I woke up in complete darkness.

It wasn't the kind of darkness you experience when you close your eyes it was absolute. There wasn't even a hint of light, no shadows dancing at the edges of my vision. My heart pounded as I tried to make sense of it. My body felt real enough. I could move, stretch, and blink. But when I opened my eyes, it was like they were still shut.

"Where am I?" I murmured, though my voice felt wrong, swallowed up by the void before it could go far.

I reached out, hoping to touch something solid, but my hands met nothing. No walls, no ground, no air stirring against my skin. It was as if the space around me didn't exist.

Maybe I was dreaming. Yes, that had to be it a lucid dream that was just too vivid. But why did it feel so? wrong? My head spun as I stood still, trying to focus, trying to wake myself up.

Then, I heard it.

A faint sound in the distance, soft at first. It almost seemed like the low hum of a breeze. But it wasn't wind. It was voices.

I froze, my heart thudding in my chest. The voices were faint, but they carried a weight that made my stomach churn. They grew louder, sharper, filled with emotion anguish.

"Please? no!" a voice wailed, breaking into a sob.

"Help me!" cried another, hoarse and desperate.

The sound swelled, a chorus of despair that echoed all around me. I couldn't tell where it was coming from; it seemed to surround me, pulling me in every direction.

I took a shaky step forward, trying to get away from it. My arms stretched ahead, fingers fumbling through the emptiness, but there was nothing to grab. The voices grew louder, overlapping, screaming.

"Stop! Please, stop!"

I stumbled back, clamping my hands over my ears, but it didn't help. The voices weren't just around me; they were inside me, pressing into my mind.

I turned blindly, desperate to escape, and started walking in a direction that felt? quieter. I didn't know if it was real or just my imagination, but it was the only thing I could cling to.

Step by step, I moved further from the screams. The voices began to soften, fading into the distance like a bad memory. Relief washed over me, though my chest was still tight, my breath shallow.

I kept walking, focusing on the silence ahead. The air felt different now not exactly comforting, but less oppressive.

Was I finally leaving it behind?

I didn't know where I was going, but anywhere was better than where I'd been. My steps grew more confident, though I was still blind, navigating the dark by instinct alone.

For a while, it was quiet. The screams were gone, replaced by a deep, unsettling silence. But even in that calm, I couldn't shake the feeling that I wasn't alone.

Somewhere, out in the void, I felt something or someone watching. I stopped and strained my ears, hoping to catch a sound, a clue, anything.

The quiet didn't last.

A faint whisper rose in the distance. Not screams this time, but low murmurs. Incomprehensible, guttural, and cold. They weren't like the screams they didn't beg or plead. They simply existed, a constant reminder that I wasn't alone.

I stood frozen, unsure if I should move forward or turn back. Either way, I had no answers. The darkness stretched on infinitely, and I was trapped in its grasp.

"Where am I?" I asked again, my voice shaking. But the void remained silent.

I kept moving. One step at a time, arms stretched ahead like a blind man groping through endless black. Minutes turned into hours or at least that's what it felt like. Time had lost all meaning in this place.

The voices, faint at first, would return in waves. Sometimes distant, like echoes from another world, and sometimes so close I felt like they were screaming right into my ears. My legs ached, but I couldn't stop. Stopping felt like giving up, and giving up here? I didn't even want to think about what that might mean.

As I walked, the darkness didn't change. No shapes, no shadows. Just the void. My breaths were shallow, my heartbeat the only sound that felt remotely mine.

And then I saw it.

A pinprick of light.

It was so small at first, I thought my mind was playing tricks on me. I blinked, rubbed my eyes, but it didn't go away. It was there a distant, glowing speck in the vast sea of black.

My chest tightened, hope surging through me. An escape. That had to be it.

I started toward the light, my pace quickening with every step. The darkness around me seemed to grow heavier, pressing against my body like it didn't want me to leave. The voices became louder again, screaming, pleading, but I ignored them. I had to get to that light.

