Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-31283382-20140611172614/@comment-4310945-20140617063723

Both the old man and the hollow are his zanpakuto spirits, they are two halves of the spiritual whole that is Ichigo and their presence is within each of his new blades. The larger is the hollow/shinigami part while the smaller one is the old man. It was stated during the reforging that this isn't a lie and that the only deception was that the old man was posing as Ichigo's shinigami powers.