The fortress loomed above him, an unbroken monolith of stone and shadow, its jagged silhouette devouring the starlight. It did not welcome. It did not threaten. It simply was—watching, waiting.

Gufran staggered through its colossal gates, his breath a ragged staccato, his vision swimming in and out of focus. His muscles burned, his skin slick with sweat and blood—not all of it his own. Every step felt like wading through molasses, his body screaming for rest.

But rest was a compromise. Rest was surrender.

And he was not dead.

Not yet.

The iron doors groaned behind him, not with the tired resistance of rusted hinges, but with a weight that felt... intentional. A finality to the sound, like the last note of a requiem.

He had not touched them.

He had not commanded them.

And yet, they sealed shut.

The silence that followed wasn’t true silence. It was charged, humming beneath the surface, a tension he could feel pressing against his skin. The walls exhaled, the very stone shifting in subtle, imperceptible ways. The air thickened, the temperature dropping just enough to make his breath ghost in front of him.

His steps slowed. His thoughts blurred.

Something was wrong.

His exhaustion wasn’t natural. His wounds—superficial at best—were not enough to drag him under.

Then why—?

The fortress pulsed.

Not metaphorically. Not in some poetic, abstract sense. The stone beneath him shuddered with a heartbeat that was not his own.

A whisper—felt more than heard—curled through the space, threading through his mind like fingers through silk.

His knees buckled. The world tilted.

And then—

He collapsed.

Darkness didn’t rush in. It pulled him under, slow and deliberate, like the fortress had simply decided to claim him.

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---

The undead stood over him.

A wall of rot and ruin.

For the first time since their cursed existence began, they hesitated.

Their master had fallen.

Something deep, something ancient, had pulled him under. His body lay before them, still and silent, his breath shallow, his mind elsewhere.

And in that moment—

Their instincts surged forward, wild and untamed, as if they had been caged for centuries and only now remembered what it was to be.

Twitching fingers. Shuddering limbs. A raw, unshackled hunger waking in hollow chests.

One by one—

They turned on him.

Gufran had commanded them. Controlled them. Owned them.

Now—

They would consume him.

A foot dragged forward. Then another. The air thickened with the weight of inevitability.

But one did not move.

The Tall and Skinny One stood still. Watching.

The others lunged.

And he struck.

His claws tore through decayed flesh, severing limbs, snapping brittle bones. The undead did not scream, did not waver, did not stop. They fought like animals, unthinking and relentless.

But he fought with something else.

Purpose.

The horde moved as one—an avalanche of hunger, blind and primal.

But for the first time, a zombie had chosen.

And he chose Gufran.

---

Gufran was not asleep.

He had not collapsed from exhaustion.

His body was here. But he was elsewhere.

Summoned.

The darkness around him was not the absence of light. It was not empty. It was alive.

It curled around him, weightless yet suffocating, pulling him deeper—not through space, not through time, but through something else.

And then—

A presence.

Not a voice. Not a being.

The fortress itself.

It did not speak. It did not need to.

It whispered without words.

It called without sound.

And it showed him.

---

A Glimpse of the Forgotten Past

Gufran was not himself.

He had no body. No weight.

Only presence.

He was nowhere. And everywhere.

Floating. Watching.

The air shifted.

And suddenly—

He saw.

Not with eyes. Not with thought.

But with understanding.

Not clearly. Not fully.

But enough.

The world had not always been like this.

The curse. The plague. The war.

They were not fate. Not destiny.

They were designed.

Someone—something—had changed everything. Not by accident. Not by chance.

By will.

And the cost—

It was more than death. More than ruin.

The world itself had broken.

Not in metaphor. Not in spirit.

Torn.

A wound in reality. Land split apart, oceans spilled into the void. Cities lost to nothingness.

The world was not whole.

It had been ripped in two.

And then—

The vision broke.

Torn away. Stolen.

Gufran was falling.

Not through space. Not through time.

Through reality itself.

---

Gufran jerked awake.

A gasp tore from his throat. His chest heaved. His claws twitched, still remembering a battle his body had never fought.

The fortress was still.

Silent.

Watching.

He pushed himself upright. The stone beneath him was cold, pulsing faintly—alive.

The Tall and Skinny One stood over him. Bloodied. Unmoving.

Victorious.

The others?

Gone. Limbs scattered. Flesh torn. Nothing left but the remnants of mindless hunger.

The fortress?

Still waiting.

And Gufran?

He had questions.

Too many questions.