What the words inscribed on the page meant eluded him. Trembling, he reached for the door, confusion gripping him. This time, his hand instinctively grasped the hilt of the doorknob with sleep-deprived eyes strained. He had been unconscious for hours after the ritual, yet his mind was fixated on the act of opening the door. Surprisingly, it turned beneath his touch—it was unlocked.
"Was it some sort of illusion? Ha, am I losing my mind?"
Astis attempted to remain rational, dismissing the experience as either a nightmare or a consequence of his impure desires. Carefully, he pulled the knob inward, the door creaking on its hinges to reveal a staircase just a meter away, leading down to the living room.
His house was a two-storey structure, with his room situated on the upper level. Panic surged as he hastily descended the staircase, each footfall echoing sharply against the hard, glossy surface of the white tiles. He turned frequently, scanning for any lurking horror.
"I really should see a psychiatrist."
He muttered, anxiety knotting his stomach.
'Something isn't right in my mind. How is my hand... fine?'
'Who, in their right mind, would attempt a ritual pulled from a suspicious book and end up haunted? Only an idiot would.'
'And that idiot is me,'
he thought bitterly, remembering how he had stabbed his own hands in a moment of fevered desperation.
He desperately wanted to convince himself that this was all just a nightmare. Rushing toward the front door, he longed to escape this torment.
However, when he turned the doorknob, what lay beyond stole his breath—confusion, shock, and horror washed over him. Outside, he should have seen the familiar yard, lush with lawns and hedges that had grown wild taking the advantages of his negligence.
Instead, there were only remnants of his temprary confinement: a simple bed, a desk hugging the wall, and stacks of books haphazardly piled together.
A glass lay discarded on the floor, and dim sunlight filtered through the window, illuminating the page that had fallen to the ground.
It was his room.
"What is... going on? Did I just teleport."
"I got out of it, and yet... what the hell is happening?"
A subtle presence crept up behind him, causing an instinctive shiver. He spun around, but the only thing in sight was the staircase looming less than a meter away, an impossible reminder of familiarity.
"I am back here."
By all reason, he should have been standing in his living room, just inside the front door.
With a furtive glance back at the room, anxiety constricted in his chest.
"It's calling me in. No, it's trapping me."
The presence he had sensed earlier intensified, its form becoming clearer, compelling him to turn once more.
This time, his gaze met something humanoid, but not quite a man. It flickered in the corner of his vision, only a fraction of a second, yet it felt like an eternity.
"Ah, shit…"
He shouted, panic rising like bile in his throat.
On instinct, Astis bolted into the room and slammed the door, locking it shut just before the entity could slip through. He stood with his back pressed against the door, guarding it as if it were the only barrier between his sanity and utter madness.
Tap Tap Tap.
Thump thump.
Loud knocking and thumping reverberated through the door, as if the entire house were quaking and it felt like it was just moments away from splintering apart.
"Go away, you fucking monster... oh, fuck, no."
"Leave me alone, you goddamn creep!"
Astis howled, not daring to look up and his voice rising in desperation until he felt his lungs might tear apart.
Sweat poured down his face, and after what felt like an eternity, he slid down to the floor amd sat hugging his knees tightly to his chsst beside the door, sniveling silently as tears streamed down his cheeks. Terror drained the color from his face, leaving him mute, too paralyzed to make another sound.
And so, he remained there for hours, ensnared in a fear that clawed at the edges of his mind.
A quiet, soothing voice broke the oppressive silence—his voice, distorted by the presence of a lurking monster.
"You wanted a Sigil, didn't you? Just finish the ritual."
"You will be unlike those fools. Embrace the void."
The pounding on the door had long since faded, leaving only a chilling stillness that wrapped around him like a shroud.
'Ritual,' he thought, 'it wants me to finish the ritual.'
Astis shook off the invasive thoughts, focusing instead on the task at hand. The ritual lay incomplete, a pivotal segment had yet to be fulfilled—he needed to read a page from that damn book.
