#aratame benihime

[aresy1pp1e]

Benihime jumpscare!!!

(More versions under the cut)

(Also, it’s supposedly part of Bleachtober23, the fourth prompt, ‘zampakuto’, but it’s may)

[uraharashouten]

I can't believe it's taken me this long to figure this out, but here goes. Kisuke stands at 183 cm tall (canon height). Sitting seiza, he should be at about 2/3 of that, or 123 cm tall. The distance from the top of his head to the top of Benihime's shoulder is 88% of that height (by pixel measurement), so the total distance from the ground to the top of her shoulder should be about 231 cm. The upper arm from elbow to shoulder typically represents about 20% of a person's height, so that would give her a standing height of around 11.5m.

Therefore:

You're welcome.

[irlkisukeurahara]

Byakuya wild for this

[rayshippouuchiha]

Ray I remember a khr fic set in a Bleach AU and it was about the Zanpakuto rebellion with Byakuran as Muramasa. Anyway Tsuna was Giotto's Zanpakuto and he's a sweet little thing who stuck to Giotto and didn't cause any trouble but there's a throwaway line that Tsunayoshi's Bankai was just so obscenely overpowered that no-one wanted to tempt fate by triggering it and I've been obsessed with the possibility ever since! Like someone pushes Giotto to his limit and he's just decides to do some Urahara-ing with Kannonbiraki Benihime Aratame but instead it's gonna be like Burn the World to Ash Tsunayoshi or something? Any ideas? Anyway here's the link! It's by the ever-awesome Ourliazo!

https://archiveofourown.org/works/10333187

OH oh this looks fantastic

[lo-55]

Beyond Dreams of Avarice Ch. 6

The first time Kisuke meets him, he’s barely a hundred years old, and Ichigo is a stranger with an ocean of power with two blades to his name. Which does not explain why he looks at Kisuke with a heart broken fondness, or why he always seems to return  when Kisuke needs him.

UraIchi Time Travel with a mild twist

Kannonbiraki Benihime Aratame. 

Kisuke gazed up at the face of his bankai. Her braided hair, her half lidded eyes, and the jointed shoulders that her red dress slides from. She’s a terror. Threads twist around her body. The same threads that he had used to find the correct weapon. 

Her. 

She had been the weapon all along. 

Leave it to his own zanpakuto to be tricky. 

That didn’t stop Kisuke from grinning up at her, a breathless laugh bubbling in his chest. He felt empty and light headed, all of his energy was gone, gone, gone, and before his eyes the giant fell apart in threads of energy. 

Kisuke tipped backwards, and strong arms caught him. 

He looked up to see brown eyes watching him with such fondness it made his ribs ache. 

“You did well, Kisuke. I knew you would.” 

Ichigo’s hands are calloused and strong, but they hold Kisuke with all the care in the world while Ichigo helps him undress and slide into the warm, healing waters that he and Yoruichi had filled their cave with. 

It was starting to feel more like his and Ichigo’s space by now than his and Yoruichi. The thought tastes like treason on his tongue, and he’s glad that he has mind enough left not to voice it aloud. 

Ichigo lays himself out on the stone beside the water and closes his eyes. He looks utterly at peace. It feels like, save for few exceptions, anytime Kisuke saw Ichigo he was relaxing, or lounging on something. People stupider than he is might have mistaken it for laziness. 

Kisuke was smarter than that. 

He could recognize Ichigo for what he was. A predator. 

And didn’t most predators spend their days resting? Saving energy for the hunt? 

Once again, Kisuke thinks he should be afraid. Once again, he knows that Ichigo won’t hurt him. 

Ichigo is paradoxical, but he won’t hurt Kisuke. That was a fact as much as Kisuke’s own name was. 

That didn’t change the fact that Ichigo, spread out across the edge of the water, looked like a lion, with his mane of spiky orange hair and his lax muscles. Every inch of him spoke of power. 

