One moment I was chasing the woman I'd hoped against hope I could at least talk to, the next I found myself in an eerily white room that seemed to expand far beyond what I should have been able to see. No color filled the sky and no shadows gave the world any depth. It was a void. There were no suns or moons hanging over me, and no arcing horizon far off in the distance hiding the lands outside the city limits I'd become accustomed to. The burning streets lights I remembered seeing only a moment ago were gone entirely. There were no sources of light anywhere I looked and yet, it was bright enough to almost blind me.
"Where am I?"
With no one there to answer me, I was left alone with my thoughts as I winced and tried to force my eyes back into working order so they might help me make sense of this.
It almost felt like a dream. A particularly vivid one where I was aware I was sleeping and could interact with my dream world as I saw fit. Only I was never much of a lucid dreamer. In fact, not only had I failed to become one after learning how and trying it out for myself, but most nights I didn't even dream to begin with. I just let my head hit the pillow, closed my eyes and let sleep take me as per usual.
It wasn't exactly hard to assume all that had just happened was just a dream. I was so detached from my own life that I genuinely couldn't remember feeling much of anything. The feel of my pillow against my head. The softness of Lucy's fur. The bitter taste of the coffee I chugged. Or the burning in my chest that finally spurred me on. I'd forgotten it, same as I always did on the nights where my brain managed to cook up something just entertaining enough to keep me satisfied for the duration of my slumber.
Is this white room what it feels like to lucid dream in a dreamless world? If so, I'd wake up in no time and forget all about it. But the idea of that was almost as jarring as the thought that that girl might get snatched up by some other unseen man on her run.
No. It didn't matter. If that moment was a dream, I couldn't let myself forget how it felt to actually try at something for once.
I had to remember. I would remember, wake up and write it all down so I couldn't forget. And when I saw her for real this time, I'd take the same steps I took then.
Working my brain into overdrive, I pressed my eyes shut and recalled everything I could about that morning, that dream.
I remembered getting up, feeding Lucy, eating a quick breakfast and leaving for work. I avoided actually speaking to the girl that stole my interest and she passed by on her morning jog. That girl, whose name I didn't know, kept mostly to herself as she ran. Meanwhile, I stared at her ass wrapped up so tightly in her black leggings. Just faintly, in hindsight, I think I could see the outline of her panties.
I shook my head. That's not what I needed to remember. Think, damn you. If everything up until now was so easy, why should this be hard? What happened next?
We always walked in the same direction, me to a job I hated, her just running her worries away and never once stopping to start up the conversation I longer for. Only, she did something that finally spurred me on to break that cycle. My chest pounded almost as hard as my feet against the cold cement of the sidewalk. I vaguely recall her turning around to look, probably at the sudden burst of noise that distracted her from the sounds coming from her earbuds.
She was beautiful. Even with her skin lightly coated in a morning dew of sweat, she was too much for me. And yet, I managed to pull out some fight and I ran. Yes.
She turned and her eyes spotted me. Maybe there was a brief glimpse of confusion, a twist to her brow that suggested confusion in the face of the man that never did more than walk behind her, but I had to hope against hope that I didn't hallucinate the small smile that spread across her lips when she turned. Even if it was a casual one.
Then she might have waved vigorously at me and forced her sports bra to work its hardest to keep her chest from moving too much. Her cleavage bounced into view as the string from her headphones got caught between them and…
No! Damn it! Stop thinking about that! Remember the feeling. How did it feel to finally come to the conclusion that trying was better than wasting away?
I clenched my fists, somehow hoping that the pain in my palms would let me remember more clearly, but the dream was fading. All I could think of was her beauty. That righteously plump ass and the pair of breasts that fit so well in her sports bra that it seemed a crime to hide their shape and…
… I suppose I'm just a terrible person.
"Good. You understand your faults."
