"CONGRATULATIONS! 100TH WIN ACHIEVED!"
The screen lit up in a riot of colors, confetti bursting across the heads-up display. Kill Points shot up, numbers cascading down like a waterfall. A tiny victory tune played, almost teasing in its upbeat cheer.
Kuk Ujin leaned back in his chair, fingers lightly tapping on his phone. He let out a long sigh.
"Wow… 100 times," he murmured. "I've played this game so many times… 91 wins, 9 losses."
He paused for a moment, rubbing the back of his neck. "I really should quit… my studies have kinda… taken a hit since I started playing this much." A small smirk crept onto his face. "But hey, I did ace that last exam, so that's something."
He leaned forward, scrolling through his stats, then muttered, "I've got another exam… math, coming up next week. Last one of the year. I really should hit the books for that…"
His gaze drifted back to the glowing screen of his phone. He let out a long, frustrated sigh.
"I hate this… my own body is begging me to play instead of study," he grumbled.
He tapped the screen again, a resigned smirk forming. "Alright… just one more. It's not the end of the world. Then I'll quit, promise. I've got exams to tackle… a future to think about."
Kuk Ujin tapped the screen once more. The phone buzzed, and the familiar loading screen appeared, colors pulsing with the same intensity as always.
"WELCOME BACK, N3M0. DO YOU WISH TO PLAY AGAIN?" the game prompted, the screen waiting for Kuk Ujin's finger to hit the yes button.
He stared at it, thumb hovering over the PLAY button. His eyes scanned the screen, lingering on the bold, foreboding title: PROJECT LEVIATHAN.
"Yeah… just one more," he muttered, almost to himself, before pressing the button.
As the screen flickered to life, he let his thoughts drift for a moment, imagining the vast world within the game.
Project Leviathan was more than just a game; it was a military survival simulation crafted to test players to their very limits.
In this universe, humanity teetered on the edge, battling colossal beasts that had emerged after "The Break"—a catastrophic event in the backstory that had decimated 80% of the population. The landscape was one of chaos, bloodshed, and sheer desperation.
It had a reputation for being merciless. Fail a mission, and it was game over. For good. No do-overs, no respawns.
Yet, people were drawn to it. Some admired its brutal realism, the way it captured every detail with stunning accuracy. Others thrived on the psychological horror, the mounting tension that made you question your every move, even when you were ahead.
Kuk Ujin couldn't help but smirk, his thumb tapping the confirmation button once more. That adrenaline rush was what kept him coming back, run after run, until this very moment.
With a hundred victories under his belt and countless strategies honed, he was ready for one last run. One final shot at that exhilarating feeling before he finally turned his attention to the exams he had been neglecting.
Kuk Ujin fixed his gaze on the PLAY button for a heartbeat, then pressed it.
The familiar HUD materialized in an instant. He was back in the game, seated in the cockpit of his tactical loadout, flanked by his meticulously assembled 12-man squad. Each member had their designated roles, weapons, and skills a team he had trained and refined through endless runs. Everything felt… just right.
The squad moved out, methodically clearing sectors and taking down standard Leviathans with practiced ease. Ujin's fingers flew over the controls, orchestrating attacks, positioning units, and dodging incoming strikes. It was the rhythm of a hundred runs familiar, precise, and predictable.
And then it happened.
The ground shook beneath him. A distant roar echoed across the horizon, rattling the virtual battlefield. Ujin's HUD lit up with warnings, but it was already too late. From the shadows, a creature emerged that was like nothing he had ever encountered. It was abnormal. Massive. Just plain wrong.
Before he could even react, it struck. In mere seconds, his entire squad of twelve was obliterated, their bodies flung across the battlefield, blood and digital debris scattering everywhere. The sounds of screams and gunfire faded into a haunting silence.
Kuk Ujin slammed his HUD menu to check the level. His eyes widened in disbelief.
"LEVEL 999.EXE"
"What the—?" he muttered, confusion knotting in his stomach. He had never seen a level like this before. Even the toughest bosses in the game didn't compare.
Then, the Leviathan stirred. Its colossal head turned toward him, and for the first time, their eyes met. The creature's gaze was sharp, deliberate, and unnervingly aware.
And then he felt it.
A chilling, impossible force reached out from his phone. He recoiled, but it was too late. A massive, spectral hand shot from the screen, wrapping around him like iron.
Before he could scream, before he could even think, the world he knew was torn away.
