Chapter 1
In the dark of night, in a city of smoke and mirrors, a man lived in an apartment of solitude. He was a hard-working man. The man who did his job, no questions asked. When he got home he would always grab a book from his shelf, make a cup of hot cocoa, put on nice, quiet music, and read until he was ready to eat dinner and ready to go to bed. It was the same, day and night. Get up, go to work, come home, read, eat, sleep, repeat. And he was content with his life, always enjoying the books of the many great authors of the past.
He began his reading with The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings and continued with the Dune series. He was almost done with it when one day while reading his book he heard a knock at the door. "Huh, that's weird. Is it somebody from work?" He said as he got up to go look through the peephole. When he looked out he saw nobody, except for a strange package. It was a small cardboard box, about the same size as his coffee maker but maybe a bit bigger.
"Maybe they brought it to the wrong address?" He thought knowing that he never bought anything online—and even if he did, it would have been something such as a new book or ink for his printer, it would never be something as big as this. He opened the door and grabbed the package. It was definitely his, it had the name and everything. Peter Maxwell, 315 Red Fall Street, 11/23/90, in the factory font that was used for almost everything. He was a bit on the small side but mostly an average-looking person. He had black hair and green eyes. He was a bit skinny, but you could never tell with the jackets he wore. He set the box on the coffee table in his living room right in front of the TV. Although he owned one, he didn't use his TV too often because he would either be reading, eating, or getting ready for bed. He really only used it when playing video games, or if a new season of a show was on or a new movie. But that doesn't happen as much anymore, especially with all of the ruckus that happened with the incident. The entire industry was just trying to turn people into slaves and ship them to China. They had everything planned out with bribes, military strength, and even negotiations with other countries. Once the government found out, there was a "small" dispute with the companies on the coast of San Francisco. Thankfully that was about 50 years ago and Peter didn't even think about it anymore. He grabbed a box cutter from the kitchen and was ready to open the box when he paused. "Why am I opening something if I don't know what is inside? And I didn't order it so there is even more reason not to open it." He spoke out loud because he usually found a solution to his problems by talking out loud. It was a recurring habit of his that was sometimes not liked by others. It was the entire reason he didn't have a roommate, not that he needed one anyway.
As he was thinking, the box collapsed into small square pieces of cardboard. Inside was what appeared to be a kind of metal ore or a gem but he didn't know what kind because it was mostly covered by rock. "This is either the biggest chunk of ore I have seen that could probably get me out of this apartment or this is a prank show and you're about to come out… Now!" He yelled out only to be met with silence, with no camera crew rushing in. Now even more confused, he attempted to move away from the rock so that he could then call the police so they could help with the problem. But as he was moving towards the kitchen, the metal ore became almost like a slime and jumped onto his right arm, injecting itself into his veins like a poison. He jumped with fear and tripped onto the couch. He tried desperately to get it off, ripping it off with his hands, using the box cutter, and even burning it off with the stove but nothing worked. It encapsulated his whole right arm, all the way up to his shoulder and grabbing at his neck. And then he felt a sting on his arm. As if there was a hot metal chain wrapped around his arm, burning away at his arm and turning it to ash. He then fell to the floor as all of his strength left him. The last thing he saw was the symbol of the Ouroboros, a snake eating its own tail. Then everything went dark and cold, with no warmth or light to be seen.