The bunker shook.
Not the gentle tremor of distant explosions.
This was close.
Something massive striking the reinforced concrete directly above—each impact reverberating through steel and stone like a gong.
BOOM.
Lee Min-ah's eyes snapped open.
Her hand instinctively went to her belly—still swollen, still impossibly heavy.
The baby that had been dead was alive now.
The doctors called it a miracle.
She called it her reason to survive.
BOOM.
Closer.
Dust rained from ceiling cracks.
The emergency lights flickered—red, then darkness, then red again.
"Everyone to the interior chambers!" someone shouted.
Dr. Choi, maybe.
Min-ah couldn't tell over the alarm sirens.
She tried to sit up.
Her body refused.
Thirty-eight weeks pregnant.
Muscles atrophied from weeks of bed rest.
And now—
BOOM.
The ceiling buckled.
Not collapsed. Not yet.
But she could see the reinforced concrete bending inward, groaning under pressure it was never designed to handle.
People scrambled past her cot.
Nurses. Patients. Guards.
Everyone fleeing toward the deeper sections.
No one stopped to help her.
She didn't blame them.
In an apocalypse, you saved yourself first.
"Wait," she called out weakly. "Please—"
A section of ceiling tore free.
Concrete chunks the size of cars crashed down, crushing two cots where patients had been lying moments before.
The bodies disappeared under rubble.
No screams. Just the crunch of impact—then silence.
Through the hole in the ceiling, something descended.
INSIDE THE WOMB
Yoo felt everything.
Not physically—his fetal body didn't have the neural development for that.
But Akasha was feeding him information, translating his mother's body chemistry into data he could understand.
"Warning: Host mother experiencing extreme stress. Adrenaline levels: 347% normal. Cortisol spiking. Heart rate: 156 BPM and climbing."
What's happening?
"External threat detected. Bunker structural integrity compromised. Monster incursion imminent."
Shit. We need to get out of here.
"Recommendation: impossible. Host body is non-mobile. Birth is 14 days premature. Early delivery would be—"
The bunker shook again.
Yoo felt his mother's body jolt, her breathing turning ragged.
How long until we're crushed?
Akasha paused—a fraction of a second that felt like hours.
"Calculating... Probability of structural collapse in immediate vicinity: 78% within next 90 seconds. Probability of host mother's survival if she remains stationary: 3%."
Three percent?
"Affirmative. Recommendation: emergency protocols required."
What protocols? I'm trapped in here!
But even as Yoo thought it, something stirred inside him.
Not Akasha's voice.
Something deeper. Instinctive.
A skill he didn't know he had.
THE MONSTER
The creature that dropped through the ceiling was unlike anything Min-ah had seen on the news broadcasts—back when broadcasts still existed.
Eight legs, each ending in serrated claws.
Body roughly the size of a bus, covered in chitinous armor that gleamed like oil-slick.
No eyes visible—but she could feel it looking at her.
Multiple mandibles clicked together, producing sounds that made her teeth ache.
The medical monitors beside her exploded.
Not from impact.
From proximity to the creature's energy field.
It advanced.
Each step punctured the concrete floor.
Click-click-click.
Min-ah tried to move.
Her legs wouldn't obey.
Too weak. Too frightened.
The spider-thing loomed over her.
One claw rose—poised above her swollen belly.
My baby, she thought desperately. I just got him back.
The claw fell.
EMERGENCY
Inside the womb, Yoo's consciousness screamed.
Not in fear.
In rage.
He'd died once because he was powerless.
Because he was in the wrong place at the wrong time—unable to do anything but bleed out in an alley.
He'd spent 823 years as scattered fragments in the void.
He'd been given a second chance—however insane, however impossible.
He would not die in a fucking womb before he even got to open his eyes.
NO!
Something inside him responded.
Energy he didn't understand flooded through his consciousness.
Akasha's voice cut through the chaos:
"Warning: Unknown skill activation detected. Classification: Spatial manipulation. Designation: Extras World. Host consciousness attempting to—"
Yoo didn't wait for analysis.
He pushed.
Reality around him tore.
Not like the rifts the monsters came through.
Smaller. Personal.
A gap in space itself, forming in the amniotic fluid, expanding.
Through his mother's body chemistry, he felt the exact moment the claw would penetrate.
0.3 seconds.
He pushed harder.
The gap widened.
Became a space.
A pocket dimension—tiny, unstable, but there.
"Skill manifestation confirmed. Extras World: Personal dimensional space. Current size: 3 cubic meters. Stability: 34%. Warning: premature activation may cause—"
I DON'T CARE!
Yoo threw his entire consciousness into the skill.
The pocket dimension expanded—not in the physical world, but in the space between spaces.
And he fell through.
THE IMPOSSIBLE
Min-ah's belly suddenly flattened.
Not slowly. Instantly.
Like the baby had simply vanished.
The spider-monster's claw hit her stomach—but there was nothing there.
Just skin and muscle.
The impact broke three ribs, but didn't kill her.
The creature paused.
Confused.
Its mandibles clicked rapidly, searching.
Where had the energy signature gone?
The strong life force that had drawn it to this specific room?
Gone.
The monster turned, scanning the chamber.
Found nothing.
With an irritated screech, it climbed back through the ceiling hole, seeking other prey.
Min-ah lay gasping, hand pressed to her impossibly flat belly.
"My baby," she whispered.
"Where's my baby?"