All Beautiful Girls Want to Stick with Me

As her consciousness faded to black, Kotomi lay in bed, feeling a sense of surprise. So, the former Kotomi Izumi had indeed been hit by a truck once.

Before she could process this revelation, the dream abruptly dissipated.

Darkness enveloped her, as silent as the void.

Kotomi found herself momentarily unable to tell if she was still dreaming or not. Surrounded by the sheer blackness, Kotomi gradually calmed down, guessing that what she had just glimpsed could be the missing pieces of her forgotten memories.

Though her mind was alert, she could sense that her body was still asleep, floating weightlessly, stripped bare in a soundless sea. The girl called Izumi Kotomi drifted downward.

There was no end. Or perhaps she'd been in this state of oxygen-free suspension from the start, hovering in this lightless ocean without ever truly falling.

It felt almost like soaking in a hot spring.

Only, this spring felt cold.

In the absence of light, there was no true darkness either. Because there was nothing, there was nothing to see. Even the sensation of sinking had vanished.

Her body felt weightless, as if she'd shed every restraint.

In this boundless, featureless "sea," Kotomi glimpsed a faintly shimmering vision, painted in flowing hues.

At last, Kotomi understood. The images before her were of that rainy day in her third year of junior high, the day she was struck by a truck on her way home from school. Fortunately, she hadn't died.

She had been rushed to a hospital.

Though her life was saved, her time on the hospital bed was marked by spells of lucidity and darkness.

During the dark spells, it was as if she were reliving that suspended, boundless black sea. But whenever she surfaced into lucidity, her closed eyes would perceive the world around her as if they were open.

She could see her anxious, tear-streaked parents and sister praying for her recovery.

She saw her father, Izumi Kaneyoshi, fighting to stay calm as the head of the family, suppressing his own sorrow while conversing with the doctor outside her room.

Her mother, Izumi Akina, was biting her lip to keep the tears threatening to overflow in check, carefully dabbing a warm towel on Kotomi's pale, fragile face, hoping it would bring her some comfort.

And her younger sister, Aimi Izumi, was seated by her bed, holding her hand and calling softly for her, "Kotomi." Hoping, just hoping, that she would wake up.

She called her name repeatedly, often breaking into sobs she couldn't hold back.

When she could no longer cry, Aimi would start again, her voice hoarse, whispering her sister's name until she wept again.

A painful cycle, repeating again and again.

One night, when Kotomi's consciousness had again surfaced from the darkness, she saw Aimi at her bedside, gently stroking her ring finger, murmuring:

"Sis, if it takes a year for you to wake up, I'll wait that year. If it takes a lifetime, I'll wait that lifetime.

"When our parents reach their end, I'll take care of them for you… and when they've gone in peace, I'll end my life holding a picture of us. I'll come to be with you.

"I love you, in the way lovers do."

…

Kotomi's eyes snapped open. Above her was the ceiling of her bedroom; she'd just had a dream…

A dream that brought back a part of those missing memories.

A dream that helped her finally understand things she hadn't known before.

Picking up her phone, she saw the time: 3 a.m.

There were still a few hours before she had to get up, but Kotomi wasn't feeling sleepy. Leaning back against the headboard, she reflected on everything she'd just experienced.

In that haze of dream and wakefulness, she had seen so much. Sorting through the images, she started piecing it together.

It was during her third year of middle school, on her way home in the rain.

As she stood at a crosswalk waiting for the light to change, she was idly grumbling about the school umbrella's poor quality.

When the light turned green, she stepped onto the crosswalk, still feeling down about being scolded by her teacher, too preoccupied to notice the truck barreling toward her from the right.

Unable to stop on the wet pavement, the truck hit her. Fortunately, she was rushed to the hospital in time, her life barely saved.

But her consciousness entered a strange state, alternating between clarity and emptiness. At one point, she stayed in that dark void for a full seventeen days.

"Seventeen days… Could that be the same as my seventeen years as Ailun in the original world?" Kotomi muttered aloud.

It was a guess. But with nothing concrete to confirm it, she decided to call out the system within her body, Kazumi.

