Going inside, I was met with the silence of a narrated absence. A room. Normal, by all appearances. But too normal. The kind you see only once and somehow remember for the rest of your life without knowing why.
The walls were bare concrete—rough, pale, soulless. There was no paint. Just gray. My eyes turned to the side of a window, oddly slanted, almost like it was unsure if it should be there. I opened it. A dull, grating sound cracked the air as my eyes adjusted to the dim.
"Huh..." I let out a quiet laugh. "Where the heck am I?"
Outside was nothing.
Not just nothing in the poetic sense, but actual nothing. A dark, dim expanse stretched forever, like a blank page scrawled with pixelated static—gray graphics melting into endlessness, no wind, no color, no form. Just the void.
I laid down on the bed. Old. Springy. Too real. Nearby, I noticed a table stacked with paper towels, the scent of cheap cardboard lingering in the air from open boxes on the floor. There was something strangely... nostalgic about it all.
Impossible. No one should know this place. They can't read my mind. Yet it felt familiar, as if part of me had lived here, or died here. Something buried deep.
Something I'd forgotten.
No. Something I keep forgetting.
Like pieces of puzzle pieces slowly dissolving in water, slipping through the cracks of memory, refusing to hold their shape. I gripped my head, frustrated.
What was the beginning again? What was before this?
Before the tower?Before the system?
Just a blank. Static in my mind. Names of people I don't remember. Events I never lived. Emotions I never owned. It was all... wrong.
[The universe that existed had been erased.]
[Behold—I will set all things anew. I will choose My elect, and I shall rule the remnants.]
"-_-… what?" I muttered. "Say that again?"
A flicker.
My system screen glitched. It blinked. Something strange. Something else. But in a blink, it returned to normal, like it hadn't happened. My name still sat there—Adam Electi. Just as before.
I laid back on the bed. The ceiling above stared back blankly.
So many thoughts. Too many.
What is this world?
I know this place is beyond this portal door.. This world. I saw it. I walked through it.
Is this a dream?
If it is… then what's real anymore?
Pfft. What even is real? I entered a portal, didn't I?
Then—sirens. A sharp, high-pitched chime. Not of danger. Not quite.
More like... a showtime.
Then a voice—boyish, crisp, echoing through an unseen intercom.
"Sorry for everyone still awake. But it is now officially past bedtime. Please, lay down and sleep."
I blinked. What?
How would he even know I'm still awake? Is he... watching me? Is he omnipresent?
No... can't be. Right?
Still, it couldn't hurt to stay up a few more minutes. Just a bit longer.
I sat, eyes wandering lazily across the strange room. Until—
A knock.
Soft. Almost polite.
I sat up immediately. My heart stilled.
"Who... is it?"
Silence.
No answer.
A chill ran down my back. This isn't one of those horror hotel games, right?
I gulped. My imagination began to spiral before I could stop it.
And then—
"Heya~!"
The door burst open.
A girl stood there. Young. Wild gray and white hair, messy like a child's scribble, and wearing a clown outfit—a tangled mix of red and white stripes, bells, and fabric that looked stitched from different circuses. A smiling mask dangled off her shoulder, and her eyes sparkled like stars that knew too much.
"Sorry~! But it's past your bedtime, silly. So go to sleep!"
"I can't—wait—" im just too tired but i cant sleep...
Before I could finish, everything turned black. A flash of movement. A mace. Black, metallic, silent as death.
CRACK
Darkness.
Gasp.
I awoke, bolting upright. Breath heavy. Mind scattered.
"The hell...?"
I stumbled out of bed.
The room had changed.
The walls were pulsing with red moss—no, not moss. Something else. Like fungal growths mixed with tentacles, slick and pulsating. Vines had spread across the corners, wrapping around pipes and furniture like veins. The air was thicker now, damp and vaguely metallic.
People moved through the space, dressed like janitors. They carried mops, sprays, rags—cleaning the red like it was normal. Like it was just another day. The goo didn't faze them. Nothing did.
I watched them work. I didn't question it.
There was nothing I could do. Nothing I could say.
Even if I did… what was I supposed to do?
I sighed.
"I really haven't changed, have I?"
The loneliness settled in again. Not just because I was alone.
But because they were gone.
My friends.
No longer here. No longer with me. Not in this world. Not in this place.
But the ache in my chest wasn't just from being alone.
It was from wanting not to be.
It was grief. A silent, echoing grief. Cold. Real.
"What is this feeling?" I asked myself aloud, voice barely above a whisper.
Oh. Right.
I miss them.
Then—a hand.
A warm pat on my back.
I turned.
A boy stood there. Older than me, maybe. Wearing a slanted cap over curly hair, grinning without a care. Behind him, a towering, golden gate shimmered, covered in patterns I couldn't understand.
"This place is great, huh?" he said, glancing at the glowing sky above. "There's nowhere else like it. Or... maybe there is. But I wouldn't know. I never got to see them."
He smiled.
"But who knows?"