A violent tremor surged through the wooden door of Arlan's room, which now felt coarse and unnaturally cold to the touch. He gripped the iron handle, his knuckles turning white. His bare skin no longer felt the grain of the wood; the beginner's armor—a forced starter item—now encased his fingers in a mixture of cured leather and thin metal plates. In his ears, the agonizing screech of collapsing architecture vied with a low, mechanical roar that sounded like a colossal engine grinding down the very foundations of his apartment.
"Mom... hold on!" Arlan shouted, his voice hoarse and nearly swallowed by the thundering chaos.
As the door finally swung open, the sight before him shattered whatever fragments of logic still clung to his mind. His living room—the cramped but warm heart of his home, once filled with an old sofa and a simple wooden dining table—had mutated into a dark, damp corridor of ancient stone. The concrete ceiling had vanished entirely, replaced by a static, violet sky that bled lines of red binary code, drifting down like toxic snow.
In the center of the ruins of his sofa, which was now nothing more than a flickering pile of distorted pixels, stood a creature that belonged only on his LED monitor: a dragon statue with scales of pitch-black steel. But it wasn't just a statue; it let out a low, guttural growl, its breath thick with the sulfurous stench of brimstone. That smoke was the source of the heavy mist now blanketing the corridor, obscuring Arlan's vision beyond a mere three meters.
Yet, through the mechanical grinding of the dragon's scales, a hauntingly familiar echo pierced the noise.
"Arlan! Dinner is ready! Come out before it gets cold!"
It was his mother's voice. But it was flat, repeating with an identical, rhythmic pause between each sentence—exactly like an audio file trapped in a system loop. A horrifying realization struck Arlan: the kitchen where his mother had been cooking was now a small stone platform floating over a vast, hollow abyss, resembling a dark bunker with an isolated, ancient wooden door.
"Mom! I'm coming!"
Instinctively, Arlan felt a strange pulse deep within his central nervous system. It was as if his brain had been integrated directly into the system's console commands. He no longer needed a keyboard or a mouse; the commands flowed directly from his thoughts into the mana circuits now woven into his flesh. He scanned the row of icons flickering in the corner of his vision. Several skills glowed dimly, indicating they were ready to be triggered.
[ Skill Activated: Flash Step — Level Max ]
Zzt!
Arlan's body lunged forward like a bolt of cerulean lightning, slicing through the sulfurous mist. His speed transcended the limits of human ocular coordination. In a single blink, he had streaked past the rows of blue torches—their flames burning with a static, unnatural light—and skidded to a halt before the ancient European-style wooden door at the end of the hall. There, his mother stood perfectly still, her hands frozen in a gesture as if she were holding a dinner plate, but her eyes were vacant, devoid of any spark of life.
Arlan's heart sank. In the eyes of the system, she was no longer the woman who had raised him with love. A floating green label hovered above her head: [ Maid NPC — Level 1 ]. His mother had been converted into a background asset of Darkness Tale Online.
"Mom, take my hand! Don't look down!" Arlan cried, his voice heavy and resonant due to the acoustic resonance of the stone corridor.
For a brief second, the glow in his mother's eyes flickered, as if her human consciousness were fighting against the oppressive script of the program. "Arlan? Is that you, my son?" she sobbed, her face pale as she stared at the armor her son was wearing. "Why... why does our home look like this? What has happened to our world?"
Arlan had no time to explain the digital apocalypse. In the corner of his eye, a transparent mini-map flashed red with a danger warning. A pulsing green dot appeared far in the distance, marking their only hope.
[ Safe Zone Detected: Town of Beginnings — Jakarta Sector ]
"We have to go, now! Trust me!" Arlan grabbed his mother's waist, hoisting her up with a physical strength that had surged drastically due to his STR (Strength) stat. He leaped from the stone platform just as it began to disintegrate into fragments of pixels.
They plummeted through the bedroom door, which had now become the exit portal of the Void Corridor. As their feet hit the asphalt of the Jakarta streets, the view outside was far more chaotic than Arlan's worst nightmares. The skyscrapers along Sudirman were now choked by massive, glowing blue neon tree roots. The cars trapped in traffic were no longer steel machines but the smoldering wrecks of wooden horse-carriages.
