Vol 1 Chapter 0 – My First Friend Was a God 【Vol 1 – When Written in Kanji, It’s Saionji Yumeba】

Misfortune Filter.

There was a time in my childhood when I was called by that nickname.

The misfortune of those around me would gather toward me, while good fortune would slip right past me.

I don’t think kids back then truly understood what that meant, but children are often sharper than adults at instinctively seeing the essence of things. In that sense, the nickname hit the mark.

Damn it! Who does that bitch think she is?!

I staggered down the street toward my apartment, drowning my sorrows in alcohol while cursing internally.

The reason for my binge drinking? Today was supposed to be the day I finally confessed to a female coworker—only to have her introduce my junior colleague as her boyfriend.

You were all over me just yesterday, acting like you were head over heels for me!

If this were just my imagination, that’d be one thing. But everyone around us could see she was completely smitten with me. It was only a matter of time.

In fact, all our coworkers were just as stunned by her sudden change in attitude.

Well… I guess this is just business as usual.

But even as I drowned my frustration in alcohol, part of me had known from the start this would happen.

Since middle school, when I first developed an interest in romance, she wasn’t the first woman to show interest in me.

Back in middle school, I was too embarrassed to confess myself. But when she suddenly introduced another guy as her boyfriend one day, I was devastated.

I regretted not confessing first.

That’s why I vowed that next time, I wouldn’t hesitate. But after that, strange coincidences kept getting in the way whenever I tried to confess. And when I finally pushed through to do it anyway, she’d introduce me to her boyfriend.

Middle school, high school, college, and even after entering the workforce—nothing changed.

And it wasn’t just romance.

My timing was unnaturally bad. A junior’s mistake would somehow become my responsibility, earning me a thorough scolding from my boss. My coworkers would sympathize, but ultimately my boss would pin it on me to cover up his own oversight.

When I turned in lost items out of goodwill, I’d be accused of theft, publicly condemned, and when the police got involved, I’d end up paying damages.

These weren’t life-ending events, but they weren’t small either. They piled up day after day, year after year.

It had been this way since childhood. Even my parents never believed me. Honestly, any capacity I had for hope had long since worn away.

With this woman too, I’d somehow known deep down this was how it would end.

Still, I tried to confess because I was sick of her clinging to me when she’d never actually be mine. And I drank to drown out the small part of me that had held onto hope.

Why am I even alive?

Being this way, I’d thought about suicide more than once or twice since childhood.

But the resolve to kill yourself is heavier than you’d think. And whenever I’d finally worked up the nerve—for some reason, something would always get in the way.

Heavy decisions take time to solidify. By the time they did, something would interfere again. After repeating this cycle, I gave up on suicide too.

As I walked down the dark road to my apartment in this foul mood, I passed a young girl.

From experience, I knew getting too close would invite false accusations, so I kept as much distance as possible. But the moment we passed each other, I noticed something dark and heavy—like black mist—erupting from her.

And for some reason—yes, for some reason—it was drawn toward me.

“Ugh…!”

The black mist rapidly coiled around me, and I couldn’t breathe.

It felt like being suddenly dragged underwater. Air leaked from my mouth, but I couldn’t inhale—a vicious cycle.

No matter how I struggled, the mist wouldn’t let go. Worse still…

You’ve got to be kidding me.

More black mist kept gathering from my surroundings, making what clung to me darker and heavier.

Straining my blurred vision, I could see mist surging toward me from impossibly far away. I spent what felt like an eternity suffocating before finally blacking out.

《Hey there, welcome.》

When I came to, I was in a pure white space being greeted by a small, friendly-looking boy.

He had blond hair and blue eyes—the kind of kid guaranteed to grow into a handsome man with a bright future. He clearly wasn’t Japanese, yet he addressed me in Japanese.

《I think you already know this, but you’re dead. Cause of death: suffocation after being crushed by the sheer mass of misfortune you attracted from around the world.》

“That black mist was misfortune?”

《Exactly. Technically, it’s negative energy generated from human emotions, but since it attracts bad luck, calling it misfortune works fine.》

“How do you know all this?”

《Because I’m what you might call a god.》

“…I see.”

Normally I wouldn’t have believed him, but after dying with such certainty, I accepted it surprisingly easily.

