Just some alternatives to Truck-Sama.

[CSJones]

Not writing prompts, just some ideas I came up for original Isekai protagonist deaths that could actually factor into the plot instead of being an unimportant part of the backstory, if anyone wants them. I'm sure some of them - if not all of them - have been done before in some form or another, but if so, maybe you can use them as a springboard to come up with another original idea.

• Character dies of a wasting disease; on being reincarnated, is delighted to have a fully-functioning body again and his heroic resolve comes from his determination to make the most of it.
• Character's method of death determines their new form. Die in a fire = Get fire powers. Drown = Become water spirit. Decapitated = Reborn as a dullahan. Perhaps there's a karmic element where dying in a heroic manner gets you a better starting build. This would work best in a series with a bunch of characters who all have different powers determined by their deaths.
• Multiple people die in the same place and are all given intersecting roles in the isekai world - as if they're in a play - and keep running into each other throughout their travels. E.g., protagonist is one of five people who dies in an apartment fire. So, somewhere in the isekai world, there are four more people who will recognize him and be crucial to the plot somehow. Taken to the extreme, this could be like: 200 people are killed in a plane crash. As protagonist travels through the isekai world, he finds out every other character he's met so far has been one of them reincarnated.
• Character cycles back and forth between reality and Isekai world every time he dies, but retains his knowledge, so the plot carries across both. For example, in order to invent a certain modern technology that would be extremely useful in the isekai world, he has to get killed in a battle, come back to real life, and study enough to become an expert before he dies again.
• Black comedy idea: Character commits suicide on learning you go to an isekai world when you die. Turns out this is very much frowned upon, and as punishment, he's given the shittiest possible form. He has to spend the rest of the story overcoming his terrible build and being made fun of as the loser who killed himself to become an isekai protagonist.
  
  
• This one's not a method of death, but an overall concept: Depressed character dies and is initially happy to escape reality, but finds that all his problems have followed him into the isekai world, just in fantasy form. E.g.: Was broke IRL, now perpetually low on gold. Hated his boss IRL, now hates his party leader. Incel IRL, now harem members keep dying or having to leave the story before he can slam. However, it turns out this is due to a curse from centuries ago that all the same problems would follow him from life to life, and now that he's back in a world where magic is real, the plot is about him figuring out how to break it and finally find happiness. Maybe he was a jerkoff in all his past lives (which is why he was cursed in the first place) and he has to get better as a person during the adventure before he can finally overcome his problems.

Let me know if you get any use out of any of them.

 

[gaylolis]

i prefer if they didn't die but went to a portal, probably from playing too much Portal.

too much deaths is depressing for me.

 

[Moctemma]

Yes, please put some effort into your character's death everyone. I'm sick of them dying hit by a vehicle, or cancer. Haven't you seen 1000 ways to die?

For me is instant drop if the character dies that way, it makes me doubt the author has an interesting story; and I have experienced I'm generally right because I drop those stories later if I give them a try. Or they're at the end of the day just another story I'll never remember.

 

[weakwithwords]

Although I had already been exposed to Quantum Leap, Sliders, Somewhere in Time, and the like, the first isekai novel I ever read was Mushoku Tensei. He was smashed by a truck while saving some teens. (YYH protaganist had a similar last minute good deed before dying scene.)

Ji Ning from Desolate Era, ..., never mind. I ran out of adenosine triphosphate.

 

[Vhail]

Take inspiration on the games Dumb ways to die if you want comedy death

 

[K5Rakitan]

Lovely!

Unfortunately, I can't bring myself to kill characters anymore. Before my boyfriend died in 2015, I was writing a little story in my paper notebook where the character based on him fell off his horse and got trampled by pursuers. What happened in real life is that my boyfriend fell off his motorcycle on his way home from work and got run over by a semi truck.

Did I make it happen, or was I merely predicting it? Well, I could have been channeling a past life. My boyfriend's wife told everyone staying in her house the night before the memorial that they once spoke to a psychic who said he had many past lives going back to the middle ages. He's always been a warrior, and he's never made it to 40.

