"Hey... hey... open your eyes..."
A voice reached me from far away, so distant and fuzzy that the words dissolved before I could understand them.
"Are you okay? Come on, wake up..."
My consciousness, sunk in a deep well, began to slowly drag itself toward the surface.
"Oh, he's coming around. Give him some space."
Hearing that, I opened my eyes, an unbearable weight on my eyelids. The image focused slowly to reveal the face of a young man with a dirty face and ragged clothes, crouched over me.
I looked at him, bewildered, as my mind tried to fit together the pieces of a reality that made no sense.
"Where am I?!" I shouted, sitting up abruptly. A sudden dizziness shook me.
"Easy," said the young man, placing a firm hand on my shoulder to stop me from getting up. His voice was tense, but not hostile. "Breathe. You're safe, for now. There's nothing to worry about."
Something in his tone, a mix of weariness and genuine concern, made me obey. I stayed still, holding back the wave of panic.
It took several seconds for my heart to stop pounding against my chest. Only then could I observe the place.
It was a cavernous chamber, with ancient, worn stone walls and a vaulted ceiling. The light came from hanging lanterns, but instead of flames or bulbs, they held pale blue crystals that pulsed with a cold, unnatural light.
In the center, a disturbing statue of a female angel with a disfigured face spread its wings. Behind it, a monumental door of dark metal sealed any hope of exit.
The setting was absurd. It seemed lifted from a dark fantasy video game.
And I wasn't alone. Around me, scattered in small groups or isolated against the walls, were dozens of people. Men and women, young and old, dressed in street clothes, pajamas, work uniforms... All shared the same expression of confusion and contained fear. They seemed to have been ripped from their everyday lives and thrown here.
But what truly captured my gaze was the chaotic arsenal piled in a corner: rust-covered swords, gnarled clubs, cracked wooden shields. A nightmare arsenal, abandoned like a macabre welcome gift.
(Where am I? The last thing... the last thing I remember is dinner. Alone. In my apartment. Looking at my phone...) I tried to cling to the memory, but it vanished like smoke. My mind was a snowy landscape, white and pristine, where only general concepts remained: Earth, countries, languages. But my name, my face, my past... Nothing. Just a terrifying void.
"Hey, are you okay?"
The voice, deep and somewhat hoarse, came from my left. A burly man, in an office suit now wrinkled and a loosened tie, watched me with curiosity.
"I'm... I'm okay," I managed to stammer, wiping the sweat from my forehead with the back of my hand.
"Don't push yourself. Can I ask you something? Do you remember anything? Anything concrete," he inquired, with an analytical look.
"Remember?" The question sounded absurd to me. "No. I don't remember anything."
The statement, once said aloud, hit me with its full force. *Nothing*. Not even my name. A panic, cold and metallic, began to climb up my spine.
Seeing the blood drain from my face, the young man in the torn clothes let out a sigh laden with frustration. "It's useless. Everyone's the same. Memory, wiped. Don't waste energy trying to force it."
I nodded, with no strength to argue. I was about to ask him another question when a piercing scream, laden with pure terror, cut through the air like a knife.
The man in the suit closed his eyes for a moment, as if that sound confirmed his worst fears. "Here we go. Look after the new guy," he said to the young man, and his posture changed; the confusion gave way to a tense alertness, almost military.
"Be careful," warned my companion. "People are starting to cross the line."
"I always am," replied the other, and walked away with determined steps toward the source of the commotion.
"What... what's happening?" I asked, my voice barely a thread.
The young man rubbed his face, exhausted. "The million-dollar question. I've been here about an hour. I woke up before most. That door," he nodded toward the metal colossus, "won't budge. Not to kicks, not to blows. So I decided to wait. For everyone to wake up. For *something* to happen. Because in a situation like this, something always happens."
I stood up, my legs still shaky. "And what do you think it is? A mass kidnapping? Something... supernatural?"
"No idea," he said, with a hint of bitterness. "But kidnappers don't leave weapons lying around for their victims. This is something else. Something we have no script for."
<
Before I could digest his words, a rectangle of bluish light, translucent and cold, materialized before my eyes. At the same time, a mechanical voice, devoid of all emotion, resonated not in my ears, but within the bone of my skull.
<
The constant murmur cut off abruptly. A heavy silence, charged with dread, filled the room. We were all staring into the void, seeing the same panel, hearing the same impossible voice.
<
<
"WHAT DOES THAT MEAN?!" howled a woman, breaking the spell of silence.
"It's a joke! A twisted damn joke!" roared a burly man, grabbing one of the rusty clubs and brandishing it toward the ceiling.
The panic, which had been simmering until now, exploded into a chaos of screams and cries. Reason dissolved in the air.
I, on the other hand, felt strangely cold. *Safe zone. Deactivation. Tutorial. Survive.* The words of the voice, like pieces of a perverse game, began to fit into my empty mind.
Ten seconds for what?
I looked around, searching for an answer in the terrified faces. I didn't know what to do, but instinctively I took a step closer to the pile of weapons.
"LOOK!! BEHIND THE STATUE, SOMETHING'S MOVING!!"
The scream, sharp and piercing, froze even the chaos.
We all turned our heads in unison. Behind the stony figure of the angel, the air seemed to vibrate and ripple, like heat over asphalt. A luminous, distorted layer fluctuated.
And then, *they* became visible.
They weren't shadows, but creatures of bony, greenish flesh. A crowded multitude of twisted beings, child-sized but with the malice of depraved adults. Skin like rotten moss, long pointed ears, and eyes that were black pits of pure avarice. They moaned and laughed with shrieks that were nails in the brain. They brandished notched knives and stone axes.
An ancestral knowledge, perhaps buried deep in human memory, resonated in me. I didn't need to remember my name to recognize them.
Goblins.
"Ggireuk! Ggireuk! GRIK!"
The sound, their war cry, was the spark. The light screen flickered and vanished.
And the green tide broke.
With a collective howl that was the sound of hunger and cruelty, the horde charged at us. The mob of humans, paralyzed a second before, erupted into a chorus of pure terror.
I saw the wave coming, the young man beside me said something but I couldn't hear him, he grabbed a rusted sword from the pile and began to run.