My eyes focus on the shrinking light above.
It's not fading away, It's not flickering out.
Like some Evil God forbid me to be exposed to it.
The cold embraced my body, wrapping around it in several layers, freezing my limbs solid. Unable to move. Unable to struggle. Just weighed and dragged downwards.
Below, the growing darkness pressed towards me like a living being, wrapping around and dragging me down into its depths.
Above, the fleeting light drew further away from me, narrowed into a final, thin thread that threatened to disappear forever.
My thoughts lagged behind my current reality.
Slowly, they began to slip away.
The thing I knew for certain…
I had died.
Yet, I don't feel scared.
How though?
My memory failed to provide the answer.
But that's not important right now.
Something broke through the black mass below, cutting through the void with slow, deliberate movements.
It wasn't in a hurry, but neither was I.
Time felt nonexistent here, but it seemed to slow as the creature approached.
I couldn't recognise it at first, but as it drew closer and shifted in the darkness, it came to me.
Vampire Squid.
S-Rank monster.
From Torment of Tartarus.
What is a Hidden Field Boss d-
The thought formed halfway before collapsing.
Before I realized it the creature had arrived before me.
We stared.
If you could 'stare' with a squid.
My body still didn't respond to fear, it barely responded at all.
Breathing felt like a foreign concept, something no longer under my control.
Air escaped my lungs.
A stream of bubbles flooded out my mouth, perfectly round and slowly drifting upwards to the vanished light.
Underwater.
A lake?
No.
Too deep.
Too strange.
Thoughts slowly dissolved before they could stabilize.
The Vampire Squid rotated slightly. Its body pulsed once, bioluminescent edges slowly outlined its form. Not hostilely, nor in curiosity.
Observing.
My mind drifted further away.
I wondered when my last thought would be.
This is inconvenient, death.
I never finished my Class Advancement.
I had been one step away from completing it.
Three months of preparation.
Poison immunity.
Fire immunity.
Hidden NPC in Labyrinth.
Turn in Quest.
My body felt heavier.
Or maybe it had become weightless.
The creature drifted closer.
Its presence filled the remaining space between me and unconsciousness.
My last thoughts began to form, slowly, carefully, to ensure completion.
Death.
I thought it'd be cleaner.
Instead…
I lost my mind.