I guess I'll toss you guys something else fun to play with that's a little less Kumbaya.
Name: Durendal Albrecht
Race: Shinigami
Age: 792
Gender: Male
Division: 11
Rank: Captain
Zanpakuto: Draupnir, currently a set of eight katanas. She started as a single sword but the form was modified based on her ability. Durendal is ambidextrous.
Zanpakuto Spirit Form:
Zanpakuto spirit personality: Draupnir is the golden ring of replication. Reflecting her master's interest in the finest quality of swords, she amplifies his interest into an obsession and gives him the means to do it. She believes she exists to serve his ends and push his dreams, even if they might be fleeting, small ones without much seriousness behind it. She will make it serious and then make it possible. As much a sword fanatic as Durendal is, she houses copies of his entirely collection of blades in their inner world, the place where she feels most at home, usually meditating in the middle of the field of swords. Durendal occasionally joins her in this. Dysfunctional as they may be, they are extremely in tune with each other, always on the same page by lead and follow reasoning. One will make the decision and the other will pursue it with all their might.
Inner World: For the lulz
Shikai: Saisoku, Draupnir. There is not visible form change till the swords are drawn after which they will become different types of swords. Draupnir's core ability is to claim swords for her master. Whenever Durendal finds a sword he likes, he can take it and absorb it into his zanpakuto. The power cannot exceed his own and the total sum of power does not change. For example, if he took one sword and stuck with it, he could probably access its full abilities. If he took two, he would only be able to access half of the abilities of each. For three, a third and so on. He has settled at eight because that's what he wanted and has no intention of ever taking in more, nor discarding one of his to make room for another. The taken sword must be a corporeal object anyway, not tied to the existence of something like a shinigami. In his shikai form, he unlocks 6 of his eight swords (This doesn't mean he can't draw the other two but they would still be katanas with no extra power or anything special.) Placement is in relation to Durendal. Each sword was obtained in the living world, usually mugged from their owners. A few he found after the deaths of their original owners.
Top left: Tizona, sword of the brave. The sword of Cid. Its power varies with the fighting spirit of the holder and preys on the cowardly who do not seek a true challenge. At most, it doubles in strenth, four times in bankai and at worse is useless. A silver two handed knight sword.
Upper left: Dainsleif, the bloody blade. The wounds created by this sword are extremely difficult to heal, naturally rejecting recovery, be it by kido, natural, or otherwise. If it is sheathed after drawing without killing someone, Durendal will die. A black scimitar.
Middle left: Caliburn, the holy sword. It can fire blasts of reiatsu when slashed, typical large projectile attack. It is destined to be lost one day. A large knightsword.
Lower left: Arondight, sword of the hero. The sword of Lancelot. It might as well be the sword of the playboy as it acts like a compass towards the nearest damsel in distress. Durendal likes it as a sword but hates the ability. A longsword. In bankai, it can generate an image of the person.
Top right: Shishenli. The glory of ten powers. This sword can conjure a circular barrier in front of Durendal about equal to a 40s kido, 70 for bankai. However, it is susceptible to fire and if burned too badly reverts to a katana, unable to be released again till Durendal seals Draupnir. A jian.
Upper right: Joyeuse, the sword of the king. Charlemgne's sword. A sword that shines brighter than the sun, blinding friend and foe alike. A zweihandler.
Middle right: Gram, the sword of selection. This sword cuts through armors and other defenses with much greater ease than a normal sword. However, if it hits a piece of wood, it will get stuck and cannot be withdrawn from it until Durendal reseals it. A short sword.
Lower right: Guojian. The sword of restoring nations. This sword leaves wounds to the touch and cannot be broken or worn away. It is destined to lose and bring ten years of humiliation, then come back to restore a nation. It curses both the user and those wounded by it with nightmares after use the next time they sleep. A double edged one handed broadsword.
Guojian and Dainsleif do not work in shikai form. Each ability is specific to the sword. That means that each sword cannot use the abilities of any of the others and that anyone who picks up one of his swords can use that ability with it too. The swords all remain katanas until they leave their sheathes after which they assume their true form.
Bankai: Tsutaebanashi Draupnir
An amplified version of Durendal's shikai plus the addition of Guojian and Dainsleif. The same shikai mechanics still apply.
Skills: Durendal has an extreme and extensive knowledge of the sword. It Iis an obsession with him, leaving him able to use almost any type of sword there is, be it a butterfly knife, a rapier, or a zweihandler. Strong enough to use one hand for a short time for some of his swords that normally require two, he is a bit above average in most physical aspects but without a stark specialty beyond his long standing experience.
Weaknesses: Kido first and foremost. Learning nothing beyond byakurai, sho, and sai from the academy and even unable to manage eishohaki for those, his skill in the field is abysmal. He is also far from a deep thinker, working entirely on his gut feeling and past experience which amounts to a lot of fighting and not much else. Outside fighting, his problem solving ability is pathetic. His solution to almost everything is some degree of violence or general rudeness. That makes his planning and leadership ability fairly inept except when it comes to helping his division members get stronger.
