“WHAT?!” Chad shouted.

“Did I stutter?” the imp replied.

“Listen…” Chad said, his hands out in front of him as he shuffled sideways, avoiding the scorching rock wall and the creepy imp flapping towards him on leathery red wings. “I’m with the Chaddington Bachelor Party. I’m–I’m actually the groom. Anyway, we all teleported in but I somehow ended up in the wrong place!”

The imp flashed a menacing smile, showing its mouthful of sharp yellowed teeth.

“Can you call someone? Customer service? Security? Tell them you have a lost guest?” Chad pleaded.

“Oh, you’re LOST alright. Heh heh heh heh,” the imp laughed. “Hopelessly lost.”

“Exactly. I think I was supposed to teleport someplace called the Village of New Beginnings or something.”

“Beginnings? Oh no, there are no beginnings here. Only endings. Only endings forever. A night of eternal endings.”

Chad continued to back away until he was cornered in the dark, smoldering rock alcove he first appeared in. The points on the end of the imp’s pitchfork looked awfully sharp.

“This is… still part of Fantasy World, right?”

“Fantasy World… Fantasy World…” the imp repeated, eyes glinting mischievously. “Never heard of it.”

Is this some kind of Bachelor Party Prank? Did Hudson bribe the staff to teleport me to the wrong place as a sick joke? I’ll kick his ass for this. I’m sweating my balls off here.

Just then, Chad remembered that he had his phone on him. He reached into his back pocket and pulled it out. Strangely, he had one bar of service.

Can’t call the guys, they all stowed their phones before going through. I don’t have any numbers for Isekai World… no WIFI here either. Who can I call?

A lightbulb went off. Chad wasn’t sure what the time zone was back home, but he dialed one of the few numbers he had programmed into his phone.

“Hey!” the imp screeched. “Only the Lord of Hell is allowed to have a phone down here!”

Chad ignored the horrible creature as he pressed the phone tight against his ear, hoping to hear it connect and ring. At last, it did! A girl’s voice finally picked up, sounding annoyed.

“Chad? It’s two in the morning. Of course… I’m still up playing DOTA and crushing some Game Fuel. What do you want?”

It was his little sister, Beatrice.

“Bea! I need your help. I’m in HELL!”

“Jeez, Chad. I would literally KILL to be able to go to Isekai World. That is like, once-in-a-lifetime bucket list BS for one-percenters. And you’re complaining? Like, no need to rub it in, dude.”

“No, listen to me! We all went through the portal thingy and I ended up in some random place with fire, and sulfur, and… I can’t find the guys anywhere.”

“Chad? It is really hard to hear you. Like, can you go someplace with a better signal?”

“NO I CAN’T!”

“Yikes, if you’re going to yell at me I’m just going to hang up. My therapist said I need to set boundaries with toxic people and–”

“Bea, Bea… okay, I’m sorry. Listen, something is terribly wrong. I didn’t exactly pay attention during the whole orientation thing, but I’m not even sure they sent me to Fantasy World. It seems way off.”

“You’re such a noob. Did you get one of those special badges?”

Chad looked down at the Character+ Pass dangling from a lanyard around his neck. The stupid face of the purple Isekai World gnome mascot was emblazoned on the thick, credit-card shaped piece of hard plastic.

“Yeah…”

“Then you can still access your character sheet! Your stats! They probably have some settings in there or options for tech support. I mean, gaming is more sophisticated than Frogger or whatever you played as a kid, but use your brain and figure this out!”

The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

The phone goes silent–CALL DROPPED.

Chad stared at the phone and cursed. He prepared to dial the number again but saw he now had zero bars of signal.

Then–CRUNCH!!!

A pointed pitchfork tip burst through the screen, showering him with tiny pieces of glass. The imp cackled, hoisting the skewered device triumphantly in the air.

“HEY! That iPhone cost almost two grand!” Chad protested.

“No phones allowed in Hell!” the imp snarled.

“I don’t believe in hell. Whatever this is, it’s not hell.”

Teleporting to a video game fantasy dimension in the multiverse, sure. A literal hell? Only religious nutjobs believe in stuff like that.

“That’s… hilarious! BWA HA HA HA HA!” the imp howled with laughter, somersaulting in the air. Chad narrowly dodged an errant swing of its pitchfork. “Come with me and you will see.”

The imp turned and began to fly away. Chad, apprehensive, reluctantly followed behind. As they moved through the cavern, the heat and awful smell intensified. The flames bursting out of the countless fire pits burned Chad’s retinas just to look at them.

