Government Response
Location: National Abyssal Research Division (NARD) underground headquarters
The tone is frantic, alarms still blaring faintly in the background.
A huge holographic map displays the exact point where the rift struck… and then vanished.
Officials arguing
A senior officer slams a folder onto a desk:
Director Hale: "A rift opened, swallowed four minors, and then closed without leaving a core. That has NEVER happened. This isn't a breach — it's something else."
Scientists are confused, some panicking.
Scientist 1: "Every rift leaves a signature… a residual energy field… something. This one left NOTHING."
Scientist 2: "But people saw lightning descend. That kind of energy spike is only recorded with E-Tier Hellgates or higher."
The room grows silent at the word Hellgate.
Another officer steps forward with a grim expression.
Agent Kurai: "If this wasn't natural… then something forced the rift open."
Everyone in the room freeze
Director Hale: "Find the entrance. Above ground, below ground— I don't care. A rift doesn't just appear and vanish without its core being destroyed.
Cut to black.
The Hellscape
The screen fades in with a ringing sound… dust… red sky… floating ash.
The boys wake up
Mark is lying on cracked stone.
Dwayne, Kyle, and Stephen are scattered nearby.
One after another, they groan awake.
The camera pans upward to reveal:
A burnt sky
Towering bone-like structures
Lava veins cracking the ground
Distant roars echoing
It is NOT the usual rift environment. Something is off… more alive… more aware.
Dwayne suddenly shoots up, scrambling over to Mark.
He grabs him by the collar and lifts him halfway off the ground.
Dwayne: "YOU—! This is YOUR fault! You freak! What did you do?!"
Mark is confused, terrified, barely conscious.
Mark: "W-What?! I didn't do anything!"
Kyle stands behind Dwayne, flames flickering around his hands out of instinct.
Kyle: "Dwayne! The hell Is this place?! This isn't a normal rift!"
Stephen, panicking, steps back.
Stephen: "W-We're gonna die here! This is where high-rank Walkers disappear forever!"
Mark looks around with dread.
Mark: "This… is definitely not a D-Rank gate"
Dwayne, still gripping Mark:
Dwayne: "Then why are YOU alive, huh?! Every time something weird happens, YOU'RE involved!"
A distant roar shakes the ground under them.
Pebbles bounce.
A massive shadow crawls across the red horizon.
Everyone freezes.
Mark swallows hard.
Mark: "We… we need to move. Now."
Dwayne releases him reluctantly, breathing heavily.
Heat pulsed through the ground like a living thing. It felt as though the land itself was breathing—slow, heavy, and hungry.
Mark's vision blurred as he sat up, clutching at the burnt soil beneath him. His lungs burned as he inhaled air thick with ash.
"…W-Where… are we…?"
Dwayne rose nearby, coughing violently. Kyle and Stephen lay curled up beside him, trembling as consciousness returned. None of them recognized the unnatural, twisted landscape around them—blood-red sky, charred earth, and distant shapes moving behind the fog.
Before Mark could gather his thoughts, a hand seized his collar.
"You idiot!"
Dwayne slammed Mark to the ground so hard the breath ripped from his chest.
"This is your fault! You got us dragged into this nightmare!"
Mark's vision spun. His fingers clawed uselessly at Dwayne's wrists.
"I—I didn't—! The lightning—something pulled all of us in—!"
But Dwayne didn't care.
Before he could hit Mark again—
ROOOOOOOAAR!!!
A monstrous scream tore through the world, shaking the ground beneath them.
Kyle scrambled up, tears welling in his eyes.
"S-Something's out there… Something huge—!"
Stephen clutched his head. "W-We're screwed… We're going to die, Mark… We're actually going to die…"
Mark forced himself to inhale. The air scorched his throat.
Calm down… Think… Please think…
He rose on unsteady legs.
"…Everyone. Just… stop."
His voice cracked, but it still silenced them.
"We're in a rift. A big one. Maybe the rank we've never even studied. If we panic, we die. Simple."
Kyle's breathing quickened. "B-But the government will notice we're missing! They'll search for us, right? They'll send a rescue team!"
Mark shook his head slowly.
The look in his eyes made Kyle go silent.
"…No rift in history has ever closed itself the moment it appeared," Mark whispered.
"And no one saw where it opened. They don't even know we're gone."
Stephen's expression collapsed.
"H-How long… until the air kills us?"
"It won't," Mark replied. "We're Abyss Walkers. Infernal energy won't kill us. But hunger and monsters will."
A long, suffocating silence settled over them.
Mark swallowed hard and continued.
"There's only one way out: find the core at the center and destroy it. Then a gate appears. That's the rule of every rift we've ever studied."
He pointed toward the distant crimson horizon, where faint pulses of light flickered like veins under the earth.
"We need to move. Now. Scout the terrain. Find the center. Survive."
Dwayne scoffed. "You think you're giving a speech or something? You want us to go running into hell based on your hunch?"
Mark met his eyes. For once, he didn't shrink away.
"This isn't a hunch. It's all we have."
Kyle stepped back, shaking his head violently.
