My first time posting anywhere. I’m writing on momentum, so please forgive any grammatical weirdness. Honestly, even I don’t know where this is going to end up. Pleased to make your acquaintance.
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Ootori Tenma was sitting cross-legged on top of his own coffin, watching the people at his funeral. Not one of them so much as glanced his way — which would have been a deeply strange sight, except that there was nobody there to see it in the first place.
The funeral was for him. Which is to say, Tenma was a thing that nobody could see — what most people would politely call a “ghost.”
“How long am I supposed to hang around here, exactly?”
Nobody was going to answer that mumble of his… or so he thought.
“Ootori Tenma. I’m here to recruit you.”
Those were the first words anyone had spoken to Tenma since he’d become a ghost.
He turned, expecting nothing, and found… a vaguely human-shaped, deeply suspicious blob of light standing there.
“Pleasure to mee—” “whff!” “Whoa, hey, careful!”
The light had stretched out something that was probably a hand. Tenma had grabbed the nearest teacup and chucked it at the hand.
“Dangerous! That was dangerous, kid!”
The light dodged it M*trix-style, looking startled but not actually angry. Tenma, not letting his guard down, started winding up another teacup. Now the light got genuinely flustered.
“I’m not some shady person, okay?! Stop throwing things! If you throw that one it might hit someone else! Just — listen!”
The light’s frantic pleading was enough to get the second teacup lowered. For the record, the first teacup had sailed clean out the open window, so probably nobody got hurt.
“So. Who exactly are you. I’m apparently a ghost — well, apparently — so I figured you were the same kind of deal.”
The light puffed out what passed for its chest.
“How rude! I am a god!”
Hearing this, Tenma slowly drew his arm back to throw — “It’s true! I swear! Just hear me out!” — and stopped.
“Just let me finish, please! Allow me to introduce myself. I am a god from another world. Tenma-kun, I’ve come to recruit you to my world.”
Tenma went briefly stiff at the news from his self-styled god (lol)… and then snapped right back.
“That ‘(lol)’ was kind of harsh. And, like, you bounced back really fast. I figured you’d be way more rattled.”
“Being a ghost was already most of the shock budget. So, you’re a god from another world, and you came here to reincarnate me. I’ll grant you that much. Why pick me, though?”
“Well, that’s easy. By coincidence?”
Tenma wound up the teacup again — “Drop the cup already!” — and didn’t throw it.
“Okay, look, it is true that I happened to be in this area. But also there was a soul that looked like a really good match for the wavelength of my world, so I called out to it.”
“You knew my name, though.”
“Yep.”
“And you said you were here to recruit me.”
“Yep.”
“You said you just happened to be in the area and you just happened to find me.”
“Yep.”
“So really, you knew me from before, didn’t you.”
”…What makes you think that?”
“It’s a little too convenient. Honestly, ‘I scoped you out as a wavelength match, killed you, and then approached your ghost pretending it was a coincidence’ would track better.”
”…”
“So. Did you kill me?”
“I would never do something like that! Don’t insult me!”
”! Sorry!”
The light’s half-tearful shout startled Tenma into apologizing without thinking. The light lowered its voice.
“And — I have to apologize too. The truth is I’ve known about you for a while. But I swear, I did not kill you. I swear it. I was waiting for your lifespan to run out on its own. I was just… keeping an eye on you.”
“How long is ‘a while.’”
“Since you were born.”
“That long?! Why have you been watching some other-world kid since the day he was born?”
The light gathered itself.
“In the world I come from, the world itself can — sometimes — catch what’s basically an illness. When that happens, the ‘existence-force’ that runs through everything alive in that world starts to weaken. Worst case, the world itself disappears. So to prevent it, every now and then we deliberately bring in souls from other worlds, to re-energize that existence-force.”
“Like an immunization booster. So, what are the upsides and downsides — assuming I go along with this.”
“There’s really no downside worth mentioning. If I had to name one, it’d be that reincarnating means starting over from infancy. As upsides — to help you live more comfortably, I’ll give you a few of the abilities they call ‘cheats.’ If you want to keep the experience and skills you built up in this life, I can carry those over too, and I’ll let you cast one piece of magic that only works in this world. Within reason.”
Tenma thought for a moment.
“Then — could you fade the memories people have of me in this world?”
”…I can. But may I ask why?”
“Yeah. This village has been depopulating for years. Old people only, no young blood. We finally got the population starting to creep back up, with a lot of work.”
“Mm-hm.”
“The people leading that effort — my grandpa and his friends — they were the ones who raised me. They doted on me. And looking at them now, sitting at this funeral, they look like they could keel over tomorrow. I can’t stand watching it. I want to do something.”
The light shivered, what passed for its body trembling, and answered through tears.
“What a good kid! Of course, that’s easy! But — why not erase it completely?”
To which Tenma — face going slightly red — said in a small voice,
“If you erased me completely, I’d be the lonely one…”
The light, wailing, lunged at him with arms spread.
“Te-n-ma-kuuun!”
Tenma neatly sidestepped.
“That’s cold! …Anyway, to grant that wish I’ll need to take you out of this world. Take my hand.”
The light extended what passed for a hand, and Tenma, after some thought, took it.
“Off we go.”
The next moment, weightlessness — and Tenma’s consciousness cut out.
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The prologue’s running a little long, so I’m breaking it here.