Phantom Protocol: Chronicle of an Isekai Warlord

Koko's warning was the final blow. L's hundred-million-dollar bounty for my identity had transformed the war. It was no longer a conflict over territory or resources; it had become a global hunt for a single man. My face, hidden beneath a mask, was now the most valuable target on the planet.

The System confirmed it. My WORLD AWARENESS tab was a sea of red alerts. Hacking attempts against our networks (which, ironically, didn't exist beyond the System's encryption). Spy drones of various nationalities being shot down by our automated defenses near Base Echo. Petty informants worldwide being interrogated by CIA, GRU, and Mossad agents. The world was looking for a ghost, and they were willing to burn down the world to find him.

The tension culminated in a meeting in my FOB Janus office. It was just the three pillars of Shadow Company: myself, Graves, and Ghost.

"You've become a liability, Kage," Graves said, cutting straight to the chase with his brutal corporate honesty. "And I say that with the utmost respect. You are this company's most valuable asset and its biggest vulnerability. You are the single point of failure. If L or anyone else identifies you, they don't just get you. They get the keys to the kingdom. They uncover the truth about the System, about the summons... everything. The house of cards comes crashing down."

"He's right," Ghost's grim voice added from his corner. "You're a static target. A very high-value target that remains in a known location. A good hunter—and this 'L' seems to be the best—will eventually find a way in. The best defense isn't a higher wall. It's not being there when they shoot."

Graves leaned forward. "You have to disappear. Go into the dark. Become the ghost you pretend to be. Let us run the company. I'll handle contracts and global strategy from Echo. Simon," he said, nodding at Ghost, "will handle internal security and field operations from here. The world will be looking for a PMC commander in a war zone. They won't be looking for a nobody in some forgotten corner of the world."

The idea disgusted me. It felt like running away. The Kenji who had escaped his family in Tokyo rebelled against the idea of hiding again. But the strategist, the Kage who had learned to make cold, hard decisions, saw the impeccable logic in their words. It wasn't a retreat. It was a tactical maneuver. A strategic redeployment of my most vulnerable asset: myself.

"Where would I go?" I asked, acceptance already weighing in my voice.

"Home," Ghost said simply. "To the last place anyone would look for the world's newest warlord. Go back to Japan. Be the person you were before all this. The best cover is one rooted in truth."

Japan. The place of my humiliation, the nest I had fled. The irony was so thick I could almost drown in it. But they were right. It was the perfect hiding place.

"Alright," I said finally. "Graves, you have command of operations. Ghost, you have command of our operators. You are the board of directors until I return."

I spent the next 24 hours delegating power. Graves relished his newfound level of control, already plotting expansion plans into South America. Ghost accepted his responsibility with a silent nod, his presence a guarantee that the company wouldn't devolve into anarchy under Graves's ambition.

Before I left, Ghost handed me a credit card-sized satellite phone. "Only one number programmed," he said. "Mine. Don't use it unless the world's ending."

My journey was an exercise in reverse stealth. I wasn't infiltrating a country; I was infiltrating normalcy. An unmarked private jet took me from Africa to a private airfield in Thailand. From there, a series of commercial flights, using a fake identity created by the System, carried me across Europe before finally landing at Narita Airport, Tokyo. With each step, I shed the layers of Kage. I packed away my tactical gear, my mask, into a System dimensional bag. I dressed in jeans and a hoodie. I stopped scanning crowds for threats and started trying to blend in.

My cover, courtesy of the company's almost limitless funds and the System's administrative magic, was perfect in its mundanity. I was Kenji Tanaka, the failed middle son of a wealthy family, who, after "taking a gap year to find himself," had decided to finish his studies. The System had enrolled me in a moderately prestigious academy on the outskirts of Tokyo: Bonyari Academy. I was just another high school student.

The contrast was a shock to my system. One day I was reviewing casualty reports on the African savanna, and the next I was listening to the tinkling of school bells and the scent of cherry blossoms. The air didn't smell of cordite and diesel, but of clean asphalt after rain and the sweet perfume of crepe stalls.

