It was night when he was returning home.
His colleagues had left early.
So it was just him and his deck of cards.
Not the generic King, Queen, or Joker.
Not the ones people played while acting overly confident.
It was Yu-Gi-Oh.
A monster-summoning card game.
A new Structure Deck he had bought after saving up some money.
Well, to be honest, he might have saved a little too much money for cards.
His drawer, which was rather large, had been filled to the brim.
He might have accumulated hundreds of cards by now.
But it wasn’t really an investment.
All he did was collect them while playing the online game.
A coping mechanism he had developed over the years.
A strange one.
Over the years he had lived through, his dreams and aspirations had been crushed and ground down.
Hence, he liked the idea of card games and anime.
Sports didn’t concern him that much, though he did maintain an “un-heart-attackable physique.”
Ding
His phone buzzed slightly.
A message had arrived.
But who could it be at this time?
It was his mom.
‘Have you eaten yet?’
The frustration on his face eased.
‘No.
I’ll get something.’
‘Don’t buy those boxed noodles.’
‘I’ll think about it.
Sleep now, or you might have to visit the doctor again.’
‘Meh.’
His mother was old.
Sometimes she worried like any other mother, yet at other times she could be so frank that it left him speechless.
Smiling to himself, he headed toward the nearby grocery store.
The streets were far from empty.
People were also heading home.
Cars and trucks still occupied the roads despite the late hour.
Honk
“I should try out the Norse deck today.
Maybe find a hand-destruction loophole.”
Taking another step forward, he dived deep into thoughts of how he would spend his evening, completely forgetting about his surroundings.
Honk
A truck appeared behind him, but he remained unaware.
“Maybe I should push for a winning streak.”
Honk
Honk
The truck was close enough to trigger every danger signal in his brain, yet he remained stranded within his thoughts.
“Or I should get h-”
He could not finish his plan.
Not after suddenly finding himself staring at the sky, despite never intending to look upward.
His eyes moved from the sky to the side, trying to understand what was happening.
And then he realized.
He was currently undergoing the process of reincarnation by the deity of transportation, Truck-kun.
His body hit the ground with a loud crunch and thud.
His bloodshot eyes motionlessly watched as people gathered around him, murmuring and pointing.
The truck crashed into a steel pole, and the driver’s whereabouts were unknown.
“Gh…”
His voice came out as a broken gurgle.
His body no longer responded to the commands of his brain.
His eyes slowly lost their luster.
‘Maybe I should have gone back to Mom…’
With a final thought for his mother, he left the world.
And somewhere else, a new life drew its first breath.
That death shook him.
He had never thought he would die in such a cliché way.
And now he was even more confused, though no longer shaken.
All around him were stars of unimaginable brilliance and size.
Comets flew by at uncalculable speeds.
A sight that might never have been witnessed by any human being.
He floated through space.
No goal in mind.
No ambition at play.
All he could do was drift.
But then, from the corner of his eye, he noticed something.
A flickering ball of light that seemed to be calling him toward itself.
Curious, he moved toward it.
Traversing floating rocks and broken meteors, he eventually covered enough distance to see what it was.
A card.
At that moment, he became even more intrigued.
Moving past the debris and obstacles, he approached it.
It was familiar.
Yet he couldn’t recognize it.
Nevertheless, he reached for it.
The moment his hand touched the card, a blinding light consumed his vision.
For a moment he stood there, blinded.
But he still managed to glance at the card.
It was…
Blue-Eyes White Dragon.
And then the world went dark.
“Waahh…”
A shrill cry of a newborn filled the air.
Within the confines of a nursery, a handful of people could be seen in the room.
Some were nurses and doctors, while the others were ordinary civilians.
Two in particular.
A woman lay upon a hospital bed, completely exhausted yet seemingly happy.
And a man who looked visibly spent.
One of the nurses brought over a small infant bundled in a white cloth and handed him to the woman.
Taking the child into her arms, the mother tenderly held him close.
The man, the child’s father, stepped beside her.
The exhaustion they felt.
The worry they had gone through.
Everything felt worthwhile as they looked upon the infant.
The father’s eyes sparkled as he wrapped an arm around his wife.
“Look, dear.
He has your eyes.”
“How can that be?
He hasn’t even opened them yet.”
“Just a feeling.
Hehe.”
The couple sweetly whispered to each other, unaware of the baby’s true state.
“Whaahahah…” (Where the fook am I?)
“Akemi!
Hold him gently.
Look, he’s crying.”
“I am holding him gently, Hiroshi.
Babies cry when they’re born.
It’s normal.”
Akemi, the mother, tended to the infant while explaining the obvious to her husband.
“WHAAAHHAA…” (THE WORLD’S SHAKING RIGHT ROUND.)
“Yeah…
I don’t think he’s crying just because he needs to.”
Chuckling at the spectacle, Hiroshi fell into thought.
“With all this wailing, how about we name him Katsumi?
In the future, he won’t cry like this.
Instead, he’ll laugh triumphantly.”
The world seemed to slow down for the baby as he was suddenly picked up by a giant of a man.
Blinded, he couldn’t see anything.
But the sensation of being lifted like a Lego piece was very real.
“From now on, you are Katsumi.”
Hiroshi smiled warmly.
“Morikawa Katsumi.”
‘Is that Japanese?’