Shonen manga are fun reads, but when you get stuck in one as your afterlife? Less so. After all, just think of all the ways you could die...again. I demand to see the afterlife's manager, because I want a refund.
Memento Mori
is a Bleach fanfic by Darth-Vulturnus.
When a somewhat normal guy gets chucked into the universe of Bleach against his will, personal survival is key. Anything else is convenient, but not an urgent necessity.
This fanfic contains examples of:
- Action Survivor: Minato Tatsushiro for the first few chapters, minus his Damsel in Distress moment and once being on the wrong end of a Curb-Stomp Battle. Once he hits the later years in the academy, he moves on from this.
- Anti-Villain: Minato, of the Necessarily Evil type. Though as the in-universe time marches on, he keeps slowly moving towards Tautological Templar territory.
- Believing Their Own Lies: Self enforced by Minato, as he knows once he starts getting to know the canon characters as people, he won't be able to stick to his plan.
- BFS: Neji Shiba's sword in both states.
- The Chess Master: Combined with Xanatos Gambit. Given his abilities and characterization though, it's more like playing against an AI on extreme difficulty.
- Greater-Scope Villain: Minato Tatsushiro and Yhwach.
- Hitler's Time Travel Exemption Act: Invoked word for word.
- Honor Before Reason: Neji Shiba.
- It's All About Me: Minato certainly has shades of this in some of his actions.
- Just Following Orders: Said by Minato just a bit too often.
- The Lancer: Neji Shiba to Minato Tatsushiro.
- Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards: Neji Shiba and Minato Tatsushiro, respectively.
- The Man Behind the Man: Minato intends to be this and the Evil Mentor to Aizen.
- Meaningful Rename: Averted, and only noteworthy because how uncommon that is for a self-insert story.
- Murder by Inaction: Minato watches Masaki Kurosaki die, and by casually killing the murderer right after, clearly shows he could have saved her if he wanted to.
- No Place for Me There: Noted by Minato. The happy ending, or at least bittersweet, because very few modern stories end on a truly bad note, isn't something he'll deserve to take advantage of.
- Playing Both Sides: Both helping Aizen and working against him.
- Rail Roading: Minato's strategy to force a Stable Time Loop on his presence to avoid the Butterfly of Doom.
- Self-Insert Fic: That's what it is, but doesn't always feel like it. Often the only way you'd know that it is as compared to just a normal original character is because it says so.
- Time Master: Downplayed. The zanpakuto of Minato Tatsushiro can change time for him, such a reverting him to a previous location, reverse injury and see the possible future paths, but it can't affect others directly.
- The Time Traveller's Dilemma: Minato's answer is to try to enforce In Spite of a Nail on the timeline.
- Utopia Justifies the Means: Not utopia, per say, but Minato knows keeping the canon plot is the best way to ensure the true villains lose.
- Villain Protagonist: Minato, technically.
- Wham Line: So far always with a Precision F-Strike.
- The sudden and so far totally unexplained presence of the resident Tome of Eldritch Lore from Cthulhu Mythos.
- The Half Identical Twin of Ichigo that pops up.
- What the Hell, Hero?: Minato gets this from Neji over his job as a professional assassin.
- Wrong Genre Savvy: Minato, possibly, in conjuction with Didn't See That Coming at the end of chapter 6.
- You Have No Idea Who You're Dealing With: Invoked almost word for word.
