[The Center of the Nightmare]
First, the sounds died. Not the chaotic noise of a battlefield, but the frequency of existence itself went silent.
Only IT remained.
I stood in the center of my dream—or perhaps, a cursed memory branded into the deepest part of my soul. I looked up. There was no blue sky. No stars. Above, there was only a sea of fluid, living, and hungry ink.
This wasn't darkness. This was a writer scribbling out a page they despised. It was a universal erasure.
I turned my eyes to the legendary Golden City on the horizon. I saw the mighty angels, beings of pure light, trying to flee. But when that black sludge touched them, they didn't scream in pain, nor did they bleed. They simply... dissolved. Like thinner spilled over a wet canvas. Colors faded, lines blurred, and they merged into nothingness.
Below, the Kingdom of Flames (Hell) was putting up a final resistance, but the black tide extinguished the hottest hellfire as if stepping on a cigarette butt. Hiss. Gone.
Then... My eyes found the Library. Amidst the crumbling pillars, a girl with snow-white hair, stained with blood and ash, stood there. She clutched a thick book to her chest. The darkness loomed over her. She raised her head. Her eyes looked directly at me.
"Remember... You just have to remember to live!"
Then, she too was erased. And left behind, staring at me from the infinite void, were Eyes. Planet-sized, lidless, emotionless Eyes.
[Awakening: Cold Sweat]
"HAAAAH!"
A gasp tore through my lungs as I bolted upright in bed. My heart was battering my ribcage from the inside. Thump. Thump. Thump. I clutched my throat. Could I breathe? Was I erased?
My pupils darted frantically around the room, searching for the darkness, searching for those Eyes. But they were gone.
The room was filled not with cosmic horror, but with the dusty beams of the morning sun. Instead of the scent of blood and ash, I smelled fresh-cut grass, damp earth, and... manure. A rooster crowed outside. The world... was still here.
I looked at my trembling hands. They were small, soft, stained with dirt. Child's hands.
"What was that..." I whispered. My voice trembled. The images in my mind were melting away like snow under the morning sun, but the terror remained. "What kind of nightmare was that?"
The door creaked open. I flinched, pulling the quilt up to my chin. I thought the "Eyes" had come to take me. But the person who entered was a woman holding a laundry basket, her face slightly flushed from the morning chill.
Mother.
I froze. In the dream... In the dream, she wasn't there. She had been erased. The feeling of her absence had been so real, so heavy, that seeing her standing there in the flesh caused a glitch in my brain.
"Dante?" she asked, looking concerned at my pale face. "Are you okay, son? You're soaked in sweat."
I couldn't answer. Driven by a childish instinct, I sprang from the bed and wrapped my arms around her waist, burying my face in her apron.
"Mom..." I said, my voice hoarse. "I just... felt like I missed you so much. Like... it was a very bad dream."
She was surprised, then she smiled and stroked my hair. "Silly boy. You only slept for one night. I'm not going anywhere."
[The Glitch: Holy Destruction]
Just then, the door burst open with a loud BAM, shattering the emotional moment.
"MOM! Big brother isn't up yet?! Arthur is down there, turning into a statue!"
A hurricane entered the room. Elena. Her jet-black hair was a mess, her hands on her hips, her cheeks flushed red with anger. She was alive. She was loud.
But the moment I looked up at Elena... The world flickered. The walls of the room turned transparent, and the image from the dream superimposed itself over reality.
(Flash Vision)
I didn't see the lively Elena shouting in front of me; I saw the ruins of the Golden City. The sea of ink covered everything. And in the middle of that sea, Elena was kneeling on a fallen pillar. Her hands were clasped against her chest, eyes closed, praying with the solemnity of a nun. The black rain of "erasure" fell upon her. It didn't tear her apart; it turned her into particles of light, erasing her from existence. As she continued to pray, her body slowly, peacefully, yet tragically faded away.
(Vision Ends)
I squeezed my eyes shut and shook my head. "What is happening to me?" I muttered. "Am I still dreaming?"
Elena's shrill voice jolted me again. "Dante! Are you even listening to me?! I'm talking to you!"
I took a deep breath, wiping the cold sweat from my forehead. I felt nauseous, but I tried not to show it. "Okay..." I said, my voice cracking. "Okay, I'm coming. Just got dizzy."
Elena rushed to the window, yanked the curtains open, and yelled down:
"Hey! Don't just stand there like that, Arthur! You're standing in the garden like a scarecrow! If I come down there, I'll break that stick over your head!"
I approached the window, trying to stop my legs from trembling. I looked down. In the garden, holding a crooked wooden stick, stood Arthur. He flinched when he heard Elena's voice, then immediately struck a "cool" pose.
The moment I looked at Arthur... That feeling returned. Déjà vu.
(Flash Vision)
This wasn't the Golden City. This was Hell. Arthur was alone. His armor shattered, his body covered in blood. He held a broken sword. He was fighting a hopeless war against the army of "Nothingness" surrounding him. Finally, the sea of ink crashed down on him. Arthur continued to swing his sword until the very end, until his hand and body melted away into the darkness.
(Vision Ends)
"VWUUUM!"
The sharp sound of Arthur swinging the stick snapped me out of the nightmare.
Arthur was shouting back at Elena from below: "What scarecrow?! I'm concentrating! Besides, this stick... uh... it's essential for Mountaineering Techniques! For balance! You wouldn't understand strategic things like this."
