The genre? You already know it: Isekai. That's the anime where a regular, boring person gets yanked from their dull life and dropped into a fantasy world, usually with a cheat skill. Well, this is my story, though I can already tell you, it didn't start with a heroic sacrifice. It started with a gas bill.
I won't lie; I was perfectly comfortable. Both my parents passed two years ago, and I lived alone, but I never felt the kind of deep, aching loneliness everyone talks about. If I got bored, I just read manga and watched anime—I wasn't just a fan, I was an otaku obsessed. My bedroom was a sanctuary: full of comics, light novels, figures, and Gundam kits. My life was simple, and I truly never felt tired or bored with it.
Oh, I forgot to tell you: I was also a martial arts instructor. In my youth, I studied a Korean art called Tang Soo Do with my grandfather. After he passed when I was thirteen, I moved to Japan and studied Karate. It didn't feel the same; it lacked the love I had when learning with my grandfather. I was good at Karate—everyone sought my advice—but I could only be a part-time instructor because I was a high school teacher. My life was busy.
Until the moment something went horribly wrong.
It wasn't a sudden, grand act of heroism that ended me; it was my neighbor's gas tank explosion. One second, I was re-reading my favorite manhwa; the next, the entire house was vaporized. I didn't survive the blast. As I watched my life's treasures—my manga, my comics, my anime figures—burn in a truly tragic blaze, I spoke to them in my mind, "Thank you for everything. My life as an otaku was amazing with you all." Then I looked at my body, half-burned to death. I was dead.
My biggest regret was not having a family to truly love. Then, slowly, I opened my eyes, utterly confused, and saw a vast, cosmic place. It was a stunning scene of brilliant blue light, warm and soul-healing, something like a dream world.
I snapped out of my daze. "Wait, what just happened?"
I didn't have a body. I was just a little, brilliant light.
"Ah, so this is what a soul looks like," I mused. "Just a light—no flesh, no body parts. Well, maybe I can just rest here for a bit."
Suddenly, a massive voice boomed.
"Hey! You there! Little light!"
I looked left, right, and… up.
"Yes, you!"
A gigantic, shadowy figure was trying to talk to me. The sheer scale of it was terrifying. The shadowy thing clapped its hands, and a painfully bright, neon-green light filled the void. What I saw was a genuinely demonic figure. I was so shocked that I instinctively shouted, "It's a demon! Run!" and immediately tried to flee, thinking, My soul is definitely in hell right now.
"Hey, you! Stop right there! I am not a demon, got that?"
I skidded to a stop. "Wait, what? But... you look exactly like a demon."
"I am not a demon! Why is everyone always screaming 'demon' at me like a little kid who just lost a fight?"
I gave the figure what I hoped was a deeply skeptical, very funny expression with my non-existent face.
"I promise you, I'm not a demon," it insisted, sounding thoroughly annoyed. "I am a deity, or a celestial creature. Your world would simply call me a god."
The creature's armor was forged not by smiths, but by an apotheosis of war itself. It was a complex, interlocking shell of brilliant, demonic gold, each piece meticulously shaped like a dragon's scale or a raptor's talon. Colossal, spiked pauldrons flared out like mirrored wings. A mantle of deep cardinal velvet trailed from his waist, pooling like a river of blood upon the steps. He was the embodiment of opulence and terror. The massive, leathery wings—a shade of darkest ruby—were held high and wide, looking like a pair of monumental, shredded banners of war.
I raised a non-existent eyebrow. "So, you're saying you're a god who just happens to look like something out of a walking nightmare?"
"Look, kid, this isn't a fantasy you conjured up. Ugh. I am, regrettably, the thing you all insist on calling a god. The celestial deity? Yes, that's me. I rule the whole Cosmic Force—it's a lot of paperwork, honestly. Anyway, every thousand years, one of us gets stuck with the job of picking a hero to save a world. Guess whose turn it is? This is my year. Try to look a little more excited, please."
"My name is Charlie—or, if we're going by my proper title, Scarlet King, the God of Chaos and Revelation."
"So, that means I need to clean up your dirty work?" I asked.
