SSEI | Chapter 1.3

“Oh, that? That was the system announcement. If you reach the designated Evening area safely before the first phase, Daytime, ends, you’ll hear that message. On the other hand, if you don’t reach the Evening area before Daytime ends… you die.”

“Wait. Hold on a second. This is—uh. Did I miss some kind of crucial explanation somewhere?”

“Nope, you didn’t. Anyway, the wasteland is a Daytime zone, and this forest we just entered is an Evening zone. Oh, and even if you try to enter an Evening zone too early, it won’t let you in—there’s no ‘space’ for you until the right time. We arrived at just the right moment, so it worked out.”

Lork’s thorough explanation was… appreciated. But from the moment he started saying words like “system announcement,” Yuan had already stopped understanding anything.

This whole thing was insane.

Was time supposed to work like this? Did different locations actually determine the passage of time? The sky had darkened the moment they set foot in the forest—was that because this place was categorized as “Evening”? And if the wasteland was a “Daytime” zone, did that mean Nighttime just straight-up didn’t exist there?

He had no clue.

All he knew was that everything about this went against every single fundamental instinct he had about reality.

“Uhh… umm… uhhhhh?”

“Wow. Yuan, that was possibly the dumbest noise I’ve ever heard come out of someone’s mouth.”

“Well, that’s because I am an idiot right now. I literally understood nothing from that explanation.”

“You’re getting stuck already? Oh, man… I have no idea where to even start explaining to someone with no memories. There’s a ton of important stuff to cover, and you don’t know any of it…”

Lork groaned in frustration.

Yuan felt a little bad, but it wasn’t like losing his memories was his fault. The best he could do now was try to process whatever the boy was telling him.

But before he even had a chance to wrap his head around any of it—

—he realized he didn’t have time for this.

“W-Wait… why is this…?” Lork’s voice suddenly cut in and out, distorted by heavy static. His speaker crackled violently, the interference getting worse by the second.

Even Lork himself sounded alarmed.

Something was wrong.

Yuan didn’t need an explanation to figure that out.

Instinctively, he turned his gaze toward the darkening forest, scanning his surroundings.

And then—

He saw it.

Something moved between the trees.

Fast.

Big.

Too large to be an animal. Too quick to have been a trick of the eyes.

Even someone like Yuan—who had zero experience in combat—could feel the hostility radiating from that presence. It wasn’t just paranoia.

Whoever—whatever—that thing was, it had deliberately damaged Lork’s speaker.

And more than anything—

He saw them.

Glinting under the dimming sunlight, flashing crimson through the gaps in the foliage.

Red blades.

“—RUN. RUN NOW!!” Lork’s voice screamed through the distorted static, raw with urgency.

Yuan didn’t need to be told twice.

He bolted.

Straight ahead, down the uneven, winding forest path.

***

With his right hand raised high in the air—its writhing tentacles thrashing violently—Yuan sprinted frantically down the forest path.

He had no clue how to use a weapon, but thankfully, the tentacles seemed to know what they were doing. Every time a faint silhouette flitted past in the distance, the tentacles aimed and fired, sending bursts of colorful energy shooting through the trees. Every explosion sent leaves and branches cascading down, and each time, the silhouette seemed to retreat just a little.

“…D-Don’t… overuse it… later…!”

He thought he vaguely heard someone warning him not to overdo it, that it’d come back to bite him later. But Yuan had no other choice. That thing chasing them was just too fast. If he didn’t suppress it with a barrage of laser fire, it would catch up to him in an instant.

“Help! Somebody help! Hey, can’t we just talk this out first?!”

Yeah, he knew it was pretty ridiculous to say that while he was the one firing lasers everywhere. Still, Yuan was dead serious. He was attacking out of sheer panic, but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t prefer to solve things peacefully—if that was even an option.

It wasn’t.

The pursuer didn’t even consider a conversation. They would pull back slightly whenever a laser was fired, but the moment the tentacles hesitated—even for a second—they would immediately close the distance and swing their blade.

A crimson blade, sharp and curved like a beast’s claw, slashed through the air. A glowing crescent of energy shot toward Yuan. He barely managed to dodge, but as he stumbled past, the edges of a tree branch that had been grazed by the attack fell to the ground in complete silence.

‘Wait, they’ve got a laser blade?! Man, why couldn’t I get something that cool…? Then again, I probably wouldn’t be able to use it anyway.’

Right as he was grumbling about his weapon choices in the middle of a life-or-death chase, disaster struck.

THUD.

With a heavy crash, several massive trees began to tilt, slowly toppling over toward the path ahead.

For a brief moment, Yuan had been relieved that his enemy wasn’t particularly accurate with their attacks. But now he realized—that hadn’t been the point. They hadn’t been aiming for him. They had been cutting down trees to block his escape.

There was no way he could outrun a falling tree. The second he hesitated, his body froze up.

Then, from behind him, Lork shouted.

“I’ll… do something… You just… run…!”

Was he saying he’d handle it somehow? Yuan barely had time to process it when suddenly, a bizarre sensation shot through his entire body.

It was a jarring, disorienting feeling—like the world around him had suddenly stopped making sense.

