Trapped in the Void

The door slammed shut behind them with an eerie finality that seemed to resonate through the very bones of the building. The sudden silence was deafening, swallowing every sound, every breath, until it felt as though the world had ceased to exist.

Arjun, Priya, and Raj stumbled forward into the suffocating darkness. Their flashlights flickered weakly in the oppressive blackness, casting feeble beams that barely illuminated the walls around them. The air felt thick—almost gelatinous—clinging to their skin with an unnatural heaviness. The temperature dropped sharply, a chill that bit at their bones, making every breath feel like they were inhaling ice.

Priya reached out instinctively to grab Arjun's arm, her fingers trembling. "Arjun, what is this place?" Her voice was barely a whisper, swallowed by the shadows.

"I don't know," Arjun replied, his throat dry, his heart pounding with an instinctive dread he couldn't shake. "But I know we've just stepped into something far worse than we could've ever imagined."

They walked, each step feeling heavier than the last, as if the void itself was trying to pull them down into its depths. The silence was oppressive, thick with a weight that threatened to crush them under its sheer force. Arjun tried to focus, but every thought felt muddled, tangled in the darkness that surrounded them. It was as if the air itself had turned into a substance—something otherworldly, something alive.

"What's happening to us?" Raj gasped, his voice panicked. His flashlight darted from side to side, but it only revealed more blackness. The ground beneath them felt... wrong. There was no texture, no warmth, nothing familiar. It was as though they were standing on the edge of the universe, lost in a space where nothing made sense.

Before anyone could answer, a sound broke the silence. A soft whisper, almost imperceptible, came from the depths of the void. The words were distorted, fractured, but there was no mistaking the cold, malicious intent behind them.

You shouldn't have come here...

Priya's breath hitched, her body frozen in fear. She looked at Arjun, her eyes wide, filled with terror. "Did you hear that?"

Arjun nodded, his grip tightening around his flashlight. "We're not alone."

And just as those words left his mouth, the whisper came again—louder, clearer this time.

You're already too late...

Raj whipped around, his flashlight scanning the air as if expecting to find something tangible in the dark, but there was nothing—nothing except the all-encompassing void that pressed in from all sides. "What the hell is this place?" His voice trembled now, the edges of his bravado crumbling.

Arjun's mind raced as the words echoed in his head. The Void. It had to be. He had heard stories, whispers among those who had dared to delve too deeply into the unknown corners of the Writiverse. The Void was where cosmic refuse was discarded, a place where even time seemed to lose its meaning. A place where the laws of reality bent, and everything familiar unraveled.

He glanced at Priya and Raj, his face grim. "The Void isn't just a place," he said, his voice low and strained. "It's where everything that's forgotten, everything that's discarded, ends up. Everything that's been broken or lost. And it's where we're going to die if we don't get out."

Priya's eyes shone with unshed tears. "We can't stay here, Arjun. We have to find a way out."

Before he could respond, another voice—a low murmur, almost imperceptible—slithered into their minds.

There is no escape from here...

And with that, the ground beneath their feet began to tremble. The very air seemed to shift, becoming thick with an alien energy that seeped into their skin, into their bones. The shadows around them twisted and writhed, contorting into shapes that defied logic and reason, like twisted reflections of something ancient and terrible.

"We need to find Ruso," Arjun said, his voice urgent. "He's the only one who knows how to get us out of here."

But just as the words left his mouth, a distant echo, a soft click, sounded from the darkness behind them. Arjun turned, eyes wide. "No..." His voice cracked. "He... he's gone."

Priya gasped, staring back at the closed door. It was as if the world had been reset the moment they entered. Ruso had vanished, leaving them to face whatever horrors this place held. And as they stood there, trapped in the endless black, the realization hit them with the force of a wrecking ball. Ruso had known this was coming. He had set them up.

"We're not here by accident," Arjun muttered under his breath, the weight of the truth settling heavily on his shoulders. "We were brought here. He did this to us. He locked us in here."

Suddenly, the air around them grew thick, too thick to breathe. Arjun gasped for air, but it was as if the very oxygen had turned hostile, dense with the residue of countless lives that had been swallowed by the void before them. The Black Oxygen. He had read about it—an oxygen variant that was slow to decompose human bodies, keeping them alive long enough to witness the endless cycle of oblivion.

And that was what they were now facing. A slow, agonizing death—trapped in a timeless prison, with only the darkness for company.

Meanwhile, back in Berlin, the scene inside Saint Isaac's grew eerily quiet as Professor Ruso stood alone in the darkened corridor. His fingers trembled as he pressed them to his forehead, closing his eyes for a moment, lost in thought.

He had done it. He had sealed them inside the Void. He had no choice. He had to protect the canon event—the flow of history that kept the Writiverse intact. If he hadn't, everything would have unraveled. The consequences of Arjun and his team meddling with the forces beyond their understanding could not be allowed.

As the weight of his decision settled on his shoulders, Ruso's face contorted with guilt. He had promised Maeve—he had promised her that he would keep everything safe. But what choice did he have? The canon could not be changed, no matter the cost.

"I'm sorry, Maeve," Ruso whispered, his voice barely audible. "I never wanted this. But... it's the only way."

His words hung in the air, a painful reminder of the past he could never undo. He had lost her once, and now he was losing himself in the process. But it was for the greater good. For the balance of everything. He hoped, in some distant part of his soul, that Maeve would forgive him for what he had done.

Ruso's gaze drifted toward the distant shadows, his thoughts heavy. In the back of his mind, he could almost hear her voice, soft and distant.

You did what you had to do...

But even as he tried to convince himself of the righteousness of his actions, there was something else—a gnawing doubt, a voice whispering that perhaps, just perhaps, he had sealed their fates with his own hands.

Back in Dellhey, the city was slowly descending into chaos.

Rogue's reign of terror had escalated. Every night, he would walk the streets, ringing the doorbells of the innocent, his shadow stretching longer with every passing hour. And with every "No" that echoed from inside, another person would vanish. Gone without a trace. His victims disappeared without a sound, leaving behind only the faintest whisper of their existence in the night air.

But Rogue wasn't after just anyone. His hunger had shifted. He was no longer content with random deaths. His search had become personal. The search for the one who had killed Shellie. The one who had shattered everything.

"Did you ring my doorbell?" His voice, cold and predatory, rang out into the night, sending shivers down the spines of everyone who heard it. He knew the truth. The murderer of Shellie was somewhere in Dellhey. And when he found them, there would be no mercy.

People began to lock their doors before nightfall, no longer trusting their neighbors, their friends. Fear permeated every street, every alley, until the entire city was held in the grip of terror.

Some left the city, unable to bear the weight of the madness. Others huddled in their homes, too afraid to venture outside, too afraid to even speak of the horror that had taken root in their once peaceful town.

The whispers of the paranormal grew louder, as reports of strange occurrences spread. Ghost sightings, visions of the murdered, mysterious symbols painted in blood—Dellhey was becoming a city of nightmares. The paranormal had taken over, and there was no escape.

In the midst of it all, Rogue continued his hunt. Every night, he grew closer to finding the one he sought. And when he found them, when he finally exacted his revenge, it would be more than just death.

It would be the end of everything.