Light was shocked by the revelation of death revealed to him. Having passed away from the human land, it seemed that he would no longer be able to continue his mission or past stated goal of achieving justice as Kira. After what happened to him, though, he had taken a long break in the void of black preceding him for what seemed like years despite no wear or tear or ruin having been done to his body. Seemingly in a state of physical homeostasis where his body remained in a state and condition similar to the one he sustained during his tenure as a living and breathing member of society, Light gave an unsettled sigh before seemingly shaking his head, waving it off.

Light Yagami: "I'm dead, huh?"

Decim: "Yes. Dead. But you won't sustain any deficiencies from the effects of aging while you are dead. As I said, those who are dead cannot return to the world of the living."

Decim clarified in the presence of the unknown stranger, Clavis, and Ginti. Ginti turned around, sighing.

Ginti: "...I'm leaving."

And with that, Ginti dragged his feet out of the room and slammed a door shut, sending vibrations through Quindecim. His anger and upsetness eroded some of the answers Light received. He knew that he would be getting training, but for what? They refused to clarify. Whether the training was inherently good or bad remained unknown to Light, forcing him to attempt to think things through the best he could. His thoughts were in an egoistic sense, organized to assure the best of opportunities for himself and himself only. 

The unknown presence walked back into the elevator where Clavis, the elevator operative was, an unnerving smile printed on his mundane face with the presence of green, inhuman facial features. With a press of a button, Clavis sent them down to another compartment of the area, likely far away from Quindecim. Light imagined they could've been plotting against him, a look of vain calculation upon his face.

Decim: "Well, feel free to explore the place. There's still time before they decide what is to be done with you and what is not to be done with you."

Decim advised, a cool, bland gaze present in his eyes, seemingly unsuspecting of Light's true nature. Light nodded slowly, only looking forward with a quarter of malice present so as not to arouse any suspicion to the true nature of his person. After being ridiculed and thoroughly embarrassed with his blunders and errors in the Yellow Box Warehouse during his final fiasco with the detective known as Near, he believed himself sure to never make the same victimization of himself an issue; the victimization of the very persona he worked hard to create, assuring a godhood of status over the name Kira alone just through the methodology of his killings.

Being dead, though, thoroughly eroded his power and influence in the Human World. The only question Light had was: who took that power and influence following the erosion of power and influence? He knew there still had to be a cult, roaming and preaching the name of Kira in the delusions of mankind. In all practicality, though, it never crossed his mind there was a geopolitical war over the Death Note in the Human World. No, more than that; a geopolitical outcry. A rage that transcended his thought process as the former detective on his own case; his own tightly-woven and close-knit Kira case continued to remain a thought enclosed in the shell of his mind, generating many theories upon the whereabouts and status of the persona he created.

There remained doubt strong enough to impede Light's forward and utilitarian method of thinking.

There was no way around it; no way around the seemingly infinitesimal ripples made by his Kira persona. Entangled in deep thought at just the possibility of what his persona could've been a causation of in the heaping influence amassed from his yearly killings and sprees of genocide through the Kira persona employing the method of the Death Note, Light's mind got to working on the various possibilities, nuances of his legacy faintly recalled in his abattoir of a deadly mind. Some possibilities considered disturbed him. Someone else at his position; someone else commanding power. Possibly a legion of people commanding power; a legion of people not worth the influence or the time, not worth all the power that came with the possession of the object he thought that would be causing a continuation of deaths. Another possibility that Light briefly considered in his prodigious mind with the seasoned intelligence of a graduated police academy detective having briefly assumed the identity of L with the equipment provided in the Japanese Task Force and the equivalent intelligence and operational capabilities to back it up ― nevertheless the warnings that his mind urged in considering the aforementioned possibility was that the Kira persona; the Kira phenomenon and all of his hard work had completely vanished, destroyed and completely abandoned by way of propagandist remodeling and shaping of the public. But Light denied it as a possibility; adamant that his legacy and status as Kira lived on.

It was strange and uncomfortable for him to picture such an acutely negative and bizarre future for the identity he worked hard to create; a fictitious identity that he inhabited at first with full control that was slowly taken away from him as he forced the notebook to be distributed to other figures to lessen suspicion as the detectives surrounding him and police got more and more suspicious of him with the signs suggested by the detective, L, a snappy and eccentric detective with the ability to get the death sentence ― or even the life sentence if Japan's rigorous assessment found Light applicable of the second equally worse and miserable punishment. He was glad that he had passed before such arrest could happen; at least what seemed to be waiting for him behind closed doors wasn't as bad as he suspected, though the psychosomatic pains and the darkness that persisted before he could manifest a physical image; a physical conception of his own appearance prior to his death. 

Light wasn't sure how much time had really passed in all appropriation of estimation and methodical calculation. It could've been a year, month, or even a day after he died; after the events of the Yellow Box Warehouse occurred. After he saw his downfall, it was sure to be that he was dead. He wasn't surprised or unpleasantly disgraced by his reality of a situation, but wasn't entirely sure what the process he was in. Light's thoughts opened up new possibilities for him and himself only, only briefly considering conspirators that he had briefly allied or worked with in a tenure of doubt and shifting the notebook around to reduce suspicion.

