John Haisha had never been what anyone would call "normal," and he wore that distinction like a badge of honor. though in reality, it was more of a scarlet letter that had been branded onto his forehead the moment he'd discovered anime at age eleven.
The divorce had been messy. His mother had kept the house in Sacramento, his father had kept his dignity (barely), and John had kept his extensive collection of manga that he'd been systematically stealing from the local Barnes & Noble. Not his proudest moment, but in his defense, volume seven of Naruto had been absolutely essential to his development as a person. When his dad announced, six months after the papers were signed, that he'd fallen in love with a woman named Yuki from Saitama and that they'd be moving to Japan, John's reaction had been nothing short of religious ecstasy.
"This is it," he'd whispered to himself, clutching his worn copy of Sword Art Online light novel volume three to his chest. "This is my isekai moment." (god I fucking hate this chud!)
His father had looked at him with the particular brand of exhausted disappointment that John had grown accustomed to. "It's not an... whatever you just said. It's just Japan. A real place. With real people."
But John knew better. John always knew better.
That had been four years ago, and if anything, the experience had only reinforced John's conviction that he was living in the prologue of an epic anime storyline. The fact that reality had consistently failed to match his expectations hadn't dimmed his enthusiasm one bit. If anything, it had made him double down.
At eighteen, John Haisha was a specimen of pure, unfiltered cringe. He stood at a wholly unremarkable five-foot-eight, with a soft, doughy physique that suggested his primary form of exercise was reaching for the next volume on his bookshelf. His black hair inherited from his father hung limp and greasy around his face, perpetually in need of a wash because showering cut into his anime watching time. He wore the same rotation of graphic tees featuring anime girls in compromising positions (strike fucking one bro) , each shirt a testament to his complete lack of social awareness. His favorite, worn at least twice a week, featured a busty catgirl with the caption "Nya~ What are you looking at?" in Comic Sans. (strike 2, son im crine)
His room in his father and stepmother's small apartment was a shrine to his obsession. Figurines lined every available surface, Rem from Re:Zero, Asuna from Sword Art Online, Hatsune Miku in seventeen different poses and outfits. His prized possession was a limited edition 1/4 scale figure of Zero Two from Darling in the Franxx that had cost him three months of allowance and part-time wages. Posters covered every inch of wall space, their corners curling from the humidity. His desk was a disaster zone of empty ramen cups, manga volumes, and a crusty keyboard he hadn't cleaned in eight months.
Yuki, his stepmother, had long since given up trying to understand her stepson. She was a kind woman, patient beyond measure, but even her tolerance had limits. She'd stopped entering his room after the "incident" where she'd accidentally knocked over a jar and discovered his—well, some things were better left unexamined (HOLY SHIT CUM JAR INCIDENT!).
His father worked long hours as an English teacher and had adopted a policy of willful ignorance regarding his son's lifestyle.
School had been a special kind of hell that John had somehow convinced himself was actually heaven.
The other students at his high school had taken one look at him the half-foreign otaku who could barely speak proper Japanese despite four years in the country and had collectively decided he was somewhere below dirt on the social hierarchy. They called him "hāfu-chikan" half-pervert. They mocked his accent, his greasy hair, his anime shirts, his complete inability to read the room in any social situation.
"Haisha-kun," they'd sneer, deliberately mispronouncing his name to sound like "haisha," which meant dentist. "Going to extract some more anime girl teeth for your collection?"
He'd smile and adjust his glasses thick-framed things held together with tape after the fifth time they'd been broken and launch into an explanation of why actually, that particular anime girl was a compelling character with deep psychological complexity, and if they'd just watch episodes twelve through fourteen they'd understand the nuanced commentary on post-modern existentialism and— (STRIKE FUCKING 3 IM TORTURING THIS FUCKER IN THE NEXT LIFE)
And then they'd shove him into a locker, or trip him in the hallway, or pour juice on his lunch. Standard stuff.
John didn't care. Or rather, he'd convinced himself he didn't care so thoroughly that the delusion had become indistinguishable from reality. Every insult, every act of cruelty, every moment of isolation he'd reframed it all as part of his protagonist's journey. He was the misunderstood genius, the diamond in the rough, the underdog who would eventually unlock his hidden power and show them all. The bullying wasn't trauma; it was character development.
"They're just NPCs," he'd mutter to himself, pushing his taped glasses up his nose. "Side characters in my story. They don't understand true culture."
True culture, in John's mind, meant spending his eighteenth birthday exactly as he'd planned for months.
While his classmates celebrated their coming-of-age at parties or shrines, John had taken the train to Akihabara with a wallet full of cash he'd saved from his part-time job at a convenience store. Six months of minimum wage, hoarded with the dedication of a dragon guarding treasure. He'd had a list, carefully curated, of limited edition figures he needed to complete his collection.
The first purchase: a Megumin figure with real fabric clothing and a light-up explosion effect. ¥24,000. Worth it.