"N-No. No way. I'm not going anywhere. If we stay in one place, if we wait, someone will come!"
Stephen nodded desperately.
"He's right! We just have to hold out! Someone from the agency will sense the distortion and—"
"They won't," Mark said, voice barely above a whisper.
"They don't know this rift exists. We were sucked in before it fully formed. It closed instantly. From the outside… it probably looked like an ordinary lightning strike."
Their faces paled.
Mark's chest tightened painfully as he looked at them—boys who had always looked down on him, pushed him around, humiliated him.
But he had never truly hated them.
Not until now.
"…If we just sit here, we'll die," Mark whispered. "All of us."
Stephen's breathing quickened to a panic.
"I'm not moving from this spot! I'm not going further in! I'd rather die waiting than die running!"
Kyle nodded, hugging his knees. "Y-Yeah. Y-You go if you want. We're staying."
Mark stared at them.
At the fear in their eyes.
At their refusal to face reality.
We're already dead, aren't we…?
He turned to Dwayne—hoping for something. Anything.
Even a grunt. Even a small sign that he understood.
"…Dwayne. You know they're wrong. We can't just stay here."
Dwayne didn't speak.
He stared at the ground, fists clenched, breathing shallow.
Mark could see it—he was terrified.
Completely and utterly terrified.
"…Say something…" Mark whispered.
Dwayne finally lifted his eyes.
But he didn't look at Mark.
He looked at Kyle and Stephen.
And then he stepped away from Mark.
"…I'm staying too," Dwayne said, voice hollow. "If someone's coming… they'll find us."
Mark's heart twisted.
He didn't feel anger.
He felt something colder.
Something sharper.
Abandonment.
He took a step back from them.
In this lifeless, burning world…
the boys he'd known his entire life had chosen to leave him alone.
Not because he wasn't useful.
But because they didn't believe in him.
Not even a little.
Mark swallowed the lump in his throat and forced his shaking legs to steady.
"…I see," he said softly.
"As expected."
The three boys wouldn't look at him.
Mark turned toward the red horizon, away from them.
"…Even in hell…" he whispered, voice trembling.
"…you guys still treat me the same stay here for all I care... ."
He took one last look at the three shapes huddled together in fear.
Then he walked away from them—alone—into the abyss.
Mark moved through the burnt forest with slow, precise steps, his eyes darting between twisted roots and jagged stones. Nothing here resembled the rift ecology he'd studied.
No glowing fungus.
No infernal moss.
No corrupted vines.
These plants were wrong.
A cluster of black, thorned stalks pulsed faintly like veins. Another plant swayed toward him as if sensing heat.
This isn't in any textbook…
Where the hell are we?
The deeper he went, the louder the distant roars became, echoing through the crimson fog like the wails of dying worlds. Mark swallowed a dry lump in his throat and kept moving.
Monsters lurked everywhere—shadows darting between trees, pairs of glowing eyes watching him from behind twisted rocks. Every time he spotted one, he hid, held his breath, and waited.
He wasn't a fighter.
He wasn't strong.
He wasn't brave.
Survival was all he had.
But his luck ran out.
As he crept behind a cluster of warped trees, he spotted a hunched creature ahead—a small, frail-looking thing gnawing on a corpse. Its bony spine jutted through its skin, and its arms twitched with unnatural rhythm.
Weak… I can avoid that one…
He stepped back cautiously.
CRUNCH.
His foot landed on a dried bone.
The sound cracked through the forest like a gunshot.
The creature's head snapped upward.
Four glowing yellow eyes locked onto him.
It hissed, jaw splitting open far wider than humanly possible.
"…No… no, no—"
SCREEEEEECH!!
It lunged.
Mark ran.
Branches whipped against his face as he stumbled through the trees, lungs burning, heart slamming against his ribs.
"Please—! Please—!"
The creature pounced, claw swiping across his shoulder. Pain tore through him and he crashed to the ground.
The monster pinned him.
Its breath was rancid, like rotting metal.
Its claws wrapped around his throat.
Mark screamed—not bravely, not heroically, but with pure, primal fear.
"I— I don't want to die!" he cried, sobbing.
"N-Not like this…! Please… please—!"
Tears blurred his vision.
"This isn't fair… I finally got my license… I was finally going to do something cool… I was finally starting to make friends… I… I…"
His voice broke.
"I don't want to die… Mom… Dad…"
A faint memory flickered behind his closed eyes—
a warm kitchen, the smell of breakfast, his mother smiling as she packed his lunch.
His father ruffling his hair, telling him he'd "grow into something special one day."
A life far too small.
A dream far too new.
"I… I still want to live…"
The monster lowered its jaws toward his face.
And something broke inside him—not fear, but refusal.
His trembling hand reached blindly.
His fingers wrapped around a sharp piece of bone half-buried in the dirt.
"GET… OFF… ME!!"
He drove the bone upward with all his strength—
SHLKT.
The jagged shard plunged into the monster's throat.
It convulsed violently, claws scraping against him. Then its body collapsed, twitching once, twice… then falling still.
Mark lay under it, chest heaving, blood soaking his hands.
He didn't move.
He couldn't move.
