“Adam.”
A soft, gentle voice roused me from my sleep.
“So you’re finally awake.” The voice continued, warmth.
Another voice, deeper, more gravelly, broke in, gruff yet filled with a sense of concern. “You’ve been sleeping for so long. Was the raid really that hard on you?”
Before I could respond, a woman’s voice pierced the air, sharp toward the gruff voice’s man. “Hey! He’s done a damn fine job healing us. If not for him, we’d all be missing limbs right now.”
The man with the gentle voice chuckled lightly, an approving sound. “You know what they say— a healer is the heart of any raid group.”
“Exactly,” the woman affirmed, her voice carrying a mix of gratitude and urgency. “We can keep fighting, keep pushing forward, as long as our healer keeps us alive.”
My thoughts drifted, fading momentarily as I pondered their words. Alive… I repeated in my mind. And then, that was word echoed with a bitter resonance: alive…
I couldn’t help but linger on the thought of it, reminiscing that moment.
The memories of blood and battle, of life clinging by fragile threads— but still, we fought.
“So long as everyone… is still alive,” I murmured to myself, the words like a soft sigh lost in the quiet of the moment.
€|4*\£{{€~*|*{£}*|*{£> * * *
“This is is! The greatest subject of all time!” The man in the flowing white robe bellowed, his voice rising with an almost fanatic fervor, his eyes gleaming with unrestrained excitement.
“His name, it fits him— the First Father of Man!” another voice chimed in, rich with reverence. The words spilled out like a holy chant, as if invoking something greater than mere mortals.
“He shall be the one to lead us. He is destined to guide us.” Declared a third voice, this one with a voice heavy with certainty, as though nothing could alter the truth they saw in this young man.
But then, a voice of doubt crept in. The voice rose, cautious and skeptical, its tone rough and cutting. “But can we truly trust him? How can we be sure he’ll lead our nation to the ultimate revolution? Can a young man like him bear such a weight?”
A slow, almost dismissive laugh came from a figure seated at the table, his eyes narrowing with measured confidence. “Don’t worry. This subject has absolute loyalty to us. We can trust him, without question.”
“But he’s so young.” Another voice broke in, laced with skepticism. “How can we entrust our army to someone so inexperience? Can you truly vouch for his abilities, his strength?”
“Yes, he is young,” said yet another, this time with an edge of awe, “but this one— this subject is special. Unlike our common kind, this one is not from our world.”
A ripple of confusion passed around the table, and one of the men leaned forward, his face taut with disbelief. “Wait. You mean… he came through The Door? The Door that’s been sealed for thousands of years? That’s impossible, isn’t it?”
The man in the white robe, his voice filled with the authority of someone who had all the answers, nodded slowly. “No, he didn’t come through The Door. Even The Gap is impossible to cross.” His words hung in the air for a long moment, heavy with meaning.
“That’s why he’s a miracle. He was sent by The Almighty as a gift to us,” another man added, his voice reverent. “He comes from a world beyond ours, a world where they have devices, technologies far more advanced than anything we have. He speaks of a reincarnation device—a means of crossing into our world. And his mind… it’s sharp, we confirmed he is indeed has the mentality of an adult man.”
“The VR Gear, he calls it,” the man in the white robe clarified, his voice a mixture of fascination and envy. “An entertainment device, he says. But what kind of entertainment device grants someone such… capabilities?”
A low growl came from one of the men, his voice brimming with outrage. “How could it be? Our world… a mere playthings to them? How dare they! Their arrogance— it must be punished. They treat us like mere pawns in their game. They must pay!”
“Indeed,” another voice purred with cunning. “Just imagine, their civilization— far more advanced, more powerful than ours. Wouldn’t it be fitting to conquer it? A world worthy of our reign, no?”
Another voice, more pragmatic, spoke up. “Conquest aside, can we even find a way to enter their world? Is it even possible to breach that barrier? Or are we forever locked out of their domain?”
The man in the white robe straightened in his seat, a gleam of determination in his eyes. “There is a way. There is nothing impossible for us, the ten wise men. We shall find a way. We always do.”
And as the words rang out, a wave of fervor swept through the group. Their eyes lit with shared purpose, their voices rising in unison:
“For glory!”
“For honor!”
“For prosperity!”
The ten men, united in their scheming, leaned over the round table, their minds weaving plots and ambitions in the blinding white room, each one convinced that their destiny was unstoppable.
* * *
“So you’re finally awake.” A voice echoed through the room.
