As I sit here on this hill and watch my best friend of 6 years beat the hell out of some delinquents from another school, I reflect on what my life has become. I was not from this world, but at the same time, I was.
Transmigration is a term used most often by Chinese authors when they write crappy West-bashing fan fictions about their overpowered self-insert character. Usually, the fan fictions are chock-full of 'China number one' propaganda, and they have no idea how real people or the characters they are writing about would act or speak.
Why am I telling you this? Well, because I have been transmigrated, or maybe it would be reborn, even now, after a little more than half a decade, I don't really know. I also don't care either. I'm here now, and that's not going to change, so whatever. Anyway, let's start at the beginning, or in this case, the end.
----
I remember my past life all the way up to my death. I was once a normal guy. I had a mom, a dad and an older brother. I graduated from college and was halfway through a program that would guarantee me a job with Porsche as a technician as soon as I was finished with it.
Unfortunately for me, on my way home from one of my training sessions, my car got hit. I think it was a drunk driver. I was T-boned. I didn't die on impact; in fact, I remember someone pulling me out. As I lay there bleeding out, I remember feeling the blood fill my lungs and letting out a choking cough as I called out for my mother.
After that, I felt nothing, and then wham, I opened my eyes, and the pain in the rest of my body was gone, but now was replaced by a dull ache at the back of my head and the weight of something on my chest.
I pushed the weight off and opened my eyes while sitting up slowly. That's when someone called out to me. "Hey, are you alright?" I turned to see a slender teenage girl with long black hair in a white coat. She had bandages wrapped around her chest on the back of her coat; the words 'Red Tail' were written on it in kanji.
The girl helped me up before saying, "My, aren't you cute, one. I'm Shizuka Itoi, nice to meet you. Are you a friend of Tatsumi?" She said with a slight blush while touching my face. I didn't respond, as I was still very overwhelmed by my new surroundings and the fact that I was, ya know, NOTDEAD.
Another girl, a pretty blonde with her hair done up and wearing a lovely kimono, took my silence for fear and cut in with her blase voice. "Leave the kid alone, Shizuka, he's frightened." The blonde then turned to the third woman in the room, who was flipping through a magazine and asked, "So Misaki, are we in it?"
"Wait, Haruka, I'm looking." The now-named Misaki kept turning pages before exclaiming excitedly, "Oh, here it is, here it is! It says we're a team of up-and-coming beautiful women!" She spun around with the magazine in hand, happily letting her own white coat fall from her shoulders, where it was resting.
At that point, Shizuka let go of me and ran over to Misaki to see the article they were mentioned in, too. "Misaki, show me, show me!" she said eagerly.
As I stood there, still absolutely confused as to what was happening, the 'weight' I pushed off me earlier spoke. "See, that's why I told you not to stand behind me. My sister always kicks me far when I'm late." It was a kid. He had dark brown hair that matched Misaki's, but he also had a bloody nose and a face full of bruises.
"Your sister..." I muttered quietly. That's when it hits me like a ton of bricks. Memories, years of them, from this body that I now inhabit, overlapping with the ones from my old life. The kid in front of me was Tasumi Oga, the main character from the Beelzebub manga/anime, and I was now Takayuki Furuichi, the main character's comic relief best friend.
"See, this is why I told you not to come along. Now you're hurt," Oga said while pointing at the bump now rising on my head.
Letting my memories settle, I responded with a shrug and said the most Furuichi thing I could think of: "No, I'm fine, it's just a bump, and besides, there are a lot of pretty girls here."
For some reason, Oga stared at me like I had two heads. "You...You're weird."
"I don't want to hear that from you, of all people." I immediately interjected. That's when Shizuka and Haruka came back over to us. "Ohh, you think we're pretty, huh?" Shizuka said in a flirtatious tone while wrapping her arms around my neck and resting her chin on the top of my head.
I knew she wasn't actually flirting with a ten-year-old like me, and this was just her personality, but I wasn't going to tell her to let go. She thought I was cute, and if she wanted to try and fluster me, then she would need to try harder than that.
"Tatsu, we were just about to go to a party, wanna come?" Haruka asked, and Oga turned to look at her with excitement while saying, "Seriously, I'll go, I'll go." I, on the other hand, was suspicious.
What teenage girls, delinquents or not, would want to take two kids to a party, and why would Oga be so happy? He isn't the party lover type. 'Unless it wasn't a normal party.'
