1 Good News and Bad News

If Kevin was being honest, the afterlife wasn't anything like what he'd expected. He'd never been one to discount any religion entirely, so there had been more than a few possibilities going through his mind as he bled out on the pavement after falling more than twenty stories. Heaven, Hell, reincarnation, the Underworld, etc. All of them seemed viable at that point.

The vast expanse of white he found himself in didn't surprise him, given his expectations. He was seated in a very comfortable chair, or at least it felt like he was. It was impossible for him to look down to confirm it, or move any part of his body at all. All he could do was stare straight ahead at the Being sitting behind the ornate wooden desk across from him.

It took the shape of a man in a black and white three piece suit, although that's as far as details went with it. Every inch of exposed "skin" was pure grey and lacked texture, and it lacked any facial features whatsoever. Really, its clothing and general form were the only things that made it vaguely resemble a human.

When it talked, its voice came from where its mouth should've been, which was more than slightly unnerving for the recently-deceased teenager.

"Hello, Kevin. Welcome to the space between life and death."

Kevin tried to reply to him, but his mouth and vocal cords were just as immobile as the rest of him.

"I apologize for the Neutralization Field that's currently immobilizing you, but it's not exactly something that I can turn off. It's a security measure put in place just in case the rare souls that pass through here decide to get…uncooperative. After the first ten incidents, the Big Man decided it was best to have it and not need it.

"Rest assured, though, that I will answer all of the questions you have. I'm nothing if not a good host to those who enter my domain, whether they deserve it or not."

'Well,' Kevin though, mentally preparing himself. 'It's not like I can do anything but listen.'

"First and foremost, yes you are dead," the Being stated, pulling a piece of paper up from the desk. "Cause of death: being pushed off of the twenty-second floor balcony of your hotel room by your older brother. You technically survived the fall, but died shortly after due to blood loss and internal organ failure. Your mother saw the whole thing, and now Jason is on the fast track to prison."

'Small victories,' Kevin internally mused. 'I died, and he gets to rot in a cell. Good riddance, you piece of trash.'

"Next, you must be wondering where you are. As is probably obvious by your less-than-alive state, this space is an afterlife; one of the many places the souls of the dead are sorted into upon passing on from the land of the living. As you may have noticed, however, it doesn't exactly match up to any that you might be familiar with.

"Well, the reason for that is simple. Every afterlife has specific criteria for making it in. These criteria include religion, moral alignment, childhood circumstances, genetic interference, etc. Depending on where a person falls in each category, they are ushered onto their eventual torment, paradise, or reincarnation. Are you following me?"

'Yeah,' Kevin thought, trying to nod his head on instinct.

"Good," the Being said, shuffling through the files on the desk before pulling another one out. "Now, you can think of this sphere of the afterlife as a type of 'Super Purgatory.' It exists specifically to house the souls of those who achieved the impossible: perfectly balancing their good and bad deeds to the point where eternal pleasure, eternal suffering, and rebirth were all unsuitable for them, while simultaneously not adhering to any specific religion. You, as you may have guessed, are one such soul."

Thinking over his seventeen years of life, the teenager could understand where the grey Being was coming from. He'd never strived to do good, but also never gone out of his way to make the world a worse place. Endeavoring to find an equilibrium had been a way for him to get through his day to day life.

"So, what do we do with these unique souls, you may ask? Why, we give them a taste of all three!"

'…I am suddenly terrified.'

"Through countless meetings and a little ingenuity, the Big Man let me put together a system for simultaneously rewarding a soul for their good deeds, punishing them for their sins, and giving them a new chance at life, all at the same time.

"I used to have three wheels I could spin to randomize your fate, but after a few years the randomness of it got boring, so now I hand pick the components depending on a specific theme I pull from the soul's life. Can you guess which one I picked for you?"

Kevin pondered on this for a few seconds. 'Video games? Anime? Junk food? Come on, don't leave me in suspense for too long.'

"Close, but no cigar," the Being shook its head, before turning the paper it was holding around to reveal a picture of a fire-breathing, winged reptile. "The theme I chose for you was 'Monsters.'"

'…this could either be amazing or terrible.'

"Your reward for all of the acts of kindness and charity in your past life will be the power to shapeshift into nine different creatures," it continued.

Silence hung in the air between them, as if it was waiting for Kevin's reaction.

'That sounds…cool?' he thought, and would've shrugged if he could. 'It all really depends on what these creatures are.'

"That, my client, is where it gets fun," the Being stated, an audible grin in its voice. "I took into account your passive interest in the Pokemon game series for this set of powers. Or, more specifically, your interest in a specific evolution line."

Excitement welled up in the teenager's heart. 'Please tell me this is going where I think it is!'

A quick shuffle of papers resulted in one with a set of nine images facing him. In the center of them all was a brown foxlike creature with hazel eyes, long ears that stood up, a cream colored ring of fluff around its neck, and a similarly colored tip to its tail. It was unmistakably an Eevee, the Evolution Pokemon, and it was surrounded by all eight of its evolutions.

"As you've guessed, the blessing I'm gifting to you is the power to shapeshift between the forms of Eevee and its evolutions. Not only that, but you'll be able to choose between a full transformation and a partial one every time you shift. I'll let you discover the full details of that on your own, though," the Being continued, setting the paper down.

