SeTa sat on the cold metal floor for a moment longer than he intended.
The illusion's aftertaste still lingered in his chest—a copper tang of forgotten guilt and unreal grief. He flexed his fingers. They still trembled, just a little.
> [Floor 0: Completed.]
[Stair Access Unlocked.]
A new prompt hovered quietly in front of him, clean and unthreatening.
He rose.
The corridor around him shifted—walls folding away, smooth metal dissolving into jagged, broken stone. Somewhere above, ancient gears turned. The air thickened with dust and cold, as if time itself had exhaled.
A staircase unfurled ahead. Endless. Spiral. Dripping with black condensation.
It didn't feel like victory.
He ascended.
Each step echoed with a hollow clang, swallowed too quickly by the darkness above. As he climbed, new lines of text burned into his mind, this time not from the system—but from something else.
> [Observation Mode: Active.]
[Subject SeTa-01: Deviation Detected.]
[Memory Collapse: Unauthorized Use at Stage Zero.]
[Administrative Review Pending.]
He paused mid-step. "Admin?" he whispered.
The Tower didn't answer.
Only the silence did—and something in it felt interested.
---
The first floor was not what he expected.
Not another room. Not another mirror. Not even a defined space.
It was… fog.
A wide, endless terrain of dense ash-gray mist. Soundless. Shapeless. Cold.
He stepped forward, but his foot didn't find ground.
It found memory.
He gasped as the floor shifted into the old bedroom from his childhood—exactly as it had been the night he ran away.
"Not this again," he muttered. "Another illusion?"
> [Challenge 1F: Trace the Scar.]
[Find the Origin of the Weakness You've Forgotten.]
His breath caught.
This wasn't another guilt loop. This wasn't confrontation.
This was recovery.
"Trace the scar…" he echoed, stepping into the familiar room. He touched the edge of the torn curtain, still stained with the coffee spill from years ago. The bunk bed. The creaky floorboard. All real. Too real.
> "You shouldn't be here," a voice whispered.
He froze.
A silhouette stood by the window.
This one wasn't him.
It was her.
The scream from before. The voice that cried out during the mirror trial. The presence that shouldn't have been in Floor 0.
And now she was here.
She wore a tattered academy uniform, soaked in shadow, skin pale like she hadn't seen sunlight in years. Her eyes were wild—both terrified and aware.
"You heard me," she said, stepping into the room.
"How?" SeTa demanded. "That wasn't part of the trial."
"It wasn't," she answered simply. "You heard me anyway. You reached into a place you weren't supposed to go."
SeTa's fists clenched. "Who are you?"
She tilted her head. "Someone who failed."
The words struck harder than they should've.
> [Unknown Presence Detected.]
[Initiating Error Purge.]
The system's voice screamed across the room like a klaxon, and suddenly, the walls ignited in digital flame. Code unraveled around them.
"No—no no no—!" the girl shouted. "I just wanted someone to remember me—!"
SeTa lunged forward, trying to reach her, but she was already fading. The memory room collapsed into fragments, swallowed by crimson errors and flashing system glyphs.
> [Challenge Interrupted.]
[System Purge Initiated.]
[Redirecting Subject.]
SeTa hit the ground hard.
Not floor.
Not memory.
Something else.
Stone. Carved, circular. A massive platform suspended in the sky.
Above him: the first true layer of the Tower.
Far below: the mist-covered wreckage of Floor 0.
The girl was gone.
But not forgotten.
And now?
Now the Tower was paying attention.
---
> [Welcome to Floor One.]
[New Trial Available: The Game of Voices.]
[Warning: You are now a Deviant.]
[Expect Interference.]
SeTa stood, brushing blood from his temple, a grin twitching at the corner of his mouth.
"Bring it."