I jumped in surprise as a heavenly voice pierced the silence of the void. It sounded like it came from every direction all at once. On instinct, I turned on my heel to find a small table only a slightly different shade of white than the rest of the world. Although, this slight difference stood out almost as much as it would were it any other color. Hanging over it was an umbrella the same shade, ironically shading the table from nothing, but casting the slightest of shadows on it and on the beautiful woman seated there in a gilded throne fit for a queen.
Our eyes met and she beckoned to me with an almost surreal curl of her finger.
While I was sure there was no way she was there when I first arrived in this place, I'd scanned every direction imaginable for signs of differences within the void and found nothing, but there was no denying that she was there now. So, with nothing but emptiness at my back, I approached her. Albeit more than a bit apprehensively.
The pain in my palms was still fresh, meaning this was likely no dream. And if she was the only other person here, then for all I knew, she brought me here. As to why she might have done so, I had no idea. All I knew was that, the closer I got to her, the more it felt like such worries were utterly pointless. The closer I got, the more beautiful she became.
Hers was a radiance so brilliant that I instantly felt as though I needed glasses because a woman of such perfection should not be capable of existing.
She was blinding. Enchanting. Her very presence exuded a warmth that massaged my soul into a comfort I'd never experienced before. Her rich, wavy blonde hair spilled over bare shoulders and down her back. The golden strands shone so brightly, it almost felt like she hid the sun itself in her curls despite the umbrella above supposedly shading her. Her long eyelashes almost fluttered as though alive when she closed her silvery pupils to enjoy a sip of tea.
And most noticeably, the thin dress she wore was very nearly transparent. No, I think it was actually just that thin. As I closed the gap, the two pink tips accentuating her already massive breasts seemed to poke through the very fabric itself. I couldn't tell, but from the way the sheer dress hugged her body so perfectly and how the long slit in it running down from her upper thigh showed no visible panty line, I guessed she wasn't wearing anything at all beneath it. The only reason I couldn't tell for sure was due to the table covering her lower extremities.
She noticed where my gaze was pointed and to my surprise, went against the assumptions I made for how the jogging girl might have reacted to my libido's actions and… she giggled. She put her hand cutely to her lips and giggled before she gestured for me to take a seat across from her. The gesture, while simple, was so absurdly elegant that it made my heart flutter, almost as hard as it might if such a woman were to ask me for a date. Seeing no other option and needing answers, I chose to sit.
"Would you like some tea?" the woman asked, pointing to the elegantly detailed pot atop the table I hadn't even noticed.
"U-Uh, sure."
She nodded happily and slowly rose up out of her seat to fill the cup already set out in front of me. With her being so close as she bent over my cup, I couldn't help but notice that the collar of her dress was nearly non-existent as it left the entirety of her cleavage exposed where it ran dangerously all the way down to her navel. This strapless, all-to-revealing dress seemed to defy physics, as it clung to her every curve effortlessly.
Once more, she noticed me looking and this time I looked away, embarrassed.
"S-Sorry."
"Don't be," she said, giggling as she sat back down. "I knew you would look the moment I saw you. And yet, I chose not to cover myself. How's the tea?"
This beautiful woman in front of me essentially told me she was letting me ogle her and all she is concerned about is the tea? Who is she?
I wrapped a finger around the handle of the porcelain tea cup, only realizing how shaken I was by how violently it clattered against its saucer. Gulping, hoping she somehow didn't notice as well, I took a sip and a rush flavor flooded my body. Before I realized the dangers of ingesting something a stranger gave me, I felt an unforgettable warmth fill my body as the tea mingled with this morning's cup of coffee. Without realizing it until that moment, I had been freezing the entire time I wondered through the void.
"It's good."
"I'm glad."
She sat up straight. I thought her hair was naturally wavy or maybe styled to look so, but when she moved again, the dozens of golden locks all floating in the air unaided, almost as though she and only she was deep beneath an ocean of water that clearly wasn't there. She folded her hands on her lap and gave me a gentle smile before she continued.
"I'm sure you are wondering why you are here."
"Well, yea. But also, where is here?"
"This is heaven."
