Autumn had settled into the city, crisp air threading between the towering buildings, carrying the scent of damp pavement and the distant char of a food truck’s grill. The late afternoon sun cast long shadows across the sidewalk, painting everything in a golden hue. Trees lining the parkway stood half-barren, their leaves scattered across the cracked concrete like discarded memories of summer.
Frank barely noticed.
His boots scuffed against the sidewalk as he trudged toward home, hands shoved into the pockets of his cheap windbreaker. The distant chatter of families in the park barely registered in his ears. A couple walked past him, their laughter bright and full of life. A group of kids kicked a soccer ball near the benches, their parents idly scrolling through their phones.
Normal. Expected.
For everyone else, at least.
For Frank, normal felt like a noose tightening just a little more every day. He hated his job—long, grueling shifts that left him drained. Call centers were soul-sucking, and his department was one of the worst. Debt collections. A cold, mechanical way of reminding people they had no escape from what they owed. He’d stopped trying to be empathetic months ago. Now, he was just another voice on the line, counting the hours until he could shut off his headset and pretend his life had meaning for a few hours.
He exhaled sharply, watching his breath curl into the air before fading.
Then, the sky flickered.
Not a cloud passing over the sun. Not some plane’s contrail catching the light.
The entire sky—deep blue and endless—shimmered like a reflection on disturbed water.
Frank stopped, blinking.
The flicker happened again, rippling across the skyline like a glitch in a game. His skin prickled. He turned, looking for anyone else reacting to it. But no one even paused. The couple still laughed. The kids still played. A jogger ran past without so much as glancing up.
Had he imagined it?
The ground trembled beneath him. Not an earthquake, not a passing truck—a deep, guttural vibration that seemed to come from beneath the very fabric of reality.
Frank’s stomach turned. His breath caught in his throat.
Something was wrong.
He staggered back a step, heart hammering against his ribs. His vision blurred, static crawling at the edges of his sight.
Then, a message—text floating in the air, impossible and unreal.
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SYSTEM NOTIFICATION
> SYSTEM INTEGRATION: STAGE 1 INITIALIZING
> STABILIZING PLANETARY RESTRUCTURE…
> WARNING: UNREGISTERED ENTITY DETECTED
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Frank’s pulse spiked. The words weren’t on a screen. They weren’t projected from some phone or billboard.
They were in the air.
In his mind.
And he wasn’t the only one seeing them anymore.
Screams erupted around him. People jolted, clutching their heads. The sky cracked again, warping like stretched glass.
Then, the world exploded.
Frank had time for one last breath before the shockwave hit—an unseen force slamming into him with the weight of a collapsing building.
The air ripped from his lungs.
The city around him folded inward like a crumpled paper map.
And then,
he was falling.
Falling into darkness.
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SYSTEM ERROR
> UNKNOWN ENTITY DETECTED IN RESTRICTED ZONE
> FORCE-RELOCATING ENTITY TO DESIGNATED SUBTERRANEAN SECTOR
> OVERRIDE STATUS: DENIED – ERROR LOG FORWARDED TO ADMINISTRATORS
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Initializing Dungeon Transfer…
Frank’s first sensation was cold stone pressing against his cheek.
His mind swam in a haze of confusion, his breath shallow and uneven. His body felt… wrong. Like he had been ripped out of existence and shoved into a new one without permission.
His fingers twitched against the hard ground, rough and uneven beneath his skin. He sucked in a sharp breath, the air stale and heavy with dampness—completely unlike the crisp autumn breeze from before. His body ached, like every muscle had been pulled apart and stitched back together in the wrong order.
Where…?
He forced his eyes open, and immediately regretted it.
Total darkness.
Not the kind where your eyes adjust after a few seconds. No streetlights, no moon, no distant glow from a city skyline. Nothing.
A hollow pit of unease formed in his stomach.
Frank swallowed hard and pushed himself up onto his hands and knees. His jacket was still on, but his pockets were empty—no phone, no keys. His wallet was gone too, not that money would help him here.
His breathing quickened. His pulse pounded against his skull.
Then—
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SYSTEM NOTIFICATION
> ERROR: UNREGISTERED ENTITY DETECTED IN RESTRICTED ZONE.
> ERROR LOG FORWARDED TO ADMINISTRATORS.
