It was too dark to see the world end. Not that it mattered anymore. The battlefield—a graveyard now—was littered with the motionless. Bodies stacked on bodies, piled like abandoned toys in some cruel god's playroom. No one spoke; they couldn't. The only sound was the thick, sticky gush of something… liquid? It had a hue—a red hue. It almost sounded like the color red, as though a painter had spilled it in the wrong places. Dripping, oozing.
The air tasted metallic, like coins held too long in your mouth, and then, just as suddenly, a flash of blinding light shot from nowhere. It was quick, like a snap. It lit up the dark for a moment, only to explode into dust. An explosion so fierce the bodies shifted, almost as if they could feel the universe folding in on itself. But then the dust was swallowed—gone—as if it had never been. That's when the monster appeared.
It didn't slink from shadows. No, it simply was. One second, nothing, the next, a nightmare woven into reality. Its scales shimmered like obsidian in the dim light, massive, impenetrable, ridged with ancient scars. A dragon? Probably. Perhaps, something worse—something older. The monster breathed and the dusty smoke evaporated, whisked into the ether by the force of its existence.
Yet, within the chaos and quiet ruin, a soft light emerged from a pile of the dead. A glow that shouldn't have been, and from that glow came a man. His body rose, lifting from the tangle of corpses like a star ascending from the night. He was untouched—his skin glowed faintly, as if light were breathing through his pores, seeping out. Not a smear of blood, not a speck of dirt. He floated, weightless, while his skin seemed to hum with power.
A soft ping—a sound so out of place it could've been comical in another time—and a blue square appeared before him. Floating, translucent, defying the battlefield's dark truth. It bore words, pixelated and cold.
"Hidden Quest (The Advent of Glory): Complete"
The man felt it then, the surge—a tidal wave crashing inside him. His blood roared with it, like rivers of lightning threading through his veins. His heart... visible now, as though he could see through his own chest. A black heart, pulsing ominously. It had saved him. His own skill, "Black Heart," had pulled him back from the abyss, shielding him from the monster's fatal blow.
The battlefield? Gone. Those cheers, those once-victorious roars—they were echoes now, ghosts in the silence. Thousands of them had been here, their lives wiped out in a single swing. A monster that obliterated hope with one attack. One single blow.
The man—Junshen Llanard—looked up at the beast. A dragon-type, he assessed. Its hulking body was a fortress, scales gleaming, each one thick enough to deflect any weapon. The kind of boss that parties feared; the kind of enemy players ran from. He wasn't supposed to be here. A summoner—a backline, strategy-heavy class. He wasn't even supposed to scratch this thing, let alone defeat it.
But that power—that power was different. It told him otherwise. It whispered yes, you can.
Junshen raised his staff, a trembling hand steadying itself as he began to chant. The incantation curled from his lips like a forgotten language being remembered. The monster wasn't agile—its size wouldn't allow it. If he could cast this spell fast enough, the strongest he had, he could bring it down.
He muttered the final word. A beam of light burst from his staff, cutting through the air, wrapping the entire battlefield in its brilliance. It engulfed the world in white.
And then, the square returned.
"The Boss monster was slain."
---
Junshen shot up, heart pounding, chest tight. His alarm clock was ringing, shrill and relentless. It was on the far side of the room—of course. He groaned, dragging his heavy body from the bed, each step sluggish, like wading through thick mud. His eyes stung from the weight of exhaustion, dark circles already bruising the skin beneath them.
He stumbled through his morning, his routine movements mechanical. Wash face, brush teeth, sit on the sofa. Coffee on the table. What happened last night?
Nothing came. His mind was a fog, dense and impenetrable. The question was abandoned as soon as it surfaced. He glanced around the room, letting his eyes wander as his thoughts scrambled for purchase. And then something strange prickled at the edge of his mind. His room—his own room—looked... different. Not different-new, but different-old.
The furniture, the objects—they were familiar, but not in the way they should've been. They were placed wrong. Arranged wrong. Wait. This was how things had been years ago. Five years, to be exact.
"Did I... rearrange these?" he muttered to himself. His voice was hoarse and kind of tired.
No, I didn't do any of this. I'm sure.
Junshen scanned the room again, this time more slowly, carefully, as if the walls themselves might shift under his gaze. The more he looked, the more impossible it became to deny. This—this was his room, but from a different time. A time when his life had been simpler, when things hadn't yet... spiraled.
His eyes darted to the calendar pinned on the wall. October 2035.
A pulse of confusion flickered behind his eyes. That couldn't be right. The year was supposed to be 2040. He was sure of it.
"What the hell?" His voice cracked as he fumbled for his phone. Old model. The weight of it in his hand felt foreign, though he knew this phone. He knew it too well. It hadn't worked in years. Yet, here it was. Fully functional.
"Did I go back in time?" he murmured, the absurdity of the thought making him wince.
It couldn't be real. It wasn't real.
He rushed to his desk, hands shaking as he flipped open his computer. The boot-up was slow, archaic. He ignored that. There was one thing he needed to know—one thing that would either confirm or shatter his sanity.
He typed: The Advent of Glory.
Nothing. No results. The game—his game—didn't exist.
Junshen sat there, staring at the screen. He felt hollow, the emptiness gnawing at the edges of his sanity. That game was his life—his obsession. How could it not exist?
He wanted to scream.
"Did I really came back in time? Before The Advent of Glory was even released?
And then, as if summoned by his disbelief, a light appeared—soft, glowing blue, just above his desk. A square. A message.
"Welcome to Advent of Glory."
His heart stopped.