"Initialization Complete."
---
A sharp buzz cracked through the darkness.
Then—light.
Cold, sterile beams blinked on one by one, revealing a massive circular arena made of matte-gray metal. The air was still, too still, like a sealed tomb. Scattered across the floor were dozens of people—boys and girls, teens and young adults—unmoving at first.
Then someone gasped.
Another jolted upright, clutching their chest.
Not everyone woke at once, but when they did, the panic set in quickly.
None of them had any idea how they got here.
"Where are we?"
"Is this a military facility?"
"Why am I here?"
Some called out for help. Some froze. Others scanned the room with wide eyes, trying to figure out if this was a dream or a nightmare they couldn't shake.
Then the voice came.
"I am calling for your full attention…"
A monotone male voice echoed from hidden speakers above, calm and clinical. Robotic.
"You are now participants in a game.
And this is not an ordinary game—
This is a Deadly Game.
There are five teams: White. Red. Blue. Yellow. Black."
They looked down—each of them had a glowing wristband, lit in one of the five colors.
Some instinctively tried to tear them off.
They wouldn't budge.
Before the shock could fully settle, a massive door at the edge of the arena hissed open.
Light flooded in.
Most ran toward it—anything was better than the suffocating chamber they'd awoken in. The hallway outside was wide and metallic, leading to a central plaza surrounded by four more identical arenas. People spilled out from three of them.
But from the arena marked Black, no one emerged.
The voice returned, this time louder.
"Your task is simple:
Kill your opponents within one week.
The team with the highest kill count will avoid punishment.
This game has no time limit.
This is a survival game.
The last remaining team will receive the Grand Prize.
And so now… let the Deadly Game begin."
No one moved.
For a long, frozen moment, no one said a word.
Then a wave of denial broke.
"This is a joke, right?"
"They're watching us… this has to be some reality show."
"I was just at school. How did I get here?!"
They formed uneasy alliances across teams and began to explore the surrounding area. What they found was worse than a prison: a perfectly simulated abandoned village, decaying yet eerily well-maintained. Ivy-covered buildings. Empty roads. Drones buzzed above them, silent observers.
They searched for an exit. A message. A clue.
Nothing.
Every path led back to the center.
Every escape blocked.
No signal. No tech. No outside help.
Days passed.
Each team found a Safe Zone near their assigned arena—clean, stocked with food and basic supplies, but no tools to communicate with the outside world. Enough to survive. Not enough to escape.
Then the seventh day came.
A strange humming noise filled the sky, barely audible, but deeply unsettling—like a glitch in reality. They tried to ignore it.
Until they heard the scream.
Raw. Terrified. Real.
They ran toward the sound.
And found a body.
A member of the Red Team—hung from a rusted flagpole, blood dripping steadily from his chest, face frozen in terror. The words "Failure Has a Price" were smeared beneath him in red.
Everyone fell silent.
Then the voice returned, sharper now:
"Red Team: 0 kills.
Lowest on the board.
You have failed to meet the weekly requirement.
Punishment has been administered.
For every failed consequence… one player will be eliminated."
It wasn't just the Red Team.
One member from every team was gone.
No explanation.
Something shifted that day.
Fear became real.
Trust began to fracture.
That day, they returned to their Safe Zones—and found weapons waiting.
Knives. Pistols. Blunt tools. All neatly arranged.
They didn't want to play.
But they didn't want to die either.
The next morning, the Safe Zones had changed—relocated and now isolated from each other, deep in the far edges of the ruined village. No more shared safety. No more cooperation.
Just survival.
The Deadly Game had truly begun.
---