Old man Zangetsu=last 11th captain

[segua]

That's incorrect. Only Kaien's form was retained by the 9th Espada or Kaien's spirit body. I strongly think Kaien died when Rukia stabbed him. You know what's funny, it seemed that Kaien won that fight with the hollow. So to say, when Kaien ran himself through with Rukia's zanpakuto, he returned to his shinigami state and seem to be the victor. I dunno if this would make Kaien an Vizard.

Anyway, I said that Zangetsu might be made from the residue of the last incarnation.

[Tsukisama]

That's incorrect. Only Kaien's form was retained by the 9th Espada or Kaien's spirit body. I strongly think Kaien died when Rukia stabbed him. You know what's funny, it seemed that Kaien won that fight with the hollow. So to say, when Kaien ran himself through with Rukia's zanpakuto, he returned to his shinigami state and seem to be the victor. I dunno if this would make Kaien an Vizard.

Anyway, I said that Zangetsu might be made from the residue of the last incarnation.

Kaien would not be a vizard. Kaien was possessed by a hollow, but he was not himself a hollow. Kaien had no hollow mask to remove in the "vizardification" process.

---

No, actually, Shirosaki, if that's the hollow's name is actually the hollow part of Ichigo. Zangetsu is the shinigami power. They are their own different entities. It seems that Zangetsu could lend his powers to either one, the king, or even both.

I still wonder if Ichigo is the reincarnation of Kaien because I'm starting to think that Zangetsu might be Kaien or residue of Kaien. Zangetsu isn't quite Kaien but is sort of what's left over. Like I said, residue of the previous incarnation of Kaien.

Heck, I'm even thinking that Orihime might be the reincarnation of Kaien's wife.

Shirosaki is just a name given to Ichigo's inner hollow by the fans. Other names having been used before include Hollow Ichigo and Hichigo (a portmanteau of the previous name).

It has not been definitively shown that they are separate entities. One can make an equally strong case for Zangetsu and Hichigo being the same being but just different sides of Ichigo's soul.

Because Ichigo looks very similar to Kaien and also has a strong relationship with Rukia like Kaien, I suppose that it might be possible that Ichigo is his reincarnation. Orihime being the reincarnation of Kaien's wife seems far too unlikely though. The only possible reason I can imagine for this theory is that Orihime is romantically interested in Ichigo and thus she may be Kaien's wife if she were to have reincarnated and was trying to seek out her connection to Kaien. However, the reincarnation theory between Ichigo and Kaien draws its strength from their extremely similar appearance and even some parallels that could be made in regards to their personalities. Orihime does not share any connection to Miyako in terms of personality or even appearance, making the theory a lot less convincing.

[Richo]

as far i recall, if a hollow eats a shinigami it eats its soul and the soul becomes one with the hollow. and all those theories about reincarnations etc etc, are all noncense being made by some wishful pple nothing else....

[segua]

The 9th Espada ate the dead husk of the hollow fused Kaien obtaining all the abilities, experience and even memories which is evident in the picture in the spoiler below. Also, read on a few more pages. Kaien did die along with that hollow that fused with him after Rukia killed ran Kaien's body through.

In Bleach, there is reincarnation. Souls migrate from one realm to the other. They are born into the living world and die into the spirit world. There, they live another life as a spirit where they die into the living world. Or that was how I understood it when Rukia explained it to Ichigo about pluses and minuses. Also, there seems to be a finite amount of spirits so that means that the spirits must be reused or in other words, reincarnated into the different realms.

Even in SS, spirits have spirit bodies made up of spiritrons which I find oddly interesting. So even spirits have spirits. So a spirit must always inhabit a body that is either made up of flesh or of spiritrons.