Author's Note:

Technically, this story here was intended to be my first fanfic. I wrote several chapters of it before I got to write Dead Scars. I should have the next chapter to D.S. up soon. Until it's finished, I decided to upload this and the first actual chapter of this fic. This will feature the first meeting between Souichiro and Yuriko Takagi. Depending on what the response is, I'll post up more chapters.

Disclaimer: Highschool of the Dead is not mine. It belongs to Daisuke and Shouji Sato and Madhouse Studios (who created the anime).

Prelude to the Dead – Dead Prologue

The wind was blowing atop the cliff overlooking the ocean as I stood there. Over my shoulder I held my giant cleaver knife and adjusted my shades with my wrist. And also, my spiky white hair blew to the side as the wind continued on its way…

Oh, my apologies! I haven't introduced myself yet have I? I go by the name Gojo Sakakibara. I'm not Japanese by blood, but I had my name changed to that at the age of 16 for certain reasons. What I can tell you for now is that it had something to do with personal family issues. By the way, I have red eyes.

Anyways, I continued to watch over the sea as the wind blew onwards. It had been at least 6 years since the Shiningen (or Them as my friend, Takashi Komuro, and his group calls them) made their existence known to the world and began the Z Era. At least half of the humans in this world were dead, leaving only 3 billion out of 6 billion humans left among the living. On the brighter side, those remaining 3 billion had adapted to the zombie-infested world and had also learned more about them. For example, we learned that Komuro's father, Kabuto Komuro, had been the chief researcher on the project known as "Breath Halter" that started this chaotic era of the undead. However, the true leader who led the undead was a horrifying man by the name of Kikuga Majumi. He killed Kabuto for a power that would give him the power to control all of the Shiningen in the world. Now the battle had taken a drastic turn and had begun the dreaded and most expected start of WWIII. Despite what his father was involved in, the incident that not only left Kabuto dead, but his wife as well, left Takashi devastated.

"WHY? What was it that he didn't see in me? Why did that monster use dad and then killed my mom. HE KILLED HER!" Takashi screamed tearfully as his childhood friend Miyamoto embraced him. I was about to-

It was then that I realized that I was becoming overstressed by all that had happened in the last 7 years since I arrived in Japan. I needed a while to relax and clear my mind.

"Hey, Ryoyuki!" I called out to my friend. "Hold on to this for a while!" I than tossed my cleaver to him and he caught it.

"Oi, Gojo!" Ryoyuki shouted out to me. "What's going on? Want a smoke?" I gave him the look and he knew to leave me alone as he smirked contently and walked away. We've known each other long enough to read each other's thoughts without any communication. That's how close we were.

His name was Ryoyuki Imamura. I owe him my life when he saved me from the icy harbor that I shacked up in when I first arrived in the Land of the Rising Sun. More on that later, though. I crossed my legs and closed my eyes. Yes. This was how peace of mind was obtained.

It was then that I began to remember those days.

Days of peaceful moments during which I lived among the great friends I made at Fujimi Academy. Most of these people are no longer alive or have become members of the Shiningen hoard.

Now I will record of what occurred before what is now known as the Outbreak. Tales now gathered into a single file: Prelude to the Dead. A good number of these are from my personal experiences. At the same time, a lot of these are actually just stories I heard from other survivors of the Outbreak. But, enough of this prologue; these stories begin now.

This story can be considered a prequel of Dead Scars. Hell, Gojo may star in a few chapters and those respective tales will be told from his perspective (a first person view). All others will be told from a third person perspective, got it? Read away!