I wasn't planning to die today.
I mean, technically, yeah — I was standing on the edge of a clock tower staring down at a town that looked like it belonged on a noble's postcard, wind slapping my coat like it had a personal grudge. But you'd be surprised how calm things get when you finally decide you're done. The noise dies. Time slows. Even the damn birds stop singing. Like the whole world was waiting to see if I'd chicken out.
Spoiler alert: I didn't.
I had nothing. And I mean that in the poetic and literal sense. No money. No prospects. No hidden noble bloodline or magical pendant passed down from a cool grandmother. Just Jack Gulf — broke, bitter, and born on the wrong side of the town that was already on the wrong side of the country.
"Let them watch," I muttered. "Let them drink wine while the dogs bark."
I looked down at the crowd below, just tiny specks from here. The nobles walked around like their cologne could buy them godhood, and the commoners—people like me—shoveled horse shit for lunch and got called lucky for it. Somewhere in that crowd, my parents were probably folding napkins for people who'd never learned to say "thank you."
I had one thing to say before gravity did the rest.
"If I had a single thing worth living for, I wouldn't be up here. So to this cursed world and all the worms in it — screw you."
And I jumped.
Darkness didn't come right away.
Which, rude. If a guy's gonna take a plunge from a hundred feet, at least give him a quick blackout, right?
But no — my mind stayed very much online as the world around me stretched like taffy, like someone had pressed pause on death. It was just dark... stretchy… and annoyingly silent. Then a flicker — red, soft and slow, like a dying ember — lit up the space around me.
And then came the voice.
"Well, that was dramatic."
I blinked. Still falling? Floating? Honestly, I couldn't tell anymore. But suddenly, I was standing. On something. A floor that looked like cracked obsidian with gold veins running through it. The air felt like ash and expensive incense.
In front of me was a man. Or something that looked like one.
He sat on a throne shaped like a curled-up beast. His eyes glowed faintly violet, his suit shimmered like molten onyx, and his teeth — those were real. Real and sharp.
"You must be Jack Gulf," he said with a grin that could have peeled skin. "Welcome to Hell."
I folded my arms. "Huh. I always figured Hell would be hotter."
He chuckled. "That's Gate 3. You're in Gate 1. This one's more... administrative."
I blinked. "So you're not Satan?"
His grin widened. "Do you think Satan greets every jumper personally? Kid, Satan hasn't seen this floor in eons. I'm just one of the regional managers. Think of me as... customer service."
"Customer service for the damned?"
"Technically, you're not damned. You're dead, yes. But you're in what we call a gray-zone. Not evil enough for punishment, not good enough for reincarnation. But you are eligible... for offers."
He pulled out a flaming clipboard.
"Let's see... nineteen years old. Unremarkable school record. A tendency toward sarcasm. Deep mistrust of authority. Fantasizes about stabbing nobles with spoons—"
"Okay, that was once."
He didn't even blink.
"But here's the fun part," he continued, tapping the clipboard. "You jumped not out of fear, but hatred. Your final words were an explicit curse against your world. That puts you on our priority list."
I didn't know whether to feel insulted or flattered.
He leaned forward, eyes narrowing. "We like people like you, Jack. People with nothing to lose and enough rage to light a continent. That makes you entertaining."
"I'm not a dancing monkey."
"No, you're a contestant."
That word made me pause.
"I beg your what now?"
"You're being offered a second chance," the devil said. "Not for free, of course. Nothing's free in Hell — you should know that. But we do have a little game going on. It's called Skull Island. You'll be sent there along with other souls like yours. Broken. Vicious. Desperate."
"Sounds like my kind of beach."
He grinned again. "It's a survival game. Twenty territories. Each a 'country' led by someone like you. You build alliances, break them, wage war, scheme. Conquer the map. When the hourglass runs out, the country with the most land wins. Anyone alive on the winning team gets the prize."
I raised a brow. "And that is?"
"Reincarnation. Back into your world. Not just alive, but as the wealthiest person on the continent. Enough money to make nobles grovel at your feet. For the rest of your half-life, anyway."
"Half-life?"
"Yes. The price is half. You'll live like a god... until your time's up."
"And if I lose?"
He snapped his fingers. The flames from his clipboard surged, shaping into burning silhouettes — screaming, twisted, consumed by something black and hungry.
"Gate 2," he said simply.
"Ah."
"So?" he said, flicking a scroll onto a stone table beside me. "Do we have a deal, Jack Gulf?"
I looked at the scroll, then at him. I thought of my parents — still alive, crying while serving plates. I thought of the nobles — the laughter, the contempt, the way they looked at us like pests in their garden.
I signed the damn scroll with a quill dipped in my own blood.
I woke up choking on sand.
The air was thick, humid, and smelled like gunpowder and sweat. I sat up fast, brushing grit from my face, my body still wearing the same coat I died in — minus the suicidal charm. Around me were others. People. Some coughing, some crying, some already fighting.
A giant obsidian hourglass floated in the sky above the island, its red sand already falling.