I didn't tell my boyfriend's wife about that story I wrote. I dropped it, and it will never be typed.

 

[CupcakeNinja]

Not writing prompts, just some ideas I came up for original Isekai protagonist deaths that could actually factor into the plot instead of being an unimportant part of the backstory, if anyone wants them. I'm sure some of them - if not all of them - have been done before in some form or another, but if so, maybe you can use them as a springboard to come up with another original idea.

• Character dies of cancer or some other wasting disease; on being reincarnated, is delighted to have a fully-functioning body again and his heroic resolve comes from his determination to make the most of it.
• Character's method of death determines their new form. Die in a fire = Get fire powers. Drown = Become water spirit. Decapitated = Reborn as a dullahan. Perhaps there's a karmic element where dying in a heroic manner gets you a better starting build. This would work best in a series with a bunch of characters who all have different powers determined by their deaths.
• Multiple people die in the same place and are all given intersecting roles in the isekai world - as if they're in a play - and keep running into each other throughout their travels. E.g., this could be, protagonist is one of five people who dies in a building fire. So, somewhere in the isekai world, there are four more people who recognize him and will be crucial to the plot somehow. Taken to the extreme, this could be like: 200 people are killed in a plane crash. As protagonist travels through the isekai world, he finds out every other human he's met so far has been one of them reincarnated.
• Character cycles back and forth between reality and Isekai world every time he dies, but retains his knowledge, so the plot carries across both. For example, in order to invent a certain modern technology that would be extremely useful in the isekai world, he has to get killed in a battle, come back to real life, and study enough to become an expert before he dies again.
• Black comedy idea: Character commits suicide on learning you go to an isekai world when you die. Turns out this is very much frowned upon, and as punishment, they're given the shittiest possible form. They have to spend the rest of the story overcoming their terrible build and being made fun of as the loser who killed themselves to become an isekai protagonist.
  
  
• This one's not a method of death, but an overall concept: Depressed character dies and is initially happy to escape reality, but finds that all his problems have followed him into the isekai world, just in fantasy form. E.g.: Was broke IRL, now perpetually low on gold. Hated his boss IRL, now hates his party leader. Incel IRL, now harem members keep dying or having to leave the story before he can slam. However, it turns out this is due to a curse from centuries ago that all the same problems would follow them from life to life, and now that they're back in a world where magic is real, the plot is about them figuring out how to break it and finally find happiness. Maybe he was a jerkoff in all his past lives (which is why he was cursed in the first place) and he has to get better as a person during the adventure before he can finally overcome his problems.

Let me know if you get any use out of any of them.

I gotta be honest. I just read the title and thought, "....how dare you..."

Guys. You do not. Fuck. With tradition! Jeez!

No respect anymore. Haa....

 

[Moctemma]

Although I had already been exposed to Quantum Leap, Sliders, Somewhere in Time, and the like, the first isekai novel I ever read was Mushoku Tensei. He was smashed by a truck while saving some teens. (YYH protaganist had a similar last minute good deed before dying scene.)

Ji Ning from Desolate Era, ..., never mind. I ran out of adenosine triphosphate.

Did you finish reading Mushoku Tensei? I couldn't read past the first book, I hated the MC and the magic explanations were boring.

 

[GDLiZy]

For me, you don't even have to show that your MC died. Just like him woke up in the wild and begin the journey.

 

[BenJepheneT]

my focus isn't on HOW the character dies, but how the story TREATS the character's death. instead of focusing on the new world, focus on the truck that killed the character.

the character has to find the secret and motivation behind the truck and its driver. why him? why not anyone else? not only does it present a sense of mystery but it also loops back to the main hook of the story; that is the death irl and a resurrection in another world. i never really seen a story that plays with the isekai truck more than a random troupe.

 

[Moctemma]

Lovely!

