I Transmigrated Into a Dark Fantasy Eroge
I'd transmigrated into a shit-tier world. A dark fantasy with no dreams in it. No hope, either.
"Ungh... ughk."
It was the reek stinging the tip of my nose that woke me. Until just yesterday, for sure... I'd fallen asleep playing a dark fantasy eroge. Had I keeled over and passed out in the bathroom, or what...?
-Clank.
The instant I tried to sit up, something yanked my wrist back down. I lifted my head to find rusty iron chains looped around my wrists and ankles.
"What the... is this...?"
The words scraped out of me, cracked and split. Days without a drop of water, maybe—my throat was scorched raw. I took a slow look around. A dim, dreary prison cell. Iron bars walling me in on every side.
-Ding!
Zion... the protagonist of the eroge I used to play.
I held my breath and surveyed my surroundings. My eyes must have adapted to the long dark, because the prison interior came into surprisingly clear view. It was vast—each cell a cramped, single-occupancy box of bars, but they curved around in a great ring, the unmistakable shape of a deep, multi-layered underground prison.
"Um, hello...? Anyone there...?"
A woman on the far side was hollering. Probably the same breed as me—passed out somewhere, woke up in chains.
-Screeeeech. Screeeeech.
That was when a figure with a black cloth over his head stalked past the cells, dragging an enormous greatsword. Every step wailed the blade against the stone floor, wringing out a monstrous shriek.
-SLAM.
"Eek... eeeeek...!"
The hooded man wrenched the cell door open. The woman shook like a leaf, paralyzed with terror. The man held her in a long, silent stare—then lifted the greatsword up over himself...
-CRUNCH...!
I turned my gaze away. I had no interest in watching what came next. The wet, rending sounds repeated for a while, and then, before long, there was quiet.
-Screeech. Screeeeech.
You have witnessed a shocking scene.
Mental Gauge is decreasing.
"......"
Fuck me... so it really was that game. A TRPG-flavored dark fantasy eroge. And I'd been dropped into that godforsaken world. My pointless little pride—the itch to be the guy who unearths an obscure eroge nobody else knows about—was what had summoned me to a dump like this.
"Water. Water. Water. Water."
The old man across the way kept droning it like a prayer. His tongue had split open, streaking the wall red, and still he licked. A senile old wreck... his body so starved the skin of his belly sagged against his spine.
"Heheheh..."
Beside her, a woman sucked on her thumb and giggled. And off somewhere, somebody else was doing... whatever. All told, there were around forty of us in here. Not a single sane one among them.
"Hey, um... gramps..."
I called out to the lunatic in front of me, my voice cracking apart. I wasn't expecting anything from a madman... but trussed up head to toe, there was nothing else to try anyway.
"......Water. Water. Water. Water."
Instead of answering, the old man stared at me for a moment—then went back to licking the wall.
"......Fuck..."
I strained every muscle and bucked against the bonds. The chains clanked and hauled me right back down each time.
"Fuck...! Fuck...! Fuck...!"
Was I going to end up like that old man? Dread closed over my head. And no wonder... In this eroge, you start at 1%, and the bad ending hits before you can so much as blink. I mean, what kind of shit game even does that... but this one did.
The bad ending where you sit in a cell, forgotten, until you die.
"......"
Action: Struggle
Consumed 1 Action Point.
Remaining Action Points: 0/10
Nothing happened.
I thrashed until my wrists felt like they'd snap... and nothing happened.
"Hey! You shit-for-brains old bastard...!"
I hollered at the old man across the way. The stress had filled me to bursting; if I didn't take it out on somebody, I felt like I'd lose my mind.
"......Water."
That batshit old coot was still wheezing his water, water, water. If he loved the stuff that much, he could've gone and guzzled jizz instead, the fucking prick...
You have consumed all Action Points.
End your turn?
The system window blinked at me, over and over. A hollow laugh climbed up my throat. First it isekai's me into an eroge out of nowhere... and now it just wants me to sit here and die? I had gotten screwed over in the most spectacular way imaginable.
The instant I tapped the option, the world lurched into fast-forward. My time alone stood frozen while everybody else's streamed past.
The old man across the way went down. Blood-soaked, having stained every wall he'd licked, he crumpled onto the floor and went right on licking it. How many more days crawled by? At some point, the old man stopped moving.
