The Chosen Ones

"Don't you feel right, baby~~!" The two sang in sync and badly out of tune while bobbing their heads up and down.

"This is a real banger song, John." The passenger said while still bobbing his head in the rhythm of the song.

"Why else would I put it on Lucas?" John said, still looking at the road while driving.

Luckily, they were inside John's car and couldn't be heard by outsiders. Though that didn't matter as they were driving down the road sandwiched between a forest on a highway.

"Hail, oh yeah~~!" Their voices continued. The song boomed at max volume.

John tapped his hand against the wheel while Lucas on the side tapped his foot to the beat.

"Get it from the main vine, all right~~!"

"I said-a find it, find it~~!"

"Go on and love it if you like it, yeah~~!"

"Hail~~!"

"It's your business if you want some, take some~~!"

"Get it together baby~~!"

"Come and get you lovaaahAAAAAA!"

Just when they were about to crash into a fallen tree on the road, time froze…

…

All the momentum stopped and they were left in a frozen environment covered in silence. Yet despite the frozen time, the two could move fine.

John looked through the window next to him and said in confusion, "What— just happened?"

Lucas turned to look at his friend. "I— have no idea." He felt his adrenaline pumping through his body because of the shock from the event that almost took place.

While both of them were in a crisis of shock they heard a voice, "Mortal, you have been chosen. Ready yourself."

The world around the car began to warp and soon everything outside turned black, yet strangely was perfectly visible.

"Nope, this is way too creepy for me." Lucas muttered with a pale face and gawked at the outside through the door window.

John didn't say anything and just looked at his scared friend in the passenger seat.

He was gazing upwards with a starstruck face. John turned his eyes to see what his friend was so starstruck by. Looking up he now understood why, the two gazed upwards until Lucas broke the silence-

"Woaw."

The sky that was blue a minute ago was now filled with countless stars, way more than the night sky on earth. All are colored differently, purple, yellow, red, and more.

It was almost blinding, even more so when the stars began to glow stronger, which painted the place with a heap of colors.

"That's it, I'm convinced, we're in purgatory." Lucas sounded dejected. "We're dead."

"Relax, if we were dead I would be in heaven right now not in purgatory with you. And I doubt you would be in heaven though so we are not dead, yet."

Lucas calmed down a bit after hearing his friend's joke, ignoring the last part, but gave him an 'are-you-serious' look, but remained cautious of the situation.

John slowly opened the door and tested the ground by placing his foot out.

"Well, it's solid." He put pressure on the ground, to test the theory, and felt resistance.

"Hmm, seems like I made a mistake, there was only supposed to be one!" The voice boomed all across the blank space. "Well as it turned out like this, both of you are chosen ones!"

"What was that sound?"

"Don't know, but look over there." Lucas pointed at a figure in the distance who was getting closer to them.

It had the look of an old man with a white beard and shaggy long hair.

John stepped out of the car to look at the figure approaching them,

"It's better to leave the car, It'd be easier to run in case something happens." John said to his friend who was sitting in the passenger seat. He nodded and stepped out. "Have you tried turning on the ignition?"

"I did, nothing worked. The key wouldn't even turn."

"Damn it. Then the best looking option right now is to run."

"No need to fear chosen one or should I say chosen ones, I mean no harm, and if you were to leave this place you would be lost in the void." The voice said again.

"Chosen one? Is this supposed to be Star Wars or something? " John said to his friend.

"Good reference, but I don't think that's what he means." Lucas said. "But still, where are we?"

Panic was still eminent on his face but not as much. He briefly considered if he should open the trunk and arm himself with whatever he could find. But then remembered that it wasn't his car and that his friend had nothing back there.

Meanwhile, John felt indifferent. Unlike his friend, he was more confused than scared of the situation. Yet he was feeling a sense of familiarity in their situation.

"Indeed that's not what I mean. You two are currently in my domain where everything exists yet nothing exists." The figure was now close enough for them to see that it was the one speaking.

