The Cruel Horizon[Old]

Obinai walks through the vacant city, each step echoing. The streets feel foreign, each corner more disorienting than the last. His heart races, his breaths coming shallow and fast as he scans for any sign of life.

Where is everyone? What the hell is going on? he thinks.

Everything stretches around him—storefronts dark, traffic lights stuck on eternal red, newspapers fluttering like ghosts in the air. His own reflection glares back from a shattered store window, distorted and unfamiliar.

This isn't happening. This can't—

"Hello?" he calls out again, his voice hoarse. It bounces back to him, mocking in its emptiness. He rubs his forehead with trembling fingers, his nails digging into his skin as if the pressure might force his mind to make sense of this.

This isn't real. This can't be real. Snap out of it, Obi, he tells himself, but his legs keep moving.

Suddenly, he notices movement at the edge of his vision—a faint flicker, like a shadow darting out of sight. He freezes, his pulse pounding in his ears as his eyes snap toward it. "Who's there?" he demands.

The whisper comes again, louder, clearer this time. It feels like it's coming from everywhere and nowhere...

"Cut it out!" Obinai's shout tears through the unnatural quiet as he whirls again. Then the cityscape shudders—warping like melting wax, street signs stretching into impossible angles. The asphalt beneath his feet ripples.

His palm slams against the lamppost for balance.

Big mistake.

The metal pulses under his touch—warm. Breathing. He recoils so fast his shoulder blades crack against the opposite wall. The lamppost stands innocently, yet his skin still tingles with the memory of that sickening give beneath his fingers.

"Nope. Nuh-uh." His voice wavers as he backpedals. "This is some bullshit—"

His heel catches on a curb that wasn't there a second ago. The ground rushes up to meet him, concrete scraping his palms as he barely catches himself. Pain rockets up his forearms.

Good. Pain means real. Wait—

The sidewalk twitches.

He scrambles to his feet, his chest heaving as the world around him twists further out of shape.

And then, in a sudden shift, the whispers stop.

The silence...

Obinai stands still, his body rigid, his gaze darting around.

Wait.

The world wavers—not the city around him, but his world. A flicker of something he can't quite place pulls at the edge of his awareness. He blinks, and for the briefest moment, the streets aren't empty. They're alive with people. He sees a woman walking her dog, a cyclist weaving through traffic, a child tugging at her parent's hand.

And then they're gone again.

What's real? he wonders, gripping his head with both hands. The whispers return, more than ever this time, rising in pitch and intensity. He squeezes his eyes shut.

But back in reality...

Obinai isn't moving at all.

He stands statue-still on the sidewalk, spine rigid as a steel rod. His eyes have rolled back, leaving only bloodshot whites visible. Drool glistens on his chin. The morning crowd parts around him like he's a boulder in a stream—first curious glances, then nervous sidesteps.

"Yo, dude okay?" A skateboarder nudges him with a deck. No response.

Laughter erupts from a group of teens. "Check this out!" One angles his phone, snapping a selfie with Obinai's frozen form. "Dead mode activated!"

A businessman pauses, tie flapping. "Someone call an—"

The ground shudders.

Coffee cups tremble in hands. Car alarms whoop. The crowd stills as one.

"Did you feel that?"

Then—

Obinai's head jerks sideways—unnatural—like a marionette tugged by invisible strings. His limbs follow, movements too smooth, too precise for someone vacant-eyed and unfocused.

"Okay, that's not drugs," the skateboarder breathes, backpedaling.

The earth hums beneath them. Deeper now...

Obinai takes a step.

Then another.

Away from the crowd.

Toward the alley where shadows pool too thickly.

"Hey man, stop!" A hand grabs his shoulder—

—and flies back like it touched a live wire. "Shit! He's burning up!"

Obinai doesn't react. Can't.

Inside his skull, a voice that isn't his whispers:

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

Almost there.

The pavement cracks momentarily beneath his feet.

No one follows.

*Inside his head...*

The whispers grow louder.

Left here, the voices murmur, not in words but in pressure, in the sudden ache behind his eyeballs when he considers disobeying.

"The hell am I doing?" Obinai mutters, swiping at his face. His fingers come away wet. I'm crying. When did I start crying?

A tremor rips through the street again, rattling his teeth. He stumbles, catching himself on a fire escape that feels disturbingly warm beneath his palm. The metal groans under his touch, vibrating with the aftershocks.

Am I dead? The thought slips in, cold and quiet. Was I taken—

"No." He spits, pushing off the wall. His reflection in a shattered storefront window looks alien—eyes too wide, mouth trembling. "This is real. Has to be real."

The whispers surge louder, pressing against his eardrums. Keep moving.

Soon, the familiar gleam of downtown's polished buildings begins to give way to more neglected surroundings, and tremors come again—more insistent, vibrating through his core.

Outside in his trance...

The streets grow quieter. The crowd of passersby that had surrounded him thins out as he wanders into an unfamiliar part of the city. Clean storefronts fade into graffiti-tagged walls, boarded-up windows, and trash-strewn sidewalks.

Another tremor rattles the pavement. Obinai's head tilts slightly, his body adjusting without conscious thought. His steps quicken, guided by the whispers threading through his mind.

Inside his head...

The whispers shift, their words growing clearer but no less alien. He furrows his brow slightly, his lips twitching as if he's on the verge of responding. He doesn't fully understand them, but their pull is undeniable.

