Honey and Toast

For the record, my name isn’t Honey, it’s Mitsuta. It just happens to have the character for honey in it, and believe me I’ve heard all the jokes. I’m not sure what my parents were thinking giving a boy such a sweet name but it’s made my life a little more difficult than it had to be. I had a really rough time when that super popular romance anime movie came out just because the main girl's name was similar to mine. My coworkers kept asking if I was from a different time. I wish, you jerks!

Aside from that, I’m an average guy with average looks and an average life. I've only ever worked part-time jobs doing various things, and the only noteworthy thing about me is my dog. I'm a nobody that spends all his free time indulging in almost every hobby otaku culture has to offer, and taking too many photos of my dog. It’s no surprise I’m not the main character, but you’d think after being hit by a truck I’d be given a second chance to be some cooler version of myself.

I read about it all the time in manga, some loser like me gets obliterated by a semi, taken to a fantasy world with game-like mechanics, and becomes the hero. Not me.

It started when I took my dog for a walk, just like we do every day after dinner. This truck comes out of nowhere almost like magic, and the next thing I knew I was in a blindingly white room.

I checked my body for injuries frantically and noticed my beloved dog Toast was with me, hiding behind my legs with his tail tucked in. A melodic voice called out;

“Child of Man, your aid is required”

I looked up to see a golden throne with the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen (so far), leaning on the armrest with her fist pressed into her cheek, looking rather all-knowing but also kind of bored. She had white and silver hair like a cloud, an outfit that barely covered all the good parts, and was everything I’d pictured when I read about Gods. I decided to confirm.

“Are you God? Am I dead?”

She sighed. Definitely bored.

“Anyways, I brought you here to-”

Ignoring me?!

“-to vanquish the demon lord of my world. I’ll give you some stat boosts so we can get this over with quickly. Level 99 always gets the job done.”

She waved her hand and a screen popped up in front of me. I barely had time to read it before Toast got curious and poked his head out from behind me to investigate.

The goddess shot straight up in her chair and drew in a deep breath and;

“OHHHH MY GOOOOOOODNESS HOW CUUUUUUUTE”

Before I could blink she flew to us in an instant and was cooing over Toast.

“Look at this little man! Look at how fluffy! Look at the fluffy widdle baby-waby ohmygoodnesslookathowcuteyouareIcan’tevenhandlehowsoft-”

I no longer existed to this lady. I tried getting her attention a few times to no avail. I get it at least.

Toast is a puffy-fluffy pomeranian with a ridiculously cute permanent smile. I worry that he's always hot with all that hair but I read you're not supposed to shave poms. I can agree with that because when I first got him they'd shaved him to clear up a rash but he looked like a Q-tip.

Now that his fur has grown back in all it's glory his vibe matches a small frilly girl way more than it does some gloomy dude like me. The only reason I got him was that he's missing an eye, so no one wanted him at the rescue. Lucky for me.

She cuddled him with all her might for a few minutes, before quickly standing up, clearing her throat, and turning to me.

Trying to play it off cool huh?

“Child of Man you must protect this creature with your life. Now go.”

That’s it?!

The room started to pixelate and changed from its stark white to dark shades, and before long I could make out our surroundings. We appeared to be in the woods, and it was getting dark. I felt disappointed that I looked exactly the same as I did before, even wearing the same shorts, dirty sneakers, and t-shirt with a picture of a Silver Bounty can of sardines on it. How lame.

Toast on the other hand was sporting a brand new golden harness and leash. There was some kind of charm hanging from the harness but I didn't recognize the symbol. It looked like a wonky circle with a hieroglyph in the middle. Why did he get new gear? That Goddess is clearly showing favouritism for him. He was starting to tug on his leash towards a bush so I took it off knowing nature was calling. He never goes too far from me in the first place and I doubt this new word has leash laws. 

Confused and with no tutorial, I spent some time cursing that goddess before finally getting that screen to pop up again.

Level: 1. What?
Strength: 10. What?
Skills; None. What?
Job: Not assigned. WHAT?

I clicked on everything I could, and there was nothing. I had garbage stats across the board, no skills, no powers, nothing.

Then I saw ‘Party’ as a tab. I clicked. There was a name.

“Toast?”

He had been sniffing around where we were in the woods, nonchalantly peeing on trees, when he heard his name and pranced over, tail wagging.

His name appeared in text above his head, so I clicked on it and fell back onto my rear as I tried to comprehend what I saw.

Level: 99. What?
Strength: 999. What?
Skills; Acid Shot, Boost Jump, Barrier Breaker, Sonic Bark. What?
Job: Hero. WHAT?!

That stupid Goddess had given everything to him by mistake?! Or was this some cruel joke that I was doomed to be an average loser even in a new world?

I was completely unsure of how to deal with this. How can my dog be a hero when he’s the size of an electric mouse and weighs as much as a stack of dirty mags? Don’t ask how I know that, focus here. How do his skills even work? And what the hell is Acid Shot? Is Sonic Bark a joke that dirtbag Goddess is making?

My mind raced as I read through his status screen. Toast had gotten bored of waiting for me to do something and pawed at me for attention, so I pushed him over to rub his belly while I kept reading. He had a skill tree that looked like it used skill points to acquire new abilities, but a bunch of them were blurred out with a lock icon. How does that work if he's already Level 99? There was an information icon next to the SP text so I pressed it and a dialogue box popped up.

"Skill points are acquired by defeating monsters. There is no limit to SP and they can still be attained after MAX level. Skill points are not awarded when levelling, and are single use.
-A"

A? Can I assume that's the ditzy goddess who caused this mess? I feel like she's making fun of me answering my question so directly.

As I fiddled around in the status screen we heard someone scream in the distance. It sounded like a girl. Toast quickly rolled himself upright and started barking, pointing himself towards the now dark trees ahead of us. I briefly thought to myself that it seemed like a normal bark and not whatever a Sonic Bark was, but that thought was quickly turned to fear as a large shadow emerged from the thicket, towering over us with it's body. It was easily 3 metres, and I managed to make out the shape of something that could have been mistaken for a moose in my world, if it wasn't standing on two legs.

With no time to take in it's other features, the next thing I felt was a blow to my side as my body was thrown out of the way. As I flew through the air I saw that Toast had headbutted me. Is this how strong he is now? That little brute.

I landed in some bushes nearby and tried to collect myself as quickly as I could despite having what I was sure was a broken rib. I called out Toast's name hoping he would come to me and we could run, but instead I saw him square himself in front of this beast 50 times his size.

What I saw next left me speechless.

Toast began to... gag. His body convulsed and I saw the familiar scene of him dry-heaving, just like he did before throwing up. He always seemed to target my books at home, but now his eye was locked onto this monster before him. All of the sudden a huge wet ball of slime launched from his mouth and hit the creature dead centre in the face.

The creature let out a roar that made me want to close my eyes in terror, but I watched the scene.

It stumbled back as a loud hissing sound filled the air, and within seconds, it fell to its knees and toppled forward onto it's melted face. It's body started pixelating and faded away, and Toast lit up with a small flash of colour.

"I... I guess that's the Acid Shot"

I scrambled out of the bush as best I could while recoiling from the pain in my side and scooped up my little guy, checking him for any wounds. His status bar popped up and read full health at 3000HP. Hopefully that's a lot.

I wanted to check if that light meant any stat increases, but I was falling apart with worry for Toast, and wheezing from my injury. I held and cuddled him, thankful he was okay, when a small voice called out from behind me.

"That was... Amazing!"