(Level: You)Includes: existential glitches, diamonds with attitude, and warnings that smell like tobacco and trauma.
The guide looked at me like he was about to say:"By the way, Earth's been sold as an NFT. Want to cry or smoke?"
I nodded.Wearing that expression people make when their world collapses but they're pretending it's just a backache.Spoiler: everything hurt.Especially the tattoo on my chest — it was blinking. Literally.
I went upstairs.Because, really, where do you go when physics just told you:"Thanks for playing. Now go screw yourself."
In front of the mirror, I did the unthinkable:I waved at myself.Or rather — my reflection did.With a smile I definitely hadn't made.
—"Uh-huh…"I scratched my face like it was a soul-level forced Windows update.—"Great. Now I've got WiFi with the afterlife's blueprints."
I took off my shirt.The tattoos were still there.Fresh. Dark. Animated.They breathed when I wasn't looking.Yes — I heard them.
On the table: the four diamonds.Small. Shiny.Carrying the energy of a sleeping baby dragon…...that, if awakened, might erase you from the multiverse.
I stepped closer.One of them vibrated.Yes. Vibrated.Like it was saying:"Hi, I'm your scheduled destiny. Do you accept cookies?"
—"Don't you dare activate," I whispered.As if threatening an emotional grenade.
And then I touched it.Of course I did.Because I'm Renji Kurogane.I don't learn.I just collect trauma and sort it by scar type.
Everything. Stopped.
Sound: off.Light: gone.Gravity: under revision.
And then — a flash.Not in the eyes.In the mind.Like someone plugged a USB into my soul and installed a file named:NOR'MAKT.exe
I was somewhere else.A place that wasn't a place.
Ruins.Fog with a proper name.Statues crying dry blood.Sighs that came from nowhere.
And in the distance:a door.Made of bone.With a symbol in the center.
The Eye.Of course.
Then — a voice.My voice.But deeper.With horror trailer echo:
"NOR'MAKT. First coordinate. First fragment. First irreversible error."
The diamond floated.Split in two.And said something without saying it:
"You've been marked.You opened the door.There is no logout."
I woke up. Again.Because apparently, my body now runs on a system that reboots every time I get too close to an uncomfortable truth.
I was on the floor.Shaking.The Eye tattoo pulsed.It was burning hot.
A knock at the door.The guide.
—"You alright?"—"Define 'alright'."—"Are you still you?"
Silence.I thought.A lot.
—"Ninety percent.The other ten… still loading."
I went downstairs.Diamond shard in hand.
—"Did you see it?" I asked.He nodded.
—"NOR'MAKT.The first place the Eye was sealed...And where it began to leak."
Perfect.Tourist destination with ancestral trauma vibes.
—"We leave at dawn."—"Why do all cursed journeys start at dawn?"—"Because horror at noon lacks aesthetic."
I went back up.And just as I was about to close the door, I heard his voice —dragged in by old sand, wasted time, and a half-dead cigarette:
—"One warning, Renji…"—"Another one?"—"Out there… time isn't a line.It's not a circle.It's a mirror."
—"And what does it reflect?"
He lit another cigarette.
—"Your broken parts."
I didn't sleep that night.Because every time I closed my eyes…the Eye blinked.
And inside that blink…a name began to form.A voice.A face.
Senku.
And I knew.I felt it.
What I thought was a memory…was a promise.
And tomorrow…someone intends to collect.