"This isn't real. None of this is real. How am I going to escape this hellhole?" she muttered to herself, grappling with the most disturbing sight she had ever encountered.
The ache in her muscles was undeniably real. She pinched her hand, desperate for a sign that she hadn't lost her mind, but the sharp pain where she had gripped the knife too tightly confirmed her worst fears.
The corpse at her feet was a grim testament to reality.
She had stumbled upon it unexpectedly, her gaze drawn to the figure half-buried in a dune of black sand.
A person, a stranger, a man.
His face was mummified, skin stretched tightly over bone, lips curled back in what resembled a silent scream, as if someone had drained the very essence of his soul.
A gas mask dangled around his neck, its lenses shattered. Ha-eun knelt beside him, her throat constricting with a mix of dread and sorrow.
"Who were you?" she whispered, her voice swallowed by the oppressive silence surrounding them.
The man's backpack lay torn open, spilling its contents across the sand.
Notebooks and rusted tools lay scattered like forgotten memories.
She flipped through the pages, her fingers leaving faint smudges in the dust. The sketches and notes were faded, some nearly indecipherable, but one phrase caught her eye, scrawled in striking red ink:
"THE ARCHITECT IS A LIAR."
Her thoughts spiraled into chaos.
Hadn't a previous note assured her that the ARCHITECT could bring her home?
But now, uncertainty gnawed at her.
Who or what was this ARCHITECT?
What had once seemed like her only path to escape now felt like a labyrinth of deception.
Her mind raced as she tried to piece together the conflicting messages.
Am I making the right choice?
As she grappled with her turmoil, a faint glow caught her attention in the corner of her eye.
Her heart raced as she noticed a keycard clutched in the corpse's bony fingers, labeled ΔΣ-7.
That is the Same symbol carved on her knife that she found on the campfire.
Its surface was pristine, an eerie contrast to the decay that surrounded it. She reached for it, and the corpse's joints snapped like dry twigs as she did so.
"Sorry," she murmured, the words feeling hollow in the face of such finality.
Here, amidst the desolation, death seemed to be the only mercy left.
I am making good use of this.
Ha Eun grabbed the key card and put it into her pocket.
In this undefined reality, she clung to the hope that the keycard might unlock more than just doors; it might hold the answers she desperately sought.
Suddenly, she froze at the sight before her.
The sand surrounding the corpse began to shift, not from the wind, because there was no wind at all. The grains rippled outward in circular waves, as if something beneath the surface was... breathing.
"No," she whispered, scrambling backward. "No, no, no."
Then, in a horrific eruption, the sand exploded.
It unwound like smoke, taking on a form that was both new and jagged.
Towering ten feet high, the creature was a churning mass of obsidian-like shards.
There was no face, no limbs, just a pulsating core of violet light that throbbed in sync with her racing heartbeat.
It screamed.
The sound was unlike anything she had ever heard.
It vibrated through her teeth and rattled her bones. Ha-eun felt blood trickle from her nose, a reaction to the shock, but she didn't have time to dwell on it. She ran.
In that moment, Ha-eun felt her body instinctively kick into gear, adrenaline surging through her like wildfire.
What was this creature? She had no idea, but one thing was clear: she did NOT want to become its next meal.
As she fled, the debris field twisted around her.
A floating car crumpled like paper as the creature barreled past,
its shard-like body slicing effortlessly through steel.
She ducked into a crumbling concrete tunnel that hung in midair, its walls plastered with yellowed missing-person posters.
Korean and English are languages she barely recognizes, and people of all ages from all eras.
"Kim Joon-seo vanished in 1997..."
"Lucas Moreno, last seen in 2021..."
"Анна Петрова, исчезла 1965..."
The creature's shadow loomed behind her, and Ha-eun squeezed through a narrow crack in the tunnel, landing on a floating slab of highway overpass.
Below her was nothing but an abyss, swirling with darkness.
The creature surged upward, its shards morphing into spear-like blades. She barely dodged, the blade grazing her side but thankfully sparing her from serious harm.
"Great, now I've saved my body from plummeting into this hell," she thought, desperately trying to think on her feet.
Suddenly, searing pain shot through her shoulder, causing her to collapse. She glanced back just in time to see the creature's attack land squarely on her left shoulder.
Biting her lip until it bled, she tried to forget the pain for just a moment.
"Sh*t, I don't want to die here— not like this!" She pressed her hand to the ground, struggling to push herself back up, but blood was seeping through her wound, staining her shoulder a deep crimson.
In her frantic escape, she caught a glimpse of the edge of the darkness, a yawning chasm leading into an infinite abyss.
Wait, abyss.
Suddenly, she remembered a passage from a textbook she had read. Then it hit her: the note from the campfire.
"Time here is meaningless. Survival is the only thing that matters... so I have to go into the abyss."
She clenched the keycard in her hand, treating it like a shield against the horror behind her.
What if that thing was part of the architect? What about survival? What about the abyss? Her mind raced with possibilities.
The creature leaped. Ha-eun gripped the keycard tightly, pressing it to her chest as if it could truly protect her.
"Come on, you ugly bastard!" she shouted, her voice cracking under the weight of fear. "Hungry? Then eat me!"
With that, she jumped into the abyss.
The void swallowed her whole.
The cold air whipped through her clothes and skin, but she couldn't focus on that; her mind was too busy dodging the hungry creatures lurking nearby.
