Ayame Yuuna jolted awake, the world spinning around her. White-hot agony seared through her body, and her bones shook with the force of a raging earthquake. She crumpled to the ground, her knees giving way to the crippling pain, disorientation washing over her like a relentless wave.
“Wonderful, just wonderful...” She spat through gritted teeth and steadied the shaking of her hands. She glanced around the area, eyes narrowing as she took in the place that surrounded her. “Where the hell am I?”
The tall and solid black obelisk towered like a pillar of darkness piercing the bright afternoon sky, its mysterious red inscriptions glowing ominously. Hundreds of flat blocks circled around it like a single-stranded helix, each slab the size of a small dorm room. The air around the obelisk felt heavy and oppressive, a chill lingering upon her skin.
She glanced around and spotted the monolithic structure towering in the distance. “The Demon Incitement Tower? What the hell did I get myself into this time? If I wasn’t already sent to hell and back with this headache, I’m sure I would be now”.
Ayame shook her head and tried to clear the annoyance from her mind and tried to remember how she got here. As she tried to do so, she glanced at the ground and noticed the message: “Your only chance at survival is to ascend the tower and construct 64 spiritual cores. You may as well accept that unless you comply, death shall be your fate.”
She looked through the message and noticed the similarity in writing style. She also saw that the width of the letters matched her fingers and noticed one of her fingertips was dirty.
“So let me get this straight: was I sleepwalking and sleep writing? And what is that supposed to mean?”
Suddenly, a loud and powerful gust of wind blew past her. It filled her ears and sent debris flying around her. She felt immense pressure pressing against her, and she had to fight to keep herself from being thrown back.
Ayame began to walk forward.
Several minutes later, she was now standing directly in front of the obelisk and its inscriptions. She could see it clearly, and it was taller than she had anticipated.
The strange characters on the obelisk were like hieroglyphics, small and mysterious symbols set in a pattern that Ayame could not decode. As she looked more closely, however, they began to glow with a faint light and hum with an energy that seemed to vibrate in the air. Ayame knew instinctively that this was no ordinary inscription.
Ayame felt the mysterious symbols glow brighter and brighter, and as she stared, a feeling of understanding rushed through her. The characters seemed to be moving, rearranging themselves in her vision until they formed a message that resonated with her. In the glow of the obelisk, Ayame could hear the phrase [The path to enlightenment is paved with unbearable suffering] echoing in her mind.
“Oh yeah, real friendly,” Ayame scoffed sarcastically. “This is the warmest warning I’ve received in
weeks.”
Ayame looked up and saw the top of the tower illuminated by the light of the setting sun. She noticed numerous figures in colorful robes scattered across the series of levitating platforms.
She felt a fire of excitement and purpose burn within her as she stared up at the tower. The floating platforms reminded her of the cave where she found Gungnir. If this was the case, there might be an artifact waiting to be picked up at the top.
She stepped forward to the obelisk. With a deep breath, she closed her eyes and placed her hands against the inscriptions.
Small amounts of her qi began to flow into the obelisk gathering until an unknown amount of qi was taken. The floating slabs of the tower seemed to tremble in response, with the first slab of the structure shooting toward her. She felt as though it were beckoning her to step on it, and without hesitation, she accepted its invitation.
“What am I supposed to do now?” Ayame thought to herself as she surveyed the platform and the area around her. She noticed the smooth surface of the slab, the intricate carvings etched into its surface and the faint glow of energy emanating from it. The tower seemed to stretch endlessly into the sky, the levitating platforms dotting its height like stepping stones. She observed the platforms above her and saw people in various ranges of clothing. Yet all of them were unmoving with eyes closed. Their eerie stillness sent a slight unease.
Ayame decided to imitate them. Slowly she sat, eyes closed, allowing her thoughts to drift away. As she did so, the scenery around her began to change. The sun was suddenly swallowed by thick and dark clouds, and the air became tinged with stale, thick air and a sense of foreboding atmosphere.
Ayame found herself inside a decrepit Victorian mansion. The musty smell reminded her of a dank dungeon. The walls were draped in aged tapestries, almost completely hidden beneath frayed cobwebs that had been collecting dust over the decades. An ancient crystal chandelier dangled from the ceiling, its glass pieces shaking with every footstep and providing a faint, eerie light in the murky corridor.
She cautiously stepped into the musty hallway, cobwebs billowing from the corners of the ceiling. It felt like a hundred years had passed in its dark walls. The air was stagnant and smelled like death. An eerie silence suddenly filled the air as she made her way toward the distant end of the hallway. As she got closer, she noticed a looming silhouette blocking the way to where she wanted to go. It was a forgotten skeleton, propped up against the door; its vacant eye sockets and toothy grin unsettled her.
The skeleton monster let out an earth-shaking roar and lunged toward Ayame. On instinct, she reached out her hands and coiled her fingers around its bony neck, choke-slamming it downwards with all of her might. The mansion trembled and roared with the impact as the monster shattered into a thousand pieces, showering the room with an avalanche of dust.
Ayame breathed heavily as she surveyed her surroundings. Suddenly, she noticed a key on the ground. She picked up the key and opened the door.
