Renji and Rukia, having grown up in a town where “shitty bastards live shitty lifestyles”, loose their friends and decided to take the well-trodden path out of the poverty – to become a Shinigami and reside in the Seireitei. But even at the Central Spirit Technique Institute, people look down on them for their social standing. Rukia has been offered the chance to be adopted into the Kuchiki clan, and be immediately graduated and accepted into the Gotei 13. Renji tells Ichigo that it was his own fault that Rukia is now a death row prisoner, and begs him to save Rukia.