In a quiet corner of the universe, on a barren desert planet tucked beside a jagged mountain range, a battered UFO lay half-buried in the sand. Smoke curled up from its ruptured hull, dissipating into the thin, copper-scented air.
I groaned as consciousness returned---a painful, throbbing awakening. My head felt like it had been used as a practice target for Devilukean battle drills. Dust coated my tongue, metallic and bitter. The cockpit's emergency lights pulsed crimson, casting my shadow in wavering shades of blood and darkness.
"Ugh... I survived?" I blinked, then gave a weak laugh that tasted of iron. "Thank god. I really didn't want to die again."
My fingers trembled as they moved across the fractured console, leaving smears in the dust. Outside, twin suns beat down on red sand dunes that stretched to the horizon. The temperature gauge flashed a warning: 52°C and climbing.
Yeah. That crash? Totally on me. Trying to slingshot past a black hole with a half-upgraded, secondhand Explorer-class ship? Classic dumbass move. It had sounded cool in theory---"Alien teen survives singularity!"---but in practice? Pure agony.
I tapped the cracked console, wincing at the sharp pain in my ribs.
"AI, you awake? Status report."
Static crackled before a synthetic voice emerged: ZZZZ... Rebooting... System online. Warning: 80% of systems are nonfunctional. Attempting to connect to headquarters... ZZZZ... No signal. Scanning current location... Unknown galaxy. Unknown planet. Intelligent lifeforms: Not detected.
"...Just my luck," I muttered, slumping back into the pilot's seat. The synthetic leather squeaked beneath me, torn and scorched. "Tossed out of the Milky Way completely. Wonderful."
Still, one upside: the impact must've knocked something loose in my head. Memories I hadn't touched in years were resurfacing---fragments of a past that didn't belong to this body.
I used to be human. An Earthling. A shut-in otaku, of all things.
My fingers found their way to my temples, pressing against the sudden, throbbing pain. The memories were like water breaking through a dam---flashes of a dimly lit room, the glow of screens, stack of manga volumes with dog-eared pages.
Lala?
A name emerged from the depths of memory. Lala Satalin Deviluke. Pink-haired alien princess from an old manga called To Love Ru. She married some clueless Earth kid, and the whole thing spiraled into a ridiculous harem mess. Pretty sure the author was living out a fantasy with that one.
But... now she was real. Or at least, this universe was. The manga had been just a distorted echo of something far bigger.
I stared out at the endless desert, letting the realization settle into my bones. If Lala was around ten years old now, she wouldn't reach Earth for another six years. I'd landed long before the main story even began.
But this wasn't some comic anymore. This was reality. And I doubted most of that manga's nonsense would play out the same way.
Right now? Reality sucked.
My first ship---the Star Raven, bought with every last credit I'd ever scraped together---was totaled. The hull had buckled along the port side, creating a jagged wound in the obsidian exterior. Repairs would take at least five months, if I could find the right parts.
No rescue. No friends. No contact.
I looked out at the empty, endless desert. Just silence, sand, and the shattered remains of my reckless dream. The horizon shimmered with heat mirages, mocking me with illusions of water.
"...Alone again," I whispered, my voice scraping against my dry throat. "Just like last time."
Some things don't change---even after death and reincarnation.
But I wasn't exactly helpless. I might be an orphan from Deviluke, nowhere near royalty like Lala, but I had my own advantages. A knack for tech. An adventurous streak. And one hell of a trump card:
A wish power.
A cheat I was born with.
From as early as I could remember---around my sixth birthday in the Devilukean orphanage---I discovered I had the ability to make wishes come true. Not metaphorically. Literally. With enough mental focus, I could manifest anything: knowledge, items, powers. It wasn't omnipotent, but it was damn close.
I still remember the day it first happened. Curled in the corner of the orphanage's sterile dormitory, clutching my knees to my chest as the older kids taunted me. "Earthling mix," they'd called me, mocking my unusual traits. That night, tears streaming down my face, I'd wished so desperately for something, anything, to make them stop.