'The book, right, it's gone missing. Damn it, I need to find it.'
His gaze darted around the room, scanning every scrap of paper that lay scattered about, reassuring himself that if he completed the ritual, somehow, it would tip the scales in his favor.
'Where could it be'
'Wait, .... what is that?'
But it wasn't the search for the book that captured his attention. It was the shaft of magenta-tinted sunlight that slipped through the narrow gap in the curtains, casting an ethereal glow across the room. The light shimmered, splattering color against the walls, and the air hung thick with an uncanny translucence—specks of dusk caught suspended within the radiant beam.
As the magenta glow deepened, the once-familiar contours of the room morphed into a dreamlike tableau.
"Beautiful," Astis murmured, lost in the moment, as if he were witnessing love at first sight. He was utterly mesmerized.
"That is your true color."
The voice echoed again from the shadows behind him.
'My true color? How bizarre.'
With a sense of determination, he stepped toward a piece of paper that had just fluttered to the floor. One singular thought dominated his mind: complete the ritual. His consciousness became ensnared in the mesmerizing magenta light.
'I am close. This time, I will succeed.'
Astis's lips curled into a twisted smile, one that felt foreign and unsettling. He had failed seven times before, each attempt a terrifying gamble with his very life as he sought to imbue himself with a Sigil. Yet this time, he felt a surge of anticipation swelling within him, or perhaps he had been coaxed into believing it.
'I will gain a Sigil.'
He reached down and picked up the letter, and as he did so, the light flared brighter, as if glad to embrace its master. In that instant, a jolt of clarity snapped him back to reality.
He gasped, freezing in place, caught between confusion and dread.
"What did I do?"
One truth stood clear: the only way forward was to read the page before him.
Astis swallowed hard and lowered his gaze. The words on the paper were unlike any language he had ever known, seen, or even heard.
"How am I reading this? Am I a fucking translator of cosmic shit?"
He wondered, bewildered.
In bold letters scrawled across the stark white sheet, the text proclaimed:
In exchange for the Sigil of Gate, I would grant the pretender's wish. Those beyond the veil of existence shall be the spectators.
"Sigil of Gate? I've never heard of it. A rare Sigil, perhaps? Finally, maybe…"
"Yes, it is the only one of its kind."
The voice cut through his thoughts, jolting him back to reality.
"Goddammit,"
He swore, irritation flaring within him. He looked up, but the sight that met his eyes only deepened his agitation: the room was awash in magenta light, stretching across the warped walls like a living entity.
At the threshold, a figure emerged from the haze—a being tall and muscular, draped in shimmering green scales that pulsed with an exotic glow. Each glimmer cast eerie shadows that danced across the room. Its face was featureless and smooth, devoid of eyes or mouth. At the center of its chest, a brilliant blue spiral shimmered, drawing Astis's gaze into its unfathomable depths.
From behind, tentacle-like appendages unfurled, gnarled and branching like ancient trees, forming a silhouette of incomprehensible power.
"Rejoice... or despair."
It intoned, its voice echoing with ancient authority.
"A god has come, contractor, to grant you the gift—no, the burden—of ascension."
Before Astis could react or protest, an invisible force seized him and lifted him from the ground. He found himself suspended in mid-air, weightless and utterly powerless. In a heartbeat, the world around him became a blur, and he was drawn closer to the being's luminous chest, unable to resist.
He felt his strength ebbing away, as if it were being siphoned from him by this otherworldly presence.
'A Hingcha…
Astis faltered, and then he collapsed into darkness.
*
"You have been bestowed a Sigil."
As the voice enveloped him, a magenta glow coursed through his bones, slowing his pounding heart to a tranquil lull. Inside him, ambition intertwined with dread—dreams and nightmares melded into one shadowy entity, and amid it all was envy.
"The first ordeal shall begin shortly and only if you succeed the given task your Sigil will become yours permanently."
Then the surrounding transformed completely.
"Foreigner you have arrive in past."
"Now the ordeal shall commence."