Chapter 0: The voice and the afterlife

"Oh, I think I fell down the stairs and hit my head! Where am I?"

Something very bright shined behind Jiro's back, but he couldn't turn back.

"You are at the place you people call „the Afterlife"!"

The voice sounded really familiar, but he couldn't remember from where. He was so shocked that he didn't know what to say and then he heard it again.

"Now is the moment for you to decide. Do you want to be reborn in this world of bad people again or do you want to try your luck in some of the other universes?"

Jiro couldn't hear the things that the voice said, but started to ask the things he wanted to know.

"How is that possible, does that mean I died? What will happen with my family? Who will take care for them?"

The only answer was:

"Yes you are dead and the other things don't matter at the moment."

After that, the voice repeat the options but added:

"....you won't remember this decision after you are reborn."

Jiro froze again everything that happens at the moment felt like a dream. And then for some reason, a few specific memories started to come back. The moment he saw fights on the streets, the moments when he felt useless, and the moments in which he couldn't do anything. He fall to his knees and started crying. For some reason now of all times, he began to realize the world in which he lived was brutal and the normal person is powerless.

A few minutes after that he picked himself up and stood up. He just stared at one point and opened his mouth. At this moment he just forgot about his family and the people he loved. He gave his offer to the voice behind his back:

"I will go back to my universe, only if you grant me one wish now."

The voice couldn't believe the things it felt. It wasn't the first time someone want to negotiate with him, but it was the first time he felt like he didn't know what the person in front of him will want, so he answered:

"I will grant you a wish but it won't be for free, if you agree to my condition I will do it."

Jiro just said"

"I'm fine with everything. I want something unnatural. I want the power to have the rights of a god, I want to decide who will die and how."

"Fine, but then there will be three conditions. First, you will have to give a reason why the person must die. Second, you won't remember until something provokes the desire to kill so strongly, that you will remember this moment. Third, if you don't have a strong desire to kill until you become 21 you will die and your soul will become mine which includes every one of your existence until now, but if you feel this desire until then you will live all your life, and then your existence will be 100% deleted from this world. If you really are okay with that just say "yes" if you aren't just say that you want one normal life again or want to be reborn in another world."

Jiro was speechless. If the voice didn't lie this means he was here in the past. It means he was reborn and reborn and reborn, again and again, and again. That scared him. Now he started to remember from where he knew the voice. It was the same voice he heard when he was there all the times. Then the voice said:

"If you don't decide in the next 10 seconds you will be just a normal person."

A timer appeared in front of him

10

9

8

7

6

"Fine"

5

4

3

"I agree with your conditions."

2

1

0

....

That is the way this new child was born. At the whim of fate or god, his name was Jiro.