I Started Out Dead, Yet Became a God in the Eerie Realm

Lu Qiu, an inferior citizen, is a beggar who scrapes by amid ruins and garbage.

Until one day, she digs a gold coin out of an ancient ruin.

The great figure praised on the back of the coin has the same full name as her.

And the portrait engraved on the front is actually her own!

"To the Supreme Lord Lu Qiu, who led us out of the darkest night."

She runs her fingers over the inscription and imagines that she is a princess stranded on some distant, abandoned planet, or perhaps a descendant of an ancient noble family.

But when a tentacle pierces her chest and a monster tears out her innards, Lu Qiu thinks: So it really was just a daydream...

She's nothing but a weak ant, not even worth being a disposable extra.

As her consciousness fades and she nears death, she sees a twisted black hole slowly appear:

[Gate to the Strange Realm 11503, ]

[Spore bodies detected nearby... Enter the gate?]

Lu Qiu's finger twitches in the pool of blood.

The black hole flickers and sucks in her broken body.

[Welcome home, child of the Mother Goddess.]

*

Spores spread, four-dimensional insects appear, and contaminated zones fall.

Parasites and Awakened emerge; the Fallen and the Executioners fight to the death...

Moving along the edges of the three-dimensional world and four-dimensional space, Lu Qiu rises from an obscure little nobody who simply wants to keep her head down, to the wicked ruler of a Strange Realm, feared by all.

Lu Qiu thinks she's been wronged.

At first, she only wanted to survive. Later, she decided being a gourmet wouldn't be bad either.

She toys with the gold coin her people minted out of gratitude, identical to the one she found in the ruins when she was still a beggar.

Looking up at the misty, blue-gray haze, Lu Qiu wonders: What is the real world?

The idea came to me in 2021, and the title and outline were set before September 2022. Please do not copy them.

[Content warnings / Notes]

① My take on sci-fi. The basic setting continues the fourth instance from Game Deity, Spore Parasites.

The core concepts and background have been substantially revised. No spoilers for now.

Theme: Never give up on hope, even in adversity.