CHAPTER 36 - WHAT IS TRUE TREPIDATION?

In less than forty-eight hours, the first group of adventurers unwittingly stumbled upon the entrance to Bliss's dungeon. Unfortunately for them, they were but a band of five silver-ranked adventurers, hardly enough to register on Bliss's danger scale.

They gathered around the entrance, a hint of uncertainty hanging in the air. The young magician among them couldn't resist touching the dungeon wall, as if testing its authenticity.

"It feels like a dungeon," 

he mused, his fingers tracing the rough stone.

"Even smells like one," 

Chimed in a girl with twin ponytails, taking in a deep breath of the dungeon's air.

"Alright, let's check it out then," 

The leader declared, and the party pressed forward, a growing sense of unease gnawing at their confidence.

As they ventured deeper, the dungeon's darkness closed in around them. The corridor twisted and turned until they stumbled upon a forest shrouded in a thick, impenetrable fog.

"Hey… Hey Drew… do you think this is normal?" 

The first to question the dungeon was the ponytailed girl, her voice trembling.

But when she turned around to seek reassurance, Drew, who should have been guarding their rear, had vanished into the fog without a trace.

"Cathy!" 

Panic crept into her as her fellow adventurer, who was supposed to be at the head of their group, was similarly swallowed by the eerie mist, as if plucked away by an unseen hand.

Cathy, now alone and disoriented, frantically scanned her surroundings, trying to decide whether to flee or to stand her ground.

Lost in the fog, she heard whispers, soft but insidious.

'It's all your fault!'

'Useless!'

The voices multiplied as doubt swirled around her like a sinister tempest. Soon, they began to infiltrate her very thoughts, eroding her sanity.

"Stop it!" 

She cried out, clutching her head, but there was no escaping the relentless torment of her inner demons.

Within the fog, a mirage appeared—a vision of her mother, arms outstretched in welcome. For a fleeting moment, it seemed like salvation within the dungeon's malevolence.

"Mother?" 

Cathy moved forward, longing for her mother's embrace.

'After you killed your father, you still think you deserve to call me that?' 

The phantom image of Cathy's mother spoke, and a painful memory resurfaced.

Her father, a rugged man, had worked himself to the bone, taking on perilous missions to pay for Cathy's treatment when she was stricken with a deadly illness as a child.

It was one of those missions that ultimately claimed his life.

Hearing her own mother blame her for her perceived worthlessness, Cathy's eyes brimmed with tears.

"Daddy did what he did for us! He… He wanted us to live!" 

She protested vehemently, as if trying to defend herself against the specter's accusations.

'I gave my life for you to be great! Not… not to become a second-rate adventurer!' 

From the fog emerged a burly figure, an eerie reflection of her father.

Seeing him exactly as she remembered him, Cathy's heart ached with grief and anxiety. The burden she had always carried—the feeling that she had never lived up to her father's sacrifice—now weighed down upon her like a crushing boulder.

She had always known it, deep down, that she was merely a second-rate adventurer, despite the years that had passed. To hear her father articulate those very thoughts, it shattered her heart into a million shards.

She knew she had fallen short of her father's expectations. Her inability to advance beyond silver rank was a constant reminder of her perceived failure. To realize that her father had given his life to enable her mediocrity, it was the gravest dishonor she could imagine inflicting upon his memory.

Cathy's world continued to crumble around her as the relentless fog of her inner torment pressed in. Her father's specter loomed, his accusations etched into her soul. The weight of her perceived inadequacy grew unbearable, and her every step became a painful reminder of her failure.

"Daddy, please..." 

She whispered, tears streaming down her face. But her father's visage remained unmoved, an unyielding symbol of her guilt and shame.

The voices in the fog intensified, a cacophony of condemnation.

'You're worthless!'

'Your father's sacrifice was in vain!'

Cathy's breathing quickened, her chest tightening as the relentless onslaught of self-loathing took hold. She stumbled forward, her surroundings twisting and distorting in her panicked state.

Each step felt like a struggle through quicksand, her mind a chaotic storm of despair. 

She gasped for air, but it seemed as though the very atmosphere had grown thick with judgment, suffocating her.

The forest around her transformed into a nightmarish labyrinth of memories and fears. Shadows danced, mirages of her past failures taunting her. Her heart raced, pounding in her ears like a drumbeat of dread.

Cathy's vision blurred, and her legs gave way beneath her. 

She collapsed to her knees, gasping for breath, her entire body trembling. Panic seized her in a vice grip, and her world fragmented into a kaleidoscope of torment.

In the distance, the phantom figures of her father and mother continued to accuse her, their voices merging with the tormenting whispers of the fog.

She couldn't escape. There was no reprieve from the relentless barrage of self-condemnation. 

Her mind spiraled deeper into darkness, and the boundaries between reality and hallucination blurred.

As Cathy's anxiety reached its crescendo, her world collapsed entirely. She was incapacitated by the overwhelming weight of her own fears, teetering on the precipice of a full-blown panic attack.