The brutal tableau of Anya's body was burned into Jason's mind. Not in the form of raw grief, but of cold calculations. Each moment wasted was a moment the monstrous forces behind the rifts grew stronger. With agonizing clarity, he understood the ruthless pragmatism born from Anya's other world. His hesitation hadn't brought her back, only made him, made them, more vulnerable.
Anya's form pulsed with a spectral glow, faint now, but undeniable. With a grim focus, he knelt. There was no ritual, no prayer for the departed, only the chilling precision of a scavenger claiming his loot. Motes of essence hung in the air, spectral remnants of both her strength and the horrifying connection he'd severed. His power swirled, gathering them close, not just adding to his strength, but unlocking new pathways of understanding.
His fingers traced the remains of the tendril she'd severed, those grotesque conduits of power and invasion. It was here the System had been weakest, here Anya had nearly broken free with sheer force of will. Again, with the cold touch of Essence Theft, he drew from the lingering specter. It tasted less of power, more of chaotic possibility. This wasn't the key to survival, but a map to the enemy itself.
With each spectral touch, the familiar halls of his high school wavered. They weren't simply fading into shadow, but layering over themselves, reality thinning to reveal a grotesque parody of what had once been. This wasn't simply a school; it was a dungeon in the making, a twisted proving ground the System was shaping with chilling efficiency.
Before he could analyze this macabre shift further, a flicker of blue caught his eye. Not spectral energy, but something more... technological. As his hand neared, it became clear: a translucent screen hovering in midair, words of stark white burning against an impossible blackness.
SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: DUNGEON ACTIVATION DETECTED. ENTRY? Y/N
His heart thundered in his chest. It was here, the brutal transformation he had caused. With a surge of both exhilaration and fear, he reached out and selected yes.
For a heartbeat, the air seemed to hum. Then the world twisted around him like a cheap kaleidoscope. Walls warped, ceilings stretched, and his gut lurched not with nausea, but with the sickening sensation of the world itself folding onto a new axis. When the dizziness passed, he stood not in a dim hallway, but a claustrophobic cavern entrance, rough-hewn stone replacing familiar lockers. Had the building truly twisted, or was this some form of warped overlay? It mattered little – the real fight had begun.
Jason cautiously ventured into the dim passage. This wasn't a school dungeon from some fantastical game, but a place of grim survival. A flicker of movement, and with brutal reflexes, he hurled a blast of energy. There was no scream, only the shatter of stone. Not a monster, but an ancient statue, now dust beneath a cobweb of crackling magic.
More traps – hidden in the darkness, perhaps rigged by other students twisted by the system? Or worse, were they manifestations of the dungeon itself, its cruel welcome to new initiates?
With each mote he'd collected from Anya and the fading tendrils, his Essence Points had skyrocketed. Level wasn't a single stagnant number, but something pulsing and reactive, shifting as he gained both raw power and a deeper understanding of those stolen glimpses into Anya's past. He had reached level six. How he longed to reach level ten to unlock a new upgrade path.
Focusing, he conjured a sliver of wax, pale and soft in the dungeon's gloom. At first, nothing changed. Yet, as he channelled essence into it, into those brutally familiar skills, he felt a shift. The wax didn't gain monstrous luminescence or turn razor-sharp, but grew stronger, its texture twisting to become harder, nearly metallic. It was still simply wax, but wax with a terrifying edge. When he experimentally jabbed it against the cavern wall, it didn't crack, but left a sharp gouge in the worn stone. He had invested some of his essence into wax reinforcement.
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No more hesitation. Every mote he had left was spent, not on raw power, but the eerie half-life of spectral sight. The passage warped ahead of him, shimmering with unnatural glows that revealed tripwires, pressure plates, even warped shadows pulsing with a dangerous echo of monsters-to-be. With each discovery, a cold understanding blossomed within him: this school wouldn't simply teach him to fight again; it would forge him into the very predator he desperately needed to become.
With a chilling blend of human ingenuity and monstrous awareness, Jason weaved through the dungeon's maze. Spectral sight became a crutch, the world pulsating with unnatural colors and warped geometries. Cobwebs became tripwires, pressure plates glowed underfoot, and faint traces warned of warped shadows that pulsed with the threat of monsters-to-be.
Each dodge, each trap deactivated or purposely triggered, chipped away at the Jason he thought he knew. Gone was the hesitant college student; in his place, something colder, honed by a System designed to reward both ruthlessness and cunning. It wasn't enough to survive; he had to adapt, to find his own monstrous strength before the dungeon warped him entirely.
Through corridors barely wide enough to breathe in, past chambers that glowed with a nauseating light, the path twisted him ever deeper. With each level, the traps gained grotesque sophistication. Not crude wires or falling statues, but illusions warping into deadly obstacles, poisoned fumes billowing from cracks. His wax, with careful and monstrous experimentation, became a shield, a tool for probing, its once dull form twisted into a crude parody of Anya's spectral tendrils.
The deeper he went, the more echoes reverberated, not just of monsters, but of students. Groans echoed from hidden corners, the occasional flicker of fear-soaked eyes peering from doorways he passed. It was tempting to reach out, to promise some salvation he felt increasingly uncertain he possessed. Yet Anya's face, lifeless and spectral, flashed in his mind's eye – a brutal reminder of how fleeting humanity was in this world.
His caution led him not into conflict, but to silent observance. From the shadows, he watched a boy, desperately scrawling strange runes on the ground. Each marking released a tiny crackle of monstrous energy, and as they began to form an intricate shape, it became clear that this wasn't an attempt at defense, but of summoning. His fingers glowed where nails had once been, a tendril of energy weaving towards the center of the glyph.
The boy wasn't just a hapless victim; he had already started down the path of warped power. But it was wrong, uncontrolled, like a desperate plea for attention that the System would undoubtedly answer - but twist to its own monstrous desires. There was no hesitation then, no room for that nagging voice of empathy.
As the glyph shimmered, the ground pulsed, Jason struck. In one ruthless strike, his wax-spear shattered the half-finished design, cutting not flesh, but whatever nascent connection between boy and monstrous will. It was a scream of raw horror, not pain, that cut through the dungeon's echoing silence. Then, a flash of fear in once-familiar eyes, the glint of monstrous hunger, not human recognition. The boy hadn't died, but something in him had cracked, replaced by an echo of the force that haunted Jason's every thought.
He couldn't hesitate. There was no room for kindness, for futile attempts to salvage humanity. Jason lunged, twisting his hand to channel raw unformed Essence. There was a scream, and then it cut off sharply, not fading into an echo, but dissolving into… nothing. In that moment, it felt not like murder, but erasure. Not a human enemy fallen, but a parasite driven out.
And yet, when he stood over the body, when the essence motes shimmered around him, the nausea wasn't from the violence, but from the horrifying echo of efficiency. There was no bloodlust, not really. There was only the terrifying logic of survival under a cruel System's watch. No turning back. That boy was proof – there were only shades of monstrousness now, some just further along the path than others. Reality was truly different from his past life.