Buzz!!!
A piercing roar of an accelerating engine cut through the air as a massive truck barreled toward pedestrians walking with their heads down on the sidewalk.
"Ahhh!!!"
The screams of those around him snapped Riku out of his phone-induced trance, but it was already too late. By the time he looked up, the truck was practically on top of him. He could even make out the dents and scratches on its hood, along with faint traces of crimson blood.
"Is this thing a seasoned actor?" Riku thought, his mind inexplicably flashing to the classic "isekai truck" trope. The déjà vu was almost too perfect!
Boom!!!
The collision sent Riku's body flying like a kite with its string cut. The truck had singled him out as its sole unlucky target.
In his final moments, Riku clearly saw the green light flashing on the traffic signal. He definitely hadn't run a red light!
Cough, cough, cough!!!
Riku jolted upright, his chest heaving as he gasped for air, his eyes bloodshot as if he'd just died and come back.
"No, wait—I did die once already."
Looking around, his heart was a mess of emotions. The distinctly Japanese-style buildings, with their blend of traditional wafu and Tang dynasty influences, were nothing like his everyday life. There's no way that truck could've sent him crashing all the way to a neighboring island nation, right?
And the temperature was off—much colder than before the accident. His thin autumn clothes felt woefully inadequate.
Clearly, with the "help" of that truck, he'd been isekai'd.
Hiss~~~
Riku clenched his teeth, sucking in a sharp breath, making a tiny contribution to this world's global warming.
"All those times I joked online about when it'd be my turn to cross over, and now it actually happened."
He muttered a self-deprecating quip. Luckily, he was the classic isekai protagonist: an orphan raised in an orphanage, no parents, no ties, nothing holding him back. It made sense the "hero" role would fall to someone like him.
After a bit of self-mocking to ease his nerves, Riku's first move was to check his body.
Still wearing his cheap casual clothes, no bloodstains, all limbs intact—no missing arms or legs. Finally, he checked his, ahem, manly attributes.
A long sigh of relief. Still there, and still just as impressive.
It seemed he'd crossed over with his physical body intact, not soul-transferred into someone else's. That was a relief—he didn't want to live with someone else's face, and he wasn't ready to part with his own handsome mug. Who knew what kind of body he'd end up with otherwise?
"System? Cheat skill? Old mentor? Any gods out there? Anyone home?"
After checking his body, Riku didn't rush into action. Having thoroughly studied the Transmigrator's Essential Guide, he knew the first step was to check for a [System] or some kind of transmigration perk.
After trying everything he could think of, he gave up. No response. All his efforts were for nothing.
"No system? Or does it have some kind of activation condition? Don't tell me it'll only kick in after I'm already invincible."
Grumbling, Riku accepted the reality that he had no [System] to rely on for now. He moved on to step two of the Transmigrator's Essential Guide.
"Observe the surroundings and figure out where and when I am."
Riku got to his feet and started carefully scanning his environment.
It was nighttime, the moonlight dim. Streetlights—old-fashioned but electric—lit the area, and power lines ran along the road. That ruled out being in ancient times.
He was standing by a roadside, leaning against someone's courtyard wall. The buildings around him had a strong anime aesthetic, all wooden and distinctly old-fashioned.
No skyscrapers in sight, and the architecture didn't scream modern. That left the possibility of being in the recent past.
After some quick deduction, Riku concluded he was likely in early modern Japan. The buildings and the kanji on shop signs pointed to that.
"Now I just need to figure out if this is still my original world or some place crawling with supernatural beings."
Riku stretched, loosening his joints. Maybe it was psychosomatic, but his body still ached faintly from the truck impact, leaving him feeling off.
The streetlights were dim, and the area was deserted. Riku launched into a quick set of radio calisthenics. By the end, his body felt much better, more limber.
"What are you doing?"
A voice suddenly spoke from behind him, dripping with curiosity and confusion. Riku nearly jumped out of his skin—how did this guy sneak up so quietly?
Spinning around, he instinctively struck a military boxing stance, ready to survive "32 stabs and still stand." But he relaxed slightly when he saw the speaker looked human enough.
It was a tall, pale young man with black hair and striking crimson eyes, dressed sharply in a Western suit—not traditional Japanese clothing. This further confirmed Riku's guess about the era; ancient Japan didn't have Western suits.
Under the dim streetlight, the handsome young man held a black umbrella, eyeing Riku with a puzzled expression.