"Additionally, each form will have full access to the elements they embody, with your base Eevee form having increased physical stats beyond what most humans could achieve in their lifetime. This is mainly in order to avoid having to give you a complicated System. It would just be annoying for everyone involved, you know?"

Kevin could completely understand. Keeping track of stats, skills, moves, etc. would probably drive him insane. Not to mention the min-maxing he'd likely drown himself in just to make sure that every aspect of his forms and abilities were perfect. He knew himself well enough, in that regard.

"The final part of your blessing is a little something to help you in conflicts," the Being stated, setting down his papers. "It's no secret that 99.9% of all universes follow the standard logic of Type Advantages. Fire beats Plant, Plant beats Water, and Water beats Fire in the typical manner. However, I'm allowing you to carry a bit of Pokemon logic over to the world I'm sending you to. Anyone who fights you will be classified under either one or two of the eighteen Pokemon Types, allowing you to gain an advantage where there normally wouldn't be one. It will be up to you to determine what categories your enemies fall into, though."

All of this was looking surprisingly good to Kevin; but, one thing he prided himself on in his previous life was that he wasn't stupid. Everything came with a price, and the Being giving him these gifts had plainly told him at the beginning that he was to receive both a gift and a punishment. He became slightly apprehensive as he waited for the other shoe to drop.

A chuckle came from the Being. "I see you're starting to catch on. The purpose of me giving you these powers is two-fold. Half of it is, as I stated before, a reward for all of the good you'd done throughout your life. The other half, on the other hand, is to counterbalance your punishment.

Funnily enough, your punishment coincides with the world I plan on sending you to for your reincarnation," it continued, once again picking up its stack of papers and sifting through it. "I had to think long and hard about what kind of world to send you to. There were ones where half-human creatures are hunted like animals, and/or are harvested for their body parts; a few where they are common, but ostracized for being different and subjected to wanton racism; and even one or two interesting ones where you would likely be kidnapped and kept as a pet until the end of your days."

If it was possible for Kevin to sweat, he would've been drenched at that point.

"Fortunately, I set all of those aside."

'Thank god!'

"Instead, I picked something much worse!"

'…fuck.'

"I took into consideration your personal trauma and aversion to physical contact, paired it with your near-self-destructive levels of sexual repression, and tied it all up with the depraved fetishes you've kept hidden in the darkest depths of your mind. With all of these being taken into account, only one world truly stood out to me."

Once again, it turned one of the papers in its stack around and revealed a picture. This one had two characters on it. One a short man, who looked like a kid, with purple hair, a red cape, and a sword that looked like an affront to nature. Beside him, a white haired woman with purple skin, tribal tattoos, and a long red snake tail in place of her legs.

"The section of the omniverse I'm sending you into is known to you in the context of the Japanese game called Monster Girl Quest."

'I…think I've heard of that before? Wasn't it an eroge?'

"Exactly!" the Being exclaimed with a little too much enthusiasm. "A world where three continents are inhabited by numerous races of Monster Girls, whose main goal in life is to find a human male to rape into submission, or devour them alive. Some exceptions do exist, but they are far and few between in the grand scheme of things. Not to mention the mixture of attractive and disturbing angels under the insane goddess, and you have a world that was not made for men to thrive!"

Kevin was now realizing why he was going to need all of the elemental control his different forms would provide him. Even the base Eevee form would be necessary for fighting off just the lower-level monster girls who would try to subjugate him. He found himself dreading the concept of traveling alone.

'Maybe I could find a reason to join up with whoever the main character is…' he thought.

"Oh! That reminds me," the Being cut in, interrupting his thoughts. "Luka isn't going to exist in the version of the world I'm sending you to. Him and his mother died while she was giving birth to him, so there is no half-angel hero to journey with Alice, defeat the four Heavenly Knights, and save the world. The protagonist of this world's story will be you."

'…I understood about half of that.'

"Don't worry about it."

'Easy for you to say.'

With another shuffling of files, the Being continued. "Now, the final order of business will be the supplies you will arrive in the new world with. I'm not so cruel as to send you into that meat grinder completely naked and defenseless, so you will be supplied with a few sets of basic clothes, a backpack, three days' worth of food rations and water, and a skinning knife."

'I'd complain about not having a weapon, but considering what I'm going to be capable of without one, that may be overkill.'

"I'm glad you see things my way," the Being stated, crossing its arms and leaning back. "With all of that settled, it's time for you to be on your way."

'One question before I go.'

"Hm? And what would it be?"

'Is this going to hurt?'

The air itself froze as a malicious, grinning mouth appeared on the Being's otherwise featureless face. "Oh, yes," it chuckled. "Like a bitch."

'…fuck.'

"Have fun. Try not to get raped."

Kevin vanished from his chair. Within milliseconds, he was gripped by the existential agony of having his soul disassembled, reassembled, and coated in a physical form that was familiar, yet foreign to him at the same time.

"I wonder if I should have told him about the extra "benefits" I gave him?" the Being asked nobody in particular as it leaned back in its chair. "Nah, he'll figure it out on his own."