"Your domain? So it's like your home?" Lucas asked.

"Correct, however you were not brought here for me to show off my domain, simply put: you have another reason. Now tell me, do you know of the multiverse?" The old man asked.

"I mean, I've heard of it." Lucas stated and continued to explain. "It's that there could exist multiple worlds similar to ours yet not the same."

"It is because of this that you were brought here though it was only supposed to be one of you." The old man said as he was scratching his beard.

"What do you mean by 'one of you'? John asked with confusion

"There was only supposed to be one, chosen one but I made a mistake so instead of one there are two chosen ones now." He answered.

"Okay, but who was the original chosen one?" This time John was more curious.

"It was originally supposed to be you but as you were about to die I took you here but I didn't realize you had a friend with you. So I decided two is better than one so why not." The old man spoke and looked at Lucas.

"Wait, doesn't that mean I'm just a side character!?" Lucas exclaimed.

"No, more like a secondary main character." His friend spoke his thoughts.

"That's good, at least the plot armor might serve me well. I better not be one of those secondary main characters who dies to motivate the other main character." Lucas spoke, feeling slightly better. Still, it felt sour to have been brought here out of luck.

"Don't worry if you die I will dedicate a few years of my time to get stronger for your sake." John said with a teasing smile on his face.

"Ah yes, I feel so much better." He spoke sarcastically.

"Still, we don't know why we're here. Though I'm not complaining considering we were about to die." John said to the old man, who now was only standing a couple of feet in front of them and the car.

"*Ahem* If I may continue." Faking a cough, the old man succeeds in grabbing their attention.

The old man looked at the two with a smile as the two had great chemistry together. He clapped his hands to get back to the matter at hand.

"Moving on, the reason you are here is becau—" The old man tried to continue but was interrupted again.

"Let me guess reincarnation?" John asked with confidence as he interrupted the old man mid-sentence. After all, he was an expert in this particular area.

"Shut uuuup, the odds of that are almost im—"

"Uhm…that is precisely correct." The old man looked to be caught off guard.

"Are you actually serious?" Lucas looked at the two with a deadpan face. What was this, a weebs dream come true? But then he realized something else. "Holy fuck, I'm actually a side character."

"I'm literally Sasuke and you're Naruto, god dammit! But, hopefully I'm at least more relevant than Sakura." Lucas called out, receiving a pat on the back from the old man.

John's mind was in a state of crisis. This was his moment, he had been preparing himself for this ever since he started reading novels. He was so caught up in this moment he couldn't hear his friend comparing them with Sasuke and Naruto.

"Don't look so smug!" Lucas looked at John who wore a giddy expression, like a child at Gamestop.

"Can I finish talking?" The old man said annoyed after getting ignored by the two.

"No, shut up, old man. Why the heck wasn't I chosen!" The mistakenly taken friend shouted and pointed at John. "Why can't he be Sasuke!"

"Well, he can be. That's the whole point of why you're here." The old man explained.

"Be kind to our god." John said while on his knees giving praises to the old man.

"You were an atheist before, and it took one old man with dementia to change that."

"This is dragging on for too long. I will give you one wish each and one wish together seeing as originally only one of you was supposed to have three." The old man elaborated.

"What's with the united wish? Are there any limits or rules to these wishes?" Lucas asked the old man who John was still on his knees praising.

"Oh, holy god. Thank you for your eternal kindness." Murmured John like a chant.

"No problem my child. But please refrain from praising for a moment and hear me out.

John listened and stood up like a soldier listening to his sergeant.

Lucas gave his friend a glance of pity.

"Now, to your question, the united wish is for both of you to choose a world together while the personal one is the person of choice you wish to become, it can be a fictional one from a movie or anime. But you can't reincarnate to the world you came from. And the rules to your own wishes are as follows: No wishing to be or be higher than god. Your wishes can't contradict each other and lastly your wishes can only involve yourselves." After giving such a lengthy explanation he looked at the two.

