Behind Me, Behind You

Recalling that Central 46 gathers six judges and forty sages as the supreme court of Soul Society, empowered to command the Gotei 13, Onmitsukidō, or Kidō corps and to hand down verdicts no captain may contest, Tōshirō Hitsugaya surveys the carnage in the underground assembly hall. The blood on the tables has already dried to a brown flake, telling him the killings happened days ago rather than hours. Since the chamber stood sealed behind thirteen walls after Renji Abarai's defeat and the wartime decree, he concludes that the council has been dead for some time and that every order concerning Rukia Kuchiki's execution was a fabrication.

Suspecting Gin Ichimaru yet doubting one man could butcher the court unseen, Hitsugaya is interrupted by Izuru Kira, who admits he expected the captain and then flees, drawing the pursuers outside while a shadowed figure lingers by another door. Izuru denies the murders, claiming the council itself unlocked the chamber to admit him moments earlier, and needles Hitsugaya for chasing him instead of guarding Momo Hinamori. He reveals that the captain's Kyōmon barrier, meant to repel outside attacks, could never contain a Kidō master like Hinamori, who slipped free, masked her own presence, and has trailed the pair the whole time. Alarmed, Hitsugaya leaves Izuru to Rangiku Matsumoto and races back toward the compound.

Izuru halts Rangiku by design, refuses to say whether Gin sent him, coldly calls her a dead woman, and unsheathes his Shikai Wabisuke, while Hitsugaya blames himself for underestimating Hinamori's devotion to the captain she believes he murdered. In the assembly hall, a dazed Hinamori studies the dead councilors until Gin appears at her shoulder in greeting. The chapter is part of the Soul Society arc, is collected in the nineteenth volume, and was adapted into the sixtieth episode of the anime.