Chapter 1: The Chickenlord’s Flawed Plan

Part 1 -

“You must be Steele Johnson, please take a seat.” The receptionist said.

Confused, I looked down at my body, surprised to see no wounds.

“Where am I?” I asked after sitting down on the sofa.

“Isn’t it obvious? You’re dead,” she replied dryly.

“Oh yeah, wasn’t I shot to death?”

The receptionist casually opened a file and read, “Reason of death: Ballistic trauma to the left ventricle and right aorta resulting in brain death at E plus ~230 seconds.”

Sitting back down, the receptionist went back to typing on her workstation.

Whaddya know? There’s an afterlife.

As the minutes passed by, the only thing that could be heard was the resounding clack of her keyboard.

At some point an eternity later, she said, “Steele, the judges are ready for you.”

She opened a door off to her left and I followed her through it to the brightly lit halls beyond.

After walking for a bit, we arrived at two large double doors, which fed into a large room with three people in suits sitting at their three podiums.

“Welcome, human number 115 253 856 164, we welcome you to the afterlife, where we will judge your actions from your life granted to you by the divine being.”

The judge sitting at the middle podium, opened the file handed to him by the receptionist, who turned around and exited from another set of doors on the right.

The doors immediately vanished as they closed.

“Lifetime kills at an astounding high of twenty-four. Self defense. 7/10 rated life, nonbeliever in the holy one.”

“Well that makes this one a clear cut case for the first circle of hell.”

What?! This doesn’t sound fun.

“Seconded.”

“-Uhhh, do I get a say in thi-”

“Well then, it’s final. Enjoy your eternal stay in the Fields of Asphodel,” he finished, cutting me off.

Instantly, the ground surrounding me lit up with a blue flash and faded.

I felt like I was being shoved through an infinitely small tube towards a light at the end of a white tunnel.

I’ve already died, so what now?!

After a brief sense of vertigo, I was dumped into a foggy field with a bunch of creepy, ghostly flowers everywhere.

These are really creepy ass flowers. I guess teleportation is a thing as well…

「That is the Asphodelus flower」 my AI told me.

How are you even here? I asked.

「I am a part of your soul. I currently cannot access Core Processors in your head, so I’m using Mind processing.」

What even are the ‘Fields of Asphodel?’

「It’s limbo, basically you were a decent person so you get suspended in eternal boredom.」

Well isn’t that fun?

A second later, there was a brief glow above my head, followed by some kind of announcement.

“Steele Johnson, human number 115 253 856 164, intellect at 99th percentile, dexterity at 83rd percentile, strength at 58th percentile, lifetime kills of twenty-four, notable skills include sharpshooting, body guarding, CQB, MMA, swimming, skydiving, fencing, and finally, killing.

The entire list is available in the details section of the product. Let the bidding begin at one hundred units of █████.”

Huh? So much for eternal boredom…

“One hundred!”

“One hundred and one!”

“One hundred and two!”

“One hundred and three!”

This one upping happened for a while.

“Two hundred and fifty-three!”

“Five hundred!”

“Wow, zero chill…” some bidder commented.

“Five hundred going once! Five hundred going twice! Sold to Bidder 10784,” the announcer, well, announced.

So, I’m worth five hundred things? Yay?

“Next up is Z-”

A blue light surrounded me and I was teleported out before he finished.

After another unreasonably uncomfortable teleportation, I found myself face to face with an extremely unreasonably sized chicken.

The gargantuan chicken stared me down as the light from teleportation disappeared.

In an extremely deep voice, it spoke.

“Steele Johnson, I, the Chickenlord welcomes you!”

“Hello, nice to meet you Chickenlord. Was I just purchased?”

“Yes! The spiritual power in charge of your world decided that nonbelievers were taking up space, so he decided to auction off everyone.”

“Well then. Nice to know I’m held in high regard! What can I do for you today?”

“My minion, we are going to take over existential plane AAXH-125 『Eden』!”

“Nice!” I reply, “What’s the plan?”

Wow, I’m looking forwards to this! This’ll be like total war or something!