Or perhaps a lion was the wrong creature. Soaking in the warmth of a hot spring and laid out on a hot rock, with power beyond anything Kisuke had ever felt simmering under his skin, he wondered if Ichigo wasn’t more like a dragon. 

A creature of immense power and tantalizing beauty. A being who could rend the heavens in his claws. Instinct told Kisuke all of this and made his skin prickle. 

Yet, what dragon was he then? 

The type to offer a staff that held the ocean in place to a being on a quest? Or the type who learned to change their skin to devour a lover that spurned them? 

Kisuke quietly floated closer. 

The dangerous, awful truth was he couldn't tell which option thrilled him more. 

The power beneath Ichigo’s skin pulled him as inexorably as a moth to a flame. 

Power, but Ichigo was more than that. He was not the nobility, steeped in influence and aura, untouchable as the sun. he was here, tangible, touchable, and when Kisuke drew close enough the his shoulders brushed Ichigo’s elbow the ginger opened those dark brown eyes to glance at him before they closed again and he settled. 

Yes, Ichigo had power to spare. But his strong, calloused hands were gentle. 

Kisuke can remember intimately the brush of them on his skin when they broke bread together. The safe cradle they’d made when he carried him in the woods. The small brush of them on his skin as he helped Kisuke into the healing waters after a rough sparring session. 

Kisuke reached back and plucked one of those calloused hands off the warm stone. 

Ichigo cracked an eye open to look at him, curious, but he didn’t object as Kisuke looked his hand over. There was a thrill under Kisuke’s skin. A man with an ocean of power, a man from the powerful clan, bastard or no, let Kisuke lay hands on him. 

He could see the telltale calloused along the fingers and palms that came of sword work. But his knuckles were scarred and hard worked, the fists of a brawler. 

His wrists were slim, but Kisuke could see the muscles that stretched from his carples up his forearm. He knew each tendon and ligament within that could be severed under a clever blade, and how limp the arm would go. Would Ichigo heal from that?

 Veins were barely visible through deceptively soft skin, but when the hand in Kisukes twitched he could see the muscles flex as well until they vanished under his  rolled up sleeve. There was a black X across his forearm and wrist, like a dark ribbon stretched across his skin. 

Kisuke could recognize it as a piece of that red-black power that Ichigo wielded so easily. 

Ichigo had offered him his arm once before to be inspected. The day Kisuke had stabbed him. The only time he had seen the man bleed, and he bled from Kisuke’s own hand. 

Ichigo didn’t interrupt his musings, but at some point Kisuke became very, very away of a single brown eye, nearly gold in the false sunlight, watching him. 

Ichigo’s power rolled against his skin, that ocean of winter-sun curling against the threads of his soul. 

When he had been young, he hadn’t understood the raw intimacy in that gesture. 

Once more he thought he should have been frightened, should have been disturbed by the seemingly docile being laid out before him. 

Once more, he found no fear for Ichigo in himself. 

A man need not fear their own blade, and Kisuke need not fear his… friend. 

Yes. His friend. 

A friend who let out a very lion-like huff and closed his eye again, to let Kisuke trace the dark markings on his arm. Through his skin, Kisuke could feel a rabbit pulse beneath Ichigo’s skin.

~ 

The threads in his soul felt strong and frayed at once. 

Strong, for his bond with his zanpakuto was more cemented than it had ever been before. Strong for he was more assured than ever with his connection with Ichigo. 

But frayed for his other connections. 

They spread around him like a spiders web, each link drawing to a person he knew. Ichigo, Yoruichi, Tessai, Kukaku, and now Yoruichi’s little shadow, Sui Feng. Small, thinner lines drew him to acquaintances, and dark threads held to people who he knew but did not… trust. No, not at all, but people whom he knew could be manipulated and played like puppets on a string. Even thinner were the threads of the underlings that Yoruichi, so fine they could snap without destroying the rest of the web should their anchors come undone. 

Which they would. No one made it long in this line of work. Kisuke had outlived his expectations by several centuries by this point himself. 