The next morning, I found a small, glowing cube beneath my pillow---a Devilukean puzzle toy that normally only the wealthy could afford. When I solved it in front of everyone, their taunts turned to awe. The caretakers interrogated me about where I'd gotten it, but I couldn't explain.
It was only years later that I understood: I had wished it into existence.
The catch? The power consumed my mental energy.
Each day, I could safely make a small wish. If I stored that energy for a few days, I could make a medium one. A large wish took about a month to charge---and it drained me to the edge of unconsciousness. If I wanted to shorten that time, I needed to grow stronger mentally: meditate, train, expand my neural capacity.
Back then, I didn't really get it. I used it for toys. Pranks. Food. I even saved a dying planet once---saw it on the news, made a wish, and poof. Gone from the danger list. That alone burned through six years' worth of stored energy.
I wasted too many wishes on stupid stuff after that. Money, gadgets, even a custom hypersleep pod---why did I buy that instead of spare parts?
Still, that wish power probably saved me when I flew too close to the black hole. Burned through every last charge to survive the collapse. My scientists had calculated that the gravitational forces would have compressed my Explorer-class vessel to the size of a grain of sand. Instead, here I was---bruised, broken, but breathing.
Past me was a dumbass. But I was just a kid---smart with tech, sure, but naive.
Now? I was sixteen. Sharper. More cautious. My reflection in the cracked viewscreen showed crimson hair with a metallic sheen, blue eyes faintly glowing, and a face that had lost its childhood softness.
I sat up straighter in what remained of the pilot's chair and cleared my throat.
"AI, check inventory. Estimate food and water reserves. Begin diagnostics on all core systems. Start repair protocols. List critical damaged parts."
✧ Captain, scanning complete.
🍱 Food & Water Reserves
• Ration packs: 187 units (6 months, solo)
• Water reserves: 200 liters (filtered)
🔧 Damage Report
• Shield Generator: Severely damaged
• Subspace Engine Core: Offline --- core destabilized
• Power Relay: Partial functionality
• Structural Hull Breach (Sectors B3 & B7)
• Navigation Module: Corrupted
🛠 Repair Estimate
• Nanobot repair: ~5 months
• Manual assistance: Time reduced by 30--40%
Required Components
• Quantum Shield Matrix Replacer
• Subspace Drive Coupler (Type-V)
• Core Energy Stabilizer Rods (x2)
• Titanium Alloy Hull Patches (Grade 4+)
• Navigation AI Core Chip (v6.2) • Plasma Circuit Relay Modules (x5)
• Omni-Wrench Calibrator
Inventory Match: 2 of 7 components located.
I sighed, running a hand through my sweat-dampened hair. "So it's really that bad, huh?"
Six months of food. Five months of repairs---if I got lucky. But scavenging parts on an unknown planet? That wasn't exactly promising. The binary star system this planet orbited looked unstable---the smaller sun circling the larger at an increasingly decaying orbit. According to standard astrophysics models, this system might have as little as a century before catastrophic collapse.
I couldn't rely on my wish power to spawn the parts instantly---not yet. The mental cost would knock me out for days, leaving me vulnerable in this alien environment. Right now, I could manage minor things: basic knowledge, quick reflex boosts, maybe learning how to build something from scratch. But materializing high-tech components out of thin air? Still out of my reach.
I didn't even know where the power came from. Maybe the universe handed it to me when I reincarnated. A twisted gift for surviving death.
I stood, ignoring the protest of bruised muscles, and walked to the viewport. The desert stretched in all directions, broken only by jagged mountain ridges to the north. No signs of civilization. No ruins. No hope of salvage.
"I'll find the parts the old-fashioned way. Exploration it is," I muttered, tasting dust with each word.
My fingers gripped the controls, worn smooth from use. Outside the viewport, the twin suns were rising higher, casting long shadows across the red dunes.
Day one of survival in an uncharted galaxy.
