The cafeteria was a warzone, and Kenji Tanaka was its favorite casualty. He clutched his tray, a pathetic fortress of lukewarm curry and wilted cabbage, trying to navigate the chaotic sea of jostling bodies. Every step was a gamble, every averted gaze a silent plea to be invisible. It never worked.
"Watch it, cripple!"
The shout was familiar, the voice belonging to Daisuke, a hulking wall of muscle masquerading as a high school student. Before Kenji could react, a foot shot out, tripping him. Time seemed to slow. The tray tilted, the curry sloshing, a blob of green cabbage detaching itself in slow motion. Kenji hit the linoleum floor with a pathetic thud, the clang of the metal tray echoing in the sudden, eerie silence.
Laughter erupted. Not just a few snickers, but a full-blown, derisive roar that reverberated through the cavernous room. Food was splattered across his uniform, his hair, even clinging to his eyelashes. He could feel the eyes on him, a hundred judgments, a thousand silent confirmations of his utter worthlessness.
"Still clumsy, huh, Kenji?" Daisuke sneered, looming over him like a triumphant predator. "Thought by now you'd at least learn to stand on your own two feet."
Kenji didn't answer. He couldn't. His throat was tight, his eyes stinging. The familiar heat of shame crept up his neck, burning his ears. This was his life. Every day, a new humiliation. At school, he was the resident punching bag, the living embodiment of failure. His small stature, his perpetually slumped shoulders, his inability to even make eye contact – it all painted a giant target on his back.
Later that afternoon, the torment continued at home. His adoptive mother, Masako, stood over him as he attempted to clean the curry stain from his uniform. Her lips were a thin, disapproving line.
"Honestly, Kenji. Can you not go one day without causing a mess? Your uniform is expensive. Do you have any idea how hard we work?" Her voice, usually clipped, was edged with a familiar exasperation that felt colder than any anger.
His adoptive father, Kaito, grunted from behind his newspaper. "Still making trouble, are we? You could learn a thing or two from Haruki. He cleans his own uniform, excels in his studies, even helps with the bills."
Haruki. The golden child. Their biological son. Kenji's adoptive brother was a year older, effortlessly brilliant, athletically gifted, and possessed a charisma that Kenji could only dream of. Haruki, who never missed an opportunity to subtly belittle Kenji, a master of backhanded compliments and feigned concern. Haruki, who probably watched from the sidelines in the cafeteria, a knowing smirk on his face.
"He has no drive," Masako sighed, turning away. "No ambition. I don't know why we even bothered."
The words, though common, still felt like a punch to the gut. No drive. No ambition. They were right. He didn't have any. What was there to strive for when every effort felt pointless? When the world seemed determined to remind him that he was, quite simply, nothing?
Kenji retreated to his tiny room, the one at the back of the house, practically an afterthought. He stared at his reflection in the dusty windowpane: a pale, gaunt face, eyes that held a perpetual weariness, a mouth that always seemed on the verge of trembling. Eighteen. Today. His birthday. Another year of this existence. What was the point? He traced the faint outlines of the streaks of curry on his cheek, a physical manifestation of his misery.
He fell onto his bed, the springs groaning in protest. The silence of the room was a temporary balm, but even here, the echoes of their words, of the laughter, rattled in his head. He wished for something, anything, to change. A meteor strike. An alien invasion. A sudden, miraculous disappearance. Anything to escape this suffocating reality.
The clock on his small nightstand ticked steadily, its rhythmic beat a countdown to… nothing. Midnight approached. One minute. Thirty seconds. Ten.
Kenji closed his eyes, a silent wish forming in his heart, one he knew would never be granted: Please, let something be different.
As the last second of his seventeenth year faded, and the clock clicked over to 00:00, a warmth spread through Kenji's chest. It wasn't a gentle warmth; it was a rapidly intensifying heat, like a star igniting within him. His eyes snapped open. A blinding, pure white light erupted from his body, silent and unseen by the world outside his room, yet so intense it filled every corner of his vision. The mundane objects of his room—the faded wallpaper, the rickety desk, his discarded uniform—were momentarily engulfed, washed away by an overwhelming brilliance.
Then, as suddenly as it appeared, the light imploded, drawing back into Kenji's core, leaving him breathless and trembling. He gasped, sucking in air, his body tingling with an unfamiliar energy. It was as if every cell in his being had just been shocked awake.
And then, it appeared.
Floating before him, shimmering with an ethereal glow, was a translucent blue screen. It pulsed softly, almost invitingly. Kenji stared at it, his mind struggling to process what he was seeing. It wasn't a dream. He could feel the cool air in his room, the rough texture of his bedsheets beneath his fingers.
[WELCOME, AWAKENED ONE.]
The words materialized on the screen in crisp, luminous script. Kenji's eyes widened. His heart hammered against his ribs, a frantic drumbeat of confusion and something else… something akin to awe.
[HOST: KENJI TANAKA.]
[RANK: S-CLASS SPIRITUAL FIGHTER.]
[ABILITY: SPIRITUAL MANIPULATION.]
[SYSTEM INITIALIZED. YOUR JOURNEY BEGINS.]
Kenji blinked, then blinked again. Spiritual Fighter? S-Class? What in the world was happening? He reached out a hesitant hand, passing it through the shimmering screen as if it were made of light. It felt like nothing, yet the words remained.
A sudden, sharp ping resonated in his mind, like a tiny bell.
[NEW QUEST AVAILABLE: "NEUTRALIZE THE LOW-LEVEL SPECTER FEEDING ON NEGATIVE EMOTIONS IN THE ABANDONED SCHOOL LOT."]
Kenji scrambled off his bed, his legs feeling strangely light, almost buoyant. He stumbled towards the window, pulling back the thin curtains. The abandoned lot behind his school was visible in the pale moonlight, a place he usually avoided. He stared at it, then back at the floating screen.
A low-level specter? Was this some kind of incredibly elaborate, technologically advanced prank? But the tingling in his veins, the raw energy thrumming just beneath his skin, felt too real. And the screen, still hovering patiently, demanded his attention.
He looked down at his trembling hands, then clenched them into fists. For eighteen years, he had been weak. For eighteen years, he had been powerless. For eighteen years, he had been nothing.
Now, a voice, clearer than any he had ever heard, spoke not from outside, but from deep within himself. It was a new voice, firm and resolute.
S-Class Spiritual Fighter.
He had no idea what it meant. But for the first time in his life, Kenji Tanaka felt a strange, undeniable spark of something new. Not fear, not shame, but… possibility.
He had a quest.