"AAAAA!" they both screamed, plunging down like anime girls getting rejected in a high-budget romance finale.
Straight into a glowing, crystal-blue body of water.
As they fell, Finn's eyes locked onto the goddess mid-tumble. Her divine assets flailed like untethered water balloons—holy, majestic, and mildly hypnotic.
He immediately gave her chest the kind of look you'd expect from a man who once risked a computer viruses for anime jiggle mods.
She noticed. "WHAT IS WRONG WITH—"
"RRRAAAAAAGHHHHHH—WOOSH—KRAAAAAAGHHH!!"
A crimson wyvern exploded into view, roaring like a metal band in heat as it rocketed past them toward the cliff. With a violent flap, it body-slammed the black wolf mid-charge and snatched it up in its claws like CPS taking kids from a meth trailer.
"HOLY—"
"AAAAA!" the goddess continued screaming, full snot-cry, like her favorite show just got canceled mid-arc.
"YOU RUINED A REALLY AWESOME—OH MY—"
SPLASH!
They slammed into the water like divine bowling balls dropped from orbit.
Underwater, Finn thrashed like someone who had never swum a day in his life. His limbs flailed. His eyes clenched shut. His soul filed a complaint. Then—he surged upward.
GASP!
He broke the surface, soaked from hoodie to trauma. Hair in his face. Wet twigs in his pants. Eyes wild.
He spat out a mouthful of water and turned just in time to see the goddess emerge dramatically, gasping and coughing like she was auditioning for a shampoo commercial.
"…Everything's soaked and ruined! THIS IS A NIGHTMARE!" she sobbed, staring at her now-disheveled, leaf-stuck locks like they were war casualties.
Finn blinked. "We just escaped death, and you're crying over your split ends?"
"You were STARING at my BREASTS as we fell!"
"So what?! I have priorities! You ever seen boob physics in slow motion?! That's a religious experience!"
She gasped, scandalized.
A thunderous roar from the nearby waterfall cut through the chaos. The two floated in the glowing blue pool, the current gently dragging them toward the misty drop ahead.
Finn wiped his face. "Let's just get to land before we get sucked into yet another near-death cutscene."
"Y-Yeah," she sniffled, still clutching her soggy pride, "I agree."
Soon, they swam toward a rocky shore. Finn crawled out first, shaking himself off like a soggy golden retriever. Twigs clung to his hoodie. His jeans sagged. His dignity had once again taken a sick day.
"Ugh," he groaned, peeling off his socks. Water squelched out like defeated marshmallows. "Wet socks are the WORST."
He glared at the sky, then at his squishy shoes, then back at the sky like it had personally betrayed him. "This is not how I imagined my epic isekai fantasy adventure going," he muttered, full of soggy disappointment.
Behind him, the goddess dragged herself out of the water coughing like a freshman after one vape hit too many. She staggered upright, looked down at her soaked dress, sniffled dramatically, then gasped in horror.
"This is designer! I'm divine! Do you know what water does to radiant silk??" she shrieked.
Then her glare locked onto Finn like a sniper scope. "This never would've happened if you didn't drag me to this godforsaken world!"
Finn snapped back, arms crossed. "Oh yeah? Maybe if you gave me a decent ability, this wouldn't have happened! I didn't even get one!"
She huffed—but then paused. Her eyes narrowed.
A faint blue orb floated above his head.
"Oh," she said with sarcastic glee, "would you look at that. Seems like you did get an ability after all."
Finn blinked. "What? What is it?"
She covered her lips, snickering. "You're… The Trip God."
"…The what now?"
"Trip God!" she said, grinning like a gremlin. "You can make people trip by holding out your hand and pulling it back—like this." She mimed the motion, then burst out laughing. "Oh my gods, you're like a walking sidewalk crack!"
"You little—!" Finn growled. He immediately thrust his hand out and yanked it back.
WHAM.
The goddess faceplanted into the ground, limbs sprawled like a divine pancake.
"HA! HOW'D THAT FEEL?!"
Finn stood triumphantly, hands on his hips like a morally confused superhero.
'This ability is AWESOME.'
"Aghhh!" she groaned, pushing herself up and spitting out leaves. "THAT HURT!"
Finn gave a devilish grin. "Oh yeah? Want me to do it again? Or maybe make fun of me some more?"
She waved her hands in surrender. "No! No-no-no—we're good! Totally good! Respect the Trip God!"
His smirk widened.
"Good."
A robotic voice rang in Finn's ear like Siri got possessed by an RPG tutorial:
"Congratulations, Finn Wiggles. You have earned your first Trip."
[Title Unlocked: God of Tripping]
Trip more targets to unlock higher-level opponents. Trip 9 more people to rank up.
'Oh hell yeah! This is just like an RPG! That's sick.' He grinned. 'Wait—does that mean other people have this system too?'
He looked down at the goddess, who was on her knees trying to fix her wet hair like she was prepping for a Vogue photoshoot.
"Hey, Goddess," he said.
She looked up, irritated. "I have a name, you know."
"Oh my," he replied in full sarcasm mode, "it appears that in all our precious time together, you never once bothered to tell me."
She stood up dramatically, one hand planted on her chest just above her cleavage like a soap opera star.
"I am the divine and elegant Majestria!" she declared. "All praise me for my beauty and boundless politeness!"
Her eyes closed in smug satisfaction.
She coughed. "This is the part where you praise me."
Finn stared at her, deadpan. "Politeness my ass. You're about as polite as a Instagram comment section."
"You take that back!" she snapped.
"Yea-yeah, okay, Ma-jezebel." He smirked. "Anyway, I've got a question. That voice I just heard—do other people in this world hear that kind of stuff?"
She crossed her arms. "No. Only those sent here by me get that system."
His eyes narrowed. "So… there are others like me?"
She looked away, slightly pouty. "Yes. But they're nothing like you. They're noble. Classy. Attractive. Clean."
'Like you're one to talk about nobility while looking like a drowned Victoria's Secret catalog…'
"So back at the forest," Finn said, "you mind explaining why your hands were glowing?"
"Oh, these?" she raised her hands, and they began to glow again with golden light.
"These are my Divine Punches. They're powerful enough to obliterate most threats with a single blow."
Finn's face slowly contorted into a twitchy grimace. His voice dropped an octave.
"You're telling me… instead of us running for our lives like civilians during a Godzilla attack… you could've just punched that thing?!"
She grabbed her head with both hands, tilted it dramatically, stuck her tongue out, and made the world's most insufferable "oopsie" face.
Finn crossed his arms, still dripping wet and emotionally unstable. "Well, Miss Goddess," he said, voice full of sass and swamp water, "how exactly are we supposed to get out of the freaking Death Forest? You know, the one with fire-breathing wyverns, demon wolves, and my emotional spin?"
Majestria tilted her head, thinking way too hard for someone who claimed to be divine.
"Hm. Good question."
"You don't know, do you?"
"Oh, don't worry. I have a plan."
"…You sure?"
"Absolutely. All we need to do is survive until sunrise." She raised one finger like she was about to teach kindergarten.
BOOM.
The sky darkened instantly. Twenty bolts of lightning slammed into the forest around them like it was auditioning for a disaster movie.
Finn didn't even blink.
"I hate you so much."