Kuk Ujin, the master of a hundred runs, was gone.
Kuk Ujin's eyes flew open.
The world around him felt… wrong.
Rubble and ash stretched endlessly, twisted buildings crumbling beneath a pale, sickly sky.
The acrid smell of smoke and burnt concrete stung his nostrils. His head spun, his mind racing to make sense of what had just happened.
Then came the sound.
Pop! Pop! Pop!
Gunshots echoed in the distance, sharp and chaotic. Ujin froze, instincts kicking in. He turned his head toward the noise and saw people running, firing weapons, and screaming in terror.
Some were being devoured by massive, lumbering beasts that trampled through the wreckage of the streets, their mouths wide open, claws tearing through metal and flesh alike.
Others were crushed under falling debris or hurled against walls as the creatures rampaged. A few cried out desperately for help, their voices raw and filled with panic, but the chaos swallowed their screams whole.
Ujin's heart raced. His eyes scanned the scene, taking in the threats, the weak points, the flow of battle.
And then he noticed something.
Something heavy. Something unfamiliar.
He looked down at himself.
A full black uniform clung to his body, tactical and practical, sleeves rolled up, reinforced padding on the chest and knees. His hands gripped an M16, real and cold against his skin.
His chest rose and fell as he struggled to catch his breath, but nothing about this felt like a dream. The weight, the texture, the recoil—it was all painfully real.
Kuk Ujin frowned, blinking. "What the…?"
He tried to stand, but every step felt unnervingly solid. This wasn't his room. His chair, his phone—none of it was here. Only rubble, gunfire, screams, and the distant, thunderous growls of the Leviathans.
For a moment, he just stared at the weapon in his hands, the uniform that didn't belong to him, the world that felt so foreign… and he couldn't make sense of it.
He stood there, completely frozen, the uniform clinging tightly to his skin, the M16 feeling almost surreal in his grip. Nothing made sense the weight, the sounds, how the sky could resemble a picture he'd memorized yet still feel like it was tearing him apart.
And yet, everything felt achingly familiar, like a level map etched into the back of his mind. He tried to think, to grasp the logic he'd relied on countless times before, but the world around him roared, and the threads of memory began to unravel.
"What the hell are you doing, cadet? Are you just going to stand there waiting for your fellow trainees to get killed? Get in there and fight!"
Kuk Ujin flinched, every nerve ending on high alert. The voice was sharp, laced with anger and fear, coming from a woman somewhere ahead, close enough that he could almost feel the heat of her words.
Even amidst the chaos and the noise, the rhythm of her voice was eerily reminiscent of the drill-call lines he'd heard a hundred times in menus and briefing clips. It was familiar in that annoying way a song you've memorized can be oddly comforting, even in the worst of times.
For a moment, he just stood there, the M16 heavy in his hands, the uniform constricting in a way that a screen never could. Confusion swirled behind his eyes, but beneath it, something colder and clearer clicked into place: this is the tutorial.
This is the spawn point, the training run you grind through a dozen times to learn the patterns. The voice, the orders, the panic. He'd mapped this scenario out with muscle memory. It was all data in his head, and data demanded action.
Ujin's eyes flicked toward the voice that cut through the chaos. A furious woman, armed and determined, was sprinting past the debris, dragging a wounded trainee behind her while firing at a Leviathan that was rampaging through the street.
"I… s-sorry!" he shouted, almost without thinking, tightening his grip on the M16. Without a second thought, he followed her lead, racing toward the mayhem. His mind was a whirlwind, still trying to grasp how he had ended up in this nightmare.How the hell did I get into the game?
The roar of the Leviathan, the acrid smell of smoke and blood, the piercing cries of the trainees it all bore down on him, but instinct kicked in. He ducked behind a crumbling wall, finding a small cluster of rubble that provided some cover.
From that spot, he sprang into action. He aimed, tracked the monster's movements, and fired, taking out smaller threats while the girl guided the injured to safety. Every shot, every movement felt strangely familiar, like muscle memory from countless previous runs. He couldn't explain it, but his body seemed to know what to do.
Even in the midst of the chaos, he began to notice patterns: the way the Leviathans moved, the weak spots in their armor, the rhythm of fear in the trainees' screams. He stayed low, focused, and calculated, doing his best to help them survive while the world around him crumbled.
And through it all, one thought pulsed in his mind .This isn't supposed to be real… how did I get here?