Charlie let out a burst of arrogant laughter. "Hohoho! That's right! You're very lucky; this is the first time in five millennia that it's my turn. Now, hohoho—"
I think this guy is incredibly proud of himself, I thought, the thought vibrating in my soul-light.
Charlie's laughter cut off. "Did you finish your thought? Don't you know I can hear you speaking in your mind, little light?"
The Intervention of the Panthean Clowns
Before Charlie could finish his sentence, a sudden, blinding flash of light and glitter cleared to reveal four glowering, magnificent figures floating awkwardly in Charlie's chaotic cosmic office.
First: Meleona, Goddess of Beauty and Nature, with jade skin and wildflower hair, looking utterly appalled to be anywhere near this mess.
Second: Anubisian, God of Death and Rebirth, a stern jackal-headed figure in obsidian armor, who simply crossed his arms and cracked a dark, silent judgment.
Third: Griffinrome, God of Wisdom and Health, a calm, scholarly man whose robes bore shifting celestial maps. He was currently reviewing a citation in a heavy, leather-bound textbook.
Last: Silveron, God of Thunder and End of Judgment, a hulking mass wreathed in chaotic electric-blue lightning, his eyes blazing with righteous fury.
"We came here to stop you, Charlie," Silveron boomed, his voice shaking the very fabric of reality. "You remember what happened last time you summoned a hero and gave them your 'blessing,' don't you?"
"Oh, for the love of god—" Charlie began, his inky tendrils already twitching.
Meleona cut in, wrinkling her perfect nose. "The last 'hero' you blessed is now a sentient, eight-foot-tall, talking octopus who thinks he's a motivational speaker. He's currently lecturing the deep-sea merfolk on 'synergy' and 'core competencies.' It's causing an ecosystem breakdown."
Charlie threw his appendages up in exasperation. "What the hell are you guys doing here?! Can't a god have one minor clerical error in a millennium without the whole pantheon dropping in unannounced?"
Charlie snapped his fingers, and from a shimmering, celestial lockbox, a massive tome titled Divine Mistakes: A Millennial Compendium materialized.
"Well, I knew this was coming, so I brought the backup plan," Charlie declared, fanning the book open with a dramatic flourish. "Let's review your performance reviews, shall we?"
He pointed a tendril at Meleona.
"Meleona! Page 42, subsection 'Supreme Dryad Fiasco.' You summoned a soul, promised her a beautiful form and nature magic. You accidentally gave her 15% of your total power, turning her into a giant, stationary tree! To cover your mistake, you titled her the 'Supreme Dryad,' but she can only sit in one place, leaving her beautiful spirit body to roam, complaining about the draft. How do you explain that?"
Meleona gasped dramatically. "That was a tribute to her grounding! And the paperwork was complicated!"
Charlie flipped the page and glared at Anubisian.
"Anubisian! Page 88, 'The Case of the Zombie Baby Reincarnate.' You had an assassin soul—a bit dark, but fine—and you promised her the magic to resurrect the dead. But you got greedy, couldn't control your ego, and gave that poor soul a zombie-like body! The entire town was 'surprised and scared to see their baby look like a zombie upon rebirth.' Thoughts?"
Anubisian adjusted his armor. "It was... an accelerated lesson in appreciating life. Besides, his undead glow provides excellent night lighting."
Charlie scoffed, moving to Griffinrome.
"Next! Griffinrome! Page 104, 'The Overconfident Scholar.' You summoned a soul for a scholarly life, promising wisdom and a healthy body. But you miscalculated her mind's capacity for your divine knowledge. She became so overwhelmed she's now permanently delusional, constantly talking about her 'work time in the new world' and yelling 'What the hell?' at her random hallucinations. Explain that!"
Griffinrome calmly adjusted his glasses. "The data suggests that the prolonged exposure, while leading to mild temporal displacement syndrome, will result in a novel form of existential resilience. It's a hypothesis."
Finally, Charlie turned to Silveron, holding up the last entry.
"And finally, Silveron, God of Thunder and Judgment! 'The Elephant-Headed Hero.' You summoned a human who was still alive—still breathing, not even dead yet! You promised her a beautiful life and strong power. Instead, you gave her 1% of your DNA and almost turned her head into an elephant! How do you use your 'End of Judgment' title to justify that?"
