The Nameless Immortal Opens His Eyes

In the beginning, there was nothing but light, rock, and dust. When the mist that devoured worlds descended upon that place, life and land rose up—things called dramas or dioramas. Different eras and fictional concepts were absorbed, carrying their own histories, beings, and truths. Fragments of consumed imagination. Unfinished verities and sentiments. Or entire worlds that had only existed inside a madman’s skull. All of them mixed together and bloomed. In that hollow, lonely gap, the life and light that sprouted took root in a world of dust.

Diorama: Golden Horizon. A land where fiction and reality intertwined, where magic and mystery existed.

Diorama: Shinhai. A realm of every kind of Eastern mystery, indigenous gods, and martial artists who wielded secret arts.

Diorama: Rotten City. A metropolis of steam and gunpowder, where intellect and the madness of rotten brains fused into engineering.

Diorama: Vertical Room. A domain of incomprehensible rules and monstrosities that swallowed scientific reason and sloth.

And countless other dioramas that bloomed and withered in turn. Every time the world was swallowed by mist, more dioramas rose and fell. The city born from the dregs—the undigested dioramas and unborn dramas left behind. The city of corridors that connected those who had nowhere else to go. And so, to its embrace, it was entrusted with nameless ruin.

From the spiral, from the chain, from the void, the nameless immortal opened his eyes.

I thought I heard a faint voice.

When I opened my eyes, a rabbit was staring down at me.

“H-Hiiik!? It came back to li─?!”

The rabbit was fluffy, yet it could talk and react like a person. It had soft pink fur, but also human-like hair growing from its head. Its eyes, nose, and mouth resembled those of the lords of creation. Any real furry would probably call it an abomination. Was this thing actually a human pretending to be a furry? Were those ears and tail just accessories? And the fur on its body too?

“Huh?”

Anyway, that rabbit was in the middle of stripping me naked. When it got all the way to my pants, I froze solid. The liberating sensation of my lower half being exposed, mixed with a sliver of shame, greeted me with refreshing clarity.

Wow, what the fuck. Getting eaten the second I wake up—which isekai cliché is this?

I got a little excited. But it seemed I wasn’t the scenario the rabbit had in mind. It stumbled backward, turned deathly pale, and bolted.

“Wh-What the hell?! Fuck!”

I watched the fluffy rabbit’s backside as it scampered away. Cute face, filthy mouth. The gap was unbearable, but I was too busy blinking in confusion to do anything about it.

“?”

It felt like I had slept for far too long. Or rather, like I had actually been dead. The place I’d been lying in was a stone coffin. A sarcophagus filled with long years of dust and death. The coffin that had sealed darkness and curses had opened, and beneath the dryness and death I had shared with it, a wriggling thought surfaced.

“My back hurts.”

I felt stiff. I stood up. No—stood up wasn’t enough to describe it.

Crack. Pop. Crunch!

“Ughaaaaah!”

The sound of every joint in my body popping was the kind of ASMR that would make people drool and rush forward if it came from a human body. I brushed off the dust and unidentifiable fragments that fell from me and rubbed my neck. I was completely naked. Hmm. Quite embarrassing. Or was it? Nudity is humanity’s natural state. Why should I feel ashamed? Jean-Jacques Rousseau said it too—return to nature. This is my natural form.

Flop. Flop.

After a brief, meaningful stretch and some meaningless introspection, I moved on to assessing the situation. Where was I, and what was I doing?

I could at least answer that much.

“A graveyard, huh.”

I pondered for a moment. But inside my head was as empty as the ruined tombs around me. Only familiarity filled the space. Shattered stone coffins. Human bones, decayed and scattered across the floor. It wasn’t an unfamiliar sight. Probably a tomb robbed by grave robbers, or one of those forgotten, ownerless graves left to the passage of time. It was such a common starting point that it almost felt cliché.

So what about my equipment? What abilities did I have?

“?”

Regrettably, I had nothing. Just my bare body. The only thing left was this pathetic sack of meat. The resonant hum of abundant ether, the weapons that had once been extensions of my limbs—none of it remained.

“Wow. It’s been a while. Born a beggar, huh. Yeah, I figured it’d be something like this.”

My hesitation was brief. If I didn’t move, the world wouldn’t change. Whatever this place was, something outside was waiting for me.

“Looks like the pink rabbit ran off that way.”

Feeling the crunch of bones beneath my bare feet, I began to climb. Cave and graveyard. Graveyard and cave. The path kept rising, and I quickly grew bored. I had the strong feeling I was forgetting something, but I couldn’t quite recall what. Still, walking itself was easy. It was something I had always done. Something I had always experienced. All I had to do was walk until I saw light. So I followed that pull.

