March 7th, 2027 — The Realm of Exodus (Hour 2)
The clearing had gone quiet again.
The creature's body—the skinless tiger with bone-plated legs and hundreds of shifting teeth—began to disintegrate. Slowly, as though eaten by invisible fire, its form turned to pale dust and scattered into the air.
All that remained was a faint shimmer where it died, a small white crystal floating in place like a snowflake caught in slow motion.
Yu-Ri stared at it, voice trembling. "What is that…?"
Min-Jae approached cautiously. The system responded first.
> [Soul Fragment (Lesser)] Acquired.
> This crystallized remnant of a fallen beast holds raw essence.
Can be absorbed to enhance basic attributes.
A moment later, the fragment floated toward him and fused into his chest.
Min-Jae gasped. It wasn't painful, but it wasn't pleasant either. He felt something warm surge through his lungs, spreading through his limbs like sparks along nerves. His heartbeat slowed, then strengthened.
> +1 Vitality
+1 Perception
He flexed his fingers slowly. "This world has… levels."
Yu-Ri stepped closer. "Like a game?"
"Not just a game. It's more like… evolution."
---
They spent the next several minutes walking through the forest.
The terrain changed quickly, as if responding to unseen shifts. The trees grew taller, then shorter. Rocks hovered slightly above the soil. Gravity felt inconsistent. Time itself seemed slower—stretching seconds into strange silences.
Yu-Ri stayed close, never letting go of Min-Jae's sleeve.
Neither said much. Their minds were overloaded—trying to accept the reality they'd fallen into. The dream-like quality had faded. The fatigue from Earth was gone. Here, they felt alert, sharp, as if something ancient within them had been stirred awake.
---
March 7th, 2027 — The Fallen Crossing (Hour 4)
They arrived at a ridge overlooking a chasm.
Beyond it, a strange structure jutted from the rock—a ruin of massive bones shaped like a bridge, curved like ribs arching through space. Each "rib" was inscribed with faint runes glowing in silver and green. Beneath the structure was a sheer fall into shadow. No bottom. No sound.
"Should we cross it?" Yu-Ri asked.
Min-Jae didn't answer immediately. He stared at the bridge.
Some part of him remembered this. Not from memory—but from instinct. His body felt drawn forward. His hands tightened on the spear.
"I think this is a checkpoint," he muttered. "A boundary."
> [Zone Transition: Do you wish to leave the Tutorial Forest?]
Warning: Monsters ahead will be more intelligent. Stronger.
Once you leave, you cannot return.
Recommend minimum Soul Level: 5
Current Soul Level: 1
"No," Min-Jae said immediately. "We're not ready."
He turned back, and Yu-Ri exhaled in relief.
---
March 7th, 2027 — Tutorial Forest (Hour 5–9)
They spent the next several hours moving through the outer forest, learning through pain and failure.
The first lesson: everything is hostile.
Trees whose leaves emitted paralysis spores.
Insects the size of housecats with serrated legs.
Small, reptilian creatures that stalked them in packs, shrieking in bursts of sonar.
They fought. They bled. They adapted.
For every monster they killed, they earned Soul Fragments.
For every hour they survived, the system rewarded them with tiny stats:
> +1 Agility
+1 Willpower
+2 Reflex
+1 Stamina
They weren't just surviving—they were changing.
Yu-Ri learned to fight with grace, her daggers an extension of her fear. She never hesitated to shield Min-Jae from surprise attacks. She grew faster, more accurate. Her eyes, once soft and innocent, now tracked motion like a predator's.
Min-Jae became a wall. He fought forward, absorbing hits, baiting monsters into traps. He moved with raw instinct—each swing of his spear more practiced than the last. He no longer flinched at blood. His grip didn't shake.
But even with their growing strength… they were still fragile.
And they weren't alone.
---
March 8th, 2027 — Outer Ring Camp (Hour 18)
They stumbled into a hidden clearing surrounded by crude wooden spikes. Makeshift tents. Fires burning with odd, blue flames. Crates marked with Korean and Japanese characters.
And people.
Real people.
A group of six survivors, mostly in their twenties. Each had different weapons—knives, clubs, and strange glowing gauntlets. They wore mismatched gear: armored shoulder plates made from monster scales, tunics woven from silk-like grass, boots salvaged from other worlds.
Their leader, a tall man with sharp cheekbones and narrow eyes, stepped forward and pointed his sword.
"State your names."
Min-Jae raised both hands. "We're not enemies. We just arrived. We're from Seoul. My name is Kang Min-Jae. This is my stepsister, Yu-Ri."
The man lowered his sword slightly. "How many beasts have you killed?"
"…Six," Min-Jae said honestly.
"Too weak," a woman scoffed behind him. She had scars across her jaw and wore bone-plated gloves. "They'll slow us down."
"Or get us killed," another man muttered.
"Enough," the leader said. He studied Min-Jae for a long moment, then nodded. "You may stay. But pull your weight. We sleep in shifts. We hunt at dawn. You eat what you kill. You die, we don't bury you."
"Understood."
---
That night, Min-Jae and Yu-Ri sat around a fire for the first time since arriving.
The others whispered stories.
One had been here for three weeks, sleeping on Earth only to return to the same spot.
Another claimed to have met creatures that spoke in broken Korean.
One man revealed his arm had been torn off, but when he woke on Earth, it was back—though his soul had lost twenty years of memory.
No one smiled.
No one trusted.
Min-Jae whispered to Yu-Ri as she leaned against him. "We have to stay sharp."
She nodded. "No one here is telling the truth. I can feel it."
He looked into the fire and thought of Earth.
Of the quiet rooftop apartment. The seaweed soup. The snowfall.
And then he thought:
> What happens when we die here…? Do we just disappear back home? Or does the world forget we existed?
---
End of Chapter 3