As the screen faded to black, a non-skippable cutscene began.
The first shot showed a dark dungeon. A group of rats scurried past the camera before it slowly panned across the gloomy prison.
Finally, it settled on a cell. Beneath a torch on the wall, a skeletal-looking undead sat slumped on the ground, its state between life and death unclear.
At that moment, a deep narration began.
"The Darksign brands the cursed Undead. And so, all Undead are captured and sent north to await the end of the world in this prison."
"This is your fate."
The camera shifted to another cell.
The character Ben had just created was crouched in a corner, hidden in the shadows.
"Wait a second… why am I a hollow!?"
Ben was stunned. He had just spent so much time making a face that wasn't scary but still looked unique.
And now, inside the game, it had turned into some hollow monster you could barely recognize?
So what was all that face-making for?!
While Ben was still speechless, the character in the game suddenly lifted his head.
A beam of sunlight shone through the skylight above.
With a thud, a skeleton-like corpse fell from the skylight and landed on the floor of the cell, and a white glow rose from the body.
Having played "Dark Souls," Ben knew this white glow meant there was an item to pick up.
After tossing down the corpse, the knight above turned and left.
Ben had seen this scene in the earlier expo trailer, but back then it wasn't shown in full.
Even so, he could more or less piece together the story.
In the last game, players played as Ash, basically non-burnable trash—it couldn't burn no matter what.
But the Undead were clearly burnable trash, and this so-called "Undead Asylum" could be understood as a dumping ground made just for locking them up.
Summing up what he knew so far, Ben moved his character toward the corpse, picked up the white glow, and got the key to the cell.
After getting used to the basic controls, he found they were the same as before, showing that the combat system hadn't changed much.
That made him happy—familiar controls might mean less suffering this time.
After all, he had put in over a hundred hours on the last game.
So getting into the new one should be quick, right?
But his joy didn't last long. Soon Ben noticed a key problem.
"Why am I overweight? And wait, I picked knight, I should have armor, but why am I holding just a broken sword? Where's my shield and sword?!"
"What is this nonsense? Because I turned into a hollow, now I have no strength?"
Ben was stunned. In the last "Dark Souls," even a nobody at least started with a small club.
But now, only a broken sword? Did they stop giving starter weapons, and now you had to farm them yourself?
And on top of that, the armor made him overweight!
Rolling and even walking felt like moving at turtle speed.
And wasn't this supposed to be starter gear? How could it already put him overweight?
Watching his knight do that slow-motion roll across the floor made Ben feel nothing but pain.
"Maybe this is the new difficulty curve? Knight starts overweight with high defense, while other classes start with weak defense?"
"And I can always unequip some armor to move more freely. So this is the tradeoff?"
As a seasoned fire-linker, Ben had learned one thing from the last game:
When he ran into something strange, he wouldn't just assume it was a design mistake. He'd think about whether there was a deeper meaning.
So in his mind, he had already come up with a perfect explanation for why a knight would start without a shield and sword, and why the armor was too heavy.
Looking at the broken sword in his hand, Ben could only sigh.
Especially after checking the weapon's attack stats—it was useless.
In the last game, this thing wasn't even worth keeping in your bag.
After searching the cell, Ben confirmed: this broken sword was indeed his starter weapon.
As for the armor, after some thought, Ben took off the helmet and chestplate.
After all, he wasn't some newbie fire-linker—he was a battle-hardened Ash from the last game.
Even if he had turned undead in the prequel, his experience was still there.
Sure, many veteran players joked that armor in "Dark Souls" was useless, like folding paper.
But in reality, it did give new players more room for error. So if you had armor with good defense or resistance, it was worth wearing.
But that only worked if you weren't overweight.
Because too much weight messed up your rolling—and rolling was the core of the whole game.
So between defense and mobility, Ben chose mobility.
"Well… I guess this also counts as starting with nothing." Looking at his shirtless character, Ben was speechless again.
All that time customizing his face for nothing, and his class choice also for nothing!
Using the cell key he just got, he opened the iron door.
With a creak, it swung open, but Ben felt a bit nervous.
It was far too dark in here, with barely any visibility. At least the last game's graveyard start was gray but still lit.
This cell, though, felt downright gloomy.
A few small enemies were curled up in the shadows, with no health bars showing, easy to miss if you weren't careful.
Thankfully, they were very weak—easier than the regular hollows on Lothric's High Wall—and they didn't even seem interested in attacking.
But who knew what lay ahead.
On the ground along the way, there were also some red bloodstains with messages, mostly teaching the player how to play.
"The damage is so low. In the last game, one or two swings were enough. Now it takes three or four. So is the new challenge just weaker numbers?"
After cutting down a few undead along the path, Ben muttered to himself.
But he didn't think too much about it and kept exploring ahead.
The early prison area wasn't supposed to be too difficult.
Along the road there were only one or two undead.
He easily finished them off with the broken sword in his hand.
The only thing a bit different,
was that the prison's atmosphere fit the name of the game, Dark Souls.
This place was a little darker and gloomier.
Compared to the last game, where you started in the Cemetery of Ash, this one felt creepier.
But after going through Silent Hill PT, this was nothing.
Even though back then he only experienced it by watching other players' full runs with bullet comments and warning pop-ups, it still counted as going through it.
This time he didn't run into many challenges, and Ben even felt it was easier than the previous game.
At the start, he had lost some health.
But now?
Not a scratch the whole way!
After all, he wasn't the same as before—times had changed!
Feeling a bit moved, Ben climbed up the ladder from the well and reached the first bonfire.
"A bonfire, so the first quit-teacher is about to show up!"
Seeing the bonfire ahead, Ben's eyes lit up.
But instead of being afraid, he was excited.
He had leveled up—so what if he didn't have a shield? So what if he didn't have a real weapon?
A true Ashen One fears nothing!
Continue at night, update will be later.
(End of The Chapter)
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