Arthur closed his eyes for a moment. Fear pressed against his chest, but he pushed it down. Panic would lead to mistakes, and mistakes got you killed.
He had climbed from nothing once. He could do it again.
"I'll live," he murmured to himself. "No matter what."
The explorers began pushing the non awakeners toward the portal. Those who hesitated were shoved harder. As the boy who tried to run and was kicked straight through the shimmering light.
"Fight for your place," the explorer shouted. "Awaken and prove you're worth keeping!"
Arthur felt a hand slam into his back. And the world twisted as the dungeon swallowed him whole.
Cold flooded his senses.
And darkness followed.
The moment Arthur stepped through the dungeon gate, the air changed.
It wasn't colder, not exactly. It was heavier, like the weight of the world pressed closer to the skin. The light dimmed into a dull gray glow that had no clear source, shadows stretching in ways that felt wrong if you stared too long.
Around him, the reactions were immediate.
One boy stumbled forward and dropped to his knees, hands shaking as he gagged. Another backed away instinctively, only to crash into someone else and snap at them in panic. A girl stood frozen near the entrance, eyes wide, lips moving soundlessly as if praying to something that had already abandoned her.
Whilst others forced themselves to move.
A tall teen with sharp eyes raised his voice, trying to sound confident. "Listen up. Don't panic. If we stick together, we'll survive. This is just an F rank dungeon."
A few heads turned toward him, hope flashing briefly in their eyes.
"We move in groups," he continued. "Watch each other's backs. No one runs alone. Monsters often pick off stragglers first."
Someone nodded quickly. "He's right. We'll last longer together."
Arthur watched them without stopping.
He had seen this before, just not in a dungeon. Back on Earth, it was always the same when things went bad. Someone stepped up, talked about unity and survival, and people clung to those words like a lifeline.
But it never lasted.
The first scream would shatter it. The first death would turn unity into blame and fear into selfishness.
Humans were predictable that way.
He adjusted his grip on the dagger and moved past them.
"Hey," someone called after him. "Where are you going?"
Arthur didn't turn. "Away."
"That's stupid," the tall boy snapped. "You'll die alone."
Arthur smiled faintly. "Maybe. Or maybe I won't."
He walked on, boots crunching against stone and bone fragments scattered across the dungeon floor.
The passage ahead widened into branching tunnels, rough walls marked by old claw marks and dark stains that weren't hard to recognize. The dungeon smelled of damp earth and decay. Every step echoed just enough to remind him how empty and exposed he was.
From the memories of the body he inhabited, Arthur knew the basics.
A hundred years ago, the world had cracked open. Rifts appeared without warning, monsters pouring out like a flood. Cities burned. Nations collapsed. Humanity nearly vanished.
Then people awakened.
Mana entered the world and with it came power. Classes. Skills. Dungeons replaced endless rifts, containing the threat and turning survival into something manageable.
That was the story everyone knew.
What they didn't talk about was how the number of dungeons kept rising. How dungeon breaks happened more often. How frontier strongholds like Grimwatch were stretched thin, burning through lives to hold the line.
That was why programs like this existed. Emergency Awakening, they called it. A clean name for something ugly.
Where they threw non awakeners into low rank dungeons and hope some survived long enough to awaken. And the rest were losses written off on paper.
Arthur exhaled slowly.
He understood the logic. And he didn't accept it.
Still, anger wouldn't help him here.
This was an F rank dungeon. That meant skeletons, dire rats, maybe kobolds if things went bad. Weak monsters, by dungeon standards.
But he wasn't awakened.
To a creature born of mana, he was prey.
The only way out was forward. Clear the dungeon or survive until someone else did. Running endlessly wasn't an option. As monsters roamed and encounters were inevitable.
Arthur moved carefully, choosing paths that bent and twisted instead of wide open chambers. He kept his steps light and his breathing steady, listening more than looking.
He had fought before. Not like this, but violence was violence. A blade didn't care what world you were born in.
Still, his chest tightened.
He was not foolish enough to think courage made him strong.
A non awakener against an F rank monster was like a child against a blade.
He felt the fear and let it sit. Panic wasted energy. But fear sharpened focus if you allowed it.
"I won't die here," he muttered under his breath.
The dungeon answered with a scream.
It echoed from somewhere behind him, high and sudden, then cut off sharply.
Arthur stopped and pressed himself against the wall.
More sounds followed. Shouting. Metal scraping stone. Then the unmistakable clatter of bones moving together.
Skeletons.
He closed his eyes for a brief second, picturing what he knew. Groups of three or more wielding rusted weapons, with hollow eye sockets glowing faintly with mana.
They didn't feel fear. They didn't tire.
The noise grew louder, mixed with desperate cries.
"Hold the line!"
"Don't let them surround us!"
A wet crunch followed by a scream that ended too fast.
Arthur moved again, slower now, skirting the edge of the sounds. He didn't want to be near that fight. Not yet. Not until he understood how the dungeon flowed.
But the dungeon didn't care about his plans.
As he passed a narrow corridor, a group of non awakeners burst into view, running blindly.
One tripped and fell. Another tried to help and got dragged down with him as skeletal hands clawed from the darkness. Blades rose and fell with jerky precision.
Arthur watched for half a heartbeat.
Then he turned away.
Running into this fight with the intent to save them would kill him. And that was the simple truth.