She spoke with all the certainty of someone being asked what time it was while standing directly in front of the world's largest clock. The lack of hesitation in her answer almost beggared believability.
"…Heaven? What are you talking about? Am I being tricked?"
She giggled again and took another sip from her porcelain cup. Not until she set it back down, and it clinked easily against its plate, did she say another word. And she started with a sigh.
"Ah. Tea is my favorite mortal invention. To think, they would use plants to flavor their water into something so enjoyable and calming. So clever."
"Are you messing with me? Why are we talking about tea? When can I go home?"
With that question, this woman's glossy lips pulled downwards into a frown. Strangely enough, that saddened expression did not mar her beauty in the slightest.
"I'm sorry, Alex, but you can never go home. Like I said, this is heaven. And that means…"
"Are you saying I am dead?" I finished for her and she nodded sympathetically.
"I am afraid so. You've passed on. You've come to me to be reborn. That is why we are having this conversation."
Her words were quick, succinct and so to the point that it almost hurt.
Dead? I'm dead? How could that be? This place didn't exactly look like the heaven I imagined, but the sheer emptiness of it meant it couldn't possibly have been crafted by mortal hands. Were it, there should have been a seem somewhere or a light source to explain why I wasn't blind right now and why I could see this beauty.
Did I actually have that heart attack I joked about as I ran? I can't say I could completely put it against myself. I wasn't exactly in the best shape, after all. I was stuck mostly where I was when I left college, somewhere between thin for my build and fat, but leaner more on the fat side these days. So, a sedentary life mixed with poor eating habits may well have ended me as soon as my heart finally moved in the right direction.
When I came to that conclusion, I looked down and saw that I was still my same pudgy self. And when I looked back up to her, this woman whose body shape would have made every model on Earth so green with envy that they'd never recover their formal skin tone after laying their eyes on her. I felt nothing but shame and she just smiled.
"Wait, reborn?"
If I dared let myself believe she was telling the truth and I really was dead, then what did that mean for Lucy? That cat was basically the only thing in this world that I actually worked hard to keep up with, assuming of course you didn't count the endless hours put into the various video games I've played over the years, which even I say didn't count.
"What, are you supposed to be God?"
With just a bit of an incredulous sneering tempering my voice, I looked at the woman again. The meer idea of this insanely beautiful woman being God almost made me want to get down on my knees and praise her, but her claiming such a lofty title was just as absurd as her breast size. My faith in a greater good was more abundant than my lack of willpower.
She smiled as she sipped her tea again.
"I suppose you could call me that. Although, I don't believe I really have a name."
"What, you got amnesia or something?"
"No, but you do. A person's death is most often a very traumatic event, so their psyche sometimes tends to shut the bad memories away. You've noticed this in yourself, correct?"
I grimaced. If she was sitting this close to me, she might have seen me clench up and try to remember, but to an outsider, it must have just looked like I was trying to prevent an accident on my way to the restroom.
"But I don't mind," she continued. "I like to speak with those willing to share my table with me until they remember."
I felt a pain in my chest. It goes without saying that I did not outright believe her, but something in the back of my mind was tugging in her direction. Somehow, it felt as though this strange woman had the answers I needed to hear to the questions I didn't even know I had.
Whoever or whatever she was, she had a power beyond her looks that I couldn't come close to placing.
She set her cup back down and tilted her head before she gazed at me almost lovingly. I felt myself grow embarrassed, but I couldn't look away. The feeling was on a whole other plane than how I imagined getting caught ogling women would have made me feel, but for the life of me, I could not look away. I wasn't being my normal self.
Wait… Now that I think about it, I don't even remember the last time I held a conversation this long. Just who is this woman?
"You may call me God or Goddess if you like, if that's easier for you" she said, as if she read my mind. "I know you have a hard time talking to people, but thanks to that tea, I have warmed your soul and eased your heart. Please. Drink some more."
Apprehensively, I did as she asked and took another drink. After, I noticed the flavor of the tea in my cup had changed all on its own, without ever being swapped out. If I said the first taste was something like a sweet black tea, then the second sip tasted more like green tea. I wasn't any sort of tea connoisseur, but the difference was undeniable.
