There are many types of darkness that people will experience throughout their lives.
The darkness of being outside at night is probably the most familiar to us in the modern world. Even then, it's not that dark. You can still see the city lights around you, or lights from passing cars.
Then, people experience blackouts in their own homes. Still, they can always light a candle, use a flashlight, or even have the lights of their own phones or other battery powered devices. Street lamps these days tend to have their own battery systems, too. And someone always has a generator.
Most rarely is the darkness that comes after a citywide blackout, one strong enough to kick everything off of power. However, ironically, this darkness just gives way to another light, with the light pollution of the city gone, the stars have their time to shine again.
The most darkness that one could experience is being deep within in a cave. No light from the surface can reach you. You cannot even see your own limbs. There is no amount of eye adjustment that will even allow you to make out vague shapes.
It is complete, utter, darkness.
I understood now why this Dungeon was called the 'Forsaken Light' cave.
It was dark. Even darker than the darkness that permeated the deepest caves. I felt like I had my eyes plucked out of my skull as I struggled through the confined space. This place truly had forsaken all forms of light.
To make it worse, this dungeon also removed the reliability and usefulness of senses other than your sight.
I could barely hear my own footsteps as a muffled pitter patter against the ground. There was no smell at all, and my arms and legs felt strangely numb.
'No wonder nobody ever returned from this place…what sort of dungeon is this even supposed to be?'
All I was left with in the darkness were my thoughts.
To be honest, this place was frightening. I had experienced a number of Abnormalities by now, even died multiple times by their hands, but I was still a human being at heart…for now. And I had never experienced something this overwhelming and new since my first time facing against the Flood Dragon.
Without even meaning to, while I walked, crawled, or limped my way through this unseen, barely felt cave, I began to occupy my thoughts by thinking of two women in particular.
Viola, Liliana…I had lost too much so far through all of this Regression.
I had managed to gather the mental energy to keep going through all of this Regression, but how much of that was bravado…? Now I was even becoming attached to Alyssa, spending a whole Regression life on getting to know her better…
Yet, once I died, she'd just forget me again, like the others. Maybe, like with Viola, some odd turn of fate I couldn't understand would stop me from meeting her...like the Abnormality that attempted to control her thoughts.
'Is it possible to control the Regression skill to make more of a…time loop?'
Yes. Right now it was forced Regression upon death to a specific time. It was only natural to wonder if, somehow, I could control it in the future.
'If only this world had status screens...'
I lamented that abilities were so vague and hard to understand. It meant that experimentation was the only way to truly improve.
But I decided to put that thought aside for the moment. It wasn't a bad idea to think about, but maybe too wishful for the current me that didn't even understand Viola's usage of 'inner energy' yet.
More importantly, I was beginning to 'see' things, even in the infinite shadows of the cave. That was worrying.
"..."
No, more specifically, I saw something. Something hovering directly in front of me in front of me. Perhaps it was more accurate to say…I saw something standing in front of me.
It was a light, somehow managing to momentarily dispatch the darkness of the cave. But it wasn't steady. It was gently moving from left to right, in a rhythm that seemed oddly familiar...
Then, from just behind that light, came a voice.
"Help me, please! I'm stuck."
The sentence was extremely simplistic. Yes, somehow, even with my deafened ears, I still heard it. A voice that sounded somehow relieved and frantic - patched together like some kind of misshapen amalgamation of a person's voice.
It didn't sound...right. So, I didn't trust it one bit. It was as simple as that.
I had watched one too many horror movies to understand this kind of trick. And in this world, the ridiculous plotlines you only saw in movies were more than possible. Being more cautious than not was a bonus.
And I had honed my danger instincts before I even knew about my Regression skill.
Trusting those instincts, I didn't move.
The light sat in front of me for a few long seconds, still bobbing in that odd rhythm, as if waiting...then it immediately turned around. Quite literally, turned, and began hovering away.
"Help! Help! Help, please!"
It repeated those words in the same tone, the light bobbing and weaving in the dark, as if it were connected to something. I realized then, that the rhythm of movement it had was that of breathing.
A slow breath in as it moved to the left...a harsh exhale as it moved to the right. I shuddered.
'Some kind of lure...?'
Again, this was something that preyed on the person in the cave perfectly. If you were less composed, panicked, not sure what was going on...you'd probably run towards a fellow person's voice as quickly as possible, not questioning the how or why of it all.
Then...maybe you'd just become another voice calling for help in the cave.
I waited for the thing to disappear entirely, before I continued moving again. Then I stopped - or to be more accurate, I was forced to stop. My nose had bumped into something. I could only tell thanks to a very faint buzzing pain on my face.
I reached forward - at least I think I was - and felt a solid, jagged surface. The wall of the cave.
