Saturday, 1:00 AM.
The live channels on StreamVerse were a chaotic, screaming symphony of terror, and at its heart was Dark Forest. The platform's entire stand-alone game category had been conquered. The top twenty biggest streamers were all, without exception, broadcasting Leo's creation to hundreds of thousands of captivated viewers. The game's price was a modest $14.99—an easy impulse buy for anyone wanting to share in the communal nightmare.
At the very top of this digital food chain, with the highest viewership of all, was Kiki.
A VTuber with over 1.4 million fans, Kiki's brand was built on a mix of high-skill gameplay and bubbly, infectious energy. Her 2D avatar, an adorable pink-haired anime girl, was a perfect conduit for her cheerful voice, and her die-hard fans showered her stream with gifts and subscriptions. For a streamer, a new, hyped game is fresh content, and fresh content is king.
Right now, however, the king was cowering in a corner, trembling.
In the game, Kiki's character was huddled in the dark bedroom of a shelter, clutching a board studded with nails. Her own heart was hammering a frantic rhythm against her ribs. She could feel a nervous heat spreading through her body, her pajamas suddenly feeling too warm.
No one told me the night would be like this! she thought, her knuckles white as she gripped her mouse. My god, what kind of game is this? It's just… cruel!
She wanted to cry, but the tears wouldn't come. She'd heard the whispers about the game, of course. She'd seen the comments calling the demo terrifying. But she had been skeptical, dismissing it as clever marketing. In her experience, "horror games" were just a slogan. They'd promise thrills and chills, and deliver nothing but boredom. They were bland, tasteless, and utterly forgettable.
So, she had started her stream with a breezy confidence, ready to play a new game for her fans, expecting a few cheap jump scares at most.
The prologue had shattered that confidence into a million pieces. It had taught her what real fear felt like. She'd shrieked, she'd cursed, she'd flinched at every shadow. And her audience had loved every second of it. There was, she knew, nothing her fans enjoyed more than watching their favorite streamer suffer.
In the hour since the game had unlocked, she had died four times. Four brutal, humiliating deaths in the first area, a desolate place called the 'Dry Grassland.' She'd been bludgeoned by a savage, mauled by a rabid dog, poisoned by a deceptively harmless-looking mushroom, and, in her most recent failure, swallowed whole by a mysterious blood-red mist that had rolled in while she was caught in the open after sundown.
Every time she respawned, the world was different. The shelter's layout, the location of resources, the very geography of the forest—it all changed. It was a fresh, new hell every single time. The only mercy was that she kept her scavenged items. Without that, she might have already rage-quit.
This time, she'd learned her lesson. She had played with extreme caution. And her reward was to be trapped in this new kind of torture: a random night event. She was pinned down by an atmosphere so thick with dread that she could barely breathe. Nothing was happening, and yet, the sheer, oppressive silence was flooding her brain, cranking her mental stress to the breaking point.
She glanced at her second monitor. The viewership numbers in her stream were climbing. It was past one in the morning, a time when her audience usually started to drop off, but tonight, they were pouring in.
She gritted her teeth. The show must go on.
"Whoa… guys, I think I'm going crazy," she said, her voice a shaky whisper. Her avatar's expression mirrored her own fear, its cute eyes wide and shadowed.
The chat, of course, was delighted.
> Kiki finally met her match! Usually dropping bodies in FPS games, now she can't even move from a corner lmao
> If a game can scare Kiki this bad, you know it's the real deal.
> Ngl, even just watching this stream is making my palms sweat.
> This difficulty seems a little unfair, it's only the first night…
> >> To the guy above: Kiki's got it easy. You should see what's happening in Zaneiac's stream right now. His night is NOT this peaceful.
Kiki's eyes latched onto the last comment. "Not peaceful?" she asked her chat. "What do you mean? What else can happen…?"
She never finished the sentence.
Scrunch. Scrunch.
The sound, crisp and clear in her headphones, was of footsteps. On dry grass. They were coming from outside, circling the house like a predator stalking its prey. The slow, deliberate pace was a death knell that sent a jolt of pure ice through her veins.
