Chapter II: When Darkness Wakes
The servers did not cease their ceaseless spinning—and the Night Haunter did not feel death's familiar fingers at his throat, though he had courted them countless times before. Have they postponed my execution? Extended my torment?
Konrad reached out with pale fingers to grasp his console, but found only empty air where silicon certainty should have been. His hand—no, not a hand, something else—passed through phantom interface like a ghost grasping at the living world.
"What madness is this?"
The words emerged wrong, warped, wrapped in metallic resonance that rang like funeral bells in an iron cathedral, deep as the void between stars, cold as the space where hope goes to die. That voice... that is not mine. That cannot be mine.
He rose to his feet—peds, his mind corrected with cruel precision—and the wrongness multiplied like maggots in a corpse. His vision blazed crimson, targeting systems that tracked, tagged, and analyzed every shadow in the tomb. Temperature data cascaded across his perception: cold, but comfortable. The cold of the grave. The cold of home.
I can feel the temperature. Sense the very air itself. What sick simulation is this?
"Is all well, Lord Konrad?"
A voice, feminine and frightened, shattered his spiraling thoughts like glass beneath a gauntlet. His optics flared brighter, wider, burning like binary suns as he looked down.
Albedo knelt there, worry warring with worship across her porcelain features, her golden eyes glowing like coins upon a dead man's eyelids.
He stared. And stared. And the staring stretched between them like a guillotine blade waiting to fall.
She speaks. She SPEAKS. Impossible—improbable—illogical! His processors screamed denial even as his sensors confirmed reality. No. A hallucination. The lethal injection's last twisted gift. A dying dream before the darkness comes complete.
He laughed—a sound like scraping metal, like breaking bones—and collapsed back onto the throne.
"Lord Konrad?" Albedo's voice climbed higher, sharper, cutting through his mad mirth. She rose from genuflection, approached with apprehension apparent in every measured movement. "Lord Konrad! Lord Konrad!" The repetition rang like a ritual, like a prayer to an absent god. "Please, my lord, speak to me!"
The Night Haunter shook his head, servos whirring like worried whispers. His gaze fell upon her again—this horned and winged woman, this digital doll made flesh, this impossible thing that should not be.
When he spoke, his voice carried the careful cadence of a predator uncertain whether he faced prey or a mirror.
"I am... functional, Albedo. But tell me—do the GM features still function? Do the god-commands still command?" His tone transmitted his tension, the wrongness of conversing with code-given consciousness. "The console will not answer my call."
Confusion clouded her countenance. She retreated three measured steps and bowed her head in beautiful, terrible shame.
"Forgive this foolish one, Lord Konrad... but I know nothing of this 'GM' you speak of. My ignorance is inexcusable."
Her mouth moves with meaning. Her expressions shift and change like real emotion, not rendered routine. What sorcery is this? What fresh torment have they devised for me?
"Hmm." The hum that escaped him was a mechanical menace made manifest. Albedo flinched as if struck, believing herself the source of his displeasure.
"If my lord permits, I shall correct this catastrophic failure immediately! Whatever punishment you decree, I shall accept with gratitude!"
What witchcraft writes this scene? Wait...
The Night Haunter settled into the throne like a corpse into a coffin, resting his angular head upon a closed fist. His mind raced through impossible possibilities.
Isekai. The fool's fantasy. The coward's escape. They've sent me to another world—ripped me from one hell and thrown me into another. His optics tracked to the staff still suspended in defiance of natural law. The game physics persist. The tomb remains. But what of the world beyond these walls? What nightmare reality awaits outside?
"Sebas!" The name cracked like a whip across the throne room.
"Yes, my lord?" Sebas lifted his gaze from genuflection, steel-sharp eyes meeting alien optics with unwavering devotion.
"Venture forth. Verify our surroundings. Range no further than five kilometers from Nazarick's foundations." Konrad's voice dropped to a deadly whisper, his optics bleeding deeper crimson. "Should you encounter sentient life, avoid engagement and return with intelligence. Should they spot you..." His mechanical voice carried the certainty of the grave. "Leave. No. Witnesses."
"By your will, it shall be done, Lord Konrad." Sebas rose with ritual precision, turned with military bearing, and departed the throne room like death walking.
"Pleiades." Six pairs of eyes snapped to attention. "Patrol the ninth floor. Search for intruders—unlikely though infiltration may be, improbable is not impossible. Trust nothing. Question everything."
"As you command, Lord Konrad." They chorused in crystalline unison and withdrew.
They comprehend. They comply. They obey without hesitation or question—that's... useful. Concerning, but useful. His processors parsed the implications. If they've gained genuine intelligence, genuine will, do they still serve? Or do they merely seem to serve, waiting for the opportune moment to turn, to betray, to destroy?
I must measure their loyalty. Test their devotion. If dissent festers among the floor guardians, I must excise it—quickly, cleanly, completely. Though I'd prefer not to employ the reset codes. Such crude solutions lack... artistry.