I let out a deep breath. The dream was fading. Only the eerie feeling and the headache remained. These weren't apocalypse warriors or holy nuns. They were just snotty neighborhood kids.
'Calm down,' I told myself. 'It was just a bad dream. A very realistic, very terrible dream. Maybe those mushrooms I ate yesterday were bad.'
But a voice inside me, a deep unease, whispered, "It's not that simple." I chose to ignore that voice for now. Life went on, and I shouldn't keep my friends waiting.
I forced a tired, crooked smile onto my face. I opened the window and called down:
"Hey, Strategy Expert! Get ready, we're coming! Hold that stick tight, you never know what might happen on the mountain today!"
Arthur looked up and grinned. "Waiting for you guys. Let's go!"
As I pulled back from the window, I placed a hand over my heart. The dream was over, but its residue remained. And when we climbed that mountain today, we would soon realize that the dream wasn't just a figment of my imagination.
[System Initialization: Blue Boxes]
My mother left the room, and the door closed. I was alone in the middle of the room. I wiped my tears. The warmth of the emotional moment was still there, but the "fog" in my mind was slowly clearing.
Just as I was about to take a deep breath and turn back to my bed...
DING!
A mechanical, high-pitched, completely artificial sound rang right next to my ear. It wasn't a bird. It wasn't the wind. This sound... It sounded like the "Magical Chime" described in those cheap adventure novels the traveling merchant sold last year. Or the sound of those pixelated game boxes I saw in the hands of rich kids when I went to the city with my father.
"Who's there?!" I whispered, using my pillow as a shield.
And in that moment, I saw It. Hovering right in front of my eyes was a semi-transparent, blue rectangle.
[System Initializing...] [Error: Chronological Data Corruption Detected.] [Memory Synchronization: FAILED (99% Data Loss)] [Backup Protocol Activated: 'Guide' Mode On]
I stumbled back. "Magic? A curse?"
Then, another line of text appeared:
[Objective: Save the 'Protagonist' from the approaching 'Absolute End' (Bad Ending).]
I paused. "Absolute End?" The image of the "Sea of Ink" from my morning dream flashed in my mind. So that dream... was the end the System was talking about.
"Then who is the Protagonist?" I asked the empty air. "Is it me?"
[ERROR: Name data corrupted. Please establish visual contact.]
[The Hidden Main Character]
Suddenly, Elena's voice echoed from the hallway: "Dante! Come on! We're growing roots here!"
I rushed to the window. The blue box moved with me, sticking to the corner of my vision. I looked down. I saw Arthur standing in the garden.
The moment I focused on Arthur, the System trembled as if answering my question, and a cursor appeared over Arthur's head.
[Target Detected: Protagonist Candidate] [Would you like to Analyze?] [(Y)es / (N)o]
My breath hitched. 'Arthur?' I thought. 'That idiot? He is... the Hero?'
I mentally commanded, "Yes."
DING!
A new window opened. Information began to scroll next to Arthur, visible only to me.
[Name: Arthur] [Role: Sword of Destruction and Salvation (Main Protagonist)] [Current Power: F (Village Boy)] [Potential: ⚠️ ERROR ⚠️ (Immeasurable / Out of Bounds)] [Talents: Natural Affinity for 'Aura' (Passive), Unshakable Will (Level: Max)]
My jaw dropped. "Potential... Immeasurable?"
Below, Arthur swung his stick at invisible enemies, shouting, "I'm strategizing!" while I stared at him.
The shock in my eyes slowly gave way to childlike, pure excitement and a cunning glint. My heart was racing, not from the morning's fear, but from the discovery of this "Cheat."
'Wait a minute...' I thought, a sly grin forming on my face. 'If he is the Main Character... and I am the Guide...'
I remembered the hero novels I read secretly in the hayloft. In those stories, the heroes were always the ones charging ahead, fighting monsters, getting beaten up, and suffering. But the ones who directed them, who gave them ideas, who determined the course of the story, were always the mysterious, intelligent characters.
'That means... It falls on me to put him on the path to save the world. I'll write the script, and he'll act it out.'
I puffed out my chest.
'If I'm controlling the hero... Then technically, I count as a hero too, right? In fact... I am much cooler than a brute swinging a sword. I am the Hidden Main Character!'
The terrible dream from the morning, the threat of the "Absolute End"... Right now, in my eyes, it didn't look like a terrifying fate, but like the scenario of a legendary game where I played the lead role. Unaware of the scale of the danger, oblivious to the coldness of death, I was focused solely on how cool my role was.
I tapped on the glass. Arthur looked up and flashed that goofy grin. "What are you looking at, Dante? Jealous of my stick? I can find one for you too!"
I laughed. My mood had lifted.
'Find one, Arthur,' I thought. 'You play with your stick. And I will plan how we will write a legend with that immeasurable power of yours.'
I threw the window open and called down, my voice full of excitement:
"Hey, Strategy Expert! Get ready, we're coming! Hold that stick tight, Arthur... Even if not today, one day you're going to move the world with that stick!"
Arthur didn't understand, but he liked the sound of it. He raised his stick high. "Of course, man! I am King Arthur!"
As I pulled the curtains closed, I muttered to myself: "Yes... You are, brother. And I am the legendary mage who creates the King."
The blue screen flickered one last time and vanished from my vision.
[Quest Started.]
As I walked out of the room, I adjusted my jacket with the air of a novel hero embarking on a grand adventure. I winked at my reflection in the mirror.
"I'm coming, squirt. Legends don't like to wait."