The Afterlife’s Stupidest Death Award

I heard a bell ringing.

No, not tolling like that one metal band's song title.

Ringing.

A goddess in all her winged beauty was floating down to me, bell in hand.

"DING DING DING! Hey mortal! you're the newest recipient of the afterlife's stupidest death award!"

I groaned.

"Uh-huh. And you are…?"

“Oh! Right! How rude of me. I am Luluthiel, Herald of the Higher Realms, Keeper of Bells, and—”

“Keeper of Bells, Herald of Realms… cool. Bell-girl it is.” I sighed.

"Turn that frown upside down mortal! the worst bit's already over! Now then let's check your file here..."

She dug through a large plastic file folder she manifested into the void.

There are two hundred and sixty-seven death awards in the afterlife according to her, mine was the most recent one which I find incredibly hard to believe.

The goddess squinted at my file.

"I still can't believe you died to a wasp, I mean really? a wasp!?" She started laughing uncontrollably.

“Yes,” I deadpanned. “A wasp.”

“You sure it wasn’t cursed?”

“If it was, it cursed me with humiliation.”

She gave a sympathetic little sigh. Then burst out laughing.

“Ohohohohohoho! You poor soul. Death by wasp sting! That’s a two-star death at best. And that’s only if the wasp was a queen!”

I sighed.

"If I remember correctly, aren't you supposed to give me a secret ability or introduce some OP nonsense?" I asked her. "Maybe something like a gift or a cool new outfit?"

"Jumping the gun a little bit are we? I was just getting to that!" The goddess clapped her hands.

A sea of shimmering letters materialized into the words "POWER GRANTED: UNLIMITED INVENTORY SLOTS"

I was about to get excited until my inability to see the big picture barged in.

“Wait,” I started. “What in the magician’s-top-hat, Kirby-stomach-having, clown-car-packing hell is this ability supposed to be?"

The goddess looked offended. “Excuse you, that’s a top-tier blessing. Do you know how many nerds would kill for infinite storage?”

I thought back to my budget-within-a-budget PC setup on earth. She's kinda got a point. Then again, I'm here and my PC is god knows how many kilometers away from me.

“I died to a wasp. I think the storage problem was lower on my list.”

She clicked her pen—pink and aggressively sparkly. “Let me spell it out for you, mortal. You now have the ability to store literally anything in a pocket dimension. No weight limit. No volume cap. No encumberment issues. Think of it as your own personal bottomless pit but with less risk of implosion.”

“Can I store logic and good decisions in there?” I asked.

“Bold of you to assume you’ll be collecting either.”

"That stung. The wasp's still got you beat though."

She snapped her fingers and summoned a glowing orb. “Right, enough exposition. Time to shove you face-first into reincarnation.”

An orb hovered ominously, humming like a microwave threatening to explode.

“Any last requests?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Can I get reincarnated into a place where wasps don’t exist?”

“Absolutely not,” she said with a grin. “That’d break the difficulty curve.”

Before I could protest, she wound up like a baseball pitcher and hurled the orb directly at my forehead.

"What in the Pokémon, scrying ball rip-off hell was that for!?"

There was a flash of light. A ringing in my ears. And then—

THUMP.

I slammed into the dirt face-first, reincarnated with all the grace of a character model that's been ragdolled.

The air smelled like pine and something that could only be described as “mossy ass.”

Then a floating UI message burned itself into my retinas:

“Welcome to the sacred realm of Altherion.”

Because of course, naming it Dirtlandia would be too truthful.

Some crows cawed somewhere overhead, presumably laughing.

At me?

Probably, who cares?

I sat up, spat out a mouthful of leafy, muddy puddle water and instinctively checked my tracksuit.

Still lime green.

Still painfully reflective.

A glowing icon blinked in the corner of my eye. I focused on it and saw the words:

Inventory: [0/∞]

Amazing. I could now carry the entire forest in my pocket if I wanted.

Too bad I had nothing to put in it except dirt, shame, and the crumbs of my dignity propping up the crushing realization that I was now king of the marshes.

“Goddamn it,” I muttered.

At that exact moment, I heard the faint twang of a crossbow being drawn.

“Freeze,” came a firm, accented voice behind me. “You’re wearing hostile beast-attractant colors and may be diseased.”

I turned slowly to find an elven girl with piercing red eyes, silver hair, and a bow aimed right where my dumb ideas are birthed from.

She stared at me like I was gum on her shoe.

“You’re not from around here, are you?” she asked.

I opened my mouth, then closed it.

My brain felt fried.

Say something dummy!

"Nah I'm like one of those rare drifters. I come from a totally different world from yours," I replied, hoping that wasn’t too vague.

The girl raised an eyebrow, then laughed.

I didn't know whether to laugh nervously along or shoot myself with this girl's crossbow.

"You're funny." She smiled.

"Thanks." I grinned weakly.

"And a little weird." She glanced around, taking inventory. "How did you even get here?"

“Well I was kind of… transported.” I said.

Lame.

Too lame.

"By a domesticated Wherep?" She snorted skeptically.

"A domesticated what-now?"

I shrugged.

"Oh right, sorry. New guy. You've probably never seen a Wherep before, right? They're really rare, very territorial creatures and pretty much despise humans. But if you put in the effort to train the—"

She then proceeded to give me the rundown of every single one of their habits. Every single thing they do and all of their weaknesses and strengths.

I nodded along helplessly, feeling like I was going to pass out any second. This girl sure has a lot to say for a stranger who just showed up.

It wasn't that I disliked her. In fact I found her rather sweet and sort of cute, she just seemed so serious and intense. Plus, she spoke in a language I could understand, the accent was a little funny but I managed to ignore that for the time being.

There goes that bright shade of red again, like shining rubies.

I got lost counting imaginary facets and stopped listening.

"Whoops, did I go off on a tangent again? Sorry 'bout that. I tend to share the good word about anything regarding monster-hunting and killing with anybody who'll listen. Well most folks, anyway. It's good for trivia if you're into that sort of thing."

I couldn't tell if she was joking or not. Either way I didn’t mind listening to her drone on about these things.

So... Are you gonna tell me your name or should I call you 'the beast'?" She drawled.

"You can call me Takumi.” My lips formed a dumb smile.

"Takumi? Now that's a unique name."

Oh the irony.

"I suppose so, ” I said, plainly.

"I like the hair too, its very clashy and out there..."

She gestured to my mop of sandy brown hair, the ends were bleached for a cosplay thing I went to, unfortunately the dye was permanent.

"Nice to meet ya, Takumi." She bowed. "Welcome to the land of the living."