Morning arrived and John awoke from his sleep, still feeling let down about the other day. After eating breakfast, he then walked down the city sidewalk, eventually passing the cafe where Yuki works. As he passed the cafe, John saw Yuki through the window; he then saw her laughing at a co-worker’s joke as she filled a cup with coffee, “She’s so cute.” he said to himself, looking at Yuki’s lovely smile. He then walked away from the cafe to the next block, approaching a street crossing shortly after walking to the end of the block.
It then began to rain, “Just my luck.” John groaned. The walkway light turned green and John began to walk forwards, he kept his head facing the ground as he walked. “I should probably pick up some food for dinner tonight and some for tomorrow, I’m kinda running out.” he said to himself as he continued to walk across the road. As he walked, his phone started ringing. John pulled out his phone and saw that his mother was calling, “Hello, Mom.” he said. His mom told him that she and John’s father were coming back to Japan from America. John told her that he couldn’t wait to see them since it’s been nearly two years since he’s seen them. “Oh yeah, I just remembered the letter the college sent. I should read it when I get back home.” John said.
Just before reaching the other side of the walkway, he noticed lights shining on the road, it was probably just a car waiting for John to cross the street. But something was off about the lights; the lights started to get brighter and wider. John then looked up and faced the direction of the lights, but before he could see what it was, a truck rammed into him at incredible speed, sending his body flying forward and landing on the ground, his head slamming against the asphalt of the street, causing the John’s forehead to slightly crack open, letting blood seeping out and stinging his eyes as it ran down his brows.
As John lay on the ground, scraped, bruised, and bloodied from the incident, he looked up into the sky as he felt the life quickly draining from his body, “I can’t feel my legs.” he said weakly, unable to move any part of his body, his chest feeling like a gun had just shot it; he started to bleed out in the street from an open gash on his back and left arm, “This is how I die?” he said to himself. “I was expecting something a little less painful, but whatever.”
His eyes then slowly started to close as his breathing and his heartbeat became slower. “Goodbye. Yuki, Mom, and Dad, I wish you all a long, happy life.” he said with his final breath; his vision became blurry until darkness was all that was left.
“BEEP, BEEP, BEEP, BEEP!” an alarm clock rang loudly. “Where am I?” John said in a disorientated voice, waking up in his bedroom. He silenced the clock and got up from the bed, wearing the same clothes he did when the truck hit him. “I guess I was dreaming.” he said as he rubbed his eyes. John then opened the bed room door, revealing not the interior of his house, but instead a void of white as far as the eye could see. There were no buildings, no ground, and no sky, only white.
John was speechless and confused, he looked around and then behind him, noticing that the door he had come from had disappeared, “What is this place?” he whispered.
“You my friend, are in the void.” said a male voice from a distance.
John jumped and quickly looked around to see where the voice came from but saw nothing, “Who was that?” he called out.
“Hey, newbie, I’m over here.” the voice replied, seemingly closer than before.
John then looked to the right side of where he was standing and saw a large, white, four story pyramid with a white, square-shaped throne on the top, and sitting horizontally on the throne was a man wearing a black, skin tight outfit with black colored boots, two bandoleers worn vertically on his left side and his right side of his torso, belt and military gloves, he had two hand gun holsters on each leg and knife sheathes on his left ankle, his bandoleer and his belt. He had a black colored katana sheathed on his back, facing his right side, and he also had many kukris sheathed on his arms, legs and on his bandoleers. The final detail of his outfit was a dark gray colored mask that had no holes for his eyes, mouth, nose, covering his entire head and face.
“I see Truck-kun got ya,” the man said, getting off of the throne and walking down the pyramid. “I swear, you leave em’ alone for two minutes and he’s already killed someone.”
The man then walked up to John and extended his hand to him, “Hi, I’m DeathKill, capitol D, capitol K. Don’t you dare call me DK, I don’t want to get sued by a bunch of angry Japanese people who uses an Italian plumper as their mascot.” DeathKill started circling around John. “Now, I know you were probably expecting a hot chick with blue hair or God, and I don’t mean to brag, but trust me when I say I’m a much better choice.”
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
“I’m sorry, but where am I, Heaven?” John said, stepping back from DeathKill.
“To be honest, I really don’t know, but this is far from Heaven. It is called many things, but you can just call it ‘The Void’.” DeathKill answered.
“The void?” John said confused. “So you’re saying I’m dead?”
“Well, of course, if you weren’t dead, we wouldn’t be talking, now would we?”
“So what happens to me now?”