Ayame felt a sudden chill as she found the mansion collapsing. The cobwebs, the dark walls, and the mansion itself looked as if it was being erased at a visible pace. When the mansion was completely erased, Ayame found herself back at the tower. The platform she was on trembled and shuddered as it flew towards the second slab.
With nothing more than a fleeting moment of surprise, Ayame regained her composure and walked onto the next hovering slab. Once settled, she patiently waited for the platform to take her somewhere new.
She crept further, taking cautious steps down the ancient hallway. Darkened paintings hung upon the walls, their colors smeared and dulled by time. As she advanced, discarded books and objects littered the floor, some crumbling away to dust. An aura of dread seemed to fill the air as if no one had stepped foot in this hallway for eons.
She kept walking until she arrived at the dining room. There she smelled something foul. It was a familiar scent: the scent of death. She peeked through the door and noticed corpses walking aimlessly. Their clothing was worn and torn, their skin rotting, and they had large wounds with maggots crawling inside. She also saw the maggots crawling in their eye sockets.
“Meikyo Shisui. (Clear Mirror, Still Water)” She muttered in her mind, activating her extrasensory ability. Through this ability, she was able to sense a total of eight zombies spread throughout the mansion: five on the second floor and three in the dining room. Their bodies were in an assortment of various stages of decay.
With a quick push kick,
Ayame kicked the door open, which sent the door off its hinges. The smell of death greeted her like Mike Tyson’s uppercut. Its foul odor assaulted her nostrils even after breathing through her mouth.
Slowly but surely, the zombies shambled toward Ayame.
With a gurgling moan, the lead zombie lumbered closer. Its once-human eyes flared with a pang of hunger too deep to ever be sated. Ayame reacted quickly, contorting her body and slipping underneath its outstretched arms before driving her knee up into its rotting face with a sickening crack. The zombie stumbled back, one arm grasping helplessly at the empty air as its putrid brains spilled out of its skull.
The remaining two zombies advanced relentlessly toward her, their lifeless eyes filled with a seething hunger that could not be deterred even by the gap between them.
Ayame launched herself forwards, her adrenaline pumping as she prepared to face the zombies. Reaching out with their decaying hands, their foul stench filled the air around them. Snarling and snapping their rotting teeth, they lunged towards her with ravenous hunger, their hollow eyes glinting with a menacing bloodlust.
In a split second, Ayame reacts to the zombie’s attack by gracefully winding her body to the right. Without hesitation, she confidently advances, instinctively dodging the zombie’s claws and gnashing jaws. Seeing an opening in the zombie’s assault, she unleashed a fierce left uppercut with her full force and fury. The zombie’s head is thrown back with a vicious crack, nearly severed from its neck.
Ayame’s eyes narrow into a predatory gaze as she stares down at the remaining zombie. In a split second, she moved with lightning quickness, transitioning from her defensive boxing stance to an offensive Muay Thai stance as she readied herself to deliver a deadly Wing Chun Knee Stomp followed by a classic Muay Thai knee strike to the skull.
Ayame leaped backward, narrowly avoiding the zombie’s gnashing teeth. Without hesitation, she stamped down hard on the zombie’s knee, causing it to buckle and kneel before her. In one swift motion, she launched her knee into its head with a sickening crunch. The zombie’s skull burst open, and its putrid matter splattered over Ayame’s face, chest and arms in a vile and gruesome shower.
“How filthy, god...damn this shit. Now the smell’s stuck onto me. Fuck.” Ayame cursed before quickly collecting herself, cleaning off the zombie’s flesh on her body and throwing away the chunks on the ground, as well as removing her clothes that were soaked from the zombie’s remains.
Ayame strode aggressively towards the hallway. As she did so, her gaze focused on the knight’s armor standing glinting in the dim light a distance away. She snatched the spear from the stand with a feral grunt and moved towards the stairs, her body still quivering from being exposed to the smell of a rotting body.
Ayame took the stairs, the spear firmly in her grip, ready for the danger that awaited above. As she ascended the stairs, she could smell the vile rotting smell in the air growing thicker and thicker.
She found a narrow door that leads to the second-floor hallway. Ayame opened the door slightly, allowing a small amount of light to enter the dark hallway. As the door opened, she could see a group of five zombies walking aimlessly in the hallway.
She hid in the corner of the door, activating Meikyo Shisui to spy on the zombie’s movements. Seeing the monsters inside, she immediately tapped the wall, creating an audible noise. The zombies turned toward the direction of the sound, and Ayame took this opportunity to launch the spear into the chest of the closest zombie. The spear dug deep into the zombie’s head, piercing through skin and bone and killing it instantly.
Ayame quickly recovered the spear and retreated back into the stairs, closing the door in the process.
Ayame raced to the door with the relentless horde of corpses chasing after her. Each time one of the creatures got close, she would swing open the door and thrust her spear into its chest, sending it crashing backward. She kept the door swinging back and forth like a pendulum until all of the undead were vanquished, and the hallway was emptied of their presence.
Ayame was sent back to the tower. The second slab shook as it flew towards the third slab.
She readied herself for the next onslaught, fervently hoping that the creatures she’d have to face were skeletons and not zombies. She would gladly take on a hundred skeletal hordes rather than face a small group of zombies.