The boy stirred, blinking against the overwhelming whiteness around him. His senses swirled as he scanned his surroundings, the harsh glare of white metal walls cutting through the haze in his mind.
“Hmm…” His voice, soft and hesitant, rasped out, his gaze still unfocused. “I feel like I’ve woken up from a long nightmare…” His words seemed to float, disconnected from the reality surrounding him.
He glance at the gleaming, cold walls, but they didn’t blind him as he expected. His attention shifted, and spotted the man who had spoken to him. His stomach churned. The man was monstrous— his arms were twisted, grotesque tentacles, glistening wetly with strange, sticky tendrils that undulated in the air.
How… strange, the boy thought, horrified and fascinated all at one. Tentacles on a human… but then, something deeper nagged at him. He reached up, running his fingers across his own face, his fingers tracing the smooth, warm skin of his cheeks. His breath hitched as he examined his hands—just two human hands, normal, unremarkable. He turned to the wall again, leaning closer, looking for any sign that might give him a clue. He stared into his reflection—yes, his face was human. This is a perfectly normal human, he thought to himself.
What is normal?
The question bubbled up, clawing at him, gnawing at the edges of his thoughts. He blinked, confused. Why did that question feel so alien, like a word in a language he barely remembered?
“How are you feeling, my child?” the man asked, his voice both soothing and unsettling, laced with an odd, distant warmth.
“I’m fine, and you?” The boy said.
“Oh, splendid!” the man said, his face lighting up, almost too eagerly. “Nothing could bring me more joy than seeing you awake.” He practically beamed, a strange reverence in his eyes.
“Where am I?” The boy shifted, sitting up on the edge of the bed, his legs feeling unsteady.
“Wait… could it be?” the man tilted his head, an unsettling grin spreading across his features. “You’ve forgotten?”
The boy’s brow furrowed, “I don’t think I can remember.”
The tentacled man let out a high, sharp laugh. “Oh my, what a disaster!” his expression turned into one of exaggerated grief. “Helen! Helen, come over here!” He beckoned toward a woman standing in the far corner of the room.
The woman approached quickly, her face a blank mask, her movements stiff. “Yes, sir Pelagius. Is something wrong?”
Without warning, Pelagius raised his tentacle arm and slapped her across the face with a sickening wet smack. The sound echoed like a whip cracking through the air.
“Ahhh!” the woman yelped in shock, her body jolting under the blow. She clasped her hand to her cheek, trying to suppress the pain.
“I told you, Helen!” Pelagius’s voice was a low growl, his temper flaring. “I told you to give Adam extra care—look what’s happened! He has lost his memories again!” His voice hissed, dripping with anger.
“I’m sorry, sir, I—” The woman tried to explain, her words choked off as Pelagius slammed his tentacle hand into her face again. The slap was brutal, ripping through the air with a buzzing, snapping sound, like a whip cracking against raw flesh.
The woman screamed, her body crumpling to the floor as the shock of the blow sent electric tremors through her spine. She writhed, as if electrocuted, her body convulsing in pain.
Pelagius clicked his tongue in disgust, his gaze shifting to Adam, whose eyes were now cold and calculating.
“It seems we need to teach you again, Adam.” Pelagius muttered, his voice taking on a cruel edge as he shifted his focus to the boy.
Adam looked at Helen, her pained body twisted on the ground, before his gaze shifted back to Pelagius. Unreadable, a strange, cold smile crept across Adam’s face.
Pelagius continued, his words faltering. “You are—”
Before he could finish, blood sprayed through the air like a fountain. Blue blood, it splattered across Pelagius’s face, and in a flash, the tentacles that had once been his limbs were severed, falling to the ground in glistening, pulsating stumps.
Pelagius recoiled, eyes wide with shock and pain, clutching the remnants of his now-missing appendages.
“Well… that doesn’t seem fun.” Adam’s voice was a quiet, deadly drawl as he stood just behind Pelagius, watching the chaos unfold. He gazed down at Helen, whose eyes were wide with both horror and something like relief at the sight of Pelagius’s suffering.
“W-what happened?” Pelagius gasped, stumbling, his body unbalanced by the pain. He looked up at Adam, his face a mask of terror.
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
Adam, now standing with a frightening calmness, cocked his head. “Tell me, Pelagius, does pain feel fun?” he asked in a voice devoid of any warmth.
Pelagius tried to speak, but the question was met with nothing but dread.
“Tell me, Helen.” Adam turned his icy gaze toward the woman still writhing in pain on the floor, her body twitching from the slap. “Is pain fun?”
