The stairs groaned under my steps.
No, not stairs. A throat.
Each step sank into flesh slick with saliva. The Tower wanted me swallowed whole before granting me a new floor.
I laughed, dragging my fingers across the walls. They pulsed. Shivered. Twitched beneath my touch like a dying heart.
"Lovely hospitality."
The throat gagged. Then spat me out.
Floor 11.
I landed on cracked marble.
The air was sterile, heavy with incense and rot. A cathedral stretched endlessly, black stone columns climbing into a ceiling hidden by smoke.
Statues of angels lined the walls. Their wings were broken. Their faces blurred. And every single one of them stared down at me with blind eyes.
The air was cold enough to sting.
[System Alert: Welcome to Floor 11.]
[Domain: Arena of Calamities.]
[Quest: Challenge Another Calamity.]
[Victory Condition: Erase your opponent's existence.]
[Failure Condition: Your own erasure.]
My lips curved upward.
"At last."
I could feel it—the stage was already set. My footsteps echoed like war drums in the silence. Somewhere ahead, in this cathedral, my opponent waited.
The first Calamity besides me.
The first prey that might taste like predator.
I strode forward.
My corpses followed, their footsteps a rattling parade. Each statue seemed to flinch as we passed. Candles guttered and died.
The cathedral opened into a nave.
And there… a throne.
A man sat upon it.
He was tall. Dressed in robes of white that glowed faintly, as though woven from starlight. His hair was silver, his face youthful, handsome in that annoying saintly way.
But his eyes.
His eyes were exactly mine.
Black as pits. Burning with manic laughter restrained by thin glass.
I froze.
For the first time since awakening as a Calamity, the back of my neck prickled.
The man on the throne smiled.
"Seo-jin." His voice was soft. Kind. Too kind. "Finally, we meet."
I tilted my head.
"And who exactly are you supposed to be, pretty boy?"
"Me."
The word landed like a guillotine.
I laughed. Short, sharp, too loud.
"You're me? Hah. Bold introduction. Careful, you'll make me jealous."
"No." He leaned forward, resting his chin on his hand. "I am not you. I am the one you were supposed to become. The one you abandoned when you chose madness over salvation."
[System Alert: You are facing the Calamity of Salvation.]
[Title: Saint of Endless Regression.]
The words carved ice into my chest.
Regression.
Endless regression.
My mouth went dry.
"How quaint," I whispered.
"Yes," the Saint said gently. "Quaint. While you wallow in corpses, I rewind time to undo mistakes. Every loss, I erase. Every death, I turn back. Where you crawl through filth, I cleanse."
He raised a hand.
And reality broke.
The cathedral walls shattered like glass, revealing a dozen versions of the same hall.
In each, I saw him.
Living a different outcome. Saving hunters I had butchered. Rescuing innocents I had devoured.
One Seo-jin, bathed in light, guiding survivors through the wasteland.
Another, striking down the Wyrm not with corpses but with a holy blade, the hunters cheering.
Another, standing at the head of an army not of dead, but living.
Each "me" smiling like a god.
I clutched my stomach. Then burst into laughter.
"Ha! HAHAHA! Oh, it hurts! It really hurts!"
The Saint tilted his head, pity in his eyes.
"You laugh to hide your terror. But I see it. You envy me."
"Envy?" I staggered forward, grinning wide. "No, no, no. I adore you. A perfect little dollhouse of 'what ifs.' Tell me, Saint—when you rewind, do you feel it? All the deaths you undo. Do they cling to your skin? Do they whisper like mine?"
His smile faltered.
Bullseye.
[Warning: Calamity Clash Initiated.]
[Rules: All deaths in this arena are permanent.]
[Regression Authority will be contested.]
The Saint rose.
And suddenly, a hundred versions of him surrounded me, each wielding a gleaming sword of light.
"Seo-jin," they said together. "This ends."
The corpses surged forward.
The cathedral exploded in chaos.
Steel clashed with steel, light searing against rot.
Every time I cut one Saint down, another struck from behind. Every time a corpse landed a blow, time rewound, erasing the wound.
He wasn't just one opponent—he was infinite.
I died.
A blade through my heart.
[You have died.]
I rose again, gasping.
And immediately another blade pierced my throat.
[You have died.]
I rose again.
And again.
And again.
The Saint's laughter echoed, multiplied by a hundred throats.
"Do you see, Seo-jin? Your regression is filth. Mine is purity. You crawl through corpses. I erase them."
Blood ran down my chin.
And I laughed with it.
"Yes," I croaked. "Erase them. Erase everything. Keep wiping it all away. Because you and I both know the truth."
The Saint's smile faltered again.
"You don't rewind because you're merciful." My grin widened, teeth red with blood. "You rewind because you're afraid."
The chorus of Saints stilled.
I spat on the floor, dragging myself upright.
"Afraid to commit. Afraid to stain your hands. You keep pressing reset like a coward who can't face the game over screen."
The silence was delicious.
I leaned forward, whispering.
"Me? I bathe in my endings. Every corpse is my gospel. Every failure, my cathedral. That's why I'll win, Saint. Because you keep erasing your sins."
I spread my arms, grinning.
"I keep mine."
The Saint's eyes burned.
"Blasphemy."
His bodies raised their swords.
And the clash began anew.
Corpses fell. Saints fell. The cathedral screamed under the weight of our war.
Each time I died, I rose with a wider grin.
Each time he rewound, his eyes grew dimmer, his breath harsher.
How many times had he erased?
A thousand? A million?
The cracks were showing.
And I was going to rip them open.
The fight dragged on. Hours. Days. Or perhaps no time at all.
At last, only one Saint remained, chest heaving, robes bloodstained. His sword trembled in his hand.
I stood across from him, drenched in gore, a horde of corpses still at my back.
We locked eyes.
He whispered, voice hoarse:
"Monster."
I smiled.
"Brother."
We lunged.
The clash of light and rot split the cathedral.
The world convulsed.
And the System screamed.
[Warning: Regression Authorities in Conflict.]
[Stability collapsing.]
[Outcome: ???]
The cathedral shattered into black void.
I fell, laughing.
The Saint fell, screaming.
And the Tower swallowed us both.