I Was Reborn in Another World, But I Awoke Inside a Corpse

Chapter 154: The Domain of Sloth

The sky above was still.

Not empty—just still. As if the stars had chosen to stop existing midway through their own glow. The ground beneath Isaac's boots was gray stone dusted with pale frost, yet no chill touched the skin. Everything in this place was paused. Resting. Waiting to remain incomplete.

They were in Belphegor's domain—the First Layer of the Abyss.

And already, it was working against them.

The first region they passed was a wide, cracked plain where countless tools lay abandoned mid-use: half-constructed statues, unplanted gardens, shattered spell diagrams on worn scrolls.

"This looks like…" Lira whispered.

"A graveyard of intentions," Sylvalen finished.

There were no bodies.

Just the weight of things left undone.

Every so often, they passed a stone where a person had clearly sat… and never gotten up again. Some had withered to dust. Others remained perfectly preserved—asleep, frozen in a moment of hesitation.

Isaac's system pulsed quietly.

[Dreambreaker's Compass] — path forward confirmed. Signal is steady.

But with each step, their legs grew heavier.

"I'm fine," Lira said quickly, though her voice was slower than normal. "I'm moving."

Isaac didn't answer—he was watching the horizon twist slightly, like a heat mirage that pulsed not from temperature, but apathy.

Further in, the path dipped into a hollow chasm filled with seated figures.

Thousands of them.

Not corpses—but beings who had stopped moving. Demons, mortals, constructs—sitting, kneeling, lying down—staring into nothing, unmoving for decades or centuries.

Some had been powerful.

Some were just unlucky.

But they were all still alive.

"They're… breathing," Sylvalen whispered.

Isaac knelt beside one. A woman in cracked armor, her eyes half-lidded.

"Why didn't they leave?"

She stirred slightly. Then whispered, without focus:

"I almost remembered why I came."

And fell still again.

By the time they passed the fourth stone arch—shaped like a ribcage wrapped around itself—Lira was starting to sway slightly.

"Isaac… I can't tell if I'm tired or if this place just keeps asking me to stop."

Isaac reached out and grabbed her wrist gently. His voice was steady.

"It's not you. It's him."

"This whole realm is his dream of inaction. The longer we walk, the more it tries to erase motion from us."

Sylvalen's breathing had shifted too. Calm, but too calm.

Isaac saw it in her eyes—her magic was resisting less. Her awareness gently blurring at the edges.

He activated [Moonflame Rebirth – EX+] and released a flare of silver heat—just enough to restore clarity.

Their bodies straightened slightly, the fog lifting from their minds.

"Stay close," he said. "Don't listen to your limbs. Listen to your memory."

Finally, they reached a massive stone structure—towering into the air. It had clock faces on every side, ancient and elegant.

None of them moved.

"Time stops here?" Lira asked.

Isaac shook his head.

"Time never started."

He placed his hand against the tower's base. The system pulsed.

[Tracking Path: Belphegor's Dream Signature: 89% proximity confirmed.]

The gears deep within the tower stirred.

And something laughed.

Not a person.

Not Belphegor.

Something sharp and wrong, burrowed into the seams of slumber.

Beyond the clocktower stood a bridge made of woven roots and thought—a direct path to the Heart of Sleep.

And floating above that bridge was a mass of darkness, slick with coiled dreamstuff—an entity made of hunger and stagnation, feasting on Belphegor's dream like a parasite in a silent god.

Isaac's eyes narrowed.

"There it is."

Sylvalen lifted her staff. "That's not Belphegor."

"No," Isaac replied. "That's what trapped him."