> Darkness. Endless. Suffocating.
A void that stretched beyond time itself.
And in that abyss… I floated.
I didn't know how long I had been here. Seconds? Hours? Centuries? My body—if I even had one—was weightless, drifting through the black nothingness. But this wasn't like before. This wasn't just waking up in some battlefield, half-dead and confused.
No. This time, I was somewhere else entirely.
And then, it spoke.
"So, you have returned."
A voice, deep and infinite, vibrating through the void itself. I turned—or at least I thought I did—but there was no direction here. No up. No down. Just it.
The Entity.
I had no name for it, no face to put to it. Only an overwhelming presence, watching me from the abyss. A force beyond reason. Beyond gods.
A chill ran through me, but I clenched my fists. "Who are you?" My voice echoed into the void, swallowed by the emptiness.
A low chuckle rumbled through the space. "I am the one who remembers… even when the world forgets."
I scowled. Cryptic nonsense. Typical. "That doesn't answer my question."
"Neither does your existence."
I froze. Something shifted in the void. The air—if there even was air—grew heavier, pressing down on me. And then—
A screen flashed before me. Cold, mechanical.
---
[SYSTEM ALERT]
☠ You Have Died. ☠
[Reconstructing Entity… ERROR.]
[Subject: Undefined]
[Title: The Forgotten King – Sealed]
---
My breath caught. There it was again. That name. The Forgotten King.
I didn't know why, but my chest tightened at those words. Like they meant something—something I should remember. But every time I reached for the memory, it slipped through my fingers like smoke.
The Entity's voice was amused. "Do you see now? You do not exist. Not truly. Not yet."
I clenched my fists. "Then why am I still here?"
Silence. And then—the abyss cracked.
A jagged, crimson fissure split through the void, spilling blinding light into the darkness. A storm of voices whispered from beyond it, clawing at my mind. I stumbled back—except I wasn't even sure if I had a body.
"You have been chosen."
The voice was inside me now, vibrating through my bones.
"You will awaken again, Forgotten King. But the world you knew is already lost."
The light surged forward. A force, invisible yet unstoppable, dragged me into the fissure.
I fell.
---
[SYSTEM ALERT]
[Initializing Chaos Rebirth: Stage Two]
[Reconstructing…]
[New World Detected: ☠ Abyssal Rift ☠]
---
I hit the ground hard.
Pain exploded through my body—real, tangible pain. I gasped, the cold air rushing into my lungs.
No more void. No more abyss. I was back.
But this wasn't the battlefield from before.
This was somewhere far worse.
Jagged black towers loomed in the distance, twisted and broken. The sky was wrong—a swirling mess of red and black, pulsing like a living thing. The air reeked of something rotten. And the ground beneath me?
Not stone. Not dirt.
I looked down. My stomach turned.
Bones.
I was standing on a field of bones.
Welcome to the Abyssal Rift.
And something was watching me.