Elias awoke to partial darkness, with cold seeping into his bones.
He tried to sit up, but his stiff muscles resisted. His breath, shallow and uneven, escaped in visible puffs, dissipating into the cold air. His fingers clawed into the ground beneath him which was smooth, hard, and eerily cold. It was ice. As his eyes adjusted to the dim light, he tried to make out where he was.
A barren wasteland of ice stretched out around him, with jagged shards of frost rising high above the ground. He tried remembering how he ended up there, but could only recall fragments of his past. He pushed himself to his feet, though his feet wobbled from the effort as he regained balance. The silence was heavy and almost deafening. Slowly, he began to walk, the ice cracking slightly under his feet, seeming as if it might break any moment.
As he continued ahead, he saw the first signs of "life", or what he thought. Frozen figures, twisted in agony and encased in ice. There faces were distorted, mouths wide open in silent screams and their eyes wide with despair. Each one of them was locked in an unnatural pose, with their limbs bent and broken in ways Elias couldn't even imagine.
"Why… why am I here?", he muttered to himself, but received no answer. Only the faint sound of wind filled the deafening silence.
The silence was broken by a sudden metallic chime which echoed within Elias' skull. He jerked his head as a faint glow appeared in the darkness in front of him. As it grew brighter, Elias realized it was letters that seemed to dance and shift mid-air, forming words.
[ (C-24) SYSTEM INITIALIZING…
User: Elias
Objective: Ascend from the Ninth Circle of Hell. ]
"System?" Elias whispered, staring at the glowing words. However, he received no response. "I… don't understand. Ascend? How? And where?" Elias said aloud. His voice echoed through the icy wasteland. However, once again, he was met with silence. The memory of how and why he had ended up there was still blurry and having nothing more to cling to, he tried doing accordingly to what the System told him.
"Where am I?", he asked, not expecting a response but surprisingly, was met with the metallic chime of the System.
[ "You are currently in the Ninth Circle of Hell, the deepest level. This is Cocytus, the frozen river where traitors dwell. The Ninth Circle is reserved for the worst of the damned and at the center, lies the damned Devil." ]
[ "Your objective is to ascend to the top and reach the twilight." ]
Elias tilted his head back and squinted his eyes to get a glimpse of the sky, but it was nothing more than a mixture of black and grey. The only glimmer of light was a pale dot far, far above; an impossible distance away. It was like a distant star, a symbol of hope perhaps. The light seemed both unreachable and essential.
But Elias was overwhelmed by the sheer scale of the climb. "Is that where I'm supposed to go?", he murmured.
Nevertheless, he continued his exploration further. As he moved forward, the frozen figures became more numerous. Some lay prone with their wide open, while others were upright, trapped within massive pillars of ice. While walking, Elias began thinking about what the System had told him earlier. "The worst of the damned," he murmured, glancing at the frozen figures trapped in the ice. He wondered what these people had done to deserve such a fate.
As he ventured deeper into the frozen wasteland, the wind began to die down and was replaced by an eerie silence. His feet crunched on the icy surface as he approached the heart of Cocytus, where Lucifer himself was said to be condemned by God.
Expecting to see something monstrous and terrifying form of the devil, hopefully encased in ice, Elias' heart pounded in his chest as he neared the center. Yet, as he stepped into the central clearing, what he found was… nothing!?
The ice at the center was broken and hollowed out. The place where Lucifer was supposed to be imprisoned, lay empty. The frozen chains that had once bound him were shattered into pieces scattered across the area.
Elias stared in disbelief. "Where is he?", he whispered. The devil was missing. "H-how is this possible? Wasn't he supposed to be trapped here for… eternity?" But the System remained silent, offering no answers. He swept his gaze across the icy wasteland, searching for any clue, but there was nothing except for the cold emptiness left in the devil's wake.
Going through the scattered remnants of shattered ice, his eyes landed on an unusual object which was half-buried in ice. Thawing the ice with his fingers, he finally grabbed it out. It was a small, ornate dagger with a hilt shaped like twisting thorns. He examined it curiously but couldn't make head or tail of its purpose. So, he tucked it away in his worn-out pocket, deciding to investigate it later.
Elias pushed forward, leaving the center of Cocytus. Venturing further, the icy winds howled loudly, sending shivers down his spine. In the distance, barely visible through the icy mist, he spotted a narrow, dark passageway carved into the ice that seemed to lead into complete darkness. However, Elias noticed that standing guard at the mouth of the passage was a large, unmoving figure, whose face was hidden beneath a hood. The System chimed coldly:
[ Gatekeeper of the Ninth Circle
"You do not have the recommended strength to fight this entity. It is advised to proceed with caution." ]
Elias gulped hard; fear clearly visible in his eyes. The Gatekeeper's presence was suffocating. This figure was different from all the frozen souls he had passed by earlier. And behind the Gatekeeper was a long passageway that led into an endless abyss of darkness.
Before he could reach the Gatekeeper, Elias felt something move in the distance. For a brief moment, he thought that he saw a figure standing atop a distant ledge, watching him. The silhouette was too far away to make out clearly, but it seemed to stand tall. Elias squinted his eyes, his heart racing with fear. Who was that? What was their intention? Was it another soul trapped in the frozen hell, just like him? Or something else entirely? Before he could process anything, the figure had vanished into the mist as quickly as it had appeared.
The System gave no acknowledgement of the stranger. There was only the Gatekeeper now, waiting for Elias in silence. Nevertheless, he approached the motionless Gatekeeper, the air growing thicker with every step.
"You again?", the words slithered through the air. A wave of confusion washed over Elias. "Again?" he echoed in utter bewilderment. "What do you mean again?", demanded Elias.
His head throbbed due to a sharp pain as he tried to grasp the implication of the Gatekeeper's words. Memories seemed to flutter just out of reach, but slipped away before he could catch them.
But before Elias could recollect himself, the Gatekeeper sprang into action. It unsheathed a massive black sword, glimmering with a dark, sinister sheen from seemingly nowhere. The sword was pretty long and its hilt was adorned with ominous carvings that twisted and spiraled like dark vines.
With a swift motion, the Gatekeeper threw the sword hurling towards Elias like a bolt of night, as it cut through the cold darkness, barely giving him enough time to react. He dove to the side, narrowly avoiding the deadly sword with just a scratch on his face. The sword had embedded itself into the ice with a loud thud, sending shards of ice flying in all directions.
As he scrambled to his feet, the sword flew back to the Gatekeeper's hands who lunged forward and unleased a flurry of strikes. Elias' heart plummeted into his stomach as he had barely dodged the first blow. With a rush of adrenaline, he turned to his heels, trying to evade the deadly precise strikes of the Gatekeeper.
He ducked behind a massive ice formation and lay low to remain hidden. He could see the Gatekeeper's silhouette come closed with the sound of its footsteps echoing in the stillness.
"Wha-… What am I supposed to do?" he muttered as his heart was pounding in his chest.
The Gatekeeper's footsteps drew nearer. Each footstep sent a shiver down Elias' spine. "System!" he gasped desperately. "What do I have to do?", he continued.
The System chimed coldly, the following words glowing in the air before him:
[ Gatekeeper Approaching
Objective: Deliver Justice. ]