Helen, though terrified, could feel a small satisfaction pulse in her chest, as if, just for a moment, she wasn’t the victim. “N-n-no.” She stammered, her voice shaking as she answered, her eyes locked on Adam’s piercing gaze.
Adam nodded thoughtfully, considering her words. He seemed satisfied with the response.
Pelagius’s voice trembled, barely a whisper now. “Could it be… you remember now?”
Adam glanced at him, his eyes glowing faintly with an eerie, unsettling light. “Hmm…” he stared at Pelagius’s severed stumps, unbothered by the man’s suffering. “That actually looks better,” he mused out loud.
Before Pelagius could react, Adam stretched out his hand toward him. His eyes glows yellow, yellow glow forming around his palm intensified, a shimmering aura of power enveloping Pelagius’s wounds.
For a moment, Pelagius thought he would be healed, that his tentacles might return. But instead, Adam’s hand hovered, and the wound began to heal—but not in the way Pelagius had hoped. Only his flesh began to close, only left with a human stumps.
“That tentacle looks gross.” Adam commented disinterestedly, his face twitching in mild disgust. He let his healing powers flow, but only for a moment, causing Pelagius to feel a strange mix of humiliation.
“Y-you dared!” Pelagius spat, his face contorted in outrage and embarrassment.
“Are you offended?” Adam’s voice was sharp, cold, and unfeeling. “Now that does seem fun.” He murmured, his eyes narrowing.
Pelagius shuddered, his body trembling as the room seemed to close in around him, suffocated by Adam’s cold presence.
Adam turned his gaze toward Helen, extending his hand. The same yellow aura surrounded it, and soon, her body stopped trembling. She gasped in shock as the pain of her slap faded, the wound healing with an unnatural, eerie speed.
“T-thank you.” She whispered, her voice thick with confusion and fear.
“You’re welcome.” Adam’s voice was distant, almost as if he didn’t care.
His eyes flickered as if deep in thought.
And then, as if everything before had been a mere prelude, he spoke.
“Both of you, kill yourselves.”
The command hung in the air, cold and absolute.
Pelagius and Helen’s bodies jerked, their wills overridden. Pelagius, in a frenzy, began to slam his own skull against the metal wall. With a sickening crack, his head split open, the blood spattering like dark rain against the bright walls. His body collapsed, lifeless.
Helen, tears streaming down her face, scrambled for a sharp object, her hands shaking violently. She pressed it to her throat and sliced through, the blood spurting out in hot, pulsating waves. She collapsed, her body still twitching, as the room was painted in scarlet blood.
The others in the room—horrified, panicked—began to scream, pounding on the walls. But the doors wouldn’t open, the metal walls were unyielding.
They were trapped.
Adam, unfazed by the blood-soaked spectacle, glanced around, his eyes blank. “Oh,” he muttered, as if only just remembering. “I forgot there were other people here too.”
His gaze swept across the room, examining each strange creature. A man with a bear’s head, a jaguar with a woman’s face, a woman with writhing snake-hair. Each one more monstrous than the last.
He turned to look at his own reflection again, his face still human, still human. His smile deepened, cold and unfeeling.
“I guess, I’m the only normal one here.” He muttered to himself.
Around him, the room was filled with the echoes of panic, the desperate screams of those who realized they were trapped in their hellish confinement. The ones left, now frozen in fear, cowered in the corners, their eyes wide, desperate, as if trying to will themselves into invisibility.
“Let me go! Please, let me go!” The man with the bear head wailed, his voice breaking in terror as he beat against the walls, but no matter how hard he struck, the metal walls remained cold and impenetrable.
Adam watched them with a detached, almost clinical interest. His gaze flicked from one to the other—his cold glowing yellow eyes drinking in their fear, savoring their desperation.
“How noisy.” He muttered under his breath, irritation flickering in his tone. The fear in the room was thick enough to taste.
Without another word, Adam extended his hand again, his fingers twitching with a certain deliberate precision. His palm opened, glowing white, radiating power that seemed to distort the air itself. The others in the room went silent, the tension so thick that it felt like the very air was suffocating them.
For a brief moment, the light surrounding his hand intensified—brighter but then with a sudden, sharp pop, a crackling burst of blood filled the room. The sound was deafening, sickening, wet crack sounded like the snapping of bones.
One by one, the heads of the remaining beings in the room exploded with a horrifying, grotesque sound. The pressure from Adam’s unseen power caused their skulls to rupture like ripe fruit, spraying viscous blood in every direction. The room was immediately showered in a fine mist of red, the stench of death mixing with the metallic scent of the walls.
