"So, what is this place?"
A young man with black hair and black eyes stood in a boundless expanse of pitch-black space, speaking to the girl before him.
He remembered that just a moment ago, he had been...
Screeeech!
Oh, the sharp squeal of brakes in his mind reminded him. He had been hit by a car and killed. Just his luck.
"It's so dark here. Is this hell or something? I don't think I ever did anything utterly depraved while I was alive."
The young man was rather baffled.
"This isn't hell."
At that moment, the girl before him finally opened her eyes and spoke to him with a smile.
She was fair-skinned and pretty, her white hair and youthful face lending her an especially ethereal air when paired with her pure white dress.
He wasn't studying her so closely because he had fallen for her or anything. It was just that, compared with her, his everyday black clothes looked rather shabby.
Rustle, rustle.
A little booklet resembling a register of life and death suddenly appeared in the girl's hand, and she began softly reading through his life.
"Let's see. Your name is Mo Bai? Twenty years old, likes playing games, no particular talents. Cause of death... pfft."
When she reached Mo Bai's cause of death, she gave a soft laugh, adding a touch of liveliness to her solemn, beautiful face.
But a second later, Mo Bai changed his mind.
"You were playing on your phone in the street and got killed by a car? Hahahaha!"
Her uproarious laughter made it utterly impossible for Mo Bai to picture her as some King of Hell or Satan ruling over the underworld.
What was this supposed to be? Was she just here to make fun of me?
"Ahem. Sorry, sorry. I haven't introduced myself yet."
Seemingly noticing the disdain in Mo Bai's eyes, the girl coughed to hide her embarrassment, then stepped down from her lavishly decorated throne. Placing her left hand over her chest, she declared solemnly:
"I am the nameless Goddess, the divine being who grants you lost lambs a path forward!"
She might have imagined herself looking terribly dignified, but Mo Bai saw something entirely different.
A girl who looked fifteen and seemed to be cosplaying was standing there, spouting embarrassing, melodramatic lines he wouldn't even dare imagine saying.
Oh God! Was this some kind of torture?! This had to be hell!
But although the thought made his toes curl, Mo Bai certainly wasn't going to say any of that aloud.
"Then... Lady Goddess? Are you going to guide me toward reincarnation, or what?" He recalled her earlier extravagant introduction.
I'm already dead, after all. Next, I'll probably become a baby somewhere and live another life, just like in those novels?
Wait. What if I'm unlucky and start out in a toilet, or a dumpster behind a bar?
Whatever. That's a problem for my next incarnation.
He was already dead, anyway.
"Heh heh. Count yourself lucky, mortal. With me, you can transmigrate in full, keeping both your current memories and your body~"
As though she had seen through Mo Bai's thoughts, the Goddess planted her hands on her hips and proclaimed this proudly.
Her words startled him.
"If I go back like this, wouldn't that cause... wait. You mean I'm going to some other world?" Mo Bai caught on immediately.
After all, returning to his original world just like this would definitely cause a stir.
Besides, his memory of being hit by the car was still perfectly clear, so this certainly wasn't some prank show.
"Heh heh. You catch on pretty quickly."
The Goddess nodded, reasonably pleased with Mo Bai's response.
"Well, I'm already dead, and now there's a short girl in front of me calling herself a goddess. So what happens next? Do you just teleport me to another world? What's your goal? And could you at least tell me where I'm going?"
Like an endless stream of questions, Mo Bai rattled off one inquiry after another.
The Goddess wasn't annoyed. Instead, the corners of her mouth lifted slightly.
She could tell that, despite his calm tone, the fact that Mo Bai could ask so many questions in one breath meant he was actually excited.
That made things much easier.
"I took a look at your past. You're a homebody, huh? Then do you know Wuthering Waves?" the Goddess asked, idly leafing through the booklet recording Mo Bai's life.
"Never played it." Mo Bai spread his hands.
"Huh?!"
The Goddess's strange cry made Mo Bai's head ache again.
She's just a brat who likes yelling...
"That's perfectly normal. I'm twenty, a college student. I'm past the age for anime gacha games. You're not going to dump me into a world I know absolutely nothing about, are you...?"
Toward the end, Mo Bai looked at the Goddess with growing apprehension.
"Heh heh~"
I have a bad feeling about this...
Seeing the Goddess's expression, Mo Bai could only sigh in resignation.
Getting to transmigrate with his current memories and body was already a stroke of good fortune, anyway.
"So... great nameless Goddess, do I get a cheat before my journey begins?"
Mo Bai discovered that he felt absolutely no embarrassment saying those words now.
Sure enough, dignity means nothing when you need a favor.
As for whether he would get a cheat?
There's already a goddess standing in front of me. If she hasn't even prepared a cheat for me, wouldn't that be pretty pathetic?
He had heard that anime gacha games these days routinely featured world-shattering destruction or apocalyptic scenes. Having something to defend himself with would be best.
"Of course you get a cheat. But I happen to enjoy dramatic developments, so..."
With that, the Goddess swept her hand, and an enormous prize wheel appeared beside her.
It bore many pictures. Mo Bai had watched plenty of anime, so he recognized almost all of them.
"Rasengan, Zanpakuto, Devil Fruits... there's this much good stuff?" Mo Bai was a little surprised.
"But what you actually get depends on your luck~ If you're unlucky enough to draw this one, don't expect any after-sales service from me~"
Mo Bai looked where the Goddess was pointing and saw a red bamboo booklet.
"The Great Thousand Record."
Cold sweat instantly broke out over him. He was just an ordinary person, after all. Drawing that ultimate self-mutilation tool would be no different from getting a "better luck next time."
"You really do whatever you feel like..." After muttering that complaint, Mo Bai stepped forward and placed his hand on the enormous wheel's pointer.
Ding-a-ling~
As Mo Bai set the enormous wheel spinning, a string of flashy sound effects rang out. While waiting for the result, he asked the Goddess one final question:
"Oh, right. At least tell me why I was the one who ended up here."
Although the Goddess looked innocent and adorable, Mo Bai actually felt deeply uncertain.
He didn't think he was lucky enough to be the one person out of over a billion who happened to win a free ticket to another world.
"There's no particular reason."
In response to Mo Bai's question, the Goddess merely toyed idly with her long hair.
"It's just so boring sitting in this pitch-black place every day, ferrying the souls of the dead along. So I send lost lambs like you to other worlds, hoping you'll come back after you die and tell me all about your interesting experiences there~"
Ding-a-ling!
Just as the Goddess finished speaking, the wheel's pointer landed on the cheat that would belong to Mo Bai.
Boom!
Before Mo Bai could even take a look, he felt the ground vanish beneath his feet, followed by a sudden sensation of weightlessness.
"Have a lovely trip~"
After the Goddess smiled and called down to the panicking Mo Bai as he fell through the air below, the space returned to pitch-black darkness.
Then she swept her hand, and all the other "cheat" icons fell off the wheel, leaving only the image engraved with the shadows of ten creatures.
[Ten Shadows Technique]
Looking at that image, she recalled the trace of anticipation and excitement Mo Bai had revealed earlier and couldn't help smiling.
"Mortals. So easy to figure out."
Before you continue