Meeting in the void

In the vast expanse of darkness, a soul found itself floating aimlessly. He didn't know where he was nor did he know how long he had been floating in this endless abyss of nothingness.

"Hello! anyone listening? I know you are watching me, so can you please come out now? It's getting really spooky out here" Suddenly the soul shouted in a random direction, to no one in particular.

"Congratulations! You have ascended to a previously unattainable level of consciousness for any mortal, for you have attained enlightenment" The next moment he heard a booming sound accompanied by a blinding light.

The soul instinctively turned towards the only source of light, and as he did that, he saw an old man wearing a white pristine robe emerging out of nowhere, as if tearing a hole through this vast cage of nothingness.

"Nah, it's just a common troupe in those cliché fanfics. That's why I knew it" The soul tried to act nonchalant about it. Alas, he couldn't contain the pride from oozing out in his voice.

"Did you really take that seriously…?" the rob asked him rhetorically in the most deadpan voice the soul had ever heard.

"Urggg…" The poor soul couldn't take the damage and fell on his knees, puking blood as a depressing aura covered him.

The rob saw him, but he just shook his head helplessly.

Anyhow, the next moment the aura surrounding the old man changed and the void started shaking, the soul lifted himself as he gazed the the surreal phenomena with curiosity and caution.

The rob noticed the cautiousness of the soul and chuckled, he then explained "Don't worry. I am just changing the meeting place for what is about to happen next. It's quite boring here right?"

With that, the old man raised his left hand and snapped his fingers, and the abyss was enveloped by a blinding flash. The next thing anyone knew, they were in a stunning and divine garden with no ends in sight.

The soul took a moment to observe the most beautiful garden ever, the grass soft as cotton, the flowers glowing with an ethereal glow, and the trees so massive that they had no crown in sight.

The air was like an elixir, capable of curing any disease with just a single whiff. He greedily inhaled a few times whilst his eyes tried to capture every corner of this magical garden.

Only after a while, did his eyes land on the old man, sitting on a simple chair, whiter than the purest of marbles. His hands rested on the table as he stared back at the soul with an amused smile.

"Take a seat! Take a seat! I don't have all day" The old man gestured for the soul to sit down on the chair, present on the other side of the table.

After he sat down, the old man started speaking "As you may have already guessed, yes I am ROB, and yes I am going to reincarnate you in a new world with your memories intact. Any questions?"

"...Wh…"

The soul opened his mouth to speak, but he was cut off immediately "Oh! And the world will be Highschool DxD"

"Don't wanna!" The soul rejected it without any hesitation.

'No way in hell I am gonna live in a world filled with beings that can wipe out humans with their fart…' he thought. If anything, throw me in a relatively safe, slice-of-life world.

As the old man heard him, he lowered his head and assumed a thinking pose. He started murmuring in a hushed tone as a smile returned to his old, wrinkled face.

"Hmm…I wonder if I should send you in front of Douma as a pregnant woman, or transmigrate you as Antigonus, throw you in Warhammer 40K, respawn you on Darkseid's planet…Or…" The more he spoke, the creepier his smile became until finally, he lifted his head to meet the poor soul's gaze as he wriggled his eyebrows perversely and said "....Or I should send you to mate with the all-mother from the Cthulhu mythos"

The poor soul imagined for a moment about him and that Thot mating…

Shudder

He involuntarily shook his head to keep those horrifying thoughts away from his head. The old man leaned forward, waiting for my answer with an ear-splitting grin on his face.

"Of course not! How can I, a mere mortal dare to defy Your Highness! O' Great Lord! Forgive this ignorant one for overstepping his bounds! This lowly one shall follow his will without fail!" He jumped from his seat and fell on his knees while bowing, performing a dogeza as his forehead was practically touching the ground.

"You don't wish to mate with her?" the old man tilted his head sideways, expressing his confusion, all the while the soul was perspiring buckets of spiritual sweat.

"No way! I may be a virgin, but even I am not freakin' dehydrated…!!" 

"Hahaha…." The old man burst out laughing, almost falling from his chair.

phew~

The mortal heaved a sigh of relief.

Afterward, when he finally stopped laughing, he said seriously "Okay! Okay! We've already wasted quite a lot of time. So let's finally get to business, shall we?"

The mortal also straightened his back as he sat properly "I will transmigrate you into the world of Highschool DxD with three wishes, in return I get to see your suff– I mean, your journey. Deal"

The old man extended his right arm for a handshake, and the soul stared at his hands for a moment before ultimately shaking hands.

