The New Job

Disclaimer: The character of Retro/Wrath, and all others herein, are owned by RetroSpecter. Unless directly stated otherwise by him, nothing in this work should be considered canon to his characters or universe- this is merely a fan work, loosely based on his canon and with a fair amount of homebrewed content to fill in gaps and flesh out the narrative. Please check out his content on YouTube, Twitch, Spotify, Twitter, etc.!

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All that is born must die- it is the immutable truth of all things. But death is not the end of existence- indeed, she is but one member of the complicated cosmic bureaucracy. Once a being's time in the living world has concluded, they must then take up residence in their new eternal abode.

The most purehearted will find peace and happiness in the Virtrule Lands, domain of the Creator and his Seven Virtues. Less virtuous spirits, marred by misdeeds in life and yet undeserving of torment, would end up in the Arklimbo, a liminal space between the extremes. But those truly corrupted spirits, deemed unfit for any other abode and in need of punishment, would be banished to the Sinfernal Realms, domain of the Seven Deadly Sins and their infamous master. Here, they would either pay in flesh and screams for their crimes in life, or else would further indulge in those crimes- after all, what use is repentance when escape is impossible?

Of course, for escape to be impossible, the boundary must be impenetrable, and so the Sinfernal gates are carefully watched and guarded, protected by the Sin of Wrath. The Sins are not eternal, however- for one reason or another, eventually they must cede their duties and allow a new demon to assume the post. Just such a restructuring had recently occurred, and a new Wrath given his station.

He was an intimidating figure, to be sure. Roughly eight feet in height and encased in gray armor covered in green, crystalline shards. His head was bare, allowing a cyan face framed by green and black spikes to be seen. Atop his head were two large horns, and between those a cascade of white fur, the end of a long mane of such that extended down the back of the head and flared out from below the neck. The rest of his skin- what could be seen through the armor- was the same cyan, much like parts of the surrounding landscape, save for the lighter underside of a swishing tail that ended in what looked like a black hand with green claws, identical to those at the end of his hands. His eyes, bright green with black sclera, looked off into the void, seemingly scanning it for incoming sinners or invaders.

In reality, though, he was merely letting his eyes wander, too irritated and bored to properly scan the horizon. The lizard continuously twitched and fidgeted within his armor, grumbling with distaste all the while. "This is so fuckin' stupid..." he growled. "You really couldn't find anyone else to do this shit...?!" He sighed irritably, flicking his tail; the clawed hand at the end snapped its fingers, and with a flash of green fire, a chair formed behind him, which he plopped into with a sigh of relief.

Retro wasn't happy. Given his new career, this was honestly fairly appropriate- but then, his new career was the main source of his ire. He didn't want this job, never had, and if he'd had his way, he'd be back in his old apartment in the mortal world setting up a PC to pursue his actual passions. But the previous Wrath had recently... lost the position, and the Horseman of War had opted to volunteer his son for the gig- despite his vocal, passionate protests.

The lizard looked out glumly over the fields of green rock and crystal. At the very least, he'd been hoping the job would be exciting. After all, being the gate guard for the section of afterlife where the worst of the worst had to go? Never a dull moment, he'd thought- and in a way, he'd been right. The stretches of time between anything interesting happening were far, far longer than moments. And even during the brief times where something would happen, it was mainly just sinners being shepherded in by lesser demons, who would either quail at the sight of him or snarl at him.