As she fell, time seemed to slow, stretching out like an endless nightmare.
The creature followed, its shards screeching against while it falling.
She saw a floating shopping container.
Ha-eun twisted, aiming for a floating shipping container.
She crashed through its rusted door, rolling onto a floor filled with bodies. Dozens of them dried like the first corpse she saw, all wearing gas masks.
A makeshift lab? Monitors lined the walls, their screens buzzing with static. A chalkboard ominously buzzing:
"ARCHITECT'S RESEARCH LAB – SECTOR ΔΣ-7
BREACH CONTAINMENT = TERMINATE ALL"
The creature's claws began to rip through the container's walls like they were made of paper. Ha-eun dashed to a terminal, shoving her keycard into the slot.
ERROR. DNA MISMATCH.
"Damn it!"
Just open this goddamn door!
A tendril brushed her back, slicing through fabric and skin. Blood oozed out, dark and thick.
She slammed the keycard into the terminal again, desperation fueling her movements.
She dodged another attack from the creature.
ERROR. DNA...
Please, just open this goddamn door!
With a surge of adrenaline, she slammed the keycard into the terminal once more.
Then, without warning, the terminal exploded, sending a rain of metal shards into her thigh. Ha-eun screamed, collapsing behind an overturned lab table.
She shivered, her body drained of strength, as she looked up at the looming creature.
Its nails retracted, and for a fleeting moment, she hesitated. Then, its core split open, revealing a jaw lined with rotating teeth like shattered satellites.
So this is the end. I just want to see my family again.
Memories of her loved ones flooded her mind, and she squeezed her eyes shut.
Suddenly, a gunshot shattered the tension.
"BANG!"
The creature was flung aside, a portion of its body exploding into a grotesque spray.
Ha-eun blinked in disbelief. A shadowy figure stood in the doorway, tall and hooded, a rifle still smoking in their hands.
"Move!" A woman's voice barked, rough and commanding.
Ha-eun lurched to the side as the stranger fired again. But these bullets weren't ordinary;
They burst into nets of crackling blue light, ensnaring the creature's tendrils.
"The core!" the woman shouted. "Aim for the goddamn core!"
Ha-eun, fueled by a mix of fear and determination, lunged forward with a knife raised. The creature squirmed, but the nets held firm. She plunged the blade deep into its violet heart.
The creature erupted in an explosion, a shockwave hurling her against the wall. Silence enveloped the lab.
The stranger lowered her rifle, and as her hood slipped, Ha-eun caught a glimpse of her gaunt features, skin mottled with galaxy-like lesions, and eyes that glowed faintly gold. Human, but not quite. Not anymore.
And just like that, the chaos of the lab faded into an eerie calm.
"Lucky for you, I keep tabs on Voidborn migrations," she said, extending a gloved hand.
"Name's Vega."
Ha-eun brushed past the hand, her focus locked on Vega. "The Architect. Where is he?"
Vega chuckled, tapping the chalkboard marked ΔΣ-7.
"You're standing right in his graveyard." With a swift kick, she nudged a corpse's boot.
"These poor idiots thought they could bargain with him.
Now they're just fertilizer."
"And you?" Ha-eun shot back.
"I'm the pest controller he never bothered to pay."
Vega deftly reloaded her rifle with glowing cartridges. "We need to move.
That Voidborn was a scout, and the hive is already on our tail."
Ha-eun remained rooted to the spot. "Why are you helping me?"
Vega's eyes flicked down to Ha-eun's bleeding shoulder, the infection creeping in like a sinister fungus.
"Because you're changing. Faster than I ever did.
If the hive gets you…" She cocked her rifle, her gaze steely. "Let's just say you don't want to see what they'll turn you into."
A low hum reverberated through the container, and dozens of violet cores flickered ominously in the darkness beyond.
"Too late. Run!" Vega cursed.
They sprinted through the debris field, the Voidborn swarm closing in around them.
Ha-eun gasped for breath, her lungs burning and her leg screaming in pain with each frantic step. Behind them, Vega fired bursts of light, creating nets that slowed the creatures, just not enough.
"Why can't you just kill them?" Ha-eun panted.
"Do you think my bullets are magic?" Vega exclaimed, frustration evident in her voice.
"Those bastards barely feel a scratch! The only option I have is to buy us some time!"
Ahead, a colossal structure loomed, a shattered skyscraper melded with Gothic cathedral arches, its windows radiating a ghastly blood-red glow.
Vega shoved Ha-eun toward a rusted service door. "Inside! Now!"
As they dashed into the cavernous hall, the door sealed behind them with a hissing sound. Vega slumped against a wall, her rifle clattering to the floor.
"Safe?" Ha-eun gasped, leaning against the wall.
"Nothing's safe here." Vega pointed upward, her voice tense.
Ha-eun followed her gaze, her heart sinking.
The ceiling was alive with Voidborn larvae, pulsing translucent sacs veined with violet light. Within each one floated a humanoid figure, its features grotesquely morphing.
Suddenly, one sac burst open. A half-formed creature tumbled to the ground, its face a twisted reflection of Ha-eun's own.
"Welcome," Vega whispered, her voice laced with dread, "to the hive."
In that moment, the reality of their situation crashed over Ha-eun like a tidal wave, and she realized the true horror of what lay ahead.