Chiba Japan, Sakura City
A silver moon hung high in the sky, streetlights flickering softly below.
A young man stood beneath them, his eyes hidden behind crimson bangs. Slung across his back was a tennis racket nearly half his height. His head was lowered, fingers flying across his phone screen.
The glow of the phone illuminated his slightly youthful face.
It was already late at night. Along the road, only a single shop remained lit the convenience store he always passed on his way home.
Shaka lifted his drooping eyelids slightly and glanced toward the storefront. On the outer wall was a poster depicting a magnificent floating city.
[Brand-New Full-Dive Game SAO Closed Beta Registration Open]
[November 6, 2022 Grand Official Launch!]
"Today is… March 21…"
He murmured softly.
"So it's been ten years… since I transmigrated?"
With that, the boy pushed open the convenience store door.
"Welcome!"
The part-time warrior with a chestnut ponytail greeted him familiarly.
"Ara, Shaka-kun."
"Aoyama-senpai," Shaka asked casually, glancing up from his phone,
"how many part-time jobs is this now?"
"Ahaha…"
Aoyama Nanami scratched her cheek and gave an awkward laugh.
"Caught me again."
Even now, it was only when Shaka interacted with people he clearly remembered from his previous life that he truly believed he had transmigrated into a crossover 'slice-of-life' world.
The reason slice-of-life was in quotation marks was because,
"Shaka-kun, I watched your match today. What a shame… you still lost to Yukimura in the end."
Aoyama Nanami looked at him regretfully, her gaze falling on the tennis racket on his back.
She couldn't help but feel envious of people with true talent. To defeat so many powerful opponents and make it to the finals, it was impressive enough.
Shaka let out a sigh, raised a hand to brush his bangs aside, narrowed his eyes, and chuckled softly.
"There was nothing I could do."
Was he weak?
No.
As a normal human, facing an opponent who literally played tennis with illusions, defeat was inevitable.
He genuinely couldn't understand how others could still swing their rackets and return the ball after having their five senses sealed.
That was total sensory deprivation!
Why don't you go become a Saint Seiya while you're at it?!
And the others,what, everyone suddenly have Observation Haki now?!
Hah.
Internally ranting, Shaka concluded once again:
This really is a two-dimensional world.
It wasn't like he hadn't complained to others about this unscientific, non-magical excuse for "daily life."
Honestly, he'd much prefer a different kind of daily life like a transfer student who's secretly an angel or demon, or maybe finding a dragon maid in the mountains behind town.
Compared to his initial vulgar dreams of becoming a plagiarist or a womanizer, the supernatural clearly fascinated Shaka far more.
I long for the mysterious.
At that moment, his phone buzzed.
The chat window he'd named "Chat Group of the Myriad Worlds" was rapidly filling with messages.
[Perverted Hero]: "A loss is a loss! Instead of whining, spend more time training, you damn normie! Go explode!"
[Chūnibyō Fallen Holy Black Cat of Chiba]: "Fallacy! Gate Master has already worked hard enough! Fighting espers Beyond the Boundary and the Four Heavenly Kings in the final battlefield!"
[The Phantom Sixth]: "You mean how Shaka-kun is in both the tennis club and the basketball club, right?"
[Kobayashi]: "You really get it, huh.jpg"
[Thunder Warhammer Apostle]: "It's all the Agency's fault, death! Gate Master is already falling apart, death! This is when we must support him, dea—th!"
[Dress-Up Doll]: "That's true, but… aren't athletes like that? With Shaka-kun's talent, wouldn't focusing on one thing be better?"
[Guitar Hero]: "Teacher Descender, has the anime OP been decided yet?"
[Shaka (Group Owner)]: "..."
At this point, Shaka couldn't hold it in anymore. He lowered his head and typed furiously.
[Shaka]: "I get what you're saying, but opening with Tenbu Hōrin is way too much! I'm not a Saint Seiya!"
[Unicorn]: "I know that feeling… like how I can never beat Kyōgoku-senpai in karate. That pressure…"
[Shadow]: "Hmph. That level of power is meaningless before a nuclear bomb."
Seeing the group's attempts at comfort, Shaka could only sigh.
Sure, he knew that later on there'd even be tennis shots capable of creating tsunamis, but
"Forget it… I didn't play tennis just to win anyway."
Shaka closed his eyes.
This wasn't a novel. Not everyone gathered at the same high school, and ages didn't magically align.
There weren't that many coincidences.