The tears still streamed, mixing with dirt and sweat on his face.
"…I… I killed it…" he whispered, voice fragile.
His hands shook uncontrollably.
"I… actually killed it…"
He pushed the creature's body off with shaking arms and stumbled back, collapsing onto the black soil.
His breath came shallow and ragged.
But through the fear…
through the shaking…
through the pain…
Something new flickered inside his chest.
A tiny spark of strength.
The smallest hint of resolve.
He wiped his tears with a blood-stained sleeve.
"…I'm not going to die here," he whispered.
"I'll make it out.
Even if I have to crawl."
He rose—weak, trembling, stained with monster blood—but he rose.
And somewhere deep inside him, the abyss stirred in acknowledgement.
Stephen kicked a pebble for the twentieth time, arms wrapped tightly around himself.
"U-Uh… guys… how long do you think it'll take before help comes?" he trembled.
Kyle hugged a branch he took for self defense like a teddy bear. "I-I don't know! This is your fault for panicking earlier!"
"MY fault!? You're the one who almost peed yourself when that bush moved!"
"It moved because YOU screamed!"
Dwayne slammed his fist into the cracked stone beside them. "Both of you, shut up! You're giving me a headache."
The two mages opened their mouths to bicker again—
—but the air suddenly dropped twenty degrees.
Something was watching them.
A low, wet growl crawled through the crimson fog behind them.
Stephen froze first.
"K-Kyle…? Please tell me… that's your stomach."
Kyle didn't answer. His eyes had inflated to the size of saucers, pointing shakily behind Stephen.
"S-S-Stephen…" he croaked. "D-D-Don't… turn around…"
Of course, Stephen turned.
Towering above them was a creature shaped like a wolf—if wolves were the size of trucks and made from exposed muscles and bone. Long strands of drool sizzled on the ground where they fell. Its ribs expanded with every thunderous breath, and its many eyes—far too many—locked directly onto the three boys.
Stephen squeaked.
Kyle let out a strangled noise that didn't sound human.
Dwayne whispered, "Oh… crap."
The creature lunged—
"AAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!"
Stephen and Kyle screamed at a pitch so loud it echoed across the wasteland, bouncing off jagged rock formations like broken glass.
Far away, Mark jerked upright, heart skipping a beat.
"Dwayne?!"
He bolted toward the sound with everything he had, stumbling, slipping, sprinting through thorn-covered bushes. His legs didn't feel fast enough—his chest hurt from fear—but he didn't stop.
"Please be okay, please—!"
Another monstrous roar cracked through the air, followed by a sickening crash.
Mark pushed harder.
He burst into the clearing—
—and immediately gagged.
Blood was everywhere.
Chunks of what used to be Stephen were smeared across a boulder like crushed fruit. Kyle's arm still twitched a few feet away, the rest of him shredded into pieces scattered across the ground.
The beast lay dead in the center of it all, throat torn open, skull crushed in multiple places as if beaten by an unhinged animal.
And standing on top of it…
Dwayne.
His fists were split open to the bone. His uniform soaked with blood that wasn't his. He was shaking uncontrollably, chest rising and falling in frantic, shallow breaths.
His eyes—normally sharp and arrogant—were blown wide in absolute terror. His pupils were tiny dots in a sea of white, like he'd witnessed his own death and survived it by accident.
He didn't see Mark approach.
He didn't seem to see anything at all.
He was frozen—trapped in the moment he snapped.
Mark swallowed hard, throat painfully tight.
"…Dwayne?"
Still no response.
Only the sound of the faint, wet drip of blood down Dwayne's shaking arms.
"Dwayne!"
Mark's voice cracked through the heavy silence like a whip, snapping Dwayne's gaze toward him. For a moment, the berserker's eyes were empty—hollow, like he hadn't fully returned from whatever nightmare he had just lived through.
Then the realization hit him.
"They're… dead…"
Dwayne's voice came out small, brittle—like it could break apart at any second. "Stephen… Kyle… they're… they're gone…"
Mark stepped closer, swallowing the lump in his throat. The stench of blood and iron made his stomach twist, but he forced his body to stay steady.
"I know," he said softly.
He reached out a hand.
"But we're going to die too if we don't move."
Dwayne's breath hitched, a sound halfway between a gasp and a sob. His hands trembled violently at his sides.
"They made a lot of noise," Mark continued, forcing calm into his own shaking voice. "Every monster within miles probably heard them. This place… it's not going to give us any time to mourn."
His hand remained open, steady. Waiting.
"We need to go, Dwayne. Now."
For a long second, Dwayne didn't move.
Then, slowly—like waking from a trance—he lifted his head. His lips parted, but no words came out. Instead, he took one unsteady step toward Mark.
Then another.
Then his walk turned into a jog.
Then a run—fear pushing him forward, toward the only other living person left.
Mark caught his shoulder and pulled him into motion.
"Come on!" Mark shouted. "Don't look back!"
The two sprinted across the blood-soaked ground and into the twisted forest of bone-white trees, the sound of distant roars already rising behind them.
The hellscape was waking up.
And it knew exactly where they were.