God told Adam that if Adam screwed up that Adam would die yet Adam sinned and lived for another 800 or so years. Adam's first death must have been a legal fiction that was not actualized until he physically died.
In the same way, the righteousness of True Believer/KJO Born Again Baptists is a legal fiction that is not actualized in this life.
When Jesus told Nico that he "must be born again" it must refer to something that happens after one dies the first time. Thus baptism is a symbol of something that happens after one physically dies.