When I took another drink, this time it was orange tea with a bit of honey. Something I remembered my mom making for me when I was little and sick. I never understood how tea was supposed to help me get over a cold and tried to refuse her, saying tea was for girls, so she placated me by adding in the honey.
The liquid slowly descended my esophagus and when it reached my stomach, I felt a sudden throbbing pain in my head. It was the worst headache I'd ever experienced, like someone taking a buzz saw directly to my grey matter. I squeezed my eyes shut and several images flashed through the forefront of my mind.
My neighbor ahead of me. The parallel lines running across a crosswalk. The green light. A voice crying out for me. The sound of tires screeching. The sky turning over on itself. Blood pooling around my limp hand. Then nothing.
"Wha…What was that."
"Those were your last moments on Earth. In other words, the moment you died."
She was right. Somehow, I knew. I remembered every detail of what happened right up until the world went black. Compared to that, this pure white space truly was heaven.
As I reeled from the massive headache and the truth of what I saw, she spoke as casually as though she were telling me the sky was blue. But the sky wasn't blue. I wasn't even sure there was a sky to begin with. I looked into the reflection of the sky, or whatever it was, in the surface of the tea in my cup and pushed it away.
"It's okay Alex. Most people choose to avoid reaching understanding at first. The pain is just too much. But like them, I know you know that what you saw was true."
"Oh, really. Then why don't you just tell me what happened then? See if that lines up with my memory."
She nodded gracefully at my prompting, as though expecting me to say that.
"A front forward answer then. Alex, this morning when you chose to follow that woman while watching her behind, you were distracted by her so much that you accidentally walked into the street to follow her. The light was green and you should have had the freedom to chase her like you wanted, but you were hit by an oncoming truck and killed almost instantly. Thankfully, at least, you felt no pain whatsoever."
My cheeks burned and I slammed my hand on the table. Thinking back now, maybe the reason why pervy thoughts kept coming back to me as I tried to recall what happened might have been because I was looking at that woman's curves even as I tried to confess to her.
"Are you telling me that I died because I was looking at a woman's ass? Are you calling me a pervert?"
"Essentially, yes."
She shrugged, her voluptuous breasts swaying gently with the motion. The simple fact that I noticed such a thing kind of proved her point, so I quickly looked away.
"It's okay. The reason you're here is not your fault alone. You see, I am also to blame for your death."
"…What are you talking about?"
Once more, she folded her hands onto her delicate thighs and explained.
"The driver that hit you had been having a difficult time in his life regarding the distain that he perceived his daughter had for him and I mistakenly chose that moment to give him an epiphany on how he might solve his problems. This distracted him and give him a compelling reason to take his eyes off the road. I am sorry, but it is more my fault you died than your own."
"What…"
At the mention of the truck driver, an image of me laying horizontally on the ground, looking up at a man with a scruffy beard frantically calling out to me with tears in his eyes struck me cold and nearly made me cry myself. The image of the man I never even knew existed crying over my soon to be dead body broke down every wall from the truth, starting from the very back of my mind until it played again behind my closed eyelids. I knew it as the last thing I saw before I woke up here.
"I have done you a great wrong that I can never repay," she said with what looked like genuine sadness.
I died. I'm dead. What did that mean for Lucy? What would have happened if I actually managed to speak with that girl? Would she have said yes? No? Or would I have just stammered all over myself when I tried to open my mouth?
"As for your cat," the woman said, reaching across the table to grasp my hand. Hers was comfortingly warm. "She will be taken care of. As it happens, the incident happened not far from your apartment. As soon as your landlord hears what happened, he will try to move your things out of the room. It will be thanks to his wife that Lucy is given to a shelter."
No longer perturbed by the idea of her reading my mind, I pressed her with another question.
"And if I talked to her? The girl."
"… I cannot say. I cannot read the future."
