Modern day, Tokyo, Karakura Town
“I’m dead?”
Kurosaki Ichigo watched his own body being carried into an ambulance, leaving behind only a mess of blood staining the concrete road beneath the overpass.
His pupils shook, and he couldn’t snap out of it for a long time.
None of the onlookers spared him a second glance.
Because he was already a freshly minted ‘Plus,’ commonly known as a soul.
Ordinary people couldn’t see him.
The only ones who could respond to him were other souls.
“Yeah, you died a pretty miserable death. Sent flying dozens of meters by a dump truck and then run over you turned straight into a carpet.”
The speaker was sitting on the curb.
He wasn’t very old, maybe seventeen or eighteen.
He had a slender build, neither fat nor thin, perfectly proportioned.
He exuded a calm atmosphere.
If he wore a pair of black-rimmed glasses, he would look exactly like a harmless classroom nerd.
If he put on a serious expression and started lecturing, he would usually make the opposite sex feel impatient.
However, that dark-humored, hellish comment fully displayed his ‘sharp’ side.
His eyes were also exceptionally bright and piercing, giving off a subtle impression that he knew a lot of things, yet he was different from a mere scholar.
“Damn it, where the hell did that dump truck come from? Also, please don’t make me remember what I looked like when I died, I’m going to puke!”
The orange-haired boy, who was a high school freshman starting the term, had unexpectedly good grades.
But no matter how hard he racked his brain, he never expected to get into a car accident right in front of a convenience store.
Even if it were premeditated murder, it would be difficult to drive a dump truck to that position in advance.
It was even more impossible for it to crash into him without making a sound.
It was as if it appeared out of thin air.
There wasn’t even a driver in the truck.
It was practically a supernatural event!
“Since you don’t want to talk about your death, let’s change the subject… My name is Shinomiya, Shinomiya Takashi, a soon-to-be college student. Since we’re in the same boat, please look after me from now on.”
Shinomiya Takashi stood up and casually brushed the dust off himself.
“Kurosaki Ichigo, soon-to-be high schooler… You said we’re in the same boat, does that mean…”
Ichigo hesitated.
“Yeah, you’re not the only one who got hit and killed.”
Shinomiya Takashi admitted frankly.
Transmigration these days was becoming more and more technologically advanced.
It used to rely on lightning strikes, now it’s car crashes.
And he got hit twice, for God’s sake.
The first time.
He had been out at a birthday dinner, halfway through the song, when it seemed like some god in the shadows got hyped up too and sent him this ‘great gift.’
It crashed him into a Tokyo that was a mix of slice-of-life anime.
He became a young master of a financial conglomerate.
Relying on his status as a reincarnated person, he was like a fish in water from childhood to adulthood, admired by everyone around him.
During summer vacation, on a whim, he wanted to go to Chiba for a visit.
However, God seemingly saw through his desire for the pleasures of the flesh and sent another dump truck to forcibly change his itinerary.
At the same time, it changed Ichigo’s fate.
Whatever cheat bloodlines he had were useless in the face of this irrational, higher-narrative-level supernatural phenomenon.
“Then again, if it weren’t for this thing, I would’ve thought I wasn’t dead. It feels completely different from the last time I died.”
Shinomiya Takashi looked down at the lock on his chest and the half-broken Chain of Fate, even flicking it with his hand, making a crisp sound.
The sound and sensation were particularly strange, giving him an uncontrollable urge to gouge the lock out.
“You always say things that make no sense. Shouldn’t you be feeling sentimental at a time like this?”
Ichigo took a deep breath.
“Things have already come to this, there’s nothing to be sentimental about. Look, aren’t we doing fine? We just lost our physical bodies, it’s no big deal. Besides, this might not necessarily be a bad thing.”
“Being killed by a dump truck is protagonist treatment. Next, a goddess might show up to guide us to another world.”
Shinomiya Takashi waved his hand.
Just as he finished speaking, a strange Japanese-style lattice door appeared without warning in the air above the sidewalk ten meters away.
The door slowly opened, and accompanied by a fluttering deep blue butterfly, a petite figure stepped out.