"Where…" he mumbles softly. "Where are you taking me?"

There's no answer, just another tremor. His gaze snaps upward, and for the first time, he truly looks at it— Nurikabe.

Its shadow looms large, darkening the edges of his vision. As his eyes follow its expanse, he shivers as he looks to see no visible end to it, disappearing into the horizon in both directions.

The whispers grow louder, insistent, as if beckoning him closer.

Outside his head...

Obinai continues forward. The dying sun stains the crumbling buildings in sickly amber light, stretching the shadows of chain-link fences into jagged claws across his path. The air smells like burnt rubber and stale beer.

A cluster of men lounge against a mural of faded tags, their eyes tracking him like predators scenting wounded prey.

"Yo, check this out," rumbles the tall one in a beanie fraying at the edges. He flicks a cigarette butt that bounces off Obinai's shoulder. No reaction.

The stocky one with prison tattoos creeping up his neck steps forward, blocking the sidewalk. "Hey. Hey." He snaps fingers in front of Obinai's blank stare. "Damn, whatever this kid took, I want some."

Laughter ripples through the group as Beanie Guy pats Obinai down. "Bingo," he croons, flipping open the wallet. His grin shows more gaps than teeth. "You ain't needin' this where you're goin'."

Bills vanish into his pocket.

The phone comes next—until one of the wiry guys in a hoodie grabs Beanie's wrist. "Leave it, man. Let his people find him before he faceplants in a gutter."

"Fuck's wrong with you?" Beanie snarls, but he shoves the phone back into Obinai's pocket with a disgusted shove. "Hope whatever's in your head eats you alive."

Obinai stumbles past them, unaware. The phone vibrates again—MOM blazing across the screen like a distress flare in the gathering dark.

Somewhere deeper in the alley, a stray dog starts howling.

The men freeze.

"Ain't that the siren?" mutters the wiry one.

Beanie spits. "Ain't no siren. Just a mutt."

But they all step back as Obinai drifts onward, drawn forward by something none of them can see.

The last sliver of sun vanishes.

The howling stops.

And from Obinai's pocket, the phone goes dark.

The buzzing continues at intervals, each call going unanswered.

Inside his head...

The whispers are deafening now, filling every corner of his mind. He stumbles slightly, his fingers twitching as if trying to grasp something intangible.

"Why?" he murmurs, his voice cracking. "Why me?"

No answer comes, only the steady pull of the whispers and the sight of the wall growing larger with every step.

Outside his head...

Obinai's body halts in front of a rusted metal fence, the jagged edges of its bars pointing skyward like skeletal fingers. A crooked sign hangs loosely from the top rail, its once-bright letters now faded and peeling, spelling out a stark warning: DO NOT ENTER.

His head tilts slightly, the motion unnatural and jerky. His unfocused gaze lingers on the fence, his lips parting wordlessly. His hands twitch at his sides...

Subtly, the ground beneath him shudders with another tremor. This one is more forceful, rattling his teeth and sending a jolt through his body.

Move.

The command isn't his own.

Obinai's leg lifts.

Steps forward.

CRUNCH—

Except there is no crunch.

His sneaker passes through the metal like smoke through a screen. The bars ripple, warping around his calf in liquid distortion. Cold seizes his flesh—not winter chill, but something else.

His body keeps moving.

Hand outstretched, fingers vanishing into rusted iron. The metal doesn't bend. Doesn't break. It accepts him, swallowing his wrist whole.

His breath comes in shallow puffs, crystallizing in the air. The whispers swell—not in his ears now, but under his skin, vibrating in his marrow.

One final push.

His torso passes through.

The world shifts.

Suddenly he's standing on the other side, the fence solid again behind him. The air sits thick in his lungs, tasting of wet stone and something metallic. His skin prickles, every hair standing at attention.

The whispers sigh, satisfied.

Good.

Inside his head…

His eyes darting around even more as his heartbeat continues to quicken.

The whispers just....continue to press against the edges of his sanity.

"Why…" he murmurs.

He stumbles around a corner...

And there it is.

No fences.

No guards.

Just Nurikabe.

Exposed.

Waiting.

He stops abruptly. "Mom…" he mutters, the words hesitant and shaky. "She said… never to venture here."

Even his father, with his absentminded professor act, had gone dead serious that one time. Things disappear there, son. And they don't come back.

The whispers spike, sharp and invasive, like claws scraping against his thoughts. He grimaces, pressing his hands against his head. "But there's no one here," he says aloud, his voice trembling. "No gates, no security… nothing." His head snaps up. "So why the fuck are these voices getting louder?"

The oppressive silence that follows feels like a response, one that tightens his chest. With a hiss of frustration, he mutters, "Dammit," and forces his legs to move, his pace quickening to a fast walk. His heart pounds as he steps past the faint marker of the city line, the air thickening with every step that brings him closer.

Outside his head…

Obinai stands frozen in the desolate landscape, his expression blank. His steps falter briefly, then carry him forward.

Finally...he comes face to face with the wall, the towering monolith stretching endlessly in every direction. Up close, it's even more intimidating, its surface rough, marred by scuffs. Dark streaks stain the stone, remnants of rain and decay that never spread, giving it an almost organic quality.

Obinai's fingers curl and uncurl. Slowly, almost hesitantly, his arm lifts. His hand reaches out, trembling, toward the wall's cold surface.

Then...his palm and fingers touch it...Nurikabe.