Prologue of the Hikikomori

I, Takemi Kazuichi, twenty years old, am a hikikomori.

Now, before you go lecturing me about my life decisions, let me tell you that I didn't choose this life. This life chose me. My classmates back when I was a young kid were violent. I would always get beat up and thrown in a ditch somewhere, and many a time I'd avoided death since they brought knives to school.

What sane person brings knives to school?!

I am an orphan, so you'd probably already know that no one cares if you're an orphan. The only time one cares is when there's an election coming up and candidates would visit to bring food. That's it. Now I don't know how it is when it comes to other orphanages but our caregivers... well, they couldn't care less. Even if you're literally crawling on the floor since your classmates dislocated your legs, they'd just prompt you on the chair and call a doctor or something. They won't ask how or why you got the injury. In fact, they'd rather not talk to you at all, not when they could help it.

For quite some time, I enjoyed being beaten up. I was the smallest in our class, probably because we only eat oatmeal three times a day. One thing I learned from being small is that it's not cute at all. I saw in reality shows that small people were called cute, but in our class, a small person is nothing but cute. I was their plaything, even the girls gang up with the guys to bully me.

So yeah, that happened, and I decided to um... drop everything. It's not like the caregivers require us to go to school... and the food there in the orphanage is free despite being oatmeal three times a day.

And that's when my transformation began.

I stopped going out of the orphanage, and I stopped going to school. In fact, I'd rather stay in my room and read books than go outside and socialize. Don't get me wrong, the other orphans were sweet, they talked to me and befriended me, but I was too preoccupied with the bullying I've experienced that I laid everything down on them. It came to a point where no one wanted to talk to me, and I wanted to talk to no one.

When I was sixteen, I was adopted by my rich parents. They loved me dearly... until they died. They said it was a plane crash that killed them. In any case, my life turned upside down before it even started looking up. Just when I almost overcame my fear of going out, I was thrown back into my shell. Reality punched me straight in the guts, and my parents' relatives didn't help. They complained that I shouldn't have gotten all their wealth, that I was a good-for-nothing kid who didn't deserve anything. They wanted to rewrite the will, or at the very least, they wanted me to distribute my wealth to them, the leeches they are.

Truth be told, I couldn't care less about my parents' relatives. They were only there for me when I got the wealth. Come to think of it... they never treated me like a relative, whereas I treated them for the aunts and uncles they are.

Long story short, I didn't give them anything. They didn't even get to lick a single cent from me. I kept everything for myself, and not once did I regret my decision. But then, I started distrusting people for the second time in my life. My phase of being a shut-in had relapsed... and now I'm staying in this lonely mansion all by myself. My relatives would visit from time to time, but I never showed them in my house. Some of them even tried breaking in, but one call to the police with video evidence made them back down. I didn't want to see them, and even if they wanted to see me, they won't because I chose not to.

The only thing I watched was movies, and the only games I play were single-players. One might find it hilarious but I didn't even have a single social media account. I was living the life... I was living the life of a lone wolf.

And money? I don't need to worry about money. I have money to last me three lifetimes, and I'm not sharing it with everyone. And even if my money were to run out, I have a vault full of diamonds and a vault full of gold in the basement. I'm not even kidding, I have so much money I'm literally drowning in them.

Of course, I knew that if I were careless, I'd lose my money in an instant. That's why I invest them here and there, and I worked my way into stock trading. It was complicated, to say the least, but I understood it and now I'm earning money faster than I could spend it— couple that with my parents' wealth and I'm basically untouchable.

For the past two years, I lived my life as a comfortable and rich shut-in, oblivious to what was happening to the world. The nuclear war might even happen right in front of my doorstep and I wouldn't be aware of it after it was already over... that's how peaceful my life was.

Now, I'm well aware that my peaceful life won't last long. Even though I'm a shut-in, I knew that one day I'd be forced to get out of this house for good. At the very least, I want to go out on my own terms. I don't want to be forced by anyone. I'm having enough fun with my peace as it is, and I won't allow anyone to disrupt that peace, much less destroy it.

Little did I know, life had something in store for me. And it all happened because of that one moment.

That one moment when she showed up on my doorstep, all bloodied up with her hand severed.