[Days Left Until Release: 38,374,882] (105,066 years)
Abel stared blankly at the translucent orange screen floating half a meter in front of his face, his gaze devoid of life.
"Maybe death would be a better option."
[Death commencing in 3... 2...--]
His heart lurched. The dullness in his eyes vanished as pure panic surged through his veins. His voice, hoarse from disuse, burst out in desperation.
"Stop! Wait--WAIT! I DIDN'T MEAN IT!"
[Request canceled.]
The screen flickered out of existence, plunging Abel back into absolute darkness.
His breath came in shallow gasps as he tried to steady himself. Trembling, he lowered himself onto the cold marble floor, letting its unnatural smoothness ground him. He couldn't see a thing, but he already knew what surrounded him, when the "Warden" was around, he'd catch glimpses of this bizarre prison.
The room was spacious, somewhere between 140 meters wide and 150 meters in length, yet utterly barren. Every surface floor, walls, and ceiling was polished gray marble, each slab so uniform it felt artificial. There were no doors. No windows. No seams. A perfect, inescapable box.
Yet, somehow, he was still breathing.
Where was the oxygen coming from?
Why wasn't he hungry? Or thirsty? Or even tired?
And why despite all logic did this place smell?
The staleness clung to him, a sickly mixture of dust and something unplaceably foul, like a room that had been sealed shut for centuries.
These were only a fraction of the millions of questions that had plagued him in the first few days and weeks
But no answers ever came.
And so, Abel could do nothing but sit and watch the days tick by, one agonizing second at a time.
Abel was so terrified of death that he'd rather sit in that room for eternity.
And so he did.
At first, Abel tried to keep track of time without the assistance from the "warden" that popped up every now and again showing a drop in the remaining days.
This seemed like the only thing he could control.
He counted the seconds, whispering numbers under his breath, his voice the only sound in the endless, suffocating silence.
"One... two... three..."
At first, it helped. A simple rhythm, a beat to hold onto. But time stretched unnaturally here, sluggish and endless. He counted to ten thousand once before realizing he had no way of knowing if his perception was accurate. Was it really ten thousand seconds? An hour? A day? Or had he miscounted somewhere along the way?
Doubt crept in, and his confidence wavered. He tried again. And again. And again.
By the third attempt, the numbers had lost their meaning, the sequence slipping from his mind like sand through his fingers. Eventually, he abandoned the effort altogether.
Then, he turned to his memories.
He forced himself to remember everything his home, his childhood, the faces of people he once knew. He walked through old streets in his mind, traced the outlines of buildings, replayed conversations. He swore he'd never forget them.
But the days dragged on.
The faces blurred. The details became harder to recall. Eventually, even his own name felt distant, like something he had read in a book rather than lived.
The realization unsettled him.
Out of desperation, he started talking to himself.
At first, it was just a whisper. A test.
"Hello?"
His own voice startled him. It sounded strange, foreign, like it didn't belong to him anymore. But it was proof that he was still here. That he still existed.
So he kept going.
He spoke about anything and everything, filling the void with meaningless chatter.
"Did you know that the longest someone has ever gone without sleep is eleven days?"
"What do you think the warden looks like? Probably a floating eyeball or some smug bastard in a throne of blades."
"I bet when I get out of here, the first thing I'll do is--"
He stopped.
His own words rang hollow.
As if escape was a certainty, as if he would ever leave.
He stared into the darkness, throat tightening.
His voice was the only thing keeping him company, the only thing tethering him to himself. But the more he spoke, the more he started to feel like he was talking to someone else.
A second presence. A phantom lurking just outside his reach.
One day, he caught himself waiting for a response.
That was when he stopped talking.
From that moment on, he resolved to stay silent.
No more words. No more names. No more memories.
He sat in the dark, motionless, waiting for something -- anything to change.
And when nothing did, he turned to the only thing he had left.
His body.
When the mind failed him, Abel turned to the only thing he had left his body.
He started small.
At first, it was just movement for the sake of movement stretching his fingers, rolling his shoulders, shifting his weight from one side to the other. The stillness of this place was suffocating, and any motion, no matter how minor, made him feel more real. More alive.
Then he pushed further.
Sit-ups. Push-ups. Squats. The exercises were simple, familiar. He repeated them endlessly, first by the dozens, then by the hundreds, then by the thousands. He had no way to measure progress, no frame of reference to know if what he was doing was making any difference.
But he did it anyway.
At some point, he tried to tire himself out, hoping exhaustion would force him into unconsciousness. Maybe, just maybe, sleep would come if he pushed hard enough.
He ran.
Circling the empty room over and over again.
