3-2...

Back then, all of creation, the multitudes of nature, existed in ambiguity. There was no life or death, and with no progress, there was no regression either.

It was a world that slowly, over the course of hundreds of millions of years, simply waited to grow cold. Even becoming a Hollow was just one part of the cycle of Reishi.

The cycle ended when Hollows began devouring humans.

Left like that, all souls would've become reduced down to one enormous Menos Grande, and the world would've come to a complete standstill.

But curiously, as if the world itself was rejecting such a fate, a single being was born.

It was a person who could destroy Hollows and convert Reishi into sand, recirculating it back into the world.

Was that...the first Soul King?

However, the world could not avoid stagnation by simply continuing to destroy Hollows.

The Soul King continued to protect a world that was bound to slowly fall back into chaos.

But there were people who did not approve of that world. Five powerful people who were nonetheless inferior to the Soul King.

They were the founders of the Five Great Noble Clans, including the Shiba Clan.

They all had different motives, but together they ended up separating the singular world as a consequence of their singular goal.

A world of Reishi, a world of Kishi, and a paradise of sand where the Hollows born in the other two worlds end up were created. In other words, the three worlds that exist today.

The power of the man who transcended everything was needed to make the separation of these three worlds a reality.

It is said that while the founder of the Shiba Clan tried to persuade the Soul King, the founder of the Tsunayashiro Clan took advantage of the situation and sealed him inside a crystal.

I did not see what happened at that time with my own eyes, but everything that occurred afterward makes up the very history of the Soul Society.

I'm not sure if it is because he saw that no matter how he struggled, he could not avoid the future to come,

or if he had seen that somehow there was hope for the new worlds, but...

I cannot fathom what his will was, but it seemed like the Soul King made no effort to resist his fate.

However, the founder of the Tsunayashiro Clan was suspicious of that docility. He feared more than anything else that the Soul King would break through the seal on his own and destroy the founders.

And so he threw the Soul King into a contradictory spiral of existence. He did not kill him nor keep him alive. The Soul King continued to live and die simultaneously.

Tsunayashiro tore off the Soul King's right and left arms, which controlled "progress" and "stillness." I suppose that wasn't quite enough for him, though.

Along with Tsunayashiro, a number of the founders took their time carving out the Soul King's heart, cutting off his legs, and slicing up every last bit of his entrails, removing all of them from his body.

They stripped away all of his power to create a puppet "king" that merely served their own selfish needs.

His voice is not heard in the government nor in business. He shows no will to rebel nor a single breath in support of rebellion. He continues to exist as a linchpin for the Soul Reapers in his broken body.

To think that such a convenient king was created in that way... Despite being the founders of the Soul Reapers, it truly is sinful.

Indeed. But the Soul King did in fact have a will of his own. It is guiding us to the grand picture amid these changing times.

There is no doubt that his will is the reason Ichigo and the others were summoned here.

You all should feel it too, seeing as your bones were converted to Ouken, and part of your soul is entrusted to the Royal Palace.

Of course! Well, I can't say anything about lineage, though.

To think that a youngster raised by someone from the Shiba Clan would come here because of the Soul King's will. What an interesting twist of fate, eh?!

That's right. The Soul Reaper that founded the Shiba Clan opposed Tsunayashiro, who was forcibly continuing to keep the Soul King sealed away.

He insisted they should let the world know of the sins they committed and leave it up to the world to cast judgment upon them.

Moreover, he also searched for a technique that would let him offer his own body to take the place of the Soul King.

Well now, that certainly sounds like an ancestor of the Shiba Clan, all right.

In a way, his extreme persistence in trying to offer himself as a sacrifice made him the most selfish fellow.

From the outset, it seemed like he was determined to become the cornerstone of the three worlds even after he failed to persuade the Soul King, despite how powerless he was.

It's truly ironic. The Shiba Clan lineage remains today precisely because the Tsunayashiro founder assaulted the Soul King.

The Shiba Clan, huh? Now that you mention it, I can see those tendencies in Kaien, too.

At the end of the day, the Shiba founder was erased from the pages of history by Tsunayashiro.

And as a result, his descendants have been treated coldly within the Five Great Noble Clans, too.