He’s talented, he’s smart. 

And he’s mean.

Yet, for all of that he still has friends who don’t mind his sand paper edges. Who laugh off his cruelties and bloodied hands and sharp smiles. 

But it’s. 

Grating. 

Sometimes. 

Or perhaps the blossoming relationship with Ichigo, with the walls he allows Kisuke to choose to build, with the liberties he allows him to take, stand in such sharp contrast to Yoruichi, who sets their boundaries and flaunts lines in sand. 

Which is not to say that Kisuke doesn’t care for her. He does. In the depths of his heart he knows that he loves her as dearly as he loves anything. But she is still a princess. 

And he is not. 

She will always have an upperhand in their relationships, even if she no longer has it in their battles.And she doesn’t even seem to realize it is the thing. 

She knows his loyalty, but more than that she expects it because it's what he owes to her. She’s never said it outright, but it hangs above him. When she took him in as her guard and companion there was never a question about it. He would do it because she was the Shihoin heir and he was a scrap of a boy who had dragged his way through basic training with blood in his teeth. 

She saw his potential and raised him high, lifted him up and gave him resources. 

But it was never a choice. 

Even his becoming onmitsukido wasn’t a choice, when the other option was starvation or worse. 

Ichigo had broken bread with him, given him something soft and filling, with no expectation of return. Ichigo had saved his life and asked Kisuke for nothing. He’d carried his damaged body to safety, and still. 

Wanted nothing. 

And Kisuke… 

Well. What the fuck was he supposed to do with that? 

“If you want me to, I'll try to visit you more often,” Ichigo offers. Firmly, he repeats, “If you want me to.” 

Of course Kisuke wants him to! Who wouldn’t? Ichigo is an ocean of power, anyone would jump at the opportunity to have him at their side, and the dark, puppet-master part of Kisuke’s brain whispers about what that power could do if he only directed it. 

The part of Kisuke that had bared Ichigo his soul and taken his arm disagreed. Wasn’t that what he was upset with Yoruichi for? For cornering him, no matter that they were friends now, no matter that he loved her, he hadn’t had a choice. 

If the day came and he needed Ichigo’s power- 

No. If he needed. 

Needed his friend's help. 

He would ask. Up front, honestly, he would ask for help and not tug and twist and play Ichigo. 

Or at least he would try. It wasn’t in his nature to be upfront. 

But for Ichigo, he could make an attempt.

And so it was their thread that was strong and firm while the one that bound him to Yoruichi was frayed. Just a bit. Enough to frighten him. 

Bitterness on his tongue when he spoke to her, deferred to her, and followed at her heels like a puppy spoke volumes. He knew he would never hesitate to throw his life on the line for her, knew it in his very bones, but in their line of work any kind of friction could grind dust in the gears and get someone killed. 

(And Kisuke didn’t want to admit it, but he didn’t like being upset with her! They were friends at the end of the day, and he hated having any kind of disagreements with her! 

He really, really hated how complicated feelings were. He wished he could draw himself away, step back and watch everything like he watched ants march across the earth. But he couldn’t. To pull away like that would be a torment worse than anything he’d ever endured and anything he had ever forced another to endure. To sever every single string-) 

It was this bitterness that was causing the fraying in his threads. A fabric of his being rubbed raw like old clothes. 

He wanted to ignore it. He tried to hide it. 

But of course the problem with friends, however fraught a relationship might be, was that they knew you. 

And Yoruichi knew Kisuke just as well as he knew her. 

So in the end he should have been surprised when one day, when he and Ichigo were lounging on huge rocks, sweaty but satisfied, a shadow flickered down the ladder and landed so silently on the ground that the dust didn’t even lift. 

But Ichigo’s head did. It snapped up, his eyes flashed, and for an instant Kisuke thought he was doing to lash out with that power of his and attack. 

Then brown eyes landed on Yoruichi, crouched on the ground, staring at the pair of them, and the tension bled out of his shoulders. 