Silveron's lightning flickered nervously. "It was meant to be a subtle augmentation for gravitational stability! She looked great in hats!"
Charlie slammed the book shut. "So, what do you think about this? Can any of you explain your mess-ups?"
"Why, you did this!" Meleona shrieked, outraged by the public exposé.
With a unified roar, the four magnificent gods, momentarily forgetting their differences and their actual mission, simultaneously leapt onto the hapless Charlie.
The resulting conflict was less a battle of cosmic, universe-ending forces and more a chaotic, flailing dog-pile. Meleona's wildflower hair got tangled in Charlie's inky tendrils, Silveron's lightning kept sparking the pages of the Divine Mistakes tome, and Anubisian, the stern God of Death, somehow ended up with Griffinrome's heavy textbook balanced on his jackal head. It was a messy, elbow-throwing scrum, exactly like a group of toddlers fighting over a favorite toy.
The Adult in the Room
I leaned against a pillar of what I assumed was the celestial whatever-it-was—maybe the "Hall of Infinite Divine Nonsense." In the center, a spectacular light show of divine power was happening, mostly featuring dazzling energy bolts that somehow always missed hitting anything important.
"I think these guys completely forgot I exist," I muttered, checking my non-existent watch.
"Maybe I should stop this before someone accidentally vaporizes the planet, guys! Hey! Gods! Hellooooo!" My voice, naturally, was instantly drowned out by a sonic boom of pure arrogance.
"Did you guys forget that we are in the middle of my incredibly serious, life-altering problem here?"
Suddenly, the five dazzling deities froze mid-blaze, turning their attention to me with expressions so blank they looked like they'd just been asked to do long division. They had that wide-eyed, stupid face a little kid makes right before they get caught with their hand in the cookie jar.
"I speak to myself," I sighed, massaging my non-existent temples. "I'm starting to think I'm not even here. We have five supposed gods and just a collection of stubborn children with big egos."
Charlie—the one whose light was an annoying neon red—puffed out his chest. "This is your problem, Meleona! You started it!"
Meleona, shimmering in a very judgmental silver, threw her hands up. "Oh, it's me, is it? I was merely trying to save this kid's soul, for crying out loud! That's my whole job description!"
Griffinrome, whose golden armor looked like it was forged from concentrated self-importance, scoffed. "Save it? Why? If this soul goes roaming the world without wisdom and knowledge, it will be useless! She should be ours for proper enlightenment!"
Anubisian—a stoic figure in shadowy purple—countered with a dramatic flourish. "Nonsense! If this soul feels alone, she can simply resurrect the Dead to be her friends! She will never get bored with her new life under my guidance!"
Silveron, who appeared to be made entirely of chaotic lightning, screamed, "No! No! No! You are all too slow! Even a common rabbit horn could kill this mortal easily if she is not trained in my ways!"
And just like that, the five gods were back to fighting, but now they were using rapid-fire, ridiculously dramatic words instead of energy blasts.
I just slumped, my face an expression of utter defeat and exhaustion.
"Yup. I am definitely dealing with a bunch of toddlers right now," I spoke softly into the eternal void. "And my emotional battery is at 2%. This is… this is fine." I made a very tired, very silly, and utterly clueless face for the gods to appreciate, but naturally, none of them noticed. They were too busy arguing about which divine domain was "more useful."
"Finally, my patience is pushed to its absolute limit, guys! STOP THIS NONSENSE!"
All five deities immediately stopped arguing.
"Hear me out, guys. You all are special in your own way. Not one thing is even special until you make that thing special, okay? You are the gods and deities that hold the respect of the cosmos and the entire universe, and you're all acting like children who need a time-out!"
My little light pulsed with righteous indignation.
"If you all want to make this work, please just don't be a bunch of egomaniacs, okay guys?"
A hush fell over the cosmic chamber. Meleona started to cry softly, Charlie looked genuinely shocked, Griffinrome questioned his own wisdom, Anubisian gazed at my soul as if seeing its beauty for the first time, and Silveron felt like the world was getting bigger and he himself was getting smaller.
