I have a boring job.
Think about it.. death is an absolute and it doesn't make mistakes, right?
Now imagine your job for all of eternity has been fixing the mistakes that death makes. You starting to see my problem? I sit around and do nothing all day everyday babysitting what humanity calls the Grim Reaper. I'm sure you've heard of him. The mythical being shrouded in a pitch black cloak with a scythe that comes to come collect your soul when you die. Everyone fears him. I mean who wouldn't fear death. However, all the myths, and legends, and common ideas of the Grim Reaper are.....well wrong.
First off, there isn't just one Grim Reaper, the Underworld isn't into abusing it's workers with that much overtime. It would be illogical and impractical to only have one Grim Reaper dealing with the thousands of deaths a day, right? Unless of course, the big bosses of the Underworld wanted to work Death to well death, which we don't especially after that whole mess with some guy named Lazarus.
So, there are actually thousands of Grim Reapers that float around among today's modern society. Apparently, dealing with around 10 souls a day per reaper is much better for facilitating the desired 9-5 workplace atmosphere that the higher ups are going for. You'd think with that many of them there would be something for me to do? But no! All the converted ones are too busy moping around and the created ones are perfect and emotionless freaks to begin with.
Ah, wait, let me back up and explain.
There are also two kinds of Grim Reapers, the created and the converted. The stronger of the two being the created one since there job takes a little more man power.
Created Reapers are strange beings that suddenly come into existence one day, which is absolutely awful for me because they always appear in the worst places at the worst time. In the shower? Boom! There's number 12,347 making it's appearance for the first time in this strange new world. How am I supposed to be their boss and have their respect when the first thing they see upon their creation is me singing Taylor Swift in the shower? Not that I don't love me some T-Swizzle, but I haven't even been able to use the bathroom or bathe in peace for centuries.
Anyway, they have the purpose of collecting the souls of deities and gods when they fall from power. As such, the number of Created stays at a one-to-one ratio with the number of higher beings. In simple words, the best way to describe a Created Reaper would be to view it as an over powered babysitter. You can't really kill a god, and they're a royal pain in the ass to deal with when people stop worshipping them. So, throw a Created Reaper at them to deal with their mood swings and keep them in check, so we don't get things like the Dust Bowl again....that was one pissed off wind deity if I've ever seen one. Keep them entertained for a few millennium, and they either decide to return to the void of cosmic power or people start to worship them again under a new name. It's a pretty simple cycle that can be rather entertaining to watch should you ever need some good ole fashion Underworld Reality TV.
Created Reapers have it simple: here's a forgotten powerful toddler make sure it doesn't break anything. Converted Reapers on the other hand really pulled the short stick. They're the ones that you're all familiar with. The dark gloomy being that wonders the mortal world collecting souls and what not. What we don't realize is that Converted Reapers were once humans. Humans that took their own lives to be exact.
Around the second or third millennium, the Almighty Supreme Overlord of the Underworld, I call him Steve cause his title is a pain and it annoys him, realized that his eternal punishments had no effect on those that had ended their own life. The majority of them ended up tormenting themselves anyway because they regretted their actions and just wanted to go back to the mortal world, which was why Steve didn't notice for so long. Anyway, Steve, being the sadist that he is, decided to grant their wish..... kind of.
Every human that had died of their own accord was to be given the duty of being a Converted Reaper. They were once again granted the ability to go to the human world. However, sadist Steve made it so they didn't have the ability to actually be a part and have an leave an impression on said world. All they could do was watch the world that they yearned to return to without having the ability to effect it. You've probably seen a Converted Reaper at some point in your life. Of course, you wouldn't remember them since they have been sentenced to wonder the world collecting souls without the ability to ever be remembered. I do have to say that Steve really came up with a twisted punishment, didn't he?
Steve did leave them with a small glimmer of hope though. Ever Converted Reaper has the ability to return to the human world if they are able to leave a lasting impression on someone. Cruel, isn't it? Do the one thing that you don't have the ability to do. At first, this was rather entertaining for me since the first batch of Converted made complete fools of themselves. They got sent to the mortal world, and they were so busy jumping and dancing around trying to be remembered by someone that the population of the world skyrocketed. That was the first time I actually got to do something in my career. I got yell at a whole bunch of hopeful souls because they kept forgetting to do their jobs. I'll say that it wasn't really all that fun on my part. Now, the converted keep themselves in check and warn the newcomers to not follow in their footsteps. Most if not all of them gave up on returning to the mortal world, so now I'm just stuck with a whole bunch of lifeless robots that go around collecting souls.
Even with the cruelty of the system, it is in itself flawless. There has never been a mistake in the collection of passing souls since the creation of the world. Making my job a complete waste of time.
Well, that is until little Converted Reaper #14,586 came along. Little #14,586, also known as Brixton, had a small slip of hand that lead to quite a colorful development in my career.
But you know, it was a rather long and complicated thing if we're going off of mortal time....so you might want to grab a seat.
It's story time.