Yoruichi looked between one man to the other. 

She squinted, golden eyes narrow as she tried to read the room. 

“Kisuke,” she said slowly. “Who’s this?” 

Ichigo tilted his head, looking relaxed. As if a noble assassin wasn’t looking at him the way a cat looked at a mouth. 

“Yo,” he waved a hand at her, the picture of laid back ease. The picture of Keian, too, and Kisuke saw Yoruichi’s jaw loosen and the connections draw in her mind. Her eyes darted to him, and Kisuke managed not to look too guilty. 

He failed.

[aiizenn]

okay okay so what’s your favorite Shikai command, Bankai (the way it’s said) ,Bankai name, and Bankai visual? Also just what’s your favorite all time Bankai in general?

𓈒 𓈒 𓈒 💭₊˚ෆ ohh yeees, hii anon!!

ok ok so! this is honestly a piece of cake (i’ve totally thought abt this b4 ໒꒰ྀིྀི ੭ ˃̵ᴗ˂̵ ꒱ྀི੭ ) let’s goooo . . .

my favorite shikai is definitely—without a doubt— “shatter, kyōka suigetsu” ! it is just so beautifully done. like the whole “shatter” fits the work of his shikai. it has the ability to control all five senses to the point that the person can misinterpret another persons form. creating a simple or complex illusion to deceive his opponents, such as creating a decoy of himself !! kubo is such an amazing mangaka, he did an astonishing job with every command, all are well written, but aizens definitely stood out from the rest!

my favorite bankai (the way it’s said) is no other than how ichigo says it ! it’s one of the most iconic lines and the va did such an outstanding job! you can hear how he says it from the bottom of his heart &’ puts all these emotions into that simple word. aaaand!! it’s the whole pause! oml the pause!! it’s that tiny pause that he does that makes it all much better. “BAN—KAI” !

my favorite bankai name is “minazuki”. unohana’s simple one word bankai name leaves me in awe (although her bankai is far from simple). there are different ways how one interprets the meaning of the name, but the one i like most is “all things end”. it goes well with how her crimson blood-like whip ‘blade’ which could’ve had acid due to the bubbles and hisses— which then dissolved and destroyed everything around her.

my favorite bankai visual? easy. it’s byukuya’s. the pretty swords that turn into pretty pink petals when given its command? count me in! i don’t think there’s much to say besides it’s so breathtaking! when it first appeared in the soul society arc, i was all giddy! plus it suits his so well, a pretty bankai for a pretty man!

my all time favorite bankai is and will always be uraharas. firstly, his shikai commands are mwahh: awaken, cry, &’ call out. the way he says “bankai” with his distinctively calm voice is a chefs kiss. the name of his bankai??! ugh so so good. “kannonbiraki benihime aratame” meaning “modification of the crimson princess dissection at doors of avalokiteśvara” (if you look into the meaning of it you’ll see just how much that bankai suits him) aaand omg the visual?? i can’t wait for his bankai to get animated, in the manga it was so beautifully drawn and when colored . . . oohh myy gossh. overall in general, uraharas bankai is my all time favorite. from his shikai commands to his bankai visual. absolute masterpiece !!

[bleachpolls]

Bankai Battledome Semifinals

[milkybishop]

i'm answering all these bleach asks cause i like bleach and want to:

Who are your top three favorite characters and why? (It can be arrancars, espada, humans, soul reapers, zanpakuto spirits, souls, visoreds, fullbringers, and of course I can’t forget the quincies): Yumichika...like of course Ikkaku Kenpachi

Who is/are your least favorite character(s) and why?: So many, but none I like HATE, I just have no interest in when they're on screen PERSONALLY: Toshiro Gin Hisagi Kira Hinamori Most of the fullbringers Shino Madarame (solely because she brought in the storyline that ikkaku is from a noble/upper class family) Omaeda Bount Arc guys Mod Soul arc guys Kon (just for being a perv) Ulquiorra (i like his design i just...i never get him so i never get into him y'know?) Pepe (...just makes me uncomfortable which is intentional but...) Zabimaru (ONLY in the Zanpakuto arc design, turn back into the baboon please even though i like rough-voiced women, i hate the snake child)

Favorite minor character?: I'm not sure what counts for minor cause Kubo is so wishy-washy with character's presences. But, Tatsuki, lesbian of all time. Or Jackie Tristan.

