(Note: I might change the thread title if this becomes my shorts thread)
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“You are to appear to before the honorable judge of the dead, Shikieiki Yamaxanadu.”
“I’m not dead yet.”
“No, you died one hundred twenty six thousand and three times. Your time to be judged is long overdue.”
“Am I going to… die? And stay dead?”
“Looks like it,” The woman continued, yawning. “Now hurry up. You’re my last passenger today.”
Before me stood a red-head wielding a scythe. She was oddly dressed, a blue dress adorned with unusual coins. But her casualness about death was what surprised me the most. While I have no idea what she meant by passenger, I wasn’t sure that I wanted to die. Four hundred years ago perhaps, but I started liking being alive. Not that it would matter to this woman. She clearly had years of experience in bringing souls to the court of the dead.
“Now come on,” she said, summoning a small boat and a wave out of nothing for it to float on. She clearly had a lot of water-based abilities.
“And if I don’t want to die?”
“You could always fight me,” the woman replied, instantly jabbing through my heart with her scythe. “But I wouldn’t advise it.”
Admittedly, I might have fought her anyway, but I still had to decide whether or not I wanted to die. It was a rare opportunity for me. Not that fighting water with fire sounded like fun. So I walked onto the boat.
“By the way, I’m shinigami Komachi, and I’ll be your guide across the Styx.”
“A death god? Never thought I would see one of those.”
“Well perhaps today is your lucky day.”
She might be right. It could be lucky.
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“Well, here we are.” Komachi declared. We made it somewhere all right. The place looked like a Greek temple on the outside, steps running down the front right up to the water of the Styx. But it was huge. It was impossible to tell just how tall it was since it poked right through the clouds with no end in sight, but to call it as big as a mountain would be an injustice to its size.
“You made it…” a short green haired girl said. Though her voice made it clear she was a little disappointed.
“I’m off. Good luck Shiki,” and Komachi left me alone with the little girl.
“I was really hoping I would never have to meet you,” the little girl told me.
“Is something wrong?”
“Come on.”
The two of us, rather than attempting to walk up the thousands of steps leading up to the building, took flight.
“You have died more times than anyone in history. Did you know that?”
“No. But most people only die once, so it’s not surprising.”
“It’s not that,” the girl continued. “As the judge of the dead, I have to judge everyone who’s died. Unlike most creatures that have rejuvenation but will eventually truly die, the elixir of immortality is one of those things that was never meant to exist and for which we have no rules. So I have to judge every one of your deaths, and sentence you as a mortal.”
“Is that a problem?” I asked, as we passed through the huge marble columns into the main building.
“First, I have to judge every one of your now one hundred twenty six thousand and four deaths. And there are a lot of sins that shouldn’t be applied to immortals.”
We reached the inner chamber of the courthouse, where Shikieiki sat behind a hundred foot tall podium.
“Please sit there.”
Shikieiki gestured to a small folding chair in the middle of the room. Clearly it was intended to intimidate the accused, but it was hard to be intimidated when the judge was only four feet tall. Although sitting in the rickety folding chair, staring up Shikieiki’s giant mahogany podium to see the judge herself, somehow was both ridiculous and terrifying at the same time.
“Now let’s begin. The first death was a stoning. The villagers though you were a demon, and a rock bashed you skull in. Prior to that death, you killed a man to steal the hourai elixir. The next death was part of the same stoning, and that was due to blood loss. The third death was caused by your lungs being punctured. The fourth death was caused by your skull being cracked in the same stoning. The fifth death was caused by thirst, the sixth death was also caused by thirst. The seven death: mauled by a wolf. Death eight: died of hunger. Death nine: eaten by a youkai. Death ten: eaten by the same youkai. Death eleven: eaten by the same youkai. Death twelve;” Shikieiki paused for a moment. She looked somewhat ill. “Death twelve: cast yourself into a volcano. You committed the sin of suicide.”
“Does it count as suicide if I’m immortal?”
“Yes, it does,” she said. Hesitating again, she continued down her list. “Death thirteen: cast yourself into a volcano. Suicide.”
“That isn’t right. I think my next death was another mauling.”
“You misunderstand. You healed inside the lava and died again almost instantly. It was the same act of suicide as the original death, but you healed and died 236 times inside the volcano. That’s 236 individual acts of suicide according to the rules.”
Then it hit me. I’m going to hell. There’s no way I could make it anywhere else.
“Death fourteen: cast yourself into a volcano. Suicide. Death fifteen: cast yourself into a volcano. Suicide. Death sixteen: cast yourself into a volcano. Suicide…” Shikieiki paused a moment. “Would you like me to tell you your sins now?”
I wasn’t sure. Did I want to give up the last hope of getting out of hell?
“Just tell me.”
“Each time you attempted to kill Kaguya was considered a murder attempt in spite of her immortality, and the times you succeeded considered a murder. And since the primary reason you die is in fights to the death with Kaguya, each of those lives contains mortal sin. In addition, almost every time you use your fire or blew yourself up you died from the burns, so they’re all considered suicide. Of your deaths, over ninety percent of them land you in hell. About five percent of them might land you in Hakugyokurou. And less than half a percent of them would get you into heaven.”
Shikieiki sat in silence for a moment, and I collected my thoughts. I was going to hell. Without a doubt, I was going to hell. In a few hours, I would know eternal torment. And the only reason I wasn’t there now was a technicality. Maybe I should just…
“Don’t even think about running away. Only a shinigami can make it here; everyone else eventually falls into the Styx, which is the direct route to hell.” She paused again.
“…Death seventeen: cast yourself into a volcano. Suicide…”
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“Death one hundred twenty six thousand and three: burned to death. Suicide. Also homicide, since you killed Kaguya. Death one hundred twenty six thousand and four: impaled through the heart by a shinigami. Komachi, apparently.”
It took a week for Shikieiki to list every last death. I wasn’t sure what to do. So I sat, stared at the floor, and thought.
“So now what happens to me?”
“Now, I sentence you. Since the overwhelming majority of your lives land you in hell…” Shikieiki looked pale, like she was about to vomit. “I can’t sentence someone who is alive to hell.” That was good to hear. “But… I have to sentence those hundreds of thousands of lives to hell.”
She was silent for a moment. It was tense. I felt like I was suffocating from the silence. Not that I needed another death to add to the total.
“I sentence you to the former hell,” Shikieiki declares, banging a rod on her bench. A huge, fiery chasm appeared below me. I was able to fly above it fortunately, but Shikieiki was higher still, holding her rod.
“Next time you meet Komachi, well, I can’t tell you to fight her, but I’m not saying you shouldn’t.”
“Huh?”
“You don’t have to make her job easy next time you meet her.” Shikieiki said.
“There’s a next time?”
“Perhaps.” Then Shikieiki’s expression changed. She gained confidence. She knew what to do, though I didn’t know at the time. “Now feel the weight of your sins!”
