The flames curled around Chantal like starving beasts, devouring everything in their path. He staggered through the black smoke, each breath burnt his lungs, his throat was raw from coughing, and his vision was swimming in the flickering orange glow. The heat was unbearable, his skin was blistering even as he covered his face with his trembling hands. The wood above him groaned, barely containing the debris caused by the fire above it. It was at this moment Chantal regretted turning down those fire-resistant houses. The ceiling buckled above him, fiery debris and beams collapsing onto him. He squirmed under the fire, looking for some kind of escape, but as the fire agonizingly melted his flesh, he realized he was in his final moments. And then, it was dark.

  Minos sat at his desk, surrounded by hundreds of mechanical arms whirring as they performed tasks like stamping and filing. His main, non-mechanical arms sifted through files, each containing the profile of a different person. Names like Mary Roberts, Zoken Tsawaka, and Miki Wallams populated the endless list. One of Minos’s mechanical hands stroked his beard as he paused on a particular file: Chantal Noelyn. The file contained a range of information, including Chantal's date of birth, sins, and virtues. At the bottom, it noted the cause of death: a house fire, on March 6th, 2025. Minos glanced at his calendar and sighed. He called to his assistant, “Spark, please pull the lever.” A tiny creature, seemingly made of flames, darted over to a lever labeled "Chantal Noelyn" and pulled it. Suddenly, a figure fell out of a chute from the ceiling.

  "Ah! What's going on?! Who are you?! O-one minute I was just at my house-" Before the figure can finish, Minos sighs and interrupts bluntly with "You've died, Chantal. Caught up in a house fire. It happens. You're in purgatory". The figure, now revealed to be Chantal, seemed confused. "Uhm...I wasn't all that religious while alive, but from what I've learned about the Bible that nonsense is that purgatory lasts for a very long time, and not...in an office space." Minos looks up from his papers and gives a slight glare at Chantal. "Well, you learned wrong. Purgatory lasts about a minute. Now discussing your sins...your only REAL sins are sloth and some lust here and there, and you did actively help those around you and that goody-two-shoes nonsense. So...angel it is." Minos stamps down 'Angel' on Chantal's file. "Wait, I'm going to heaven?" Minos scoffs. "Oh, of course not. Heaven and Hell are total malarky. You're going to limbo." Chantal looks slightly incredulous. "Wait, you judged my sins and virtues in like 5 seconds, doesn't that-" Minos interrupts them with a louder and more frustrated tone. "Do not test me. Go. Now.”

  A door appears to the very left of the office place. It's a mechanical door that slides up to reveal a long and wide river. A figure in a boat slowly starts to appear. The figure is revealed to be death himself. A skeleton in a robe with a scythe. Spark slowly pushed Chantal out of the door and into the boat with the grim reaper and the door slams shut. The reaper slowly turns to Chantal, it's bony jaw slowly opening up, and they say in a whispy crackly voice “What's up?” Chantal blinks twice, all his fear dissipating as he looks up at Death with a confused expression. “Uhm…not much I guess?”

  As the door shuts closed Minos sinks into his office chair and sighs exhaustedly. He turns to his assistant. “Next, Spark.” Spark doesn't respond, he just stands there as if broken. Minos raises his voice. “Spark, are you even listening, get to it!” That's when Minos starts to notice something. Today there was supposed to be 12 souls down the chute. But this was only the 1st soul. Yet he doesn't see a single extra one on his files. Something is wrong. Horribly wrong. Somebody is interfering with the bureaucracy. Minos looks panicked for a second, before his face hardens. He sighs and dials a number on the phone. 666-6666. The phone barely rings before a sickly sweet voice is on the phone “Hellloooooo, Lucifer speaking~!”

  Death smiles lazily, despite having no cheek muscles “Well that's cool. It's gonna be a smooth ride from now, so you can just chill.” Chantal once again looks incredulous “You aren't gonna, y'know, say mysterious an cryptic riddles or something.” Death glances at Chantal and laughs a bit, seemingly used to these questions “Is that what you humans are depicting me as? Nah, I'm just a guy.” Chantal glances around the river, as silence befell upon them both as Death casually rows the boat, when Chantal speaks up “So…do you know what this ‘limbo’ is like?” Death sighs in annoyance “Ugh, Minos never told ya? Is swear, he thinks judgement is his only job. It's basically exactly like the human world, but to become an angel or demon based off sins and virtues. Speaking of which…” Death grabs a bottle of something glowing and sparkling. “Drink this.”

