"I'm hurt... it hurts so much," he whispered as he stepped into the quiet midnight street. Blood stained his clothes, his footsteps slow and unsteady. His right hand clutched his side, where the blade had struck, trying to hold himself together as the pain threatened to bring him down.
"Closer... I need to get there," he murmured, forcing one foot in front of the other. His eyes fluttered — opening and closing slowly — as blood continued to spill from his wound. With every step, every drop lost, his strength faded, leaving him weaker... slower... but he kept going.
"No, I... ne—" his voice broke off as his knees buckled. He collapsed, clutching his bleeding side, the warm blood slipping between his fingers. Darkness crept into the edges of his vision, and his body gave in, his torso hitting the ground with a dull, final thud as consciousness slipped away.
A faint smile tugged at the corner of his lips as a single thought echoed through his fading mind: At least I saved someone... at least no one else had to get hurt.
With that final acceptance, the fear of death slipped away. A strange calm settled over him, heavier than the pain, deeper than the blood seeping beneath him. His breathing slowed. His vision dimmed. And as his body lay motionless, crimson pooling around him, his eyes fluttered shut, quietly surrendering to the darkness.
...
A few seconds after his death, he found himself abruptly awake. Standing upright in a place he didn't recognize. All around him, countless strangers murmured in hushed voices, their faces dazed and unreadable. The sheer number of people made the air feel heavy and oppressive. When he tried to make sense of his surroundings, he saw only endless white stretching in every direction, featureless and infinite. But when he looked down, the ground beneath his feet was a flawless, pitch-black surface, polished like glass, reflecting nothing. There were no walls and no sky. Just white above and black below, and the quiet sound of lost souls trying to understand where they were.
"Excuse me… where are we?" he asked, his voice low but urgent, as he reached out and tapped the stranger's shoulder.
The man turned slowly to face him. Their eyes met, one filled with confusion and the other searching for answers. But the stranger's expression offered no comfort. It was grave, unreadable… and just as lost.
"I don't know either," the stranger said, his voice low and steady. "Look around you." He gestured to the crowd, his hand sweeping slowly across the sea of confused faces. "None of them understand what's happening. Just like us, they all died... and then woke up here." His expression hardened, eyes locked on the distant horizon as if searching for answers that refused to come.
"So... this is what comes after death?" he murmured, his voice barely above a whisper. His lips parted slightly as he scanned the crowd around him.
Hundreds stood nearby, each bearing the same silent question in their eyes. Some wore expressions of confusion and dread, others seemed oddly at peace, even smiling as if they had accepted something the rest had not.
"My name is Lukas," he said softly, extending a hand. "I know you died too… but lately, I've started to wonder if this is heaven."
He stood in front of Lucen, his eyes steady and searching, a faint smile on his lips, more sorrowful than joyful, but sincere.
"I'm Lucen," he said, his voice steady yet warm. "And I believe others feel the same, this place is nothing short of heaven."
He extended his right hand with quiet sincerity. Their palms met in a firm handshake, a silent exchange of relief and understanding passing between them.
Then, an unfamiliar sound filled the air, like reality itself was bending and warping under pressure. The crowd looked up. Above them, where everything had been blinding white, something began to emerge. A massive, obsidian-black head pushed through the whiteness as though it were tearing through fabric. There were no eyes and no features. Only a wide, expressionless white mouth stretching across its face, silent yet deeply unsettling.
"Hello. I am the assistant of the god," his voice was neutral — neither cold nor warm — but it carried effortlessly through the space.
"You may be wondering why all of you are here. You can call me Black. That's my color."
He paused.
"Welcome to Hell."
Though he hadn't raised his voice, the crowd stirred. A strange effect settled over them, their voices grew louder, not from shouting, but as if his words had amplified something inside them.
"Is he… serious?"
"What is this place? Is this hell?"
"No... I thought this was supposed to be heaven…"
Murmurs rippled through the crowd like a wave of disbelief. Faces shifted from confusion to horror. Some stood frozen, mouths agape. Others frowned deeply, brows drawn tight in disbelief. A few girls instinctively covered their lips with trembling hands, trying to stifle gasps.
At the center of it all, Lucen stood paralyzed. His expression was carved in pure shock. Eyes wide open, lips parted, as if caught between a scream and silence. He couldn't move, couldn't blink. The truth had struck like lightning, sudden, blinding, and irreversible.
"This hell is divided into one hundred sections," Black said, his voice calm and devoid of emotion. "Each section holds between ten to fourty harrowing intellectual trials. They are ruthless challenges designed to push your mind beyond its limits. You must conquer them all. Only then, after enduring the full extent of this ordeal, will you be given a choice. To be reborn into the world of the living… or ascend to the peace of heaven."