“You are going to be reincarnated!” DeathKill said enthusiastically.
“What do you mean by that?” John asked.
“Jeez, haven’t you ever heard of isekai?”
“Not really.”
“What!?” DeathKill exclaimed in disbelief. “You mean you’ve never heard of isekais?
Come on, man, they’re everywhere in weeboland! Wait, or was that called Japan?” he paused. “Oh well, you get the picture.”
“I may have heard about some of them, but I’ve never read or watched them. I was busy and never found any time.” John answered.
“No matters, Buster bear.” DeathKill said, walking away from John. “You’ll know what an isekai is soon enough.”
DeathKill walked towards a white wall with a huge TV monitor on it and a large keyboard with switches, Computer keys, and various other control items. He then sat on a small chair in front on the monitor and started typing on the control board.
“Now let’s see what world would be good for you.” he said, typing away at the control board.
“Wait, why am I here, what is this ‘void’?” John asked.
“Well you see, when someone dies, they don’t go to the afterlife right away. Instead, they come here to the void, and get one last chance at another life.”
“Then what does that make you?”
“I’m here as the guy that chooses where the people that come here go to. It’s a boring job, but it’s not the worst thing ever.”
“A job,” John asked. “Who are your higher ups then?”
“That would be the isekai gods.”
“Isekai gods?”
“I know, lame name, but it’s what they’re called, so if you don’t like that name then take it up with the author.” DeathKill replied.
“What author?” John asked, even more confused than before.
The monitor then bleeped, “Yes! I got a world that hasn’t been taken yet, and it’s based on a popular video game in Japan.” DeathKill said excitedly. He then got up from his chair and walked over to a large, square shaped metal door. He then typed on a small keyboard next to the door.
“Alright, let’s get you out of here before someone else shows up.” DeathKill said as he finished typing and opened the door, revealing a dark room.
“Wait, wait, this is all happening so fast, I just died and now you’re saying that I can live another life. Why can’t I just go back to my first life?”
“Buddy, that is not how isekai works, now get in so I can finish watching Frozen.” DeathKill said, pushing John into the room. “And don’t worry; you’ll still have your original first name. They always do for some reason. I don’t know why, if I reincarnated, I would change my name in an instant.”
John quickly leaped out of the room, DeathKill then told him to get back into the room immediately, but John refused and fell to his knees, and in panicked desperation, begged DeathKill to send him back, a tear falling from his face. DeathKill, feeling slight annoyance at the sight of John begging at his feet, kneeled down and put his hand on John’s shoulder, “Look man, I’m sorry you died and didn’t get to experience life. I really am.” he said. “But, take my advice: you didn’t get to live your life, so what? But you know what, you have got another chance to live, that’s good. Now, you get in that room and live your new life, alright?” John stood up, wiping the tear from his face and agreed to be reincarnated, “Wonderful!” DeathKill exclaimed, getting behind John and started pushing him towards the room.
DeathKill pushed John into the room. He then warned John that if he saw a blue, oval, diamond necklace with a dragon symbol on it, he was not to buy, wear, break, or go anywhere near it. John asked him why, but DeathKill didn’t give him a reason, only saying that it was because he said so.
“Why are you doing all of this?” John asked.
“Because, isekai never dies.” DeathKill said, closing the metal door. DeathKill sighed and said to himself, “It just reincarnates into another show.” before locking the door and heading towards the monitor.
In the dark room, John looks around the room, seeing nothing but darkness. Then, lights from the room’s ceiling turned on, forming a line leading towards a small table with a laptop that looked a lot like his back in Japan, with red glowing keys on it. John walked to the table and saw that on the laptop screen was the word “Enter Password” in red colored letters in the middle of the screen. He then sat down on a small chair in front of the table. He saw a yellow piece of paper taped to the table with the numbers 33005 written on it. He typed in the numbers, causing the laptop to change the red colored “Enter Password” prompt to a green colored “Welcome, please press Enter”. John then pressed the enter key, causing the screen to go black and the lights on the ceiling to turn off.
Suddenly, the part of the room in front of John started to glow in colors of white and red as a vortex made from pixels of all sizes appeared in the center of where John was facing. Shocked, John stood up, but before he could do anything else, he was sucked into the vortex. As he traveled down the white and red tunnel-like interior of the vortex, he started to hear a woman, moaning and screaming in pain in the distance, the moaning became louder and louder as John traveled closer to a bright white light at what seemed to be the end of the tunnel. John then started yelling, and with a flash of bright light, exited the tunnel. A brief silence was all that remained.