"Great! Now hurry up and start choosing your wishes. Of course, no OP wishes as it would make the story boring"

"Hmm…." The soul thought for some time, pondering over his choices as he cannot simply choose something broken like 'THE ABSOLUTE'.

After some time he finally decided "For my first wish, I want a spiritual core that is– 

1.) Indestructible, inimitable, and indelible

2.) capable of producing all different forms of energy like– mana, chakra, spiritual pressure, etc…

3.) Grants nigh-perfect mana/energy control"

"...Basically you wish to be Ichigo Kurosaki with Six-eyes on steroids….Smart. But you'll get a nerfed variation of it. The core can only produce something that already exists in the world of Highschool DxD or something extremely similar. Also, you will have to get hit by said energy, at least once to start producing it within your SC. Next!" The ROB explained.

"… you just want to see people suffer" the soul muttered. At that, the old man's smile turned into a grin and he eagerly nodded his head. "Devil"

But then thinking about it, the world of highschool DxD sure has a lot of different types of energy—like…

Demonic energy of the devils,

Draconic energy of the dragons,

Holy and light energy from the angels and fallen angels

Natural energy from the youkai

Divinity from the gods and…. And other types of magic like mana, used by humans, Norse magic, fairy magic, etc.

Yeah, I guess it isn't that much of a nerf then. so…

I shrugged my shoulders, accepting it without causing too much trouble. Who knows when he might lose interest in me and wipe me out without even lifting a finger…

"Then my second wish is to have the MC starter pack, which includes

1 ) Heaven-defying talent—- everything new that I try amidst a life-and-death battle will always succeed, No matter how low the chances of success are. And casually breaking the old laws like walking in a park.

2 ) plot armor thicker than Rin Tohsaka's thighs— chances of dying in a fight are less than that one germ left alive after washing hands. And getting random enlightenment on the verge of death is a given

3 ) Lady Luck's favorite— chances of 'fated encounters' happening are very high. Casually finding heaven's treasure like a pebble on the roadside.

And about the third wish…. I want to have one favor from you at any point in my life"

"Pretty dumb 2nd wish honestly…" The ROB closed his eyes and said "The moment I chose you out of countless others, you automatically became a protagonist y'know"

"As for the third wish…" His eyes snapped open as he peered into my soul"…. you do realize that a favor from me is very very very...…very op right?"

He didn't reply, clearly knowing that he was pushing his past luck. But then the ROB smiled and said "Sure… considering your second wish is basically useless, I suppose I can do that. But I won't do anything too drastic like changing the world to fit you however"

He nodded. That was already pushing it too far, and knowing nothing good comes of excessive greed, The soul chose to remain silent.

"OKAY!! Now before I throw you out, do you have anything you wish to ask me?"

"Actually yeah, why did you even reincarnate people? If you really wish to see my journey– as you said, then can't you see it with your omnipotence?" He asked

"Hmmm… How should I explain it…. Ah! Got it..!" The ROb seemed as if he had gained enlightenment in that moment, Despite how ironic it sounded "Watching the future is like reading a manga, but when I sent you there, it's like an anime adaptation..Does that make sense?"

"Although I want to ask, Why bother when you can just go to the future and then see it in 'Anime adaptation' and that does time even matter to you? But I will refrain from asking them as it neither concerns nor interests me. Instead, why did you choose me" The soul tilted his head.

He didn't get his answer immediately, instead, the ROB gazed past him, looking at the air in blank space "Klein Scardon— when you were fifteen, you killed a pregnant mother. When you killed her she was six months into her pregnancy. What did you feel when you died your hands with the blood of the pregnant mother and the unborn child"

"Woah…! Where did that come from?" The Soul– or now named Klein recoiled back at the unexpected question.

"Just answer me"

"Hmmm…. If I remember correctly, she was the wife of one of the opposition leaders. I was ordered to kill her, she wasn't actually the target though. The target was her husband, My orders were to kill his wife and frame fake evidence of her being killed by his own party. Use his vulnerability to fuel his hatred and change his alliance.

About what I felt– Nothing. It was just another mission I was assigned to complete, and I just did that" The soul replied, his initial cheerful mask faded as it was replaced by a blank–expressionless face.

"Why did you kill the child then? What was its fault? What evil did such a pure being do that rewarded it with such harsh punishment?" The Old pressed further, his face mirroring the mortal in front of him. 

