like this mini-arc. I’d say this could happen on the second day.

Ashido is still present, but along with a new character, a mysterious and strange-looking Arrancar woman. She was dressed in a dark, flowing and tattered ballerina outfit with a single-horned deer/dragon-like skull mask covering her right eye and the right side of her head. Her left eye is a deep green sclera with a crescent moon shaped pupil, her skin looked gray with a hint of green, and her flat bob hair is a platinum blonde with a deep green underside.

Her name is Grisgri.

Rukia would meet Ashido and try to help him while Ichigo and the rest meet Grisgri on their search for Rukia.

They would be suspicious of Grisgri, especially since her green accents and expressionlessness reminds them of Ulquiorra. However, they figured she wasn’t an Espada or even a Fraccion, as she lacked a Zanpakuto.

At the end of this, Ashido remains in the Menos Forest with Grisgri, the two having formed an alliance.

Before the rescue team leaves the Forest, Grisgri hands Rukia an ornate mirror, considering her trustworthy enough to have use for it. When asked why, Grisgri merely says ‘To return clarity’.

Battle in Las Noches (or a similar location)

Okay. This is where things get screwy for me as I try to figure out how this could go down without the Gotei 13 taking center stage.

The group makes it to Las Noches after about a day and they enter.

They (including Nel and her brothers) initially stuck together, since their goal was to get Orihime and get out, until they got separated into three groups because of Szayelaporro’s meddling.

Both Chad and Rukia face off against Aaronierro and it is here where Rukia accidentally uses the mirror to ‘blind’ Aaronierro and they are able to kill him.

Just like canon, Renji and Uryū face off against Szayelaporro. He does not leave just to change his clothes after he got Sprengered by Uryū and instead, after he gets hurt by Uryū’s attack, goes into his Resurreccion. He does his voodoo crap and it is here that Uryū uses his ability (his Können: Threads of Fate) to reverse his condition onto Szayelaporro once he was able to attach a spirit thread. Not understanding what he did, Szayelaporro would try to break more of Uryū’s bones and organs, only for Uryū’s to redirect the damage onto Szayel. I’m honestly unsure if Szayel would continue to do this, given that it's clear that it’ll bite him in the butt, but considering that he kept trying to kill Mayuri with his voodoo despite it clearly not working shows that, when pissed and confused, Szayel would forgo rational thinking and give in to anger. He does try to kill Uryū by crushing his heart. But, again, this gets reversed.

And in his dying breath, Szayel hints that something has happened to Orihime. Already exhausted from using his ability, Uryū would then use it to ‘take’ Renji’s injuries so he could continue to fight. This causes Uryū to lose consciousness and Renji carries him.

Ichigo winds up fighting Zommari. Ichigo is pretty fast (at least in Bankai) and I can see that once Zommari tries to take control of Ichigo, his Hollow side would start showing up. You know at the end of the fight, Ichigo would be more cautious over what he’ll do.

Chad and Rukia and Renji and Uryū reunite and try to regroup with Ichigo.

At some point, Ichigo would be looking for any place Orihime could be held until he felt Uryū’s reiatsu drop (since Rukia wouldn’t have been gravely wounded by Aaronierro) and attempts to check what happened until Ulquiorra stops him. He tells him the same thing to rile up Ichigo and stabs him in the chest.

He would come to later, his injury healed. Nel only told him that ‘some lady’ did it. Believing it to be Orihime, Ichigo tries to continue his search, but would be stopped by Grimmjow.

The fights with Grimmjow and Nnoitra would still happen because of their importance to Ichigo and Nel’s story.

With Rukia keeping an eye on the still unconscious Uryū and injured Nel, Chad and Renji would help Ichigo against Nnoitra and Tesla.

And, honestly, I couldn’t think how anyone could beat Nnoitra except Kenpachi. So, at this point, Kenpachi and Byakuya were sent mostly to get the group out, regardless if they had managed to save Orihime or not. Byakuya makes quick work of Tesla and, of course, Kenpachi fights Nnoitra.