《Earth’s god really did something cruel, though. Concentrating all misfortune onto one person to raise everyone else’s happiness quotient—such a sloppy plan was never going to work.》

“What… did you just say?”

Did he really just say what I think he said?

《Yeah. Your misfortune since childhood wasn’t a delusion—it was pure fact. From the moment you were born, Earth’s god manipulated your fate, turning you into someone who attracts others’ misfortune.》

“…”

《It’s also why you had so many encounters with women. Women carrying misfortune could transfer it to you through contact, experiencing overwhelming euphoria in the process. They’d unconsciously develop intense feelings for you—like love at first sight multiplied by a hundred. Their affection was absolutely real. You weren’t delusional about being popular with women.》

“I don’t remember ever being popular.”

《That’s where your condition gets nasty. Women felt overwhelming love for you, but your misfortune wouldn’t allow mutual affection. Whenever you decided to confess to a woman showing interest, a phenomenon close to mind control would forcibly manipulate her, causing the relationship to fail.》

“…”

Who exactly was I supposed to direct this rage toward?

《I understand your anger. Anyone would think it’s absurd. So let me help you vent a little, even if it’s just a small comfort.》

“What are you planning?”

《Well, take a look at this.》

The boy gestured, and a semi-transparent window about fifty inches wide appeared.

And what played in that window was…

“Who’s that?”

An unfamiliar girl was screaming in the street at night, clawing at her own face with her nails, tearing at her skin.

《That’s the girl you passed on your way home—the one who dumped an enormous load of misfortune onto you. Since you could actually see her misfortune, she must have lived a pretty unfortunate life herself, though not as bad as yours.》

“Ah.”

That jogged my memory.

She was indeed the last girl I’d passed, and the location looked familiar.

“What’s she doing?”

I didn’t understand why she was hurting herself.

《Like I said—women who transfer misfortune to you experience overwhelming euphoria. After dumping that much bad luck on you, her euphoria must have been unimaginable. That emotion shot straight past infatuation into the realm of love.》

“So why is this happening?”

The girl had moved beyond clawing at herself and was now slamming her head against a concrete wall with full force.

《Because she watched the person she loved writhe in agony and die right in front of her eyes, unable to do anything. Her mind plummeted from overwhelming euphoria straight into despair and guilt.》

“How would she know I was the cause?”

《Why wouldn’t she? All those other women instinctively understood and showed you affection, didn’t they?》

“…”

In the window before me, the girl finally collapsed, blood pouring from her head.

“Showing me this doesn’t make me feel any better.”

《Well, you only just met her—or rather, you barely even encountered her. The real show starts now.》

“?”

The scene in the window changed, and—

“What the…?!”

A woman wielding a kitchen knife was repeatedly stabbing a man, her face twisted in fury.

“Why are they…?”

I recognized both of them.

《One’s the coworker you tried to confess to today, and the other’s your junior—her boyfriend.》

Yes. The woman who’d been clinging to me until yesterday, only to suddenly introduce my junior as her boyfriend today.

《That’s because your death freed her from the mind-control-like phenomenon. She found herself dating someone she didn’t even like, and the loss of you combined with that realization drove her to madness. Her hatred redirected toward her unwanted boyfriend.》

“…”

After creating a splatter scene, the woman’s expression went blank. She dropped the knife and stumbled out of the room, covered in blood.

She made her way to the roof of her apartment building and—without hesitation—jumped, painting the ground red below.

“…”

《The stronger someone’s feelings for you, the greater their despair and guilt when freed from the control. Suicide and self-harm like this are happening all over the place. Check this one out—it’s extreme.》

The window now showed an unfamiliar woman dousing everything in gasoline and setting fires everywhere.

《You probably don’t remember her, but she’s the girl you had a crush on in middle school—your first love.》

“That was over ten years ago.”

Middle school was more than a decade past, and I’d long since moved on from her.

《Doesn’t matter. It may be ancient history to you, but for her, those feelings were forcibly twisted through mind control. In fact, because of the control, her affection for you never faded or dulled. That’s why her despair and guilt drove her to such madness.》

“This isn’t making me feel better—it’s horrifying.”

After that, he showed me countless women losing their minds. Far from satisfying, it was painful to watch.