I knelt down and felt the rest of the wall...nothing.
I paused, remaining in place for a few seconds as I began to think.
'Do I move backwards? Do I try to orient myself somehow? No, I can't move too much, or I'll lose my sense of forwards and backwards completely...'
Calmly, I stood up, and tried walking backwards...only to feel my back press up against a wall.
'...damn.'
The cave behind me had changed. At least, what should've been behind me. Who knew how the cave had morphed already?
Had I even been walking straight all that time? Maybe I was just walking in a circle? I-
'I...have to calm down.'
I took a few deep breaths, thinking back to the mental training with Viola. I imagined myself under that waterfall again, calm and tranquil as could be with Viola watching over my progress - watching over me.
That set me at ease.
'Alright...let's think about where to proceed from here.'
The next move was obvious. I had a perfect memory, didn't I? It was time to put it to use.
I began walking, but I didn't think about trying to memorize "where I was going". Instead, I focused on remembering the feeling of the ground beneath my feet.
It was hard, considering that my limbs barely had any feeling, but the fact that the cave had so many sharp edges constantly pressing into me worked in my favor. Pain was one of the easiest to distinguish sensations, after all.
I realized then that the cave wall that had been in front of me was gone, too, and I was walking unimpeded again somehow...then I hit another wall.
But I wasn't afraid or surprised this time. I backed up, and began walking...now that I knew exactly how the ground should feel against my feet, I stopped when I felt that I was just retracing the same path I had taken last time.
I paused, then turned and began walking.
New ground.
It was primitive, but it was the only reliable way to navigate in this cave, where direction, sound, and sight meant nothing.
The oddity of the cave never stopped, despite my better navigation. When I was sure I was walking on a path I had already walked on, I'd feel a sudden wall that wasn't there before. Or there'd be a random set of turns that previously didn't exist.
But that was all just white noise meant to distract me. Because, as long as I didn't keep re-treading the same ground, I was making progress.
Luckily, there didn't seem to be any drops or steep cliffs inside the cave. I counted myself lucky for that. Still, I wasn't moving unscathed.
'Damn this...hurts...'
At some point, I had stopped walking, and began crawling. The cave had started to close in on me, forcing me to move through on my hands and knees.
In a way, it was embarrassing, that I had been so thoroughly controlled by this cave's influence...but more than embarrassing, it was utterly claustrophobic. At some point, I started having to squeeze my way through, barely using my shoulders and feet to propel myself through the tightness of the cave.
I could feel rocks cutting against my skin - I could feel my bones creaking as they were squeezed closer and closer against my sides. My limbs sometimes refused to move at all, giving me a momentary panic as I thought myself to be stuck.
As I kept moving, my thoughts began to stray again. I realized that I had long since lost track of time, and had no estimate of how long I'd been in this cave.
I could feel hunger rattling my body - I had brought no supplies in here other than the flashlight, which had been lost somewhere along the way a long time ago.
Things were wriggling around my body, multiple tiny legs and slimy bodies pushed around and against me. It was utterly disgusting.
Still, whenever I began to feel overwhelmed, I'd think back to my training with Viola...and Alyssa, who was barely holding on.
And I'd find myself able to move just a little bit again.
Eventually, the cave began to ease up. First crawling became a little easier...then I was able to crouch a little bit, and then I felt the space above me opening enough to stand once more. My body was sore and trembling, but I managed to get up.
I took a deep breath, and I could feel that even my stomach was hurting - or was that my lungs? I didn't know anymore.
My legs kept moving, and then - pain. Searing hot pain, hitting my eyes, all at once.
"Ugh-!"
I covered my face with my hands, stumbling backwards. I didn't fall into the open path I had just been walking, but instead, felt the rough cave wall.
Panicking, I forced my eyes open, only to...actually see.
I blinked more than a few times, my vision slowly coming into focus. I was inside of a dimly lit room.
It was circular, a large spherical room dug straight out of the rock. Lining the walls were purple crystals which glowed bright, barely illuminating the bare-bones room.
"Dang...I got blinded that hard by that small amount of light?" I couldn't help but chuckle at myself. The darkness of that cave had really adjusted my eyes to be way too sensitive. I was just happy that stumbling backwards didn't send me to the beginning of the cave again.
My eyes naturally went to the center of the room, where a large, clear-looking sphere was. The core of this dungeon.
'Let's get this experience over and done with...'
I walked forward, intending to get out of this cave as soon as possible...only to be stopped.
Out of nowhere, a hand had grabbed mine. Strong, unrelenting...I then looked up, and my eyes widened even more than they must have when the light hit them.
"What do you think you're doing?"
What was standing there, stopping me from grabbing the dungeon core and getting out of this place...was myself.
And that voice...was my voice?