Left to his own resources, Light shook his head to snap out of the complex thoughts which interweaved his mind's insides to the fullest level. He found a nearby leather couch in Quindecim's bar-like interior. Giving a brief glance to Decim for a moment in all secrecy, Light wondered about him, curious. What was his mission? What was his purpose? Shaking his head conspicuously so as not to arouse any suspicion in the brevity of his glance and partial glare, Light sat down on a leather couch.

He gave a pointed stare down at the ground, trying to process what happened. Decim's eyes were on him in the moment as the bartender recognized Light's thoughtful stance for a moment. A moment of silence was exchanged between the two. Neither one of them said anything to each other in the conceivable moment before Decim rose to the occasion with a proclamation that he would have to leave; to excuse himself to business elsewhere.

Decim: "...I have to go somewhere. I'll be back. Do please explore the place. There's a lot to observe and take in. It'll keep you occupied while the Arbiters arbitrate on your fate."

Light nodded slowly, saying nothing, too consumed by thoughts to say anything of substance.

He was just alone. By himself and entrapped in the darkness and uncomforting solitude of the bar. Alone. Surrounded by an unfamiliar environment growing in uncertainties with the previous implications of a confrontation he couldn't understand. 

https://youtu.be/gbKaOd-zFjI

No ― he understood the situation very well. Just not from the lens that he was hoping. Instead of being the one passing righteous judgment down on others, he was being the one righteously judged by a predecessor power; a preceding power with a topical amount of influence in the way of things and the rite of judgments. It sickened him and permeated his ego to the point where Light could feel hypertension in his body, likely to lash out in the isolated silence of the space.

His thoughts intensified. Embitterment drove his moves in a way. Pondering too long, however, didn't seem to bode particularly well for him as he could feel the hypertension giving away some instability in the head of some sort. If the bartender was watching him from some blindspot in Quindecim's lurking shadows and darkness, perhaps he could begin to see Light's fatal instability curving through, effectively demasking him of any nuance of the calm, laidback and suave influence raised by his supposedly normalized persona.

But something was off. There was not a normal, sane, and functioning human being behind all of the bluffs and all of the supposed spit-spat that Light spoke in his deception. There was something worse than a normal, sane, and functioning human being. A liar. A clinically able liar with the capability to tell lies of the highest degree. In fact, Light was so proficient at lying that he had been able to get away with it concurrently even with his mental state in question from the psychosomatically disorienting brand of pain forced upon him in the land of the living.

Beyond that, there was something off about Quindecim. The sound of a door creaking open filled Light's ears, causing him to cringe at the heart-wrenching sound. And for the moment, it was only the catalyst of irritation to Light.

Nothing more.

Nothing less.

Unbeknownst to the righteous judge of the Human World in his past life, though, a presence made itself clear. Heavy breaths could be heard as the door that creaked open became visible. A corridor of darkness in the doorway became visible, seemingly leading out of the bar.

Light's eyes switched between the open door and an assortment of different rooms and doors in Quindecim's interior, narrowing his eyes, a distrusting glare directed at the corridor of darkness before him. He could hear the heavy breaths. Not sure where they were coming from or what they were coming from, Light stood up, certain enough that addressing the source was of a good prevention of any unpleasant surprises awaiting him in the near future.

Light Yagami: "...Whoever's there, please show yourself. I can hear you breathing."

???: "Ha. Ha. Ha. Heh. Still the same, huh?"

The voice permeated through the bar and throughout lower and upper echelons of the establishment. Confounded, Light tilted his head to the side, recognizing the voice partially. It was dry. A voice with fissures and abrasions; definitely one that seemed to be of crude proportions. Not that it mattered much, anyways, Light thought, especially with the circumstances he suspected himself of being in.

Light Yagami: "...I beg your pardon?"

???: "You heard me. If you want to talk more, enter the corridor. I'll be waiting for you."

A sick, foreboding chuckle followed after, meandering away into the darkness. Light saw a brief flash, identifying an unusually tall silhouette in the once-dark hallway for a moment as if power had suddenly been returned to the building. The tall silhouette's lower body was obscured by a cape, haphazardly dragged about the floor, colliding with what seemed to be obstructions like tables in the darkness of the corridor. 

Light wasn't sure of whether to follow or to stay back. His instincts, however, told him to follow. 

And so he did.

Following after, Light walked in as if there was no probability of him being harmed by the tall silhouette or interrogated. He kept calm. He wasn't sure if he was speaking to another Arbiter or risking mitigation of the privilege of the training he heard mentioned as an incentive to keep him around despite the many things he'd done. Light wasn't sure of many things, but he was sure that he had made the right move by entering the dark corridor, exceeding the space in the bar known as Quindecim.

