After reclaiming all the spiritual power I had released over the course of about an hour, I felt a bit nauseous.
It was that peculiar sensation you get when you've drunk way too much water—a heavy, sloshing feeling inside every time you move.
Nursing my unsettled stomach, I returned home to find Unohana sitting quietly in front of the tokonoma, staring at a piece of calligraphy hanging on the wall that read [The Way of Humanity].
What is she doing here at this hour?
This is usually when the lunch break ends and afternoon duties begin—the busiest time of the day...
―Thanks to you, the operations of the Gotei 13 have been completely paralyzed.
'Ah, so it was my fault.'
In 그가 case, it wasn't strange for her to be here.
It wasn't as if people had died or been injured, causing the shutdown; everyone had simply been crushed unconscious by the sheer weight of my Spiritual Pressure.
I watched Unohana's back from the doorway for a moment before stepping into the room and closing the sliding door.
At the soft rattle... thud of the door, Unohana slowly turned her head toward me.
She didn't turn all the way; she stopped just enough for the tip of her nose to be visible. She gave a slight nod before turning back toward the tokonoma.
"...While you were away from home, I looked at this calligraphy and thought a great deal. You, who always spoke of the duties and paths a human must take... when you said you allowed people to die despite knowing they would, I couldn't understand why you would say such a thing."
"And? Did you find an answer?"
"No. I couldn't. That is why I am still agonizing over it."
I figured as much. Of course, an answer wouldn't come that easily.
I almost let a bitter expression slip onto my face, but I kept my composure and simply nodded.
Just as I was about to open my mouth, Unohana continued.
"However... I realized something else. That shutting myself away and agonizing alone only leads to an endless spiral of thoughts."
Unohana fell silent for a moment, gently wiping a thin layer of dust from the tokonoma with her hand before letting out a soft sigh.
That sigh held a mixture of fear born from the unknown, a touch of anger, self-reproach, and regret.
When she finally turned to look at me, her face was... a complete mess.
Her eyes were red and swollen as if she had been crying, dark circles hung beneath them from lack of sleep, and her cheeks had hollowed out, making her look gaunt.
Despite looking like she might collapse at any moment, she slowly placed both hands on the floor and bowed her head deep.
It was a dogeza filled with absolute sincerity—the kind performed long before the term was ever used for cheap jokes.
"I am sorry. All human relationships stem from dialogue. Disconnection breeds misunderstanding, misunderstanding breeds discord, and discord returns as conflict. I knew this well, yet I let my emotions take precedence. I thought I was old enough to control myself by now, but I suppose I was mistaken."
"Why are you bowing? Don't do that. It's not strange to fight when there's a difference in understanding."
"I am not apologizing for the fight itself. I am apologizing for having arbitrary expectations, feeling arbitrary disappointment, and for prioritizing my own feelings through silence rather than dialogue after our disagreement."
"Then it's fine. It's only natural for a person to prioritize their own feelings. It's okay, so lift your head now."
I said that, but Unohana didn't raise her head for quite some time.
I swear, I don't know who she took after to be this stubborn.
I let out a heavy sigh and sat down across from her. Only then did she finally look up.
It seemed she had purged all her pent-up emotions through her tears and internal struggle; the eyes behind her swollen lids were as calm as a still lake.
"You speak first."
When I opened the way for her, Unohana closed her eyes for a moment before looking at me again.
"You... why did you just stand by and watch, knowing that people would be hurt and die?"
"Straight to the point, then."
I preferred it this way. If you truly want to clear up a misunderstanding, it's better to crash head-on rather than beating around the bush.
In that case, it was only right for me to skip the pleasantries and get to the heart of the matter.
"No matter how precious a child is, a parent cannot keep them tucked away in their embrace forever. If I step in to help every time something happens, you all will never grow. That is why I was only watching."
""Because that is what a god does.""
My voice and Unohana's overlapped.
I looked at her with a bitter smile, and she immediately fired her next question.
"Then why did you form a bond with me? You say you are a god. Why do you live among humans? You say you are a god. Why do you act like a human... when you are a god...?"
