The corridor didn't narrow. It just got darker. The kind of dark that doesn't fight back, doesn't hide anything, it just is.
Not cold, not loud. Just absence pressed into the shape of a hallway. Merlin moved through it with no plan and no idea how long his legs would keep working, but he walked anyway.
His boots hit stone. Not loud. Not echoing. Just soft and gritty, like stepping through an old furnace someone forgot to shut down.
The air thinned. Every breath tasted like regret, sharp, metallic, and old.
He walked until the corridor split. Left: nothing. Right: more of the same.
The system didn't ping.
No gods commented.
Not even the Reaper followed.
It was just him now.
His hand brushed the wall. The surface wasn't smooth. It wasn't rough either. Just… undecided. Like it hadn't chosen if it was real.
"You can show up now," he muttered. "Whoever you are. Trial, monster, lost soul. I'm not picky."
Nothing.
He moved right.
