The Wandering of an Unstuck Stepbro: Multiverse Travel - Chapter 248: Another 30 years

(Ryoto’s pov)

Another 30 years flew by, and that means that I am over a century old. To be more precise, I’m ~127 years old, not counting my years as Jacob.

Jesus, I’m starting to get old, and I still have about a hundred years to go before returning to my home world.

In these 30 years or so, my children entered the worst nightmare of every parent, their teenage years.

Masaru didn’t change much, surprisingly. I was ready for his dad-hating phase since he acts like a protagonist, but it didn’t come. He was as calm, friendly, and soft-spoken as always.

Yukima… was Yukima, but more. She is as much a trouble magnet as I am. How does she find Hollows to fight so often? I don’t know.

Now, into the problem child, Akio.

I don’t know what happened, but he was distancing himself from everyone. It’s not like he wasn’t talking with us or ran away, but it was noticeable, and he doesn’t want to talk to anyone about that or refuse to even admit that anything changed, and I can’t exactly force him to talk.

Akio was a bit closer to Isane, so it wasn’t completely hopeless, but it would indicate that I was at fault, and I don’t know what I did wrong. I tried to be a good and fair father to all my children. Maybe it’s the famous rebellious phase, or he is just embarrassed by his father for some reason.

At least he still wants to train with me and the rest… sometimes.

Why is being a parent so hard…

“Hey Gin, do you know what’s up with Akio?” I asked my son, who refuses to call me a dad even after all these years.

“For the 10th time, I don’t know anything. If you worry so much, you can follow him for a day, two or a week… Not like he’ll sense you.” Gin answered me between his practice swings.

Gin’s got a point. It’s certainly a possibility, but it doesn’t necessarily mean that I’ll find out what I’m looking for, but I’m hesitant to do it.

“I know that much, but I don’t want to be an overbearing parent who controls everything their child does. It doesn’t even guarantee anything. If something wrong is going on, I’ll interfere, but otherwise, I’ll be holding out my hand until Akio decides to grab it. It also isn’t unusual for a child to get a bit distant from his parents, but it doesn’t make me any less saddened.”

I explained my reasoning. It was the way people around me helped me. Lala was around me, sharing her positivity until I opened up more. The same could be said about Rio and Kaede. Alme was a bit different, and so was Rin. With Rin, I was the one who was there for her, and Yoruichi, while knowing more than she let on, always waited for me to explain first before confronting me unless it was urgent.

I don’t have a great example with Isane. Sorry Isane, but it doesn’t mean I love you any less.

I can only think of one other reason besides the rebellious phase why Akio is distancing himself. He isn’t much of a fighter. It doesn’t mean that he is weak for someone his age, but he lacks that something. I didn’t treat him differently because of that, and I trained him just as hard as the others to not make him feel like an outcast in the family.

His talent lies not with fighting but with something else. Science. That’s why he spends more time with Kisuke than me.

Well, as long as he is happy…

As I was watching over Gin’s training, a Hell Butterfly flew towards me. I allowed it to land on my finger to get the message that was sent to me.

…

…

…

That’s strange. I don’t remember doing anything troublesome as of late, so why does Yama-jii want me to come to the Captain’s Assembly Hall… alone. And it’s not another Captain meeting, from what I understand.

Something is going on.

“Gin, I’m being called, so we need to cut the training short.” I informed my son.

“Yeah, yeah, I’ll keep practicing for a while longer. Have fun.” Gin answered dismissively while jot stopping his sword for a moment.

Well, let’s see what Yama-jii wants from me.

—

What waited for me was a group of 5 people and Yamamoto himself, who, after ordering me to accompany these individuals, left me alone. Hikifune was also with the group, but I didn’t pay attention to her at the moment.

Why are they here? Should I be afraid? Even if I try to run away, I don’t have a chance of escaping with all of them here in this room. Maybe if there was only one of them, then I would see a chance, but against the group, I can’t see myself winning or even escaping.

For now, I’ll be confident and pretend I don’t know anything.

Scrap that; I really don’t know why they want to meet me. If this was about murder, then Squad 0 wouldn’t even blink about it. They just wouldn’t care, so it must be something different.

The only thing I can think about was my meeting with the Soul King, but no one should know about it besides Kisuke.

“Hahaha! Is this the famous Ryoto Yuuki?”

A monk like Shinigami approached me with a big smile and a healthy laugh.

Ichibei Hyosube, the leader of Squad 0. I like his beard, but he terrifies me at the moment, even if he looks friendly. I remained calm on the outside, not showing my nervousness in any way.

“That’s me. Now, can I know why I was called here to meet all of you? You seem to wear Captain’s haori, but I haven’t met any of you except Hifune… Squad 0, I presume?” I took a quick glance at Hikifune.

I pretended to just figure out their identities. It would be strange to know them. While as a Captain with a few decades of experience, I have knowledge about Squad 0, I never met them.

Hearing me, the monk grinned but didn’t say anything.

Before I could ask again about their reason for calling me here, I felt someone using Shunpo to get behind me, so as a form of defense, I sidestepped as fast as I could to see who was trying to sneak up on me. I didn’t want to attack for obvious reasons.

The whole exchange didn’t take even a second, but if I wasn’t careful from the moment I entered the Assembly Hall, I wouldn’t even notice.

“So, the boy has a quick reaction. At least we know that he isn’t a pushover.”

A tall man with an old-style delinquent hairstyle said. Wait, this hairstyle isn’t old style by today’s means, and he could even be called a pioneer.

The tall man didn’t say anything more as he was karate chopped on the head by Ichibei.

“Don’t scare the young man! We talked about it already!” Ichibei turned to me. “Sorry about him. Now let me explain our reasons for being here.”

—

END