The man with the bear head was the first to go, his skull bursting open in a geyser of blood and tissue. His body crumpled to the floor, twitching once before going still. The jaguar-headed woman’s face shattered in a shower of jagged bone and gore, followed by the woman with the snake-hair, whose head exploded into a grotesque spray, her screams silenced in an instant.
Adam stood in the center of it all, watching with an eerie calm as the blood soaked the walls and pooled on the floor. His eyes gleamed with satisfaction, his breath steady, unaffected by the carnage that now surrounded him.
The bodies of the others slumped to the floor, their twitching ceasing as the last remnants of life faded from them. The floor was a slick, crimson sear, and the air was thick with the smell of death and blood.
“Ah, much better.” Adam murmured, looking down at the carnage he had orchestrated. He seemed almost pleased, a small, satisfying moment playing right in front of him.
He turned his head, his eyes scanning the room. He could feel the panic radiating from the few survivors who had remained silent throughout the massacre. They knew, they understood. There was no escape.
With a flick of his wrist, Adam raised his hand again, his fingers splaying in a cruel gesture of finality.
“Done already?” Adam whispered, as if the brutal massacre had been nothing more than a passing amusement, a momentary distraction. He stepped over the bodies, his feet squelching in the blood-soaked floor.
“Hmm…” Adam murmured, his eyes scanning the bloodbath around him. “I supposed that’s the end of this little show.”
He paused for a moment, looking at the reflection of himself in the blood-slicked floor, his face almost peaceful. The gore surrounding him seemed to fade into the background, as if it didn’t matter at all.
In his mind, he was the only thing that was normal.
“I’m the only one left now.” He murmured softly, almost to himself. “Normal. At least I’m normal.”
* * *
“Sir! It seems we’ve detected anomalies in room XXXVII!” A woman’s voice, sharp with urgency, cut through the sterile silence, her eyes wide with alarm as she turned to the man in the white robe.
The man’s face normally calm and composed, shifted into a grim expression. “That’s where subject HL-P-I is.” He muttered under his breath, his mind racing. “Impossible… this can’t be happening.”
“Yes, sir.” The woman continued, her voice strained. “Multiple life signs have been lost in that room, leaving only one.”
The man’s eyes narrowed, disbelief and growing dread filling him. “That couldn’t be possible.” He snapped. “The room was designed to mitigated all external interference, all colors… Everything is meant to be under control. What the hell happened?”
His pulse quickened, his thoughts a chaotic whirlwind. “Call all the elite guards.” He barked, his tone demanding, urgent.
“Yes, sir.” The woman replied immediately, her fingers hovering at her temple. With a deep breath, she closed her eyes, focusing intensely. A faint white glow radiated from her fingertips as she relayed the command.
“Attention all elite guard, please proceed to room XXXVII. I repeat all elite guards, report to room XXXVII immediately.”
Within seconds, a wave of heavy boots and hurried footsteps echoed as the guards, heavily armed and steeled for anything, rushing toward their destination.
The man in the white robe, felt the weight of his heartbeat in his chest as he sprinted through the cold, sterile halls. His mind churned with the worst possible thoughts. What could have gone wrong? What could have triggered this?
When he finally arrived, the room outside was a sea of tense, armed bodies. The elite guards—veterans of countless operations—waited in silent readiness. Their weapons, gleaming with cold precision, were gripped tightly, poised for the unknown. Some wielded swords, others shields, and spears, each guard displaying an unspoken understanding of the potential danger.
The wall with the sign of XXXVII written. No space of opening, not even a gap. What could possibly happen in here? They all thought to themselves.
The man in the white robe’s eyes glowed faintly as he stood before the unyielding wall. With a low, strained exhale, he extended his hand, focusing his energy. The door hissed and groaned, a low metallic sound as it began to open with a slow, reluctant sigh, revealing the white bright metallic interior.
The elite guards surged forward, cautiously entering the room, weapons drawn, scanning every inch. But their eyes swept the space, disbelief flickered across their faces.
They stood frozen, looking at each other in confusion, none daring to speak first. There was no emergency, no bloodshed, no danger. The room, as pristine and orderly as always, was quiet—too quiet—but the lives they expected to be lost… were still there.
A man with grotesque, twisting tentacles for hands stood, blinking in surprise. “What could possibly be the problem?” he asked, looking directly at the elite guards with a furrowed brow, his voice thick with confusion.