During the fight, a mysterious Arrancar(?) girl in a cloak appears and takes Ichigo up to a tall tower. Rukia would follow behind while Byakuya uses kaido (since, I can imagine most captains can use kaido; the only one who doesn’t would be Kenpachi) on the others.

(Note: I totally forgot about Rudbornne and the Exequias XD. So, I guess Kenpachi and Byakuya will be busy with them for a while.)

Ichigo wakes to realize that he’s being healed under Orihime’s Shun Shun Rikka.

After all of this, he sees Orihime. And she is wearing an Arrancar mask.

Twisted Princess

And this is where things get interesting.

A lot of people felt that Orihime should’ve been made into an Arrancar or something due to the line that hinted that something about her has changed. Me, I never thought of it that way, only that it was an odd line to say.

Buuuuuuuut…I liked what I was able to cook up.

So, things are relatively still the same (with some slight differences), until Orihime makes her declaration that she would reject the Hogyoku out of existence. Now, this was where I was disappointed that nothing came of it. Here, she will act upon it, to show that she is capable and that she can help Ichigo.

I’d still want Loly and Menoly to be part of this, due to what will happen later as I think Loly was meant to be a reflection of Orihime.

So, for the next couple of days, Orihime actually tries to figure out how to get to the room the Hogyoku was in. By some luck, Ulquiorra gets called away to deal with something and Orihime uses this opportunity to get out and retrace her steps back to the room where the Hogyoku resided.

And either it’s not there anymore or she was unable to ‘reject’ its existence (at least she tried!).

Whatever happens, Szayel (obviously, before his fight with Uryū and Renji) is there to take her to his lab for an experiment, requested by Aizen. 

I can see that Aizen was fully aware of her love/infatuation/obsession with Ichigo (how? Idk. Maybe he had spies in the form of tiny Hollows or something) and he decided to use that against Orihime and to further fuck with Ichigo.

And that experiment involved a peculiar Arrancar mask that was found (by someone. Don’t know who). It had a strange property that Szayel wanted to study: that it seemed…parasitic. Like it had a life of its own.

And Orihime was his test subject.

The mask was placed on the left side of her face and it slowly (there’s a reason why I wanted the groups’ trek towards Las Noches to take days) started to grow and take over, twisting her personality.

Rukia vs Orihime

It’s not much of a fight, honestly. It’s more of Orihime ‘protecting’ Ichigo from Rukia and acting like an entitled princess or spoiled brat.

Important Note: While the Arrancar mask is the reason she’s acting this way, it only amplifies already existing negative traits she has. It’s amplifying her love/obsession over Ichigo and her jealousy towards Rukia, making both more apparent. Whatever inhibitions she had over her negative feelings, it's gone. Once all this is over, she’s going to hold herself accountable.

Orihime will attack with Tsubaki (who she healed), but Rukia will act defensively and primarily focus on using Bakudo spells, which Orihime blocks.

Orihime would accuse Rukia of ‘stealing’ Ichigo away. She tells her how she didn’t want Ichigo to go to the Soul Society, even tried talking him out of it, in spite of it meaning Rukia’s execution would be successful. She says that she had Ichigo first. She claims Ichigo as hers and always hers.

Orihime would gush how she watched Ichigo fight for her, revealing that she had seen his various fights.

Rukia does conclude that the mask is probably responsible for this behavior and tries to figure out how to remove it and return Orihime to her senses.

And that’s when it hits Rukia to use the mirror, remembering what it did to Aaronierro. She would shine the mirror in Orihime’s face, burning the mask off of her.

With clarity returned to her, Orihime immediately starts crying and apologizing for her actions, showing her regret, remorse, guilt, and accountability.

Rukia could probably assure her that the person she being wasn’t the real her, but Orihime admits to having those feelings and feels like a monster because of it.

Even so, Rukia still hugs her. And Orihime hugs her back, crying her eyes out.