The corpse shriveled at horrifying speed. Only when it had curled into something like a twisted dead branch... did the flow of time return to normal.
Zion — Action Points 1/10
You have faced a shocking situation. Action Points decreased.
"Just fucking kill me already, you bastards...!"
I screamed past the iron bars. Nothing came back except the woman's tittering snickers and the moans of the dying.
Action: Shout
Consumed 1 Action Point.
Nothing happened.
You have consumed all Action Points.
End your turn?
"......"
Time raced ahead again. The thumb-sucking woman died. Smiling the whole way down... and still that phantom giggle went circling my ears.
How many turns did I burn? Every time a turn came back around, I'd haul on the chains and scream—just in case. Then end the turn again. And again.
In this fuck-forsaken turn-based game... turns meant nothing. Every skip, somebody across the way died. The Mental Gauge kept bleeding down. After a while, even when my turn arrived, I stopped doing anything at all.
No matter what I tried, the window just spat "Nothing happened." at me, on loop. That garbage status window kept dangling hope in front of my face like it was mocking me. If nothing was ever going to happen, why the hell did you build this thing?
"Fuck..."
I gave up and just kept hammering the system window in front of my eyes.
[ YES ]
[ YES ]
How many days had gone by? A few months, maybe? It could've been years. There were no windows down here—time passed, and the only clock I had was other people dying.
The prison had gone still. I looked around: every remaining prisoner had withered into one of those twisted dead branches. My thirst burning a hole through me, I licked the wall.
"Water...?"
Lick after lick, moisture beaded on the tip of my tongue. Barely a few drops' worth. Hope bloomed anyway.
"Water...! Water...! Water...!"
I licked the wall, again and again. My mouth filled with the taste of iron. It took hours of this before I understood—the water was my own blood.
The one small mercy was that while a turn was skipping, I couldn't feel hunger or thirst at all.
End your turn?
-THUD. THUD. THUD...!
Dust sifted down from the ceiling. A sound I hadn't heard in ages. Again and again came the roar of walls being smashed apart.
"The jailer...?"
Finally... I could die. At least I wouldn't be sealed inside this fucked-up turn system for all eternity. The footsteps drew closer and closer.
-KRA-KA-KA-BOOOM-!
The iron gate of the underground prison blew clean off its frame. Sunlight began bleeding down from the prison's topmost floor. The footsteps receded and returned, receded and returned. But the shriek of a dragged greatsword—nothing. Not a sound of it.
"Over here...! Here...!"
I forced it out through my shredded throat. Whoever they were... at least they weren't the jailer.
Action: Shout
Consumes 1 Action Point.
Summons someone to this location.
The steps closed in, and then she came into view. A woman clad in silver armor. Blood and shreds of flesh had dried stiff across the plate. Dark-red blood was still dripping from her colossal sword—someone, it seemed, had died at her hand only moments ago.
So I'm going to die, then... At least I'd never rot in here forever... I lifted my head slowly. Jailer, or someone else entirely... I wanted, at the very least, to see a face.
"Wha......?"
A woman with long, snow-silver hair. Enormous breasts... I knew this woman. The very woman I'd seen hundreds—no, thousands—of times in this eroge...
"Elena...?"
The game's main heroine. The strongest knight on the continent... and Elena—whose bare skin was a far more familiar sight to me than her armor—was standing right in front of my eyes.
"Huh...?"
Elena made a dumbstruck little sound. She demolished the iron bars with one lazy swing of the greatsword and came toward me.
"Found you... at last...!"
The sword clattered to the floor, and trembling hands wrapped around my face.
"Zion... I finally found you......"
Her shoulders heaved, and tears fell in heavy drops. She sobbed out loud like a small child. Elena knowing who I was... it made no sense. By all rights she shouldn't have laid eyes on me once yet—how the hell did she know me?
"Hnnngh... snff... forgive me... I came... too late..."
Whether I replied or not, Elena nuzzled her cheek against mine. Her tears slathered all over my face.
"Who... are you...?"
For now, I decided to play dumb. According to the story, the protagonist doesn't meet Elena until far, far later. Elena went still for a moment, then peeled herself off me.
"What...... did you... say......?"
Elena's pupils wavered wide. Perhaps she'd caught sight of her own disgrace... she lightly wiped her face and spoke again.
"I am... your girlfriend... you see......"
"......?"
What...? The strongest female knight on the continent had just declared herself my girlfriend.