His footsteps echoed against the marble, the only sound besides his own breath. He ran until his legs burned, until his lungs screamed, until the idea of taking another step should have been unbearable.
Then he kept going.
He ran for two days straight.
Not a single yawn. Not a hint of fatigue. His body refused to fail.
Something was wrong.
That should have terrified him. But instead, all he felt was disappointment.
Still, the training became a routine, an obsession.
His body changed rapidly. His muscles grew harder, more defined. His movements became lighter, sharper, faster. He was getting stronger. That was undeniable.
But it wasn't enough.
The hunger was slow at first, creeping in unnoticed, a quiet whisper at the back of his mind.
More.
It didn't matter that he could sprint across the room in a fraction of a second. It didn't matter that he could leap high enough to touch the ceiling. The strength wasn't enough. The power wasn't enough.
He needed more.
It wasn't about survival anymore. It wasn't even about escaping.
Strength was the only thing left that mattered.
He struck the wall; it was an accident.
Or at least, that's what he told himself.
He had been testing his speed again, dashing from one end of the room to the other, when his foot slipped. Instinctively, his hand shot out to catch himself.
Instead, his palm hit the marble at full force.
A loud crack rang through the space.
Pain exploded up his arm. His wrist bent at an unnatural angle, bones jutting through the skin. Blood spilled onto the floor in thick rivulets, pooling beneath him.
Abel froze, heart pounding.
His first thought was
'I should be screaming.'
But the pain, sharp and all-consuming, was oddly grounding. Real. A sensation so raw it cut through the monotony of his existence like a blade through silk.
He stayed there, staring at his ruined hand, waiting for the fear to come.
It never did.
Instead, his lips curled.
A laugh slipped from his throat, quiet at first, then louder, until it echoed through the empty space. A dry, shaking, half-mad sound.
For the first time in over a year, Abel felt something.
So he did it again.
And again.
And again.
His body broke. He shattered his own bones, tore his own flesh, reduced his limbs to little more than ruined muscle and jagged fragments of white.
Then, after slipping into unconsciousness, he woke up whole.
Stronger. Faster. More resilient.
His body would not let him die.
The pain no longer mattered. The agony was a gift.
And it only made him hungrier.
From that moment on, Abel had only one purpose.
He tested his limits in the only way that made sense by destroying them.
Every day, he broke himself apart. Every day, he let his body rebuild itself stronger. At first, he started small, breaking fingers, shattering wrists. Then he moved on to his arms, his legs, his ribs.
He learned exactly how much force it took to break each bone, exactly how long it took for his body
to recover.
It was a cycle. A ritual. A devotion to something far greater than survival.
Strength.
It wasn't long before he crossed the line.
The day he sprinted across the room in less than a second, he realized just how far he had come. A feat no human should be capable of. An impossible speed. An impossible strength.
And yet, it still wasn't enough.
The hunger for power burned deeper than ever, a gnawing void in his chest that nothing could fill.
Then, one day, everything changed.
The familiar, translucent screen flickered into existence before him, interrupting his next strike.
That was unusual.
The "warden" only ever appeared once every few days or so marking the passage of time. It felt different this time.
A sharp, artificial jingle rang out.
[Doot ta da Doo.]
Abel's breath hitched. His eyes darted around the empty space, his pulse hammering in his ears.
What does this mean?
Is it over?
Did I finally break through?
Or worse, was I never supposed to do this?
Before he could spiral further, new words flickered onto the glowing orange screen.
[The System Has Been Officially Activated.]
Abel took a step back, wariness creeping up his spine.
Over a year in this place, and not once had anything changed. Until now.
[Congratulations, User. You Have Gained an Epic Title.]
[False Prodigy – You Have Friends in Very High Places.]
Abel frowned. Before he could react, more messages followed.
[Congratulations, User. You Have Gained an Extremely Rare Title.]
[System Protester – You Have Not Used the System's Functions for Over 365 Days.]
His eyes narrowed. A system? He barely had time to process before another message appeared.
[Congratulations, User. You Have Gained an Epic Title.]
[Dirty Masochist – You Have Achieved a Combat Strength of 2,000 All By Yourself.]
His expression twitched. A flick of his eyes revealed an entire list of new titles, most insignificant, some utterly vulgar.
'What kind of sick joke is this?'
Hundreds of questions flooded his mind.
The system paused. The screen flickered. Then--
[Would You Like To Leave This Place?]
Abel stopped breathing.
His fingers curled into fists, nails biting into his palms. The weight of the words crushed the air from his lungs.
'Leave?'
Then, ever so slowly, his lips parted.
"…I can leave?"