First Dungeon

"Guest 9845126."

The voice echoed through the room, its calm yet commanding tone cutting through the soft hum of the waiting area. Max stood up, his nerves a bit more tense than before. He walked towards the door, his ticket still clenched in his hand.

As soon as he stepped through, the world tilted beneath him, and a sudden weightlessness took over.

"Woah!"

Before he could process what was happening, the floor dropped out from beneath him. The portal sucked him in with a force that made his stomach lurch, and Max felt a brief moment of panic. He had been expecting a smooth transition, but this?

Everything spun.

When the world settled, he landed with a thud—not on soft ground, but on something harder. Stone? He groaned, pushing himself up from the cold surface beneath him. Max blinked rapidly, trying to adjust to his surroundings.

He was in a long hallway, dimly lit by flickering torches. Guards in plain, unremarkable uniforms stood at every door along the walls, their eyes fixed forward. They didn't seem bothered by Max's sudden arrival.

Out of nowhere, a voice boomed, breaking the eerie silence.

"Well, well! The ol' surprise portal drop! Gets a new guy every time!"

Max turned to see a man shuffle toward him, an older figure with a balding head and a half-smoked cigarette dangling from his lips. His face was weathered, but his smile was easy, despite the grime that clung to him.

"Welcome to the dungeons, Max! I'm Gerry, and I'll be your guide."

Max stood up, brushing himself off, still catching his breath from the unexpected fall.

"That scared the crap outta me."

"You'll get used to it." Gerry chuckled. "And that was the easy part. The real fun's inside the dungeon."

"I hope not. I'm only in an F rank," Max said, his voice flat. The words barely carried through the still air.

"So? Fun's to be had anywhere," Gerry replied, his tone light, though there was a hint of something else there—perhaps a knowing smile hiding behind his cigarette. He took another drag, exhaling the smoke slowly, as if savoring the moment. "F rank's gonna be a little challenging for you... no offense."

Max glanced sideways at Gerry, trying to meet his eyes but finding himself caught in the haze of smoke. "I know... I'm trying to improve," he muttered. 

"That's the only thing we can do. Get a little better every day," Gerry said, starting to walk ahead, his boots making a rhythmic thud against the floor. Max followed, the silence between them not uncomfortable, but filled with the unsaid.

"I try, but sometimes I feel like I hit a wall," Max's words were quiet, barely above a whisper, as though saying them out loud would somehow make it more real.

Gerry chuckled softly, shaking his head as he continued walking. "Heh, you sound like the rest of 'em. Everyone hits a wall eventually." He paused, glancing back at Max. "But here's the thing—it ain't about how hard the wall is. It's about how many times you can smack your face into it and still get up. The real trick's just keepin' at it, even when it feels like you're goin' nowhere."

Max's jaw tightened, frustration bubbling up again. "Easy for you. You have to at least be an A rank."

Gerry stopped walking for a second, letting the cigarette hang loosely from his lips. He gave a short chuckle before shaking his head. "A rank, huh? That's just a title, kid. Doesn't mean you don't hit walls. You know what makes the difference? It ain't the rank. It's what you do when you're stuck. When your body's tired, when your head's sayin' 'just quit,' and you keep goin' anyway."

Max let the words settle in, but it was hard to fully believe them. The exhaustion, the constant pressure—it all felt so real. He muttered, "That's what I've been doing... and still, I feel stuck."

Gerry exhaled slowly, the smoke drifting into the air like his thoughts. "That's 'cause you're not a high rank. You're still young, so you got time."

'I don't have a lot of time with everything coming… 'The weight of the future pressed against his chest, heavy and suffocating.

"Guess I do..." Max said, his voice betraying a quiet bitterness that didn't quite match the words.

Gerry, seeming to sense the shift in the air, turned to him, a soft smirk on his face. "See? What I always say is... it's okay to take some time for yourself. Have a rest, y'know? Can't always go at it full throttle."

"I'll try," Max said, his voice quieter, unsure if it was a promise or just an acknowledgment.

