Darkness
After accepting his first Trial, what Will encountered was darkness. And not the kind one gets used to over time. No, this darkness was absolute--an all-consuming void that disoriented his senses and left his thoughts suspended in limbo. This wasn't mentioned in the novel at all. In the story, after the protagonist Arthur accepts the trial, he is directly transported into his Trial Ground--no intermediate phase, no mysterious void.
"So what exactly is this darkness? Is this part of my trial?"
"No… If that were the case, the Records would have already issued the objective. But there's been nothing... not even a whisper."
Confused, and with no clear direction, Will chose to wait--perhaps the only reasonable choice he had left in this unknown, empty space. As his mind began spiraling toward the enormity of his situation, he started to reflect. This world--the world of the novel he was now inexplicably trapped within--operated under the absolute, omnipotent system known as The Akashic Records. In simpler terms, Only One Way to Survive could be considered a type of LitRPG novel… but now that it had become his reality, it felt anything but simple.
The novel was built upon the backbone of a power fantasy--characters grew stronger by enduring and surviving the life-threatening trials constructed by the Akashic Records.
No one truly understood how the Trials functioned--or even how the Records themselves operated. And those rare beings who did have knowledge about it were far removed from the world of mortals. Worse still, not everyone had the capacity to endure the truth behind the Records.
Still, within the Nine Realms, most scholars and theorists held one prevailing hypothesis: that Trials were either forms of hyperreal simulations or alternate realities--crafted directly from the whims and imagination of the Akashic Records themselves.
But no one truly knew… because the Records do not think like mortals.
Regardless, one thing was certain: Trials become exponentially harder the higher you climb. It was a well-known, straight upward graph of difficulty. The first trial, however, was supposed to be the easiest--so easy, in fact, that ninety-nine out of a hundred candidates managed to survive it.
Unless, of course, you were someone like Arthur Lightbringer.
Arthur, who had divine blessings due to his unwanted faith, also suffered greater misfortunes as a result. His Trials were said to be nightmarish. But for ordinary people? The first trial could be as simple as surviving a week on only water--or counting from one to a thousand without breaking concentration.
That's why Will had accepted the trial without hesitation.
But now, after what felt like an eternity of floating in this void--unable to move, to think clearly, or to act--he was beginning to suspect that he might've made a mistake. Perhaps a fatal one.
After all… is it not better to be eaten alive by voidlings than to be swallowed by an endless, silent emptiness that consumes your soul from within?
It was at that moment--as though the Records had been reading his thoughts, as if they truly could peer directly into the folds of his consciousness--that the endless blackness surrounding him began to dissolve. Light began to pierce through the abyss, like distant rays of a dawn yet to come.
And then, like a passenger stepping onto a train platform, Will felt himself being pulled forward--toward his Trial Ground.
Without turning back, he stepped onto the path ahead, though a lingering sensation remained--like someone's gaze was trailing behind him, watching silently from the shadows.
As always, the first thing that greeted Will was darkness.
But this time, the darkness wasn't absolute. It was… gentler. The kind of soft twilight that exists just before sunrise. It was more of a veil than a void.
Before he could fully take in his surroundings, a chime sounded in his mind--a un familiar mechanical twinkle--and the voice of the Records declared:
---
> [Welcome, William Ironheart. Prepare for your First Trial.]
Objective: Leave the City of Yharnam before the arrival of the Lost King.
Time Remaining: Three days.
---
The very first thing Will noticed wasn't the objective… but the name.
William Ironheart.
It was now confirmed--without question. He had been transmigrated into another world. And his new body? It belonged to someone called William Ironheart. That name, while not a major character, had appeared a few times in the novel. Occasionally. In passing. But it was enough--enough to give Will a small shred of comfort, some sliver of direction in this overwhelming unknown. Perhaps knowing a bit about the original identity would help him navigate the events ahead.
But first--before anything else--he had to survive this trial.
Like a dim ember slowly catching flame, his consciousness began fully syncing with his new body. At the same time, his surroundings started to become more visible.
The cold hit him first.
It was a biting, numbing cold that seemed to coil around his bones. A suffocating chill that drained warmth and life from the air. Around him was a thick, toxic fog--murky and polluted--clinging to the ground like rot. It felt like the heavy mist of a cursed morning, where the air itself refused to move.
Will could barely see ten meters ahead. His breath came out in thin wisps, and he could feel his body shivering uncontrollably.
He was lying at the edge of a crumbling stone road--its once-proud architecture now weathered and worn down by time and neglect, reduced to little more than a dirt path. His clothes were in tatters--made from material meant to protect against the cold, but now so worn-out that they were practically useless.
And then it hit him.
The moment he accepted the Trial, the Records had instantly extracted his spirit and consciousness from his original body. That's why, in that void, he had been able to think so clearly--without emotion, like a machine. But now? Now he was inside a new body. And this one felt everything.
The fear. The helplessness. The slow, creeping panic of finding yourself in a situation where you have no control, no power, no answers.
> "I should move. I need to find a way out of here…"
He knew that staying in one place, exposed, wasn't wise. He needed to look for his objective. Clues. Anything. But despite the growing urgency, his body refused to listen. He remained where he was--knees pulled to his chest, trembling, staring blankly at a flickering gaslamp nailed to the side of a nearby building.
Time passed.
He didn't know how long.
Eventually, he noticed movement--people walking down the street. Figures clothed in old-fashioned garments, dark and faded in color, moved past him without paying him any mind.
That moment snapped him out of his trance.
Coming to terms with the terrifying reality of his situation, Will took a deep breath and slowly rose to his feet, steadying himself against the cold stone wall beside him.
His objective was clear: Escape the city before the arrival of the Lost King.
And yet, even knowing this was his first trial, he couldn't shake the uneasiness from his chest. They said in the Nine Realms that the first trial was easier than squashing a mosquito. But in his heart… he had a strange, irrational feeling.
> "What if… the mosquito turns out to be the hardest thing to kill?"
He didn't know it at the time… but he was absolutely right.