Geometrically, it was unheard of, but Light wasn't one to make judgments on what was possible and what wasn't after experiencing many years reigning over the world on a supernaturally magnificent scale. He eyed the tall silhouette now that he was closer, watching the silhouette's mass become illuminated by natural light of some sort; whether or not the location he was in had any correspondence with the natural laws of daylight back on Earth unclear, the silhouette stood, light gleaming, towering over Light even at a distance which would make it appear the silhouette was smaller than it actually appeared.

Light remained calm, any anxieties from seeing such a creature likely appeased by a familiar former experience rooted in the back of his head. It occurred to him presently that he could recall the voice; the precise grainy, coarse and proportionally uneven flecks of the silhouette that called attention to the dark corridor he was in at the moment. The occurrence of thought, though, soon thereafter disappeared, replaced with the allure of the present. The silhouette was grotesque in appearance. Long, lanky, and massive in comparison to Light, it seemed practically inhuman.

???: "...Remember me?"

Light Yagami: "...Who are you?"

The answer seemed to be lingering in front of Light's head. He could recall a long, lanky figure before, but the memory seemed to be lapsing in and out of his subconscious and conscious mind. Janky, poky and scrutinizing eyes could be recalled, too, but the memory seemed to be forcibly suppressed, seemingly reminding him of some conception of danger of some sort in the past. Some sense of danger in combination with the sense of an ally; a familiar face that he had made as an accompanying individual in the role of his plot in the past. But it was washed away.

Washed away and eroded by a stream of other memories which seemed to enter Light's mind quickly in correspondence with the attempt to remember what happened in the past, the fact of remembrance returned at last when Light was exposed to a horrific, deadly image.

Suddenly, the silhouette turned around and light struck outside, illuminating the horrifying face of the creature.

Light found himself shocked, horrified at the appearance of the creature. As if he had not been exposed to the horrors of such a monster before in his life, he fell back, hitting the ground on his bottom, breathing sped up from the exposure to the creature for a moment before coming to a realization. It was Shinigami Ryuk. He quickly got himself off the ground, proceeding to shake his head and readjust his suit.

Shinigami Ryuk: "...Miss me, Light? It does seem that you have a tendency to repeat the same mistakes even after the situation in the Yellow Box Warehouse."

Light Yagami: "...Ryuk. Long time, no see... so, this place. Is this where people are sent when they die?"

Shinigami Ryuk: "...You could say that. However, I wouldn't want to spoil everything for you. You've been sleeping for a long time, Light."

Light Yagami: "...Long time?"

Shinigami Ryuk: "...Yes. I'll explain more later. We are in a realm that is between separate worlds. I couldn't believe it when I first saw it, but perhaps the humans from the Human Realm happen to be correct about the virtue of the manmade concepts Heaven and Hell with the reimagination of reincarnation and another concept known as being sent to the Void, which is, well, as you know, Hell."

Light Yagami: "...Right."

Shinigami Ryuk: "To tell you the truth, Light, there's something I've personally missed about you in the time allotted since your passing from the Human Realm. You're one of the most exciting holders of the notebook, and you know how to put up a good fight with or without it in your possession. I suppose that's what brought me to confess the truth about this situation in an honest perspective."

Light Yagami: "...And what would that confession be about, exactly?"

Shinigami Ryuk: "...You see, there's been a lot in the Human Realm that has occurred. I personally have no emotional attachment to the Human Realm or its occupants ― but in your case, I've summoned the will to go to these lengths just to see your potential in this new environment. Multiple holders of the notebook exist from meddling with the stock of notebooks, and I've been able to find some Shinigami in the Shinigami Realm willing to upset the balance far enough to make the current state of affairs interesting for the both of us."

Light Yagami: "...Multiple holders? So, wait, you've distributed copies of the Death Note across the Human Realm to carry on the work of Kira?"

Shinigami Ryuk: "...More or less. I know it's not the best move I could make, but come on. I was bored."

Light gave a hard, discerning stare at Ryuk for a moment, concerning the different variables involved with the taken route of action made by the Shinigami.

Shinigami Ryuk: "Let's just make sure you remember one thing, Light. You were selfish and nasty to me when we had a contract in the Human Realm the first time around. I don't have to stick around and help you out of this mess. I could drop my Death Note and give it to another holder in the Human Realm, and we can part ways for an eternity."

Light Yagami: "Pardon, Ryuk, but I'm overcome with enthusiasm."

Shinigami Ryuk: "...And why's that?"

Light Yagami: "Why not? You've spread the Kira name twice its threshold. And assuming I can actually attain the role of Arbiter that these people are speaking to me about in the afterlife, I'll still have a say in passing down righteous judgment on those who make it to the afterlife regardless of what anyone says."

Ryuk flashed a wide ear-to-ear smile farther than anything he had smiled before, laughing infectiously.

Shinigami Ryuk: "Just so you know, don't let them find out you have your memories back, or you may be cast into the Void. Even then, if you aren't cast into that miserable place, you might find yourself in solitary confinement."

Light Yagami: "...Understood. If you can allow me to supposedly cheat death and come back a second time in this place of destitution and riddance, I'll give you all the entertainment you so desire. While waiting for that to happen, I'll play along here."

Light said to Ryuk, a smile printed on his face.

And so, the games would begin.