The Divine Cluster-Blessing
Suddenly, a loud, metallic GONG echoed through the void—like a church bell the size of a planet. The divine clock showed my time limit was 10 minutes to be successfully reincarnated into another world.
Charlie shrieked, "Oh, my cosmos, have mercy! Move, you guys, I don't have time for this! The little light needs my blessing before it's too late!"
Charlie transformed himself instantly. The towering, demonic gold armor vanished, replaced by the form of a charming ten-year-old human boy.
The young man who replaced the Scarlet King had a wild, untamed storm of hair—mostly obsidian black, but threaded with vibrant, painful streaks of crimson, like veins of raw energy running through coal. He framed a face etched with a look that was both dangerously aloof and intensely focused.
And Meleona? She gasped, then instantly jumped onto Charlie, hugging him with dangerous force. "Charlie! You're so cute in this form! In five millennia, I've never seen you like this!"
Charlie squirmed. "Stop it! That's why I always use my original nightmare form! For safety! Move, you pervert woman!"
He shoved Meleona away. "You're so mean, Charlie!" she pouted, getting salty.
Charlie, thoroughly flustered, performed his blessing to me with 1% of his power. A scarlet aura flowed from him to my soul-light, and a Status Skill Screen popped up in front of me, though it was still flickering blankly. As the aura hit, my soul began to receive a body, but the body slowly started growing tentacles like an octopus.
Meleona gasped in horror and fear, trying to stop Charlie. "Don't you dare turn the child into a tentacle again!"
But it was too late. Seeing the disastrous outcome, Meleona joined the fray, sending 1% of her power towards me to neutralize the effect. A soothing green aura washed over the scarlet, and my body slowly began to stabilize, becoming that of a normal human being, glowing with an inner light of both scarlet and green.
Charlie looked at Meleona with a shocked, angry, and silly expression.
"Wait, what the hell are you doing?! You horny girl! This year is my blessing time for the hero that I summoned, you idiot!"
And suddenly, the other three gods—Griffinrome, Anubisian, and Silveron—all joined the party of blessing, each sending their own hilarious and accidental 1% of power towards me.
Charlie threw his hands up in panic. "Wait! Wait! Wait! What are you guys doing?! Stop it! This is my blessing, you idiots!"
In the middle of the chaotic scrum, the five of them accidentally dumped 50% of their combined power into my soul. They weren't thinking rationally; they were just shoving energy.
My little light simply sighed. "Oh, my. I'm going to die twice," I thought.
Suddenly, my body was full of divine light that could not be controlled. It EXPLODED into an unimaginable surge of mana. The energy separated into three different Galaxies spinning rapidly in the void—a terrifying spectacle of power. But those three separate galaxies were not far-flung cosmic bodies; they were my mana, still completely contained within me.
The five gods were panicking like it was the literal end of the cosmos. "Oh, my heaven! Oh, my cosmos! What the hell did we just do right now?!"
I passed out, but as I did, my true body was revealed. It was a marvelous and beautiful sight, radiating a power that no one, even the gods, had ever seen.
Meleona, the Goddess of Beauty, got a perverted look in her eyes as she gazed at my unconscious form. Love hearts popped up around her head.
"Ooh, my! That boy is so charming!" she cooed.
Charlie looked up at the sky of the cosmos, where the three swirling Galaxies of my mana spun.
"The three galaxies... are his mana," he whispered in dawning horror. "That means his body has three Infinity Mana sources..."
He looked back at the other four gods, who were trembling.
"...I think we die now. We just created the end of the cosmos himself."
The Broken Status Screen
I blinked open my eyes. I looked at my true form and the divine clock. 1 minute left. So, I survived all that. I got a second chance after all that chaos.
All five gods came to me. Charlie, looking genuinely contrite, spoke. "Sorry, my little light, for all of this. We just overdid it this time and weren't thinking rationally. But it's time for you to be reincarnated. Have some fun, okay? We'll be watching you," Charlie said.
And as the clock ended its last bell, I was reborn into a new world.