Unfortunately, I can't bring myself to kill characters anymore. Before my boyfriend died in 2015, I was writing a little story in my paper notebook where the character based on him fell off his horse and got trampled by pursuers. What happened in real life is that my boyfriend fell off his motorcycle on his way home from work and got run over by a semi truck.

Did I make it happen, or was I merely predicting it? Well, I could have been channeling a past life. My boyfriend's wife told everyone staying in her house the night before the memorial that they once spoke to a psychic who said he had many past lives going back to the middle ages. He's always been a warrior, and he's never made it to 40.

I didn't tell my boyfriend's wife about that story I wrote. I dropped it, and it will never be typed.

I'm sure you didn't make it happen, that's not how the world works. Predicting it, yes.

 

[weakwithwords]

Did you finish reading Mushoku Tensei? I couldn't read past the first book, I hated the MC and the magic explanations were boring.

Yes, I did alhough I had to wait for quite some time for the rest to be translated due to dome hiccupor drama at b-tsuki.

It was one of the first Japanese web novels I read so I had no firm expectations. I had to finish Silas Marner as a required reading so I can tolerate a bit more than what I should.

I'm Standing on a Million Lives

I Will Die Soon

I've only seen a few black comedies, but the one I actually enjoyed was Cable Guy.

BenJepheneT, Isekai Transporter has an mc that runs over people with trucks to deliver them to other worlds.

GDLiZy, Beastborne starts like that.

 

[hory-portier]

I hate mainstream ideas and I purse originality. In my own story the way I moved MC to a different world might not be that original but it is good example of what you also mentioned - useful for later story as in my story nothing happens by a chance even if I might omit backstory of some minor events as unimportant.

So in the case on my story I used wish granting being and one spontaneous wish according to the saying: "Be wary of wary you wish for, because you could get it".

That being exists and can travel words, so this gives me possibilities:

• There can be more people with wishes granted.
• There could be more wish granting beings
• That wish granting being might actually do things with some plan in mind that will be shown at the end
• There are other more complicated possibilities and mixes of already mentioned.

As for some more original ideas... Let me think...

• Random black hole appears and takes you to the isekai. Later at the story you learn backstory about what created that balck hole and maybe you will even have to save the world now.
• Screw this I'm out - Good for comedy, you have enough of this, you rage quit but after shutting the door behind you, you find out that you did it more literally than expected. Hello new world.
• Kyubey - You are dying. Cancer? murderer? Yandere girlfriend? Whatever, you're going to die alone soon. Now a strange creature appears saying "Sign a contract with me and become a Isekai Warrior. I promise absolutely nothing bad will happen to you ／人◕ ‿‿ ◕人＼" - Of course this little shit have some hidden ideas.
• Teleport - You have the power of teleportation but one day when you must teleport away to save your life in critical moment, you are so exhausted that you don't even see clearly in your head where you want to teleport. When you open your eyes you don't recognize this calling... - I used this one in an RPG but I teleported player in one meter above the campfire. Now the question - Can you also teleport to other worlds? How to go back? Did someone manipulate your teleport destination?
• Matrix - You just saw someone pick up a phone and then disappear... You tried doing that too and woke up in a strange world surrounded by machines... You can guess the idea here. The item used to 'log off' from the inside world/matrix can be anything and also the outside world can be everything. Maybe your world was just magic experiment of some university mages that were considering possibility of a world being round and not flat like theirs, so they made a simulation... (Ever heard of Terry Pratchett?). You could find out that they want to turn off your world since they have enough data already.
• It's just for work - Your company sends you to do your job in another world. You got contracted to do your job in foregin countries. You thought that after that small country in Africa next place can't be so bad... And now you are here having to 'do your job' here... And let me tell you something. You are damn good at your job. Just think of any job that would be good for your story. You can add some black deals/secrets of the company later in the story.

I could make up things like that all day and I wouldn't run out of ideas. The hard part is to find something that can be used well later in your story.
I seriously find it disgusting if a Truck-sama is used in something other than a parody/comedy. If it has to be accident then why not train hitting your car? Maybe plane crash landing on the river when you were driving on a bridge and got pushed down by strong wind... Or if it's to be super realistic, then just drunk driving. That's the most common source of accidents and professional.

