"Finally! I sat here and waited for hours while you slept... you silly idiot."
'I knew it!... No fucking way...'
Max's jaw dropped, the granola bar slipping from his mouth and falling to the floor as he froze in a strange mixture of shock, disbelief, and joy. He stood halfway between the doorway into a white nothingness and his bedroom - one leg in, one leg out - torn between retreating or stepping fully into what he was almost certain this was.
He had thrown his door open moments ago while looking back at his room, giving the messy place one last glance to make sure he hadn't forgotten anything, before turning toward what should have been the dimly lit living room outside his bedroom—and had thought it was unusually bright, making him think that he had left the light on by accident last night.
Long ago, he'd developed the habit of scanning his bedroom for stray items to toss into his backpack before heading off to another day at 'Action Now!' Comics, causing him to not immediately notice the missing living room when he first opened the door.
Max's slowly recovering look, still dripping in obvious surprise was met by a Cheshire-cat-like grin on the face of the strange woman from the previous night that had weirded out Max...Vespera!
She was somehow even more beautiful now, not to mention much taller than she had been before, as if she had been scaled up from a mere human's size.
A large black rectangle, like some divine flat-screen TV, hovered in the air before the plush velvet couch where Vespera reclined. Just above her, a tray of snacks floated within easy reach, allowing her to casually grab a bite while watching whatever flickered across the screen.
'Hhhmm, I thought he'd come running inside the moment he opened the door, like the others...'
Tilting her head, Vespera voiced her next thought aloud, hoping to shake Max from his lingering hesitation—not that it made any difference now.
"You can go back and forth between your 'room' and here all you want, but what looks like your room is just a construct already, I'll make it simple, in terms you understand, Maximillian Nakamura... When you clicked that link last night you were already visited by 'Truck-kun' for the second time... Get it?"
Max gulped; he actually did understand exactly what this giant beauty, lounging seductively, was talking about.
"Truck-kun" became a well-known internet meme that showcased a recurring trope in different isekai works of anime, manga, and light novels, where characters are transported to other worlds and realities. In these stories, characters often end up in new worlds through various means, such as reincarnation after death, with many meeting their end in their original world by being hit by a truck.
As this concept appeared in more and more various works, a meme featuring a character called "Truck-kun" emerged, depicting the truck as a figure responsible for killing people in their original world and transporting them to a new one.
The fact that this now divine-looking 'goddess' had brought it up to help Max make sense of his predicament was, in his mind, a whole new tier of Isekai-meta absurdity. After the bizarre chain of events from the night before, however, Max couldn't claim to be completely shocked; he'd chalked it all up to a series of comically obvious and odd coincidences due to this being the real world.
Well, comical if you ignored the part where he almost became a hood ornament, of course!
'So, that truck that almost hit Levi and me earlier...and the obvious username online last night...Seriously?'
Max blinked a few times, his expression flat, and said, "So, I'm assuming I'm talking to 'TherealJumpchan'? Is this actually what I think it is, or just the most vivid, lucid dream I've ever had?"
"Hehehe, you got it! Now, why don't you just come over already? I can even pinch you, if you like...you know, so you can make sure you aren't dreaming."
She winked and made a pinching motion with her finger and thumb, playfully pretending to pinch her own butt.
Max lost track of his last thought and suddenly felt an overwhelming urge to approach the woman lounging before him. He paused, puzzled by the impulse, until it hit him—he was being manipulated emotionally, psychologically, and even hypnotized on a deeper, more primal level. - Exactly like outside of the comic shop!
"Ah so self-aware! Yet another reason I extended this invitation to you Maxie...Come, I'll stop being so cryptic and just let you know what this is."
Max quickly took the twenty or so steps to where Vespera was sitting, stopping several feet in front of her on the couch, not bothering to try and fight Vespera's influence. He had an idea where this was headed and was not against it one bit to be honest. The hope of transmigration that is. Get your minds out of the gutter!
