- The game has begun - The first thing I heard was a voice. A man's voice, commanding and slightly mocking. - Your world will be destroyed by a flood of monsters. But you will be able to take revenge on all living beings, ha-ha-ha... or protect them.
The voice disappeared, and I saw light. It grew brighter and brighter until it felt as though a giant hand had pulled me outward, and in an instant the light filled everything I could see.
The sensation of being pulled vanished. After a few more seconds I could see something besides the blinding glow. As my vision returned, so did my other senses.
It felt like I was sitting with my back against a tree, my head lowered, staring at my legs. Bones? I had reincarnated into the body of a skeleton?
I tried to move my leg. My right leg bent, and I confirmed that the bones I saw were indeed mine.
Lifting my gaze, I looked around. I was in a forest. To my left and ahead were trees. To the right I saw the edge of the woods, only a few dozen meters away, and beyond it a mountain. The forest, as if afraid of the giant, refused to grow closer than a few hundred meters to it.
Looking around, I finally began to understand what was happening.There was no shock, no panic—because I had already felt my death. Instead, I was glad that I still retained my memories. That meant I was still Light, still myself... more or less alive... if not for one thing.
I was a skeleton. How ironic.
I had always loved fantasy worlds not only for their magic, adventures, and opportunities beyond my old world, but also for their beautiful living landscapes. And here I was—a skeleton.
In my old life, I had never once left the limits of my city, a place without a single real park, forest, or even a grove.
Lowering my head, I sighed sadly. My ribcage expanded as if I truly breathed, but that was all. No sound, no movement of air.
I sank into depression. What was I supposed to do now? Yes, I loved nature, but I didn't want to avoid intelligent beings. I wanted companionship.
My only hope was that in this world the undead weren't automatically considered evil. Since I had kept my emotions unchanged, perhaps the rest of the intelligent undead weren't wicked either, and their reputation was like that of ordinary living beings. In a way, I was alive too. My body might be made of bones, but its functions could still resemble those of the living.
The idea that the undead moved without energy was absurd. Laws are laws. And the law of conservation of energy is one of the fundamental ones—without it, there would be chaos. So my body had to draw energy from somewhere.
Nervous, I jumped to my feet without thinking. Looking right, I jogged toward the edge of the forest. I needed to figure everything out quickly, or I'd go insane!
That voice had said my world would be destroyed. But my parents were still there. I loved them dearly and didn't want them to die.
Exiting the forest, I looked at the mountain. Or rather—it wasn't just one mountain. To the left and right stretched whole ranges, but the one in front of me was the smallest of all I could see.
The mountain before me rose about five to six hundred meters. There was almost no vegetation on it, it was all stone. Its slope was steep, but not so much that it was unclimbable.
I was about to rush toward it, climb, and see the world from the summit when a glowing screen appeared.
A yellow, rectangular screen. On it were the words.
Do you want to create a dungeon?
Yes \ No
I frowned—if my face could. And mentally asked myself a few questions. What dungeon? Where would it be created? What exactly was it? And if I refused now, could I create one later?
The screen flickered for a second, darkened, then returned to its pale glow with a new message.
Dungeon — A territory controlled by a dungeon core. The dungeon's territory is under full control of the core until invaded by enemies. A dungeon can be expanded.
The dungeon's center can be created at most one kilometer from the creator.
The nature of the dungeon was already described in the first reply.
If you refuse, you can summon the creation screen at any time simply by thinking of it.
If I could, I would've smiled. Instead, I "pressed" No. My finger passed through the screen. Not too surprised, I pulled my hand back and focused.
No.
The screen vanished.
I looked at the mountain again and ran toward it. My thoughts were on both this new world and my old one. I had no time for dungeons.
Climbing the mountain took several minutes. That was when I confirmed the undead truly needed energy.Halfway up, I began to slow down. By the time I reached the top, I was moving at half my earlier speed.
Now I felt uneasy. I didn't know where my energy came from—what if I became forever motionless?
Afraid to move further, I lay on my back.
The sky was the same as in my old world—blue, with white and grayish clouds. The sun was at its zenith, and I stared at it.
Apparently, since my body lacked eyes, I could look directly at the sun without issue. After a few minutes, I felt energy returning. The scraps of fear melted away instantly. It seemed I drew energy directly from the world around me.
Standing, I looked toward the forest where I had first appeared.The forest stretched left and right to the horizon, just like the mountain chain. Nowhere did it approach the mountains closer than a few hundred meters. It extended for dozens of kilometers before giving way to plains and fields. From here I couldn't make out more details.
But directly before the mountain where I stood, the forest reached only about half a kilometer. Beyond it stretched a clearing several hundred meters wide and a couple kilometers long. In its center stood houses surrounded by a stone wall. Past that ran a wide cut in the forest—an open passage, perhaps twenty meters across.
I also noticed another path running from the clearing to the mountain.
I hadn't seen it when I awoke, because I had appeared a few dozen meters to its right and gone straight toward the mountain.
From the clearing to the mountain, a worn trail led upward. On the slope, it wound back and forth, making the climb less steep.
Following its curve with my eyes, I saw it passed only a few meters to my left. It lay in the lowest space between the mountain I stood on and the taller one beside it. That mountain rose several dozen meters higher than mine.
Crossing over to the other side, the path descended again. Raising my gaze, I saw a completely different landscape.
If the scene before the mountain had been pleasant, this one filled me with unease.
Bare, red earth. If plants grew there, I couldn't see them from here. All the land I saw was utterly dry and lifeless.
But then my eyes caught several moving dots. Squinting, I realized they were advancing across the barren land. Judging by their direction, they were heading for the mountain. They were still far away—too far to make out clearly.