In a room of an ordinary hospital, a young man in the prime of his life lay confined to his bed.
The pale face of the young boy was expressionless, his life fading before his eyes due to his powerlessness.
His health had begun to deteriorate after a highly publicized accident in the newspapers.
Now, he had at most a few months left to live.
The government was no longer providing real assistance to cure him, as far as he understood the situation.
Especially since the media had already moved on to other stories.
"Am I going to die?" the young man murmured, lifting his eyes toward the white-clad figure beside his bed.
The doctor, who was jotting down notes in a chart, paused for a second before letting out a sigh.
"Alas… I can only say I'm sorry, but with current medical technology, we cannot treat the genetic damage caused by such a level of radiation," he said in a professional tone.
The man felt no real sympathy for the boy due to the nature of his work, but he understood his distressed state to some extent.
After all, he was young, yet his life was nearing its end.
"Your current condition is the best this hospital can manage," he continued, as if to justify himself.
"Is that so? I understand…" the young man said in a dull, low voice.
His gaze lingered one last time on the eyes of the doctor in his protective suit before turning to the sky through the window.
Silence filled the room.
The doctor had finished taking notes, but he sensed the patient wanted to say more.
So, he decided to stay for a while.
Under the bedsheet, the young boy clenched his fist before taking a deep breath.
"Doctor Claude…" He didn't speak loudly, but the silence in the room allowed the doctor to hear him easily.
He nodded to signal the young man to continue.
"I want to be euthanized. I don't want to die in agony from the effects of radiation. E-even now, I'm suffering as all my cells slowly break down."
The doctor was stunned by the patient's request but understood his perspective.
When it comes to dying, one might as well choose the time and manner.
The young man looked at Doctor Claude, who remained silent for a moment.
Seeing him on the bed, pale but with resolute eyes, the doctor decided to try to dissuade him.
He didn't want the young man to make a rash decision driven by emotion.
He said in a concerned voice:
"Léo, don't give up so easily. Perhaps one day, a technology capable of treating your genetic damage will emerge."
Unfortunately, his attempt at persuasion was cut short by the desperate patient.
"Doctor Claude, there's no need to say more. I know my condition all too well. *Cough*" As he tried to put more strength into his voice, the young boy coughed.
It took a minute for the coughing to subside, but the sight that followed strengthened his resolve.
There was blood on the palm of his hand.
"See? It's impossible for a technology capable of curing me to miraculously appear in the little time I have left." He paused briefly before continuing, looking into the scientist's eyes.
"After all, this isn't an ordinary genetic disease but one caused by radiation from an unknown military substance."
Doctor Claude and his patient engaged in a silent battle of gazes that lasted an indeterminate amount of time for both.
The clock on the wall ticked slowly.
One second, two seconds, three seconds…
After five minutes of calm, silence, and deadly stillness between the two men,
the doctor finally decided to set aside his oath and accept the will of the man before him.
He would take his life.
"So, do you have any last wishes to express? Tell me, I'll inform the remaining government agents, and they'll do their best to mitigate the fallout from your death."
Doctor Claude spoke to Léo in a calm voice, but his tone carried a more human than professional emotion.
Léo understood then that this man would likely pressure the government to fulfill his wish.
But it couldn't be anything outrageous.
Even though the human losses from this nuclear radiation leak had been minimized thanks to his actions, the government wasn't keen on wasting resources on a future corpse.
Especially since Léo's case was already a thing of the past in the eyes of the world, as no one talked about it on TV or the internet anymore.
*Haha, I really should've minded my own business that night,* he thought, relaxing slightly after the doctor's acceptance of euthanasia.
Léo's misfortunes had begun about a month ago, around four in the morning.
A car had crashed due to a driver overdosing on illegal substances after a wild night.
Normally, such stories are commonplace on this planet.
However, there was a problem with the vehicle hit by the drugged driver.
It contained radioactive materials stolen by a terrorist group.
The accident caused a silver metal box to fly out the window.
The box burst open violently where Léo was smoking his cigarette, and the highly radioactive substance it contained spilled onto the ground.
Curious, Léo approached, picked it up, and saw the radioactive symbol printed on the open metal box and the tube on the ground.
At first, he thought it was fake, influenced by all the comics and manga he loved reading.
After all, the scenario of a young man stumbling upon something greenish and radioactive is a cliché.
He decided to ignore the metal box and went to rescue the people in both cars, but Léo noticed something wrong with his body.
He felt dizzy, and his nose was bleeding profusely after picking up the greenish tube spilled from the open metal box.
It didn't take a genius to connect the dots.
The radioactive substance in the silver box was real!
Léo knew he was done for, having come into contact with the tube after picking it up.
How could he have guessed he'd stumble upon stolen military material while just wanting to smoke outside his apartment?
Beyond his own situation, Léo knew how dangerous a radiation leak could be in an ordinary neighborhood.
Since he didn't know the severe damage this unknown substance could cause, Léo believed at the time that his condition couldn't get worse.
He immediately put the radioactive material back in the box, called the police to explain the situation, and waited for help on the scene.
No, he wasn't crazy for staying there.
Léo knew that after close contact with radioactive materials, he himself had become a source of radiation.
He couldn't leave, but this act only worsened his condition.
*Boom!*
Right after making the necessary calls, a loud explosion rang out from the accident site.
Without even looking, Léo knew the two culprits of this situation wouldn't survive.
