I close my eyes and think. What great sin did I, as an existence, commit to have fallen into the dystopian universe of Project Moon...
I think about what I was doing before I came here, and whether that constitutes a crime.....
And why I am suffering like this.... Rummaging through my memories, I recalled what I had been doing just before I fell into this place....
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I'm the type to set a daily routine and stick to it. And today, I was running Mirror Dungeons again.
For reference, Mirror Dungeons are a roguelike content within Limbus Company.
I like these Mirror Dungeons so much that at some point, I ended up earning the title 'Mirror Demon'.
Of course, I am not a Mirror Demon. Even if I run Mirror Dungeons about 100 times a day, I don't consider myself a Mirror Demon, and with that thought, I was running them again today.
And after running Mirror Dungeons about 100 times daily, I slowly started to turn my eyes to other games.
Robotomy Corporation, Library of Ruina, and the Project Moon games I had put off because they were too hard to clear until now. Finally feeling motivated, I started with Robotomy Corporation.
After somehow managing to clear The Endless White and The Black Silence, I reached the ending soon after. Watching L Corp crumble before my eyes, I finally managed to get All S-Ranks in every cycle.
Riding this momentum, I entered LoR and, after performing the final Reception (the Head), I saw all the endings.
Next, I waited for the download of the game that caught my interest: Hoyoverse's Zenless Zone Zero, commonly known as 'ZZZ'. Perhaps because I had been gaming non-stop in my room for so long, my throat became parched. Seeking water to quench my thirst, I opened the refrigerator door,
but there was nothing inside. So I went on a rare expedition to the convenience store. After successfully buying cola, water, various late-night snacks and treats, I was on my way back. I entered a dark alley, one of the quickest routes home.
If only I hadn't entered this alley then... No... If only I hadn't gone out and just ordered delivery instead, I wouldn't have ended up like I am now...
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It was a dark evening. No, to be precise, it was around 3:20 AM, closer to dawn.
As I walked through the alley, I felt something strange.
The further I walked, a nauseating, fishy smell of iron wafted from my surroundings. Because it was dark, I began to feel scared of this alley, and at that moment, a phenomenon that seemed to distort space itself appeared before my eyes. As various parts of my surroundings began to change, my eyes hurt, so I closed them. When I opened them again, what I saw was...
An alley even darker than before.
And everywhere, instead of the buildings that should have been in the alley, there were countless structures that looked like unauthorized constructions. The fishy smell of blood that had been wafting since earlier was now intensifying enough to sting my nose.
The fear emanating from the empty surroundings gradually began to bind me. As I was becoming terrified, I realized a sound was coming from somewhere.
- ..!!...!!!-~-!!
- Wh...Who is it?? Is...Is it a person??
Frantically wanting to escape this terror, to leave this place,
I ran towards the source of the sound. Seeing a human figure there,
I hurriedly chased after that figure, but the closer I got, the more I felt that something was wrong and amiss.
The closer I got to the figure, the more the fishy iron smell... no, the smell of blood, vividly and horrifyingly, saturated the entire alley. I could also discern the true nature of the sound that had been faintly audible since earlier.
- Crunch!!!..C-Crunch!!....S-Squelch!!!!
The sound that had been faintly audible from the alley, when heard up close, was unmistakably the sound of someone being killed. The monster before me was the source of that sound, and I realized the scent of blood that had been permeating the alley was their creation.
Soon after, I could discern the identity of that existence, and another individual turned to look at me. Seeing the form of the other monster, I could be sure....
- What the... that... that's... Project Moon's 'Sweepers', isn't it?... Why are they here...
The monsters, the 'Sweepers', each had different appearances: gas masks, diving suit helmets, or heads reminiscent of machinery. They all shared full-body protective suits, bandages wrapped around their arms and legs, and carried red hooks or wore attached fuel tanks filled with red liquid on their suits.
Soon, they became aware of my presence one by one, and all of them simultaneously began to stare at me silently.
- """ ....!@%5#@3&!&!127!*9@%&*!17(#34#7@!290!!!!!!!!!!!! """
Immediately after, they let out a scream upon seeing me and rushed at me like a wave.
Watching this, I quickly started to run away to survive, to escape from the horde of Sweepers swarming towards me.
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Having escaped the Sweepers, I ran desperately to survive.
I ran to avoid death, to go back..... I ran and ran.
You know the saying, "A comedy from afar, a tragedy up close"??
I was now fully understanding what that meant...
From afar, it might just be an interesting play or spectacle,
but when it becomes reality and approaches you, it's nothing but a tragedy.
I kept running. To avoid death, to avoid becoming fuel for those creatures.
I ran incessantly, even when exhausted, I ran with all my might until I was on the verge of death.
But I was an ordinary human. I hadn't undergone any physical enhancement procedures, nor did I have any prosthetic limbs. I was just an utterly ordinary, common person, so my body was gradually pushed to its limit.
The Sweepers, seeing my exhaustion, excitedly rushed at me, frantically charging to turn my flesh
into fuel. With all strength drained from my body, I watched the horde of Sweepers approaching from my spot...
- Don't come!!! Don't come closer!!
I shouted 'Don't come closer!!', but my words were trampled and vanished before the horde.
I was eventually being turned into their fuel....
- Grind!!! Squelch!!!!
- It hurts!! It hurts!!! Stop!! Stop it!!
