I was Reborn as a God Candidate in a Dead World

Abel didn't respond to Noah's weak joke. Not immediately. He was still standing near the door, arms crossed, jaw clenched like he was working through something heavy. A shadow lingered behind his usual stoic calm.

Noah blinked away the last shreds of divine static in his brain. "Okay, that was the part where you chuckle dryly or tell me I talk too much. You're messing up our routine."

Abel's eyes flicked up.

"He looked at me."

"…What?"

"My father." Abel's voice was low now, almost cautious. "Back in the garden. When I shouted your name. He heard me. He turned."

Noah sat up straighter, heartbeat thudding. "You're sure? Not just, like, random ghost awareness vibes?"

Abel shook his head. "No. He reacted. As if… he knew me."

Noah stared at him, the gravity settling like iron across his back.

"That… never happened before?"

"Never," Abel said tightly. "Not once in all the years I wandered this place. Even in my child form, even when I stood in front of him, screaming—he didn't see me. He didn't know me."

Noah looked down, letting that sink in. "But now he did."

"Now he did."

They sat in silence for a beat. The candlelight flickered. Shadows danced on the wall.

"Okay," Noah said finally, "wild theory, and by wild I mean probably totally correct: it changed because we killed one of the black mages."

Abel's jaw tensed, but he nodded slowly. "That's what I suspect too."

"They're connected to the curse."

"Or reinforcing it."

Noah exhaled, rubbing his hands together, still getting used to the faint hum of magic under his skin. "So… what, we hunt the rest? Like cursed Pokémon?"

"We hunt them," Abel confirmed. "I don't think we have another option. Until they're gone, we'll never stand a chance against him. And maybe… maybe once they're dead, he can be freed."

Noah looked at him. "That's what you want? Not revenge?"

Abel didn't answer. He just turned toward the hall and started walking. "The others had a lab. In the north wing. My father gave it to them."

Noah pushed himself to his feet and followed, bones still aching but lighter somehow, as if his body had finally accepted the divine mess he'd become.

"Let me guess," he muttered. "Creepy lab. Horrible experiments. Totally not a trap."

"Most likely."

Noah sighed. "Awesome."

They disappeared into the corridor together—Noah's footsteps quiet, but steady. Stronger.

Ready for what came next.

The north wing felt different.

It wasn't just darker—though the flickering torches barely clinging to the damp stone walls didn't help—it was colder. The kind of cold that didn't come from lack of sunlight or stale air, but something deeper. Older. Like the stones themselves remembered suffering.

Noah rubbed his arms as he walked, his fingers still tingling faintly from the divine awakening. His footsteps echoed, too crisp. Too alone.

"Do you feel that?" he asked, keeping his voice low. "Like the castle itself's holding its breath?"

Abel nodded once. "This place was sealed off, even before the fall. Only the king and the mages had access. Servants were forbidden."

Noah squinted ahead, where the corridor curved and descended into blackness. "Okay, but was it also designed to feel like the inside of a coffin? Because I'm getting big 'you're not supposed to be here' energy."

They passed arched windows now—long sealed with thick iron bars and ivy-covered glass. Behind one of them, Noah caught the faintest movement.

He stopped.

"...Did that statue just move?"

Abel turned.

In the alcove stood a hunched stone figure—twisted, humanoid, but wrong. Too many limbs. A face frozen in horror. Its hand reached toward the window, claws grazing the inside of the pane.

Noah stepped back. "Okay, we're not commenting on that. Let's just pretend it's a charming architectural flourish and keep moving."

Abel said nothing. Just walked faster.

As they moved deeper, the hallways began to show signs of… corruption.

Paintings rotted into sludge on the walls. Metal sconces turned black with rust. Vines sprouted from the cracks in the floor—not green, but bone-white and pulsing faintly, like veins.

The air grew heavier. A soft, rhythmic pulse vibrated beneath their feet.

Noah frowned. "What the hell is that sound?"

"Blood," Abel said, his voice clipped. "It used to be a fountain system. The mages… repurposed it."

Noah gave him a horrified look. "You couldn't have led with that?"

"They liked theatrics."

Noah rolled his eyes. "Great. So we're walking into a discount haunted laboratory built by three necromantic theater kids."

A low growl echoed from somewhere ahead. They froze.

Then a shape shambled out of the next corridor—a former knight. His armor half-fused to his skin, eyes glowing with corrupted magic, his jaw slack and drooling black ichor.

Another cursed soul. Once human.

Now monster.

Abel drew his blade.

Noah sighed, summoning a tarot card and feeling the weight of magic build behind his palm.

"Let's make this quick. I've got a haunted science lab to complain about."

The entrance to the lab was a massive stone door, its surface etched with runes that pulsed faintly—like veins beneath skin. Someone had once carved warnings into the walls beside it. Old servants' tongues. Some desperate, shaky. Others etched with such force the blade had splintered.

Noah brushed a finger along one of the carvings.

They never die. They only change.

Abel pushed the door.

It groaned open.

The lab stank of copper and something worse—like rotting meat soaked in perfume. Crimson veins crawled along the floor and walls, pulsing softly. Glass tubes and vats lined the room, most shattered. The surviving ones bubbled with strange fluids. Floating inside: limbs. Torsos. A fused pair of skulls.

Noah stopped cold. "Okay. No. This place is fucked."

Abel's jaw tightened. "This was not here when I was a boy."

Noah looked around. Tables were still laid with surgical tools, metal hooks, bone saws—all stained. A chalkboard near the center showed diagrams of anatomy spliced with magical circles. The words Ad Astra were written over and over in red.

"I don't think the mages were into astronomy," Noah muttered. "Unless stars are made of guts now."

One of the vats hissed.

A figure stirred in the corner.

At first, Noah thought it was a statue—just another warped experiment. But then it breathed.

The knight from earlier—his arm half-wrapped in corded, wet muscle like it had been grown anew—staggered to his feet and let out a gurgling cry. He wasn't alone. More prisoners stirred in the shadows, some dragging mutilated limbs, others barely recognizable as human.

Noah threw a card. It exploded midair, scattering limbs and flesh.

Abel rushed forward, sword flashing silver. One, two, three strikes—and the cursed fell. But not fast enough. A transformed woman lunged at Noah from behind—her spine twisted into hooks.

"Shit—!"

Noah ducked and blasted her with another card, but she kept coming, shrieking.

And then the air stopped.

Every sound died.

The walls pulsed once.

A new voice—wet, cold, and humming with pleasure—filled the chamber:

"You break my toys, little thief."

From behind the largest vat, something emerged. Tall. Gaunt. Skin pale like raw fat. Its eyes were pits of black, weeping red tears. Veins pulsed under translucent skin. Ribbons of flesh floated around him like scarves, each one twitching like it had a mind of its own.

Noah's mouth went dry.

SYSTEM ALERT

MAJOR BOSS ENCOUNTER: THE RED ALCHEMIST

Class: Weaver of the Hollow – Fleshbinder

Difficulty: Severe

Threat: Fatal

Reward: Unknown

The mage extended one arm—long, boneless fingers stretching—and the wounded knight on the floor screamed as his body began to twist, flesh unraveling into strands and wrapping around the mage's arm like a leash.

Abel stepped in front of Noah, blade raised.

"Second one," he growled. "He was always the cruelest."

The Fleshbinder smiled.

"Come, children. Let's stitch something new."