The rain wasn't falling so much as it was attacking Tokyo. It came down in thick, relentless sheets, turning the neon signs into watery smears and the streets into shallow, grumbling rivers. Inside his van, the steady thump-thump-thump of the wipers was the only thing keeping Kazuto awake.
Another thirty minutes, he thought, squinting at the GPS. Drop off this package, clock out, microwave some curry, collapse. The thrilling life of Voldius Kazuto, age thirty-five.
He wasn't unhappy. It was a simple life. He knew the streets, knew the rhythms of traffic and the best shortcuts. He was good at his job. Being a deliveryman was about solving tiny, daily puzzles: finding the right address, navigating a tricky apartment lobby, making sure Mrs. Tanaka's porcelain figurines didn't get a scratch. There was a quiet satisfaction in it.
His van sloshed into a narrow, dimly lit side street in a less-fashionable part of Shinjuku. The address led him to a non-descript, slightly grimy building wedged between a shuttered pachinko parlor and a noodle shop that had clearly seen better days. The package on his passenger seat was a small, plain cardboard box. The label was oddly bare: just the address and the word "FRAGILE" stamped in stark, black letters.
"Weird," Kazuto mumbled to no one. He grabbed his delivery tablet, shrugged on his waterproof coat, and tucked the box under his arm, making a mental note to get a fresh signature. The rain immediately began drumming a frantic rhythm on his hood.
The building's lobby was a cave of flickering fluorescent light and the smell of damp concrete. There was no directory. Just a single, industrial elevator with a call button that glowed with a sickly yellow light. With a sigh, Kazuto pressed it.
The elevator arrived with a shudder and a groan. The doors slid open to reveal an interior that was… perfectly normal. Clean, even. He stepped inside. There were no floor buttons. Just a single, unmarked panel.
"Great. Haunted elevator. Just what I needed."
As the doors closed, the flickering lobby light was cut off, plunging him into silence. The elevator didn't move. The air grew still, then thick. A low hum, more felt than heard, began to vibrate in his teeth.
Okay, this is officially creepy. Did someone prank order a delivery to a condemned building?
A notification pinged on his tablet. He looked down. The screen was glitching, lines of static scrolling over the delivery confirmation page. Then, the text dissolved and reformed into a single, clear line of text he'd never seen in the company software before:
[Destination: Luminous Pangaea. Synchronization: 12%.]
Kazuto blinked. "What the…?"
The air in front of him rippled. Not like heat off asphalt. This was wrong. It was like reality itself was a screen, and someone had just poked a finger through it. The ripple spread, cracking the air with silent, hairline fractures of impossible light—deep purples and electric blues that hurt to look at.
« NOTICE: SPATIAL ANOMALY DETECTED WITHIN IMMEDIATE VICINITY. »
A voice. Clear, genderless, and utterly calm. It spoke directly into the center of his mind. He jerked his head around, but the elevator was empty.
"Who said that?"
« NOTICE: ANOMALY COHERENCE INCREASING. LOCAL PHYSICAL LAWS BECOMING UNSTABLE. »
The fractures widened, merging into a shimmering, vertical slit. Through it, Kazuto didn't see the elevator wall. He saw… swirling colors, glimpses of a foreign sky with two moons, the silhouette of vast, twisted trees. The hum became a roar. The cardboard box in his hands felt suddenly warm.
This is not happening. This is a stress dream. I fell asleep at the wheel. Any second now I'm going to—
The slit exploded outwards.
It wasn't an explosion of force, but of wrongness. The elevator walls didn't shatter; they unfolded, stretching into impossible geometries before dissolving into the chaotic light. The floor vanished from under his feet. He was falling, but not down. He was tumbling through a kaleidoscope tunnel of screaming color and fractured physics.
« WARNING: HOST ENTITY BEING CONSUMED BY CHAOTIC SPATIAL RIFT. »
Consumed?! Kazuto's thoughts were a frantic, wordless scream. He clutched the delivery box to his chest like a life preserver.
« INITIATING SOUL TRANSMIGRATION PROTOCOLS. »
« ADJUSTING TO LOCAL MANA SIGNATURE… COMPLETE. »
« ASSESSING HOST CONCEPTUAL CORE… »
The voice was methodical, unstoppable. The madness around him began to slow, the colors softening. He felt a bizarre sense of being… scanned. Weighed. A lifetime of small choices played in a flash: letting a car merge in heavy traffic, helping a lost tourist, patiently explaining a missed delivery for the third time to a hard-of-hearing old man, the stubborn refusal to let a package get damaged.
« CONCEPT IDENTIFIED: [STEADFAST RELIABILITY]. »
« CONCEPT: [PRACTICAL EMPATHY]. »
« CONCEPT: [UNYIELDING PATIENCE]. »
« SYNTHESIZING ULTIMATE SKILL… »
A final, blinding light engulfed him. The last thing he felt was the absurd, mundane texture of the damp cardboard box in his hands.
« SKILL CREATED. WELCOME TO LUMINOUS PANGAEA, VOIDLIUS KAZUTO. »
« ULTIMATE SKILL: [BOUNDLESS MERCY: KINGDOM OF ETERNAL REFUGE]… AWARDED. »
Then, silence. And the smell of damp earth and strange flowers.