Favorite zanpakuto?: Character-wise: Fuji/Ruri'iro Kujaku (causes the gay allegories, will always be famous) Aesthetic-wise: Chika Shihōin's Zanpakutō (pretty, love a tassle)

Favorite shikai? Ability-wise: Sakasama no Sekai (i think it's really fun and relatively simple and can catch anyone off-guard but Katen Kyōkotsu is also fun but soo complicated i still don't fully get its rules sometimes) Aesthetic-wise: Ichigo's initial shikai (talented, brilliant, incredible, iconic)

Favorite bankai?: Ability-wise: Kannonbiraki Benihime Aratame (spoilers) (it's op as hell and sooo in character for Urahara with the dissection vibe) Aesthetic-wise: Senbonzakura Kageyoshi (the image of the blades rising in the dark has always stuck with me but there's alot of contenders Katen Kyōkotsu: Karamatsu Shinjū or Minazuki)

Favorite kido? (It can be bakudo, hado, or kaido): Man, idk, Rikujōkōrō cause it's the only one I remember the ability of

Favorite squad? Squad 11 of course, without question.

Favorite captain?: Kenpachi but I also don't think he's a good captain sdjhgjdhg. So, Shunsui I think, he's the most competent. Or Mayuri, cause he's weird and interesting.

Favorite lieutenant?: I think Ikkaku? Cause of his loyalty. But also his ass does not do the lieutenant's work so actually probably Nanao.

What’s your favorite opening theme from the series?: Orange Range - *Asterisk, OP1 (always and forever)

What’s your favorite ending theme from the series?: My Pace - SunSet Swish, ED 6 (i just like the beat)

Favorite manga panel?: This is like evil, there's too much choice. Like I LOVE kubo's use of negative space so I adore so many of those impact panels. I think Kyoraku Shunsui's Bankai reveal page slays cause of the paint texture. Rose's star blast wound panel. Ichigo's vasto lorde form reveal. Soooo many panels in the Unohanna vs. Zaraki fight like her bankai reveal. I'm going to keep this in mind when I do my re-read after the anime ends and then come back to this kxjhgkjdhfg.

Most heart-wrenching death?: Unohana. I think it was sad for the characters but mostly for ME, cause she served every ounce of cunt and then died. I always say, if Kubo is to finally abandon his habit of reviving/bringing characters back, I hope he stills brings her back no matter what. Tousen's is up there.

Favorite arc and why? Soul Society: The Sneak Entry Arc, hands down. AND NOT JUST CAUSE YUMICHIKA IS INTRODUCED, it's the arc that has the most fights I'm interested in, the most development for some characters and others get to shine. I do definitely think nostalgia is a big reason too because I think that the first time I ever saw Bleach and it's where I got to in Bleach before dropping off when I was a kid. But I do love it.

Favorite movie and why?: I think Memories of Nobody, maybe Hell Verse? Because I think they had good stories and I remember being really into either it was the animation or emotion of Memories of Nobody. I think Hell Verse, I liked the animation. But honestly, I don't remember much about the movies and I watched them only last year.

Favorite piece of merch that you own? I think it's my Yumichika tote bag? But I love alot of my merch, and especially my Ichigo figure my friend's boyfriend won for me in one of those remote crane games (and it got lost to the transit void and we'd all given up hope).

Do you have any tattoos? Yes. Yumichika cat tattoo by @ kiera_tattoo (no pics cause there's something we need to tweak when I can next get a trip to London ;-; ), but I love it!! still thinking about getting a panel tattoo or sword but atm not Looking for one.