One of the guards, visibly taken aback, stammered, trying to regain composure. “N-no sir, we… we received the signal—”
But before he could finish, the soft, deliberated steps of another figure approached entering the room.
“Pelagius, are you all right?” the voice was calm, smooth—a man in another white robe. His posture relaxed despite the situation.
“Yes.” Pelagius responded, raising a hand in nonchalance, “as you can see, I’m perfectly fine. What has prompted you to deploy the entire elite force here, my good friend Albatus?”
Albatus’s gaze immediately shifted, scanning the room for the one person who stood out. A young boy, sleeping soundly on his bed in the far corner, undisturbed by the chaos.
For a long moment, Albatus didn’t speak, his eyes lingering on the boy, as he could felt strange unease creeping through him. “Nothing… perhaps it’s just a false alarm. The scanners showed all life signs had been lost—except for one.”
Pelagius chuckled, a low, amused sound. “Tch, tch, tch, you’re always the most cautious among us, Albatus. As you can see, everything is under control here.” He waved a hand dismissively, as if the situation were nothing more than an inconvenience.
Albatus’s mind raced as he processed the situation. What could have triggered the alarm? What could have caused the anomalies sign, when everything here seem normal?
Pelagius seemed to read his thoughts, his voice dripping with pointed sarcasm. “Ah, well, it seems we can never escaped the fate of having unreliable subordinates. It’s the price of having the greatest wisdom, isn’t it, Albatus?” his sharp words were aimed at both his subordinates and those Albatus who had failed to give accurate reports.
The man in white paused, throwing a glance at the scanner who had relayed the alarm, an icy reprimand flickering in his eyes. But there was no time to dwell on it. Albatus’s thoughts shifted once more, focusing on the matter at hand.
“How’s the boy?” he asked, his voice trying to sound casual as he glanced toward the sleeping child.
Pelagius smiled, his face twisting with smug pride. “As you can see, we just completed our latest round of tests on him. He’s quite the subject. Exhausted from the strain, but nothing out of the ordinary.” He reached into his robe, producing a report, waving it in front of Albatus. “Don’t worry, everything is under our perfect control.”
Albatus’s mind was still not at ease. He glanced at the boy again, feeling an odd sense of wrongness prickling at the back of his neck. What’s not right here?
“Yes, yes… I see.” Albatus murmured, trying to convince himself as he studied the boy.
Pelagius, sensing the change in Albatus’s demeanor, quickly shifted the conversation. “Ah yes, my good friend, how’s the progress on our latest project? Is everything running smoothly? You know, I’ve been running low on experimental subjects… the resources we discuss that before, one that needed to build the ultimate army.” He said, almost eagerly.
Albatus took a slow breath, masking the unease that still gnawed at him. “Everything seems to be proceeding well in most areas.” He replied. “But recently, we’ve lost all 21 men in a particular area—seems some uncooperative group intervened.” His voice darkened as he spoke of the loss, his fingers tightening slightly into a fist.
Pelagius tilted his head, his grin widening. “I see, that’s unfortunate. Should we use ‘that’?” he asked, his tone suggesting he was referring to something more… drastic.
“No, no need for now.” Albatus said, waving off the suggestion. “But, we did capture a surprising new resource. One that will certainly pique your interest.” His voice dropped, eyes gleaming with the promise of something new.
“Oh? You really know how to keep me intrigued, my good friend.” Pelagius responded, his smile turning more calculating. “I’m looking forward to seeing it.”
Just then, a soft voice broke through the conversation—a child’s voice, sleepy and disoriented. “What’s all this noise?” The boy blinked groggily, wiping the sleep from his eyes, his gaze fixed on the armored guards standing in a silent row.
Pelagius’s smile faltered slightly as he looked toward the boy. Albatus’s lips thinned as he muttered under his breath. “Seems I have more work to do.”
“I’ll see you later my friend.” Pelagius said, his tone light, as he form an eerie grin. “And I wouldn’t mind if you sent me that troublesome resource of yours—the on that caused all this commotion, yes?” he fixed Albatus’s subordinate with a pointed stare.
Albatus, eyes flicking toward Pelagius’s silent threat, nodded stiffly. “Don’t worry, I’ll send you a ‘gift’ for taking up your precious time.” He said, a thin smile curving his lips.
As the door to room XXXVII began to close, the heavy silence seemed to press in from all sides. Albatus’s mind churned with unease. He couldn’t shake the sensation of something being… off. His steps echoed as he walked down the hall, the weight of a looming, unknowable threat hanging over him. The boy, the room, the unsettling feeling that clung to everything—something was wrong.