Birth, Aging and Death In Soul Society

[NoSanninWa]

Originally Posted by HiroInazuma

she died as a baby and came to SS as a baby I just have one question...HOW DO SOULS DIE?!

Souls don't die. A soul's spiritual body dies. After the spritual body dies the soul then returns to the real world and is born with a physical body again.

How does a spritual body die? Simple. It's just like a real body, excpet that it is made of spiriton instead of atoms. So when someone's spirtual heart is ripped out of their spiritual chest dripping spiritual blood all over the ground, it will kill their spiritual body.

[Hisago]

Ok. Shinigami aging. 109 years ago from the current storyline, Shuuhei was a little kid. Based on what I saw in -104, I've made some speculations.

- Aging for Shinigami slows way down as they pass adolescence. However, this doesn't explain why Hiyori, who could pass for 13-16, remains the same over a nine year period... Perhaps she's a midget O_o?

and

-Normal souls age at a near-human rate. They would have to, or Soul Society would get overcrowded very quickly.

[Thewanderer]

Originally Posted by Hisago

- Aging for Shinigami slows way down as they pass adolescence. However, this doesn't explain why Hiyori, who could pass for 13-16, remains the same over a nine year period... Perhaps she's a midget O_o?

Only 9 years? She looks exactly the same in the present too, over 100 years from then. I'd say she's just petite.

Not sure how she still have freckles though...

[Lythian]

Keep in mind that Hiyori is a Vizard, and for all we know, Vizards may have a completely different aging pattern than SS dwellers, further complicating matters.

This topic makes my head hurt...

[Thewanderer]

Originally Posted by Lythian

Keep in mind that Hiyori is a Vizard, and for all we know, Vizards may have a completely different aging pattern than SS dwellers, further complicating matters.

This topic makes my head hurt...

Hmmm... maybe it's because they're half hollow?

That theory would introduce the thought of hollow lifespans being that much longer then, if they're mortal. For all we know, hollows NEVER age.

[Hisago]

Originally Posted by Lythian

Keep in mind that Hiyori is a Vizard, and for all we know, Vizards may have a completely different aging pattern than SS dwellers, further complicating matters.

This topic makes my head hurt...

But she's not a Vizard at the moment. She's still a Shinigami.

I've also speculated that Arrancar don't age at all, but I don't really have anything to back it up...

Aging most likely has something to do with the amount of spiritual energy that a being has. I don't think aging would ever stop for a Shinigami, it would just get very very slow the stronger they were. Which begs the question, if they had the capacity to store a large amount of reiatsu but it was constantly at low levels for whatever reason, would they start to age quickly again?

Nono... we know for sure, that normal (=no spirit power) human souls don't age at all. It was one of the first information Ichigo&Co. learned when entering SS.

But... how do they get reborn into humans if they don't age and thus don't die naturally?

[Hisago]

With all the trillions of souls there must be there, chances are at least one of them would be ready to die...

[Zu Ra]

If we assume people with high reatsu can stop or delay aging things will be easier . Shunsui / Uki / Unohana are over 2000 years yet they look they are in mid 30 s . Yamaji is old but he might be a dinosaur

[Hisago]

Have they ever given any of the Shinigamis' exact ages?

[HiroInazuma]

Originally Posted by Hisago

Have they ever given any of the Shinigamis' exact ages?

Nope Rukia said that she lived about like 10 of Ichigo's years

[kagato3]

My rule of thumb is that Shinigami age at a speed of 1 year for every 10 they live at least no one has been shown ageing faster then that. The flash back chapters seem to suport this but ther are a few oddities.

Spoiler for manga info:

Mainly the vizzards all look pretty much the same 100 years ago but it does look like they aged a little

Originally Posted by Hisago

But she's not a Vizard at the moment. She's still a Shinigami.

I've also speculated that Arrancar don't age at all, but I don't really have anything to back it up...

Spoiler for manga info:

Arrancar do age both Nnoi and ZAG looked a bit younger when they got rid of Nel

As for ages the only one we know about for sure is Rukia as she was abandoned as a very small child and has stated that she has been in SS for 150 years. Renji, Kira, Momo and Shrio are all seemingly ageing at the same rate as her as well but we do not know how old they were when they came to SS, Kira for example is form a minor noble famialy so he may have been born there.

[Hisago]

Originally Posted by kagato3

Spoiler for manga info:

Arrancar do age both Nnoi and ZAG looked a bit younger when they got rid of Nel

I think their hair was just shorter... In fact, I don't think any of the captains, except for Byakuya, looked younger in the flashback chapters. Their hair was just a bit different.

[Sabaku Kyu]

Originally Posted by kagato3

My rule of thumb is that Shinigami age at a speed of 1 year for every 10 they live at least no one has been shown ageing faster then that. The flash back chapters seem to suport this but ther are a few oddities.