Personality: In short, a single minded ass. Durendal is the epitome of self gratification, not really caring what the world around him thinks. This isn't anything new for him but he reaches a class of his own when he graduates from being like every other 11th division punk to a force strong enough for the Gotei 13 to rather put up with him and make use of him than try to arrest him for pursuing his sword fetish and mowing down a few meaningless humans or killing a few in duels fir their swords. It is all a whim to him. He is often excessively rude and demeaning to others but makes a point of casually tossing in a very valid point here and there to make it harder for them to refute or ignore him. He drinks a lot, often breaks the dress code, and picks fights on a day to day basis. He does, however, follow orders for the given moment. Longer lasting orders involving his habits he will blatantly ignore or treat as a momentary order.
Aside swords, Durendal has respect for two things: strength and the will to win. Having either of thesr aspects in his eyes makes him a bit less of a jerk in your direction. The rest he treats like fools, a waste of his time. Where someone starts doesn't matter to him. You could be a noble. You could be strong. You could be weak. It is the pursuit of strength that makes someone a man and not money or rank. He is also slightly chauvanistic, individually overridden by his assessment of worth but that is on an individual basis only. Most women he treats as something closer to objects and not worth his time unless given sufficient reason to revise his opinion. Flowery words are less up his alley. Understanding people through battle is. In this sense, he is both simple to understand and occasionally extremely deep when it concerns his obsession.
It is rumored that he has a vault in the living world, a shrine where he stores his collection of swords that he didn't absorb into his zanpakuto but deemed worthy enough to keep around. Of course, not many think much of it since talk of sword hunter Durendal is lightly taboo and most of the shinigami are too young to know about it before the recordswere hidden or erased. As he doesn't do anything in half measures, that vault is probably huge.
Appearance:
Bio: While his history is mostly classified under SS policy and his rise to the attention of the Gotei 13 was quiet, those who look at the classified files or were shinigami before the seraph incident would likely know the name Sword Hunter Durendal. Originally a normal shinigami in the 11th division and aspirations to do great things, on the day he achieved his shikai, he went missing in the living world for a few hours. No one really thought much of it but in that time, he had torn a human museum to shreds and taken a sword from it. More than fighting like a typical member of the 11th, he became completely obsessed with swords, swords of the finest quality. It wasn't long before he started killing humans for them instead of just stealing. His interest wasn't a hobby nor a curiosity but a fanatical obsession. The shinigami had never put much value in looking at the events of the living world that didn't incld hllw but they did notice him going missing for periods of time and then all of a sudden having new swords. One day he had one and two the next. Three the day after. After the fifth one, people started asking questions due to the abnormality of it and the thefts and murders in the living world were linked to the swords that integrated themselves with his shikai. Upon an attempt to quietly deal with him, he moved to thrashing the shinigami. It seemed that his power had grown exponentially since stealing a few swords. Not only had he acquired some new abilities but his focus and intensity had reached an entirely new level. Despite being an unseated member before who had barely stood out, the 10th seat was destroyed and the 7th seat barely crawled back while he was left without any serious injury at all as he fled.
Undeterred by a little thing like being on the run over a few swords, Durendal hadn't a care about that and spent the next ten years gathering a massive stockpile of legendary swords from mortal mythology and beyond. The Gotei 13 placed him on the official hit list for interfering with the living world and he was all too happy for it. Having all those swords was great but for a sword to be truly happy, you have to use it. With shinigami sent to apprehend him, he had no shortage of play mates. They had made a monster before they could blink. Thingssimmered down on his end as the ryoka invasion and winter war left the shinigami with much more pressing matters than going after a rogue that wasn't hurting them directly. Durendal became irritable and discontent. The seraph incident was the last straw and he returned to Soul Society to fight. They were in enough turmoil that they didn't care about the little details. He fought on their side for no better reason than that he was picking fights with the strongest targets. In the aftermath of it, the seraphim were repelled and time was taken for the Gotei 13 to realize that they had a wanted face sitting on their front door, flaunting his presence without any shame at all... but they were in no condition to take him down. He was a captain level shinigami and trying to apprehend him would have been disastrous, liable to end with hundreds of casualties and him getting away anyway. They were in no condition to pursue him either. Rebuilding was more important. Upon further review, it was deemed that he actually hadn't even done anything against the law in over a hundred years other than resist arrest. The decision was made to strike a deal with him and sweep his record under the table, subtracting one rogue shinigami from the hit list and adding one captain class shinigami to their waning numbers. He wasn't likely to be a danger to them and would be kept neatly under control as long as he got to sate his thirst for battle.
As it turned out, the seraphim made no quick return and the fights that Durendal had been hoping for didn't materialize, meaning that he often picked fights with the other shinigami for years to come but kept it in check, keepiing the collateral damage low and the fights without too hefty injury. In other words, he kept his play mates alive and the trouble small enough that a blind eye could be turned to it. To this day, he remains one of the rudest, most unliked people in the Seireitei but not one will deny that he will defend and lead his division with the power and force befitting of a captain. Nor would they doubt his haste in defending his subordinates. It is tradition, though, that the taxfor him having to save them is sparring with him. The 4th gets a lot of unnecessary worj from that. He calls it raising up worthy opponents and as much as it is bullying, it isn't any less teaching.
