……Brrrring♪ Brrrring♪
An unpleasant bass thud pounds against my skull.
……Brrrring♪ Brrrring♪
”…So noisy.”
I reach out blindly beneath the covers, grope around for the source, and groan as
reality drags me out of sleep.
”Ughhh… who is it…?”
The culprit behind the racket is my phone. Who could possibly be calling while I
was sleeping so comfortably?
……Brrrring♪ Brrrring♪
I glance at the screen and see my twin sister’s name-Manami.
I really don’t feel like answering, but if I ignore her, she’ll be in a
foul mood later.
”Fwaaaah…”
I stretch wide, swipe the screen, and answer with a half-stifled yawn. “Fwah,
hello… it’s me… what’s up?”
”What’s up? Don’t ‘what’s up’ me! Why aren’t you at
school yet!? You’re skipping again, aren’t you!?”
Her voice blasts through the speaker loud enough to make my ear ache.
”Ahh… sorry. I was asleep until just now.”
”Hah… were you up late gaming again?”
”Nah, it’s just-the new one I bought is seriously fun, so I got a little
carried away…”
Game cases sit stacked like towers around my bed, and the new title’s package
rests right on my desk. The monitor is still sitting on the game’s title screen with the music looping
softly-hard evidence that I passed out mid-play last night.
”This is way beyond ‘carried away’! Honestly!”
”My bad, my bad. I’ll head over right now.”
”It’s already noon, big brother. Hah… you’re hopeless without me.
See? This is exactly what happens when I’m not around! I really regret not walking to school with you today
just because of student council work. I should’ve forced you out of bed back then-“
Ah, here goes Manami’s nagging mode. Once she starts, it drags on forever.
”Ah, Manami? I’m hanging up now. I’ll head to school, so catch you
later.”
”A-ah, wait! I’m not done-“
……Click.
I cut the line before she can finish. We’re in the same class anyway, so
I’ll see her soon regardless. No big deal.
”Alright, time to get changed…”
Crawling out of bed, I start pulling myself together.
Our household is what you’d call a single-mother family. My dad was a piece of
trash who ditched Mom three years ago, ran off with another woman, and vanished into thin air. So right now
it’s just the three of us: me, Manami, and Mom. At school, everyone compares me to my twin-the perfect honor
student-but I got used to that ages ago.
I shove the lunch box Manami made into my backpack. By the time I get to school,
it’ll probably be right around lunch break, so I can just eat it then. I brush my teeth, splash some water
on my face, and throw on my uniform. My bangs stick up a bit, but it’s fine. A guy’s morning routine is
pretty simple anyway.
”Come to think of it, we’ve got P.E. today.”
I stuff my gym clothes into a larger backpack and sling it over my shoulders.
”…Okay, ready. Let’s go.”
Talking to myself when nobody’s around is a bad habit of mine, even when
I’m not playing games.
……Click.
I open the apartment door and step outside-and my entire field of vision gets
swallowed by a blinding white flash.
”Whoa!? What the-so bright!”
The intensity forces me to throw up an arm and squeeze my eyes shut as the light
washes over me like a wave.
….
….
….
When the glare finally fades, I slowly open my eyes.
There’s no sound-only the sound of my own breathing echoing unnaturally loud.
No air moving, no smell, nothing.
It’s a pure white space, completely isolated from the outside world. The walls
and floor blend together so seamlessly that up, down, left, and right don’t even make sense.
It looks totally empty-until I squint and spot a solitary desk and chair sitting up
ahead, with a laptop PC resting on top.
”…Huh? Where am I? Am I still dreaming?”
I stretch wide, then give my cheeks a hard slap. A sharp smack breaks the silence.
”Ow…. Okay, seriously, what is this place? I was standing at my front door a
second ago.”
I don’t seem to be dead. My legs are still here, the pain feels real, and I
don’t remember getting hit by a truck or anything.
Approaching the desk cautiously, I check the surroundings. This doesn’t really
look like an isekai setup… not that I particularly want to get reincarnated, though I wouldn’t be
surprised if some template goddess showed up right about now.
”Ah, right. My phone.”
I swing my backpack around, pull my phone out, and figure I’ll call the police
since this has to be a prank.
……Click. Click.
”Huh? It won’t turn on.”
I hold the power button down repeatedly, but the screen stays dead black.
…Okay, this might actually be bad.
An alarm bell goes off in the back of my mind. White walls, white floor, white
ceiling. A desk, a chair, and a black laptop. No doors, no exits.
