Dread Gacha：Building a Horror Empire in the Stars

Silas Parker pushed open the heavy doors of the conference room and followed the crowd inside. He clutched a single file to his chest, his face deathly pale and punctuated by the occasional weak, hollow cough.

Ahead of him, the air was thick with laughter and celebration. A dozen people, all members of the Parker Family, had gathered for a festive occasion: the division of his father’s estate. Silas was the biological son, the only child, yet he had been tossed the most worthless scrap of the inheritance—an abandoned property and not a single Star Credit to his name.

The irony was a bitter pill to swallow. Julian Parker, walking just ahead, caught a glimpse of Silas’s swaying, fragile form and couldn't suppress a smirk. He nudged his brother with an elbow, wanting Marcus to savor the sight of Silas’s utter dejection.

Instead of a shared laugh, Marcus let out a sharp cry of pain, his breath hitching in a series of cold gasps.

Julian blinked, confused. "What’s wrong?"

Marcus’s face was a mask of agony, sweat beading on his forehead. He clutched his right arm as if it were about to snap, a bone-chilling cold radiating from the limb. It felt as though something invisible was gnawing on the marrow, instantly souring the joy of inheriting his uncle’s fortune.

"I don’t know," Marcus wheezed, gritting his teeth. "My arm has been throbbing for days, but it’s worse now. It’s like ice... but there’s no injury."

His complaint acted as a catalyst. Suddenly, the others in the room began chiming in with their own grievances.

"God, Marcus, I’ve got something similar. My neck has been killing me, like a weight is pulling on it, but the doctors found nothing."

"Wait, are you guys feeling that cold, too? That deep, marrow-piercing chill?"

"Yes! Exactly!"

"Damn it, me too! And I feel like I can’t catch my breath, like something is squeezing my chest!"

Silas, trailing at the very back, watched them with a vacant gaze.

In his vision, a pale, bloated Wailing Infant with twisted features was perched on Marcus’s right shoulder. Every time Marcus spoke, the infant’s needle-toothed maw clamped down harder on his arm. The man complaining of neck pain had a Spectral Apparition—the victim of a hanging—kicking rhythmically at his throat. The one struggling to breathe was being smothered by a massive, bloated ghost whose fatty hands were locked tight around his ribs.

Half the people in the room were infested with spectral parasites.

Above each of their heads, a line of crimson text pulsed like fresh blood:

Lifespan -5

Lifespan -8

Lifespan -10

[Heh-heh-heh...]

[Did they really think my master’s money was theirs for the taking? Let them rot! Let them all drop dead! Hahaha!!!]

Silas raised a hand to cover a fake cough, tapping his finger against the skull-shaped ring on his hand. The skull’s mouth was stretched wide in a silent, manic laugh. He signaled the system to dial back the madness.

He had bound himself to the Dread Gacha System, but he wasn't a cartoon villain. He hadn't ordered these spirits to haunt his relatives; they were simply starving, and his family smelled like a feast. Even if they were technically his ghosts, they had minds of their own when they were hungry.

Unaware of what Silas could see and hear, the relatives grew increasingly anxious. With the inheritance papers signed, their only priority was rushing to the hospital to figure out what was wrong with them.

Julian, however, felt perfectly fine. He had always been persistent, especially when it came to making Silas miserable.

Since his brother was too busy clutching his arm to help, Julian sauntered over to Silas, tilting his chin up with an arrogant sneer. "Don't go blaming Uncle, Silas. You might be his only son, but you're a disappointment. It's a good thing Uncle had foresight. In a few years, when Marcus gets his military rank, maybe we’ll let you ride his coattails."

Julian glanced down at the document in Silas’s hand, his voice dripping with mock sympathy. "Oh, and that? That’s the only thing Uncle left you. You’d better take real good care of it!"

He burst into a fit of laughter, but the sound died in his throat when he saw the look in Silas’s eyes. It wasn't despair. It was pity.

Silas stared at the Phantom Grasp—a disembodied spectral hand—shoved deep into Julian’s nostril, and the glowing red text above his head: Lifespan -5.

"...As long as you're happy," Silas said softly.

Julian assumed Silas was just putting on a brave face. He opened his mouth to deliver another insult, but he was suddenly hit by a wave of suffocating, icy air that seemed to crawl up his nose. Panic flared in his chest. Was this the contagion Marcus and the others were talking about? He didn't want to catch whatever 'loser' disease Silas had. He shot Silas one last glare—muttering something about how Silas would come crawling back to them for scraps—before scurrying after the main group to the hospital.

[What a total moron! Host, you should have let the Phantom Grasp snap his neck! He only lost a measly five years! What a waste—]

Silas calmly pinched the skull’s jaw shut, manually muting the system. Now that the room was empty, he finally examined the document. This was his inheritance: Blythe Manor, an abandoned estate on a remote, backwater planet.

While the others had laughed at him, Silas had been genuinely stunned. He didn't understand why they thought this was garbage—the estate spanned over eight thousand acres. The potential was limitless.

To anyone else, it was a graveyard of debt. To the man holding the Dread Gacha System, it was a goldmine.