《Hmm. I thought you’d feel at least a little vindicated seeing what happened to women who abandoned you for other men, even if they were controlled. Maybe this was too extreme.》

I may have been betrayed, but I hadn’t fallen far enough to enjoy watching women I’d once cared about enough to confess to meet such fates.

《Oh, you’re misunderstanding something. It’s not just women committing suicide and self-harm. Your misfortune-attracting power worked on everyone regardless of age or gender. Anyone who had even slight contact with you is probably taking similar action.》

“Are we talking hundreds of people?”

《Not even close. At minimum, tens of thousands.》

“…Huh?”

There’s no way I interacted with tens of thousands of people.

《Not until yesterday. But at the very end, misfortune from around the world got drawn to you, remember? That’s caused global panic.》

“Whoa…”

I’d noticed mist converging from far away, but the scale was beyond imagination.

《Thanks to that, the world’s misfortune got wiped out and the happiness quotient may have risen temporarily, but this panic makes those few days of good luck a net negative. Earth’s god got what was coming to him.》

“A few days?”

《Yeah. No matter how much misfortune you absorbed, it’s fundamentally negative energy generated by humans. The happiness period would only last a few days at most.》

“All that for nothing…”

《Yup. Totally not worth it.》

I felt deflated in every sense.

《Anyway, let me introduce myself properly. I’m what people call a Reincarnation God.》

“Reincarnation?”

《Yeah. Normally I don’t meet individuals personally to guide them, but your case is special in a way.》

“Because of my misfortune-attracting condition?”

《No. That condition’s already over.》

“…What?”

《You collected so much from across the entire planet that you exceeded your capacity. That negative energy has accumulated inside you and is trying to become something else.》

“Something else?”

《I don’t know what exactly. All I know is that your misfortune-attracting trait collapsed after exceeding its initial limit, and the negative energy accumulated inside you is slowly taking shape.》

This sounded more complicated than I thought.

“Can’t you remove this negative energy from me?”

《Earth’s god who created the misfortune-attraction function might be able to, but I won’t allow it.》

“Why not?”

《Because it’s undeniably your property now. I understand you’re wary of anything called “negative energy,” but I won’t let Earth’s god unlawfully take it from you. It belongs to you, and you should be the one to use it.》

“You’re surprisingly fair.”

《Thanks.》

While Earth’s god’s unreasonableness infuriated me, this Reincarnation God seemed genuinely fair.

《I couldn’t do this job without being fair. I have to process everything impartially, without favoritism or discrimination.》

“Am I an exception?”

《Earth’s god was so unreasonable that showing you a little favoritism still doesn’t come close to matching the injustice. We’re still well within the bounds of fairness.》

“…”

Something told me—just a feeling—that this god was exhausted from being fair and was showing me favoritism out of loneliness.

《Haha, I won’t deny that. Being fair is surprisingly exhausting.》

Apparently he could read my thoughts, but I didn’t mind. I’d already let my guard down around this Reincarnation God.

《Well, I can only show you favoritism now, unfortunately.》

“That’s a shame.”

I was tired of human relationships too, and having someone I could trust only for now was genuinely disappointing.

《Alright, as much as I hate to, it’s time to get down to business. I’m going to reincarnate you now. Since you might have your negative energy confiscated within Earth god’s jurisdiction, you’ll have to give up on reincarnating on Earth.》

“There are worlds besides Earth?”

《Countless. Many are genuinely rotten, but to put it simply: parallel worlds, future worlds, past worlds, alternate dimensions, hyper-dimensional worlds—there are so many it’s ridiculous to count.》

“I-I see.”

《The world you’ll reincarnate into and what you’ll become are randomly determined, excluding Earth god’s domain. But given your soul’s strength, you’ll definitely be reborn as a human or something similar.》

“Soul strength?”

《Strong souls become intelligent life forms. Weak souls might become small animals, plants, or in the worst cases, insects or microorganisms.》

“I didn’t want to know that.”

《Don’t worry—souls only weaken after hundreds of reincarnations totaling hundreds of thousands of years.》

“More epic than I imagined.”

《That’s the divine perspective for you.》

Truly a world beyond human comprehension.

《Alright then, I’ll begin your reincarnation process now. May fortune smile upon your next life.》

“…Thank you.”

The gratitude came out more sincerely than I expected, surprising me. As I wondered when I’d last been this honest, my consciousness faded away.