Let's see how long I could last.
The AI hadn't lied. This planet was a dead zone. No signals. No cities. No civilization.
Just me. And a wrecked ship.
All because I cheaped out on spare parts for a hypersleep upgrade. Regret doesn't fix fusion cores.
Still, I had one card left: creativity.
"AI," I said, bringing up the interface. "Calculate optimal use of wish power to reduce repair time."
✧ Calculation complete. Two options:
Temporarily enhance nanobot efficiency by 300%. Reduces total repair time to 2 months. Cost: Medium-high mental energy.
Use wish to locate native materials for part substitutions. Cost: Medium energy. Risk: Environmental unknowns.
"The nanobot boost sounds safer. Still slow, but manageable."
I'd decide tomorrow. For now, I needed rest. My body had gone through trauma no Devilukean training prepared me for---surviving forces that should have reduced me to atoms.
I stood, stretching sore muscles, and walked toward the ship's kitchen. The Star Raven was compact---four main sectors: cockpit, utility bay, living quarters, and rear engine/storage. Sleek obsidian-gray walls with flickering cyan trim reflected the damage she'd taken.
The kitchen was a narrow galley, stocked with auto-dispensers and an old synthesizer unit. A maintenance droid whirred as it prepped a meal, its single red eye tracking my movement.
On my way through, I passed a cracked mirror.
There I was.
Sixteen. Devilukean. Crimson-red hair with a metallic sheen that caught the emergency lighting. Blue eyes faintly glowing, a trait from my father's bloodline, according to orphanage records. A lean, wiry frame from light-gravity training. My heart-shaped tail---the universal mark of Devilukean heritage---swayed behind me, its tip twitching with anxiety I wouldn't verbally admit.
Not bad-looking, honestly. Guess my genes weren't total garbage. If I'd had this face back on Earth, maybe I wouldn't have spent so much time alone.
The thought hit unexpectedly, and I turned away from my reflection. That was another life. Another me. Gone.
Dinner was a bowl of synth-noodles with something protein-adjacent. Not great, but it filled the tank. First real meal since that black hole stunt. The noodles tasted faintly of chemicals and artificial umami, but after nearly dying, they might as well have been gourmet.
Outside, the sky darkened to deep violet. Twin moons rose, casting silver shadows across the desert floor. The temperature plummeted as rapidly as it had risen during the day---thermal extremes typical of desert planets with thin atmospheres.
"AI," I said between bites, "activate perimeter defenses. Deploy Scout Drone Type-B. Begin terrain scan. Mark any object over two meters."
✧ Perimeter shield deployed (limited). Scout drone launched. Scanning radius: 1.5 kilometers.
Good enough for tonight.
I dumped the bowl into the cleaner and made my way to the sleeping pod. Past posters curled on the walls---ship schematics, Devilukean fighter prototypes, anime art I'd printed from a local Devilukean file network. Little pieces of who I was, or who I'd been trying to become.
The pod hissed softly as it adjusted to my weight. I lay back and stared at the ceiling. The silence of the desert pressed against the hull, absolute and suffocating.
Sixteen years.
Sixteen years since I woke up in this universe.
Only today had the memories started creeping back in full. Pop culture. Anime. That deep loneliness of being an Earth-bound dreamer wishing for more.
Well... I got what I wished for.
This universe is massive. Brutal. Teeming with god-tier beings who could crack planets in half without blinking. The Deviluke Empire alone controlled over seventy-five percent of the Milky Way, with technology that could reshape entire solar systems. Their king, Gid Lucione Deviluke, was said to have destroyed fourteen planets in a single battle during the unification wars.
And me? I'm just a low-ranked Devilukean orphan. No crew. No resources. A busted ship. A volatile wish power that might backfire if I'm not careful.
But somehow... I wasn't afraid.
I felt curious. Focused. Almost excited.
As the ship's systems hummed a lullaby of survival, I closed my eyes.
This life might actually be more fun than the last.