"Kazumi! Are you there? Can you hear me?"

"Yes, yes, I hear you. What is it, waking me up when I was sleeping so soundly?" A soft, pale blue glow appeared, and Kazumi sat down beside Kotomi, rubbing her eyes.

"Kazumi, is there a part of my memory that's missing?" Kotomi asked directly.

"Huh?" Kazumi's sleepiness vanished instantly as she stared at Kotomi, surprised.

Kotomi sighed and explained everything she'd just dreamt, felt, and speculated on.

When she finished, Kazumi was silent for a long time. Then, she reached out, gently pulling Kotomi into her embrace.

"Your suspicions are entirely correct. After the truck hit you during your third year, you lay unconscious in the hospital. During those seventeen days of suspended consciousness, you were living in another parallel world as Ailun for seventeen years."

Kotomi's eyes widened at Kazumi's confirmation, a flood of indescribable emotions washing over her.

Tears welled up and streamed down her cheeks, one drop after another…

A reaction beyond her control, unrelated to her current emotions.

It was as if, upon rediscovering her forgotten memories, her body and mind were instinctively releasing something repressed.

No matter how long Kotomi cried, Kazumi held her close, her hand slipping under her pajama top to gently rub her back.

"Kazumi… Who am I really?" Kotomi looked up at her with tearful eyes, her voice choked with emotion.

"Just take a deep breath, and then I'll explain everything to you slowly, all right?"

Kazumi's expression softened as she cupped Kotomi's face, letting her hair down, her pink strands falling loosely.

The distance between them disappeared as Kazumi pressed her lips to Kotomi's.

This was no passionate, heated kiss—it was a delicate touch, each gentle caress carrying Kazumi's warmth and devotion, a tenderness that Kotomi could only sense but not define.

She closed her eyes, losing herself in the feather-light sensation. The kisses drifted from her forehead, to the corners of her eyes, to her nose, cheeks, and finally, her lips.

In the silence, all she could hear was the soft exchange of their breaths. Each touch was fleeting yet intoxicating, leaving her heart racing.

This single kiss held countless emotions that words could never capture, like the taste of fine tea, a memory to be savored in days to come.

Seeing Kotomi gradually calm down, Kazumi couldn't help but smile as she noticed her cheeks flush.

Yup, she's definitely the dominant type…

"Now that your nerves are settled, I'll begin explaining. You've actually deduced most of it. I'm just here to fill in the details."

Smiling, Kazumi loosened her embrace. She lifted the covers and slid into bed beside Kotomi, resting her head on Kotomi's soft lap. Nestling in closer, she tilted her head with a mischievous smile, then began her story.

With Kazumi's explanation, everything fell into place.

Technically, this wasn't Kotomi's second life—it was her third.

Everything began that rainy day in her first life, when, as a junior high schooler, Kotomi Izumi was struck by a truck. While her life was spared, she became a medical mystery: comatose, yet not truly gone.

Her family and doctors didn't know that Kotomi's consciousness was cycling through states of clarity and darkness. During her lucid spells, even though her eyes were closed, she could see and hear everything around her. During her dark spells, it felt as if her entire being were submerged in a lightless ocean.

After a while, her comatose state entered a second phase: complete unconsciousness.

For seventeen days, her awareness drifted away from her body and entered another dimension, where she was reborn as Ailun in a parallel world.

"Simply put, the world we're in now is Parallel World B, the one you were originally born into. Your seventeen years as Ailun took place in Parallel World A," Kazumi explained.

Due to the differing flow of time between worlds, the seventeen days of sleep in Parallel World B were the equivalent of her seventeen years as Ailun in Parallel World A.

But then, something else happened. The version of her living in the parallel world was also struck by a truck.

This time, the collision jolted Kotomi's consciousness and soul out of World A and back to World B, returning her to her original body and rousing her from the coma.

"So, I was Kotomi Izumi in my first life, then Ailun in my second, and now I'm Kotomi Izumi again in this third life?" Kotomi said, pointing at her face.

