Morning arrived, with birds fluttering onto branches, chirping curiously at passersby below.
In Class 2-B of Teitan High School, Lucien Valemont sat slumped at his desk, resting his cheek on one hand as he stared blankly out the window, his eyes heavy with exhaustion.
"Lucien, did you not sleep well last night?"
Hearing the voice, Lucien turned his head, his dull gaze flickering slightly as he replied, "Ah, Ran. Yeah, I had insomnia."
"That's no good! There's a test today—you need to pull yourself together!"
Ran gave Lucien an encouraging fist pump before returning to her seat—just to his right, separated only by the aisle.
A short while later...
"Huh? Lucien, you didn't sleep well last night?"
???
Again?
Lucien sighed and looked at the speaker.
"Yeah, Sonoko."
Standing before him, Sonoko Suzuki crossed her arms and frowned. "That's no way to be! How can you be so out of it? Did something happen?"
"Nothing happened. Just couldn't sleep."
Lucien shook his head.
In truth, he was dealing with a problem—one entirely of his own making.
Lucien wasn't originally from this world. In his past life, he had been an ordinary office worker on Earth until one night, after overtime, he was struck and killed by a dump truck running a red light.
After death, he reincarnated into this world.
Lucien had been born anew, regaining consciousness while still in his mother's womb—though his underdeveloped brain meant his awareness came in fragments.
Over the years, he had pieced together that this wasn't a parallel world but a fusion of multiple slice-of-life anime universes.
For instance, Sonoko Suzuki standing before him and Ran Mouri, who had greeted him earlier, were both popular characters from Detective Conan.
Moreover...
Lucien had even seen news about the Shishigumi Group on TV, and there was a book titled "The Metronome in Love" by Utako Kasumi—whose real name was Utaha Kasumigaoka—on his family's bookshelf.
He also frequently saw a popular idol named Ai Hoshino on television.
All these signs clearly indicated that this world wasn't just a simple parallel universe but one composed of multiple anime worlds from his past life.
The good news was that most of these anime leaned toward slice-of-life genres.
Aside from the frequent deaths in Detective Conan, the rest were relatively safe.
The bad news? Lucien was a transmigrator without any cheat abilities!
In the blink of an eye, Lucien was already 17.
He had attended Teitan Elementary School, and thanks to his family's decent financial situation in this life, he had lived comfortably.
That was, until two years ago, when his parents in this world suddenly died in a plane crash.
The loss hit Lucien hard.
After so many years together, he had long since accepted them as his real parents.
He spent a long time in depression before eventually pulling himself out of the grief with the help of some friends.
Now, two years later, Lucien was in his second year of high school. In another year, he'd graduate and move on to university.
However—
Looking at Sonoko Suzuki and Ran Mouri standing before him, Lucien couldn't help but feel a headache coming on.
Would he even make it to his third year?
Would he be stuck at 17 forever?
While eternal youth sounded nice in theory, something about it just felt… off.
Then again, considering this world wasn't solely the Detective Conan universe, it was hard to say whether time would become as chaotic as it did after that smug Shinichi Kudo shrank into Conan Edogawa.
And more importantly—
Shinichi's transformation into Conan was still some time away, but right now, Lucien faced an even more pressing issue!
His initial judgment about this world might have been completely wrong!
All this time, Lucien had believed he'd transmigrated into a slice-of-life anime world—one with some danger, sure, but still within acceptable limits.
On top of that, he had deliberately trained his body over the years. While he couldn't match Ran's superhuman strength (she could kick through a lamppost, for crying out loud), he could probably take on three or five average adults in a fight.
But then, just yesterday after school, Lucien overheard some students from the neighboring class talking about the new transfer students.
Normally, that wouldn't be a big deal—except these two new students were named Miko Yotsuya and Hana Yurikawa!
If only one of them had appeared, Lucien might not have made the connection.
But both of them together? There was no mistaking it—they were 100% the female leads from Mieruko-chan!
"Dammit! What happened to the slice-of-life setting? Why are there suddenly ghosts and demons?!"
Lucien scratched his head in frustration. This was exactly why he hadn't slept last night.
The sudden realization that this world wasn't just a slice-of-life anime world but one filled with supernatural horrors had kept him awake, his mind conjuring shadows in every dark corner, convinced something was watching him.
Alright, fine—
He didn't have Miko's spiritual sight and couldn't actually see those entities. But there was a term for this kind of paranoia: "seeing ghosts where there are none."
And right now, that was exactly Lucien's state of mind.
Though he couldn't see anything, he couldn't shake the feeling that ghosts surrounded him!
"Maybe I should transfer schools?"
Lucien even entertained the thought of transferring.
After all, staying near the protagonist of the story meant inevitably encountering strange occurrences.
Who knows—one day he might get targeted by some ghost or deity because of Miko Yotsuya, and that would be terrible!
But then again, you can't avoid fate forever.
If this world already has a Miko Yotsuya, what's stopping others from existing?
If a few god-slayers suddenly appeared, the aftermath of their battles could affect an unimaginably large area. Where could he possibly hide then?
"Whatever, I'll just go with the flow. What happens, happens!"
Lucien thought somewhat resignedly. As a transmigrator without even a cheat ability, what else could he do?
He might as well just lie flat.
"Lucien?"
Sonoko waved her hand in front of Lucien's face.