Ichigo vs Ulquiorra, Uryū vs Yammy, Orihime and Rukia vs Loly and Menoly

Yeah. Yeah. Same as canon and I liked the extended fight with Uryū and Yammy in the OG anime.

But the girls…here we go!

So…Loly. Loly, Loly, Loly…

I hated her…yet I like how she is everything Orihime hated about herself. And now that I have this in mind, I wish that their final encounter was Orihime actually standing up for herself.

So, Loly and Menoly are still in the narrative to act as not just a reflection of Orihime (in Loly’s case), but also as a comparison to Orihime and Rukia’s dynamic.

In their first encounter, Loly and Menoly did their usual bitchiness at Orihime until Ulquiorra came in to stop them.

Second encounter, when Orihime is on her way to the throne room. Since it is Aizen’s room, that pisses off Loly and Menoly even more and proceeds to beat her up until Grimmjow comes around and stops them (sorta like he did in canon) as a way to return his debt to Orihime for healing his arm. And, of course, Orihime heals them and leaves for the throne room.

In their third encounter, Orihime has the mask on, but has yet to be completely taken over by it. Loly and Menoly would antagonize her even more and that’s what fully triggers the take over. With her twisted behavior, she puts Loly in her place.

Now, Aizen no longer sees use in Orihime and the mask is gone, Loly and Menoly will confront Orihime one last time. Rukia would protect her and Loly would call her Orihime’s slave, mocking how Orihime is so pampered that she has others fight for her. Unlike Loly.

At some point, Loly and Menoly would go into their Resurreccion (I have no idea what Menoly’s could be).

Tired of Loly’s words, Orihime would help Rukia in the fight. She doesn’t have the will to fight with Tsubaki (considering what she went through), but she would use her shields to protect Loly’s poisonous strikes.

It’s here where Yammy appears and takes Loly and Menoly out and tries to attack Orihime and Rukia until Uryū arrives.

Byakuya and Kenpachi vs Yammy

I know that a lot of people hated Yammy, be it him being the Zero Espada and his overall character. I will say that, in terms of character…I honestly don’t care. Let him be a brute. Also, a lot of people sorta downplay the damage he had done to Kenpachi and Byakuya and among other things.

Here’s a post from reddit that talks about this.

I will say that him being the Zero Espada is…unnecessary. Cuz, if he’s gaining strength from his anger/rage, that and his Resurreccion probably enough. He didn’t need to have a twist.

During Ichigo and Ulquiorra’s fight above Las Noches (or whatever new location), Renji and Chad assist Byakuya and Kenpachi against Rudbornne and his army until Yammy reappears and goes into his Resurreccion.

Byakuya would have Renji and Chad regroup with the others so he and Kenpachi could deal with Yammy.

I will say that the guy should not be defeated offscreen.

More Witnesses, More Trauma

What this means is that Uryū and Orihime would not be the only witnesses to Ulquiorra killing Ichigo and Ichigo’s full Hollow form. Renji, Rukia, and Chad would also be there.

The strategy here would be Rukia guarding Orihime so she try to heal Ichigo while the boys distract Ulquiorra.

Of course, even with Renji and Chad joining the fray…it still does nothing to Ulquiorra and they suffer some major injuries.

All of this would deepen Orihime's guilt.

And then, they'll witness Ichigo going into full Hollow mode and rip into Ulquiorra. And when Ichigo stabs Uryū, Rukia does attempt to use the mirror again, but it does nothing. She still stands her ground to protect Uryū, even as Ichigo charges up a Cero.

And then Ulquiorra stops him and the rest plays out as in canon.

Going Home, Shaken

Everyone returns home, though Byakuya requests Rukia and Renji to stay at Urahara's for the time being.

In fact, no one is up for going to their respective homes at the moment and rather stayed at the candy store to heal up, decompress…and be together.

‘In All, But Blood’

Father, sensei, commander. Sons, disciples, captains. Brothers by soul, brothers in arms, brothers in hearts. Best friends, partners, lovers.

