In the delivery room of a hospital, a swaddled infant slowly opened his eyes and looked around, excitement stirring in his gaze.
"Did I... did I transmigrate?"
He remembered working late at the company, hammering out code, when his computer suddenly leaked electricity. His body convulsed, and his consciousness slipped away.
"Hahaha, I never thought I'd get another shot. This time I'm not being a programmer. I'm starting a company. I'm going to be rich."
The infant waved his tiny hands, basking in dreams of a bright future.
Just then, a virtual interface appeared in his vision, visible only to him, black text rippling across it.
[Realm: Unlimited Point Allocation]
[Available Attribute Points: 100]
[Spiritual Power: 1]
[Strength: 1]
[Speed: 1]
[Recovery: 1]
[Vision: 1]
[Hearing: 1]
[...]
"Isn't this the game system I programmed in my past life?"
The baby stared at the floating screen in delighted shock.
In his previous life, he had worked on a mobile game called Realm, coding level ups, attributes, skill upgrades, and more.
He had not only transmigrated after that electric shock, he had brought the program along with him.
"There's even a Spiritual Power stat on the interface. So I'm not meant to be a billionaire, I'm supposed to be an urban Immortal King?"
Thrilled, the baby spoke to the system without hesitation.
"Add points to Spiritual Power. All of it. Dump it all into Spiritual Power!"
"..."
Time skipped ahead fifteen years.
Karakura Town.
Near Karakura First High School.
The baby from back then had grown into a handsome boy, about one meter seventy, black choppy hair, school uniform neat on his frame.
Right now he was drenched in sweat, sprinting flat out while shouting to Kurosaki Ichigo beside him.
"Ichigo, believe me. As long as we stick together with one heart, no matter how dangerous it is, we can overcome it."
Kurosaki Ichigo's mouth twitched. He glanced over his shoulder, sweat beading on his brow.
"Tachibana Yu, are you sure we can overcome any danger?"
Behind them, a deafening rumble rolled again and again.
A closer look revealed a three meter tall monster with gray-black skin, a hole gaping in its chest, and a bone-white mask over its face.
Its massive frame stamped giant footprints with every stride.
Power lines snapped and crackled in midair as its body tore through them, spraying sparks.
Even so, it did not slow. It stared greedily at the two figures ahead and let out piercing shrieks.
Tachibana Yu swallowed hard.
"Of course. This isn't even the first time we've dealt with this. When have we not made it out alive?"
"Great, like that's something to be proud of."
Kurosaki Ichigo cursed despite himself.
"Less talking, turn here!"
At Yu's shout, the two of them dug in their heels and veered hard into a narrow alley.
The feral monster behind them could not turn in time. BOOM! It smashed a hole in the wall and then barreled after them as if nothing had happened.
"Damn it, can someone save us already? Kurosaki Isshin, Urahara Kisuke, Tessai Tsukabishi, Yoruichi Shihōin, Shinji Hirako..."
Yu wanted to swear up and down.
The Hollow on their tail had definitely devoured seven or eight of its own kind. It was not an opponent he could handle.
Just as the two of them were running for their lives, a thread of silver flashed across the sky.
SWISH!
The monstrous Hollow froze. From its pallid mask straight down to its crotch, a thin white fissure opened.
With two thunderous crashes, it split apart and collapsed.
Something unknown had cleaved it clean in two.
Hearing the sound, the boys finally skidded to a stop. They looked back and let out a long breath, wiping at the cold sweat.
"It's finally over."
"But what on earth is going on?" Kurosaki Ichigo asked, baffled. "Why do these monsters always drop dead right when they're about to catch us?"
For five whole years, he had run into creatures like this nearly every other day.
They were huge and hideous, and their strength and defense were terrifying, like demons out of legend.
And yet, absurdly, they always died a second before they reached the boys.
As if someone were protecting them.
It's Kurosaki Isshin, right... Yu thought, watching the Hollow's corpse dissolve.
Hundreds of Hollows had been cut down over the years. The only person he could imagine doing it was Ichigo's goofy dad.
With that in mind, Yu pulled up the Realm system he had brought into this world.
Absorbing the Hollow's residual spirit energy had earned him another hundred attribute points. Added to today's passive gain, the total had climbed past two hundred.
[Realm: Unlimited Point Allocation]
[Available Attribute Points: 100]
[Spiritual Power: 28,000]
[Strength: 4,100]
[Speed: 560]
[Recovery: 12]
[Vision: 12]
[Hearing: 12]
[...]
Staring at the familiar interface, Yu could not help recalling his tragic past.
When he first transmigrated, he thought increasing Spiritual Power would boost his cultivation aptitude, so he dumped every point into it.
By the age of ten, he had a staggering twenty thousand Spiritual Power.
He thought he was about to embark on the path of cultivation, until one evening he turned a corner and fell in love at first sight with a Hollow.
One look at that ghastly mask, and his mind went numb.
That was when he realized he hadn't transmigrated into a cultivation world at all, but into the original world behind the mobile game Realm: Bleach.
What good was all that Spiritual Power?
A Soul Reaper might grow stronger by raising Spiritual Power, but as a human, would more Spiritual Power just make him taste better?
That day a Hollow chased him for twelve hours. He nearly died of exhaustion several times.
Over the next few days, Hollows came courting him almost daily, until he was bullied into becoming Karakura Town's parkour master.
After countless brushes with death, he discovered that only by increasing Spiritual Power and Strength could he inflict even the slightest harm on a Hollow, so he kept boosting those two.
Which led to a vicious cycle.
The stronger his Spiritual Power, the stronger the Hollows he attracted. To survive, he had to raise it again, which lured in even stronger Hollows.
He lived like that for half a year, until he found Kurosaki Clinic.
After paying a hefty price, he managed to lodge there and finally stopped the nightly private meetings with Hollows.
Thinking of those blood and tears, Yu ground his teeth at the interface.
"Realm, add points!"
...