After dying by being brutally torn apart by wolves—again—Gideon had, as usual, expected to wake up beneath the silent vaulted ceiling of the cathedral in Inizio. A little dazed, maybe missing a few memories of how he got mauled this time, but nothing out of the ordinary.
That was just the routine. For NPCs like him, death wasn't some big dramatic finale. It was more like hitting a reset button. Get shredded, respawn, dust off the trauma, and return to standing around pretending to be helpful.
But the moment he opened his eyes, something was off.
It wasn't the cold marble floor of the cathedral beneath him. There was no soft light filtering through stained glass. No eerie stillness that echoed with too much space and not enough life.
Gideon woke up in a massive dome soaked in darkness. The ceiling loomed impossibly high, curving into shadow like it didn't know when to stop. The stone beneath him was rough, uneven, and far too cold for a respawn zone.
The walls stretched wide in every direction, carved from dark stone and lined with torches—old, flickering things that hissed like they'd been burning for too long without being noticed. They cast long, twitching shadows that danced across the ground like they were thinking about forming a committee.
This was not Inizio.
This wasn't even remotely close to familiar.
No warm light. No echoing stillness. No quiet nothingness.
Just darkness.
Just stone.
And Gideon, lying there with no idea where the script had gone.
Gideon pushed himself up, slow and wobbly, like someone trying to stand on a boat made entirely of bad decisions. His legs weren't exactly thrilled about it, and neither was his back, which creaked in protest like it had just remembered it was technically dead a few minutes ago.
Once he was on his feet—more or less upright—he instinctively glanced at his hand.
Empty.
No glow. No hum. No sleek blade of condensed, high-concept sci-fi energy curled into his fingers.
His psyblade was gone.
Just… not there. Like it had ghosted him the second things got weird.
He looked down. His clothes weren't faring much better. Slashed, torn, and soaked with blood that was definitely his and probably from three different parts of his body. Wolves, man. Zero chill. They didn't even give him a chance to monologue.
Before he could start processing the full list of regrets, the air shifted.
Not dramatically. But enough.
And then it came—a voice. Deep. Smooth. The kind of baritone that probably came with its own echo and a manager. It rolled through the chamber like it paid rent to live in the acoustics.
"Gideon Brangwen. Another NPC who has outgrown his code. Under ordinary circumstances, your existence would be erased without hesitation. But today, I have chosen restraint."
Gideon didn't know where the voice was coming from. It didn't bounce. It didn't travel. It just was, everywhere at once, as if the dome itself had decided to say something out loud for the first time in a few centuries.
A torch sparked to life at the far end of the dome with a dramatic flick like it had been practicing its timing for weeks. Flame rolled out in slow, flickering waves, doing its best to look important as it revealed what had been hiding in the dark.
A throne.
Big. Heavy. The kind of throne that screamed "I rule everything" but also maybe "I haven't stood up in six hundred years."
No gold, no velvet, no over-the-top flair. Just pure, intimidating stone and the silent threat of back problems.
And seated on it—very much not pretending to be modest—was a man.
He didn't move. Didn't speak. Just sat there like someone who already knew he was the final boss of whatever drama Gideon had stumbled into.
He wore a black suit, sharp and fitted like it had been tailored by someone who charged in blood and existential dread.
His hair was long, dark, and too perfectly arranged to be fair. Not a single strand out of place. Gideon, still covered in wolf-related regrets, instantly felt judged.
His skin was pale. Not "I've been inside all week" pale—more like "I've never needed the sun because the shadows work for me" pale.
But the eyes? Red.
Calm. Piercing. Way too good at making a person question their life decisions.
And then there were the horns. Four of them, casually sprouting from his temples like his skull had missed the memo about keeping things reasonable.
The front two angled forward with a low, predatory curve, like they were halfway between a weapon and a fashion threat.
The back pair swept elegantly behind his head, long and arched like they'd been carved by an overachieving sculptor with dramatic flair.
All four were bone-white, smooth as ivory, and sharp enough to make even eye contact feel hazardous. They didn't look added. They looked earned. Like the universe handed them out and said, "Here, you've unlocked advanced intimidation."
Gideon stared.
And the man stared back.
Well. Not stared, exactly. He didn't do anything. He just was. Like gravity in a suit.