It was a young girl.
She wore a black kimono and had an onion-shaped hairstyle.
Her delicate face combined with large eyes made her very cute, but the long sword at her waist and the cold aura she exuded carried an indescribable majesty.
“?”
“…”
How could they not see someone so conspicuous?
This point was the same for both parties.
If Shinomiya Takashi and Ichigo were merely drawn by her strange appearance and strong presence, then Kuchiki Rukia was shocked by the ‘aura’ emanating from these two.
Coming from the Soul Society to the Human World, which was devoid of reishi, theoretically, any slight fluctuation of spiritual pressure would be as conspicuous as a rare animal.
However, standing before these two…
For a moment, she had the illusion that she hadn’t left the Soul Society at all.
“The spiritual pressure they emit unconsciously has naturally merged with the reishi in the atmosphere, changing the very environment of this place…”
In this situation, even if a Hollow appeared, it would probably subconsciously ignore them.
The expression on Rukia’s face grew more solemn.
She landed on the ground and approached the two step by step, her hand resting on the hilt of her sword.
She had no sense of boundaries for a first meeting, acting as cold and decisive as an officer on duty.
“Hey! Who the hell are you?”
Ichigo tensed up, took a step back, and questioned her loudly.
He completely failed to notice the ‘See, what did I tell you?
Here comes the goddess’ expression on Shinomiya Takashi’s face beside him.
Rukia explained as if it were routine: “Don’t be nervous. I am a Shinigami stationed in Karakura Town, responsible for sending the souls of the deceased to the Soul Society the resting place of souls.”
“That being said, I didn’t expect to encounter two souls with such high spiritual power right upon my arrival. You two should be glad I came at the right time. If I were any slower, you would definitely have attracted powerful evil spirits, and then you would face something far more terrifying than death.”
“Shinigami? Soul Society?”
Ichigo was completely confused.
Encountering two weirdos in a row, his ability to think was reaching its limit.
“Do Shinigami have regional protection measures too? You carry a katana instead of a scythe and wear a kimono instead of a cloak. Don’t religious foreigners reject this image?”
As soon as Shinomiya Takashi spoke, the tense atmosphere immediately relaxed.
“Of course not, because I will unhesitatingly use forceful means to make them get down there before they have time to complain.”
Rukia was surprised for a moment, then she puffed out her chest righteously.
She clearly had a bit of a noble air, yet she spoke like a slippery, shameless veteran, making it impossible to deal with her.
“Wait, when you say ‘get down there,’ you don’t mean going to hell, do you?! We don’t even know if what you’re saying is true. And a Shinigami is an elementary schooler like you? That sounds unreliable.”
Ichigo frowned, his face full of wariness.
“Shut up! I am ten times older than you. A human brat like you has no right to question my abilities. But since you have the talent and might become my colleagues in the future, I’ll introduce myself.”
“My name is Kuchiki Rukia. You will slowly come to realize the greatness of this name in the Soul Society.”
“Hey, I haven’t said goodbye to my family yet…!”
Before Ichigo could finish, Rukia stepped forward with a fake smile.
With a ‘shing,’ she drew her sword and used the hilt to strike Ichigo’s forehead, making him fall backward and be swallowed by the white light emerging from the ground.
Then it was Shinomiya Takashi’s turn.
He didn’t resist at all, acting as indifferent as if he were letting a flight attendant help him buckle his seatbelt while waiting for takeoff.
After sending the two away, Rukia breathed a slight sigh of relief and leaped onto the overpass to gaze at the modern cityscape of Karakura Town.
Although there were suspicions of her being ‘gilded’ by her family name, she would definitely break everyone’s doubts with impeccable achievements and successfully complete her stationing mission.
“Speaking of which, I forgot to ask their names… but it doesn’t matter. If they can successfully graduate from the Shin’ō Academy and join the Gotei 13, we’ll meet again sooner or later. By then, I should already be a Lieutenant, or at the very least a high-ranking Seated Officer.”
“I’ll make that orange-haired brat feel the majesty of a senior… Hmph… how dare he call me an elementary schooler!”