Despite discussing such a heavy topic, there was no tension in the air. How can tension even exist in the first place? Tension only exists between two people with relatively equal power.

Here, it was no such thing, one person was a simple mortal, while the other person was an Omnipotent being, capable of doing everything that a human mind can or cannot imagine.

Furthermore, An oppressive aura surrounded the entirety of the garden.

The leaves wilted, flowers withered and tree trunks snapped like a dry twig. Strangely, Klein was the only one unaffected by the aura of dominance. Clearly, the ROB was warning him to answer honestly.

"How can a parasitic aggregation of cells be classified as pure or impure?" Klein didn't answer the ROB's question, instead, he asked a question of his own. 

If you replace the mortal–klien with any sane human, they would be groveling on the ground begging for mercy. In fact, asking a question would be the last thing on their mind.

But was Klein sane? No! 

Did Klien know that he was walking on the edge of a sharp knife? Definitely! But he was far too curious and far too gone to return. So, despite the oppressive force surrounding him, Klein leaned in his seat to make himself even more comfortable. 

He knew that if the person in front of him wished to kill him, he would die. It was a simple, undeniable fate. So why not make yourself comfortable on your death chair? 

Now all that's left is to find out whether history will repeat itself, only this time a human will die instead of a cat.

"Hah….Haha….Hahahaha…" However, contrary to Klien's expectation, the ROB chuckled, which soon turned into full-blown laughter, this time louder than the previous one.

When he finally finished laughing, he wiped the tears from his eyes and said with a smile "There you go! You already have your answer… If a 'good person' were to be put in your shoes, they would've tried to deny it, they would've had numerous sleepless nights until finally, they found someone to blame or the Famous 'It was for the greater good'...

If someone 'evil' were to take your place they would've rejoiced, laughed in joy, etc, etc..In both cases, their journey would've been a monotone."

"…Umm… I don't understand" Klien asked, clearly confused by ROB's answer.

"Sigh~… think it like this, if I choose to reincarnate an extraordinary individual like Arthur Pendragon, then what do you think will happen?" the ROB continued without giving Klien any chance to respond "It will be utterly boring. Do you know why?.... Because no matter what happens, he will always follow the path of honor and justice.

But someone like you on the other hand has infinite paths to choose from, like they can choose the evil MC route or maybe to good ol'conquering the world route or maybe even the harem route…"

The ROB was looking at the space ahead of him, like even now, he could see all these things playing out in front of him. "…But that isn't the end y'know! You see, even the MC has tens of hundreds of women in his harem, let's say even if one dies, then…

*BOOOOOM

Our happy-go-lucky protagonist turns into the end-game boss villain. And now it's time for the new protagonist to rise from the ashes! Then we follow his journey as he, along with the ex-wives of our ex-protagonist tries to defeat the protagonist turned antagonist and save the world!

Will they succeed? Will they fail? Or will they succeed in slaying the evil but nothing remains?

So many possibilities! So many outcomes! Doesn't that make you excited!? Doesn't that make you wish to just sit down and keep watching?!!" the more he said, the more his expression changed.

His breathing slowly became ragged, his palms sweating, along with a pronounced blush on his face. Until he intertwined both his hands with his body, practically hugging himself. Everything showed his excitement and arousal.

All of these expressions weren't particularly disturbing. Not for someone like Klien, who has seen it countless times in his vast yet rather short life.

But somehow these signs of excitement on his old and wrinkled face made even him more uncomfortable than had ever been in his life.

It didn't help when he realized that he was the cause of ROB's sudden arousal, albeit indirectly. This reveal left him squirming uncomfortably in his seat.

Still, he asked a final question "Doesn't that make you evil as well?"

ROB looked at him with an unreadable expression, as he monotonously said "Are you really insinuating me white using the scale created by humans to judge humans"

'Well…if you put it like that, It does sound stupid' Klien thought

The ROB must have guessed what he was thinking, as he waved his hand dismissively "Forget it. You won't understand"

"Thank god I won't understand you" Klien, for the first time, thanked every single god in existence for his lack of understanding. Quite ironic, since he was sitting in front of The GOD.

"OK! Enough time wasted. Now off you go!" and with those words, Klien's eyes started getting heavier, the last thing he saw and heard was "Be sure to entertain me little man!!" the ROB waving his arm excitedly with the same horror-inducing lecherous smile

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