Glancing back, he noticed the door way into his room was changing. The old, basic doorframe, painted to match his living room, had vanished. In its place was now a beautiful, dark wooden frame with countless markings and strange inscriptions covering it.
The door was slowly becoming a match for its new frame as well.
He turned his head to ask her for the full story, but before he could even get a word out, she was already leaning forward, her finger lightly pressing against his forehead just as his head completed its turn; almost instantly, a peculiar feeling began to ripple just beneath his scalp.
"Ahhhh..." Max's inventory of stories in his memories were being searched by her, looking for an example.
"Ah perfect! In the story 'Solo Leveling', the main character's body needed to build up its strength to be able to contain all the awesome power it was intended to inherit. This... is something like that, except I'm letting you in on the plot right from the get go. If you aren't worried about why you're being 'transmigrated,' wont you have a less stressful time? Maybe even have a little fun? Let me have a little fun? I like to watch you know... Hey, what's with that look? I like a good story is what I mean."
She suddenly tilted her head and gave Max a weird look. "You know, I can read your thoughts... it isn't very nice to call me a pervert, even inside your own brain, Max."
The tall, glowing being batted her eyes seductively then grinning widely at Max, clearly teasing him.
"What? I was mortal once too, I used to have a type... You think I would choose someone I found subjectively ugly?"
Max narrowed his eyes, then raised an eyebrow, while smirking, he was currently remembering the near miss with the truck again and annoyed but the compliment sort of leveled things out. "Wow... that's shallow as hell."
The radiant face flattened its lips into a fake look of disgust while scrunching up its nose for a moment, pretending to pout and look hurt, before laughing and smiling again.
"Hehehehehe... Shut up... What? It's not okay for a god to take a pass at a mortal every century or two? Hehehe, anyways, I know you have more than just a grasp of what's going on already, but there are most certainly a lot of things you don't know, the real rules of what you call 'Jumpchain' are a little bit different than what you're used to. And yes, I was going to give you a 'traditional transmigration experience' with the truck back there..."
"...Oh stop with the look, I wasn't going to let your little buddy get hurt."
"Yeah, Levi would have totally loved to see someone splattered on the blacktop, totally... So, this IS what I think it is?!"
Max had been mostly shocked up to this point, luckily, by nature he was fairly level headed, so it wasn't enough to fully fluster him, allowing some feelings of excitement and anxiousness to build inside him as well.
He had been a little bit annoyed that this higher being was playing with his life but when linked to the news of being given the anime mc treatment... He was already mostly over it... however, he truly did not appreciate Vespera involving Levi in any of it.
Lungs swelling, Max took a deep breath and decided let it go, letting the reality of the now seep into his being while letting go of the past. A strange feeling of anxiousness still stuck around however.
It was probably the same feeling lottery winners experience, from the moment they find out they've won to the moment they actually receive their prize—surreal, with a lingering fear that it might not truly happen..
Max was brought back to the moment and took a small step back as the woman rose from her suggestive position on the recliner, she towered over Max, who didn't even come up to her waist, standing with her long, thick legs open, with the end of her medium length, very revealing white dress barely hanging past Max's line of vision, it wouldn't take much for Max to slouch and see what was happening underneath the hood of this vehicle, so to say.
And, clearly reading his mind, she slowly rose on her toes to give him the chance to do so.
'PERVERT! What the hell!?'
Max blushed a little and rolled his eyes, but didn't take the bait, looking to either side but not directly ahead.
The next moment, her figure shrank down quickly, until she was around four inches shorter than Max, who happened to stand at around six feet tall without shoes and socks on.
"What? I get bored sometimes and its fun to tease a future co-worker while he still can't do anything about it."
There was the slightest red flush on the perfect white and smooth skin of the glowing woman in front of Max, now looking up at him.
"Co-worker? What do you mean? Is this the whole thing when I 'spark' as a Jumper, I become like you? Then I become a 'Jump-Chan'?"
"More or less, you can do what you want afterwards, if you succeed. I want you to succeed too, by the way. There aren't many strings attached to any of this, the more the multiverse grows, the more stable it becomes. This is just one way to do it"
While Vespera spoke, she lifted up a hand and a virtual display appeared out of nowhere.