“Simple! I’ll spawn you in by hijacking a dungeon and you’ll beat things up until you’re strong enough to beat everything up and take over the world!”

Oh. I have to do all the work alone.

“What if something’s stronger than me?”

“They won’t be! I will bless your new body so that you’ll be able to take out enemies with ease!”

That’s still some pretty shifty logic...

“Sounds like a plan? May I make some requests for my body?”

“Go ahead,” the Chickenlord said magnanimously.

“Firstly, can I be a humanoid at least?”

“Of course, it’s understandable that you aren’t accustomed to being in the ultimate form,” he said, his wattle jiggling as he nodded, “I’ll let you create your own body.”

That sounds reasonable… I’ve never created a body before though. Whatever the case, I’ll need my beloved computer assistance.

“Also, can you add in the microchips my body had before I died?”

“I’ll try, but I might not have enough ████ to do it.”

Hmmm, looks like money really can buy everything…

“Just one question…” he said, tentatively.

“Go on…”

“What’s a microchip?”

“Circuitry on a silicon wafer designed to create an integrated circuit.”

“Uhh….” He looked at me in confusion.

“Do you think you could make it if I drew the blueprints for it?”

“Of course!” He said, smiling.

“I’ll just need something to draw it on and I’ll get started.”

Part 2 -

“Whaddya mean, it’s too complicated?” I demanded, furious.

“I mean, the blueprints took up an entire book you dolt!”

“This is just the first one! Hurry up and make it so that we can get onto the next one!”

Seemingly an eternity later, we managed to finish all the chips, but then we ran into another problem.

“Due to all your troll ass enhancements, I’m short on ████, so I can’t just incarnate you in your old body and have enough to spare to magically enhance it. You’ll have to go in as a child of Eden.”

“But then, how will I kill things?”

“You’ll have to use magic to kill things!”

“But I’ve never used magic before…”

“That’s okay… you can learn against dungeon monsters… hopefully…”

“That’s wishful thinking!”

“WellsinceyouhavenomorequestionsI’lljustspawnyouinnow” He said quickly.

“Wait, I have more questi-” I tried to object as I lost consciousness.

The Chickenlord simply stared and waved.

I entered this state where I could see the possibilities of how I could spawn in. A ‘Character Creation’ room, if you will.

The budget was 435 ████.

My Bloodborne spell was ‘Summon Chicken Golem.’ Go figure.

I spent the majority of the ████ creating a human-elf hybrid, one of the few things I could afford in order to get the best strength and magic potential balance. Neither the strongest humanoid nor the most powerful mage, but it’ll have to work. Well rounded-high utility is the way to go.

I spent the rest of the ████ adding enhancements such as increasing base muscle mass, intelligence, and magic affinity.

Then I slammed my fist against the big green check mark and I blanked out again.

「Welcome to Eden」 Aipers commented sarcastically.

I found myself standing in a small stone room. The torchlight caused shadows along the wall to flicker to some unknown rhythm.

I tried to take a torch off the wall, but I found I couldn’t. In fact, the fire didn’t give off any heat. It was a cold fire. Must be that fancy magic stuff the Chickenlord was talking about.

Anyways, let’s give this magic stuff a try!

“SUMMON CHICKEN GOLEM!” I cried in a kind of high pitched voice.

***

Nothing happened.

Oh yeah, I’m a kid!

Looking down at my body, I found that it was significantly smaller than what I was used to.

It was then, that I realized that I was naked.

My elephant was gloriously hanging out between my legs.

I’ll have to fix that.

There are clothes stores in dungeons, right?

Maybe I can steal some off some monsters?

This is a legitimate problem… Whatever, I’ll just concentrate on magic for now.

“SUMMON CHICKEN GOLEM!” I cried again, my high pitched voice echoing off the walls.

***

Nothing happened.

「Albert Einstein once said that insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results」 Aipers commented dryly.

Are you trying to say something? I asked.

「Try a different pitch」 she commented helpfully.

“SOOMMON CHACKON G-O-LOM” I yelled out, this time my voice coming out significantly lower.

***

Nothing happened.

I tried different pitches, different yelling positions, yelling it with a stick in my hand, swish and flickering, and literally everything.