  Chantal grabs the bottle and squints suspiciously. “And if I don’t…?” Death shrugs. “You die a second time. Permanently. Just a black void.” Without hesitation, Chantal gulps down the liquid. “So, uh… what does it do?” “It transforms you into an angel or a demon, depending on Minos’s orders. It's even customized.” Chantal glances behind him—and suddenly, wings are just… there. No sound, no warning. They simply exist now. Large and feathered, resembling those of an owl—his favorite animal when he was alive. But instead of awe, his reaction is pure horror. “WHAT THE HELL?! GET THEM OFF—” Death chuckles. “Yeah, that’s everyone’s reaction. They’re permanent, bud.” Chantal stares, utterly dumbfounded. “PERMANENT?! I DON’T WANT THESE DAMN WINGS FOR THE REST OF ETERNITY!” Death gives him an unimpressed look. “Well… they’re comfortable, right?” Chantal hesitates. The air is freezing, but instinctively, his wings wrap around him—and they’re warm. Soft. Comforting. “...I guess they’re not that bad…” Chantal paused “Wait a damn second. If Minos’s office is completely mechanical why is there a random river protruding from it?” Death shrugs once again “The river of Styx has been around for longer than me and Minos and possibly even the man upstairs. Well, here's your destination.”

  Chantal looks down from the boat. All they see is murky water slightly lighter than the rest. “Uhm…I don't see a dock or anything to step onto, it's literally just murky water-” before Chantal could react, Death casually kicked him off the boat into the lighter spot of water. Instead of falling into the river, Chantal finds that he went through a thin coat of liquid and is now laying, dazed on concrete. He glanced up, and what he saw…just looked like his hometown of New York City. Not a single difference he could spot. Angels and Demons were strolling by, glancing at Chantal and then continuing as if this was a natural occurrence. Some demons were muttering stuff like ‘another goody-two-shoes’ before continuing walking.

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  Chantal barely had any time to process anything before a deep voice interrupts his non-existent thoughts. “Ah, a new arrival!” Chantal whipped around to see a tall demon with Markhor horns. “Welcome to Limbo!” Chantal stares at the guy in silence for a solid 20 seconds before responding with. “So, who are you?” The demon laughs gently “Oh, I must've forgotten to introduce myself. I am Everett, been here since ‘92” Chantal blinks slightly “Wait, you've been dead for 33 years??” Everett blinks once or twice “So, that's how long it's been? That makes it the 3rd millennium! What's it like?!” Chantal frowns slightly “Uhm…well, the world is heating up, people are going broke, the world's gonna end cuz of Elon Musk…” Everett blinks again “...well I'm damn sure glad to have died early. And you should too! Cmon, lemme show you around.”

  Everett grabs Chantal by the arm and starts walking down the street with him. “So, let's just start with the basics. Here in Limbo, we have 5 subdivisions all ruled by demon kings.” Chantal looks confused “Why are demon kings running the areas of a neutral afterlife” Everett laugh softly “Well, a long long time ago, the way you became a demon in the afterlife was much more strict. If you had even one sin you were condemned as a demon. So these 5 demon kings ended up being very respectable and fair apart from their one sin. So the man upstairs, feeling guilty, let them rule over 5 subdivisions which are basically the parts of NYC: Staten Island, Manhattan, Brooklyn, Kings, and The Bronx.” Chantal looked even more confused from that “That's kinda stupid. So you're telling me Limbo, which is an exact replica of NYC, came before NYC itself?” Everett shrugs “The man upstairs thought it would be funny to make a city exactly like Limbo.”

  Chantal just sighs “So, who are these demon kings anyway.” Everett brightens up once again “So there’s Satan, the ruler of Staten Island which is the place we're in now. Why? Because it's close to New Jersey. Then there's Belphegor who rules Manhattan. Mammon rules over Brooklyn and Asmodeus rules over Queens. And then there's Lucifer, who rules over The Bronx.” Chantal silently contemplated all this information as they walked down the street. He sighs. “This is…a lot to take in, man.” Everett smiled empathetically “Hey, maybe we can go to LimboBucks to cool off for a bit. Chat and everything.” Chantal glanced at Everett slightly “I guess that would be nice” Everett nods “Come with me, I know the route. I know this place like the back of my hand.” Everett squints at the back of his hand, and it's revealed he actually has an exact map of Limbo on it.

