Seigen Suzunami

He keeps to the ordinary black robes worn across the Gotei 13, layering the Fifth Division's captain haori on top. A shade of deep crimson colors his hair, which he splits along a central part, allowing a single loose strand to fall past his left cheek.

Duty sits at the center of how Seigen carries himself, and he draws a firm boundary between his office and his private life, insisting that Fujimaru and Matsuri address him by rank whenever they are on the job. Off duty the severity loosens, and he would rather people simply use his given name than bow to his title. Beneath the stern surface is a man devoted to those close to him: he watches over his subordinates, cherishes his sister Konoka, and has spent much of his life quietly doing favors for her, wanting above all to be someone others can lean on.

Roughly a century before the game's present, Seigen joined Kisuke Urahara of the Twelfth Division and his own lieutenant Aizen on a Rukongai assignment to scatter a Hollow pack that had grown strangely coordinated and preyed on locals. They cut down the bulk of the swarm and drove off its leader as it moved to devour a pair of orphaned twins. Seigen carried the injured child back to his home, where Konoka mended the wound. The siblings gave their names as Fujimaru and Matsuri Kudo, and when the fed children begged for more, the household recognized that only souls with spiritual promise feel hunger. Offered a place among the Shinigami, the twins accepted so they could repay the kindness, and after six years at the Shin'o Academy both entered the Fifth Division.

Later the captains learned that Arturo Plateado, an Arrancar whose power had finally matured, had returned to menace Soul Society. His blade Fenix swallowed the spiritual energy of everyone it slew, so the officers moved with extreme care, aware that a single captain's reiatsu could push him beyond stopping. The Central 46 turned to Konoka, the only soul able to wield the Shisuikyo, a mirror that drains reiatsu. Seigen hated the idea yet went along with it. The mirror sapped Arturo, but it bled Konoka dry as well; once the Arrancar fell she collapsed, and with no one left to steer it the Shisuikyo pulled Seigen, both twins, and Arturo into the Wandering Spirit World.

When Seigen finally emerged, Aizen found him and claimed the mirror had killed Konoka, seeding a grief that curdled into blame against the twins. He struck at Soul Society with Hollow support, was repelled, and eventually begged Aizen to strip away the emotions holding him back. Aizen answered by grafting a Menos Grande onto him, remaking him into a towering Hollow that hurled violet Cero and lost the power of speech, though it still sensed Konoka's spirit lingering within the girl Shiyo. In his last stand he was bonded to the Shisuikyo itself, swelling into a serpentine monster before Matsuri, Fujimaru, and Shiyo brought him down. Konoka's soul then surfaced to greet him one final time, and the reunited family spent the last of their strength sending the living home before fading away. His Zanpakuto, Shiden, channeled violet lightning in its Shikai, loosing paralyzing webs and a great thunderous bolt.