Sweat dripped into his eyes. He blinked.

And in that instant, he realized something terrifying—he was way closer to the fallen tree than he had thought.

His foot barely hit the ground before he was already past it.

His movements weren’t matching reality.

The moment he thought about reaching a spot, his body was already there—as if the whole process of running had been completely skipped.

Somehow, this feeling was familiar.

Back when he had first escaped from the wasteland and entered the forest, hadn’t it been the same? He had been far from the treeline, and yet, in the blink of an eye, the forest had been right in front of him.

As he lifted his head to make sense of it all, he realized something else—he had already crossed over the fallen trees and was now heading up a mountain path.

‘Was that Lork’s doing?’

Now that he thought about it, Lork had said something about getting some kind of organic survival weapon. This must’ve been its effect.

Yuan was still confused, but there was one thing he was absolutely sure of—this bizarre “skipping” was helping him a lot.

If he could keep moving like this, there was no way the pursuer could catch him. No matter how fast they were, if he could bend causality and force time forward, then he had an undeniable advantage.

…That is, as long as he could keep moving.

‘Huh?’

Yuan’s next step never landed.

His feet felt glued to the ground.

He couldn’t move.

It wasn’t exhaustion—his body wasn’t that drained yet. But his legs felt stiff, foreign, as if they no longer belonged to him. A deep, unnatural sensation locked him in place.

“Why did you suddenly…? Yuan, don’t tell me—!”

Lork looked genuinely flustered, as if this was completely unexpected for him. Yuan, still gasping for breath in a daze, suddenly heard a chilling voice from beyond the forest.

“I was wondering how you got here so fast… A ‘Procedure-Skipping Weapon,’ is it, Lork? If it’s at that level, then sacrificing your body must have been worth it.”

A stranger’s voice came from behind. It was monotonous, devoid of emotion, yet precisely because of that, it carried a heavy weight, an overwhelming low whisper that sent a shiver down the spine.

The moment Yuan heard it, he instinctively understood—his escape had been meaningless. He had already been caught, and running any further was pointless.

A sharp, invisible blade seemed to press against him, sending a chill down his back. He felt so small in the presence of that voice that he didn’t even dare to resist. He inhaled sharply, his hands twitching upward as if to surrender—but then he remembered the state of his right hand. Instead, he simply bowed his head in silence.

“Damn, guess my luck is just terrible. Of all people, my first encounter had to be you? Seriously, what’s the point of running at this rate…”

Lork, rather than urging him to escape further, responded in a resigned tone. The burning static that had been in his voice earlier had faded away.

“Maybe you’ll be luckier in the second battle. How about I make you an offer, Lork? Tell me where and how you got that weapon, and I won’t kill you or that white one over there.”

“White one”? Did he mean Yuan? Yuan vaguely assumed so as he carefully listened to the conversation. These two definitely knew each other. And considering how aggressively they had been fighting, it was a bit surprising that the other guy was even offering to let them live. That was… sort of a relief, right?

But Lork didn’t seem thrilled about the offer.

“What’s the point of clinging to life in a place like this? Idiot.”

“L-Lork…?”

“What about your partner? You just threw them into some toxic lake again this time, huh? Didn’t kill them, but close enough?”

…What the hell? So this wasn’t just an offer to let them go in exchange for information? Yuan blinked in confusion as Lork’s words finally sank in.

Now that he thought about it, the guy behind them was alone. If this “game” was supposed to be team-based combat, then…

If what Lork said was true, that meant this guy had deliberately gotten rid of his own partner.

A shudder ran down Yuan’s spine. Just as that thought chilled him, the boy behind him finally spoke.

“Forget it. I’m not the kind of bastard who’d sell out my own. And besides, this white kid, it’s his first time. I’d rather not let him go through that. If it’s between that and dying, just kill me.”

Wait—what?! Yuan nearly jumped but was immediately paralyzed by fear. What kind of situation were they even in, for death to be the better option? And what kind of monster was this guy behind them, to be capable of something so unspeakable…?

Before Yuan could even ask, the man behind him moved.

“So, negotiations have failed. Understood.”

A dull thud rang out, followed by the sound of something bursting.

The backpack Yuan had been carrying suddenly became lighter, its contents spilling out all at once.

A hot, sticky liquid splattered onto his back, his neck, and his shoulders.

Revulsion hit him like a brick.

Lowering his gaze, all he could see was a small pool of blood, spreading slowly across the ground.

—

“Uh… Agh. Aaaah…”

The only sound escaping Yuan’s throat was the same garbled voice that Lork had laughed at earlier, calling it stupid.

But now, there was no one left to mock him for it.

Struggling to steady his trembling body, Yuan cautiously turned around. A moment ago, his feet had felt like they were buried in the ground, refusing to budge—but now, they moved without trouble.

Because his head was still lowered, the first thing that entered his vision wasn’t the attacker—it was the victim.

A small boy.

His head had been split clean in half. If one dared to look closely, they could see every detail of the cross-section.

That grotesque left hand—so unnatural, so unsettling, the one that had once acted as his legs—now dangled limply, not even twitching.

There was no way he could still be alive.