"B-but you just…"
"What I said was not fortune telling. It was a few degrees above simple logic. The news of your death was reported immediately after the incident, by the woman you lusted after no less. And your landlord is just as greedy as you remember him being, but his wife is an animal lover to a fault. She'd never let a cute cat like that end up anywhere where it wouldn't be taken care of properly."
Knowing this to be as oddly convincing as her recollection of my death before my memories kicked in, she let go of my hand just as the tension in my shoulders started to ease. She straightened herself again.
"Because of my mistake, I wish to give you a say in how you are to be reincarnated."
"Wait, what? I-I've only just realized that I'm dead. Now you want to tell me I have to go through that life all over again? Are you crazy?"
Even though I knew how my own actions led to an unsavory life of loneliness, I couldn't say it wouldn't happen again. I was familiar with the concept of reincarnation. It meant I had to start over. But even if I started off with the handicap of moving to a new world I was entirely unknowing of, I was sure to have to undergo that same monotony of easy once I got up to speed. The thought of living that life all over again was too much.
She nodded again, ever sympathetic to my thoughts, and stood up from her seat. When her dress soundlessly shifted with gravity, I flinched in my seat, suddenly fearing that, whoever this woman was, was offended by something I said.
However, all she did was walk over to me, put a hand on my head and pulled my face into her cleavage. Somehow, despite how rigid my spine had become in my fear, I had no ability to resist her actions. Not that I could say for sure that I would if I could. Once I felt the softness of her breasts on my cheeks, I became overwhelmed with her warmth. And more importantly, her very heartbeat played at a steady rhythm that stripped away my worries.
"I'm sorry, Alex. I know this is a bit much to take in right now, but you can't stay here forever. Your soul needs to move on before it starts to rot."
As she spoke, I felt the gentle vibrations of her voice against my hair and was calm. It felt like I wasn't even capable of being upset anymore.
"… What's going to happen to me?"
"You're going to be reborn. Usually, when a soul moves onto another life, they begin anew as a newly born infant in the arms of a new mother, in a world adjacent to the one they lived their previous life in. If they were good people, then they would go to a happy, loving family. And if not…" she shook her head, her golden locks tickling my nose as she dismissed the idea. "However, because your death was my mistake, one of my gifts to you is that I'm going to let you choose when and where you start your life."
"When and where?"
"Yes. You may start this new life as an infant and allow yourself to grow naturally, or you could start as a young man ready to tackle the world, if you like. Or anywhere in between. And beyond. I will also be letting you keep your memories of your past life regardless of your choice, a favor I don't usually grant to others."
She continued to speak, her voice a blissful boon to my soul. The softness of her chest as she cradled me started to make me feel tired.
"As for the where, that is entirely up to you."
"Where? You mean I could pick to be born into another country?"
"Another country. Another time. Another world, even. You can go to a world where scientific advancements your old world wouldn't reach for a hundred years are the norm. Or maybe one so far in the past, where you'd be seen as a genius for simply being able to read and do math. Or you could choose to go to a world similar to those you've seen in movies or read in a book and befriend the main character. Anywhere you can think of is a world I can make for you."
I buried myself in her chest, wrapped my arms around her and thought.
This woman, this Goddess, was telling me she would not only allow me to reincarnate somewhere else, but that she'd even create an impossible world for me to inhabit, all because she slipped up and got me killed.
In a sense, that was amazing. But in another, it was exactly what I didn't want. A world centered around me? People praising me for things I didn't earn? The idea was oddly exciting, but was hard to imagine me finding this new world, any world created solely for my benefit, to be a happy one.
But on the flip side, if what she was saying was true, then I could have an easy life if I chose correctly. The sci-fi world she mentioned sounded nice. It would likely be possible that any of the problems humanity had faced up until now had been fixed by someone or another, thanks to how advanced the society was. Wounds could be healed instantaneously and diseases could be a thing of the past, thought back on only when teaching students how rough we all had it way back then. Who knows, maybe they even have a pill that boosts your will to get off your ass.
