In Belteruk's eyes, he could see the severed soul string protruding from the virtual reality server access helmet, dangling and swaying. Normally, the soul's main body would have come out attached to that string, but not now.
That was because soul No. 3789028376 was currently enjoying a game inside the virtual reality. This was precisely why Death Gods could know that souls were inside virtual reality without even logging in themselves.
Virtual reality games were quite a nuisance to the Death Gods' work. When someone died, they should be able to come out right away so they could be taken... but humans who died while connected like that still strutted around inside the server, not even knowing they were dead. Like headless insects that thrash around for hours despite having no consciousness.
In such cases, Death Gods had no choice but to wait until the soul they needed to take to the Underworld logged out.
Of course, an eccentric Death God like Belteruk had no particular complaints about this. Because what he had in abundance was time, and all that time was connected to the terribleness called boredom.
Belteruk found this thing called virtual reality a bit annoying, but in some ways, he was actually grateful for it. Because it helped him kill just a little bit of the tedious, endlessly long time given to him.
Swish.
Belteruk put his Death God's scythe back in his robe.
He thoroughly scanned the room. This was done while waiting for soul No. 3789028376 to come out, examining what kind of human this soul had been. He wasn't doing this because he had any interest in soul No. 3789028376. It was just a habit he'd developed over an uncountably long period. It had no meaning whatsoever.
The room starkly displayed the personality of soul No. 3789028376's owner.
Simple basic furniture and electronics. A desk and a bookshelf placed on that desk. A few books placed on it and a bed. Also, a small trash can placed next to it, and finally, the virtual reality capsule where soul No. 3789028376's body lay. Everything was as clean as if newly purchased, without a speck of dust.
Mysophobia.
Soul No. 3789028376 seemed to be a perfectionist who wouldn't allow even a tiny speck of dust in their space. Belteruk had seen many such people, but cases this severe were uncommon.
'Obsessive-compulsive cleanliness? Or perhaps...'
Belteruk's clairvoyant eyes extended beyond the room to the living room and even the bathroom. Like this room, it was difficult to find even a single speck of dust. But this wasn't what Belteruk had expected.
Sniff sniff.
What stimulated his senses wasn't his eyes but his nose. He smelled a familiar yet peculiar scent from somewhere. A very acrid yet unique fragrance that pleased Death Gods' noses. It was the smell of blood and rotting corpses. It was so faint that even he, a Death God, could barely detect it. A scent so faint that he could only properly sense it now that he was concentrating. Perhaps this was why he hadn't noticed it when he first entered the building.
Belteruk's nose flared. He was tracking the source of the smell. The smell was rising from below.
He lowered his head.
As his gaze naturally directed downward, he didn't find the source of the smell even as it passed through the 5th floor, 4th floor, 3rd floor, 2nd floor, and 1st floor. Belteruk's jet-black eyes turned completely white. This was a phenomenon that appeared when he raised his clairvoyance to maximum.
He quickly detected a secret space in the basement.
'Hm!?'
There was no corpse there either. His vision went further down. Only after passing three more such secret spaces could he find the source of the smell.
This customer is truly meticulous.
"Kekeke."
Belteruk muttered lowly. The reason was that he could confirm that the owner of soul No. 3789028376 was a human who created work for Death Gods. He didn't know what his profession was, but his 'hobby' seemed closely related to the Death Gods' work.
Deep in the hidden cavity underground, dozens or perhaps hundreds of human corpses—difficult to confirm at a glance—were sleeping peacefully inside an enormously massive freezer. Judging by the presence of still-fresh corpses not yet completely frozen, the owner of soul No. 3789028376 had clearly enjoyed his hobby just a few days ago, perhaps even yesterday or today.
This planet called Earth in the 111th Dimensional Realm had been a more brutal planet than other places from the beginning. Though it had distanced itself somewhat from Death Gods in recent times, essence doesn't change easily. Before the academic discipline humans call science had developed this much, scenes like that could be easily found anywhere on this planet. Of course, when war breaks out, things worse than that happen often.
Therefore, for Death God Belteruk, such things were nothing special. The reason he found it interesting lay somewhere completely different.
Corpses bear the soul color and murderous intent of the killer. Even if those corpses are already empty vessels devoid of souls.
From the corpses in that underground freezer, purity could be felt. Not a trace of murderous intent could be found. How should one express that purity?
Pure murderous madness. Wouldn't that be the right way to put it?