Her words held a note of accusation, but I could understand where she was coming from.
She must have been anxious. That was why she had become so emotional.
One could ask how someone who has lived for nearly a thousand years could get so worked up over this, or if she was emotionally unstable, but it was likely because of those thousand years that she had no choice but to be emotional.
The moment she saw a facet of me as a god—something I had never shown in a millennium—the dissonance between the 'me' she understood and the 'me' that truly existed must have been staggering.
'He isn't that kind of person. He isn't someone who would say those things...'
Because of that disconnect, my actions from Unohana's perspective must have felt like a god's whim, or perhaps a grand deception.
But even so, my answer wouldn't change, so I answered honestly.
"Because I wanted to live as a human."
As soon as she heard my answer, Unohana snapped her head up and glared at me with sharp eyes.
"Then why...!"
She tried to speak, but then she squeezed her eyes shut and bowed her head again.
"No, no... I'm sorry. I'm sure you had your own difficulties..."
"No, you're right. This was my mistake. Am I a god? Or am I a human? It's true that I was standing at that crossroad, unable to find my way. And it's true that as a result, I ended up with a lukewarm outcome. The guy who always told others to be decisive couldn't even decide his own path... it was my fault."
When I shrugged with a bitter smile, Unohana looked sorrowful.
"But I've decided now. That's why I left the house with only a single letter. I had to find this answer within myself."
"You've decided..."
"Between being a god and being a human."
It was a problem far more difficult than I had imagined, but surprisingly, the answer was simple.
Both were me.
"I've chosen to live as a human. Not as a being watching from a step away, calling it 'your choice,' but as one who lives among you—laughing, crying, making mistakes, and learning from failure."
As I spoke, Unohana stared at me, her breath hitching as her eyes widened.
Just looking at her expression, I could tell what she was thinking.
She was likely wondering if I had become a mortal instead of an immortal.
To ease her worries, I shook my head with a soft smile.
"I can guess what you're thinking, but it's not that. The 'god' part of me still exists. I've only changed the way I live."
I've said this since I attained enlightenment: my choice to live as a human is separate from my existence as a god.
To use an easy metaphor, it's like an incredibly wealthy man vowing to live like an ordinary person.
Just because that billionaire lives in a tiny studio apartment with a cheap deposit and low rent, it doesn't mean his money or his reputation suddenly vanishes into thin air.
It's like that.
What I chose was a lifestyle, not a state of being.
Besides, you can't exactly undo what you've already become just by making a choice.
It would be like Kagaya coming down to the mundane world and suddenly losing his enlightenment and becoming a normal human.
"Then... how will you live from now on?"
"Not much will change from how things are now. However, I'll be better to the people around me."
"Instead of saving everyone?"
"Thinking you can save everyone is arrogance. Even an omnipotent god couldn't do that. However, I will choose the options that allow as many people as possible to live. And, as I said before, if I take everything on myself, you won't grow. You haven't forgotten why the Gotei 13 was created, have you?"
"...You are right. I was being narrow-minded. Depending on you too much was a form of self-indulgence."
Unohana looked deep in thought for a moment, but then she let out a long sigh, her face clearing as if a weight had been lifted.
"Thank you. For speaking honestly with me. And... for accepting my selfishness."
"Why are you thanking me for that? We're husband and wife."
We shared a soft chuckle as we looked at each other.
After that, we talked about everything we hadn't been able to say before.
Things that had hurt our feelings, things we wished the other would improve upon—all of it.
After spending a long time talking and melting away the lumps in our hearts, we returned to how we were...
No, our relationship became even better than it was before.
"So, do you have a name now?"
"I do. Or rather, I didn't just get one, I made it myself. Tenjin Shaku. Tenjin is the surname, and Shaku is the given name."
"Then do I become Tenjin Yachiru now?"
"No, about that..."
As a result of my strong persuasion, Unohana ultimately decided not to change her surname.
The reason? Partly because I was worried about that old Monk, and also because the name I chose didn't have a particularly pleasant meaning.