As I moved closer, it grew brighter, larger. It wasn't just a speck anymore it was a door. A glowing, radiant outline of a door standing alone in the void.

"That's it!" I whispered, my voice shaking with relief. "That's my way out."

I broke into a run, my feet pounding against an unseen ground. The voices behind me roared, desperate and furious. I didn't care. The door was getting closer, the light so bright now it made my eyes water.

"Almost there," I muttered, my hands reaching out.

The door stood tall, glowing with an intensity that made me squint. It wasn't ornate or grand just a simple outline of white light. But to me, it was everything. Freedom. Escape.

I didn't slow down. I ran straight for it, threw my body through the door, and

Blinding brightness consumed me. For a moment, I felt weightless, as though I was falling and flying all at once. My stomach lurched, my skin prickling with heat.

Then I landed.

I blinked, adjusting to the sudden shift. The light was gone, replaced by a fiery red glow that bathed everything in an eerie, pulsating hue. My breath caught in my throat as I took in what lay before me.

Screams erupted from every direction, louder than ever, piercing my ears and rattling my skull. The air was thick with the stench of burning flesh and sulfur. Towering cliffs of jagged rock rose on either side of me, rivers of molten lava snaking through the landscape.

And everywhere I looked people.

They were twisted, contorted, their bodies writhing in agony as they endured unspeakable punishments. Chains bound some to fiery walls, their flesh searing and regenerating in an endless cycle. Others were dragged by shadowy figures, their cries for mercy drowned out by the relentless chaos.

I couldn't move. My legs felt like lead, my chest tight with horror. This wasn't freedom.

This was Hell.

I stood frozen, my mind struggling to process the scene before me. The fiery red landscape, the rivers of lava, and the endless torment of those trapped here. The screams were unbearable, clawing at my sanity, but it wasn't just the noise it was the overwhelming realization of where I was.

I had run toward that light with such desperation, convinced it was my salvation. I thought it was escape. Safety. But now, standing here, all I felt was despair.

I glanced back over my shoulder, hoping the door was still there, that I could somehow retreat into the darkness, but it was gone. The void I had spent hours walking through had vanished, replaced entirely by this burning, chaotic nightmare.

"This can't be real," I whispered, my voice trembling. "This can't be where I belong."

I took a step forward, my feet crunching on brittle, scorched ground. The heat was oppressive, yet it didn't consume me as it did the others. All around, people wailed and begged, their voices filled with sorrow and regret.

"Please! I'm sorry!" one cried.

"No more, no more!" another shrieked, clawing at chains that seemed to tighten with every movement.

Their suffering was endless, their punishment unrelenting. My chest tightened as I watched, unable to look away.

Was this what I had been running toward?

In my desperation to escape the darkness, I hadn't stopped to think. I'd just assumed the light was good. That it was my way out. But now, standing here, I realized how blind I'd been. The light had only been a lure, a cruel beacon drawing me deeper into something far worse.

I sank to my knees, trembling.

How often had I done this before? In life, had I made the same mistake? Choosing something because it looked right, felt right, only to discover later that it wasn't what I truly needed?

The thought churned in my mind as I watched the suffering around me.

The darkness I'd fled had been terrifying. Lonely. Endless. But now, as I thought back, it hadn't hurt me. It hadn't screamed or seared my flesh. It was silent, yes oppressive, even but it had left me whole. I'd run from it, assuming it was evil.

And here I was.

Perhaps the darkness wasn't bad. Perhaps it was simply? unknown. And in my fear of the unknown, I had sprinted toward the first thing that seemed familiar, the first thing that seemed safe.

Now I understood: not everything that looks good is truly good. And not everything that feels bad is truly bad. Sometimes, the hardest thing to face the thing that scares us the most is what we need to endure.

But it was too late.

I had chosen the light. I had stepped through the door.

And now, I was here.

I lifted my head, staring at the burning horizon, the endless suffering that stretched as far as I could see. The ground beneath me cracked and rumbled, the heat intensifying.

This was my reality now.

And I had no one to blame but myself.