Okabe Hajime had been a trucker since he was nineteen.
Two decades of early mornings, ramen dinners, and highway solitude. He gave his loyalty to the same logistics company — one of those shadowy ones that delivered high-value "classified" cargo, the kind that never showed up in shipping manifests. Hajime never asked questions. He was just a driver.
But on one rainy Tuesday night, everything changed.
He swerved to avoid a person who stepped into the road — a young man, dazed and standing still like he wanted to be hit. Hajime reacted on instinct, jerking the wheel. The truck skidded, then—
Boom.
Another truck slammed into him. A black one. It came out of nowhere and rammed straight through both Hajime and the man he tried to avoid.
When he came to, Hajime was in the hospital. Bruised ribs, fractured leg, and debt stacking up like cargo boxes. The company didn't press charges… but they did fire him.
The "mercy" he received? Silence. They scrubbed his records, blacklisted him from every major shipping firm, and made sure no one would hire a liability like him again.
Turns out, the cargo he was transporting had something to do with "dimensional energy" — whatever that meant. Some experiment or weapon or tech tied to isekai phenomena. It was all hush-hush, of course. All Hajime knew was that his twenty years of service boiled down to a forced NDA and a ruined life.
Now 40, with no job, no savings, and no future, Hajime felt like a ghost in his own skin.
So one day, worn down and empty, he walked into traffic.
And got hit again — by another black truck.
But this time, he didn't die. He didn't even get isekai'ed. He just… blacked out.
When he woke up in the hospital again, a stranger was waiting by his bed. A tall man in a sharp black coat, sipping canned coffee like it was fine wine.
"You're hard to kill," the man said, smiling.
"Who the hell are you?" Hajime rasped.
"Recruiter," the man replied, flipping open a badge. "ITA. Isekai Truck Agency."
Hajime stared, waiting for a punchline.
"We deliver selected individuals to other worlds," the man continued. "Heroes, villains, chosen ones. We work on behalf of gods, demons, and everything in between."
"And you hit them with trucks?" Hajime asked, flatly.
"Technically, yes."
"Am I dead?"
"Nope. But you should've been."
The man leaned in, eyes gleaming.
"You've been exposed to Dimensional Energy — DE. The crash, your depression, your desperation — all of it brewed the perfect storm. Enough to qualify you as either someone to be isekai'ed… or someone to do the isekai-ing."
"But why me?"
"Because the driver who hit you died on impact. He was on a job. You were never supposed to be in that intersection. And yet…" the recruiter trailed off. "Here you are."
He stood up and tossed a black key onto Hajime's lap. It shimmered faintly, vibrating with strange energy.
"You can't go back to your old life. You don't have a life left. But you can have a new one. With us. As a driver."
Hajime looked at the key. Then at the man.
"What if I say no?"
"Then you keep rotting in this world. Forgotten. Broke. And when your DE hits terminal levels, you'll be isekai'ed at random — no guide, no direction, no guarantees."
The man smiled again. "Or you can take the wheel. Deliver fate. And maybe, just maybe… find purpose again."