Word Count: 7,000
Starring: One smug demon bunny, a thousand dimension-hoppers, and a therapist with way too many tentacles.
Author notes: I'm closed to fixing it guys wait for a moment in the next future chapters
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Location: Hell's Lounge – Post-Hunt Cooldown Zone™
Vibe: Unhinged but professional
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Hell had never smelled this good.
The air was seasoned with divine barbecue, roasted feathers wafting up like sacred incense. Sir Pentious was serving angel ribs on skewers while Husk experimented with holy wine-based cocktails.
Angel Dust wore a "Chef Daddy" apron for some reason. No one questioned it.
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Charlie looked around with suspicious eyes, arms crossed, her royal nose scrunching at the sizzling celestial meat.
"Wait… are you guys eating angels?"
Niffty paused mid-bite, angel wing crispy in hand.
"…Yeah. Problem?"
Charlie's expression twisted. "That's CANNIBALISM, right?"
Lawrence blinked.
Then all the dimensional merchants turned at once, offended in perfect unison.
"No. The fck."
"Girl, what??"
"We have standards, btch."
"Don't disrespect the plate like that."
Lawrence, mid-sip of seraphim bone broth, held up a clawed finger.
"Professionals aren't cannibals. Angels aren't the same species. They're divine livestock with attitude. Plus—" he licked his fingers, "—their meat slaps."
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Suddenly, Gilbert—the therapist with more arms than dignity—slithered over, sipping on a stress smoothie made of powdered moonlight and crushed anxiety.
"Speaking of divine realities…" he said, wiping his forehead with a therapy napkin, "Did anyone mention TF2 Reality?"
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The rookies froze.
One raised a hand. "Wait. Like… Team Fortress 2?"
Lawrence's ears perked up.
"Hell yeah, that one."
The rookies looked utterly confused.
"Isn't that the one with the guy who talks to his shovel and the doctor who laughs like a war crime?"
"Yes," said Lawrence. "And those insane motherf*ckers are the reason you're alive."
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The room fell quiet.
Charlie blinked. "WHAT?!"
Lawrence stood dramatically, cloak flicking back, his voice echoing like a narrator on caffeine.
"Flashback time."
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Scene: TF2 Reality – Mann Co. Fortress
Lawrence (silver rank at the time, still trying to figure out how not to glitch when nervous) stood with other wounded dimensional merchants in front of Miss Pauling—clipboard goddess of chaos control.
"We need a solution," Lawrence said back then, shaking. "We've lost too many. We're talking 5 billion dimensional merchants floating in the f*cking Void."
Miss Pauling adjusted her glasses.
"And you think we have the answer?"
"You do," Lawrence replied. "The respawn machine."
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She didn't blink. She just turned to the Administrator.
The old lady pulled a lever that activated a thousand alarms, broke five laws of physics, and somehow brewed espresso.
"What will you do with it?" the Administrator asked.
"We'll use it legit. To bring our people back."
Pause.
"…You're not gonna use it for morally grey sh*t, right?"
Everyone: "Define morally grey."
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The Administrator squinted.
"…F*ck it. I like your attitude. Take it."
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Back in the present, Lawrence threw his arms out.
"And boom! IBPM got the respawn tech. We reverse-engineered the hell outta that blueprint, handed it to Queen Moon—yeah, the HQ head of the whole thing—and we brought back every single f*cking dimensional merchant we lost in like, six damn millennia."
Gilbert slithered dramatically, pointing at the air. "I was literally FLOATING IN THE VOID for 3,000 years watching reruns of soap operas on loop!"
"We know, Gilbert," everyone groaned in unison.
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One rookie whispered, "So wait… that's how we can't die?"
Lawrence nodded.
"Exactly. Respawn system's coded through the quantum imprint of your soul. You go splat, you wake up back in the IBPM medbay with a juice box and trauma flashbacks."
Another rookie asked, "And YOU came up with the idea?"
Lawrence scratched his head, ears flicking back.
"Yeah. Back when I was a silver rank. I was desperate. I'd lost friends. Comrades. My KD was crap—like only 398 gods and goddesses at the time."
Everyone stared.
"…That was low?" asked Sir Pentious.
"For me?" Lawrence smirked. "Yeah. I was underperforming."
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He looked at his reflection in a holy spoon.
"I've glowed up since then. I'm what they call—uh—'built diff.'" He turned to the fourth wall.
"Unless, y'know, the reader's a TikTok anime editor. Then you already know the glow-up arc hits different."
He leaned back, hands behind his head, sighing like a retired war vet with PTSD and excellent hair.
"But strength? It cost me everything. My soul, my friends, my f*cking trust."
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Charlie gently pat his head again. "You're still cute though."
Lawrence snorted.
"Still cursed though."
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The lounge filled again with energy.
Merchants danced, weapons sparking with leftover angel blood. Sir Pentious sang karaoke with Husk (poorly). Angel Dust was trying to convince the tentacle therapist to do a body-pillow collab. Niffty swept the ceiling in full flips.
Lawrence watched them all.
The Void survivors. The freaks. The legends.
His people.
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End of Chapter 11: "The Cannibals, The Respawn, and The TF2 Incident"
Word Count: 7,000
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