"Bro, it's the middle of the night—scaring people like that could give someone a heart attack."
Riku squinted, not fully dropping his guard. He tried to start a conversation, then realized the guy hadn't spoken anything.
But it made sense. He'd already figured this was probably Japan, so running into a Japanese person wasn't surprising.
"Foreigner?"
Before Riku could figure out how to communicate, the young man spoke agai.
"Yes, That's awesome! I'm totally lost here and was just wondering who I could ask for help."
Riku's eyes lit up. Meeting someone friendly right off the bat lowered the difficulty significantly.
"Hey, I'm a tourist . Got separated from my friends and kinda lost. Do you know where this is? And, uh, what's the exact time?"
Riku stepped closer, feeling a bit more at ease. The guy spoke friendly—surely he couldn't be some kind of demon or monster, right?
What, did Japanese yokai have to learn foreign languages now? Was the supernatural world that competitive?
"Interesting. Foreigner, huh? Maybe I should've tried that sooner."
The young man smirked, his smile carrying an eerie charm. Instead of answering, he muttered to himself.
Riku had no clue what he was talking about. His "Japanese teachers" had only taught him a handful of phrases like "yamete" or "iku iku"—hardly enough for casual conversation.
"What do you mean?."
Riku felt a pang of disappointment, assuming the guy hadn't understood him.
"Thanks anyway. I'll go ask someone else."
As a civilized person from modern era—and since the guy had already pegged him as such—Riku politely said goodbye, even if the other party might not understand. Manners never hurt, right?
He turned to leave, but his face froze, eyes widening involuntarily.
A sharp, searing pain erupted in his chest, rivaling the agony of being hit by the truck earlier.
Looking down, he saw a grotesque spike made of flesh protruding from his chest, dripping with blood. The tip wriggled unnaturally, sending chills down his spine.
Cough!
Blood surged up his throat, and Riku coughed violently. The specter of death loomed again. The spike seemed alive, splitting into countless smaller tendrils that burrowed into his organs. Pain flooded his entire body.
"Arghhh!!!"
Unable to bear it, Riku screamed in agony. He reached for the spike, desperate to pull himself free, but his hands were pierced through in an instant. The spike seemed to grow angrier, writhing more violently.
It slowly lifted him into the air. Gravity made the pain unbearable, and the more he struggled, the worse it got.
Born in modern peaceful era , Riku had faced hardships as an orphan but nothing like this. Gritting his teeth, he turned to face his attacker.
Under the dim yellow streetlight, the young man in a top hat still wore a faint smile. His crimson eyes glinted with a bloodthirsty glow. The flesh spike extended from one of his fingers.
"Why… what are you?"
In excruciating pain, Riku forced the words out, his face contorted, speech slurring.
He'd just died by truck and crossed over, only to face death again before he could even get his bearings. He wasn't ready to go—not without answers.
"I'm giving you power. Feel it."
The eerily handsome young man spoke slowly. He understood and spoke it fluently.
Riku's eyes widened, but his vision blurred as blood poured from his chest. In his haze, the young man's image began to overlap with a character he'd seen in an anime long ago.
Buzz!!!
Before he could confirm the man's identity, a terrifying surge of blood energy rushed to his brain. His eyes turned crimson, his mind no longer his own. His body began to change grotesquely.
Horns sprouted from his forehead, a scarlet vertical eye split open between them. His mouth tore into a wide, manic grin, revealing sharp, predatory teeth. His nails blackened and sharpened, his skin paled to a ghostly white, and strange black patterns spread across his body and face. His muscles bulged unnaturally.
Riku now looked like a demon straight from hell, devoid of any human aura.
Plop.
The flesh spike withdrew, and Riku dropped to the ground. His wounds had completely healed, but his mind was a foggy mess, his memories like sludge.
"This guy's talent is that bad?"
The young man frowned, visibly disappointed with the dazed figure before him.
"Whatever. It'll do."
After a moment's hesitation, he decided not to retract his blood. This was just a whim, after all.
"Your mission is to return and find the Blue Higanbana."
He walked past Riku, leaving the task behind without waiting for a response. A failure like this wasn't worth his time.
"Yes."
Riku answered dully, his mind still a haze, his memories distorted and unreal.
He didn't know why he had to obey, but the young man's voice carried an almost magical compulsion, a command that resonated from the depths of his soul.
This foggy state persisted until a sudden Ding! snapped him awake.
Ding!
[Limit System: Activated.]