A horn blew from the east.
And Skull Island welcomed us all.
[To be continued]
The First Lie
You ever wake up in a war zone?
Me neither. But I'm guessing it feels a lot like waking up on Skull Island: a bunch of strangers shouting, sand in your mouth, no clue where you are, and a giant hourglass hanging in the sky like God flipped his kitchen timer.
The first thing I noticed — besides the absolute chaos — was the vibe. That sounds stupid, I know. But places have feelings. And Skull Island felt like it remembered pain. Like the trees had watched people die under them, and the sand knew the taste of blood. It wasn't hell, not yet. But it was the lobby.
Around me, bodies were pulling themselves up from the ground like drunken crash survivors. No orientation. No map. No "Welcome, here's your room key and a free towel." Just confusion and noise and heat.
"Back off, freak!"
"I didn't touch your damn bag, relax!"
Someone two feet from me got decked in the jaw and collapsed in a heap. No one stopped to help.
Good to know I'd landed in the friendliest group of desperate souls alive.
Then I heard it.
A voice. Calm. Precise. Way too comfortable for this level of chaos.
"Alright, enough of this."
I turned. A guy — tall, clean, neat — somehow already not covered in dirt like the rest of us. He wore a jacket that looked stolen from a military museum and had this steel-cold look in his eyes. Like he'd seen worse things than death and hadn't flinched.
"Listen up!" he barked, and somehow people listened.
The crowd didn't exactly obey, but the yelling dropped a few decibels. He didn't wait for silence.
"My name is Mercer," he said. "I don't know how many of you are dumb enough to think this is a dream, but it's not. We've got no map, no water, no food, and no rules except survive. We're in one of the twenty zones of Skull Island, and if you don't want to die screaming, we better start organizing."
"And who made you boss?" someone spat from the back.
"Me," Mercer said. "Because I'm the only one with a brain that hasn't melted."
He gestured behind him. There were five others — three guys, two girls — all of them standing in a V-formation like this wasn't their first rodeo.
"Form a camp. Build defense. Send scouts. If you're too soft for that, walk off and take your chances with whatever's in the jungle."
I hated him instantly. Not because he was wrong. He wasn't. But because he looked like the kind of guy who always won. Even in hell.
But I'm not an idiot. So I kept my mouth shut and watched.
Some people drifted toward him, like sheep magnetized by someone who sounded like certainty. I could already see his little nation forming. A patchwork of survivors clinging to structure like it could save them.
I wasn't joining that.
Because I'd made a promise the moment I signed that scroll.
No kings. Not anymore. I wasn't dying to serve another bastard with a louder voice.
I slipped away from the crowd, toward the treeline. Jungle thick and unforgiving. Humid like it wanted to drown me in my own sweat. I needed answers — and space.
And I got both.
Sort of.
Because that's when I met her.
She was sitting on a fallen tree trunk, legs crossed, sharpening a knife made from what looked like bone. Her eyes tracked me the second I entered the clearing. No surprise. No fear.
"You're either brave," she said, "or stupid."
"Can't I be both?"
She cracked a smile. It didn't reach her eyes.
"I'm Ava," she said.
"Jack."
"First time dying?"
"Isn't it always?"
She didn't laugh. Just slid the bone knife into a belt I hadn't noticed and nodded.
"You're not with Mercer?"
"Nope."
"Good. I don't trust him."
"I don't trust anyone who talks like he's done this before."
She looked at me then. Like, really looked. I got the sense she was filing me away in some internal index — not as a threat, not yet, but as a variable.
"People are already forming groups," she said. "Territories will get drawn soon. Alliances, betrayals, the usual mess. And when the sand runs out…" She pointed up. "Only the top dogs get out."
"And the rest?"
"Food for the soil."
She stood and dusted her hands. "I'm not planning to die here, Jack."
"Neither am I."
"But I'm also not rushing to build a kingdom of cowards under some pretend general."
I liked her. Not in the creepy, anime blush way. But in the "I wouldn't mind watching your back while you stab someone" kind of way. Practical. Calm. Real.
"Wanna team up?" I asked.
"Maybe."
"What's the catch?"
"You lie to me, I gut you."
"Fair."
Later that night, we made a fire in a low ditch. No smoke, no light beyond a faint glow. Ava knew how to cover tracks and silence sound. She'd been a soldier, I learned. In another life. Got fragged by a mine planted by her own side. Long story.
I told her my story too. Some of it. Not the tower part. Not the part where I jumped. Just enough to let her think I was angry. Anger was easier than sadness. People respected rage more than despair.
And I asked her one thing.
"What happens if we win?"
She didn't answer right away.
Then: "We go back. Rich. Alive. But not young. Half our life."
"I'm fine with that."
"No, you're not," she said. "You just don't know what you'd do with a full one."
That line stuck with me.
I didn't sleep that night. Ava did. One eye half-open like a damn snake.
I watched the red sand fall from the giant hourglass above us.
And I lied to myself for the first time since dying.
"I'm going to survive this."
[To be continued.]