She should technically count as a reincarnator, she supposed. Other people were usually reborn into someone else's body—or even as some strange creature—but she'd managed to return to her own body. Only the gender was different.

"Exactly.

"To sum it up, World B is where you lived your first and third lives, while World A was where you spent your second life as Ailun. Don't let this leave you wondering which one is the 'real' you. From the beginning, you were always Izumi Kotomi. Reincarnation just brought you from World A back to World B, and from being a guy to being a girl again."

Kazumi then took a pen and wrote it out clearly on paper for Kotomi to see:

First Life: Izumi Kotomi. (Parallel World B)

Second Life: Ailun. (Parallel World A)

Third Life: Izumi Kotomi. (Parallel World B)

Reading Kazumi's explanation on the paper, Kotomi finally understood.

It was incredible to believe, but having already gone through the miracle of reincarnation, what other miracles could possibly be beyond her grasp?

"Though I'm curious—when I reincarnated from my second life to my third, I remember waking up on a bench in Tokyo. Shouldn't I have woken up in a hospital bed?" Kotomi asked.

"Oh, that. I mentioned your consciousness and soul earlier. After your second life ended and you were sent back here, your consciousness reached your body first, waking you up. Although you had no memory loss, you were without your soul at first, so you weren't complete."

"To put it bluntly, for a few days after you were discharged, you were…a little out of it. But since you'd always had a naturally clueless vibe, you didn't seem any different, really.

"As for why your soul returned to your body later…" Kazumi scratched her cheek with a slightly sheepish look.

"The thing is, while your soul was being bound to the system, the server bugged out again. It was only supposed to delay your soul's arrival by about half an hour, but due to the bug, the delay stretched to several days. By the time your soul and the system were finally bound and you became complete again, you had already been out of the hospital for a while. On that day, you'd gone to a bookstore in Tokyo and, feeling tired, sat on the bench to rest."

With that, everything fit into place.

Kotomi felt her mind catching up to it all.

"I think I finally get it now. Still, Kazumi, can't you upgrade the server? No wonder you keep saying it's fast enough whenever there's lag—compared to a delay of several days, it really is faster!"

Kazumi sighed, looking a bit speechless. She had gone through a whopping eighteen tries to pass the System Licensing exam, and it wasn't cheap. Every attempt required a hefty fee. When she finally earned her license, she didn't have much left and ended up buying a budget server with a potato logo on it.

"An upgrade isn't impossible. It's just…pricy."

"How much? I mean, I'm not exactly loaded, but I did earn my first million this month," Kotomi said confidently, trying to look carefree.

"A decent upgrade costs about that much." Kazumi handed her a price list for various server upgrades.

Kotomi's confident grin froze as she read the numbers. The carefree expression on her face stiffened, completely disappearing.

A few minutes later, she crumpled the paper, tossed it into the trash, cleared her throat, and patted Kazumi on the shoulder. "Kazumi-chan, upgrades are a virtual rabbit hole. Trust me. You should just leave it as it is. A little delay once in a while is perfectly fine; we're better off saving the cash."

"Couldn't you just say it's too expensive? And what's with this 'Kazumi-chan' thing? Isn't calling me Kazumi enough?"

Kazumi raised an eyebrow. Being called 'Kazumi-chan' felt a bit strange.

But just as she was about to complain more, she noticed Kotomi's face had softened into a genuine smile, as if she'd found new clarity, letting out a breath of true relief.

"Feel better now that you know everything?" Kazumi asked gently.

"Yeah, like a huge weight's finally lifted." Kotomi's smile was radiant, pure and relaxed.

"Sleep tight, then, and have a good dream. Tomorrow is bound to be a bright, clear day." Kazumi murmured, running her hand through Kotomi's soft white hair.

"Good night."

Kotomi lay down again, closing her eyes.

Watching Kotomi's serene expression, Kazumi felt an unexpected urge to sneak one last kiss.

But restraint was key!

Just as she was about to leave the room and give herself a chance to cool down, she felt the corner of her skirt being tugged.

She turned, surprised, to see Kotomi giving her a pleading look. "Kazumi… I think I can't sleep. I'm…kinda sleepless!"