CHAPTER THREE: Two of Spades
Noah
The hallway pulsed red.
The door slammed behind him, and the temperature dropped by ten degrees in seconds. Noah staggered forward, disoriented, heart rattling in his chest like dice in a shaken cup.
Then he heard it:
> Ding.
A screen blinked to life overhead—holographic, hanging in the air with impossible clarity. On it, a playing card slowly rotated: a Two of Spades, the symbol jagged and carved, like it had been scraped into metal with a knife.
> YOU HAVE ENTERED A "SPADE" GAME: PHYSICAL TRIAL. CARD: 2♠ – DIFFICULTY: LOW. RULES: – REACH THE EXIT. – DO NOT BREAK THE MIRRORS. – DO NOT LISTEN TO THE VOICES. – FAILURE RESULTS IN ELIMINATION.
The word elimination flickered red.
Noah backed away from the screen. "What the hell is this? A video game? A nightmare?"
Then came the timer—hovering in the corner of the corridor, counting down from:
> 10:00
He didn't have time to think.
A low scraping sound echoed behind the mirrors.
One by one, the reflections began to move—not in sync with him, but independently. Some stared. Some clawed at the glass. One began to laugh, a horrible, gurgled noise like a drowning child.
The hallway twisted as he moved—turns where there shouldn't be, corners that bent in angles that made no sense. He began to run.
But the voices followed.
> "You'll never wake up."
"She's already dead, Noah."
"Break it. Break the glass. See who you really are…"
He clamped his hands over his ears. The mirrors trembled.
> 7:12
A shadow darted in front of him—too fast to see. The wall cracked open, revealing a second corridor. A path. An exit?
Or a trap?
He had to choose. Now.
---
Reina
The subway corridor was colder now. Time was moving differently—ticking in rhythm with the low hum in the walls.
The others had gathered around a strange table inside the room the had just entered.
On it lay a card.
2♠
Reina stared at it. "Spades means… physical?"
The quiet girl—Mayu—nodded. "Yeah. My brother plays poker. Spades are fights. Clubs are teamwork. Diamonds are wits. Hearts…" Her voice dropped. "Hearts mean life and death choices."
"Good to know," Reina muttered, watching the timer appear above the nearest door.
> 10:00 – ROUND STARTED
"Collect red keys," the screen had said. There were five doors, all numbered. Room 5 pulsed red, with a message etched above it:
> DO NOT ENTER THIS ROOM.
The others had already found two keys—hidden inside a drawer and behind a mirror. But each door they opened triggered something new. One room released a flood of freezing water. Another had walls that moved inward like a trash compactor. Reina had narrowly pulled the salaryman out before it crushed his leg.
Then came the scream.
It echoed from Room 3.
They rushed inside—and found the quiet man with the crooked smile, now covered in glass shards, blood leaking from his mouth.
Above his corpse, the ceiling displayed a message in cold digital letters:
>PLAYER 036 ELIMINATED
Reina turned, her breath visible in the air. Three minutes left. One key missing.
And in Room 5… scratching.
A noise that sounded too much like someone trying to speak through a throat full of water.
Someone would open it. She knew it.
The question was who—and when.