It began again.

The door to the pit creaked open above, sunlight filtering in once more. Aziz stayed crouched in the corner, his eyes narrowed as he watched the two men appear, their figures silhouetted against the light. They repeated the same lines, their voices echoing down into the pit, but Aziz didn’t bother listening. The words washed over him, meaningless now. He had heard them too many times. As the pouch was dropped into the middle of the pit, the darkness closed in again. He remained still, letting the familiar dread wash over him without resistance.

This was the tenth time.

Each time the day began again, everything happened exactly the same way. He had tried countless things—shouting, pleading, demanding to be let out—but the men above ignored him every time, mechanically dropping the pouch before moving on. Ten times he had died. Ten times the snake had found him, its venom searing through his veins, leaving him writhing in agony until death mercifully claimed him. And each time, he woke up in the same hell, the cycle starting anew.

Despair had gripped him after the third death. The constant torment of dying alone, suffocating on his own blood in this pit, had shattered him. He had tried to escape this hell within a hell, but every attempt was met with failure. The darkness within him grew darker than the pit itself, consuming his spirit with each death. Despair soon gave way to hate. Now, all he wanted was to tear the throats out of the men who had put him here. He wanted nothing more than to crush the snake’s head, to feel its life drain away beneath his fingers.

“Why me…?” he whispered, his voice a fragile echo in the void, the question reverberating off the cold, uncaring walls.

The answer never came, only the sound of his own voice bouncing back at him, mocking his suffering. Rage boiled within him, a fury so intense it made his whole body shake. Ten times. Ten times he had died in the most painful, cruel way imaginable. Ten times he had been alone, drowning in his own blood in this preordained grave.

Rage quickly retreated as it gave way to a torrent of tears. Aziz broke down, his forehead pressed against the dirt, slamming his head onto the ground as he sobbed, his body trembling with exhaustion.

“Please… make it stop… please…” he sniffled, his voice barely above a whisper, “Why can’t I just die?… die… DIE! DIE!”

His cries echoed through the pit, reverberating through the very earth as if the world itself were taunting him. But there was no escape, no end in sight. Slowly, the last remnants of self-pity shed away, leaving behind a twisted, broken child—a monster of agony born in the depths of the earth.

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Hiss.

There it was. Right on time.

The snake, his inevitable demise, slithered toward him, ready to kill him again. Each time before, Aziz had tried to run, to fight, to survive. But his weak body had failed him, every time. But now, as the snake approached, he noticed something different. He could see it more clearly. He didn’t understand what was happening to him, but he knew that with every death, something inside him was changing. The darkness in the pit grew a little brighter each time, his vision sharpening, the contours of his prison coming into focus.

Aziz had a theory. The venom—it was altering him, not just killing him. No matter how many times he died, the scars of his deaths remained, and each time he came back, he was a little different. By the fifth death, he noticed that the pain from the poison was lessened, though it still killed him. He was becoming immune.

He stood up, rolling his aching shoulders. He pushed aside the torrent of emotions threatening to overwhelm him and forced himself to focus. If he wanted to live—if he wanted to see outside this cursed pit again—he needed to endure this.

“When I get out of here… I will find you. All of you,” he swore, his voice filled with cold determination, the faces of the masked men burning into his memory.

It was a promise. A promise of revenge upon those who had thrown him into this nightmare. But first, he had to survive. On his eighth death, Aziz had started to believe he was becoming immune to the poison. If he continued this cycle, eventually, the venom would lose its power over him. But to reach that point, he would have to die again and again. How many more deaths would it take? He didn’t know, but it didn’t matter. He had to get out of here, no matter the cost. He had to see the sun again.

Slowly, anxiously, Aziz held out a trembling hand, inviting the black-death to take its bite. The snake needed no encouragement. He could see its full length now, over a meter long, its raven-black scales glinting in the dim light, its indigo eyes watching him intently. In an instant, it struck, its fangs sinking into his flesh. Another second later, it withdrew. Aziz winced as the venom coursed through his body, but he didn’t fight it. He sat back, closed his eyes, and allowed death to take him once more. But this time, a smile tugged at his lips.

“This is it,” he whispered, a wry grin forming as the pain subsided, replaced by a maniacal glee. “The pain is gone.”

He glanced over at the snake, which watched him from the corner of the pit, its hissing growing louder as it sensed something was different. Aziz bared his teeth, hissing back at the creature that had killed him so many times.

"I'll be back, cursed beast. Next time, things will be different. Wait for me."

The snake recoiled slightly, its instincts warning it that its prey was no longer as helpless as before. Aziz felt the venom working slower this time, his body resisting it, fighting back. He knew it, and he felt as though the snake knew it too. Its hissing grew frantic as it realized its prey was taking longer to die. This was it. Aziz was finally resistant to the poison.

The next time, he thought as darkness claimed him once again, things will be different.