And somehow, that was worse.
Because all it took was eye contact. Just that. One second of being looked at, and Gideon's spine turned into a violin string tuned by anxiety itself. Every hair on his arms decided to stand at attention like they were saluting a warlord.
He didn't even know why he was shivering.
Just that he very much was.
The man shifted ever so slightly, tilting his head and resting it against one palm like he had all the time in the world—and maybe even invented the concept.
It wasn't lazy. It wasn't casual. It was the kind of pose that said, 'I'm important, I'm tired of being important, and now I'm mildly bored of explaining it to mortals.'
Then, just as Gideon was halfway through wondering if this was a dream, a punishment, or an extremely exclusive job interview, the man finally spoke.
"Be grateful. You stand in the presence of the one who built The Dungeon with his own hands... Agharan. I am your creator."
Well. That was... casual. Just your average day of being told your entire existence was handcrafted by a guy with boss music energy and four designer horns.
Gideon stared at him. He didn't really mean to admire the guy, but let's be honest—he looked like a cosmic CEO who micromanaged reality and somehow made it look good.
Still, Gideon had been alive long enough (well, respawned enough) to know that anyone who called themselves a creator was either incredibly powerful or incredibly dramatic.
Or both.
"So... you're basically our God?"
There was a beat. Agharan's red eyes narrowed just a touch, like the question had personally offended his brand identity.
"I don't like that word. It's too... loaded. I prefer 'Dungeon Master.' Has a better ring to it. Anyway—since you went off-script and ignored the rules written into your little NPC spine, I should've deleted you on the spot. But instead... I'm offering you a new deal."
Gideon's stomach did a quiet somersault.
This was either a promotion… or the opening pitch of a really polite threat.
Agharan rose from the throne in one smooth, deliberate motion—like gravity stepped aside out of respect. There was no dramatic wind, no thunder rumble, no explosion of power. He just stood, and somehow the room got smaller.
Massive didn't even begin to cover it. Gideon craned his neck just to get a proper look, and even then, it felt like trying to take in a mountain that had decided to dress itself as a person. Every inch of the man radiated weight—not just physical, but presence. The kind that pressed down on your thoughts and politely reminded you that you were very, very small.
"I'll overlook it. But only if you agree to one thing."
Gideon blinked up at him. A condition? That sounded suspiciously like a loophole dressed in generosity.
"What thing?"
"I want you to climb. All the way back to this chamber. Clear every floor of the dungeon. Reach me again—and when you do, I'll grant you one wish. Anything you want."
Gideon's brows knit together like they were trying to protect his brain from what he'd just heard. A wish? Any wish?
"But I don't really need anything... I'm happy. I've got my routine, my family—if this is about me going off-script, I promise it won't happen again."
For a moment, he thought maybe, just maybe, that would work. Maybe the cosmic horned guy would nod sagely and let him off with a warning.
Agharan didn't move.
He didn't even blink.
"That's cute. But this isn't up for negotiation. You'll climb, whether you want to or not. Think of it as a gift. A command wrapped in privilege."
Gideon's stomach quietly packed its bags and took the rest of his confidence with it.
This was sounding less like a mission and more like a magically enforced favor from a very tall man who treated free will like a polite suggestion.
[You have acquired an NPC Privilege Skill.]
[Inheritance of the Doomed: The user inherits the complete skillset of any mob or boss they personally defeat, claiming their essence in full. This power activates only once per species, preventing duplication. However, if seven days pass without the user claiming a new ability through this skill, they—and every trace of their bloodline—will be erased from existence, as if they never were. This skill can only activate three times per floor, forcing the user to climb higher.]
Gideon stared at the floating text in front of him, reading it once, then again, then a third time just to make sure the words weren't playing tricks on him. They weren't.
It was a skill.
A very shiny, very rare, very what-the-heck-is-this-doing-in-my-life kind of skill.
The effect? Pretty straightforward. It let him absorb the abilities of any mob or boss he managed to defeat. Just slurp up their powers like a discount hero buffet. No limits mentioned. No fine print—well, almost no fine print.
Then he got to the drawback.
And his stomach made a noise that could only be described as existential dread in audio form.
