Characters

Ichigo Kurosaki

The primary protagonist of Bleach, orange haired high school freshman Ichigo Kurosaki is forced to become a Substitute Shinigami after unwittingly absorbing most of Rukia's powers. His cynical nature at first makes him ill-disposed towards the duty, but with the passage of time he comes to accept and welcome it, recognizing that even if he is not able to save everyone, he can at least use his skills to protect those close to him.

Rukia Kuchiki

Rukia Kuchiki is a Shinigami who was sent on a Hollow extermination patrol in Ichigo Kurosaki's home town. Though her physical appearance is that of a teenage girl, in reality she is over 150 years old. Rukia is forced to transfer her power to Ichigo and assume a temporary lifestyle as a regular human. She registers at the local high school and takes up residence in Ichigo's closet, while teaching him how to be a substitute Shinigami in her place.

Renji Abarai

Renji Abarai is an elite Shinigami bearing the rank of 6th Division Lieutenant, making him second in command of a sub-branch of the Shinigami armed forces. Although first introduced as a deadly enemy, he has conflicting loyalties between his job and Rukia, whom he grew up with. A brash and driven man, he holds both a deep respect and animosity towards his immediate superior, 6th Division Captain Byakuya Kuchiki.

Yasutora Sado

Yasutora Sado, better known as Chad, is one of Ichigo's few friends at school. He is a biracial (Japanese/Mexican) student who towers over his classmates. Despite his imposing appearance he is quite meek, and refuses to fight unless it is for the sake of another. He does not have awareness of ghosts at first, but can still touch Hollows, and eventually is able to see them when he witnesses a group of children being attacked by a Hollow. He later discovers a unique ability that strengthens and armors his right arm, enabling him to fight hollows.

Uryū Ishida

Though on the surface nothing more than the solitary class genius, Uryū Ishida is actually a Quincy, descendant of a line of priest-like Hollow-hunting archers. He bears a deep grudge against all Shinigami, including Ichigo, but comes to view Ichigo differently over time, eventually becoming an ally and friendly rival. His father refuses to have anything to do with Quincies, so he receives training from his grandfather, until his grandfather is killed. He wears a special glove that helps to focus and strengthen spirit particles. However, it is never to be taken off, for while you would temporarily gain unparalleled power, one loses all his or her Quincy powers. Ishida does take it off by breaking it to defeat a powerful enemy while trying to save Rukia, but the enemy escapes, and Ishida is left powerless. He is surprised when his father show's his Quincy powers and offers to restore Ishida's as long as he promises to no longer deal with Shinigami. He regains his Quincy powers the only way possible:While mentally and physically exhausted, he is shot with a medium strength Quincy arrow 17 millimeters to the left of his heart

Orihime Inoue

Orihime Inoue is a long-time classmate of Ichigo, closely linked to him by mutual friend Tatsuki Arisawa. She is effectively an orphan, as she and her elder brother Sora ran away from their abusive home at a young age, and her brother later died. Though initially devoid of spiritual powers, she begins to develop spiritual awareness and later obtains one of the most powerful healing abilities in the Bleach universe, able to completely restore a body to its previous state regardless of how severely it is wounded. It is not technically a healing ability, however. She has the ability to "reject" or "deny" what happened to an object or area, making it as if nothing ever happened. It can also restore power, as witnessed when she healed an Arrancar, Grimmjow. After healing his marking, he defeated with ease an opponent who had usurped his position through battle previously.

Character types

* Human: The humans of Bleach are much like the residents of modern Japan, and most cannot see or sense disembodied spirits in any way. Spirits can, however, inhabit artificial human bodies called Gigai which are visible to ordinary humans. One in 50,000 Humans is a medium with some awareness of nearby spirits, but only a third of these are able to see them clearly, and only the strongest of mediums are able to speak with or touch spirits. Certain unique Humans naturally have both the power to sense and the strength to fight with spirits. Ordinary Humans can gain the ability to interact with spirits by spending time around a large source of spirit energy.

* Plus: Benign spirits in Bleach are known as Pluses. A plus is the spirit of a person who has died. A chain, known as the Chain of Fate , protrudes from the chest and binds the plus to a location, object or person that they felt close to in life. The soul can move about freely if the chain is broken, but this also causes the chain to corrode. Normally, Pluses are sent to Soul Society by Shinigami in a ritual called Soul Burial before this corrosion becomes significant. If the Chain of Fate is corroded entirely before a soul burial can be performed, a hole will form in the chest of the soul where the chain was once anchored. Such souls are driven mad and become evil spirits known as Hollows. If the Chain of Fate is torn out deliberately, this also leads to spiritual degradation.

* Shinigami: Shinigami (Soul Reaper in the official English editions, Death Gods in most subtitled versions) are the psychopomps of Bleach. They are souls with inner spiritual power, recruited from the ranks of the residents and nobility of Soul Society. Like all spirits, they cannot be detected by normal Hhumans. Shinigami use their Zanpakutō, supernatural swords that are the manifestation of their owners' power, to perform soul burials on pluses.Shinigami also use Zanpakutō and magic known as Kidō to fight their arch-rivals, the hollows. A group of Shinigami known as the Vizards have obtained Hollow powers, gaining removable masks and access to certain Hollow abilities.

* Hollow: Hollows are the central antagonists of the Bleach franchise. They are evil spirits that reside in Hueco Mundo, but travel to the Human World to feed on the souls of the living and dead alike. Like Shinigami, Hollows are made of spiritual matter and cannot be detected by ordinary Humans. While the majority of Hollows can be overcome by the average Shinigami, there are some which surpass even the most elite Shinigami in strength. All normal Hollows wear white masks, but a small group of hollows have broken them, becoming Arrancar. By shattering their masks, these Hollows regain the ability to reason, sometimes obtain a humanoid form, and gain access to Shinigami powers.

* Quincy: The Quinces are a clan of spiritually aware Humans who once fought against the Hollows, using weapons composed of spiritual energy to slay them. As opposed to Shinigami, Quinces absorb and channel energy from their surroundings to fight. Unlike the Shinigami method of killing Hollows which allows the Hollow to enter Soul Society, the Quincy technique simply destroys the Hollow's soul entirely. This method has the propensity to shatter the balance of the universe, because when souls are destroyed, the number of souls entering and leaving Soul Society cannot remain equal. This issue prompted the Shinigami to conduct a campaign to exterminate the Quincy about 200 years before the main storyline. At least two Quincies still remain.

* Artificial soul: Artificial souls (also known as Modified Souls, or Mod Souls) are a type of soul mass-produced by the Shinigami. Issued in pill form, they are used to force Shinigami out of their Gigai during protracted stays in the living world, and also to evict pluses that refuse to leave their bodies after death.They come with a pre-programmed personality that animates the host body until the owner returns. In addition to the mundane versions, a series of experimental souls authorized and created by Shinigami researchers exists. Known as modified souls, these were meant to hunt Hollows by possessing soulless human bodies and supercharging a particular aspect of them (for example, strength or speed). The Shinigami decided to scrap the project due to the inhumanity of forcing dead bodies to fight, and ordered the destruction of all modified souls. Only one modified soul exists in the manga, but there are three more such characters in the anime.

* Bount: They are a vampiric like race created when an experiment in Soul Society (conducted by Ran'Tao) goes horribly wrong, and the Bount souls get mixed up with normal souls which causes Bounts to be born from normal Humans and because of the Bounts powers they where despised by Humans as well. Because of their massive Reiatsu they where easy prey for Hollow which cause the Soul Society to take action in exterminating the Bount which happened when the Bounts battled the Quincies the Soul Society used the opportunity to destroy the Bounts.