The three whose souls are inexplicably linked. Since the dawn of souls.

Find it now, on Archive of Our Own. 

For the most part, this arc is largely unchanged except for the later half when Uryū is introduced…because, of course.

As I was typing this down, I realized how much of a clutter mess it was becoming, so I’m gonna try and make these into sections.

A Change to Rukia’s Backstory

I’m actually in the middle of writing a fic revolving around my change for Rukia and Byakuya’s backstory and it involves this minor moment after Rukia, Ichigo, and his family return home:

Rukia had a mother instead of an older sister and lived with her in the Rukongai and she decides to share this with Ichigo, as a means to let him know that she understands what loss is like. Yes, there’s Kaien, but that one is still too painful for her to deal with and she lost her mother when she was quite young, so she was more mentally prepared to tell this story..

An Alternate Take on Soul-Docking

I think Ichigo finally learns of Uryū’s existence in mid-July, so it's been nearly a month since Memories in the Rain. I’m…kinda surprised it took Uryū this long to do anything.

In this new continuity, Uryū’s confrontation happens a little earlier, maybe a week after Ichigo faced Grand Fisher. There’s a reason for this and I’ll get to it eventually.

The contest still goes on as normal until the fight against the Gillian and Ichigo and Uryū Soul-Docking…get your mind outta the gutter for this LeeCracks. I see you. XD

Originally, this occurs when Uryū places a hand on Ichigo’s sword (shut up) and because of his nature as a Quincy, he winds up absorbing Ichigo’s immense spiritual energy.

This time, its not the only thing that happens.

At the same time, Ichigo gets bombarded with immense energy as well. Like something was forcing its way in. It made him feel colder too.

And you learn why soon enough.

After the initial shock of the pair experiencing this power boost, they use this to fight Gillian and a larger horde of Hollows. In the end, the pair manages to gravely wound the Gillian. Not enough to kill it, but it's more damaged than in proper canon, having a gapping burn hole (since its a Gillian, one shot doesn’t kill it) and an ice-encrusted gash.

Keep in mind that Ichigo has been using Sode no Shirayuki in all of this arc XD

The Gillian returns to Hueco Mundo, leaving behind a reishi-based distortion. Which will get taken care of later by someone else.

I’m basically building up a lot here and hopefully it comes together nicely…as nicely it can get from how I’m writing this.

Ichigo and Uryū, as the high from the power boost simmers down, the power surge goes out of control and they experience an overload. It won’t be until Kisuke literally slices through a spirit thread connecting the two for the whole thing to stop before any further damage is caused.

A Karakura Festival

(Edited: I’m getting rid of a lot of stuff here just so that way you have the freedom to come up with your own stuff. I still wanted an event to happen to at least give more character to the town.)

Afterwards, the same aftermath, except Renji and Byakuya had not arrived yet the next day.

Instead, some more focus on Ichigo, Rukia, and Uryū as a trio. Plus, some interesting history for Karakura Town since…well we were supposed to care for the town when Aizen wanted to sacrifice everyone there to make the Oken.

There is a festival coming up and Ichigo’s history teacher, a blonde man with a knack for spelling things backwards (who is acquainted with the girls’ PE instructor, a dark skinned woman with cat-like reflexes) *wink*wink*, would have the class do a group project centered around the festival’s history and set them up in 10 groups of 3. Ichigo, Uryū, and Rukia are put in the group.

As for what Chad and Orihime are up to, they mostly keep to themselves as they still try to comprehend their new reality.

Some down-to-earth shenanigans while the trio does stuff for the project. That is until Rukia gets an unexpected encounter: Renji.

Of What’s to Come

She would introduce Renji to Ichigo and Uryū, since Ichigo could see him in his soul form, and Uryū being a Quincy.