"Where in the timeline will we get reincarnated to?" John asked with a thinking face as he was overflowing with ideas of worlds to reincarnate to.

The old man smiled, "Where in the timeline depends on which world you would choose. However It'll likely be before any massive events happen in the world, so as to let you get used to your new lives."

"What about the exact place in the world, do we get to choose that?" Lucas asked. If he lacked the plot armor needed to survive, then he would sure as hell be stuck by someone who had it. He glanced at John.

"Because of the unusual scenario of you two being here, you'd both be reincarnated close to each other as a by-product of that." The old man answered.

"Good," Lucas sighs in relief.

"Can't get rid of me that easily," John said and bumped shoulders against Lucas.

"Wasn't planning on it!" Lucas replied.

"So, are you finished, can we pick a world now?"

"Of course, and take your time. Once you have your wishes sorted out I'll listen to them." Then the old man closed his eyes and waited patiently for them to decide.

With that said, there was a pause as the two friends contemplated how to start. It was John who first sat down on the hood of the car and crossed his arm.

"I've got 10 worlds in mind, and a couple of wishes." He started with a confident smile.

"You're hopeless. But so am I if I don't make a good wish."

"Let's start with the world. It'd be easier to base our personal wishes on that."

"Yeah I agree. We could always go somewhere calm, like Horimiya."

Of course, naturally, Lucas knew it was hopeless. He knew that John would never go with something that simple, and judging from the look on his friend's face, one of disappointment, Lucas had to retract his statement.

"Why? Why would you pick that? It's like NASA offering you a free trip to space, only to reject it for one of those children rocket rides at the mall."

"Yeah, except the rocket has a 80% chance to blow up in our face." Lucas started and continued, "And don't you say that we should reincarnate into Naruto."

"Why not? If I pick someone like Superman no one would be able to stop me." John said with a smile

"What would you even do as Superman in a world full of ninjas?"

"Dunno, but still. C'mon, don't you want to be a shinobi?" John said with puppy eyes.

"Can't we go somewhere more calm, seriously. Our lives depend on this." Lucas' eyes went serious and he leaned against the side of the car.

"I know, I know. But I have an idea for a compromise of sorts."

"A compromise you say?"

"You want a way to have a calm and relaxing life, yeah? And I want action and cool fights. Then I see a couple of options. We could go with Mob Psycho, Index or My Hero." John raised his suggestions.

"You're on point about wanting to have it chill. And all of them do sound good." However, out of all of them, My Hero Academia suited his tastes much more. "So out of those choices, my pick would be My Hero."

John smiled and rubbed his hands together, "Good, then onto the personal wishes. I have a couple in mind. I would either go with Goku, Madara, Flash, Saitama, Scarlet witch's power or Hulk." John said as mumbled up a mess of characters he'd wish to be.

"Mhm! There are so many choices to choose from. Can you help me, Lucas?" John said as he scratched his head as he couldn't decide.

Lucas on the other hand just looked at him.

"Pick anything, but I swear if you go with Madara I will pick Naruto, just to spite you." But Lucas shook his head at the idea. "Nah, I'll go with Gojo from Jujutsu Kaisen. Can't go wrong with the strongest. Did you hear that old man?"

The old man nodded at him.

"Now that you mention it, I kinda want to pick Madara. Just imagine Chakra vs Cursed Energy… okay I have decided. I choose Madara Uchiha"

"Good. I've heard your wishes and the determination each of you holds. Now I shall begin the reincarnation process." The old man held his palm to the sky and muttered something.

The stars above them began to pulsate as the world itself was beginning to fade to white. Before it would all disappear Lucas had one last question,

"Hey, old man, what are we supposed to do as the chosen ones?"

The old man scratches his chin with a sheepish look, one unfitting of a god, "Oh, I forgot about that part."

"Damn you, you demented old man!"

And so, everything in front of them faded to white as they would start a new life in another world— from zero.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This was the first chapter of this story, let me know what you think of it. Next chapter will be released tomarrow. Thank you for reading!