It was already sunset, and without the direct sunlight, it didn't feel as scorching outdoors, but the mugginess remained.
Akira had sweated a lot today and felt sticky all over, making him want to go home and take a shower as soon as possible.
However, his current lodging was far from school, taking over an hour to walk, and Akira had neither a bicycle nor money for the train, so he could only walk back.
Akira certainly wanted to complain, but to be honest, he knew his current situation very well; having a place to stay was already a great stroke of luck.
One must know that when Akira first transmigrated, he not only couldn't speak the language and didn't know his new name and identity, but he didn't even have a place to live.
It's no exaggeration to say it was a 'hellish start'.
Recalling the day he first transmigrated to this world, Akira was filled with emotion.
In his previous life, Akira was a copywriter and planner working for a large game company.
Late at night, the day before the game launched, he was still working overtime at the company, rushing a draft. His body was nearing its limit, and his mind was hazy, but his heart was full of anticipation for liberation.
He thought that once the game launched, the grueling days of working overtime until ten every night would finally end, and his weekends would surely return.
The accumulation of fatigue caused a strange throbbing pain in his skull, as if his brain was trembling. Finally, unable to keep his eyelids from fighting, he decided to take a short nap.
He never expected that closing his eyes once would make him say goodbye to that world.
He never dreamed that the long-awaited liberation would come in the form of falling asleep and never waking up. Perhaps this was the tragic end for an office drone.
Working oneself to death was a cause of death he had always heard about, but he never truly felt it, always thinking it was far from him, until it happened to him.
Then, a blessing arrived in an unexpected way. He had always thought that transmigrating to another world was a plot that only happened in fictional works, until it happened to him.
When he opened his eyes again, he found himself in a classroom, sitting in the protagonist's seat, the second to last row by the window.
At first, he thought he had dreamed of returning to his High School days, but he quickly realized that the school uniform he was wearing was not the nostalgic blue and white tracksuit, but a Western-style uniform.
Turning his head, he could even see cherry blossom petals drifting outside the window… Huh? Where is this?
After trying various stimulating methods to wake himself from the dream, he finally confirmed that he had encountered the legendary transmigration… or had he?
After going to the toilet, washing his face, and looking in the mirror, he wasn't so sure anymore.
Because he found that, although it was transmigration, he hadn't turned into 'someone else'.
If anything, it was a subtle state between body transmigration and soul transmigration; that is, his body was still his own body, and there were no 'memories that didn't belong to him' in his head.
To be precise, his body still had some changes; he had become younger.
Although his appearance hadn't changed, his dark circles and acne scars from puberty were gone, and his body had become much thinner and lighter, like shedding dozens of pounds of weight.
Since starting work, prolonged sitting and the 996 work schedule had led to him becoming overweight from overwork; his weight only increased, and a double chin was almost forming, but now all that excess fat was gone.
What surprised him the most was that the scar at the corner of his eye was still there.
It was a scar from when he was very young, cut by a piece of broken glass. He was very lucky that his eyeball wasn't injured, but it left this scar, and this scar grew larger as his body grew, becoming a mark that represented him.
Such a non-birthmark scar was still there; did something similar happen in this world too?
What exactly is going on?
Transmigration? Rebirth? Possession?
Only a ghost would know.
He quickly gave up on dwelling on questions that had no answers. Since he was here, he might as well make the best of it. Instead of thinking about useless things, it was better to gather more information about 'his current self'.
In any case, since no scoundrel claiming to be a god appeared to explain what had happened, and no system prompt box popped up, it meant he temporarily couldn't escape his current predicament.
Looking on the bright side, at least he was free from that black-hearted company, wasn't he?
And he didn't have to wear someone else's face, and even became younger…
Then let's re-enjoy youth!
Then came the minute of despair that ruined his first High School debut opportunity, the self-introduction time where the atmosphere dropped below freezing, dead silent.
However, he also learned his new name through this.
Akira.
This new name also made him feel both amused and frustrated.
Because in his previous life, his surname was Bai, and his given name was Yuming, which was "Bai Yuming."
After transmigration, his surname became Kuroba, and his given name was the single character Akira, which was "Kuroba Akira."
Although there was only a one-character difference, the pronunciation was completely different.
And because even his name hadn't changed much, Akira initially always wrote 'Kuro' as 'Bai' and would forget the spacing in his name. It took him quite a while to correct it.
After school on the first day, Bai… Akira realized an even more serious problem.
That was, he didn't know where his home was.
So Akira could only bite the bullet and find his homeroom teacher. After much difficulty, using broken Japanese and universal hand gestures, he expressed his predicament of not knowing where his home was. Kobayakawa Teacher helped him search through the student contact book, but she couldn't find Akira's home address or contact information.
Kobayakawa Teacher thought it was an oversight, so she called the dean of students, but received the following reply:
"As for Akira, he came from out of town to attend High School, and he's reportedly still looking for a place to live. Once he finds a place, we'll have him write down his address and phone number."
In other words, Akira wasn't homeless; he just hadn't found a place to live yet.
Akira didn't quite understand Kobayakawa Teacher's words at the time, but he still understood 'sonna (how could that be)' based on his rich experience watching anime, and he saw the troubled expression on her face.
Afterward, Akira searched his schoolbag and indeed found a bank card, which was most likely the housing funds provided by his family.
But…
He didn't know the password!
It's one thing not to have loaded the local language, but at least leave me this part of the memory! Baka! Baka!
Poor Akira, whose local language skills at the time weren't good enough to curse creatively, could only angrily repeat "Baka" like an idiot in his mind to vent his frustration.
Meanwhile, Kobayakawa Teacher was a bit hesitant. She really wanted to help this student who seemed to have 'aphasia,' but she didn't know how to help him.
There's no way she could take him home, right?
Taking a male High School student back to her home? The possibility of a teacher-student romance?
Kobayakawa Teacher, who had never been in love, began to fantasize about that forbidden development…
No, no, no, no matter what, she couldn't go that far.
As a new teacher, if she did something like that and it was discovered, she would definitely be fired.
In the end, Kobayakawa Teacher could only express that she was powerless to help.
Thus, Akira began wandering Tokyo on his first day of transmigration.