So damn bright.
The fluorescent lights weren't doing him any favors. Vorn cracked his eyes open slowly, didn't panic, just stared at the sterile white ceiling tiles above him. Then all the pain came rushing back.
His ribs screamed like someone had taken a baseball bat to them. His throat felt like sandpaper. His head pounded with this rhythmic thump-thump-thump like someone had shoved a something behind his eyeballs.
"Still alive, I guess."
He whispered it to the empty room. Wasn't really happy about it - just stating facts.
Turning his head slowly, he took in the scene. IV drip, some kind of medical monitor blinking quietly. Beep... beep... beep. A chair by the door with nobody in it.
He tried sitting up.
Big mistake.
His body folded in on itself like wet cardboard. A groan escaped his chest before he could stop it.
'Okay, not yet.'
His hand instinctively reached under the pillow, fingers finding cool metal. The glasses. Still there.
"Thank god."
"Thought I'd lost them," he muttered, sliding them on. No flashy effects this time - they just adjusted to his face like they belonged there.
[USER VITALITY: 37%]
[STABILIZING...]
He lay back and stared at the ceiling again.
That's when the weird part hit him. He wasn't just Vorn anymore. That was the problem.
He had Vorn's name, Vorn's face, Vorn's busted ribs. But underneath all that... someone else was there too.
'I still remember the taste of instant ramen. Remember missed deadlines and standing at train stations thinking life was pointless.'
But now this body had bled red on dungeon floors. Had eaten raw meat to survive.
Two minds, one corpse, and somehow, they weren't fighting each other.
'Weird how that works.'
Creak.
The door opened and a woman in a light-blue lab coat stepped in - early thirties, Bureau crest on her badge, short hair pinned back all professional-like, and a face that gave away absolutely nothing.
"You're awake."
Vorn didn't answer. She walked to the monitor, checked something, scribbled notes on her clipboard.
"You were found in a Gate. Trial-type, Category D." She glanced at him. "Alone."
He nodded slightly.
"Not many people survive that. Especially not unawakened civilians." Her voice wasn't accusing, but it sure as hell wasn't trusting either.
"I don't remember much," he croaked. Which was technically true - he remembered surviving, not much about how.
Click click went her pen as she wrote something else.
"We're classifying you as Unknown for now. No aura signature, no mana footprint, but something helped you in there. Care to comment?"
He looked at her. Then looked away.
"Lucky, I guess."
Her eyebrow twitched, but she didn't push.
"You'll be transferred to temporary shelter status once you're medically cleared. For now - rest. The Bureau takes care of its own." She turned to leave, then paused. "There was someone here earlier asking about you. Said they were your sibling."
Vorn's heart skipped.
"Did you tell them anything?"
"Just that you were unconscious. They left a name - Seren. Ring any bells?"
His throat clenched tight. 'Seren.' That name came from somewhere deep in the other mind, the original Vorn's mind. It hurt to hear - not in a bad way, just like pressure on an old bruise.
"Yeah," he whispered. "That's my sister."
She nodded once.
"We'll let her know when you're ready for visitors."
The door closed with a soft click.
The memories came back slowly. Not his memories - Vorn's. The real Vorn's.
They weren't clear, more like old photos that had been left in water. Blurry faces, muffled laughter, a hand patting his head, another one smacking the back of it when he got in trouble.
A small, dim apartment. Two bowls on a cracked table - one empty, one full. 'She always fed me first, even when we had nothing.'
His chest felt heavy. Not just from the pain. Something else. Guilt? He couldn't tell the difference anymore.
He dozed off and dreamed of screaming, blood, crunching bones. Gutterspawn snarling in the dark. The card burning red-hot in his palm. His mother's face - gone forever now, eaten by that damn card.
Jolt.
He woke up as the lights flickered overhead.
[DROP OF BLOOD - RANK: MINOR - STABILIZED]
[GLASSES SYNC RATE: 81%]
[ANALYZING...]
He sat up slowly. The pain was still there, but something else had joined it.
Strength.
His fingers weren't shaking anymore. His vision was sharper - he could hear footsteps down the hall, the hum of a vending machine three rooms over.
The blood drop. It was actually working.
The card hadn't shown itself since the dungeon, but he could feel it curled up in his chest like a patient cat, waiting for the right moment.
Hours passed. They brought him food and he ate quietly, some of it made him want to puke - flavorless Bureau nutrition bars that tasted like cardboard - but his body devoured every bite like it was starving.
When he asked for clothes, they gave him plain gray sweats and a hoodie.
Looking in the bathroom mirror with his glasses on, he saw two things staring back: Vorn's face and something else hiding underneath. He didn't know what it was, but he could feel it was on his side.
He smirked at his reflection.
"I can work with this."
That evening, while pretending to sleep, he listened to agents talking outside his room.
"—still no aura reading?"
"Zero. Like scanning a damn corpse."
"You think he's faking it?"
"Doesn't matter. HQ wants eyes on him, nobody without talent survives a three-hour trial dungeon with no backup."
"What about that thing embedded in his chest?"
"No clue, readings say artifact, could be junk, could be Rank A+."
Their footsteps faded down the hall.
Vorn grinned in the dark.
"Junk, huh?"
The glasses pulsed once.
[NEW NOTIFICATION AVAILABLE]
He opened it with a thought.
[SYSTEM ALERT: PATH DETECTED - VEILED NOIR]
[CONDITION: MASKED EXISTENCE]
[REQUIREMENT: REMAIN UNREADABLE BY ALL DETECTION ABILITIES]
[BONUS: BLOOD DROP UPGRADE FREQUENCY DOUBLED]
[WARNING: AURA DETECTION = DEATH CONDITION]
He leaned back against his pillow.
So that was the game. Stay invisible, stay undetectable, and in exchange - the system would keep feeding him power.
He pulled the blanket over his head.
Free food, free bed, no monster patrols trying to eat his face off.
'Honestly? Not a bad place to start getting stronger, but what is the death game'
[CURRENT LEVEL: 1]
[EXP: 45/100]
[PATH: VEILED NOIR]
[VITALITY: 41% AND RISING]