"How long had you been here in this cell for?" Liam asked, his voice hoarse and strained.
Esther's response came slowly, almost as if she was trying to remember, or perhaps, had long since stopped counting the days.
"For two days." She said flatly, her tone distant. "And today is the last. My master punished me before locking me up here."
"Master?" Liam repeated, the word reverberating in his mind like a painful echo.
Esther's voice didn't waver. "Maybe you will get one too."
Liam froze, her words hanging in the air like a curse. "What do you mean, I'll get one?"
Esther didn't elaborate, but the chill that ran down Liam's spine told him all he needed to know. His thoughts began to race, as though his mind was struggling to piece together a puzzle that he'd never wanted to solve. Master, punishment, slave, survival—each word linked in a way that made his stomach turn.
Liam's heart began to race as he looked around the cell, searching the dark corners for something, anything that would explain this madness. The walls were bare, the air stale, and the silence suffocating. He pressed his hands against his temples, trying to focus. There had to be an explanation. There had to be some way out of this.
His mind churned with the possibilities, but it only made the reality hit harder. Esther... survival... slave... masters...
And then it hit him like a tidal wave, crashing into him with a force that left him gasping for air. The pieces clicked together in his mind, each one fitting with a painful clarity that made his body tremble.
"No... no, no..." Liam's voice cracked as he stumbled back, his mind spinning faster than he could keep up. "No!!" He shouted, his voice rising in panic. "No! No, this can't be happening! This isn't real! How is this even possible?!"
He paced frantically around the small space, every step echoing off the cold stone walls. His breath came in sharp, frantic bursts as he tried to grasp at anything that would give him control over the situation, anything that would make sense of it all. But it only grew more absurd, more impossible with each passing second.
"How is this possible?! How could I... No, there's no way..."
Liam whispered to himself, his voice barely audible. His hands ran through his hair, tugging at it as the horror of the realization consumed him. He could feel the weight of it, crushing him under its truth. His heart was hammering in his chest, the sound almost deafening in the confined space.
"I'm in my own... novel."
He finally whispered, barely able to believe the words as they escaped his lips. His mind swam with the shocking realization. This isn't just a nightmare... this isn't just a bad dream... He was no longer just the author of this story. He wasn't standing outside of it, watching it unfold on a screen or on paper. He had become a part of it. A part of the twisted, dark world he had created—his own nightmare brought to life.
"No... no, no, no..." Liam muttered in disbelief, his voice frantic, desperate. How could this be happening? How could he be here— in this place—as a character in his own story?
Everything he had written, every twist, every turn of fate... it was no longer fiction. It was real. And now, the nightmare had consumed him whole.
Liam's breathing was rapid, his chest heaving as the truth of the situation settled over him like a heavy, suffocating blanket. He had written this world. He had created it, designed every detail, every horrific rule, every torment. But now he was in it.
The cell, the punishment, the concept of survival... they were all elements of his novel. The world he had created to be a dark, twisted reflection of reality, where power and control were the only currencies that mattered, where the characters were bound by their suffering. But he had never imagined—never, ever dreamed—that he would become one of them.
And then came the worst part of all: Esther's words. "Maybe you will get one too."
The thought of becoming someone's slave and being subjected to the same cruel fate as the characters he had invented—was too much to bear. The weight of it crushed him further, as if the walls themselves were closing in around him.
"No... this can't be real..." Liam whispered, his voice breaking as he sank to his knees in the middle of the cold cell, his hands shaking uncontrollably. The world he had known, the world of reality, of writing, of control was gone. And now he was nothing more than a pawn in his own story.
The room seemed to darken even more, the shadows pressing in on him as if to drag him deeper into the nightmare he had created.
And somewhere in the distance, he could hear a faint sound—a whispering, taunting voice that belonged to the characters he had once controlled.