Léo observed the explosion site, momentarily stunned by the noise, before shrugging.
*Good riddance, you endangered people's lives with your reckless actions,* he thought at the time, not hiding his satisfaction.
Shortly after Léo's call, professionals arrived to handle the nuclear leak incident, and Léo was taken to his current hospital for treatment.
Léo looked at Doctor Claude and said seriously:
"My wish is to give my parents enough money for their retirement. Beyond that, I have no other wishes."
What else could a dying man want, if not the well-being of the living?
Doctor Claude paused briefly before nodding:
"Alright, I'll arrange the euthanasia as well."
"Do you have any other unfulfilled wishes? Are you sure your parents' early retirement is enough?"
Léo responded with a weary smile:
"No."
After discussing some details, Léo looked out the window after the doctor left.
The scene outside was filled with various sounds and colors, but it left no trace on his pale face.
It didn't take long for the clear, bright sky to give way to a long night, with only stars twinkling in the dark sky.
"It's already night? Time passes so quickly!" Léo murmured, gazing at the starry sky.
…
Three days later, Léo lay in his bed, watching the doctors in protective suits prepare for the euthanasia.
At that moment, Doctor Claude, also in a protective suit, approached him.
"Léo, we'll take good care of your parents. Also, are you really not going to inform them of your death?"
Léo smiled tenderly at the thought of his parents before replying:
"No… Please keep it hidden for as long as possible. I… I haven't exactly been a good son, so I don't plan to trouble them further."
The young man's voice was calm and resolute, but there was a certain strength in it.
He had already made his decision.
"By the way, when will the euthanasia begin? My entire body is burning with pain. My hair is starting to fall out, and my skin has scattered red swellings."
Léo had been suffering since arriving at the hospital, but the symptoms had worsened recently.
This was also why he had chosen euthanasia.
"Doctor Claude, I really don't want to die in agony, disfigured, on a path where death is certain… I want it to end."
Doctor Claude sighed but decided to speed things up.
"I understand, and the euthanasia will begin immediately. We'll put you into an artificial coma and use the least painful medication possible to ensure your death without suffering."
At that moment, a doctor in a protective suit approached, holding a syringe filled with an unknown liquid.
"Léo, you'll soon fall asleep with no possibility of return… Do you have any last words?" The doctor's voice had returned to a purely professional tone as he prepared Léo.
"No, you can start," Léo said calmly.
After receiving Léo's confirmation, the doctor with the syringe began injecting various medications.
Léo slowly drifted off to sleep after a few injections.
The young man had started to feel afraid.
He now understood why they say everyone is equal in the face of death.
He felt alone in the darkness he was facing.
Léo saw the abyss.
As time passed in that dark space, the awareness of his own physical existence faded little by little.
At that moment, the fear of death and the fragility of life became very clear to him and took root.
He never wanted to feel that again.
"Will I stay here? I don't want that! My life was just beginning."
He didn't know if tears were streaming from his eyes, but the darkness of that place revealed nothing.
In an unknown space, a sliver of consciousness wavered, as if wandering in the void itself.
"Is anyone there? Or anything! Give me a reaction… I-I beg you!"
Even after pleading, shouting, cursing, and begging, there was no response.
There was only silence.
*Will I stay here forever?*
The image of Kars, from the manga *JoJo's Bizarre Adventure*, flashed in his mind.
This thought began to take root in him as despair grew in his heart.
Léo was on the verge of breaking.
"I don't want this!" Léo screamed into the infinite void.
"Did I blow up the Milky Way in a past life? Or did I do something to destroy the Earth, for the heavens to treat me so cruelly… is it because of how I treated my parents? I-I fixed things with them… didn't I?" Léo began rambling and declaring random things after his journey through the space between worlds.
He was unaware of time, but the man from Earth clung to his identity.
At that moment, a crack appeared in the space.
"Huh… What's that? A spatial rift! Let me float closer and take a look."
Due to the madness beginning to spread in his mind, Léo wasn't afraid of the unknown phenomenon; he even proactively moved toward the spatial rift.
"Wow! This spatial rift is truly magnificent, it has an enchanting beauty. W-wait a minute… it feels like I'm being pulled in? This sensation… I-it's so real, I want more stimuli… pull me in!"
Still in his madness from the long time spent in the space between worlds, Léo was thrilled to encounter a "sensation" beyond his own thoughts.
"Huh? — Real? T-this thing is real!"
Léo took a deep breath after regaining his senses during the process of being pulled into the dimensional rift.
"I'm screwed, I-I have to get away!"
With Léo's final cry, he was instantly sucked into the newly appeared spatial rift.
After that, the space returned to calm with the departure of that human consciousness.
…
In the dark night, at the heart of a small Japanese-style courtyard, Léo's consciousness awoke in the body of a boy about six years old.
Still disoriented by the transition, he staggered, bringing a hand to his aching head. The memories of the child mingled with his own, gradually assimilating from the moment Léo took possession of this body.
It took him about ten minutes to fully regain his bearings.
Around him stood small houses, and in the distance, he glimpsed the massive carved monument depicting the faces of the Hokage.
But something was off—the colors, the outlines, everything seemed hand-drawn, like in an anime.
"Hmm… It's like I've transmigrated into another world again? Is this… *Konosuba*?" he murmured, confused, as a thousand questions surged in his young mind.
Yet, reality soon imposed itself on him: Léo no longer existed.
From now on, he bore the name Rin Okumura.