Eventually, my yelling drew a little green creature to me.

This must be the legendary goblin that populates dungeons!

In his right hand, he appeared to be holding a shank. Seeing as I was unarmed, he rushed at me.

I redirected his attack to the left and retaliated with a blow to the jaw. Unfortunately, I wasn’t used to using my new body, so when I took a step forward, I tripped and fell flat on my face.

「Adjusting muscle-memory for new body.」

Immediately, I found it a lot easier to move. Just like a mini version of big-me.

I quickly got up and round-house kicked the bastard across the face. It flew through the air and slid across the ground for half a second before coming to a stop.

Its eyelid twitched slightly as it got angry.

How surprisingly durable.

It got up in a rage and charged again.

In another lunge, it shot forward and grazed my arm with its dirty shank.

In a smooth movement, I managed to disarm the little bastard and get behind him. The shank flew off, finally coming to a stop a few meters away.

After I managed to get my arm around its neck, I executed a rear naked choke on it.

Once I got my second arm behind its head, it was over in seconds.

Running over, I picked up its shank and stabbed it into the unconscious goblin’s eye.

The goblin turned to light and vanished, leaving behind its loincloth and shank.

I wonder if other monsters drop better clothes. I’ll have to see, but I’m not wearing that loincloth.

Maybe they’ll be more powerful as well. What fun!

As I was pondering this, I ran into another goblin.

Now that I had a shank, the creature seemed apprehensive, rather than totally aggressive like the last one.

Not that I cared. I just killed it and took its shank.

Now I have two shanks.

“SUMMON GOLEM!”

***

Nothing happened.

Wow, what a striptease. I supposedly get overpowered as fuck magic, but I can’t even use it.

「Define, ‘overpowered as fuck’」

I dunno, I guess Kyle would be jealous?

「So your wine collection is ‘overpowered as fuck?’」

Not anymore… I left it to him in my will.

After a bit more walking, I arrived at a well-lit stairwell.

I climbed down into a lower floor.

The most immediately noticeable feature was how it had plants.

Seconds later, my stomach started making the rumblies.

Are these plants even edible?

One bush had some red berries.

I picked one off and tasted it apprehensively.

It tasted pretty sweet, additionally, I didn’t die so in no time at all I had picked the bush clean and eaten my fill.

Now full, I continued my journey to… well, uhhh somewhere.

Something prickled my ear at the edge of my hearing.

I stopped and listened harder, but I couldn’t really figure out what it was.

Eventually, it became a dull echoing buzz.

Small insects flew all around me, but strangely enough, none of them touched me.

Some came extremely close to me and I swatted at them, but I couldn’t hit any. They simply dodged and rolled too quickly.

Suddenly, I smelled smoke. It was a strong acrid smell and I tried blocking it out, but my eyes watered and I gasped at the repugnant smell.

Within the space of a single second, the air became cold.

Who did that?

I looked around but I didn’t see anything nearby.

I hunched down and wrapped my hands around my legs, but it didn’t do much against the extreme cold.

As my extremities got colder, I rubbed them to heat them up.

Insects buzzed around me and I started sweating. Sweating of all things. In this blizzard temperature!

A goblin came up, seemingly unaffected by the cold or the insects. Several other goblins followed in its wake.

I walked up with its pointed shard of metal and stabbed me.

A trickle of blood ran down my arm.

「Steele, listen up, you are hallucinating, I think. The cold and the insects aren’t real. You must kill the goblins immediately or your chances of survival decrease to zero.」

Huh. If I don’t think it exists, will it hurt?

I forced myself to stand up in the frost covered stones and focused on winning the fight.

So the cold isn’t real? It sure feels real.

The goblin’s guard relaxed for a second as it watched an orb of blood hit the ground.

I moved like a bolt of lightning and embedded the iron shard into its throat.

The other two goblins jumped backwards in surprise. One of them was holding a sword and the other a mace.

Their attacks were crude and unsophisticated. I repelled them with ease and ended their miserable existences.

Suddenly, I felt extremely lightheaded.

Unable to stand for any longer, I fell over and lost consciousness.