Seven days. That's all he got. If he didn't absorb a new skill within seven days, it wasn't just him who vanished. The curse would wipe out his entire bloodline. Like some sort of cosmic delete button wired directly into his DNA.
Gideon's jaw dropped. Fully unhinged. His brain quietly walked out the back door and left his expression to figure things out.
This wasn't a skill.
This was a glitter-wrapped death sentence with bonus features.
He glanced toward Agharan, who was now reclining on his oversized throne like he hadn't just handed out an enchanted ticking time bomb with elegant phrasing.
There was a smirk curling at the corner of his lips—one of those smug little smiles that said "I absolutely meant to do that, and I'm not sorry at all."
"Consider our deal set. Climb your way back to me, floor by floor, and when you stand here again—I'll lift the curse myself."
Gideon made a mental note to never again wish for more excitement in his life.
Gideon stared up at Agharan, eyebrows drawn together like they were trying to shield his common sense from what his mouth was about to say.
He didn't look angry, exactly—just confused in that special way only someone forcibly saddled with a cursed death-clock skill could be.
His head tilted ever so slightly.
"I didn't realize our creator had such a cruel streak."
There was a pause. Agharan blinked once, as if genuinely surprised it had taken Gideon this long to figure that out.
"Cruel? I take people from their worlds without consent and force them into a dungeon built to test their limits for my own entertainment. Every challenge, every monster, every rule—they exist because I willed it. If that isn't cruelty, then you've misunderstood everything about me."
Gideon blinked slowly, absorbing the confession like someone digesting bad news in the middle of a buffet line. Then he shrugged with the blank acceptance of a man whose expectations had been thoroughly incinerated.
"Point taken."
"Besides… I didn't throw you into this just because I felt like it. I saw something in you. Potential. The kind that could grow into a proper unit—useful, capable, maybe even impressive."
"That's a lie."
"Fair enough. I'm bored. That's the real reason. You just happened to be standing out when I needed something mildly entertaining. The 'potential' bit? That was me being generous with words. A little motivation never hurts, and who knows—maybe flattery buys you an extra day or two alive."
The floor beneath Gideon lit up in a sudden pulse of red, casting a glowing circle around his feet like some arcane spotlight had decided to wake up and get dramatic. Symbols flickered to life beneath the surface—delicate, swirling, and vaguely threatening in the "you're-about-to-be-yeeted" kind of way.
It hummed softly, which felt far too polite for something that might tear his atoms apart.
Agharan's voice rolled through the space, calm and final, like the end of a conversation that had already been decided three plot points ago.
"Let's meet again, Gideon. We'll see if you can endure the trial I designed never to be conquered."
Gideon looked up at him, eyes narrowing as the red glow grew brighter. There was a lot he could say. Deep words. Wise words.
He picked violence.
"When I return, I'm going to make you eat your words… and then I'll make you lift the curse—right after I'm done rearranging your face."
Agharan actually laughed—deep, amused, and just the tiniest bit unhinged. Not the kind of laugh that made you feel better, either. More like the kind that made the walls seem taller and the room a little colder.
"I've arranged a few parting gifts for you. You'll discover them after you respawn. Some may be useful… others, well—let's say I added them for personal amusement."
Agharan's smirk lingered—quiet, curved, deliberate. It wasn't the playful kind or even the triumphant kind. It was the type of smile worn by someone who had just tipped over a row of dominoes and already knew exactly where they would land.
There was something dark behind it. Satisfied. Calculated. Sinister in that slow-burn, long-game kind of way.
Gideon gave him one last glance, eyes dry with sarcasm and zero reverence.
"Who would've guessed? Our supposedly mysterious, all-powerful god turns out to be exactly what he looks like—evil and sadistic. Shocking."
And then, just like that, Gideon vanished. No flash. No bang. Just gone—pulled out of the chamber by the same arcane force that had brought him in, like a badly-behaved bug dragged offstage by the universe.
Agharan stood still.
The smirk faded.
His face settled into silence—a blank, stoic mask with no hints of laughter or pride. Just thought. Deep and focused.
"Perhaps… the heir I've searched for across countless worlds isn't out there after all. Perhaps he's been standing before me this entire time."
His hand curled slowly into a fist. Not in anger. Not even in resolve. Something colder. Something patient.
"I'll be waiting for your return… Gideon Brangwen."