Transmigrated into Eroge as the Simp, but I Refuse This Fate

Chapter 308: Cradle

The descent deepened.

With every level they passed, the world seemed to pull taut around them. The rain outside dulled, no longer falling in sheets but in sluggish droplets that clung to the air like oil. Even sound felt stretched—warped under pressure. And above, the sky no longer looked like a sky.

It looked like something staring back.

They moved down through reinforced corridors flanked with barrier glyphs—etched lines of containment magic glowing brighter with each step. Pressure layered in waves. Not from any present enemy, but from the depth of resonance leaking through the complex itself.

The mana here wasn’t calm.

It was waiting.

Two massive gates barred their path as they advanced, each thrumming with its own mana pulse. The first was rounded, forged of blacksteel and inscribed with deep spiral markings that glowed faintly crimson. A shield array hovered before it, stabilizing the energy surrounding the lock. As they stepped through, Kael gave a flick of his hand—and the gate split open down the middle with a slow, seismic grind.

The moment they passed through, the air changed.

Heavier.

Rawer.

Damien narrowed his eyes as a fine layer of static laced his skin. Not electricity. Mana. Unfiltered. Untethered. It clung to everything—like fog, but denser, alive.

The second gate was even worse.

Hexagonal in structure, built from fused crystal and alloy, it pulsed like a heart. And the moment they neared, the sky above flashed—not with lightning, but with something deeper. The clouds twisted, peeled, and then tightened into themselves. Like a knot pulled tight.

A rumble followed. Not thunder.

Not natural.

Just… something moving. Something large. Something distant.

Kael raised a hand, halting Damien just before the threshold. The crystalline gate before them pulsed faintly, like something alive was waiting behind it. The air was taut, every breath edged with pressure that hadn’t been present before. A kind of silence that wasn’t just soundless—but alert.

Without a word, Kael reached into his spatial ring. His hand came back holding something small and jagged—an opaque crystal veined with dull lavender light. It shimmered once, then settled.

“Hold this,” Kael said, voice low but firm.

Damien took the crystal without hesitation. It was warm—warmer than it should be. And as soon as it touched his skin, something coiled faintly at the edge of his senses. A presence. Not invasive, but… tuned. Waiting.

Kael held up an identical crystal in his own palm, his crimson eyes fixed on Damien with something new in them—not amusement, not even tension.

Weight.

“The moment you break it,” Kael said slowly, “you’ll lose consciousness.”

Damien’s grip tightened slightly around the object. The crystal felt denser now. Alive.

“You won’t feel the transition,” Kael continued. “Not right away. But you’ll be pulled. Out of this space. Out of this body. Not astral projection—not spirit separation. Something deeper. Your mind, your essence, everything that forms the ’you’ beneath the core.”

He tapped his own temple.

“You’ll wake up somewhere else. A mirror space. A threshold zone. It’ll look different to every person. But it’s still the same place. The Cradle.”

Kael paused, letting that settle.

“You’ll have no outside help. No signal tether. No link to your core beyond what your will can anchor. And if you die in there—”

He glanced to Dominic.

“—your body here turns to stone. Vegetative. Hollow. You’ll still breathe. But nothing behind the eyes.”

He turned back to Damien, voice quieter.

“This crystal? It’s not a safety net. It’s a key. You break it, you enter. There’s no coming back until it’s done.”

The tension in the air coiled further as Kael let go of his own crystal, watching it hover beside him, caught in an ambient field.

“Understand?”

Damien nodded once. No hesitation.

Kael cracked a faint smile. “Good. Then you’re ready.”

The moment Damien’s fingers clenched around the crystal, there was no hesitation. He crushed it in his palm.

The crystal cracked with a dry snap, and in an instant, a wave of mana surged outward from the point of rupture. It was silent—no light, no sound—but the effect was immediate.

Damien’s eyes turned hollow.

Not blank. Hollow.

His pupils faded, his irises dimmed to a washed-out grey, and all the tension in his body released in a single, silent collapse. He dropped—no resistance, no stagger. Just a fall, like a puppet with its strings cut.

Dominic moved without panic, catching the side of Damien’s shoulder to ease the impact, lowering his son’s body to the ground with practiced care. But his gaze didn’t leave the space above him.

Because the air had begun to pulse.

From the remains of the crystal, energy poured out—slow at first, then violently. Pale, radiant tendrils of arcanum stretched across Damien’s chest, then his limbs, then into his core. Not entering. Syncing. Mapping.

“It’s started,” Kael said, his voice low.

He didn’t sound surprised.

He turned to Dominic, and for a moment—just a breath—they locked eyes. No words were needed. They had both seen this before. Both carried the memory of what this process could become.

And still, they had let it begin.

Damien’s body began to glow. Not brightly, but steadily. As if the energy wasn’t coming from the world, but from inside—being pulled outward, called into alignment with something far older.

“Then let us do our part,” Dominic said.

Kael nodded, stepped to the gate, and raised both arms.

The second gate—fused crystal and alloy—responded like a living thing. Its runes flared, and with a low, guttural groan, the structure began to open. A vertical slit widened into a jagged iris, and the pressure behind it rushed out in a wave.

The blast hit like a hurricane.

Wind. Mana. Force.

Even Kael flinched, gritting his teeth as his boots dug into the reinforced floor. Dominic raised one hand, shielding his coat as the pulse tore across them.

“You really went overboard with this one,” Kael muttered, eyes narrowing against the gale. “Putting the kid into an SSS-Rank danger zone?”

“I know,” Dominic said quietly. “But that’s what she said to me.”

Kael didn’t need to ask who.

He just sighed. Ran a hand through his hair as the wind hissed past.

“Damn old hag. Always playing twelve moves ahead.”

He looked down again at Damien—now still, glowing faintly, energy webbing across his skin like veins of living starlight.

“If this kid comes back,” Kael said, voice flat, “we might really see a new monster born.”

Dominic moved with clinical precision.

Piece by piece, he removed Damien’s clothing—coat, shirt, boots—until nothing remained. Not even underlayers. There was no ceremony in it, no awkwardness. Only necessity. This was the protocol. Skin to ether. Nothing between him and the field that would receive him.

Kael arched a brow but didn’t comment—at first.

Then, dryly, he muttered under his breath, “Well, the kid’s… built for war.”

Dominic didn’t miss a beat. His glare cut sideways, sharp enough to draw blood.

Kael held up a hand. “Fine. Shutting up.”

The last layer of mana embedded in the crystal fragments pulsed, and the energy surrounding Damien deepened in color—cascading over his now-bare form with renewed affinity. The light wrapped around him more smoothly, more completely, as if the barrier between conduit and subject had finally dropped away.

This was how the Cradle accepted its chosen.

Unfiltered. Unarmed. Undressed. Not just physically—but metaphysically. No false protections. No ego. No shield between the spirit and what came next.

Kael stepped back, arms folding.

Dominic did the same. One last glance at his son—expression unreadable. He didn’t pray. Didn’t whisper anything sentimental. He simply turned, walked out, and left Damien in the center of that chamber glowing like a nascent star.

Behind them, the gate sealed shut.

And Damien was alone.