The blood fog was thick, choking, saturated with the screams of the dying. Kaine’s breath came ragged as he pressed himself against the cold obsidian wall of the dungeon, his hands slick with blood—most of it not his own.
His guildmates lay in pieces around him. Riven had been the first to fall, his body crushed into pulp by one of the monstrous limbs that had burst from the floor. Juno lasted a little longer, long enough to unleash a firestorm spell before the creature ripped her spine out. Now, only Kaine remained.
System Notification:
⚠️ WARNING: Party Integrity at 0%. Survival Probability: 2%.
The thing in the center of the dungeon stirred. A grotesque mass of shifting limbs, twisting mouths, and sightless eyes. It was waiting.
For him.
Kaine clenched his teeth. A dagger in one hand, a broken mana crystal in the other. He was out of options. Out of time.
The only way out was down.
Then, the altar whispered.
A voice. Ancient. Amused. Hungry.
“You are dying, little thief.”
Kaine’s head snapped toward the darkness. The altar sat at the dungeon’s edge, obsidian stone pulsating like a beating heart. Shadows coiled from its surface, reaching for him.
“Bleed for power… or die a martyr.”
The ground trembled beneath Kaine’s feet, a low, bone-deep vibration that sent dust cascading from the dungeon’s jagged ceiling. He forced himself to move, pushing off the obsidian wall, his breath ragged in the thick, metallic stench of blood. His guild—what was left of them—lay strewn across the broken stone.
The dungeon was supposed to be low-tier. A routine raid. An easy payday. Instead, it had become a slaughterhouse.
A deep, guttural sound reverberated through the cavern—not a roar, but something worse. A hum, vibrating against his ribcage, unnatural in its resonance. The thing lurched forward, unfolding from the darkness like a grotesque marionette with too many limbs.
Kaine didn’t look directly at it. He couldn’t. The dungeon twisted reality in ways the human mind wasn’t built to process. Looking at it too long would break him.
He could see it moving in his peripheral vision—a mass of shifting appendages, insectoid plates, and gaping mouths lined with jagged, uneven teeth. Not just one mouth. Dozens. A pulsing nightmare of gnashing maws, chewing, devouring, even though nothing was inside them.
Kaine’s grip tightened on his dagger. It felt like holding a toothpick against a hurricane.
The System notification pinged, cold and clinical.
🔻 SYSTEM ALERT: Raid Party Integrity Critical.
🔻 Survival Probability: 2%.
“No shit,” Kaine thought bitterly.
A single yellow slit flickered open amid the creature’s writhing form.
It had noticed him.
And it was hungry.
The air collapsed inward as the dungeon boss lunged, its many limbs elongating unnaturally, seeking purchase in his flesh. Kaine dove—too slow. A claw grazed his side, and pain exploded down his ribs. His leather armor did nothing. He hit the ground hard, rolling onto his back just in time to see another limb descending like a guillotine.
This was it.
There was nowhere left to run.
Then—the altar pulsed.
A voice, low and whispering, curled into his skull like smoke seeping into the cracks of his mind.
"You are dying, little thief."
Kaine’s vision blurred. His heart pounded, and the shadows around the altar shifted, moved, slithering toward him like eager fingers.
"Bleed for power… or die a martyr."
The monster reared up, its mass eclipsing the dungeon’s light.
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Kaine had seconds to decide.
He reached for the altar.
And everything turned black.
----------------------------------------
Kaine gasped, but there was no air. No ground beneath him. Only an endless abyss stretching in all directions, a void so absolute it felt like the universe had never existed in the first place.
He should have been dead.
His fingers twitched, still sticky with his own blood. He looked down. His body was intact—torn leathers, deep cuts along his ribs where the dungeon boss had nearly ripped him apart. But he wasn’t in the dungeon anymore. He wasn’t anywhere.
Then—a voice.
"You bleed well, little thief."
Kaine froze. The words didn’t come from around him. They came from inside him.
And then—he saw it.
The darkness moved. It coiled, twisted, shifting like living ink bleeding across an unseen canvas. And from it, something stepped forward.
A shape. Tall. Slender. Wrong.
It had no face, only a yawning, hollow void where one should be. Its form was both there and not there, a silhouette against nothingness, shifting like smoke caught in an unseen wind.
And yet—it smiled.
Kaine felt it more than saw it.
"Such defiance. Such hunger."
The voice dripped amusement. Not cruel, not kind—just… watching. Calculating.
"You reached for the altar. Now, you will reach further."
Kaine’s heart pounded. His breath came in short, shallow bursts.
His instincts screamed. Run. Fight. Flee.
But there was nowhere to go.
“Who—” His voice cracked. He swallowed. “Who are you?”
A chuckle, low and ancient, like a thousand voices whispering over dry leaves.
"Many have given me names." The thing tilted its hollow head. "But you may call me the Hollow King."
