It was funny, Hinata thought on introspection, later. That he, who'd always had such damnably good luck, would be reincarnated, like so many otaku dreamed of, but in all the wrong ways.

For One... the way he died.

Hinata was walking home with his girlfriend, a pretty girl with long brown hair tied back in a ponytail and brown eyes that glowed with life. Her name was Aika, and she was one of the most popular girls in the final year of high school- why she would want to waste her time on an otaku like Hinata, he couldn't imagine, but he was happy with her. Really, though, Hinata wasn't a bad guy- he might have liked anime and manga more than some, but he still showered, shaved, worked out and kept his home clean. He didn't let his hobbies consume him, or make him socially awkward... so, while he did see himself as very lucky to be with Aika, in the end he supposed it wasn't surprising, per se.

"Hikaro," Aika said teasingly, combining his name with Karo, a Japanese nickname for one's boyfriend. "Can we stop by one of the cafes downtown before you take me home, please? I gave my lunch to Anita-chan, she'd forgotten hers, and now I'm really hungry." She wasn't insisting, but her voice implied that she would definitely appreciate a snack break.

"I don't mind," Hinata answered politely, draping his arm around Aika's waist and making his way with her around a corner, down the street. As if the kami around him wished to have a good laugh at his demise, though, the dark-haired boy tripped on a crack in the sidewalk and flew forward... over the edge of a subway staircase. Around him, screams echoed as a body bounced down the stairs, leaving blood on each concrete stair with a wet smacking noise. By the time Hinata bounced and rolled to a stop at the bottom, in the subway station amid a number of shrieks and screams, he was dead as a cherry blossom in September.

The second... incorrect matter, if you will, was where Hinata opened his eyes. One second he was rolling down the stairs, and the next he was landing, sprawled face-first in the mud. A cold rain was falling, soaking his hair and clothes, and all around him through the haze of rain, trees could be seen, massive and ancient, rising into the air.

"Didn't I just fall into a... ugh, mud..." Hinata slowly pushed himself to his knees, becoming more and more confused as the mud squelched against his skin. "If I were going to get reincarnated or something stupid... wouldn't I be in some castle chamber, or something...? I must have been knocked unconscious... just dreaming... maybe a coma."

Then, there was the third "incorrect matter", if we care to keep with a theme, and this one alarmed Hinata far more than either of the others. There was a small swell to his chest, and where he'd had short black hair just seconds ago, now long, wet, white locks fell to his shoulders. He wasn't wearing his school uniform, either, but a ragged pair of cloth pants and a long black shirt made of some sort of coarse fabric with a low cut neck that showed...

"Oh, what the fuck...?" Hinata cursed, clamping his thighs together- but as he'd feared, there was nothing there to crush. "What the hell is this, some kind of twisted joke?!"