In a rare emotional moment as I was leaving Charlie's cosmic office, the God of Wisdom, Griffinrome, was trembling and in shock as he gazed at my status screen. "This... this is... are?" Griffinrome trailed off, unable to explain.
Charlie looked at Griffinrome, his reaction a sight of impending cosmic doom. He walked up to Griffinrome, his face full of sweat. "Wait, what the hell are you looking at? It's not a big deal, you know that. You're reacting like you just saw a cosmic ghost horror film!"
Charlie snatched the divine tablet from Griffinrome's hand and looked at the status screen.
Charlie's eyes flew wide open. All the gods rushed to look, and all of them were equally shocked and began to shriek, simultaneously screaming, "What the hell is this broken screen?!" All five were trembling in shock and fear at my stats, making a sight that was both terrifying and utterly hilarious.
Category Value
The divine tablet displayed my status:
Status LVL 1
Name Not yet registered
Race Not yet registered
HP 80 (Normal for LVL 1)
Defense 40 (Normal for LVL 1)
Attack & Strength 70 (Above Average)
Stamina & Speed 70,000 (Broken)
Mana Triple Infinity (Catastrophic)
Skill (1) Scarlet Star Union (Buff & Debuff Magic) - Can buff allies and debuff enemy connection/cohesion. Time limit: 3 minutes.
Unique Skill (2) Nature Life Absorption (Supreme Barrier Magic) - If an enemy attacks or makes contact, their physical strength and skill will be debuffed by 50%, and magic damage will be debuffed by 50% on contact. Time limit: 3 minutes.
Special Skill (3) Genesis Arrival (Cosmic Summoning) - Can create a life form with a soul based on the user's imagination to manifest itself.
Mana Cost 100 to 1,000,000,000,000
Cooldown 1 minute to 1 week
Summoning Storage 30,000
Locked Magic (5) Scarlet (150 Lock), Nature (150 Lock), Wisdom (150 Lock), Death/Undeath (150 Lock), Thunder/Strength (150 Lock)
title=(supreme summoner, divine support)
He looked back at the other four gods, who were trembling.
"...I think we die now. We just created the end of the cosmos himself."
Meleona stared at Charlie. "Charlie, what world did you send that little light to?"
Charlie gave Meleona the tablet, and she shrieked in shock. "Charlie, what the hell are you doing? You sent this poor soul into a chaotic massacre apocalypse world?!"
"Wait, what! Let me see!" said Charlie to Meleona, and he surprisingly almost passed out from another moment of shock at what he was looking at. "Calm down, just calm down," Charlie repeated to himself.
Meleona simply said, "Poor soul..."
Suddenly, Charlie gave a devilish smile, his eyes filled with greedy motivation. He looked at Meleona, his spirit lifted. "Don't you worry, Meleona! That light is not a normal hero! He is the best hero alive with the most broken skills! He has the blessings of all five gods!"
The Neon Apocalypse Domain
The new world you've been reincarnated into is called the Neon Apocalypse Domain. It's a place of constant, uncontrolled chaos, where even heroes and Demon Lords struggle to manage the relentless danger.
This world is approximately seven times the size of Earth and is plagued by an unprecedented number of dungeon breaks.
The current survival rates for the major populations living there are terrifyingly low due to the sheer difficulty of the dungeons:
Humans: 60\% survival rate
Demons: 40\% survival rate
Elves: 50\% survival rate
Dwarves: 37\% survival rate
The total number of dungeons in this world, broken down by rank, speaks to the scale of the apocalypse:
Dungeon Rank Number of Dungeons
Superior SSS+ Rank 10,000,000
Nightmare SSS+ Rank 10,000,000,000
Rare SSS+ Rank 10,000,000,000
SSS+ Rank 1,000,000,000,000
SSS Rank 1,000,000,000,000
SS Rank 10,000,000,000,000
S Rank 100,000,000,000,000
A Rank 100,000,000,000,000,000
B Rank 100,000,000,000,000,000
C Rank 10,000,000,000,000,000
D Rank 300,000
F Rank 400,000
G Rank 600,000
This world is so full of dungeon monsters that only
heroes and demons working together can survive.
Good luck, kid! You're going to need it.