If you’re a fic writer, who do you write for? I don't write fic much but it is Yumichika/Ikkaku but usually just musing on how a reveal might look or their past. It's not really shippy.

If you are an artist, do you have a favorite character to draw?: I don't do fanart much, so I've only drawn Yumichika.

If you could be in the Bleach universe would you be a soul reaper, visored, human, quincy, espada or arrancar?: God I'd probably be a human who sits at home not questioning buildings getting exploded.

Free space to ask whatever you want that I missed or talk about something that isn’t mentioned! Favourite flashback: All of Turn Back the Pendulum

[tatakaeeren]

your top 5 bankais?

hi anon! ohh nice oneee, there are so many to choose from!!! .....SPOILER ALERT!! ...I'll name the bankai name, not the user... to avoid spoilers.

1.-Senbonzakura Kageyoshi 🌸

2- kannon biraki benihime aratame 🩸

3.- katen kyōkotsu karamatsu shinjū 🎭

4- Hakka no togame ❄

5.- Tensa Zangetsu ✨

Ask me my top 5_____

[littleeyesofpallas]

Rope Artist, Hajime Kinoko

his homepage, his instagram, his twitter,

he also features in the 2009 shortfilm, Kinbaku - The Art of Bondage...

...and the 2015 feature length documentary, The Pleasure of Rope

[suisshin]

観音開紅姫改メ

[tsukuyomi-e]

Inktober 2018 (no prompt) Days 26 - 31

Since the last one was for Halloween, I did them as zombies x)

Days 1 - 10

Days 11 - 20

Days 21 - 25

[uraharashouten]

so this is mostly meant to be silly but is benihime considered a mech since she's mannequin-esque/not flesh and blood and can technically be piloted?

First of all, I love this question.

Second of all,

I think the version from BBS Untold Stories is the closest idea we have to MechaHime. And what I find both interesting and revealing about that is... it's the off version. The not-quite-right version. I don't play BBS, but I understand the plotline here is that all the alternate versions of characters are someone's fantasy of how things might have been, how they might be, but if you consider them, they're not really improvements.

What I do love about this design is that it makes the puppetry reference overt. It's certainly hinted at in Kannonbiraki Benihime Aratame's design, from her jointed appendages to the strings that tug at Kisuke's stitching, pulling taut from somewhere offscreen.

Oh did I say 'hinted at?'

(The original kanji translates better as 'marionette,' and actually I think I'm going to have to write a whole other meta just on this chapter title, so stay tuned...)

Yeah. Anyway, both designs beg the question of who's the puppet, and who's the master, don't they?

What is alluded to, though, is most definitely a distanced, indirect method of control, more robotic surgery than mech suit. It's not Kisuke's way to charge into battle in overpowered armor, or with a massive mechanized manipulator on his back. It's far more in-character for him to be... well, pulling strings from behind the scenes. So while it may be fun to imagine him playing Attack of the 50-foot Woman in first-person POV, the actual danger represented by Benihime in bankai is not the massive body you see before you... but everywhere that may be transformed by her invisible touch.

[irlkisukeurahara]

I'm trying to study benihimes hair because I wanna cosplay her and every time I look at her I get even more confused

[thedemonlady]

BANKAI: KANNON BIRAKI BENIHIME ARATAME

[berrymascarpone]

My thoughts about the latest TYBW episode!

1. Is this the first time Ichigo and Mayuri have ever talked on screen?

2. Ōetsu Nimaiya is wearing clown shoes. They squeak.

3. Grimmjow is back!! Also Chad’s anti-arrancar secret weapon is apparently maracas???

4. Someone gave the Soul King a glitter makeover

5. Also as an afterthought, if broken bankai can’t be fixed but can be modified like Mayuri’s Ashisogi Jizō, and Urahara’s bankai is (spoilers) Kannonbiraki Benihime Aratame (in which Aratame means modified), does this maybe imply that Urahara had his bankai broken once before and thus had to modify her?