"Sanctum?"
The word left Vaelis's lips as a whisper—a question, a reflex, a grasp in the dark.
But the moment it did, everything changed.
The hut, the warmth of the fire, the weight of the worn clothes on his skin—all of it vanished.
Like a switch had been flipped.
And now—
He stood alone in a place that should not exist.
The sky—if it could be called that—was a pale gradient of grey and faint violet, stretching out infinitely. No clouds, no sun. Just an endless ceiling of soft emptiness. The ground beneath his bare feet felt solid, cool, smooth. Almost like polished stone. But it had no texture. No dust. No cracks. Not even a speck of dirt.
All around him stretched nothing. A vast, barren land. No wind. No sound. Just... silence.
His breathing quickened. His heartbeat thudded in his ears.
"What the hell is happening?" he muttered to himself.
His voice echoed. But not off walls—off nothing. Like the void itself was bouncing it back, mocking him with repetition.
A sudden panic clawed at his chest.
"I'm losing it. I'm actually losing it."
He turned in a slow circle, scanning the endless landscape. No signs of life. No colors. No familiar shapes. Just the same smooth expanse in every direction.
Am I dead?
That thought hit him like a hammer.
"Is this what death looks like?"
His voice cracked. He laughed—but it came out as a choked, broken sound. A laugh twisted by fear.
"One moment I'm in a hut, and the next I'm in this… this dreamless dream. Am I in a coma? Is this brain damage? Is this some weird purgatory?"
His eyes stung.
"No. Stop. Don't lose it."
He closed his eyes, tried to breathe deep. Counted.
One. Two. Three—
When he opened them again, he noticed something. Two dots. Far away. On the horizon.
Small. Black. Fixed.
At first he thought they were specks in his vision. But they weren't. They weren't moving with him—they were fixed to the space itself.
So, he walked.
Step by step, with nothing but the sound of his own footsteps and the dull rhythm of his breath, Vaelis moved toward the only landmarks in this dead world.
As he approached, the shapes slowly grew.
Buildings.
Two buildings.
No—structures. That was a better word. Because they weren't quite buildings as he knew them.
Tall, about four stories high. Smooth. Seamless. Like enormous blocks carved from a single slab of some unknowable material—darker than steel, but somehow gleaming faintly, like moonlight caught in deep water.
No windows.
No visible floors.
Just one single door on each. Perfectly cut. Perfectly still.
They stood side by side. Silent. Waiting.
Their presence in the middle of nothingness felt unnatural. Intentional.
Wrong.
He stood before them and couldn't decide whether to scream or fall to his knees.
Nothing made sense.
The past few hours—days?—had passed in a blur of contradictions. One moment, he was walking through a neon-lit city, scrolling through his phone. The next—naked in a field under the sun. And now here, in this place with no name, no air, no answers.
Only two things were certain to him now.
One—he was either dead or utterly insane.
And two—whatever was happening, it was just beginning.
Vaelis stood in front of the two monoliths, shadows of doubt crawling through his mind.
The structures loomed over him, silent and cold. Each one had a single door—no handles, no knobs, no keyholes. Just smooth, vertical lines etched into the surface, like part of the walls themselves. For a moment, they almost seemed to watch him.
He hesitated.
Something about them felt final.
He narrowed his eyes. Back on Earth, he'd read stories like this. Myths. Tales. Fables. One door leads to fortune, the other to ruin. The choice often seemed random—until it wasn't. And the consequences were always irreversible.
He clenched his fists, then unclenched them. "This isn't Earth," he reminded himself. "And I don't even know what's real anymore."
He looked at the left structure. Then the right. Both doors were shut tight, but the lack of any visible mechanism made them feel more like they were waiting—not locked.
Still… which one?
The silence of the void seemed to press against him.
His mind raced. What's behind them? Why are there two? Am I being tested? By who? By what?
"They probably won't even open," he muttered.
So he stepped forward.
He chose the right.
No logic behind the decision—just instinct.
He pressed his palm against the door, expecting resistance. Expecting nothing.
Instead, both doors slid open—soundlessly, simultaneously.
His heart nearly jumped out of his chest. He stumbled backward on reflex, a few steps away from both openings, blinking at the sudden shift.
"No way," he whispered.
For a moment, he thought about running. About turning back into the vast nothingness and pretending none of this was happening. But the pull of curiosity—and maybe madness—was stronger.
He stepped cautiously forward, but not into either building yet. Just enough to peer inside both from a distance.
The left building was dimly lit from an unseen source. Inside, rows upon rows of tall shelves stretched into the shadows. Books. Hundreds—maybe thousands of them. Leather-bound, ancient-looking, each spine marked with symbols he didn't recognize. Some glowed faintly. Others seemed to shimmer with a film of dust that moved like mist.
The place breathed knowledge, but not in a comforting way. The air inside felt heavy, as if the wisdom stored within had its own gravity.
Then he turned to the right.
This one chilled him.
It was darker, colder. The walls inside were made of the same strange black material as the exterior, but arranged in long rows. Along those rows were shapes—coffin-like structures, silent and sealed. Each one precisely placed. Identical in size and shape.
There were dozens. Maybe more.
And as he stared, he realized—they weren't empty.
Though he couldn't see clearly, something deep inside him knew. Each of those coffins held something—or someone.
He swallowed hard, a cold sweat rising along the back of his neck.
What was this place?
Why was he brought here?
Was this some kind of twisted afterlife?