> ATTEMPTING AUTOMATIC SYSTEM ASSIGNMENT…
> PROCESSING…
> OVERRIDE GRANTED. NEW DESIGNATION: Delver [LEVEL 1]
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Frank flinched as the words seared into his vision. His mind rebelled against the sheer impossibility of it, yet he understood them—not in English, not in any spoken language—just raw knowledge forced into his brain.
He clenched his fists, trying to steady himself. System? Delver? This had to be a dream. Or a psychotic break.
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He took a deep breath, but the air was thick, damp, and wrong.
Something moved in the dark.
A faint, scraping sound—too distant to pinpoint, too close to ignore.
Frank stiffened, his blood turning ice-cold. He strained his ears, forcing his breath to slow.
Another noise. A dragging sound. Slow. Inconsistent. Like something injured.
He turned his head toward the noise, heart hammering in his chest. He couldn’t see it, but he could feel it.
He wasn’t alone.
Then, another system message appeared, and this time, it came with an ominous chime.
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SYSTEM NOTIFICATION
> DUNGEON INITIALIZATION COMPLETE.
> WELCOME, DELVER.
> SURVIVE.
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Frank’s pulse spiked.
He wasn’t dreaming.
This was real.
And something was coming for him...
The dragging sound grew louder. Closer.
Frank barely breathed, frozen in place. His heartbeat pounded against his ribs, every instinct screaming at him to run—hide—fight. But how? He had nothing. No weapons, no light, no idea what the hell was even out there.
The noise stopped.
A deep, rattling exhale slithered through the darkness, low and wet, like something struggling to breathe. Then, a second sound—a chuffing snarl from farther away.
There were two of them.
Frank tensed. They weren’t coming for him. Not yet.
Something else was happening.
He squinted into the pitch black. His eyes were useless, but his ears caught every sound. Shifting rubble. Clawed feet scraping stone. A low, guttural growl.
A fight.
They were fighting each other.
A deafening impact shook the ground as something massive crashed into the stone. A sharp, pained shriek followed—one of the creatures had been thrown.
Frank recoiled, panic rising in his throat. These things were enormous. If either of them noticed him, he was dead.
The snarling battle continued. Flesh tore. Claws ripped. The air filled with the sound of crunching bone and strangled cries. Something’s skull split with a wet crack.
And then—silence.
Frank stayed completely still, his breath shallow.
He could hear one of them still breathing—ragged, weak. The other… was dead.
He swallowed hard. The air stank of blood.
Then—
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SYSTEM NOTIFICATION
> AURA DAMAGE DETECTED.
> PASSIVE EFFECT: ENEMY HEALTH DEPLETING…
----------------------------------------
Frank’s entire body went rigid.
Wait. What?
The wounded creature was right in front of him. It hadn’t seen him. It wasn’t reacting to him at all.
But… it was dying.
Because of him.
He barely processed it before a second system alert flashed in his vision.
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SYSTEM EVENT: DISTINGUISHED ACHIEVEMENT!
> CONGRATULATIONS! You are the first human to defeat an enemy above your level.
> Calculating appropriate compensation…
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What?!
Frank’s breath hitched. His aura… It was some kind of passive damage?
The creature gave a final, shuddering wheeze. Then—stillness.
Another alert.
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SYSTEM NOTIFICATION
> FIRST KILL ACHIEVED.
> REWARD ISSUED: MASSIVE EXPERIENCE GAINED.
> LEVEL UP! LEVEL UP! LEVEL UP!
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Everything burned.
A searing heat exploded through Frank’s body, twisting every nerve and muscle. His vision swam, bones aching like they were being stretched, reshaped. His skin crawled with an unnatural sensation—something beneath the surface shifting.
His HP shot up. His stats skyrocketed.
But the pain didn’t stop.
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SYSTEM ERROR!
> UNEXPECTED GROWTH RATE DETECTED.
> REBALANCING… PROCESSING… COMPENSATING…
> WARNING: ABNORMAL REGENERATION UNLOCKED.
----------------------------------------
Frank collapsed to his knees, gasping for air. His muscles locked, his vision blurred. It felt like his insides were rebuilding themselves.
His pulse slowed. His breath steadied.
And then…
The pain was gone.
Replaced by something else.
