Inside a well-built house, a portal shimmered open, its edges rippling with otherworldly light. Jack's bony black fingers emerged first, skeletal and unsettling, followed by Mary and her seven-year-old son Arthur, whom she still carried on her back despite her exhaustion. The moment they crossed through, Jack transformed into purple mist and surged toward Arthur's chest, disappearing into the black skull marking etched there like a brand.
Arthur found himself alone inside his own mind, cut off from everything familiar.
"Where am I?" he thought, glancing around nervously, his mental voice small and frightened. Complete darkness surrounded him, pressing in from all sides with an almost physical weight. It felt like the void again—that terrible, empty place where nothing existed and everything hurt. His small feet moved forward hesitantly as he searched for Lenny, his only friend in this nightmare, or perhaps those two people he'd seen in the void before, though their names had already slipped from his memory like water through his fingers. He called out, his voice echoing into nothingness, but no one answered. The silence was suffocating, wrapping around him like a burial shroud.
Then a black screen materialized before him, its text glowing faintly with an eerie phosphorescence.
**Your training begins.**
**You will fight deadly monsters to become fully adapted to your power.**
**Starter pack unlocked.**
**Five points to use in whichever stat you desire.**
Arthur's breath caught in his throat. "Stats? What even are my stats?" He studied the message, reading it over and over, trying to make sense of words that felt both familiar and alien. "And training? What am I training for? Why am I even here in the first place?" His thoughts tumbled over each other in confusion and rising panic.
**Question has been acknowledged.**
**You are here to train your powers and become more adapted to them, so you can defeat your enemies more easily in the future. This system wants the best for you. It created this space especially for you. You're welcome.**
Arthur frowned, his young mind struggling to comprehend concepts far beyond his years. "Does it have a personality as well? What is this?" The ideas swirled in his head, overwhelming him like a flood. This was simply too much for a seven-year-old to take in at once. He wanted his mother. He wanted to go home.
"What's my status, though?" Arthur mumbled, his voice small and uncertain, barely more than a whisper.
**Status:**
**Your status reflects the state of your stats and health.**
**Status: Alive**
**Strength: -1**
**Speed: -1**
**Agility: -1**
**Power: -1**
**Void Energy: Non-existent**
**Fighting Potential: High**
**Potential to Die Here: 100%**
**Although this is a mistake, giving you negative points means you have every chance to die here.**
Arthur's eyes widened, fear gripping his chest like an icy hand. He could die here. Actually die. This wasn't what he'd thought at all. He'd assumed that if a monster killed him in this space, he'd simply wake up back in his body, safe in his mother's arms. But no—death here meant real death. Permanent. Final.
**Penalty for not finishing the tutorial:**
**Death with no revival.**
Arthur's heart pounded so loudly he could hear it echoing in the void—if he even had a heart in this mindscape. His hands trembled as he forced himself to walk forward, each step requiring courage he didn't know he possessed. Somewhere in the distance, a low growling sound reached his ears, making his blood run cold and his legs want to freeze in place.
The void around him shifted suddenly, reality bending and reforming. Instead of endless darkness, the space transformed into a gigantic cave that resembled a warehouse, vast and threatening. Stone walls rose on either side, rough and ancient, and scattered throughout were various contraptions—traps, clearly designed to maim and kill. Arthur's stomach twisted with dread. "It said there would be monsters coming after me, not that I was going to die to a trap," he thought desperately. "What is this?"
**Warning:**
**If you die to a trap, you will be able to respawn at your last checkpoint. Your checkpoint will not be decided by you and will be decided by the system. Good luck, host. You will need it.**
Arthur swallowed hard, his small frame shaking with fear he could barely contain. The trials for survival had finally begun, and he had the terrible feeling it was about to become a total bloodbath. He was just a child. How was he supposed to survive this?
Without warning, a massive blade zoomed down toward Arthur's face, glinting wickedly in the dim light. He dodged nearly in time, but the blade carved flesh from his cheek, leaving a burning trail of agony. He cried out, pain searing through him like fire, but quickly forced himself past it. His life hung in the balance—he couldn't afford to be held back by pain, or he would die for good. The wound throbbed, warm blood trickling down his face.
Arthur's body wasn't particularly tall or strong. He was only seven years old, small for his age, and he wasn't particularly fast either. But one advantage he possessed over these monsters and traps became clear: none of them could hide in small spaces, but he could. He would exploit that advantage ruthlessly, using every trick his young mind could devise.
He continued walking throughout the cave-warehouse hybrid, trying to quiet his ragged breathing, when suddenly a large beast charged toward him from the shadows. The creature had pitch-black eyes that seemed to swallow light and resembled a skeletal dog, but extremely large and muscular—not from flesh, but from bones so thick they seemed impenetrable, like armor forged from death itself. The dog-like beast rushed toward him with terrifying speed, but a blade from one of the traps slammed into it, knocking the creature down with a sickening crunch. The same blade nearly destroyed another beast that looked somewhat like a tiger with sharp, giant claws, reducing it to pieces that scattered across the stone floor.
The bone dog recovered quickly from the blow, shaking itself, and lunged toward Arthur again with renewed fury. The beast was fast, impossibly fast. Arthur wasn't. Panic flooded through him as he quickly ducked behind a piece of metal leaning against the wall. The metal wasn't particularly large, barely enough to conceal his small body, but he'd rather hide behind something inadequate than get directly hit by that beast or a trap. His heart hammered against his ribs.
A slashing noise rang out, sharp and final. The tiger beast's head flew past him and smashed into a nearby wall, turning to paste with a wet sound that made Arthur's stomach heave. But the bone dog remained right on Arthur's tail, relentless and hungry, and he had to escape. The beast knew where he was. He could feel its awareness like a weight on his back.
"There has to be another hiding spot somewhere," Arthur thought frantically as he continued running, his legs burning with effort. Multiple places offered concealment, considering the abundance of metal and rocks scattered throughout the cave-warehouse. He just had to reach one before the beast reached him.
The bone dog dove toward Arthur, its jaws snapping. He quickly rounded a corner, ducking behind a boulder, pressing himself against the cold stone. He slowed his breathing and tried not to gasp for air, covering his mouth with both hands to muffle any sound. The bone dog landed with a resounding thud, shaking the metal and stone, forming cracks around the ground where its massive foot had struck. It stared around with its pitch-black eyes, searching, hunting. It didn't see anything and began walking away, its claws clicking against stone.
"Are these things targeted toward me?" Arthur thought, hoping desperately for an answer. He hoped the system would answer his question, would give him some guidance, but it didn't respond. The silence felt like abandonment.
Then the bone beast finally turned around and stared directly at the boulder, as if it could sense his presence through the stone. It walked toward it with deliberate steps, and Arthur knew he was done for. His brief moment of safety had ended.