Spoiler for manga info:

Mainly the vizzards all look pretty much the same 100 years ago but it does look like they aged a little

I originally went with the 1/10 aging rate, but that doesn't really explain how some shinigami (like Yamaji) live well over 2000 years. If the 1/10 th were fixed, then a shinigami's max life span should be a 1000 years or so.

On the other side of that, it must be awfully tough to survive 10 years in Rukongai as a 1 year old then another 10 years as a 2 year old like Rukia and Renji would've had to do.

So now I think it may be progressive type of thing, where the aging process slows down as you get older, sort of like how Superman's aging is depicted to be. He aged at the same rate as a human into his early adulthood but in stories set in the future, he's always shown to have aged far less than everybody else and it's said that his lifespan will be far more than that of a human.

Maybe for the first two or three years or so (if you come to SS as an infant) you age close to the rate of a human, by the time you get into your teens the aging has slowed to approx 1/10th the rate, in your 20's maybe 1/20th and so on until when you get to Yamaji's age, centuries may pass and you've barely aged.

[Zu Ra]

There is this other thing IMO only shinigamis dont age,common denizens of Rukognai age and die (not much reatsu). Shinigami are afterall the ones with high soul power. Aging depends on reatsu .

Originally Posted by Hisago

Have they ever given any of the Shinigamis' exact ages?

Nope Kubo has kept that still open so he can change it as plot demands .

Spoiler for manga:

Initially we had assumed Shunshui and Ukitake were the oldest captains after Yamaji. But now we know Uno is mostly like older than Uki Kyo as they called Uno Sempai.

Aizen ,initially people had assumed he is old .. but now you can put his age to 150-175 years.

Regarding Hiyori she isnt a kid she is a loli just as Toshiro is a loli shota

[Hisago]

I like Sabakyu's idea, having their age slow by increments...

[kagato3]

Originally Posted by Sabaku Kyu

I originally went with the 1/10 aging rate, but that doesn't really explain how some shinigami (like Yamaji) live well over 2000 years. If the 1/10 th were fixed, then a shinigami's max life span should be a 1000 years or so.

On the other side of that, it must be awfully tough to survive 10 years in Rukongai as a 1 year old then another 10 years as a 2 year old like Rukia and Renji would've had to do.

So now I think it may be progressive type of thing, where the aging process slows down as you get older, sort of like how Superman's aging is depicted to be. He aged at the same rate as a human into his early adulthood but in stories set in the future, he's always shown to have aged far less than everybody else and it's said that his lifespan will be far more than that of a human.

Maybe for the first two or three years or so (if you come to SS as an infant) you age close to the rate of a human, by the time you get into your teens the aging has slowed to approx 1/10th the rate, in your 20's maybe 1/20th and so on until when you get to Yamaji's age, centuries may pass and you've barely aged.

One problem with this

Spoiler for manga:

Byakuya's garandfather, the ex captain of the 6th, does look like he aged 5 years between chapter -105 and when Rukia was adopted which agian places him in to the ageing 1/10 year catagory and also blows a hole in the you age slower the more powerful you are theroy as well. Which makes it realy anoying since there is nothing to help explain Yamaji and the other oddites.

[Amirali]

Originally Posted by Sabaku Kyu

Maybe for the first two or three years or so (if you come to SS as an infant) you age close to the rate of a human, by the time you get into your teens the aging has slowed to approx 1/10th the rate, in your 20's maybe 1/20th and so on until when you get to Yamaji's age, centuries may pass and you've barely aged.

Originally Posted by kagato3

One problem with this

Spoiler for manga:

Byakuya's garandfather, the ex captain of the 6th, does look like he aged 5 years between chapter -105 and when Rukia was adopted which agian places him in to the ageing 1/10 year catagory and also blows a hole in the you age slower the more powerful you are theroy as well. Which makes it realy anoying since there is nothing to help explain Yamaji and the other oddites.

That could be explained if aging rate changes with sickness. After all, it makes sense that some diseases might accelerate aging/decay. Also is it just me, or does Ukitake look significantly older than his classmate Shunsui? And if it's not just me, could it be the tuberculosis causing it?

I personally like the theory of Basielus below. The strongest point is, it basically throws out any need for consistency in aging rules, and says it depends on the person's self-perception. I'm not sure if any other approach satisfyingly handle all cases.... there always seem to be a few annoying oddities (as insanity mentions, the Vaizards, Urahara,Yoruichi,etc). At least in this method, there's always wiggle-room as to how old a character perceives him/herself.