They cruelly tore my limbs apart and struck me down numerous times with their scythe-like weapons.
As my body was torn apart and I writhed in pain, I...
- Mmph!!!! Ugh!!!!!
had my mouth covered by a Sweeper's hand, and they groped my still-living entrails before...
- Rip!!!!
dismembering them shortly after. Even in the midst of this, I tried to crawl away, but...
- Crunch!!!!
I was stopped by a Sweeper's downward strike to my head. With my brain crushed, I died on the spot....
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My head was crushed and shattered by a Sweeper's scythe strike. In my hazy consciousness, I was waking up.
My body feels heavy... It feels like waking from a deep sleep, but something was holding me back. Suddenly feeling suffocated, I flailed desperately, finally managed to open my eyes, and climbed towards where I could see light, grabbing onto whatever was within reach. A sound like 'Shoosh!!' echoed, reminiscent of emerging from water.
Gasping for air, I breathed heavily, trying to calm down. When I slowly opened my eyes, what I saw was.....
A scene that seemed to depict a 'Mountain of Corpses and a Sea of Blood' unfolding before me. No, the spectacle filling my vision was exactly that.
As I struggled to catch my breath, each gasp felt like I was swallowing blood, accompanied by the overwhelming, vibrating stench of blood and rotting corpses assaulting my nose.
But right now, this spectacle didn't seem scary. I was more curious about how I had survived... Perhaps, having experienced that scene and died before, my mind was broken to the point where this didn't appear frightening.
Soaked in blood, I wandered around this place filled with nothing but corpses and blood.
Then, I saw a figure eating something on top of a giant monster carcass in the distance. Trying to avoid a repeat of the previous incident, I cautiously tried to move away, but....
- ...Huh..??
I blinked, and when I opened my eyes, what I saw was
- You... what are you?? How... did you get here??...
The being standing before me, who didn't even feel human, was asking me how I got here.
To that question, I said I didn't know. The being stared at me silently, then sniffed the air.
Soon after, I finally reached my limit and collapsed...
- Thud!!
Seeing this, the being looked at me with surprise. Moments later, I opened my eyes again.....
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For reference, all the events that happened here on this day became the greatest turning point in my life.
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- Ugh.... hmm....
My eyes won't open properly... It feels like someone is blocking my vision. So I pushed away whatever was covering my eyes, and what I saw was...
- Hmm.... It seems you've finally come to your senses...
The being before me, whom I hadn't properly recognized at first—or perhaps shouldn't have recognized—exuded an aura not of that overwhelming energy, but rather like a [ God ].
And so I asked the being before me if it was a [ God ]...
- Excuse me.... Are you... perhaps... a [ God ]..?
But to the question of whether it was a [ God ], the being warned me sternly not to call it that.
- Don't call me [ God ]... It's blasphemy..... If you must call me something, call me [ The Great One ]...
Hearing this, for reasons I didn't understand, I complied with [ The Great One ]'s words and refrained from calling it [ God ]. Then, it immediately got to the main point.
- Right... Let me ask you again... How did you get here?
Hearing this, I explained the circumstances of how I ended up here as if pouring out my resentment. After hearing everything, [ The Great One ] apologized.
- I'm sorry... It seems you were caught up in an incident on our end....
The reason [ The Great One ] apologized here was that one of [ The Great Ones ], named 'Agat', was disposing of useless and pointless dimensions and occasionally made mistakes, causing distortions in other normal dimensions. I had been caught in one such distortion. The probability of ending up in another dimension—that is, another world—through this distortion was like scattering a spoonful of sugar in a desert and then perfectly retrieving each and every sugar grain intact. Hearing this, I...
- Impossible.... Isn't it??
was dumbfounded. I had literally succeeded in moving to another dimension through a miracle... It said there had been several other cases besides me, but I was the first person it had seen who crossed over with their body completely intact.
Since things had turned out this way, and as an apology, it offered to grant me a special privilege. To that, I nodded my head vigorously in agreement. Then, I started thinking about how I would receive the abilities and what I should choose, but..
- Ptui.
- Huh..?? What are you....( Plunge!!!! ) Gaghh!!!!!
Suddenly, [ The Great One ] grabbed my head, plunged its finger directly into my brain, and started injecting something, sloshing it around.
- Glug glug glug... Glurgle glurgle glurgle... Gurgle gurgle
- Let's see... What I can give you is... [ Transcendent Body ], [ Limit Break ], and [ Immortality ]... And what else I can give... [ Egoist ], [ Indomitable ], [ Madness ]... and finally, [ Adaptation ]!
But due to the pain I felt during this process of receiving the privileges, I was foaming at the mouth and passing out.
- With this, you won't die easily anywhere.
Then, [ The Great One ] bid me farewell, gave a status window and inventory to my unconscious self, and to send me back to my original place, it shoved me into the sea of blood, expelling me from this hell, sending my soul and spirit back to where my physical body was.
Meanwhile, my physical body... was slowly dying, being turned into fuel by the Sweepers, but.....
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My physical body suddenly stopped becoming fuel. Thanks to the 'Immortality' from [ Immortality ] and the privileges, I revived, grabbed a Sweeper's head and exploded it, starting to rampage. Thus, I would survive without dying.....
Having been fated to die but completely escaping destiny thanks to [ The Great One ]'s help and the special privileges, when I opened my eyes, all I could see was a devastated ruin around me.