"Then… there's still a chance?"
"We won't be trapped in this suffering forever?"
"Is that truly possible?"
"But… he warned us"
"What if we fail?"
The crowd, once a storm of panic and despair, began to quiet. Hope, fragile as glass, glimmered in their eyes. Yet not all were convinced.
"If you fail even a single challenge, you will die permanently. Your soul will cease to exist," the voice declared, flat and devoid of emotion. "There are no second chances. You must complete every trial without exception."
A heavy silence fell. The words sank in like cold iron.
"Oh, and one more thing," the voice continued, echoing through the void and clawing into the minds of the recently departed. "You're wondering why your body feels different, why the elderly among you now appear young again."
The voice paused, just long enough for unease to spread.
"It's because we restored each of you to your prime and your peak physical form. That is, everyone except children under eighteen and those who were disabled in life. They are granted rebirth immediately. But don't mistake it for mercy, if they die again, they will return here, just like the rest of you."
Black's emotionless words lingered like smoke in the minds of the unfortunate, each syllable another weight on the soul.
And then, Black suddenly disappeared.
In the next moment, everything changed. All of them were instantly teleported into an infinite space, pure white, stretching endlessly in every direction.
All 5,001,248,037 human souls, every last one, had been transported to another place.
...
Lucen glanced up, then down, nothing but endless white stretched in every direction. Ahead stood Lukas, silent and still. Lucen turned slowly, heart pounding. People surrounded him, spaced precisely two meters apart.
Then, without warning, a green door materialized before each person. It stood tall and silent, glowing faintly.
As the doors began to open, a wave of people surged forward without hesitation, slipping past the threshold with urgency or perhaps blind instinct. Yet Lucen held back. His gaze fixed ahead on the lone figure.
Lukas.
Amid the motion and noise, Lukas raised a hand in subtle invitation. A quiet gesture that only Lucen seemed to notice. Without a word, Lucen stepped forward.
While others rushed toward whatever awaited beyond, Lucen walked toward Lukas.
Then.
A sharp, resonant chime rang out from above, cutting through the tension like a blade. Those who had yet to pass through the green door froze, their eyes instinctively lifting. Without warning, glowing text etched itself into the air above them:
Section 1 — 1st Challenge
Objective: Step through the door that has appeared before you. Survive.
Time Limit: 20 minutes.
Many still lingered outside the doorway, hesitant, among them Lucen and Lukas. As their eyes fell upon the posted instructions, a shared look of confusion overtook their faces. The message offered no clarity, only a ticking countdown and a single, cryptic command. Even Lucen, usually composed and quick to act, found himself frozen in uncertainty.
"Lukas... do you remember what he said about those 'harrowing intellectual trials'?" Lucen's voice was low, tense. His gaze locked onto Lukas's with an urgency that stirred unease. "Something about this feels wrong."
Without waiting for a response, Lucen reached out, gripping Lukas's hands tightly.
"I agree. We shouldn't go through that door," Lukas said firmly. Lucen nodded in silent agreement, his eyes scanning the crowd. Around them, dozens stood hesitating at the threshold, faces tense with quiet fear. As Lucen met their eyes, he saw uncertainty, dread, and the same silent conclusion he and Lukas had reached. They all felt it: something on the other side was wrong.
Then.
A sudden voice rang out, loud and urgent.
"I think we shouldn't go through that door for at least twenty minutes!"
The shout cut through the air like a warning bell, raw with instinct rather than authority. A murmur followed, spreading quickly among those who had hesitated at the threshold. Whispers turned into quiet agreement. One by one, heads nodded.
Fear, logic, or something deeper, they all reached the same conclusion.
It was a trap.
Lucen stood among the cautious few who had chosen not to follow the others. He didn't need to explain himself. The silence around him said enough.
They all felt it, the wrongness. And unlike those who had rushed ahead, Lucen and the rest listened. They stayed. Watched. Waited.
After twenty tense minutes had passed, the silence was suffocating. They sat motionless on the cold ground before the door, nerves frayed, eyes flickering between each other and the still, unyielding threshold. Then, without warning, new text flickered into view above them:
Congratulations to those who resisted the temptation and did not enter the door. You have successfully completed the challenge. Those who stepped through it perished the instant they crossed the door.
The weight of the revelation sank in slowly, like poison spreading through a wound. They stared at the message, minds struggling to process the quiet brutality of it.
Survivors Remaining: 4,986,244,292
Total Participants: 5,001,248,037
Confirmed Deaths: 15,003,745
Fifteen million lives, gone in the span of a breath. No warning, no second chances. Just a test of trust, willpower, doubt, and the consequences of a single step forward.