As for the truck-meme way... Let's use all the options mentioned above but let you barely escape them. In the last moment when you are already sure that the world just wants to kill you and you look at the train in the metro tunnel getting close to you, that can't move you know that it's the end for you... But no! Some blue haired little girl in miniskirt appears and kicks the train away. While you're confused, she looks at you happy that you're fine, then she turns into a truck and BOOM! Hello, select your cheat power, and no, I can't be picked up!

 

[Kyrian_Clawraithe]

As for the truck-meme way... Let's use all the options mentioned above but let you barely escape them. In the last moment when you are already sure that the world just wants to kill you and you look at the train in the metro tunnel getting close to you, that can't move you know that it's the end for you... But no! Some blue haired little girl in miniskirt appears and kicks the train away. While you're confused, she looks at you happy that you're fine, then she turns into a truck and BOOM! Hello, select your cheat power, and no, I can't be picked up!

I want to read that scene.

Also one idea I've had is to give the MC disease/disability that leads to their death and it follows them into the fantasy world, but because the rules of reality are different in a fictional world than the disease/disability becomes a power. So cancer leads to remarkable regeneration capabilities, Schizophrenia leads to the ability to communicate with the secret spirits of the world.

However, because they died because of the disease/disability so they don't like it but are forced into using it or the dangers of the fantasy world will lead to their second death and there is no third strike.

 

[Mejiro]

Is there any reason for the death? If all it is there for is to be a one-way ticket to a different world without any further plot relevance, then it doesn't make much difference. There's a lot of isekai where the 'original world' is basically irrelevant and never mentioned again, and the same for the cause of death, in which case 'death by random truck' is as good as anything else, there's not much benefit to spending time on random cruft thats purely an excuse to get the plot started.

 

[HURGMCGURG]

Have someone die from something entirely mundane, like tripping and hitting their head on a rock or a carbon monoxide leak in the house, which makes them paranoid in their next life as they never know just what could kill them, so they make it their goal to be as unkillable as possible.

Give them a disease where their mental faculties slowly decay and make us watch them slowly fade away as a person until they're brain dead. They might wish to never lose themself like that again and seek a way to fix that.

Maybe someone dies because a shelf full of heavy items fell on them.

Maybe someone dies because abusive parents kill them.

Maybe someone dies because they trip while holding a knife.

Maybe someone dies because they sleep in a hot car with the air conditioning off.

Maybe someone dies because of a stray bullet from a gunfight gets them in the back of the head.

Maybe someone dies because an old building they're hanging out in collapses.

Maybe someone dies because of a poisonous bug or plant or chemical.

Maybe someone dies because of heart issues caused by their unhealthy habits.

Sky's the limit.

 

[lnv]

Have someone die by being hit by a die.

 

[Chaos_Sinner777]

I don't see anything wrong with using the classics. But, if you've got an interesting idea, then why not? For instance, one thing I'm thinking of for a story I'll get around to eventually. A story that starts in World Invasion, and leads into Isekai. I've got some other stuff in mind for the specific story, but even as simple as an MC fighting the invasion and deciding to go through the portal that's letting monsters in would work. Of course, that isn't dying, but the point is that it's an alternative way of getting into another world. When it comes to deaths, I'd like the idea of them dying in ways you don't expect. And like some of the others have talked about, having their death play into their new life in some way. So, stuff like.

• Killed by Ants: Reborn as an insect monster in their new world.
• Drowns in a Pool: Reborn as a member of an aquatic race. Has a permanent fear of water.
• Killed in an Archery Mishap: Obtain's projectile resistance skill.
• Kicked in the Head by a Horse: Super lucky in their next life.
• Stage Magician Prop Failure: Only talented in Illusion magic in a world where most people can learn any kind.
• Struck By Lightning: Born with a birthmark matching the scar the lighting would have left had they survived, seen as a cursed child, eventually struck by lightning again and regains memories of previous life.