I turned my thoughts outward and asked Shizuka, "I'm guessing this is not the average 'guy throws a house party while parents are away' kind of party, is it?" Shizuka just smirked at me and said one word, "Nope."
Twenty minutes later, I got my answer. We were standing near an underpass, and in front of us was a crowd of guys waving flags while some were sitting on choppers. This was not a party; it was a fucking gang war.
"You bitches! Don't think we'll let our guard down just cause you're girls! Men show them the strength of Donbura High!" The lead dude, who looked way to fucking old to be a high schooler, shouted before running at the all-female gang.
Red Tail responded in kind with their own colourful words. "Fuck off and die baldy! Let's go, girls, follow our leader and kick their fucking asses!"
As the gangs fought each other, I silently slipped off to the side and watched the battle unfold. It was pretty cool, honestly, watching a big brawl like this up close. That being said, those girls were beating the dogshit out of the guys. For guys who looked so scary, they seemed so weak. I mean, even Oga was easily knocking them out with a single kick. Then again, that guy is a bit abnormal.
The fight soon ended, and once it did, I rejoined the group near Misaki. "So, your name's Takayuki Furuichi, huh? Hmm, I'm gonna call you Takachin. Take care of my brother, alright? He might look scary to others most of the time, but I'm sure that he wants a friend." She said while patting my head.
I get where she's coming from, she's looking out for her brother... but lady, please stop, know I'm a kid again, but this is still weird to me. "I will." Instead of saying what I was thinking out loud and probably getting kicked in the chest for it, I responded with that.
"Well, it's getting late, I should probably go." I walked over to Oga, who was lying down in the grass, panting with a massive smile on his face. "Hey, man, I'm going home. See you at school tomorrow?" I held up my hand for a fist bump. He stared for a second before bumping his fist against mine and saying, "Yeah, see ya tomorrow."
----
After heading home, I gave a quick greeting to my mom and headed to my room. Taking a seat on my bed, I let out a sigh. "This is crazy, man." One second I'm dying, and the next I'm a completely new person. 'This is the most cliché fan fic set up ever.' I thought to myself.
This is such an odd life. I am Takayuki Furuichi. I have all the feelings and memories growing up here with my mom, dad and little sister. At the same time, I also still have the love I felt for my old family.
It's a hard feeling to know I'll never see them again, but at the same time comforting that I do still have family here that love and support me. With another sigh, I shook my head and spoke to myself. "Okay, man, you need to stop living in the past now. You've got your whole future ahead of you and a whole new world to experience."
With those thoughts, I lay back on my bed thinking about what this world has in store for me. 'I will need to start some type of physical training. I may not care for beating people up, but protecting myself from danger is always a good thing to think about. I'll also need to see if I can get some kind of contract with a demon. Humans in this world can't inherently learn magic on our own, so I'll need to be a contractor. I'll also need to, to, to...' "Okay, what the hell is that?!"
Ever since I lay down, I felt something underneath me. With a quick glance at my bed, I saw nothing, so I checked under the covers, and that's when I found it. It was a small flat box with a letter addressed to me on it. Opening it up, my eyes went wide as I read it.
Hey man, congrats on your new life. To make this more fun for you, I've given you a gift and made your new world a bit more 'Lively' for you. Have fun, Love -Rob.
I was frozen. I didn't know what to think, and I didn't know what to do. I just stood there unmoving. 'A Rob. Was he the reason I died, or did he just pluck my soul and stuff it here for his entertainment?'
For a good five minutes, I didn't do anything. I just stood there like a statue before ultimately realizing, it didn't matter. For if this Rob really did kill me in my last life, then he could just as easily do it again. The same goes for if he put my soul here, he could simply pluck it back out.
I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding and slowly turned to the items in the box. They were two vials of liquid. One was white as snow, and the other blue like the clearest of skies.
Seeing them a reading the vials made me smile wider than I thought possible. "Oh fuck the hell yeah." On each of them was a single word written in black.
Blank and Archmage.
===
Oh, here I go, here I go, here I go again, OH, starting another fanfic.
Why do I keep doing this to myself, to you?
I had this idea just before I went to work last night. Like, as I was driving there, I opened up my notes app and started using text-to-speech to have it written down before I could forget it.
I feel motivated. This is the only chapter I have written, so don't expect more soon. I might start making a new one tomorrow after work. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed. Love you ;)