"It's almost impossible to experience Joy when you're a ghost. You don't really have a brain, so everything can be kind of unbelievably depressing."
"However, there are a few ways to have fun. You can risk your unlucky soul on the line for weapons and traits in the afterlife. You can absorb other souls which include, wisps, banshees, demon kin. You can even stay at home all day and stare at the television in your personal safe space."
"When I died, I think I had been named George, and my girlfriend killed me because I found out she robbed a bank, but I wasn't too upset at it anymore. It been a hundred years, and I still didn't get to see Yama yet. Something about there being trillions of people that die in the universe."
"When you died, they gave you a room that you could design with your spectral body. My room had a television, and a bed where I just floated at night when it got dark, wherever I was."
"And… and now… now it was morning again. Day 365,922 since I'd been waiting my turn to talk to Yama in the Underworld. It wasn't too bad. There was a rerun that I'd watched 5096 times, and I was probably going to watch it 5097 times."
Knock! Knock!
"Get out, Number 100,666,337,444! Ugh, what's your name… Harvard. Yama is ready to see you now!" A dull sounding voice woke 'George' up from his sleep, but he figured out he was named Harvard pretty quickly. "You qualified for the universe expansion pack! Hurry up! I have 500,000 people to work with today! Get the hell out here!"
'It's my time finally?' George sort of floated over to the door. He could feel the space around him, and sort of used his mind to move his floating spectral body. He knew he used to have scruffy brown hair that his girlfriend shot hit through, but now he sort of was just a gray mass of energy, so it was pretty easy to move fast. He floated through the doorway and out into the underworld.
'Wow, so this is the underworld. I-I see why it took so long for them to call me,' Harvard slowly tilted his spectral head up and down. He had 'vision' of sort, but he could also see behind him and in front of him. Of course, he looked like every other ghost besides for an orange bandana he had around his neck. He had won it after calling during commercials 1,000,560 times. He heard it was a special, but mostly wore it because it kept him warm at night and made him feel like he had a family.
"You-you're in luck," A voice entered Harvard's ears. A small man in a striped uniform gently whispered at him. "You qualified for the beta of the Universe Expansion Pack. Aren't you excited?"
'Excited? What should I be excited about,' Harvard looked around. There were billions of stacked boxes in every direction with millions of ghosts being escorted on a long line further into the netherworld. 'How special can I be? There are trillions of other ghosts that came here every day.' He thought, before he replied, "I'm excited!"
"Good, Yama will see you now. You can skip the line. It would've been another thousand years wait. Follow me."
Harvard let out a deep sigh of relief and followed the man in uniform and observed his body. He looked like an ogre of some sort, well, maybe a disgusting human being would be a nice way of putting it. He had large muscles, but a face that would scare a little girl to death and her mother at the same time. Besides for his sort of chubby body, though, he seemed pretty nice.
Harvard turned and looked at the line. A few million ghosts of different sizes seemed to have formed the body of a snake that extended into the horizon. Thank god he didn't have to wait on that.
A few seemed to be unable to bear watching him walk passed.
"You-you should burn in hell!" One screamed, but Harvard ignored it. He just kept following the child-killing-ugly ogre further and further down the long path. Eventually, a golden palace appeared and he got invited inside. After walking through a long corridor, he found a beautiful woman studying a large book. He expected King Yama to be a man, but he didn't mind seeing a girl for the first time in 100 years She had a beautiful body with large mounds and a butt the size of a mountain. He tried to look up to see what color her eyes were, but it got blurry past her breasts.
"Harvard George." And that explained why he thought his name was George, King Yama stood up and leaned down to look into his eyes. "Died by his girlfriend via gunshot wound to the temple. Worked as a lawyer for 10 years, and saved dozens of innocent criminals. You also set the record for the most calls in during commercial breaks during Star Night Awakening. It's why you earned that beautiful orange bandana that you have tied around your little neck."
"I-I'm honored to meet you. I salute your work!" Harvard learned to flatter people to get what he wanted at a young age, but also had his entire fate at stake so he tried to put on max level charm. "You make me smile just by being in your presence! EVery part of you is shaped perfectly! Absolutely top quality! Mmmm! So good to see you!"
"Nice to meet you too, Harvard," King Yama laughed and picked him up with her finger. "It's a honor to offer you a chance to enter into the phantom universe! I've been designing a new universe expansion pack and I'm so damn excited you qualified for the Beta test!"
"The what?" Harvard thought she might offer him a reincarnation, or something like in most webnovels. What the hell was a universe expansion pack. "I-I'm sorry. I've been in a small dark and cramped room for a hundred years. What's a universe expansion pack?"
"The universe expansion pack allows you to fight for rewards that include reincarnation, divine abilities, and cultivate your little soul in a battle for the universe!"
King Yama cleared her throat and gently put Harvard on her desk. Looking forward, her mounds shook like two large mountains as she spoke. King Yama really had an endless amount of beauty, he joked to himself before she continued speaking. "You are one of the first trillion to be able to enter into the expanded universe! 1500 new planets have been created in the extended netherworld that I spent hundreds of years designing tirelessly."
"However, you don't get to be just any normal ghost that enters into the new endless horizon! You are one of the ten million that earned a bandana! Your bandana will provide you with one random ability and give you feedback. Some people call this a system, but I like to call it a leg up you earned after calling on so many commercial breaks."
"I see…" Harvard nodded his head. "So this extended universe is a new part of the universe you made so us ghosts can fight it out right? What happens if I lose?"
"I don't know yet. You'll probably disappear and be swallowed by the void for all eternity. However, don't worry. I'm confident in you Harvard! I have the utmost faith you'll claim one of the 1,500 planets and make your way to the highest peak level in this new universe! Woohoo! YOu ready?!"
"Disappear… Void… Eternity," Harvard wanted to smack himself in the face, but he sort of lacked an arm. "I-I see. Are there any other options?"
"Oh, calm down, Harvard. I make the decisions in the underworld. You do what I say or I make you suffer for all eternity. I know you came from Earth, and were an expert at litigation and saved many people with your cogent arguments. However, right now, I'm opening a door to becoming the second most powerful being in the universe. You either take it or burn in hell for all eternity."
"I'll take option one, but please at least put me in an easy starter location. This is a world based on a video game right? Can you give me a place with easy quests and lots of hot babe NPCS?"
"You're asking for too much. You should've kept your damn mouth shut Harvard," King Yama sounded so terrifying he felt his soul shake, and he instantly regretted mentioning an easy starting location. "Now, your new life is loading. Please enjoy the new world you're entering."
If you enjoy this story, please support with votes or comments :D. Thanks for joining Harvard on the journey once in a second life time!