Throughout the event, Rukia was under the impression that Renji was there to fight a powerful Hollow, due to thinking he’s still in the 11th Division. In reality, he’s become the lieutenant of the 6th Division, who are in charge of internal affairs within the Seireitei. Essentially, a police force within Shinigami ranks. And Renji was sent to investigate Rukia’s actions.

While he was there, Rukia pretty much tries to hide the fact that Ichigo is the Substitute Shinigami and Uryū, being the smart cookie that he is, could tell that Renji was lying about his reasoning and remain suspicious of him.

During the festival events, Renji berates Rukia for even indulging in a ‘human’ activity. Rukia defends it, having fallen in love with the human way of life.

Sometime later, as the festivities quiet down, Renji decides to drop the act and tell her the real reason he was there: to arrest her and kill the human who took her powers.

He gives her a few hours to come clean, which Rukia does use as she would write her letter while Ichigo spent the remainder of the festival with his family.

From this point on, it sorta places out the same, with Byakuya meeting up with Renji to inquire why he took longer than usual. Uryū and Ichigo would try to save Rukia, but is unable to and she gets taken to the Soul Society.

Ichigo, Uryū, Orihime, and Chad would then train for their adventure into the Soul Society.

Similar to the Substitute Shinigami Arc, there isn’t much to change except for an additional fight and the change to Rukia and Byakuya’s backstory that I mentioned here.

Before the Petals Fall! Yasutora Sado vs Shūhei Hisagi! 

Yeah. Chad totally deserved another win before Shunsui and thanks to…someone I don’t remember (-_-), they felt that Shūhei would’ve been a good opponent for Chad.

I have no idea how that fight could go, but assume Chad was able to win…maybe barely. 

Kuchiki Shame, Sakura Pride

So, I’ve pretty much shared this idea before…so I’m gonna try and make this brief…maybe.

Basically, the moment Byakuya reveals to Rukia his reason for adopting her. Instead of it being him fulfilling the promise of his dead wife, it’s more of Byakuya finding his lost little sister.

In this remake, Byakuya and Rukia are half-siblings. They have the same father, Sōjun, and different mothers. Byakuya’s mother, Kohaku, was Sōjun’s betrothed from the Kasumioji clan (or a cadet branch of the Kuchiki clan) and Rukia’s mother, Tsukina, was a poor sumi-e painter who became Sōjun’s mistress sometime after meeting her in the Rukongai. Whereas Sōjun and Kohaku are only married for the sake of the clan, Sōjun fell in love with Tsukina and made the bold move to take her in as his mistress. Tsukina was a humble woman who didn’t ask for much. Her only prized possessions are her sumi-e paintings.

Despite Byakuya’s displeasure of his father’s actions, he grew fond of Tsukina, finding comfort in her that his own mother lacked. She even gifted him a sumi-e painting she made just for him. One day (about…65-ish years before Rukia meets Ichigo), Tsukina gives birth to Sōjun’s daughter, Rukia. Byakuya, a young adult in his 60s, was smitten with his little sister.

The only one who was still incensed was Kohaku. She felt threatened by Tsukina and, after Sōjun’s death, forced her to leave the estate with baby Rukia or else. With a heavy heart, Tsukina leaves with her baby without telling Byakuya goodbye. Kohaku would then lie to Byakuya about Tsukina and Rukia’s absences, wanting him to focus more on becoming the head of the family and to not make the same mistakes as his father.

Tsukina lived in the Rukongai and raised Rukia there, earning money by selling her sumi-e paintings. For the next four years, she sent letters to the Kuchiki estate, hoping to speak to Byakuya about how she and Rukia are doing. None of the letters reach Byakuya as Kohaku would have a hold of them and have a servant burn them. The servant, however, never burns them and instead keeps them somewhere safe until, one day, the servant gives Byakuya the letters. Afterwards, Byakuya would go find Tsukina and Rukia, only to learn that Tsukina had died and Rukia had moved on to another district.

