Sorry for the sudden shift, but we’re going to be taking a step back now.

While my mind was on a horrific demonic trip through an artificially manufactured Isekai, my body was on an entirely different journey. I wasn’t conscious at all during the whole thing, so I only know what Bunny and Rose told me afterwards. (Oh, yeah, I lived, by the way.) There seem to be some gaps and inconsistencies in their stories, but it’s the best I got.

First of all, Bunny really did shoot me, but it was apparently an attempt to help me. It was all part of Rose’s plan. She figured that, actually, going against God was stupid. If beings were created just to kill me, they were going to kill me. Instead of trying to fruitlessly circumvent that situation and then panicking when it happens, her genius idea was to make it happen, but on our (their) own terms.

Of course, she didn’t tell me that was her plan, because if she did I would’ve kicked her teeth in like a horse. So, naturally, I was the only one not informed of this big plan.

Biologist was receptive to it. Bunny was hesitant, but according to Rose, she was the only one who could pull it off. I’d be way too weary of Bio or Rose holding a gun, and might have counter-acted. But I never expected Bunny to hurt me, so she was the one who had to do it.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

After she shot me, she stood up and took a trip to the restroom—blank faced as ever. According to her, she was contemplating the plan and trying to come up with alternate strategies to help it succeed. (Rose said she just didn’t want anyone seeing her bawling her eyes out.)

So then, Biologist and Rose were left alone with my bloodied corpse on the ground. They started patching me up, but only after they had confirmed I was dead. I think they would make for horrible EMTs.

But it didn’t matter, because my body didn’t stay the same for long.

It was actually Rose who noticed something weird was going on with my body. It was sort of crumpling up and turning pale. Biologist thought humans “just did that” when they died. It wasn’t rigor mortis or anything, I was actually crumpling up into a ball of paper.

Seriously. It was about as big as a basketball. Ask ten people, and all ten would say “that’s not a person, that’s a ball of paper.” Just as light as one, too. Rose pulled back one of my papery folds and looked inside. There were inky lines covering every surface, like the lines on a circuit board. They ran in strange directions, converged into shapes and then diverged, and even seemed to skip around the page. But no matter how much she unfolded, there was more. She pulled back layer after layer, like pulling the leaves off a head of lettuce. She decided to stop after the whole kitchen table was covered in sheathes of paper. They didn’t pull off the big crumply ball, in fact, the paper wouldn’t rip or be damaged at all.

Wait, did they try that? Did they try to burn me or something? How would that have helped anything? Anyways, needless to say, they were pretty confused, until Biologist showed up and made things clearer.