She couldn't help but feel curious about him.
Though Lucien had attended Teitan Elementary and now Teitan High School like them, they hadn't been in the same class before high school, so they weren't particularly close.
Sonoko always felt there was something mysterious about Lucien, as if he harbored some earth-shattering secret, which piqued her curiosity and made her want to dig deeper.
Plus, Sonoko was a sucker for good looks, and Lucien happened to be exactly her type. If he weren't so aloof, she might have even made a move on him.
"Sorry, I zoned out. What were you saying?"
Lucien snapped back to reality and looked at Sonoko.
"If you ever need any help, Lucien, you can always come to me!"
Sonoko winked at him and then dashed off before he could refuse.
Lucien glanced at Sonoko as she returned to her seat and shook his head slightly. He actually liked her, but he wasn't the type to actively pursue girls. Besides, he found the whole process troublesome. Not to mention, he also had a bit of a crush on Ran, who sat nearby.
After all, who wouldn't like Angel Ran?
...
The school day ended, and it was time to go home.
Lucien picked up his bag and left the classroom.
Behind him, Sonoko and Ran huddled together, whispering about something.
Just then, Shinichi Kudo strolled over, hands in his pockets, looking as cool as ever.
"Hey~! Weren't we going to that new ice cream shop? What's the holdup?"
Shinichi glanced at the two whispering girls and thought to himself, "Women are so troublesome."
"Shinichi, you're so ungentlemanly. Don't you know boys are supposed to wait for girls?"
Sonoko shot him a disdainful look.
"Hey, hey, hey! I am waiting for you two! What more do you want?"
Shinichi rolled his eyes.
"Ugh, never mind. You wouldn't get it. Come on, Ran, let's go!"
With that, Sonoko grabbed Ran's hand and dragged her out of the classroom.
"Sonoko, slow down!"
Ran protested as Sonoko pulled her along.
"Tch. Whatever."
Shinichi clicked his tongue and followed them.
Meanwhile, as Lucien walked down the hallway, he instinctively glanced into the neighboring Class C.
As it happened, he saw an orange-haired girl pulling a girl with long black hair toward the entrance.
"Huh~! Are you from the class next door?"
Seeing Lucien standing at the entrance of Class C, the simple-minded Hana Yurikawa instinctively asked.
"Yeah, are you two new transfer students?"
Lucien nodded and inquired.
"Hello! My name is Hana Yurikawa, nice to meet you!"
The orange-haired Hana Yurikawa said with a smile.
"This is my friend, Miko Yotsuya. And you are...?"
"Lucien Valemont, from Class B."
Lucien glanced at Miko Yotsuya, who was staring at him.
He wasn't sure if it was just his imagination, but it felt like Miko wasn't looking at him—but at something behind him.
Hmm... This feels bad! Could there be something behind me?
For some reason, a cold sweat trickled down Lucien's temple.
"I have something to take care of, so I'll be going now!"
With that, Lucien quickly walked toward the stairwell.
"That's strange. Is Lucien in a hurry or something?"
The airheaded Hana Yurikawa muttered in confusion before cheerfully linking arms with her best friend, Miko Yotsuya. "Miko, what do you think of the new school? I think it's pretty nice! The classmates are surprisingly friendly!"
Miko forced a smile and nodded.
"Hana, let's go home."
"Sure! Want to grab something to eat on the way?"
"No, I'm a bit tired. I just want to rest."
"Oh, okay then."
The two walked toward the stairwell, chatting and laughing—but upon closer inspection, Miko's smile was clearly strained.
'Ughhh... Why is this happening again? I thought transferring schools would mean I wouldn't run into them anymore!'
Miko's mood was terrible, and she couldn't focus on whatever her best friend was saying.
...
Lucien rushed home as fast as he could and splashed cold water on his face in the bathroom, finally feeling a bit better.
"Phew... As expected, running into those people never leads to anything good."
He muttered to himself.
Turning around, he left the bathroom and headed to the kitchen to make something to eat.
Ding!
[Comics Trait Extraction System Activated!]
Lucien froze mid-step.
"System?"
He cautiously called out in his mind.
[The Comics Trait Extraction System is at your service. Would you like to receive the user manual?]
It really is a system?!
Lucien's eyes lit up with excitement.
"Receive! Receive it now!!"
He shouted mentally.
The next second—
A flood of information appeared in his mind.
It was the system's user manual.
The Comics Trait Extraction System allowed Lucien to extract traits from various American comic characters.
The system had a [Comic Gate], and by passing through it, he could enter worlds dominated by American comic elements—including but not limited to movies, TV shows, comics, and novels.
The method of entry was simple.
Sleep.
Yes, all he had to do was fall asleep to cross over into those comic worlds.
Lucien had one chance per day to enter the Comic Gate. The moment he closed his eyes and fell asleep, he would be transported to a random American comic world.
In these worlds, the system would generate a reasonable identity for him—though it would only be an ordinary one.
Returning to reality was just as easy.
Again, he just had to sleep.
And—
No matter how much time passed between the two worlds, as long as he slept, only one night would have passed in the other world when he woke up.
In other words;
To everyone in the current world, Lucien had never disappeared.
But in reality, he had indeed vanished for a period of time.
As for how this was achieved?
The system didn't explain.
And Lucien didn't need to know.