Byakuya is unable to search for his sister due to his duties, but he would eventually find her 10 years later, attending Shinigami Academy. He adopted her and didn't tell her of her lineage, mostly to protect her, and had the estate not say a word either. Kohaku was furious with this decision, claiming that Byakuya would doom the clan. She would die some time later, never once changing her mind.

And you guys can get the rest.

I was fine with Byakuya and Rukia not being blood-related, but still as much as siblings as Ichigo is with his sisters. ‘The blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb,’ and all that. But…I dunno, this felt better.

And, for crying out loud, Byakuya and Rukia look related. Not only that...but I feel the whole Hisana sideplot became...eh. I mean, its not like I was expecting Byakuya to mention Hisana at least once with each scene he was in...but I did felt that Hisana's existence was...unimportant.

While the first arc was...relatively okay for what it was, I had to agree with this post.

I very much wished that the first arc was longer and gave us more time to get to know the characters before the Soul Society Arc

And there was room for it.

From Memories in the Rain (June 16~18) to the Hollow Killing Contest (July 18), nothing happened. There is the introduction of Don Kanonji, but that happened within a day or two.

Obviously, I rearranged the events for more stuff to happen (even changing Masaki's death date). I was thinking about having her death date remain the same (after Ichigo and Uryu's contest, obvy), but I figured it wouldn't work due to Ichigo...pretty much trying to relate to Uryu and it wouldn't be until Memories in the Rain that he would realize that it was a Hollow that killed his mother.

I've also wanted Orihime and Chad given some more time to process their new world view.

I've introduced a new character to the mix, Kiko. Kiko is a kitsune that I've talked about in a recent post. I mostly created them to show how animals are generally affected by the Bleach universe.

If people bring up the cursed parakeet, it wasn't the parakeet that was supernatural, it was possessed by a human child spirit.

So, what I’m about to do is share my initial ideas of my reimaginings on the arcs plus original arcs.

First of all, the overall series has been extended. By that, I mean the time that Ichigo has his (own) powers is longer than canon proper. Like…4 times however long Ichigo had them. Basically, when the Fullbringer Arc comes around, Ichigo is probably starting to attend college.

Second, like I said, I want to share my initial ideas of my reimagining, mostly in the form of a synopsis/overview since I’m honestly too lazy to write fics for them (except for just wanting to write moments in them should the want to do so arrives).

Thirdly, in this post, I’m mostly going to share a list of arcs that I have in mind. You will notice that a few of them are the filler arcs we got (and maybe a technical crossover?). This is mostly due to the fact that they are honestly very interesting and could've fit well in the plot should the story structure had been reconstructed. Not only that, but I’m also hitting a slight snag of how to connect the arcs after Act 1, so Acts 2 and 3 are more jumbled messes as I’m not quite sure how to connect them. I’m probably not gonna write the arcs in chronological order, mainly because I can’t think of a more detailed plot (besides what the arc story is even about) for them quite yet, except for Act 1.

Lastly, this is me still wanting to make a more…coherent narrative of an otherwise incredible series. I like what Kubo gave out. I just wished there was more structure to them. I ain’t Kubo and I’m going to add my own flair to it.

Note: I’m setting Bleach in the early 2010s mainly because of personal preferences (the year of when the series occurs doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things). There are gonna be some arcs with ??? in the title because I can’t come up with a more clever title outside of Post-This or Pre-That. I might add a new arc or remove one depending on the story beats.

Additionally, I want to give focus to the MAIN cast. As in, the story should revolve around them. The majority of the Gotei 13 will not play a direct part (they are a military organization in charge of countries at least in the East Asian area...they are busy) unless its needed or if some of them are part of the supporting cast (who are closely connected to the main casts' story). I might even add my own OCs. Again, depends on the character the story is connected to.

As for the casting lists:

The Main Cast

Ichigo

Rukia

Uryuu

Orihime

Chad

Renji

The 'Crucial' Supporting Cast

Byakuya

Urahara

Tatsuki

Isshin

Ryuuken

Obviously, everyone else is relegated to being other support and side characters.

How's it look now?