Deep down, I already know this isn’t a prank or a kidnapping-I’ve been
dragged into something completely beyond normal human logic.
Cold sweat runs down my back.
”Oh come on… Hey! Is anybody there!?”
I shout at the top of my lungs, but the sound dies immediately without even an
echo.
”Haha, you’ve got to be kidding…”
My brain can barely process how surreal this is.
”…Phew.”
I take a slow breath. Panicking right now is the worst thing I could do-I need to
focus on what’s in front of me.
Walking over to the desk, I pull out the chair and sit down. The black laptop sits
there without any power cord attached, looking ridiculously suspicious.
”If I can just contact the outside world with this…”
I steel myself and hit the power button.
The dark screen turns bright white. No password prompt, no Windows or Mac logo-just
an operating system I’ve never seen in my life. Text starts scrolling down the screen on its own in bright
green terminal font.
[ Hello, Kageyama Manato ]
[ You have been selected as an (Early Access Player)! ]
[ From now on, you will challenge a game made by God! ]
> Proceed
”What is this? A game made by God? How does it even know my name?”
My heart starts pounding. Anyone else would be losing their mind right now, but
deep down, my gamer instincts are already kicking in. An unknown game made by God that nobody has ever
cleared…
The fear is still there, but the excitement completely overrides it. A smirk
spreads across my face before I can stop it.
”…Sounds fun.”
Without hesitating, I press Enter.
The display transitions to the next page.
[ Select game difficulty: Normal ]
[ Select number of initial players: 1 ]
[ Select number of game rounds: 3 ]
> Proceed
Looks like a standard settings screen.
”No explanation text?”
Hovering the cursor brings up no tooltips, and pressing Proceed looks permanent. I
have to choose carefully.
Looking through the difficulty settings, there are five options: EASY, NORMAL,
HARD, VERY HARD, and NIGHTMARE.
”Safe choice? No way. [NIGHTMARE] is the only real option here.”
For a gamer, picking the highest difficulty on a first run is the golden rule. If I
don’t, it won’t feel like a real clear, and I’ve got too much pride to play on easy mode.
Next up is initial players, ranging from 0 to 5.
”This is my first playthrough, so let’s go with [0]. I don’t need
deadweight messing up my run.”
I lock in 0. It says “initial players,” so there’ll probably be a
system to recruit allies later anyway.
Finally, the number of rounds-min 3, max 10.
”Longer runs are always better. Maxing it out at [10]!”
At this point, my curiosity has completely wiped away any lingering fear. A
god-tier game made by an actual god is about to start, and the fact that I’m currently late for school
doesn’t even cross my mind anymore.
With [NIGHTMARE], [0], and [10] selected, I hit Proceed.
[ (NIGHTMARE) selected: Enemy levels will increase significantly ]
[ (0) selected: Acquire ‘Bonus Skill’ ]
[ (10) selected: Acquire ‘Bonus Skill’ ]
[ ! All-High-Difficulty-Selection Hidden Bonus ! ]
[ Acquire a ‘Bonus Skill’ upon each clear ]
> Start
”Seriously? A hidden bonus!?”
So setting the difficulty higher pumps up the enemy levels. That means this is
either an action game with RPG mechanics or a full-blown RPG. And by choosing solo play on the max round
setting, I stacked multiple bonus skills right out of the gate.
…Hell yeah.
I don’t know what these skills do yet, but starting with this big of an
advantage is going to be fun.
”Alright, let’s see what this God’s got.”
I slam the Enter key.
The moment I do, another blinding burst of light erupts around me. Space distorts,
gravity shifts, and my head starts spinning.
”Whoa-again!?”
My vision fades to black as my body gets sucked into the light.
….
….
….
[ First Game: ‘Abyss Labyrinth’ ]
[ Current Floor: 1/30 ]
[ Current Player Count: 1 ]
[ Difficulty: NIGHTMARE ]
[ Game Start! ]
Trivia:
- The protagonist’s name is presented in the system log as ‘Kageyama
Manato’ (family name first, given name second), but his sister calls him ‘big brother,’ establishing
the sibling relationship.
- He deliberately chose the highest difficulty ‘NIGHTMARE’ alongside zero
initial players and maximum rounds, triggering hidden bonuses that reward ‘Bonus Skills’ per clear.
- The transition from the white room uses identical sensory cues (bright light,
spatial distortion) to the earlier arrival, suggesting the game’s teleportation system reuses a consistent
mechanism.