Jack slowly opened his eyes. His body ached, and every breath felt heavy and sharp. The world around him was strange—unreal.
Enormous pillars, each as thick as a house and glowing faintly, rose from the ground and disappeared into the sky. Their tops were hidden in clouds, like they stabbed into heaven itself. The ground beneath him was smooth and cold—almost like glass. It felt like a dream… or a nightmare.
He sat up, heart pounding.
"Where… am I?"
Then the memories hit him like a punch.
He had walked in on his girlfriend sleeping with another man—Feng Yuan, his so-called friend. Rage took over. Jack beat Feng Yuan without mercy.
But the police came. His girlfriend cried and screamed, pretending Jack had attacked her. She told them Jack tried to rape her. Feng Yuan backed her lies without hesitation.
Jack was thrown into prison.
In his cell, he couldn't sleep. Couldn't think. His heart burned with one thing—revenge.
One night, he made a move. He climbed the high prison wall. But just as he neared the top, a wire touched his arm.
A blast of electricity shot through his body. His muscles locked. His vision went white.
Then... darkness.
And now... he was here?
Jack stood up slowly. His legs shook. A strange feeling crawled up his spine—like someone, or something, was watching him.
He looked up.
The sky shimmered.
At first, he saw one sun. Then two. Then four. They multiplied—eight, sixteen, thirty-two. Soon, the sky was filled with blazing suns. Hundreds. Maybe thousands.
His mouth went dry. His skin turned cold.
Then… it appeared.
The sky twisted like a curtain being pulled back. Something moved behind the suns—something enormous.
A shape, bigger than any mountain, slowly drifted across the sky. Its body was hidden behind thick clouds, but its limbs—long, dark, and endless—hung from above like threads. Thousands of glowing eyes opened in the sky, blinking all at once.
They stared directly at Jack.
He froze.
The ground suddenly shook. One of the massive pillars rose and then slammed down near him. The shockwave blasted Jack into the air like a ragdoll.
He hit the ground with a sickening thud. Pain exploded through his body. His ribs felt broken. Blood rushed to his mouth, and he vomited a thin stream of red.
It hurt. Too real to be a dream.
The suns blinked out—gone in an instant—then reappeared, burning even brighter than before. The world around him went silent.
Then a voice boomed from the sky. Deep. Cold. Ancient.
"Welcome, Jack. Welcome to the Web Beyond Death."
The massive figure still hid behind the clouds—but its eyes... thousands of glowing, unblinking eyes... watched him.
The air around Jack turned heavy—so heavy it felt like the sky itself was pressing down on his chest.
From above, the voice echoed again—closer this time. Cold. Powerful. Almost... curious.
"You should be dead, Jack."
Thousands of glowing eyes shimmered, blinking slowly above the clouds.
"But I have taken you into the Web Beyond Death… for a reason."
Jack couldn't speak. His throat was dry. Fear gripped him tighter than any prison ever had. His mind raced.
Then the voice returned, like a whisper crawling through his skull.
"You have a choice."
Suddenly, one of the towering pillars moved through the clouds. But now Jack saw it clearly—it wasn't a pillar. It was a leg.
A massive, black, hairy limb, cracked with glowing veins. It looked like a spider's leg… but far too long. Far too twisted. It came down before him, blocking out the sky.
It pointed at Jack like a finger of fate. The leg alone was dozens of meters thick—larger than any tree he'd ever seen.
"Let me swallow your soul, and you will rest forever in silence."
The clouds shifted, parting slowly.
Jack caught a glimpse of the thing's body as the leg withdrew. Endless flesh, twitching with writhing threads. The sight sent a jolt of pure dread down his spine. His legs buckled.
"Or… I can give you life. A second chance."
Jack's whole body trembled.
"But you must earn it. I need something—something only a soul like yours can find."
"A soul like mine...?" Jack whispered. His voice cracked with fear.
"You will be sent to a world… a living world of Dao. There, you must find the Fruit of the Spirit Dao."
Jack's heart pounded harder. He didn't understand what the fruit was, or what Dao meant. But one thing was clear:
He didn't want to die. Not like this.
"I… I'll do it," Jack said, his voice shaking. "I'll find it. I want to live."
The voice rumbled, deep and thunderous.
"Good."
Then, more softly—like a secret being whispered in the dark:
"If you succeed, I will reward you. You may choose—return to your world… or stay in the new one. As a god. Or a monster."
Jack hesitated, then asked in a low, fearful voice, "How do I find the Spirit Dao Fruit?"
The voice answered coldly.
"We will give you power—to complete the task we desire. But remember, once you find it, you must die."
"Die?" Jack repeated. His fists clenched. He wanted to curse, to scream—but he held it in.
"After your death, your soul will return to us with the Spirit Dao Fruit. Then, we shall reward you—just as promised. But…"
The voice grew darker.
"If you die and return empty-handed… we will torment your soul until you beg for destruction."
A chill colder than death itself crept into Jack's bones. The threat echoed in his mind like a curse.
Suddenly, black threads shot down from the sky, wrapping around Jack's body like silk ropes. Despite their touch being soft, they made his skin crawl.
"Now go…"
"And remember: the Web sees everything."
The ground cracked beneath him, glowing with blinding light. A tunnel of threads and shadows opened below.
Jack screamed—not from fear, but from the feeling of his very being unraveling and rewriting at the same time.
As he fell into the glowing abyss, the last thing he saw—
Was the giant, monstrous, blinking thousand eyes… watching him vanish into the unknown.