Soul No. 3789028376 possessed the kind of sensibility that was difficult to encounter anymore in this 111th Dimensional Realm, which emphasizes things like human rights and civilization these days. It wasn't completely absent, but it was rare.
Belteruk had encountered such a soul after a long time, which was why a smile formed on his lips.
"A pure murderer thirsting for blood. In Earth terms, a psychopath, wasn't it?"
This was Belteruk's assessment of soul No. 3789028376 from the 111th Dimensional Realm. At that level, wouldn't it be difficult to emerge from the Eight Hells again before proper purification? Perhaps they might rot in the Eight Hells for about ten million years. If unlucky, their soul might even be extinguished before spending those ten million years...
Of course, it wasn't his concern.
Having confirmed up to that point, Belteruk completely lost interest in soul No. 3789028376. Whether No. 3789028376 was the worst murderer in universal history or not had nothing to do with him. Anyway, his duty as a Death God ended once he took that person's soul to the Underworld. Whether Death God Yama turned that bastard's soul into a rag or extinguished it wasn't his jurisdiction.
It was then, as Belteruk was about to scratch his eye with his scythe again in boredom.
Beebeep—the clear tone of the Death God terminal rang out. It was a warning sound. It meant the time to collect the soul was almost up, so get to work.
Belteruk didn't think much of it since he was already finished with work and waiting, but still, just to confirm once more, he took out and opened the Death God Registry. Like before, he yawned and checked the soul number of the collection target.
3789028376.
It matched.
"No problem."
Just as he was feeling relieved.
"Hm!? This is...?"
He discovered a problem! A fatal one at that!
The dimensional realm number written below the soul number wasn't 111 but 112! This customer wasn't soul No. 3789028376 from the 111th Dimensional Realm, but soul No. 3789028376 from the 112th Dimensional Realm.
An impossible thing had occurred.
It was a simple mistake, but in the Death God world, mistakes were often directly connected to extinguishment. If this matter became known to Death God Yama, it would be the end. If unlucky, the one suffering ten million years of pain in the Eight Hells he'd mentioned earlier might not be this soul, but himself. Naturally, that ending would nine times out of ten be extinguishment.
Belteruk's mind raced quickly. Tens of millions of years performing Death God duties. Not a single mistake until now. He'd been overconfident in that, and finally today's incident had erupted.
'I can't lose everything I've worked for over tens of millions of years because of this one mistake! Damn! Damn! Damn...! Ah!'
At some moment while repeating the word 'damn' countless times in his mind.
He recalled 'that incident' that had shaken the Underworld hundreds of millions of years ago.
'Soul grafting.'
The bizarre incident committed by one mad Death God who tried to artificially create soul conjoined twins.
That Death God had experimented with whether it was possible to put two souls into one body. The method was very simple—attaching a severed soul string to another living soul's string and patching it together. This was strictly a grave sin that violated Death God service regulations.
Each action of a Death God is connected to the order of dimensional realms. But to do such a thing to a soul that should be alive—his ending was obvious. Eventually, that Death God was discovered and extinguished.
Whether the experiment succeeded or failed, what kind of events occurred in the dimensional realms as a result of that incident—none of this was ever revealed. Death God Yama had issued a gag order to those involved.
However,
Within Death Gods internally, opinion generally leaned toward it being possible. Given that Death Gods who casually brought up this story whenever bored still existed.
Indeed.
'Is it possible?'
What if he tried it now? What would happen?
His eyes saw the soul string dangling outside the virtual reality capsule. There was still time. No. 3789028376 hadn't logged out yet.
If that soul logged out in this situation?
Belteruk would be extinguished. But if he attempted soul grafting, there might be a chance to cover up his mistake. If he grafted soul No. 3789028376 from the 111th Dimensional Realm onto the body of soul No. 3789028376 from the 112th Dimensional Realm who should have died, then severed only the string of soul No. 3789028376 from the 112th Dimensional Realm and guided it to the Underworld, all dimensional realms would flow as originally planned! If this worked, no one would know of his mistake!
Though the soul from the 111th Dimensional Realm would go to the 112th Dimensional Realm, at least the total quantity of Underworld souls would be preserved. That would be enough for Belteruk to feel at ease.
It didn't take long to decide. Belteruk grasped the end of soul No. 3789028376's string from the 111th Dimensional Realm. Then, without a moment's hesitation, he pulled out his Death God terminal.
Beep-beep-beep—
The Death God number 112 appeared on the terminal. With a light vibration, Belteruk disappeared from that spot.
It was the moment soul grafting was realized for the first time in hundreds of millions of years.