The rain had been relentless that morning, tapping insistently against the cobblestones of the bustling city square. Merchants shouted over the din of the storm, their cries mingling with the clatter of wooden carts and the occasional whinny of a horse startled by the sudden downpour. Amidst this ordinary chaos, an extraordinary, though utterly ridiculous, event was about to unfold.
Keran Thalwyn, a man of modest stature but exceptional intellect, was darting through the slippery streets, clutching a rather insistent tabby cat against his chest. The feline, a stray of unparalleled stubbornness, had become trapped atop a slickened roof, mewing plaintively for someone—anyone—to rescue it. Keran, ever the self-proclaimed savior of small, helpless creatures, had leapt without hesitation. And now, drenched and panting, he navigated the treacherous square with a speed that was entirely unmatched by his coordination.
His eyes, bright with the zeal of someone entirely convinced of his own righteousness, caught sight of a yellow object lying innocuously on the wet stones: a banana peel. It might have been the faintest obstacle to a man of ordinary fortune, easily avoided with a careful step. But for Keran, whose heroism often outweighed his prudence, it became the instrument of an unparalleled calamity.
His left foot struck the peel with catastrophic precision. Time seemed to fracture, stretching each second into a long, quivering moment of cinematic inevitability. The tabby yowled as Keran's legs betrayed him completely. He flailed, arms splayed, cat clutched tight, and the world seemed to tilt like a ship in a storm.
A collective gasp rose from the nearby market-goers, some rushing to help, others frozen in awe at the spectacle of impending disaster. Keran's eyes widened, not in fear, but in the profound realization that he, a man of remarkable intellect, might soon meet a fate wholly unworthy of his genius.
Then, in a movement that could only be described as tragically graceful, Keran collided with a stack of barrels. One barrel—filled with fermented apples, judging by the pungent aroma—rolled like a boulder, colliding with a cart of assorted vegetables. Carrots flew, cabbages bounced, and the tabby cat, in an act of pure feline indignation, leapt from Keran's grasp and disappeared into a puddle.
Keran himself landed with a sound that was somewhere between a thud and a splat, arms awkwardly outstretched, face pressed into the mud, and a banana peel still stubbornly clinging to his shoe. For the briefest moment, silence reigned. The marketplace, a chaotic orchestra just moments before, seemed to pause, as if the world itself was holding its breath.
Then came the unmistakable click of celestial recognition.
High above, in a dimension unbound by mud, rain, or market carts, the gods were gathering for what might have been the most perplexing council meeting in all of divine history. Among them, a deity known for incompetence as much as omnipotence squinted at the scene.
"Is… is that the hero?" the god murmured, one celestial brow arched so high it nearly merged with the constellation above.
"Yes," another deity responded, drumming its fingers on the intangible table of eternity. "He has perished… though in a manner most absurd."
The first god tilted its head, confusion etching deeper lines into its ethereal face. "But… I assigned him SSS+ rank. How… how does one earn SSS+ by slipping on a banana?"
"Apparently, one simply must be alive," the second deity replied dryly, its voice echoing across the aether. "Though I confess, I did not foresee… this."
Below, in the damp and muddied square, Keran's consciousness wavered on the precipice between life and something far more celestial. For a brief, terrifying instant, he saw visions of infinite bureaucracy, endless mountains of paperwork, and the divine beings—confused, slightly offended, and remarkably judgmental—scribbling notes about his soul.
And then, with all the subtlety of a cosmic joke, he died.
But death, it seemed, had no intention of leaving him unremarkable. The gods, in a moment of unprecedented confusion—or perhaps sheer divine whimsy—awarded him the rank of SSS+, the highest conceivable mark of heroism in the known cosmos. The paperwork for such a rank usually required feats of unimaginable valor: dragons slain, kingdoms liberated, philosophical conundrums solved, and occasionally, existential dread successfully avoided. Keran had, by contrast, slipped, flailed, and fallen.
An auditor deity, faintly horrified, flipped through the cosmic ledger. "This… cannot be correct."
"Doesn't matter," said the first god, waving a hand that shimmered like liquid starlight. "He has the rank. That is all that matters. Let us see what mischief… er, greatness, he brings."
And with that, a beam of ineffable light descended upon Keran, lifting him from the mud and market chaos. His vision blurred; the smell of wet cabbage was replaced by the faintly antiseptic scent of… somewhere entirely else.
When Keran opened his eyes again, he found himself lying on a gentle slope, beneath a sky painted in shades of pink and gold that no earthly sunrise could hope to replicate. Around him stretched a landscape simultaneously familiar and fantastical: rolling green fields dotted with medieval villages, spires and towers piercing the horizon, and in the distance, forests that seemed to shimmer with faint magical energy.
He tried to speak. "What… where am I?"
No answer came. Not from the wind, not from the sky, not from the birds—which, upon closer inspection, appeared to have slight luminous patterns curling across their feathers.
And then came the first glimpse of the absurdity that would define his new existence: a small village cart, drawn by a horse with an expression of remarkable judgment, slowly rolled by, carrying crates labeled mana pumpkins, enchanted flour, and, inexplicably, a large banner proclaiming "Welcome, SSS+ Hero".
Keran blinked. "SSS+?" he whispered. The memory of mud, banana peel, and cabbage crashed into him. His heroic credentials—issued by incompetent divine authorities—made no earthly sense. Yet, somehow, here they were, emblazoned in the colors of prophecy and public approval.
A figure approached, garbed in robes that shimmered with the subtle glow of spellcraft. A young woman, probably a mage—or at least someone who looked the part—curtsied politely. "Sir… Hero," she said, her voice polite but edged with barely concealed astonishment, "we've… we've been expecting you."
Keran's mind raced. Expecting me? Why? I slipped on a banana. I am not a hero. I am… an accident. A divine mistake.
Yet, as he rose, brushing mud from his clothes, the villagers began to gather. Children peeked from behind doors, elderly men murmured prayers that were part gratitude, part bewilderment, and merchants lined up with curious goods, as though awaiting his judgment—or his approval.
It was in that moment that Keran realized the terrifying weight of his situation. He was no longer merely Keran, the man who tripped over produce. He was Keran, SSS+ Hero, the accidental harbinger of change. Every expectation, every hope, every prophecy in this medieval land would now be projected onto his shoulders, and he had no roadmap, no experience, and certainly no manual for navigating the absurdity of both heroism and divine bureaucracy.
As he took a cautious step forward, a sudden thought struck him: Perhaps this is the beginning of something… miraculous. Or catastrophic. Likely both.
And somewhere, far above the mortal realm, a god sighed, rubbing its temples with ethereal hands. "Well," it muttered, "at least it'll be entertaining."
Thus began Keran's journey—a tale that would combine invention, comedy, and social upheaval, all under the watchful, bewildered eyes of the heavens. A tale where slipping on a banana peel could spark revolutions, where mud-stained hands could invent machines that change the world, and where a tabby cat, unimpressed and utterly disdainful, might very well hold the key to the future.
In that strange, shimmering light, with villagers staring, magical birds overhead, and a destiny far beyond anything he had imagined, Keran took his first step. And it was the step of a hero—though perhaps the most unheroic hero the world had ever seen.
The rain had stopped. The world waited. And Keran, for the first time in his life, realized that accidents—divine or otherwise—were sometimes the greatest miracles of all.