Chapter 170 For Real? Am I Really Dead?!

They say when a person dies, they're surrounded by pitch black darkness.

Then, they see a brilliant glow that they reach out to—something like the light at the end of a tunnel. Well...

... That didn't really happen to me.

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"Damnit... I really died." My voice echoed across the vast expanse as I looked around me.

It was clear white—like a vast ocean of blankness.

The sky was undiluted with any color, and everywhere I looked had the same color—or lack thereof.

The blankness seemed to spread for miles, and I couldn't perceive anything but the natural whites that filled everywhere. I was the only odd one out.

'This sucks...' I sighed.

Having nothing more to do, I sat down. After a while, I laid my back on the clear floor and closed my eyes.

There really was nothing I could do. Once you died, it was over. That was a fact I couldn't argue with.

'I tried my best, but...'

Regret was useless, so I wasn't going to torture myself with that.

My comrades were most likely going to die. Dulum would fall. The Demons would continue their conquest and achieve everything they wanted.

Game over!

'Despite how much I tried to postpone it... shouldn't I have known this was inevitable?' With another heavy sigh, I wallowed in the white space.

I was probably going to be here for a long time, so I had to brace myself.

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"You're a strange human, aren't you?" A voice suddenly appeared from a distance.

"Hmm?" I slowly opened my eyes and rose to an upright sitting posture to witness a being who stood a small distance from me.

How could I really explain who I saw? The 'thing' was covered in pure white. It had a blank contrasted from everything else by its gold outlines.

A strange power radiated from its body, and I could tell that it was beyond my perception. I simply sat and gawked at the being, silent as heck.

What could I say in the presence of such an awesome existence? With common sense, anyone could easily tell that this was none other than—

"God. I am God." The white being proclaimed, as though I couldn't conclude that much.

In fact, anyone with a decent amount of IQ would have been able to figure that out already.

"Welcome to my domain." He seemed proud, for some reason.

But, this was simply a completely blank space. It was devoid of life or color, or anything else. Just completely bare.

"O-okay..." Despite all my thoughts, I could only leak out a few stutters of nervousness.

"So, as you can guess already... you're dead. Usually, your body would just decompose and your Soul would be broken down into the foundation of the world, but... since you're not an original resident of this world, you've been caught up here." The God explained.

'....' I stared blankly at him, wondering what sort of expression he had to be making.

There were a million things I wanted to say to this dude, but I kept quiet about them. It was best to let him talk, for now.

"I have been watching your struggles since you got transmigrated to this world. It must have been difficult, yeah?"

I dumbly nodded.

"Well, you were summoned. There's hardly anything I could have done about it. But to help you out... I gave you a gift, you know?"

"Uh?" At this point, with no [Freedom Of Expression] or any other Skill working, I couldn't control my facial reaction well.

I gave a bland expression of surprise, trying my best to appear more shocked.

"The Arcana Call you've used for a couple of times now... [The Fool]. I gave you that as a gift, so you could survive in this world."

"Wha...?"

"Surprised? Well, I am a generous God. I figured you'd probably not survive this world without a little divine help. I'm a little amazed you were able to operate it seamlessly, though. I thought I'd have to explain its workings to you first."

"Haha... that was just luck. I watch a lot of anime, after all."

It was a good thing he didn't know about the T.W.T.S.S. Novel. Everything he had said or done was proof that he had no idea about the book.

"Anime? Is that a term from your old world?" The white being asked, cocking his head.

I had to say, this entity was very good—even better than me—at acting. After all, almost everything he said were blatant lies.

Pure bullshit!

'You claim not to have anything to do with the Transmigration when you're the sole reason I'm here! You dragged me into this world, and you're not taking responsibility.'

And just look how he shamelessly said he gave me [The Fool] as a gift, as if he had any other choice.

Everything, from the System to my Title, was designed by this guy.

'And talk about misrepresentation! Why does he call himself God as though he's the only one. He's 'The Foolish God', the least among all his siblings.'

He brought me to his realm to gloat and pretend to be benevolent when everything thus far was his fault. Fortunately, I knew the storyline well.

'Damien fell for his words and made so many errors because of this fraud. I don't plan on doing the same!'

After all, Spoiler Alert, this very entity before me served as the main antagonist of the T.W.T.S.S. Story.

"Y-yes. Anime is a source of entertainment from my original world." I laughed nervously.

He was pretending not to know about Anime when he practically snatched me from my world and brought me here.

'I have some concerns, though...' My thoughts trailed as I tried my best not to let my suspicions show.

In the first place, why wasn't it Damien who was summoned, but me?

So far, everything seemed to add up. The setting, the abilities, even the antagonist. But, why was I the protagonist and not Damien from the Novel?

I had no idea, really. That was why I initially wanted to see how my interlocutor would act before I drew any conclusions.

Regardless, I needed more information.

"Haha. Is that so? You're an interesting young man. Even when you died and appeared here, I expected you to panic, even if just a little. Yet, you just accepted it so easily. It didn't seem like you were so eager to die."

As I expected, this Foolish God' had been watching me since I arrived here—just like the creep he was.

In the original story, Damien's first death occured not long after he was summoned into the first world.

He was tasked with saving the settlement, just like me. However, with no sense of what was happening, or how to use his Arcana Call, he died miserably.

When he arrived in this place, he was completely freaked out. I believe he spent a great deal of time here, going crazy and being mentally weakened, before the Foolish God' appeared and deceived him.

As a result, he made a grave mistake from the start of the series. In return, though, the Foolish God taught him on his Skills, Titles, Classes, and also the Arcana Call.

Damien was eventually resurrected by the Foolish God, who called it a second chance, and he was able to use his Arcana Call to reset the timeline.

Once he did so, though, he ran away from the settlement... and everyone within it died.

'Yup! Not the best moment for our MC.'

Unlike him, however, I took a completely different route. I didn't need the Foolish God to explain anything to me, and I had so much knowledge that I put it to good use.

I was able to avoid coming here altogether... and I would have preferred it if things never ended up like this.

Now that they had, though, I was sure the lunatic in front of me would have questions pertaining to how I survived for so long without his 'help.'

"Well, I have watched a lot of Anime, after all. I know about places like heaven, so I didn't really fret. Plus, I know about concepts of Gods, that's why I wasn't too shocked when I saw you."

"Keke... is that so?"

This dude was making me more nervous the more I stayed here. Even though he was the most inferior of his siblings, the fact that he was the main antagonist of the series showed how formidable he was.

Besides, blitzing me with a single thought would be a piece of cake for a God. I stood no chance.

'I just need to find a way to drive this conversation well...'

The Foolish God, despite his name, remained one of the most intelligent in the series—if not the most. His cunning and ability to set up his master plan was what made the plot of the original novel so intriguing.

In terms of deceit and planning, he was by far the strongest.

Damien was very impressive, but it wasn't due to his natural prowess alone that he won. Someone like this was almost impossible to win against.

The only advantage I had was my knowledge of all of these things.

'That's why I'm certain of one thing, at the very least.' A smile formed on my face as I calculated just what step I had to take to achieve the optimal result.

'I'm going to get resurrected. It's only a matter of how!'

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[A/N]

I'm sorry for the clone chapters. I hope you enjoyed this chapter and you understand what is happening so far.

Things are about to get wild.

Thanks for reading.