A thin white finger pointed at it and several images popped up, little bubbles that were nestled together in clusters, along with some string like lines crisscrossing back and forth between several of them.
"This is more or less a way for you to understand the grand scheme of things with your limited intelligence and knowledge, no offence."
"None taken, your Jump-ness"
"See? That's another reason I knew you were perfect, able to joke with a deity without sweating even a little bit, I mean, I'm most certainly the nicest, prettiest one out there so I'm not surprised...but what if you ran into a meanie that did something like this?"
A second later, Max found himself pressed onto the floor, Vespera was staring down at him with an interested grin on her face, before retracting the tiny amount of power she had just used.
Max slowly pushed himself to his feet, aching and battered from the impact with whatever strange nothingness he was now standing on, and shot her a sharp glare. "What the hell!?"
Vespera held her hand up to her mouth a giggled cutely, "Maxie, I just wanted to give you a quick reminder that this is very real, you were starting to get main character syndrome."
Max thought for a moment and relaxed, she was right, he wasn't used to being in the presence of someone with super powers let alone a god. It would do well if he was more cautious in the future.
Vespera tilted her head, studying Max with a playful smile. "Quick learner! Alright, Maxie, let me lay it out for you—how this Jumpchain thing is going to really work, especially with my special rules."
She paused, reaching out to trace a glowing finger along the air as a virtual diagram appeared. "First off, the Jumpchain you're familiar with? This will be more or less the same, It's just a template you are very familiar with and makes this 'make a god' thing easy for me. Pretty standard. You pick your powers, items, perks—whatever catches your fancy—and you take them with you from jump to jump. Anything you choose to add to your inventory, or perks you select, are yours forever. They're not just temporary boosts—they become part of you. Think of it like building a new layer upon your existing self, stronger and more capable each time. Finally, on the last jump, if you've gained enough power, which I'm sure you will, you can pick one last scenario and your transformation will be complete and the reality you are in will become real, yours to do what you want with."
Vespera's eyes sparkled. "Speaking of your body—when you jump, you won't be starting with what you are now, not that there's anything wrong with you as you are, cutie. I'm giving you a recreated, upgraded body—stronger, faster, more resilient. It'll serve as your base for all future jumps. No matter what universe you land in, you'll always have that solid foundation. Like I said earlier, I want you to make it."
She hesitated for a moment, then added softly, "One thing I do want to clarify—no children until your final jump. I know that might sound harsh, but I want to avoid the whole 'ghost babies' thing. No sadness, no complicated feelings—just focus on your growth and your journey. There are ways for people and creatures to move between jumps, but they're special and only in the options, perks and companion section of every Jump 'document', you already know that."
Vespera's expression grew more serious, but still gentle. "I chose you because of your builds—your choices posted Discord, your approach—are really solid. Most 'Jumpers' tend to stack powers without much thought, creating these overpowered, mismatched characters. But you? You've been carefully selecting abilities that flow well together, slowly transforming from a human into something more. That's exactly the kind of journey I want to help guide, I have high hopes for you."
Max cut in while she paused and asked, "So, you checked out some of the Jumpchains I've written obviously? There's a couple other people out there with better ones though..."
She leaned back with a grin. "Well, to make this work, at least a million or so lifeforms need to have embraced and loved the story or fiction that is being visited for my powers to bring it to life, so to say, that and the seed of godhood that's about to be placed into you. So, in short: You will get a juiced up little godling body, if you acquire an inventory or inventories, they and items within stay with you, no kids for now and you promise that you're intentionally building yourself a vessel that's flexible, balanced, and capable of evolving into something truly extraordinary. Oh and you have to play nice to a certain extent, I'm not concerned about you becoming some sort of evil eldritch horror, but if you do, I will smite you... so fast.... Sound good so far?"
Max shook his head, trying to keep up. "Yeah, sounds pretty standard, I mean, you gods aren't afraid of a little competition? Right?"