The forest was silent again.
A heavy, suffocating silence.
Around me, bodies lay motionless in the wet grass. Their empty eyes stared at the sky, their hands frozen mid-gesture. The air smelled of blood and ash.
The few survivors who remained stood still, too afraid to speak.
I clenched my fists, my throat burning. Anger was the only thing keeping me upright.
— "Why… why are you doing this to us?!" I shouted.
No answer.
Only the echo of my voice bouncing back between the trees — cold, hollow, mocking.
Some of the others started whispering.
— "Maybe it's over…"
— "Didn't the voice say we passed?"
But I knew better.
The Game never really ended. It just changed its shape.
After a while, when nothing else happened, we finally decided to go back.
Rayer and the other participants went their separate ways, silent, still haunted by what they'd seen.
When he got home, Rayer sighed deeply. The house felt colder than usual.
Suddenly, an old phone attached to the wall began to ring.
A device he had never seen working before.
He hesitated, then picked it up.
— "Hello?"
A familiar voice answered.
It was his mother.
— "Rayer, my son… how was your first week?"
He froze for a second.
— "It… it went well," he replied uncertainly.
They talked for a few minutes, like nothing was wrong. Then he hung up, feeling strangely heavy.
Days passed.
Nothing strange happened. The villagers acted as if nothing had ever occurred.
But Rayer couldn't shake the feeling. He knew it wasn't over.
And he was right.
Sunday came.
And, just as he expected, someone knocked on his door.
This time, he didn't resist. He followed the same shadowy figures through the night.
But the path was different.
Instead of the forest, they reached a vast circular room.
Ten giant doors stood in front of them.
A deep, mechanical voice echoed through the chamber:
— "Welcome to the second trial. Four doors are safe. The other six… will kill you."
Rayer froze, his heart racing.
— "All doors will open for ten seconds. Watch carefully… then the room will spin. You must choose."
The sound of gears grinding filled the air.
All ten doors burst open at once, revealing corridors of darkness, flashes of light, and strange moving shadows.
Ten seconds.
Then everything closed again.
The ground began to shake. The entire room spun violently, blurring the walls until there was no way to tell one door from another.
— "Ten seconds to choose," the voice commanded.
Rayer's chest tightened.
He thought about everything that had happened, everyone he had lost.
Then his eyes fell on Door Number Six.
Without thinking, he ran to it.
His hand met the freezing metal handle.
What if it's the wrong one?
What if I die?
He took a deep breath.
And stepped through.