As I pondered this and the other options she gave me, I found the possibilities for each interesting, if not terrifying in their own way. Mid way through flipflopping between loving the idea and hating it, what caught my attention was the suggestion of a movie world.
"If you could send me to a world created for a movie, what about one like a video game?"
"If that is what you wish, I can do that."
As I was never really a social person in life, more often than not, I spent my free time sitting at my computer playing video games. I could think of any number of them that would be interesting to live in. Some would be scary. Some would all but guarantee that I'd find myself dead soon after arriving there. But some would be incredibly peaceful. It all depended on which game I chose to model the world from.
"Then…could you send me to a world that works the same way as an RPG game? One set in medieval times? With magic."
"Are you sure? Living was rough in those times."
"Are you kidding? Being able to live in an RPG would be amazing! Being able to level up and gain new abilities. Fight monsters and grow stronger. Who wouldn't like that?"
Somewhere along the conversation, I had given up the possibility that she wasn't a God. Equally as much, I had all but forgotten the idea that this new world would be dangerous or that my life would just repeat. In a world where I could actually put a number to myself and show that I'd improved in some way through my efforts, I'd at least have evidence of progress and a constant nagging spurring me on if all I did was sit on my ass all day and the numbers never went up.
Perhaps it was foolish of me, but I was already enthusiastically looking forward to that ideal fantasy life. For all I knew, she could have been lying to me. If I turned around that second, would there have been a camera pointing at my face and an audience on the other side of it laughing at my expense? Or would she just be snickering at me for actually taking anything she said seriously?
I chose to ignore those intrusive thoughts. I'd had enough of those. If she was a snake oil salesman, then I'd prefer to find out once I bought and paid for the product, rather than assume the worst off the bat.
"Any other conditions you would like for me to consider?"
"Oh, uh… I want to start as a young man again. Around eighteen years old. I feel I wasted the best years of my life by shutting myself away, so I want to try again."
"That is admirable. I hope you use this chance to better yourself. I truly do. I will base your new world on your memories of the games you've played and the movies you've watched and the books you've read, so that I have all the details I need to tailor a world to your liking. But also, one that is different, so that you can learn."
So, she played me a bit when she suggested I could enter a world of fiction and join hands with the main character? If so, I can't say I mind. Doing so would likely make living ridiculously easy for me, assuming I remembered the story well enough to do what needed to be done when it needs to be done while avoiding all the pitfalls the characters were supposed to go through. And easy wasn't really what I wanted.
"Can you really do that?"
"Of course," she said, her smile bright enough to say with certainty that I now knew where the stars in the sky came from. "Just let me access your memories."
With that said, she took her soothingly gently hands and held my cheeks. She lifted my face up to meet her silvery eyes. I was sad to lose the feeling of her softness, but when I saw her face approaching mine, I became even more embarrassed than I did when she first embraced me.
Then she kissed me.
The lips she placed over mine were as gentle on my flesh as though she thought she might break me if she applied even the slightest bit of force. I could feel the heat of her breath as our lips moved and danced together.
She tasted of chamomile tea.
"There," she said, pulling away from me without so much as a hint of redness in her cheeks. "Your new world is ready for you now."
I touched a finger to my lips before I realized what she said.
"What? Already? Just like that?"
She nodded.
"Before you go, know that I will be giving you some special abilities that only you will have in this world. As penance for my mistake. I hope you use them well."
"What abilities?"
"Oh, don't worry about it," she said, her smile turning with a wry cattiness. "You'll like them."
She took a step back from me and gestured for me to stand. With her sheer dress barely covering her voluptuous body, she was practically naked before me. And she was all the more stunning for it. The fact that I was right about the missing underwear was nothing more than a bonus.
She giggled again when she caught me looking.
"Are you ready?"
"Y-Yes. What should I do now?"
"Nothing at all. Just brace yourself."
She reached out a dainty hand and held it in front of my face for a moment. My back stiffened, probably the opposite of bracing myself and she lightly tapped my forehead with her index finger. And everything went dark.