A constant, soothing hum beneath his skin. Weak, but there. A presence. A function.
Regeneration.
Frank’s hands trembled as he looked at them.
He had survived.
And he wasn’t the same anymore.
rank's breath came in short, ragged bursts. His body wasn't his anymore. It felt alien, reshaped—warped into something barely holding itself together.
The pain had stopped, but something new had taken its place. A faint, pulsing hum vibrated beneath his skin, like an engine idling deep inside him. His wounds—scrapes and bruises from the fall—were already fading.
He wasn’t healing normally. He was regenerating.
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SYSTEM NOTIFICATION
> UNSTABLE GROWTH RATE DETECTED.
> DAMAGE MITIGATION SYSTEM UNLOCKED: [REGENERATION – LEVEL 1]
> DUE TO SIGNIFICANT POWER GAP BETWEEN ENTITY AND DEFEATED FOE, BONUS EXP AWARDED.
> LEVEL UP! LEVEL UP! LEVEL UP! LEVEL UP!
----------------------------------------
Frank lurched forward, gasping. A fresh wave of heat surged through him, warping his muscles, reinforcing bones that shouldn’t have been able to take this punishment.
It wasn’t comfortable. It wasn’t pleasant. It was force-fed evolution.
And the system wasn’t stopping.
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SYSTEM ERROR!
> REBALANCING IN PROGRESS… SYSTEM COMPENSATING…
> ADDITIONAL PASSIVE UNLOCKED: [REGENERATION – LEVEL 3]
> ERROR LOG FORWARDED TO ADMINISTRATORS.
----------------------------------------
Frank clutched his chest, struggling to breathe through the sensation of being rebuilt from the inside out. It wasn't just his body that had changed. His mind was sharper. His instincts screamed at him with primal clarity.
He was alive—when he shouldn't have been.
The system was trying to fix him, but it didn’t know how.
A sound split the silence.
A deep, animalistic sniff.
Frank froze.
Something was here.
A new monster—drawn by the scent of blood.
He barely had time to think before the ground trembled beneath him.
A shadow moved in the dark.
A pair of glowing red eyes blinked open.
And then,
it charged.
Frank barely had time to react before the monster lunged.
Stone cracked beneath its weight. The air shook with a guttural snarl, and the faintest gleam of jagged teeth caught the nonexistent light.
MOVE!
Instinct overrode logic. He threw himself sideways, rolling against the uneven ground just as claws raked the spot where he'd been kneeling.
The impact sent a blast of dust and bone fragments flying.
Frank hit the stone hard, gasping for breath. Something sharp sliced into his arm—but the pain barely lasted a second before his regeneration stitched the wound closed.
His heart pounded. He needed to see.
Another movement—something fast, circling.
Frank pressed his back against the nearest rock formation, pulse hammering. His eyes strained in the dark, searching for any clue—any way out.
Then—
A light.
Faint. Distant. But real.
A soft, bluish glow shimmered far beyond the jagged ruins ahead.
Not natural.
Not a trick.
Something alive or something mechanical.
Either way, it was better than staying here.
Another low growl echoed through the dungeon.
Frank didn’t hesitate.
He ran.
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SYSTEM NOTIFICATION
> STATUS: ACTIVE PURSUIT DETECTED.
> HOSTILE ENTITY LOCKED ON.
> SURVIVAL RATE: LOW.
----------------------------------------
Frank pushed harder. The terrain worked against him—uneven stone, scattered debris—but he didn't stop. The creature behind him was gaining. Too fast. Too strong.
A wall of ruined pillars came into view, towering jagged shapes of crumbling obsidian.
Frank veered toward them. If he could just—
Something hit him from behind.
The world flipped.
Stone and dust exploded as he slammed into the ground, skidding across the rock.
His ribs cracked.
He choked on the impact, vision swimming—but it didn’t matter.
Because the glow—that distant blue light—
Was right there.
A doorway.
A way forward.
Frank gritted his teeth, vision tunneling.
He had seconds.
He stumbled through..
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SYSTEM ERROR LOG
> SURVIVAL PROBABILITY REACHING CRITICAL THRESHOLD.
> AUTO-BALANCE MEASURES PREPARED.
> PENDING REEVALUATION…
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The light swallowed him whole.
And then,
he was gone.