The creature’s dying scream echoed through the corridor, but Nihil didn’t hear it. The black void around him drowned out everything but the sharp thud of his heartbeat. His blood, darkened and sticky, oozed from the gashes across his torso and arms, seeping into the crumbling stone beneath him. The pain was unbearable, but it was the numbness that terrified him.

  His body was shutting down, piece by piece, like a broken machine. His limbs trembled uncontrollably as he pushed himself up from the ground. His shard-blade had shattered, the only tool he had ever relied on now nothing more than jagged remnants of metal that had served their purpose.

  And the worst part was, he wasn’t even sure if it was worth it anymore.

  The Tower was a goddamn maze. There was no end to it. No salvation. Just endless corridors, endless death, and endless monsters lurking in the shadows, waiting for their turn to rip him apart. He had already fought through a dozen of them, but each victory felt more hollow than the last. Each step forward was a reminder that he was just a speck of dust against the vastness of the Tower.

  The air was thick with the scent of decay, the oppressive silence weighing down on him like an invisible hand. His breaths were ragged, shallow, and the world around him seemed to blur and twist at the edges. Nihil stumbled forward, dragging his battered body through the disorienting landscape.

  The first floor was nothing compared to what lay ahead. This was the beginning — the opening act to a much larger hell. He had to go deeper. He had no choice. If he stopped now, the Tower would swallow him whole, and his pain, his suffering, would have been for nothing.

  But a part of him... a part of him wished he could just let go.

  The tower had already claimed everything — his friends, his family, his past. The fragments of reality he once knew were nothing but broken dreams now, scattered across time and space. Even his memories felt like they belonged to someone else, warped by the endless cycles of the Tower. He was no longer Nihil the man. He was Nihil the broken, the damned, the one who refused to die.

  The corridors shifted around him, twisting, as if mocking his resolve. The ground was slick with blood and the remains of the creatures he’d slain. A long, winding staircase rose in front of him, leading to an upper level he had no intention of reaching. The thought of going higher — of facing whatever nightmare awaited him there — made his stomach turn.

  But there was no choice. The Tower called.

  “Keep moving,” he muttered to himself, his voice hoarse, cracked. “Keep moving. Don’t stop.”

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  His feet felt heavy as he ascended the stairs, each step a battle, each movement a war against his body’s failure. His muscles screamed in protest, but he couldn’t afford to listen. Not now. Not when he was this close to losing it all.

  He reached the top of the stairs, eyes scanning the new floor before him. The air felt different here — thicker, charged with an unnatural energy. It crackled in the air, unsettling and cold. The walls were lined with strange, pulsating runes, glowing faintly in the dim light. Their meaning was beyond him, but their presence made his skin crawl.

  And then he saw it.

  A figure standing at the far end of the chamber, silhouetted against a swirling vortex of dark energy. The figure was tall, cloaked in black robes, with an aura of power that made the very air tremble. Its face was hidden, obscured by the hood, but Nihil could feel its gaze — cold, calculating, like it was watching him, studying him.

  “You’re late,” the figure said, its voice echoing through the chamber like a death knell.

  Nihil froze. His heart skipped a beat. The voice was like nothing he had ever heard before, a deep, reverberating tone that seemed to come from everywhere at once. It was wrong, alien, inhuman.

  “What… what is this?” Nihil rasped, his breath shallow.

  The figure took a step forward, the ground beneath it rippling as if reality itself was bending in its presence. Nihil instinctively reached for his shard-blade, but it was gone, shattered beyond use. He was defenseless.

  “An invitation,” the figure replied, its voice carrying a weight of finality. “An invitation to end this cycle. To stop the inevitable.”

  Nihil’s pulse quickened. He knew this wasn’t a coincidence. This wasn’t just some random monster or challenger. This was something... else. Something older. Something far more dangerous.

  “Who are you?” Nihil demanded, his voice barely a whisper.

  The figure tilted its head, the hood obscuring its face even further. “I am but a reflection of what you seek. A fragment of the Tower’s heart, scattered across time and space. I am what you must face if you wish to break free.”

  The words hung in the air like a curse.

  Nihil’s mind raced. He had been climbing this Tower for as long as he could remember, surviving, fighting, bleeding. But now, here, in front of this figure, he felt something he hadn’t felt in a long time: doubt. Fear. This wasn’t just another trial. This wasn’t just another monster to kill.

  This was the beginning of something far worse.

  The figure raised a hand, and the vortex of energy behind it began to grow, its swirling darkness threatening to consume everything. The temperature dropped, and the air felt like it was closing in, pressing down on him from all sides.

  Nihil staggered back, but there was nowhere to go. The walls were closing in. The Tower was moving.

  It was alive.

  “It’s too late for you, Nihil,” the figure said, its voice now a whisper of malice. “The Tower will devour you, just as it has devoured all others. There is no escape.”

  “Then I’ll die fighting,” Nihil spat, his eyes burning with defiance.

  The figure smiled, a cruel, empty smile. “Perhaps. But even in death, the Tower will claim you. You are nothing but another failed attempt.”

  With that, the figure extended its hand, and the vortex expanded, the air thick with the smell of decay and death.

  Nihil took a deep breath, the weight of his body pressing down on him, the pain in his chest growing unbearable. But he wasn’t done. Not yet.

  He would fight. Even if it meant dying, he would not go quietly.

  One last step.