I mean, it looks like what I would imagine hell to look like… sort of…

The imp led Chad close to the edge of a burning pit.

“The answer you seek is in there.”

Peering down, Chad could barely stand the heat as what looked like red hot coats mixed with magmatic rock and coursing flame burned endlessly below him. It was a nasty drop too.

“So damn hot! What am I supposed to be looking at?” Chad demanded.

“You want proof you’re in Hell? I’m happy to oblige!” the imp squealed.

Chad suddenly felt the sharp pitchfork stick into his back, the three prongs piercing his polo shirt and digging into his flesh. He screamed in pain and suddenly found himself wheeling his arms wildly for balance as he leaned precariously over the edge.

Then–SHUNK. The imp pulled the pitchfork out, sending spurts of blood flying backwards and then Chad was falling, falling face first into the seething flame.

He screamed and writhed in sheer terror. The heat was unbearable. His clothes quickly caught fire and his very muscles and flesh began to melt and ooze off his bones. His eyeballs boiled in his skull. Intense white heat enveloped every nerve in his body. He spasmed wildly, uselessly in the bottom of the pit. His movements grew slower, and slower. And then, all was black.

*

Chad regained consciousness in the hot rocky alcove where he had first arrived in this horrid place. He shook himself, disbelieving. What was this nightmare, this hallucination? He looked down at his body. No burns, no damage. He was totally intact. Except for one thing–he was completely naked. The only thing on his entire person was the Character+ Pass hanging around his neck.

The imp lazily flapped over from the larger room with the fire pits into the cave, eyeing Chad’s nude figure.

“Your pecker is smaller than I would have expected. Heh heh heh!”

Chad self-consciously covered his genitals. With no shoes, he now felt the scorching hot ground acutely. He tried to dance from one foot to the other, clutching his junk. A memory flashed through his mind of walking barefoot through the black asphalt alleyway to the community pool in his childhood, the ground piping hot under the Southern California sun. But this time there were no shadows, no cool patches for respite. Just burning heat.

“What did you DO to me?” Chad screamed at the imp.

“I did you a favor. I cured you of denial. Heh heh.”

“You… you KILLED me! I…” Chad’s mind careened madly. Was he going insane? That was the worst pain he had ever felt in his life. He could have sworn he had…

“You can’t die, imbecile. You are already in Hell. There is nowhere else to go! And no escape. Want me to show you again?”

The imp quickly thrust the sharp pitchfork up to Chad’s throat, the sharp points barely grazing the flesh of his neck.

“No! No, no, no. I’m good! I’m good!”

“Good? Far from it…” replied the imp, pulling back the pitchfork. "But at least that awful outfit of yours burned up."

Chad danced on the hot ground, tears running down his face. The pain on the soles of his feet was nearly unbearable. He could feel the burning skin, imagining the developing sores.

“Get me out of here!!!”

“There is no way out. Hell is a one-way trip.”

“You aren’t listening to me. I don’t belong here! There’s been a mistake!”

The imp cackles some more.

“That is literally what EVERYONE says who ends up here. Not very original, are we?”

“I got in here… there must be a way out!”

“I don’t know how you ended up all alone in this random corner of Hell, but I will tell you that the only ones who can come and go as they please are the Lord of Hell himself and the Key-Bearing Angels. As far as I can tell, you are neither!”

“Ouch. Ouch, ouch, ouch!” Chad jumped, shifting from foot to foot. “The Lord of Hell, is that like your boss?”

“Yeah… he’s a real bastard. I mean, we’re not on a first name basis or anything. I shook his hand once, several thousands years ago.”

“Well I need to speak to him! If he knows a way out of this place, I need to see him right away.”

“Bwa ha ha ha ha! Go right ahead. The Lord of Hell resides on the very bottom floor, in the Final Circle of Hell.”

“And where are we? Ouch!”

“The first floor of the First Circle. The waiting room to the bottomless abyss of never ending suffering, if you will.”

“And how many floors are there?”

“Hmmmm. Could be hundreds. Could be thousands. Could be millions. Could be infinite. This is HELL, a spiritual netherrealm. It does not adhere to petty mortal notions of longitude, latitude, distance, depth, and length! You only perceive it that way because your feeble mortal mind cannot fathom its true nature!”

“Whatever! Ouch. I am going to go talk to this Lord of Hell and get the… well, you know, out of here!”