However, in the distance, right in the center of Bundaran HI, a colossal dome of golden light stood firm, piercing the dark purple sky. The Safe Zone.
Arlan sprinted through the wreckage. In several parts of the street, reality itself seemed to tear open, vomiting creatures from another realm.
[ Monster Detected: SLIME — Level 1 ]
Several blobs of translucent green slime with glowing red cores hopped from behind the ruins of a TransJakarta bus. They let out a disgusting, gurgling sound as they attempted to block Arlan's path.
"Out of my way, data trash!" Arlan growled.
Automatically, a beginner's shortsword materialized in his hand. Without breaking his stride, Arlan swung the steel blade in a single, precise horizontal slash. SLASH! The Slime was cleaved in two, its energy core shattered, and its gelatinous body evaporated into grains of binary data that were sucked into Arlan's body as experience points.
The moment they crossed the threshold of the golden mist surrounding the Safe Zone dome, the world suddenly fell silent. The heat of the sulfur and the roars of monsters vanished, replaced by the soothing scent of jasmine and air that felt significantly lighter.
But the scene inside the dome was even more surreal. Arlan saw hundreds of people standing motionless along the streets, which now bore a medieval architectural style despite still being paved with Jakarta's cracked asphalt. They wore modern clothes—sharp office suits, tattered school uniforms, simple house dresses—but their faces were empty, and their movements were repetitive. Above their heads, floating green text glowed: [ Commoner NPC — Level 1 ].
"Mom, we're safe here," Arlan whispered, lowering her gently near a bus stop that had morphed into a wooden garden bench.
Arlan flinched. His hope that his mother would return to normal was instantly crushed. She sat there in a trance, staring straight ahead, no longer recognizing him. The green label remained fixed above her head: [ Maid NPC — Level 1 ].
At the same time, a system notification window appeared with a cold, metallic chime, celebrating his success in a way that felt utterly inhuman.
[ Tutorial Mission: Survive the Distraction Area — CLEAR ✓ ]
[ AzureBound Level Up to Level 2 ]
[ Reward: 10 Gold & 500 EXP ]
As he checked the notification, his mother suddenly began to pace back and forth within a three-meter radius, moving repetitively like a robot running a "Confusion" script. Nearby, a man in an office suit continuously swept the same patch of asphalt without end, while a woman selling traditional herbal medicine sat on a bench, repeating the same line over and over: "Welcome to the city, traveler. Do you require a potion for your journey?"
"They... they've truly become background NPCs," Arlan muttered, his hands clenching until his gauntlets creaked. He checked his own status. Unlike the thousands around him, his name remained a clean, pure white. He still had his consciousness. He was still a Player.
"The world has turned into a game, Mom. Darkness Tale Online has overwritten our reality," Arlan whispered, staring at the purple sky outside the dome. "And here, only those with 'awareness' can survive as humans. I swear, I will find a way to bring you back."
Arlan looked toward the darkness of Jakarta, now inhabited by high-level monsters. He knew that staying idle within this golden dome was only a matter of time before the system deleted their data permanently. If this reality was a game, then there had to be a control center, an Admin, or even a Final Boss that had to be destroyed.
In the distance, beyond the Safe Zone's boundary, he saw organized flashes of magic light exploding in the night sky. There were other players who had survived. Factions were already forming.
"I need to find other players who are still 'awake'," Arlan murmured. His sword hilt began to glow red—a sign from the system that a new Quest had been triggered by his presence in the safe zone.
Arlan stood tall, letting his beginner's cloak flutter in the mana-infused wind. His first step toward the summit of the Mandiri Tower had just begun from the Jakarta plaza that had now become the Town of Beginnings.
[ STATUS WINDOW - AZUREBOUND ]
- Name: Arlan (ID: AzureBound)
- Job Class: Sword Magician (Base Class)
- Level: 2 (Status: Anomaly)
- HP: 550 / 550 | MP: 350 / 350
- Equipped: Beginner's Steel Sword & Leather Combat Suit
- Active Skill: Flash Step (Max)
- Achievement: Tutorial Clear! (Saved 1 NPC)