You are…well, you’re not sure who or what you are. There’s a name that appeared in your mind, but it was wrong. Just like everything else that came “before-“ before you awoke here, in the dark, where the only light came from candles, lamps, and the strange upward glow that some caverns and tunnels were cast in the oddly enchanting light of.

When you awoke, you were told what was happening, where you were- that you had been condemned, but were considered for a return, if only you would prove yourself. You’d been left to die- but by the grace of your saviors, you would shake off the old curse of what came before, and become a new man, a new warrior, raised up to fight if you would survive the trials to come. Perhaps not what some wished for, but few received a second chance at life.

With that, order was brought to the chaos of your being, beginning with a name. Erdan Two-Two-Eight. It was a name you would have to learn to respond to, to accept as your own, no matter what remnant of false memory protested. That memory was before, after all- and all that was before was an illusion.

The trials were dangerous. Down here in the depths, you were tasked with maintaining a base. Men from above would come down with ammunition and supplies, and they would go up with wounded and the things you were asked to find. Any who died down here, stayed. Those so wounded they had to go up would return as well- but could not say anything about where they went, as they’d been blindfolded.

So your days began with the duties of patrol, maintaining the outer perimeter of the base, frightening off creatures of the dark using light, sometimes, and other times the simplicity of an air gun or handgun. Some of them were fleshy and able to be hurt with such. Others required stranger methods, such as flame, or scents, or chants and gesticulation. Then came the hunts- more difficult, but you had known your squad well enough at that point to work with them, had drilled with them enough. Then the delves, marching down into the glowing deep, though the light went away when you reached the bottom. The voices that echoed up were louder. It was unpleasant- but you all reminded yourselves, it was your path to redemption.
This outing had been a particularly unpleasant one, as you had had to fend off what were called Shadow Soldiers that had gathered around a strange shell. They were facsimiles of your sort- illusions, supposedly, but their bullets and knives wounded like the real thing, and the only weapon that harmed them were those fired in true hatred. You had all learned to hate, now. Those who were left, who hadn’t either been sent up or left behind, perhaps to become Shadow Soldiers themselves, some theorized. Now though, you and a few members of other squads had gathered around a table with a lamp, rotated off of duties in order to rest. You gambled on cards- though with no money down here, you bartered tea and sugar. The luxuries that you ought to have been consuming.