As I walked around the hallways, everything began to glitch—statics of gray and black spreading like a broken television screen of pixels.
It wasn't like this the first time I entered. Objects were replicating. Walls with windows kept cycling back and forth, like they couldn't decide where they belonged.
The warm, desolated flicker of the ceiling lights cast a sickly hue overhead. When I looked up, I saw a brown and yellow lightbulb. I glanced back at my compass, trusting it to lead me.
I walked toward a staircase. As I climbed, my head hit the ceiling—it was too dark to see anything. "Ugh... frick…" I muttered. Feeling around the ceiling, I noticed a lock. I twisted and opened it. It was a trapdoor.
I pushed it open. My eyes dulled from the sudden brightness, though there was no sun.
I pulled myself up and pushed off the ground. What I saw was a flesh-toned plain of grass. It wasn't tall—not at all. It was extremely flat, like the textures in an old 2000s video game.
Touching the ground, it felt fake—like the dirt had just been painted green.
A sense of luminality swept over me, a calmness of some kind. I couldn't find the right word to describe it—it was just... strange. I looked at the endless horizon, the sky above holding no clouds.
I continued to follow the path.
Along the way, I saw large balloon-like playgrounds shaped like houses, and fences encircling colorful bars and slides meant for kids. But… why not?
A memory came to me—me as an adult, just swinging on a playground while kids watched me. Their stares burned, as if I were a creep or a stalker, a potential kidnapper—just because I was too old to be there.
Too old to play on the slide… But it wasn't my fault. I never got to experience the joys of childhood. We were too poor. I clutched my chest.
I swung on a bar that was too tall for me. Still, I smiled. Each time my feet scraped the ground as I swung, it brought a strange comfort. After a few moments, I let go and followed the compass again.
As I thought about all of this, I realized this felt like a child's dream—just wandering and exploring freely.
I mean, I'm not that old. I'm only 19. I still have the duty to experience my teenage years while they last.
White fences stretched across the plains, and houses were carved deep into the hillsides.
Farther along, I saw a tall electric pole buzzing with static, connected to those houses. Curious, I looked inside one.
It was a simple square room, everything packed into one space: a sink, a sleeping mat, and a table. I looked closer and saw a man eating soup. Then, strangely, he sprinkled cereal into an empty bowl until it overflowed.
I just walked away.
There were more balloon playgrounds ahead, but I was growing tired. I did what I could—I tried to fit into the slides. I was embarrassed, being an adult doing this, but I still did it. Then I walked out.
Impatience crept in. The once-silent hum of the wind had shifted into whispers. They were getting louder—and it was annoying the heck out of me.
I loved horror games, sure—but I didn't like being the one actually experiencing the damn thing.
Looking at the houses again, I saw people sitting at their tables. Some were lying on their beds. Others were washing dishes. But there was something wrong…
Their hands were elongated. Each one had two joints and four fingers—the same was true for their thumbs. It was uncanny, like something out of a nightmare.
[][][][] []
Adam didn't want to be seen by them. I just stared from a distance, uncomfortable, unwilling to get any closer to these strange humans.
he was getting bored… but those things creeped the heck out of me. The world was turning a shade of gray under the darkening orange sky. Just a few minutes ago, it had been daytime—but now it was already night. I shouldn't be accepting this. It wasn't natural.
I looked again at the people—their odd, blank faces.
The landscape kept repeating. The same houses. The same playgrounds. The same fences. Over and over, like a corrupted game level on loop.
The noise was getting weirder. What started as whispers had become wind laced with the roaring and screaming of people—layered beneath a dim, unsettling mix of wind.
With the sky orange it now had turned to a deep, bloody red.
I rested my case. I trusted the compass."Okay," I said, breathing heavily, "this is my last step off the playground."
I was too tired to keep walking. I took one final swing on the playground. Then I stood up, stepped onto the red slide's fence, and tried to fit—but it was too small. Suddenly, I was confused… the slide just kept going.
For seconds, the red spiral slide looped endlessly, and my body kept falling, deeper and deeper. Then it turned into gravel and dirt.
NOPE.
I refused. Rehan.[Roger.]
Electricity pulsed through my muscles as I grabbed at the sides, trying to climb. My fingers burned—bits of them scraped raw as I bore my full body weight using only them. It was agonizing.
But finally, I managed to crawl out. After falling for what felt like forever, I laid there on the catwalk, exhausted.
"Ugh… I shouldn't have trusted this duck," I muttered.
I looked back at the slide. The hole kept going endlessly down. I turned my back to it and walked away into the night.
Then—my eyes widened.
Flesh. Bits of blood trailing across the ground like a twisted path.
The houses were open. Flesh and organs spilled from them, dragging downward, deeper into some unknown place.
It freaked me out. I ran. I runned, finally catching sight of something—A small, gaping portal.
I looked inside a house. But it wasn't a person I saw. Not anymore.
What remained was being mauled and absorbed by a grotesque creature—balloon-like with their body swelling, mutated—its body colorfull and deformed. It had four legs and two arms, and as it consumed the body of its nutrients, it dragged it further into the house.
I saw others. More and more of them. Grabbing people. Hauling them from their homes. Devouring them.
Screams and roars echoed through the air. These mutilated humans—Were they the source?
"So… this is where the roar was coming from," I whispered.
I coughed, covering my mouth. The creature stared directly at me as it dragged its victim away...
Pinching myself thinking if its a dream...
Wait it is...
I take a long breath and calm myself down...
There's nothing to be afraid...
Then—
A status screen appeared in front of me.
[Entering: A Forced Invitation to a Death Fight…][Start] [Reject]
I pressed "Reject."
But the screen kept popping up. Again. And again. Faster. Relentless.
Until—
[Force Activation][3][2][1]