The next morning, the sky was heavy with storm clouds. Thunder rumbled faintly in the distance. Rain slanted in thin threads under shifting winds, drifting like mist across the air.
The world smelled clean and sharp, washed by the storm. Raindrops streamed down his window, dripping into the puddle on the sill, rippling outward in tiny circles.
Harano Tsukasa splashed cold water onto his face. The icy sting cleared his mind, the chill sinking into his pores. He dried off with a towel, rubbing away the stray droplets clinging to his cropped hair.
In the mirror, a young man stared back.
A sharp nose. Lean features. Hair cropped short a couple days ago, leaving him looking fresh, neat.
Not Tokyo-handsome.
Not ugly either—just… normal.
And honestly, there weren't nearly as many "Tokyo pretty boys" as people imagined. Most men in this city were just salarymen—polite on the surface, hollowed out inside. The so-called ikemen? More often than not, soft, delicate types who didn't even look like men.
Tsukasa's only real flaw was his thin build, a body that hadn't seen real exercise since college, leaving him weak-looking. Otherwise, he was perfectly ordinary. Someone who should've gone through the motions of life—marriage, children, steady job—like any other salaryman.
Instead, the man whose body he now inhabited had chosen suicide.
There had been reasons for that.
Harano Tsukasa—age twenty-four. Born in Hokuto, Yamanashi Prefecture. Graduate of Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology, with a major in Agricultural Bio-Production.
His father had died of cancer five years ago.His mother ran a small convenience store back in their hometown.
Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology wasn't Todai or Keio, but among Japan's national universities, it was ranked decently—top twenty, respectable. His field of study should have landed him a promising job in agriculture.
But it hadn't.
Not because jobs weren't available. Not because anyone sabotaged him.But because he refused them.
Instead, he tried to start his own business. Farming.
With money he'd saved from part-time jobs and a loan from his mother, he rented ten acres of land in Saitama and began cultivating hybrid melons. His dream: to grow fruits in Tokyo that were normally exclusive to Hokkaido.
He wasn't reckless about it either—he had research, models based on his professors' and seniors' academic papers. On paper, it looked possible.
But paper isn't reality.
The money vanished. The venture collapsed.
That failure shattered him. He drifted aimlessly for months in his rented apartment, drowning in guilt while his mother traveled from Yamanashi every week to comfort him. Even then, the damage lingered like a wound that never healed.
He couldn't face going home and working in his mother's shop—not after wasting her life's savings. So he stayed in Tokyo, refusing to touch agriculture again.
Starting that farm had exposed him to the brutal side of reality:Lack of funds.Failed investments.Impossible loans.Endless red tape from farmers' associations.
All the obstacles, none of the "government support" the textbooks promised.
To survive, he worked odd jobs—subway pusher, convenience store stock boy, truck loader.
Eventually, two years ago, under his mother's urging and friends' persuasion, he took the Tokyo civil service exam. He passed, becoming a local government clerk in Bunkyō Ward. A steady, stable job.
But in Japan, local bureaucrats weren't respected.Low pay, low status, low ceiling.A life you could see through from start to finish.
And so he'd despaired.Two years of gray, joyless routine later, he lit charcoal in his apartment and killed himself. No note. No explanations.
Tsukasa—now inhabiting this body—had no judgment to pass. Yes, the man had been weak. Yes, he'd abandoned responsibility. But Tsukasa hadn't lived his despair. He was just borrowing his shell.
And unlike the original, Tsukasa had an advantage: the wish-list system.
[Auto Pay Raise: 0.2 yen/second (Active)]
[Accumulated Salary: 6,107.8 yen]
[Withdrawal: Linked to bank account]
[Critical Rebate Card: One-time use. Random rebate on purchases under 1,000,000 yen.]
[Credit Limit Card: One-time use. Instantly adds 1,000,000 yen to account balance.]
He could literally make money by doing nothing.
In fact, his passive "salary" was already double what he earned working as a civil servant. Just with the auto-pay function, he could survive in Tokyo—a city where survival was expensive.
And this was just the beginning.
The wish-list system was full of hidden potential. Every fulfilled desire brought new rewards. A fast lane to the good life. Sure, it required effort and time—but wasn't that the whole point of living? Experiencing the highs and lows?
Especially when money made those highs and lows so much easier.
Yes, the system only worked with women's wishes. And yes, that meant getting tangled up with "bad women," maybe even earning a reputation as a scumbag. Trouble was inevitable.
But wishes weren't inherently good or bad. They were just desires—dreams out of reach, yet not impossible. His job was to fulfill them. And with his flexible sense of morality, Tsukasa wasn't worried.
If anything, he was excited.
Take "green tea girls" for example. Everyone complained about them, but didn't every guy secretly want a couple of those manipulative beauties revolving around him? The difference was control—who held the strings.
It was no different from money itself. You could be its master, or its slave. As long as he stayed grounded, he wouldn't lose himself.
And as for getting too entangled with these women—falling into scandal, moral condemnation—Tsukasa had already made his peace with it.
"If I've already become ruins, then the house can't collapse any further."
He whispered it to his reflection, then straightened, resolve hardening in his chest.
He dressed sharply: dark suit, blue-striped tie, polished shoes. Muscle memory took over—Japan's civil servants were still service workers, after all. Appearance mattered.
Laptop bag slung over his shoulder, trash bag in hand, he left. Outside, rain fell steadily. He popped open a cheap transparent umbrella from the convenience store, tossed his trash, and headed to Ikebukuro Station.
From there, a train to Kasuga Town in Bunkyō Ward.
Tokyo in June was heating up. The long, damp rainy season had passed, but the weather was still fickle—warm ocean currents kept the humidity unpredictable. Tsukasa blended into the crowd of salarymen, umbrella in hand, trudging through puddles toward work.
But as he reached Bunkyō Ward Office, a commotion stopped him.
A campaign van had parked in the plaza across the street. A tarp-covered stage stood beside it, a giant screen flashing bright despite the drizzle. Dozens of people had gathered.
Onscreen was a curvy young woman, speaking passionately into a microphone. The placard before her read: "Tokyo Governor Candidate."
The Governor of Tokyo—the equivalent of the city's mayor. Elections were underway, which explained the posters plastered even near his apartment.
"Uchino-chan, I love you!"
"Uchino! Uchino!"
"She's the one! Make her governor!"
"You've got this!"
Men in the crowd shouted themselves hoarse, fists pumping in the air, eyes burning with zeal.
Onstage, Uchino smiled sweetly, then—
She peeled off her rain-soaked white blouse, revealing a staggering cleavage that bounced beneath the lights.
The crowd went wild.
"Cute and sexy, right?" she purred into the microphone, her lips brushing close, her voice a low, sultry purr. Paired with that coy, blushing smile, it was enough to drive the men delirious.
It was hard to believe this was an election rally.Then again, this was Japan. Stranger things had happened.
Tsukasa chuckled inwardly. If he had a vote, he'd cast it for Fujiwara Chika.
Still, despite himself, he lingered outside the ward office, across the street, giving Uchino's… "Northern Hemisphere" a respectful half-minute of silent attention.