The system pinged again.
🔻 SYSTEM ERROR: Unauthorized Entity Detected.
🔻 WARNING: CONTRACT VIOLATES SYSTEM PROTOCOLS.
🔻 CONTINUE? [YES] / [NO]
The text flickered, corrupted symbols flashing between the words.
Kaine stared at it, throat dry. He had no idea what this was.
But the alternative? Waking up in a dungeon full of corpses with a monster still waiting to rip him apart?
The Hollow King extended a hand. Or what passed for one.
"Bleed for power… or die a martyr."
Kaine’s vision swam. His ribs ached. His own blood drifted into the abyss like droplets suspended in time.
The choice was an illusion.
There was only one answer.
He reached out—
And the shadows swallowed him whole.
----------------------------------------
Kaine’s body jerked violently as he sucked in a desperate breath. Cold, thick air rushed into his lungs, burning like fire and ice at the same time.
He was back.
Or at least—somewhere else.
The dungeon still loomed around him, but it had changed. The walls—once jagged obsidian—now throbbed with a sickly dark pulse, veins of writhing shadow snaking along the stone like living things. A soundless pressure filled the chamber, pressing into his skull.
His hands trembled as he lifted them. His veins—black as ink—crawled beneath his skin, pulsing with every frantic beat of his heart. His fingertips tingled, shadows curling around them like living smoke.
Something was different. He was different.
System Notification:
⚠️ SYSTEM ALERT: UNSANCTIONED CONTRACT ACCEPTED.
⚠️ HOST DESIGNATION: CORRUPTED.
⚠️ FIRST ABILITY UNLOCKED: [SOULREND CLAWS]
⚠️ RANK: F
⚠️ CORRUPTION: 12%
The text flickered, static bleeding into the edges of his vision. He blinked hard, breath unsteady.
"Corruption?"
"Soulrend Claws?"
A new presence curled in his mind, settling there like an unwanted weight.
"You will understand in time, little thief."
Kaine gritted his teeth. The Hollow King’s whispered amusement slithered through his thoughts, too close, too familiar.
No time to process.
The ground shook violently.
The dungeon was collapsing.
Cracks splintered through the stone, black energy seeping from the fractures like leaking wounds. The corpse of the dungeon boss—what little remained—was being devoured by the encroaching shadows.
Kaine staggered upright, legs weak. He didn’t know what had happened, but if he didn’t move—he was going to be buried here.
The only exit was ahead. A jagged tunnel of shifting darkness.
He forced himself forward. One step. Then another.
The shadows watched him.
And somewhere deep in his mind—the Hollow King laughed.
----------------------------------------
The dungeon screamed.
Not a sound—a feeling. A raw, keening pressure that rippled through the air, crushing Kaine’s skull from the inside out. His vision blurred, shadows pulsing at the edges like they were alive.
The world was falling apart.
Cracks raced along the walls, the once-solid obsidian splitting open like fractured bone. Thick black veins bulged from the stone, writhing, pulsating in rhythm with something unseen.
Kaine ran.
His muscles screamed, but he forced his legs to move. The ground lurched beneath him, stone platforms crumbling into the abyss.
System Warning:
⚠️ DUNGEON INSTABILITY CRITICAL.
⚠️ TIMER UNTIL COLLAPSE: 00:47 SECONDS.
"Not enough time."
Something shifted in his vision—a blur of movement in the periphery. The shadows twisted, moved, reshaping reality in ways that made his stomach churn.
“You cannot outrun the end, little thief.”
The Hollow King’s voice coiled through his thoughts, amused, indulgent. Kaine ignored it.
A chasm split open before him, its depths an endless swirl of shadow. No way forward. No bridges. No time.
System Alert:
⚠️ ABILITY UNLOCKED – [ECLIPSE STEP]
Kaine didn’t question it. He moved.
The world folded.
For a moment, he was nowhere. His body disintegrated into shadow, a sensation both weightless and suffocating—like sinking into frozen tar.
Then—he was on the other side.
He hit the ground hard, knees scraping against broken stone. His head pounded, his vision swam, but—he was alive.
A sharp, violent CRACK split the air.
The dungeon’s core—a massive, pulsating shard of blackened crystal—shattered.
Everything imploded.
Darkness.
----------------------------------------
Kaine awoke gasping.
The dungeon was gone.
He was lying on cold, wet stone, the scent of rain and rot heavy in the air. Not the dungeon. Not the city.
Somewhere new. Somewhere wrong.
System Warning:
⚠️ HOST LOCATION – UNKNOWN.
⚠️ CORRUPTION: 14%.
⚠️ MENTAL STABILITY – WARNING: SANITY DRAIN DETECTED.
And then—footsteps.
A shadow moved in the mist.
A voice.
"What the hell are you now?"
A gun clicked into place.