Darkness wasn't supposed to have texture.
It wasn't supposed to breathe.
But the moment the "Maw" swallowed me, the world bent, something tight pulling on the edges of my skin like a wet sheet, and then—release.
My head vibrated.
My pulse quickened.
And then I opened my eyes.
Breath escaped my throat in one loud exhale.
The realization hit like cold water: there was nothing beneath me. Just a slow, restless ocean of purple and deep blue, streaked with white like stars dragged across wet paint.
Then the floor remembered itself.
Stone knit itself like a braid beneath my shoes, in a slow growling ripple, like a surface forming just to hold me.
"Okay," I whispered, voice cracking. "Okay, no—um. No way. I wanna go back."
I turned around, and the rift was gone.
A blank stone wall stared at me, smooth as bone.
"Why... why did I step in? Why the hell did I—"
I lifted my head and finally saw—really saw—where I was...
The chamber seemed to hesitate around me, its walls swelling and shrinking as if the whole structure was searching desperately for the right shape—some half-remembered cathedral buried in its bones.
Pillars rose on either side of me, tall enough to pierce the dark, but their shapes morphed inconsistently, as if trying to figure out what they're meant to be.
My mind lagged, trying to keep up.
Sections of the walls were fully formed, ornate with decayed arch work... then abruptly would collapse to raw, ragged nothingness. Like someone had started designing it and got bored hallway through.
But the ceiling wasn't a ceiling at all.
A jagged tear forced its way through the stone, exposing a swirling ocean of violet nebulae, and the same smear of stars from earlier. Light poured downward, bathing everything in shifting purples and cold blues. Dust... or what looked like dust, floated lazily in the beams, but didn't fall.
Gravity didn't know what it was doing here.
Nothing did.
"Seriously... Fuck this."
I pressed a palm against the nearest pillar.
Its texture rippled under my touch.
Literally flexed, it's shape curving around the area I rested my palm.
I yanked my hand back, heart spiking.
Regret slammed into me so hard my knees weakened.
I shouldn't have come. I shouldn't have stepped in. This place was wrong.
Every instinct I had screamed leave, even though leaving was no longer an option.
But another feeling pressed underneath the fear; heavier, sadder, older...
You can't run forever.
My throat tightened.
"Just once," I whispered hoarsely. "Please… just once let me finish something."
The cathedral responded with a long, low creak — stone stretching, shifting, settling into some new shape.
Rearranging.
Welcoming.
My stomach dropped.
That's when the System flickered into existence at the corners of my eyes — like a cracked lens catching light.
[SYSTEM STABILIZING…]
The letters twitched like bugs as they snapped into place.
For a moment, the System looked… normal. Comfortable. Or as comfortable as something like this could ever be.
MENU: Aiden Valin — Level 3
Strength: 5
Intelligence: 1
Magic: 1
Stamina: 2
Resistance: 1
Mana: 111 / 111
And the part I hated looking at—
[DEATH COUNT: 1]
My breath hitched.
There it was. The ugly truth stamped in white light. A reminder I had already died once. That somewhere on a cosmic scorecard, I was marked.
Underneath it, a single ability flickered faintly:
DOOMCYCLE Ability Available (1):Resonance Shift —The user may exchange significant stamina and mana to sense the intentions of nearby souls through resonance vision. If mana is depleted during use, the spell will drain the user's eyesight, resulting in temporary or permanent blindness.
A cold sweat prickled across my skin.
"Yeah," I muttered. "Still never using that unless I'm dying."
The menu hovered there for a second longer, stable, familiar, the only thing in this place that made any sense.
Then it glitched.
A sharp static crackle shivered through the cosmic darkness, as the UI spasmed, symbols warping into geometric noise.
"What—?"
The interface split open like breaking bone.
New panels burst outward, rearranging themselves into a ring of glowing windows around my vision.
[NEW MENUS UNLOCKED]
"What," I whispered, "the actual hell does that mean—"
The first new panel stabilized, pulsing dimly:
[HP: 63 / 63]
The bar throbbed faintly, like it had a heartbeat.
[EXP: 99 / 121]
Exp. A number I'd never seen before.
"Were you… tracking this the whole time?"
The System did not answer.
[SPELL COMPENDIUM]
Status: Empty
A hollow, quiet ache formed in my chest.Everyone else in stories got spellbooks full of cool shit.I got an empty binder.
Another window unfurled sharply:
[CREATURE ARCHIVES]
Locked entries flickered:
???
???
ARMLESS [DATA PENDING]
SPINE TWITCHER [LOCKED]
MAWGLUT [LOCKED]
???????[LOCKED]
My pulse punched the back of my throat.
There were names on there I had never heard of. Never seen. Never wanted to see.
But the System already had them catalogued.
Like it expected me to meet them.
Then the final menu expanded, scrolling downward in sterile, clinical lines:
[DUNGEON SUMMARY: THE DORMANT MAW]
Origin: Cosmic Tear Fragment
Type: Aberration / Reality-Warped Pocket
Status: Dormant → Reactivated Trigger:High-Mana Host Detected
Hazards: Distortion, Incomplete Entities, Spatial Collapse
Boss Presence: Confirmed
Survival Probability: 42%
42%.
My knees nearly buckled.
The summary flickered, imprinting one more message before the window folded itself away:
[EXTRACTION: UNAVAILABLE]
The cathedral groaned deeply in response, as if the dungeon itself agreed.
I swallowed hard, pulse thundering.
"…Finish something," I whispered. "Just… finish something."
And the path ahead — once a scattered mess of melted stone — began to rearrange itself into a corridor, arching downward.
Inviting me deeper.
Whatever was waiting for me down there, I would have to face it.