In the garden of Okinawa, family and press were gathered.
A new record was about to be broken.
Everything had been carefully prepared.
The ground had been cleared with precision.
The concrete blocks were aligned, their edges sharp, their surfaces still intact.
Michihiro Ikemizu knew their density, their resistance, the exact way they would give under impact.
His body was ready as well. His breathing, slow and steady, followed a rhythm he had mastered for decades.
A Nobel Prize laureate, a man of discipline and method,
he knew exactly where he was,
what he was about to do,
and why he was there.
At least… that was what he believed.
Suddenly, that certainty no longer held.
His head was spinning.
Had he lost consciousness?
Sensations returned in fragments: a diffuse light, vague shapes, no familiar reference point.
He was lying on the ground.
That observation was enough.
He inhaled, placed one hand against the floor, and rose without haste, yet without hesitation.
His balance responded immediately. Too well, even.
Position.
Unknown environment.
No apparent pain.
His gaze first settled on the ground.
Beneath his feet, the stone was cold, smooth in places, yet marked with pale tracings—almost too precise to be decorative. Lines and symbols, arranged in rigorous symmetry, formed a circular pattern at whose very center he stood. He did not step without thinking—instinctively, he avoided disturbing anything.
A deliberate boundary.
Not an ordinary design.
Around him, several light sources flickered at human height. They cast long, unstable shadows, giving the walls a deceptive depth. The heat they emitted came in uneven waves, as though the air itself struggled to stabilize.
He raised his head.
The room was vast, enclosed, built to endure. Two openings faced one another, each letting in a different kind of light. One was pale, steady. The other darker, tinged with shifting reflections. The contrast was too sharp to be accidental.
Orientation.
Architectural choice.
Figures stood around the circle. Some upright, others slumped and motionless. He noticed short, irregular breaths. None appeared armed. None spoke.
He was not alone.
A few steps away, another body lay upon the stone. Alive.
He knew it without needing to check—the chest rose faintly. That body was not his. And yet, it occupied exactly the place where he should have been.
Substitution?
Error?
No hypothesis imposed itself yet.
One thing, however, was certain:
this place was neither improvised nor safe.
His hands came into view.
They were young.
Smooth skin. Supple joints, free from the stiffness he knew all too well. He turned them slowly, examining them as one would an instrument believed to have exhausted all its potential. He did not need long to understand that something had changed. Not an immediate threat—rather an imbalance, as if a perfectly mastered equation had been rewritten without warning.
His life had not ended.
The realization imposed itself without emphasis. What he had taken for an end was not one. He breathed more deeply, checked the steadiness of this new breath. Everything responded.
Then, almost without his noticing, a thought surfaced.
If he was still here…
If he was no longer confined to a body marked by time…
Some limits might no longer exist.
The idea remained incomplete, too vast to grasp all at once. Yet images emerged: a house left behind, familiar faces, paths he had deliberately avoided in the name of rigor and efficiency. There was neither bitterness nor reproach in their return. Only a late clarity—calm, almost clinical.
He had chosen discipline.
He had chosen mastery.
He had chosen to refine himself, again and again.
These choices were not mistakes. They had shaped him, strengthened him, given him coherence. Yet, in this suspended moment where everything overlapped, he also perceived what they had left aside. Not through fault. Through priority.
His fingers closed slightly, testing the strength of this new body. The response was immediate, effortless.
It was not a sense of grandeur that followed, nor a sudden exhilaration. Rather an opening. A margin. The possibility of not mechanically repeating a perfectly traced trajectory. Of choosing differently, when the time came. Of passing on something other than a silent example.
He did not know where he was.
He did not yet understand the rules of this world,
nor the reason for his presence.
But a certainty—slow and solid—was taking shape:
whatever this place was, he was not bound within it.
The thought did not have time to go any further.
A voice, gentle yet firm, echoed within his mind.
“You who are groping yourself, yes, you stranger, just listen. Do you feel that sensation of lightness growing in your head? Reject it with all your might and get up immediately, grab a sword, you’ll need it, and escape out the left window.”
Just before acting, for a fraction of a second, his gaze caught, through the opening, an unnaturally reddish sky.
Profile — Michihiro Ikemizu
Michihiro Ikemizu is a man from another world (otherworlder), cast onto The Great Land within the universe of ISEKAI: The Otherworlder’s Heir.
Rigorous, methodical, and deeply rational, he approaches every situation with calm lucidity, favoring analysis over impulsiveness. His conduct is shaped by an inner discipline forged through effort, consistency, and a strong sense of responsibility.
Psychological Profile
- Type: ISTJ
- Strengths: courageous, curious, determined, gentle, honest, patient, respectful
- Flaws: cold, proud, rigid, solitary, stubborn
Michihiro is a man of principles and structure. His strength lies in self-control and moral coherence. His decisions are rarely driven by immediate emotion; they follow a long-term vision, sometimes at the cost of isolation.
Key Relationship
He is the father of Arius Lovelace and the husband of Soria Rainheart/Lovelace.