  As they walk down the street, Chantal notices Everett seemingly knows everybody there. Even people who seem to hate everyone and everything say hi to Everett. He must've really gotten along with everyone in the past 33 years. Someone eventually walks up to Everett. A much larger angel with a ginger beard and Arkansas accent. “Hey, Ev, my man! How's it hanging? Who's this ya got with ya?” Everett happily first bumps the man and turns to Chantal “Oh, this is just a new arrival in limbo. Chantal, this is Kay. Kay, this is Chantal.” Kay shakes Chantal’s hand very quickly “Well I'll be darned. How are ya handling the whole being dead thing.” Chantal shrugs “I'm still processing this. I could've sworn atheism would've made me a demon or something if that's how things work.” Everett laughs gently, “You need at least 3 sins to become a demon. For example my friend here only has two, skepticism and gluttony.” Chantal tilts his head curiously. “Hey, Ev, if you need at least 3 sins what did you-” Everett interrupts Chantal very loudly, as if trying to hide something “ANYWAY, KAY, do you wanna go to the coffee shop with us?” Kay shrugs “Sure, dude, why not? I'm thirsty…”

  Eventually they get to the coffee shop. It's filled with angels and demons, all talking and chilling out. Chantal looks at the menu. The options were: Miserable Mocha, Destroying Decaf, Sad Sanka, and the ‘favorite’, Literally Hot Tar. (Reserved for demons.) Chantal just asked for black coffee. As he sat down, somebody suddenly tapped on his shoulder. He turns around and sees…MINOS AND DEATH??? Chantal is completely flabbergasted. “What- I thought you two were only-” Death interrupts him casually “Oh we just come over here while we're on break. Look, Chantal and Everett, we need your help. Lucifer has gone absolutely MAD with power. He's trying to take over all of Limbo, and he's screwing up the entire damn DIVINE ORDER.” Chantal looks over everything “And why do you need our help specifically” Minos shrugs “We honestly just took a hat and pulled out two random names.” Kay interrupts “Hold on, I've known Ev ever since he's gotten here, I wanna come with.” Minos rolls his eyes “Ugh, we don't care who comes with, as long as we put an end to the highly inefficient chaos Lucifer is causing.”

  Chantal stands up and sighs “Look. I just got into Limbo and this is a lot to process. I'm not going on some adventure to save limbo so you can choose another damn name from your hat.” Death laughs nervously “Well, uhm, you see Chantal, it's quite literally orders from the man upstairs himself. If you were to deny him, he might strike you down…immediately.” Chantal looks quite frankly pissed. “So you're telling me I have no choice in this?! That's bullshit!” Everett places a calming hand on Chantal’s shoulder. “Look, Chantal, I know this is a lot for you but we're gonna get through this alright? You and me.” Chantal gives a tiny smile before Kay interrupts loudly “AND ME!! Don't forget about me! I'm going too.” Minos clears his throat “I believe me and Death are going to come along as well. We must make sure that nobody dies for a second time, which can very well happen.” Chantal puts his hand to his chin. “Wait, why would this take very long? It takes just about two hours to get from Staten to The Bronx.” Everett laughs nervously. “Yeah, so, maybe that was true in the human realm but in the afterlife, this place has been increased to about the size of the entire USA so as to not overpopulate. I mean, every soul that dies goes here, they all need to be accommodated.”

  Kay interrupts loudly and enthusiastically, "WELL THEN WE SHOULD GET GOIN'!!!" Kay kicks down the LimboBucks door and runs out at lightspeed. Death smirks a bit "I like the fat guy's attitude." Death runs after him. Minos sighs louder. He sighs a lot. "Death, wait up, you're gonna fall over again. It took weeks to find your humerus last time." Minos reluctantly walks out the door after Death. Chantal sighs. He looks more sad than anything. Everett glances at him, concerned. "Are you okay, dude?" Chantal glances up "I just...wanted to live a normal afterlife. And now I've got this giant damn quest I don't even wanna be a part of!"

  Everett sighs empathetically "I understand how you feel. But, once we're done with this, you'll be able to live your afterlife as normal as ya want. No fighting, no Death, no Minos. Just you and your afterlife." Chantal smiles slightly "Heh. You're good at making people feel better. Alright...let's go then…but I'm not fully accepting this.” Chantal and Everett walk out the door of the LimboBucks. And maybe. Just maybe. Chantal is ready for whatever comes at him.