The second: a special edition Rem & Ram twin set with interchangeable heads and accessories. ¥18,000. Essential.
The third: a massive Hatsune Miku figure, 1/3 scale, taking up an entire shelf by itself. ¥35,000. Life-changing.
He'd bought six more, each one sending a thrill through his body that he suspected was probably similar to what normal people felt when accomplishing actual life milestones. By the time he left the store, his backpack weighed roughly the same as a small child and his wallet was devastated. He'd had to skip lunch, but that was fine. He had cup noodles at home.
The walk back to the train station took him through a less crowded side street, the plastic bags cutting into his fingers as he hummed the opening theme to his current favorite anime. The sun was setting, painting the Tokyo sky in shades of orange and pink that looked exactly like an anime background. Everything was perfect. This was the life he'd dreamed of back in Sacramento. This was—
"Oi! It's the chud!"
John's heart sank just slightly before his delusion kicked back in. He recognized the voices Takeshi and his friends, students from his school who'd made bullying him into something of a hobby.
There were four of them, blocking the narrow street ahead. Takeshi was their ringleader, a handsome kid with styled hair and an athlete's build. Everything John wasn't.
"Got some new girlfriends, hāfu?" Takeshi called out, gesturing at the bags. "Real women too scary for you?"
His friends laughed, the sound echoing off the buildings.
John adjusted his grip on his bags and kept walking. "They wouldn't understand," he muttered to himself. "Uncultured masses. Probably watch live-action exclusively." (I wanna kill him rn)
"What was that?" One of them, Kenji, John thought his name was stepped forward. "Speaking English again? This is Japan, freak."
"I said they're figures," John said louder, his Japanese clumsy and accented. "Collectible figures. Limited edition. You wouldn't understand the artistry—"
"Jesus Christ, he's really talking about it," another one laughed. "Bro, you spent your birthday money on plastic women?"
"They're not plastic, they're PVC, and the craftsmanship—"
Takeshi shoved him, not hard enough to knock him down but enough to make him stumble. "You're so fucking weird, Haisha. How do you live with yourself?"
The honest answer was that John lived with himself perfectly fine, insulated by layers upon layers of delusion and anime-rotted brain matter. He'd long ago stopped processing these interactions as bullying and started processing them as the necessary trials of a protagonist before his redemption arc.
"You guys are like the arrogant nobles in chapter one," John said, more to himself than to them, continuing his shuffle forward. "You'll see. Character development is a journey."
"What the hell is he talking about?"
"Anime shit, what else?"
John pushed past them, or tried to. Kenji grabbed one of his bags.
"Let's see what kind of perverted crap you bought—"
"Don't!" John yanked back, but the bag tore, and one of his new figures the Rem & Ram set—tumbled out onto the pavement.
For a moment, everyone froze. The twin figures lay on the ground in their plastic packaging, their anime girl faces staring up at the sky.
The laughter was immediate and cruel.
"Oh my god, look at them!"
"This is what you spend money on?"
"Dude, you need serious help—"
But John wasn't listening anymore. He'd knelt down to pick up his figures, checking them frantically for damage. The box was scuffed but intact. Relief washed over him. He carefully placed them back in the torn bag and stood up.
"Are you done?" he asked flatly. "I need to catch my train."
There was something in his complete lack of affect that seemed to disgust them even more than his usual awkward attempts at explanation.
"You're hopeless," Takeshi spat. "Actually hopeless. Don't you have any shame? Any self-awareness?"
John looked at him, this boy who represented everything society deemed normal and acceptable, and felt nothing but pity. "You're the one who doesn't understand," he said quietly. "I'm living my dream. What are you doing?"
He turned and kept walking, clutching his bags tighter, leaving the group behind. He could hear them shouting after him more insults, more mocker but it all faded into white noise. Just background dialogue from characters who didn't matter.
The street opened up onto a larger intersection. The train station was just two blocks away. John's mind was already drifting back to his collection, mentally rearranging his shelf space to accommodate his new acquisitions. Maybe he'd put Megumindoll next to his Kazuma figure, create a little scene—
He didn't see the crack in the pavement.
His foot caught, and suddenly John was falling forward, his bags flying from his hands. He hit the ground hard, glasses knocked askew, and looked up just in time to see the truck.
It was a delivery truck, nothing special, taking the turn onto the street at a perfectly normal speed. To anyone else, it would have been just another vehicle, easily avoided if you just stayed on the sidewalk.
But to John Haisha, lying in the street with his vision blurred and his mind warped by ten thousand hours of anime consumption, it wasn't just a truck.
It was Truck-kun.
"Finally," John whispered, a smile spreading across his face even as his body locked up in fear. "My isekai."
Behind him, distantly, he could hear Takeshi and the others screaming at him to move, to get out of the way, but their voices sounded like they were coming from underwater.
The truck's horn blared.
John closed his eyes, still smiling, and waited for his adventure to begin.
The impact—