Gerry clapped him on the shoulder, his tone light but warm. "Hey, if nothing else, you've made it this far."

Max didn't respond. There was no need. The words hung in the air between them, simple but heavy with meaning.

…

"Thing 1 and Thing 2. I've returned with a client," Gerry called out with a grin, his voice carrying through the air like he was addressing a crowd rather than the two stone-faced guards standing sentinel by the gate.

The guards didn't move an inch. Their eyes remained fixed ahead, expressions as impassive as statues.

Gerry chuckled, shaking his head with a playful roll of his eyes. "I'll get a response outta you guys someday... someday," he muttered under his breath, though Max could tell it was more of an inside joke with himself.

He looked back at Max with a smirk, as if sharing some kind of secret. "Don't mind 'em. They're about as talkative as that wall you talk about," Gerry said, jerking his head toward the silent guards.

Max raised an eyebrow. "Seem like it. Like British guards," he remarked with a hint of humor in his voice.

Gerry glanced sideways at him, an amused look flickering across his face. He paused, then raised an eyebrow in mock confusion. "British guards? Britain hasn't been a thing for forever."

Max blinked, suddenly feeling self-conscious. "My bad…" He rubbed the back of his neck, sheepish.

"Uh… yeah, sure, your bad," Gerry replied with a chuckle, clearly not bothered by the slip. He turned his attention back to the portal as his card slid through the scanner, the device making a soft beep before the shimmering gateway flickered to life.

The portal opened with a low hum, and Gerry stepped aside to let Max through.

Before Max could step forward, Gerry handed him a small, sleek button. "Here," he said, holding it out. "Emergency call button. If you run into something that's too much for you, just hit this. The guards—well, probably me, honestly—will come runnin'. But just a heads-up, it'll cost you. Don't go pressin' it willy nilly."

Max nodded, feeling the weight of the button in his hand. It was small, but the implications of it were heavy. "Thanks, Gerry," he said, his voice a little shaky, though he tried his best to hide it. "Wish me luck."

Gerry gave him a wide grin and a theatrical flourish. "I wish thee luck in thy aventure into thy dungeon," he said in a grand, exaggerated tone, stretching out his words like an actor playing a part.

Max raised an eyebrow, caught off guard by the sudden shift, but he quickly played along, dipping into a dramatic bow. "I thank thee for thy kinship," he said, his voice deep and formal, a playful glint in his eyes.

Gerry burst into laughter, clearly enjoying the exchange, and gave Max a small salute. "Break a leg, kid," he said, his tone shifting back to something a little more grounded, but still with a warm, almost fatherly undertone.

Max stood up straight, his heart thudding in his chest as he took one last deep breath. He could feel the weight of what was coming—the dungeon, the monsters, everything that was about to unfold. But he wasn't about to back out now.

With a quick nod to Gerry, he stepped through the portal, the shimmering light swallowing him up as the world around him faded away.

Max blinked as his eyes adjusted to the harsh, glaring sunlight. The air was dry, thick with the scent of dust and decay. As he surveyed his surroundings, he realized he was standing in a vast desert. But unlike any desert he had seen before, the sand here was a deep, crimson red, as if it had soaked up the blood of countless battles over the centuries. The ground was scarred with uneven, jagged cracks, like deep wounds that had never healed.

The horizon stretched endlessly, a sea of desolate dunes, with no sign of life except for the occasional gust of wind that swept the sand into shifting patterns, creating temporary landscapes that were as fleeting as the thought of safety in this place.

Max couldn't help but feel a chill creep down his spine as the weight of the environment settled in. There were no plants, no signs of water—no hint of survival beyond the brutal, arid expanse. This place was inhospitable, a battlefield frozen in time, and everything here seemed to whisper of violence and death.

'Well, I kinda expected this,' Max thought, his gaze drifting over the sand, now noticing the scattered remnants of what might've been bones—human or monster, it was hard to tell. He tightened his grip on his dagger, his thoughts sharpening like the edge of his weapon. 'No vegetation, no food, no water... just monsters waiting to tear me apart. Great.'