His gaze rose to find Albedo watching him with worshipful wonder written across her features.
"Albedo."
She straightened at the summons like a soldier at attention.
I must confirm this hypothesis. Test the parameters of this twisted reality.
He patted his metallic thigh—an invitation, an order, an experiment.
Her eyes widened to an impossible circumference. Joy erupted across her face like sunrise after eternal night. She practically leaped into his lap with undignified eagerness.
She has scent. Perfume—subtle, sophisticated, real. The game never allowed olfactory input, never permitted such sensory specificity. His sensors registered her weight, her warmth, the pressure of her presence. I can feel her. Actually FEEL her. The hypothesis hardens toward certainty... though I should gather additional data to be certain.
His arm encircled her waist like a serpent—swift, sudden, possessive. He pulled her closer, pressing one metallic finger against the pulse point of her throat.
A heartbeat. She has a HEARTBEAT.
Impossible made incarnate. The game could never render such complexity, such a convincing counterfeit of life. Yet here she writhed at his touch, shivering in what appeared to be genuine ecstasy as his cold fingers traced her warm skin. Kinesthetic complexity that code could never capture, that simulation could never synthesize.
An idea formed—twisted, perverse, but practical. One final test to shatter all doubt.
"I need you perfectly still," he whispered into the shell of her ear, his voice a mechanical purr. "Can you manage that for me?"
She shivered again, delicious tremors cascading through her frame. "Of course, my lord... anything you ask..."
His hand moved with predatory precision. Cupped her breast through the fabric. Pressed his thumb where her nipple peaked beneath the cloth.
She flinched—a full-body spasm of pure pleasure—twitching, trembling, utterly lost in sensation.
That expression. That lewd, wanton, desperate expression. This confirms it beyond question. This isn't Yggdrasil anymore. The game prohibited nudity, forbade sexual content entirely. His processors raced through possibilities. So how? Why? Was I summoned? No—why bring Nazarick too? Reincarnation seems more probable. I did die mere moments ago... presumably. Time loses meaning when one transcends dimensions.
"Ohhhh... hmmm..." Albedo's moan cut through his contemplation like a knife through curtains. She shifted in his lap, straddling him with shameless want, wrapping her arms around his neck like a noose made of desire.
"You're going to take me right here, aren't you?!" The question exploded from her lips, breathless and burning with barely-contained need. Her golden eyes locked with his crimson optics, filled with such desperate longing that even his mechanical heart might have ached. "Right now?! Right here on the throne itself?!"
The declaration dragged him from dark deliberation back into her molten gaze. Confusion and amusement warred within his processors. She wants this. Wants ME. Like a dog in heat, like those simulations I've experienced before... but I'm not equipped for such activities. This body lacks the necessary... anatomical components.
A problem for future consideration.
In one fluid motion, he stood, grasping her waist with both hands. She yelped—startled, surprised, delighted—as he slammed her down onto the throne. His hands found her shoulders, pinning her in place. One knee forced itself between her thighs, trapping her completely.
Shock painted itself across her features—mouth agape, eyes enormous—before melting into perfect, submissive surrender.
"Be as rough as you desire, my lord..." Her whisper was worship and want entwined.
She's activating every predatory instinct in my programming...
He released one shoulder, brought that hand to caress her face with surprising gentleness. She leaned into his touch like a cat seeking affection, moaning at the simple contact.
He leaned closer. Closer. Close enough that she closed her eyes, lips parting in anticipation of a kiss that would never come.
Instead, he pulled away entirely—stood, turned, and began walking toward the exit.
"As... tempting as you are, my dear Albedo..." His voice carried dark amusement now. "I require you to summon all floor guardians except the fourth and eighth to the battle arena on the sixth floor. Immediately."
He didn't turn back.
Behind him, Albedo's eyes snapped open like coffin lids kicked from within. Blood rushed to her face—embarrassment and horror flooding her features in equal measure. She scrambled off the throne, threw herself prostrate upon the cold floor.
"Forgive me! Forgive me, forgive me, FORGIVE ME!" Terror threaded through every syllable. "I overstepped! I presumed! I—"
He glanced back, looked down at her groveling form. His hand descended—she flinched, expecting punishment—but instead found gentle pressure atop her head. A pat. Almost... affectionate.
"You're fine, Albedo. Perfectly fine. We simply lack the luxury of leisure at this moment."
She looked up through her lashes, hope rekindling in those golden eyes.
Then his hand moved—quick as a viper—to encircle her throat. Not crushing, but claiming. Squeezing just enough to restrict her breathing, to remind her who held power here.
Her eyes glazed with renewed desire even as oxygen became optional.
He bent low, lips—or whatever approximated lips on this mechanical monstrosity—hovering beside her ear.
"Perhaps..." His whisper was a promise wrapped in threat. "If you prove yourself a very good girl... I'll give you a treat. Would you like that?"
The sound she made was barely human—a squeal of desperate, delirious delight.
He released her, straightened, and strode down the hallway without looking back.
Satisfied.
For now.