"I hear footsteps," she whispered, her voice cracking. "Oh god, what do I do? What is that? What's outside!?" Her only weapon, the nail-studded plank, felt pathetic and useless.
The chat exploded with speculation, but no one had a real answer. It was too new. Everyone was experiencing this for the first time, together.
Inside the game, the single incandescent bulb flickered, a dying candle against the encroaching darkness. The footsteps continued their slow, methodical patrol, and then, after another agonizing minute, they began to fade, growing fainter until they were gone.
Silence.
"Is it… gone?" Kiki held her breath. The absence of sound was deafening. A collective sigh of relief went through the chat.
"Okay," she exhaled, her voice trembling. "I think it's gone. Wow. This game is making my hands go numb."
She reached for her water bottle, the tension of the last few minutes leaving her throat painfully dry. As the bottle touched her lips, a deep, vibrant red light suddenly blazed to life outside, flooding the room. It bled through the cracks in the boarded-up windows, painting the walls in a hellish crimson glow.
She froze, stunned. Before she could even process what was happening—
Squeak.
The bedroom door behind her, the one she had shut and locked, slowly creaked open. Her breath hitched. She scrambled forward and slammed it shut again, her heart pounding a frantic, painful rhythm.
"What's going on?" she gasped, her voice ragged. "Did something get in? Who knows what's happening!?" She was pleading with her audience now, the line between streamer and terrified gamer completely erased.
Her mouth felt like sandpaper. Unconsciously, she had drawn her feet up onto her chair, as if trying to escape something lurking on the floor.
The red light vanished as suddenly as it had appeared, plunging the room back into gloom. It was then that a new sound began to creep into her headphones: a strange, penetrating hum that was gradually getting closer. Her mental fortitude was starting to crumble.
[I want to go home.]
A quiet, mournful voice spoke from directly behind her.
Kiki's blood ran cold. There's someone else in the room.
She whipped her character around. There, sitting on the edge of the messy bed, was a man. He wore a neat shirt and suspenders, his head bowed as he rummaged through a backpack.
[I will leave here,]he muttered to himself. [I must leave this goddamn forest!]
"Who is that!?" Kiki shrieked. "How did he get in my house!?"
The chat offered a flurry of theories.
> It's an NPC! Maybe a side quest?
> Talk to him! See if you can interact!
Nodding, her hands trembling, Kiki cautiously guided her character toward the man. She took a step, glanced away for a fraction of a second to check a sound, and then looked back.
The bed was empty. He was gone.
The entire chat spammed a single, unified sentiment: FUCK
At that exact moment, the game's atmosphere collapsed in on itself. The room began to fill with fog. The lightbulb flickered erratically. A chorus of demonic whispers flooded her ears. A line of text, her character's own panicked thought, appeared on screen.
[There's something lurking in the dark. I'd better stay in the light, not near the wall.]
Her eyes darted to the window. A strange, translucent creature was hovering just outside. A ghost.
"Stay in the light, stay away from the wall," she chanted, a desperate mantra.
The next second, the lightbulb popped. The room was plunged into absolute, suffocating darkness.
Hope died. A fear so profound it felt like falling into an ice cellar seized her. A chill shot up from the base of her spine and exploded in her brain.
The whispers grew louder. The ghosts, no longer held back by the flimsy walls, phased into the room, their hideous faces materializing out of the dark. They swarmed her. The screen shook, blood splattered, and a cacophony of terrifying sound effects assaulted her ears.
She completely panicked. All strategy, all thought, vanished, replaced by a single, primal instinct: run.
This house isn't a shelter, her terrified mind screamed. It's a tomb!
She scrambled through the darkness, the howling spirits and maddening whispers chasing her. She found the door and lunged for it, ready to throw it open and flee into the night.
But the door opened by itself.
Kiki froze. Her eyes focused on the figure standing in the doorway, silhouetted against the foggy night. Her pupils shrank to pinpricks.
The scream that tore from her throat was not for her audience. It was not for the stream. It was a raw, unfiltered, blood-curdling shriek of pure, unadulterated terror.
(Author's Note: The random events experienced in this chapter were condensed and intensified for the story. The first night in the actual game is a bit more forgiving!)
PLS SUPPORT ME AND THROW POWERSTONES .