My senses, honed for warfare, were going haywire. I analyzed groups of students as if they were enemy cells. The hierarchy of the popular kids, the jocks, the geeks... it was a power structure as complex as any warlord tribe. Classrooms weren't briefing rooms, but potential ambush zones with no clear escape routes. I was a wolf dressed not only in sheep's clothing, but also forced to attend sheepherding classes.

I felt completely, utterly out of place. The Alex part of me was fascinated by the genre shift, from a military thriller to a high school romantic comedy. The Kenji part was terrified, swamped by memories of social pressure and academic failure. And Kage, the commander, was simply... bored and paranoid.

On my first day, as I walked through the school courtyard, trying to look like a normal teenager and not a veteran of multiple black ops wars, the "incident" occurred.

My senses screamed DANGER! a split second before it happened. It wasn't the whistle of a bullet or the thud of a mortar. It was a different sound: the rustle of fabric against brick and a quick gasp. My eyes snapped to the source: the top of a tall school wall. A figure was in mid-air, flying towards me on an insane ballistic trajectory.

My combat training took over. There was no thought, only reaction. While a normal student would have frozen or been bowled over, my body moved with brutal efficiency.

Threat analysis, the System flashed in my mind. Unidentified projectile. Mass: approximately 55 kilograms. Velocity: high. Collision vector: imminent.

I pivoted on the ball of my foot, shifting my center of gravity, bracing for impact not as a victim, but as a CQC professional absorbing an enemy's charge.

The figure, a blonde girl with a red bow in her hair, landed directly on me.

Instead of the comical, painful crash she probably expected, I met her with an absorbing stance. My arms instinctively wrapped around her to control the fall, turning our combined momentum into a controlled roll that took us to the ground. We tumbled across the grass, and I ended up on top of her, pinning her, one hand ready to sweep for a weapon, the other to neutralize. A perfect takedown maneuver.

We stopped. The silence was broken by her scream.

"BAKA! GET OFF ME, YOU GIANT PERVERT!" she shrieked in perfect Japanese with a thick American accent, pushing against me with all her might.

I scrambled off her instantly, getting to my feet and stepping back, returning to a neutral stance. I analyzed her. Threat assessment: Minimal. Hostile intent: High (verbal only). Weaponry detected: None. This "attacker" was a chaos of furious energy.

"You! Why were you in my way?" she demanded, scrambling to her feet and dusting off her uniform. "I'm late because of you!"

"You jumped a ten-foot wall," I replied calmly, my voice flat and emotionless. "Landing trajectory was your responsibility."

"My... my responsibility?!" she stammered, her face reddening with anger. "You should have moved, instead of standing there like a gloomy telephone pole!"

The encounter made no tactical sense. It was illogical, inefficient, and loud. As she continued to yell at me, I felt a hollow sensation at my neck. The small titanium locket Javier had given me as a good luck charm before the Congo mission was gone. The chain was broken. It must have snapped in the fall.

"Hey! Are you even listening to me, seaweed head?!" she yelled.

I ignored her and began scanning the ground, looking for the locket. It was the only personal item I had, a link to the life I had just left behind.

"Argh! You're impossible!" she exclaimed. She checked her watch, let out a gasp, and sprinted off towards the school building, leaving me alone in the courtyard.

I stood there, in the middle of the peaceful Japanese academy. I had come here seeking refuge, a place to disappear from the radar of spy agencies and world-famous detectives. I had survived Koko Hekmatyar, the Volkov Group, and an assassin named the Seraph.

And on my first day of "peace," I had been attacked by a flying schoolgirl, lost my only sentimental item, and gotten into a meaningless argument.

I looked towards the school building where the blonde girl had vanished. Then I looked at the peaceful blue sky. Graves was commanding armies. Ghost was hunting in the shadows. And I... I was in a high school romantic comedy.

And, for some reason, this new battlefield, with its incomprehensible rules and illogical threats, felt infinitely more confusing and terrifying than any war zone I had ever been in. My mission had changed. Main objective: survive adolescence. Secondary objective: find my locket.

And I suspected the blonde girl with the red bow was now the prime suspect in my investigation.