It started with my hand.
I was sitting in the back of the lecture hall, the same place I always sat—the spot where people usually piled their extra coats because they didn't notice I was already there. I was used to being ignored, but I wasn't used to seeing through my own skin.
At first, I thought it was the lighting. Then I realized I could see the wood grain of the desk through my palm. I wasn't just being ignored anymore. I was disappearing.
And that's when I saw him. Or it. A tall, jagged shadow standing in the corner of the room that shouldn't have been there. It didn't have a face, but I knew it was looking right at me. Because I was the only one in the room who was starting to look like it.
Am I dying? The thought shot through my mind like a lightning bolt. I tried to stand up, but my legs felt like they were made of static. When I moved, there was no sound. My chair didn't creak. My boots didn't thud against the carpet. I looked down, and my torso was flickering like a badly rendered video. One second I was wearing my favorite hoodie, and the next, I was looking at the empty chair behind me.
"Professor?" I tried to yell.
Nothing. Not even a whisper. My vocal cords felt like they were vibrating in a frequency that didn't exist in this world.
In the front of the room, Professor Miller continued his lecture on Quantum Mechanics, his voice a dull drone that felt miles away. Next to me, a girl named Sarah reached over and set her heavy textbook down.
She set it directly on my lap.
I didn't feel the weight. The book simply passed through my thighs and landed on the seat of the chair as if I weren't even there. She didn't flinch. She didn't look at me. To her, I was already gone.
I'm erasing, I realized, a cold sweat breaking out across my forehead—or where my forehead used to be. I'm being deleted from reality.
But the thing in the corner... it was moving.
The jagged shadow didn't walk; it glided. It moved against the grain of the light, a hole in the universe that was darker than any night I'd ever seen. Its "fingers" were long, needle-thin wisps of smoke that scraped against the wall, leaving behind trails of frost.
It wasn't looking at the Professor. It wasn't looking at Sarah.
It was looking at the empty space where I was sitting.
I scrambled out of the chair, or at least, I tried to. I felt like a ghost haunting my own body. My movements were fluid, effortless, and terrifyingly fast. I stumbled toward the exit of the lecture hall, my heart hammering against ribs I could no longer see.
I reached for the door handle. My hand—now a translucent, shimmering outline—passed right through the metal.
[NOTIFICATION: SINCHRONIZATION AT 15%]
A blue, semi-transparent box flickered in front of my eyes. It wasn't a hallucination. It was sharp, glowing, and followed my line of sight with mechanical precision.
[WARNING: THE VOID IS TRACKING THE HOST.]
[CURRENT VISIBILITY: 0.04%]
A system? My mind raced. This was the kind of thing you read about in those "Player" novels, but this didn't feel like a game. It felt like a death sentence.
I turned back. The jagged shadow was only five feet away now. Up close, I could hear it. It sounded like a thousand dead leaves skittering across a grave. It raised a long, smoky arm, and for the first time, I saw its "face." It was a mask of cracked porcelain, frozen in a silent, jagged scream.
"Get away from me!" I swung a fist at it.
My hand connected. But it didn't feel like hitting a person. It felt like sticking my hand into a freezer. A jolt of agonizing cold shot up my arm, turning my vision white.
[SYSTEM ALERT: PHYSICAL CONTACT DETECTED.]
[STRENGTH STAT: UNRANKED]
[ABILITY ACTIVATED: PHASE STRIKE]
The shadow recoiled. A chunk of its smoky chest dissipated, swirling into the air like ink in water. It hissed—a sound that vibrated in my very marrow—and lunged.
I didn't wait. I turned and ran through the door.
Literally.
I didn't open it. I simply leaned forward, and the solid wood gave way like a curtain of mist. I tumbled out into the hallway, landing on the linoleum floor. I waited for the pain of the impact, but it never came. I was light. I was weightless. I was a predator in the making, but right now, I felt like the prey.
The hallway was packed with students. Hundreds of them, talking, laughing, and rushing to their next class. I stood in the middle of the crowd, screaming for help, waving my arms.
A group of guys walked straight through me. I felt a slight chill as they passed, like a draft under a door, but they didn't even blink. I was a ghost in a world of solid stone.
I need to get home, I thought, my panic reaching a fever pitch. If I can just get to my room, maybe I can figure this out. Maybe I can wake up.
[OBJECTIVE UPDATED: SURVIVE THE FIRST HUNT]
[REWARD: PERMANENT ANCHOR]
[FAILURE: TOTAL ERASURE]
I looked back at the lecture hall door. The jagged shadow was emerging. It didn't pass through the door like I did; it oozed through the cracks, its porcelain mask twisting as it searched the hallway.
Then, it locked onto me.
I turned and sprinted.
I discovered quickly that being invisible had its perks. I didn't have to navigate the crowd. I ran in a straight line, passing through bodies, lockers, and walls. Every time I passed through something, a small notification popped up: [PHASE EFFICIENCY +0.1%].
I burst through the main entrance of the university and hit the street. The bright afternoon sun should have felt warm, but it felt like nothing. I looked at the ground.
I had no shadow.
I was a hole in the world.
I ducked into an alleyway, my breath coming in jagged gasps. I leaned against a brick wall, feeling my body begin to solidify slightly. My hands were becoming visible again—pale, trembling, but solid.
"Isitgone?" I whispered.
[VISIBILITY: 45%]
[THE VOID IS NEARBY.]
A shadow stretched across the brick wall in front of me. It wasn't my shadow. It was tall, jagged, and holding a blade made of frozen darkness.
I looked up. The creature was perched on the fire escape above me, its porcelain mask staring down. It didn't want my money. It didn't want my life.
It wanted my existence.
"Okay," I said, my voice finally returning, cracking with a mixture of terror and a new, dark spark of anger. "If you want to play hide and seek... let's play."
I focused on my hand. I focused on that feeling of fading away. [SKILL: TOTAL CLOAKING ACTIVATED]
I vanished just as the creature leaped.....