Welcome to the Afterlife Customer Service!

By Duke Paopathon Pardede

Welcome to the Afterlife Customer Services!
Your call is very important to us… even in death.

Miles Everett was ready to quit corporate life. He just didn't expect to quit life itself.

One moment, he was walking away from his soul-crushing job. The next—headlights, a sharp impact, and… an office?

Turns out, the afterlife has paperwork. And worse? Miles has been hired.

Now, stuck in the bureaucratic nightmare that is Erebus, he's handling ghostly complaints, eldritch HR policies, and co-workers who have been here for way too long. There's Gus, the exhausted veteran; Pia, the office troublemaker; Edgar, who takes the rules way too seriously; and Lily, who is having entirely too much fun being dead.

But something about Erebus isn't right. Files erase themselves. Time bends in ways it shouldn't.

And Miles? He's starting to forget things—things he shouldn't. The more he digs, the clearer it becomes: Erebus isn't just processing the dead. It's keeping them. And if Miles doesn't find a way out soon… he might just become another permanent employee.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Duke Paopathon Pardede
• Release date: Jun 17, 2025
• ISBN: 9798231298778

Book preview

Welcome to the Afterlife Customer Services!

Duke Paopathon Pardede

Published by Duke Paopathon Pardede, 2025.

This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.

WELCOME TO THE AFTERLIFE CUSTOMER SERVICES!

Second edition. March 17, 2025.

Copyright © 2025 Duke Paopathon Pardede.

Written by Duke Paopathon Pardede.

Cover illustration by Nadira Nurul Faiqah

To my family, to my mom, and to my big, chaotic, occasionally dramatic but always supportive family.

To my friends, wherever you are, however I found you, and especially to my best fake friends—you know who you are.

To those who work tirelessly behind the scenes, in life… and beyond .

To the ones drowning in paperwork, buried under deadlines, surviving on caffeine and questionable breakroom snacks—this is for you.

To the overworked, the underappreciated, and the ones who make the impossible happen while nobody notices—whether you're in an office, a classroom, or, apparently, the afterlife.

And, of course, to my lecturer—for giving me an excuse to turn corporate suffering into a book.

INTERNAL MEMO: COMMON CUSTOMER COMPLAINTS

Department: Afterlife Customer Services

Status: Unresolved

My afterlife Wi-Fi is slower than when I was alive. What's the point of eternity if I can't stream?

Complaint filed by Jackson R., Ghost Influencer.

I specifically requested 'Rest In Peace.' This is neither restful nor peaceful.

Complaint filed by Eleanor V., Professional Sleeper (former life, obviously).

Why does my haunted house have a lease agreement?

Complaint filed by The Ghost of Apartment 4B.

I was promised angelic choirs. Instead, my neighbor is a guy who hums off-key for eternity.

Complaint filed by Disgruntled Afterlife Resident #9823.

I applied for reincarnation, and I think there was a mix-up. Why am I a pigeon?!

Complaint filed by Gerald T., Current Pigeon, Former Lawyer.

Excuse me, but I was expecting a dramatic entrance to the afterlife. Choirs, golden gates, maybe a deep voiced narrator. Instead, I woke up at a desk. Explain.

Complaint filed by Miles Everett, Employee #0000

Why are ghosts taxed???

Complaint filed by The Estate of Mr. Jonathan L. (Deceased, Still Paying).

I'd like to file a formal complaint against the Grim Reaper. He was late. Twice.

Complaint filed by Samuel K., Twice-Dead Business Consultant.

I think I was misfiled. My evil twin got into Heaven, and I got stuck in corporate hell. Please advise.

Complaint filed by Not The Evil One, I Swear.

I agreed to haunt my old office, not WORK there again!

Complaint filed by Brenda M., Former Employee (Now Permanent Employee).

End of Memo. Please direct all further complaints to HR.

Responses may take up to eternity.

Table of Contents

Congratulations you’re hired!

Edgar’s Grimoire

The Layers of Erebus

Afterlife Transportation

WELCOME HOME, MILES. TRY NOT TO QUESTION ANYTHING.

Day 2: Bureaucratic Hell and Navigation Nightmares

Miles’ First Complaint Ticket: Welcome to the Side Quest Bureau

The Answer? No, First You Need Another Side Quest

Procurement (A.K.A The Place of No Return)

Day 7: This Is Why We Don’t Open Cabinets

The Office That Wasn’t There

The Man Who Wasn’t There

Lily’s Great Idea (But Worse, and Also Cursed)

The Aftermath: Okay, This Is Actually Cursed

The Plan: How Do We Make It Stop???

The Cursed Mall Trip (But It’s Nice... for an Hour)

The Cursed Mall Trip (Now with Public Rituals, Because Why Not?)

The Final Shockwave (Because of Course They Would)

The Art of (After)Living

The Neighborhood: Getting To Know The Afterlife

The Employee Record Glitch

Routine Maintenance (Or So They Say)

The Infinite Delivery Order Problem

Step One: Find the Source of the Problem

Step Two: Fix the System Before It Spirals Further

Step Three: Just... Turn It Off

Paperwork and Paranormal Horrors

The Wrong Street

Paranormal Bureaucracy

Congratulations, You Survived Yesterday. Now Survive This.

Filed Under: Unresolved

Welcome, New Employees!

The Toast

A Place Built on Forgetting

Request for Immediate Exit

The Threshold of Oblivion

The Slow Unraveling

The Things He Had Lost

404: Employee Not Found

Breaking In

The Ones Who Never Left

The Others Who Weren’t Supposed to Be There

The CEO, Unmoved

The Door Appears

Congratulations you’re hired!

The city never really slept, but it had its quiet moments. Late at night, when the office lights finally dimmed and the last of the overworked employees stumbled out, the streets belonged to flickering neon signs, the hum of distant traffic, and the occasional silhouette of someone chasing a dream—or running from one. Miles Everett had spent years believing he was working toward something bigger. Something better.

But life had a cruel sense of humor.

He stepped out of the towering glass building, exhaling a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. The office door clicked shut behind him, final and absolute. In his hand, a coffee-stained resignation letter, crumpled from the number of times he had second-guessed himself. It didn’t matter now. He was free. No more twelve-hour shifts. No more soul-crushing meetings. No more pretending he cared about synergy or whatever corporate jargon they threw at him.

Tomorrow, he was supposed to wake up as a free man.

And then—

Headlights.

The blare of a horn.

A sharp impact, like being yanked out of existence. For a second, he was weightless, untethered from the world. There was no pain, no panic—just an eerie sort of stillness, like the universe had pressed pause.

Hah. Figures.

Then—

Welcome to the Afterlife Customer Service Center! Congratulations on your new employment!

A voice, chipper and artificial, shattered the void. Miles’ eyes snapped open. Harsh fluorescent lights. Cubicles. A blinking monitor displaying a cheerful onboarding message.

And in front of him, a disturbingly enthusiastic manager, already shoving a stack of paperwork into his hands.

His resignation letter was gone.

His freedom? Denied.

Wait, Miles rasped. Am I…?

Dead? Absolutely! The manager grinned. But don’t worry—your corporate background makes you a perfect fit for the job!

Somewhere, in the depths of the cosmos, the universe had made one thing very clear: Miles Everett wasn’t done suffering yet.

Miles stared at the paperwork in front of him. His fingers twitched, mind lagging behind reality. This wasn’t happening.

No. No, no, no, no.

"This—this