Chapter 1:
In the Dark World, with the Light of You
Seventeen-year-old Ken Yanami stood at a familiar intersection, waiting at a traffic light, just as he had thousands of times before. Holding on to his bike, he watched the people around him, his mind wandering aimlessly. His mind was a maze of complex reasoning, just like Ken himself. Despite being deeply interested in many things, he felt empty, as if he lacked the spark that seemed to drive everyone else forward. Ken stared at the strangers who passed him.
“Take these people, for example... That guy with the briefcase is walking like he's rediscovering Newton's laws. And that girl is glued to her phone as if the fate of humanity depends on her. They are all in a hurry, they all know why they live. And I... I'm missing something... But what is it?”
Ken sighed. At that moment, the light turned green and something strange began to happen. The people around him seemed to blur and disappear from his vision, and they were replaced by a flickering white light, as if he was standing on the threshold of the other world.
“It can't be...” His face froze in disbelief as a massive rotating portal appeared in front of him, filled with doors just like the ones he had seen in his favorite anime. But it wasn't a dream or a trick of the eye - it was a real portal, and it was pulling Ken and his bike in. Inside the portal, the outlines of various doors flickered in and out of view.
“Hey, hey, wait a second, I'm not ready for this! I'm not the one you need - find some other fool willing to risk his life for nothing! To hell with your isekai, I actually have plans for tonight!” Panicked, Ken grabbed onto his bike and then grabbed onto the nearest lamppost in an attempt to resist the pull of his foreseen fate.
His bike was the first to disappear, sucked into one of the open doors, which slammed and disappeared. Ken, despite his desperate struggle, was pulled toward another door. And finally, as if in a senseless dream, Ken, clinging to a lamppost as if it were his last hope for survival, was swallowed up by the light.
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