The texture of the wall changed. What had been, up until now, stuccoed sheetrock on concrete had smoothed out and felt more like wood. The paint scheme hadn’t changed. It was so subtle that I wasn’t sure I would have noticed it if I hadn’t been following the wall with my hand.

  I stopped, running my hand back and forth between this new section of wall and the old, making sure I wasn’t imagining things.

  Lightly rapping my knuckles on both sections, I found the new one returned more of a warm thunk, like tapping on a table or a wooden door. There was definitely something different here.

  Now engaged, I kept my hand running along the wall until the texture changed back.

  “About the size of a doorway,” I thought.

  I tried pushing on it, with no avail. I then spent several minutes checking the edges for seams. Nothing.

  With how designed everything was, I couldn’t believe this was some sort of fluke or bug. There had to be something to this, another dungeon secret, but right now there didn’t seem to be anything else I could do. Maybe there was something further along that would give me a clue.

  My stomach rumbled, and I pulled the ration bar from my inventory. I realized that I had been going for quite some time, and this was probably the longest I had lasted in the dungeon so far. I sat down against the smooth section of the wall and held the ration bar in my hand.

  RATION BAR – UNPERISHABLE

  CONSUME?

  YES/NO

  Something occurred to me and I selected no. A new prompt appeared.

  TAKE INTO INVENTORY?

  YES/NO

  Again I selected no, leaving the bar sitting in my hand.

  “Okay,” I thought. “I don’t have to take everything into inventory. I can just hold on to stuff.”

  I hadn’t really had the chance to inspect the bar until now. The wrapper was plain white, with black text that simply read Ration Bar. There were no other markings. I guess the dungeon wasn’t sponsored.

  Pulling open the wrapper, I was met with a very dry looking, pale chunk of something. Of all the protein bars and candy bars I had eaten in my life, this had to be one of the most unappetizing looking ones I had ever handled.

  I took a bite.

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  You know how water doesn’t really have a flavor? It was like that, but in food form. My stomach protested and I had to force myself to swallow.

  “This is terrible,” I said to myself, willing myself to take another bite.

  I really didn’t want to continue, but I knew I would need the energy. Next time I wouldn’t bother eating one of these manually. I hoped there were more varieties of food to encounter. Along with the prospect of not getting much restful sleep, not having access to hot, tasty meals would do a number on my already fragile sanity.

  I did feel somewhat sated after eating the bar, but I definitely wasn’t satisfied. As terrible as it was, it was enough to keep me going a little while longer. Part of me wondered if I would get hungry at normal intervals, or if that was now gamified as well and I’d have to eat more often to refill some sort of hidden hunger gauge.

  I brushed the crumbs away on my pants and stood again, looking at the smooth section of wall.

  “Wish I had a way to mark it,” I thought. “Maybe I’ll try grabbing a pen or something from my apartment next time.”

  Next time.

  I was already deciding that there would be a next time. Was I getting okay with dying?

  Putting my left hand back on the wall, I continued up the corridor.

  **

  About another ten meters or so up the corridor I came across an unmarked apartment door. The last time I had entered one I had been met with death, so I wondered if going inside was a good idea. The one creature I had encountered in the hallways seemed a lot more appealing to fight than living static, and I knew there was a level up mechanic.

  If I was met with another TV room, would I chance getting another magazine to permanently upgrade my fork? That was assuming the magazine would still be there and not replaced with another random item.

  I was assuming a lot, and once again my need for information drove me forward.

  Reaching out, I turned the knob, once again stepping back as the door swung open.

  The room itself was a narrow storage closet of some kind, but I wasn’t really paying attention to the room. A human being, a goddamn human being, was sitting on the floor with his eyes closed.

  The word monk came to mind. He definitely had the look. Shaved head, orange robes, and a muscular body chiseled by years of studying martial arts. He was even posed in meditation, hands folded like he was praying.

  “Hello?” I said to the monk from the hallway, not sure what to do.

  No response. The monk sat unmoving, not even twitching at my voice.

  “Hello?” I tried again.

  Still nothing.

  The closet, unlike the hallway, was fully lit, so I could see the extent of it. It was only a few feet wide and long, containing shelves with ripped and torn cardboard boxes that seemed to scream they had been placed there more for atmosphere than any practical reason. Set dressing, like something out of an open world game.

  There was a small bench at the back, sitting right behind where the monk was seated. A small yet elaborate looking black box sat on top.

  “That’s a reskinned treasure chest if I ever saw one,” I thought.

  Experimenting, I pushed a hand past the doorframe and into the room.

  At that action, the monk’s eyes snapped open, murder in his pitch black eyes. In one smooth motion he was on his feet, walking directly toward me. He opened his mouth, forming a large O, and I could see a familiar set of circular serrated teeth inside. A very inhuman scream echoed forward from that mouth.

  I quickly pulled my hand back and the monk stopped.

  It seemed to be staring right at me, but somehow not seeing me. It, and it now was an it because it wasn’t human, cocked its head back and forth like it was scanning the area.

  I didn’t move. I didn’t breathe.

  After a few more moments of scanning, it turned around and sat down again in front of the bench.

  Okay, so dungeon rooms only activated once I was inside. That was good to know.

  The question now was how confident I was in taking on a storage monk armed only with a fork.