Originally Posted by Basileus

I have absolutely nothing to support this, but it always seemed to me like the age that a shinigami appears to be is based more on how they mentally see themselves then on how old they actually are. Yamamoto is ancient, and the years of responsibility and stress make him appear old, even if it doesn't affect his actual physical abilities. Unohana is the nuturing, caregiving healer, and so appears as a soothing, middle-aged woman. Yachiru sees herself inextricably as Kenpachi's daughter, its literally all she's ever known, so as long as he's around her mental "image" of herself won't change and she'll stay young. We've seen that Rukia and Renji matured physically during their time in Rukongai, which would make sense given all they dealt with and the death of their friends would force a more mature outlook. The same could be said of Matsumoto (or you could take the approach that she realized how much fun adults could have with drinking and made the change pretty quickly regardless of Rukongai). The kicker here is Toushirou, because he see's himself as the kid genius and is constantly trying to live up to that standard, not grow beyond it. He thinks he still has to prove himself, he thinks he needs to drink milk to grow, he still sees himself as a kid trying to be accepted in an adult's world, regardless of his talent, and this is the very thing that keeps him looking like one. Like I said, absolutely nothing at all to support this, but it makes a certain amount of sense (at least to me). It also nicely explains why shinigami who are so much older than others can actually look younger.

Originally Posted by Basileus

Yeah, and because I'm a HUGE nerd, here're the reasons I worked out for why they each look like they do:

1st Squad:
Yamamoto: How many times over the years has he sat at his desk, looking over a casualty report from another battle, and thought back over all the long years and all the deaths? Most of the time it rolls off him, he's used to it now, but every once in a while he really stops and thinks about it, thinking back over the millennium and all the people who have come and gone, and he comes face to face with the reality of how long he has truly lived. And every time that happens, he finds that over the next few months or years, there are more wrinkles, more white in his hair, less hair on his head. Yamamoto has lived for a long time now, and he can almost count the dead in the wrinkles on his face and hands

Sasakibe Choujirou: His entire personality was defined by his meeting with that Englishman. His sword, his hobbies, everything about him reflects his passion for English culture. And thus he has naturally come to look like a distinguished and cultured gentleman, the paragon of the ideals he tries to live up to ever day: old enough to have seen the world and learned from it, but not so old as to have lost the spark of vitality and energy.

2nd Squad:
Yoruichi: She's a rebel, an iconoclast, and she's spent her entire life fighting "tradition." Old people are the ones who support tradition, and since she was against it, by her definition that meant she was young. Even when she found herself in positions of authority, her refusal to buy into "the system" and her devil-may-care attitude kept her looking young. The events that saw her exiled from Soul Society, and the realities of living in the real world have forced her to adapt, and that adaptation has made her a bit more cautious, a bit more willing to look before she leaps, and so she has aged a little. But she's still more-or-less the same underneath all that, and so she keeps looking young.

Soifon: She was young when she met Yoruichi and she still lives in her shadow, so she has changed little. Yoruichi has defined almost her entire life. When they served together while Yoruichi was captain of the 2nd division, Soifon was so devoted to her, so completely caught up in being the perfect tool for her will, that she thought about herself almost not at all, and so she changed not at all. When Yoruichi left, the stress of taking over the division, and the shock of being abandoned forced Soifon to re-evaluate her position in the world, and this was reflected in a maturing of her appearance. But it was also accompanied by a determination to prove herself to Yoruichi, and a drive to best her old mentor, that allowed her to conceive of her body as a weapon to do just that, and a weapon needs to be in the best shape if it is to be useful, and this kept Soifon from aging either too far or too rapidly.

Marechiyo: Marechiyo really is the boor he appears to be. He never thinks too hard or too much about anything, including himself. He naturally assumes that he will have money, and position, and comforts, in the easy, offhand manner that somebody who has always had something does, and age makes no difference to these factors, so he has been progressing fairly "naturally" so far with his appearance. His parents are still alive though, and thus he still thinks of himself as someone's son, a mental outlook that has kept him looking fairly young all these years.

Anyways, I won't post them all up if people aren't interested, but I've got them saved in an AIM conversation doc so its just copy and paste if people are. The other part about the theory is that it reinforces the fact that the relationships among the shinigami have as much to do with how they see themselves and how they look as their own conceptions or age.

[Spectacular_Insanity]

Nice theories and ideas all around, but in the end, I think that continuity is just getting kicked in the groin and left for dead in a ditch somewhere. Nothing makes any sense anymore, especially when you take into account all the Shinigami that have left Soul Society, like that one guy that Rukia and the others encountered in Hueco Mundo (whose name I cannot recall because I just don't care). And then there's Yoruichi and Urahara, neither of which has aged a day since the "Turn Back the Pendulum" manga chapters. Also the Vizards. The list goes on and on.

[HayashiTakara]

Actually, Yoruichi has longer hair now, she had short hair back in the day well, IIRC anyway XD

[Konpachi]

Originally Posted by HiroInazuma

she died as a baby and came to SS as a baby I just have one question...HOW DO SOULS DIE?!

.... im quite sure she was born in Rukongai... seeing as how she has a sister... and after Soul Burial u forgot about ur past life... including ur family... so Hisana wouldn't know who the hell Rukia was.