To gather so many familiar figures from his previous life into this chat group, Shaka had paid a heavy price,hard work, effort, and above all, luck. Even among the hundred members, over eighty percent barely knew him.
"You could say I gave everything for my ideal…"
That's right, this multiverse chat group was something Shaka built himself. A simple, ordinary chat group.
As for why he created it and why he started playing sports
Shaka glanced at the member list.
[Perverted Hero] — Satō Kazuma
[Shadow] — Kageno Minoru
[ ] — Blank
[Grip Strength: 50kg] — Natsuki Subaru
[Demon Lord] — Mikami Satoru
…
All of them were transmigrators or reincarnators.
And Shaka himself was a living transmigrator.
That alone made his already restless heart burn even hotter.
"Honestly, chasing a harem in a realistic world where all the 'wives' aren't even in the same school something's clearly wrong!"
Shaka smacked his lips.
"And it's an easy way to get stabbed."
He clenched his fist.
"But another world is different! That's a world ruled by strength where a man's ambitions are easily fulfilled!"
"Even someone like me can do it!"
A coward in reality, a keyboard warrior online Shaka firmly believed this.
"And really, who could resist the temptation of handcrafting a nuke?"
So
Young Shaka awakened.
He yearned endlessly for the mysterious. He longed to transmigrate once more.
He waited in the mountains for fate, searched libraries for legends of the Three Holy Heroes, read Das Kapital, filled out hero recruitment forms, and even waited until the final moment in shutting-down games.
Thankfully, he remained rational enough not to deliberately get hit by a truck, or go looking for Haruhi Suzumiya or the Evil God D.
Those beings who could be called "gods" even in a slice-of-life world currently existed in a state of both existence and nonexistence.
In short: Schrödinger's gods.
These actions earned Shaka a reputation as a weirdo in middle school. Come to think of it, a large portion of the group were people just like him…
And his efforts weren't entirely in vain.
He did find a god.
A "one-eyed, one-legged" god of wisdom, elected and revered by yokai.
Unfortunately, Shaka couldn't see yokai at all.
In the end, the only thing that truly connected him to the mysterious was
Sports.
Ridiculous. Casually hitting black holes was apparently considered normal athlete-level performance in this world.
No superpowers? Don't even think about competing.
Shaka typed as he walked, turning into an aisle and grabbing his future rations five-pack instant noodles and sausages.
He checked out while debating the relationship between superpowers and sports in the group chat.
"Thank you for your purchase. That'll be 340 yen."
Shaka paid, then casually asked before leaving:
"Aoyama-senpai, are you sure you don't want to join my group? Everyone's amazing maybe it could help with your dream."
"Sorry, I'll pass."
Aoyama Nanami smiled and waved.
"Come again."
She didn't mention that she couldn't afford the data usage.
Slightly disappointed, Shaka stepped out of the store.
Then he noticed a system notification in the chat.
[Mori Summer has left the chat group.]
"So it's that time already…"
It happened often. After all, it was just an ordinary chat group he couldn't maintain close relationships with over a hundred people.
But this time…
It was someone he knew.
The group immediately erupted.
[Thunder Warhammer Apostle]: "The Agency has made its move! All of Mori-sama's data in the electronic sea has been erased! Damn it!"
[Jet-Black Flame Master]: "She probably just graduated from chūnibyō. We're not middle schoolers anymore.
That aside hey, dumb group owner, are you still chasing that so-called Unseen Boundary?"
[Shaka]: "Yes. This is the one thing I won't give up.
'Mystery' truly exists."
Shaka pressed send.
A loading circle appeared.
Then—
[Out of Service]
Suddenly, the sound of cicadas filled his ears. A warm, radiant light washed over him.
"Huh? No signal?"
As Shaka frantically tapped his screen, he sensed something was wrong.
He looked up.
A breeze carrying the scent of soil swept through his long bangs, revealing emerald-green eyes narrowed to pinpoints.
Before him stood dense woods. Birds chirped cheerfully as sunlight filtered through dappled leaves.
The soft ground beneath his feet was unmistakably real soil.
Most importantly
The glaring "Out of Service" icon on his phone told him one thing clearly:
This place was outside all electronic signal coverage.
He had likely transmigrated again.
The unplanned miracle left him stunned.
After a long silence, Shaka covered his face and accepted reality.
"...i almost forgot."
"At the entrance of a convenience store late at night, you don't just run into silent white-haired armored girls…"
"It's also one of the classic transmigration trope"