And then I saw the light.

The world opened up in an instant.

“Oh?”

The scent of desolate wind. A haze of light that seemed ready to begin at any moment. I stepped out through the passage where all of it poured in.

“Yeehaw!”

I spread my arms wide to greet the light as I emerged.

Whoooosh!

Standing at the edge of a cliff, wind whipped against me. The sudden smell of steam and oil. Letters woven from light and magic danced in the air. A world where things that should not exist were simply… existing.

—Dooooong!

The strange warning tone from an airship scattered the people who had been walking below. Winged humans. Witches sitting sideways on broomsticks. It was a truly exotic and unexpected sight.

“What? It looks perfectly fine?”

After that sigh, what caught my eye most were the pillars. Enormous pillars that made me feel like a dwarf stuck to the floor of a corridor. Where those pillars stretched endlessly, there stood the Corridor City.

Pillars connecting sky and earth. Rows of them. Cities that filled the land, cities perched on cloud bridges extending from the pillars. Floating islands and cities drifting in the sky above the earth. Sky roads and bridges linking them all. That was only a part of it, yet at the same time, it was the complete picture of this world. From the cliff where I stood, I could only see a fraction, but it was an extraordinary city. Its residents were no less so.

“Oh my?”

My eyes met those of a witch who happened to be flying past the cliff. She slowed down for a moment, smirked, and scanned my naked body. Hmm. Had she fallen for my magnificent physique? Whatever the case, I grabbed my wrist and pulled it tight against my side, striking a pose with soul.

—Flex!

“Hup!”

Side chest—tightening my core and emphasizing my pectorals.

“Heh heh, enjoy the show~”

Apparently impressed by my physique, the witch flicked her fingers and flew off. A coin clinked as it fell to the ground. I relaxed my abs.

“Whoa! What’s this?”

Picking up anything that dropped was simply an immortal’s instinct. Even trash had its uses, right?! I looked down at the coin that had landed in my palm. It was a coin no matter which way I turned it. But it was completely different from the kind you broke or swallowed for luck. Most of all, the way it shimmered with rainbow light was extraordinary. The moment I saw it, I understood.

“Hmm. They’re still using currency?”

Looked like the world hadn’t completely collapsed yet. Confusion washed over me. How many times had I experienced this? Questions about my own experiences rose up.

“Huh. I can’t seem to remember anything.”

Then the questions turned toward myself. Hazy memories. Things I knew I remembered, yet couldn’t quite recall. Ah, it was fine. I knew what to do in times like this. Naturally, I opened the Corridor.

The familiar sight of the gallery was definitely going to—

Crackle—!

Suddenly sparks erupted inside my head. Noise flooded the gallery screen floating before my eyes. Was this ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠some kind of error? But it only lasted a moment. A translucent screen of dust and light appeared, and countless lines of text flowed across it.

Tabs upon tabs, endless lines of text without order. Almost entranced, I clicked on one of the posts.

“Kwaaaaaagh! My eyes, fuuuuuck!?”

I narrowed my eyes to form a defensive barrier and hurriedly scrolled down to the comments.

The endless flood of comments was too much to bear. Information posts. Recruitment posts. Shitposts. Every single thread was pure madness and intellect combined. A living, breathing scene overflowing with humanity. Before I could even guess at its true nature, my finger was already pressing the “Write Post” button.

“Newbie incoming!”

“What the hell? The management here is trash.”

My boiling enthusiasm instantly cooled. Still, my eyes kept chasing the lively gallery. Countless pieces of information. Things I needed to filter, things I needed to cram into my head—they poured out endlessly. And as I watched, I thought: the intellect and madness of this place had not yet dried up. That fact confused me.

But there was something more urgent.

“…Where’s my old gallery?”

My head hurt and my breath felt heavy. Or was it my head that was heavy and my breath that hurt? An uncontrollable anxiety welled up. Deep inside, imperfection boiled. Eternal recurrence and the unbearable lightness of being. All those things scraped against one another. As my anxiety accelerated, my eyes and hands moved frantically across the gallery.

It was there. As if overturning everything that had come before, my identity was right there.

“Phew. I thought it was gone again.”

I crouched down for a moment and read through the remaining posts in the gallery. A sense of affirmation about myself slowly rose. Even the question of who I was grew faint. Yeah. This was it.

Finally, filled with confidence, I stood up.

“Alright, let’s go! First, I should figure out where the hell I am!”

One of the basic principles of being an immortal: 1. Just wander around. That’s how you ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠find out whether this is a place you should avoid or a place you’ll return to later. Since I had nothing but this body, there was literally nothing to fear.

But… how do I get down from here?

. . .