Silas had his own line of blood-red text floating above his head, and it was far more terrifying than his relatives': [Body will reach total putrefaction in 3 days. Create a dungeon immediately!]

The journey was long. It took two days of space travel before his ship finally descended toward a dusty, grey marble of a planet.

Silas stood before the gates of Blythe Manor. The metal frame was corroded, covered in rust that looked disturbingly like dried blood. The security systems were dead. Inside, the buildings had collapsed into piles of rubble, some showing the charred remains of past battles. Weeds choked the paths, and the silence was absolute.

The isolation was perfect. There wasn't another building for miles; the nearest transport hub was a five-kilometer trek away.

The system peered out through Silas’s senses. [Not bad,] it chirped. The atmosphere certainly fit its brand.

Still, it felt the need to complain. [I still don't see why we had to come all the way out here. We could have just used the Parker Family mansion. Or a street, a school, a hospital—classic tropes! This interstellar architecture is weird, but we could have merged the realms easily. Why pick a wasteland?]

Silas didn't bother explaining himself. He found a relatively flat rock and sat down to catch his breath, then opened the system interface.

[Title]: Acolyte of Dread

[Specters]: Sloan (Purple); Hangman; Water Wraith; Mimic Shadows; Razor-Haired Ghoul; Wailing Infant; Phantom Grasp

[Buildings]: Dilapidated Apartment; The Alley

[Items]: Low-level Ward x3

[Dungeons]: None

[Terror Value]: 0 (Converted from fear/yin energy)

[Faith Points]: 0 (Provided by any sentient being)

True to its name, the system allowed him to draw various spectral entities, buildings, and artifacts. The last two stats were the system’s currencies. Terror Value fueled the gacha and fed his ghosts.

Silas had arrived in this world seven days ago. The original Silas was already dead when he took over—a sickly boy who had literally died of shock upon hearing of his father's passing. Silas was effectively a ghost inhabiting a corpse.

He didn't remember much of his past before the system, but he knew one thing: if he completed his tasks, he would earn a living body of his own.

The system had granted him a "Ten-Day Preservation Period." If he didn't create a dungeon within ten days, he would become a very public, very rotten science project for the local labs.

On his first day, he had used a free ten-pull. Lacking a place to put the spectral buildings, he couldn't generate Spectral Miasma. His ghosts had been starving for three days before they started hunting for themselves. Now, finally, he could give them a home.

Silas scanned the terrain and selected a patch of level ground. He selected the Dilapidated Apartment and The Alley.

Seconds later, a thick, unnatural mist swallowed the ruins. A crumbling apartment complex with peeling paint surged out of the earth. Connected to it was a narrow, lightless alleyway. An old drainage pipe on the building’s side seemed to be leaking; rusty water dripped onto an iron railing with a metallic *plink*, looking for all the world like falling blood before being swallowed by the dark puddles below.

As the structures solidified, Silas felt a mental link to them. Data flooded his mind:

[Dilapidated Apartment] (White): 10 Spectral Miasma / hour

[The Alley] (White): 5 Spectral Miasma / hour

[Set Bonus]: +5% Miasma production

The apartment was six stories tall, stairs only. Each floor had ten units across four different layouts. There was a security booth on the ground floor and a water tower on the roof. The walls were covered in chaotic, unsettling graffiti, and the halls were lit by flickering, dim white bulbs.

The Alley was simpler: two large dumpsters and a perpetually damp floor.

Satisfied, Silas released his ghosts. The moment they were free, the air filled with a chorus of shrieks and the sound of grinding teeth. Bloody handprints and footprints began to crawl across the walls. The flickering lights in the building strove to stay on as the spirits surged through the halls.

After a few minutes of feasting on the fresh Spectral Miasma, the ghosts calmed down, their frenzied hunger sated.

The ghosts were taken care of. Now, it was Silas’s turn.

He opened the mission log. The top entry read: [Create your first dungeon. Reward: 5% Body Restoration.]

Five percent? He hoped that meant five percent of his body would return to a living state. Currently, he was cold, stiff, and lacked both smell and taste. It was an agonizing existence.

[It’s better than nothing!] the system urged. [Hurry up!]

He only had a few hours left before the rot set in. Silas looked at his inventory and began configuring the parameters:

Name: Depths of the Alley

Difficulty: E-D

Specters: Hangman, Mimic Shadows, Phantom Grasp

Buildings: Dilapidated Apartment + The Alley

Rules: Entering the 4th floor; showing a shadow in the alley after sunset; walking flush against the walls in the corridors.

Items: Low-level Ward

Clear Condition: Survive for three days.

The system watched the birth of this new spectral realm, cackling with glee. [Finally! Finally, it begins! Tremble! Cower, you foolish mortals! Welcome to—]

The system’s grand monologue was cut short by Silas hitting the 'Back' button.

He didn't finalize the dungeon. Instead, he went back to the settings and changed "Proscribed Rites" to simply "Rules."

Then, he issued his first command to the ghosts: "Do not kill anyone."

A string of question marks popped up over the skull ring.

[Wait, what? No killing? What kind of garbage setup is that? It’s not a horror dungeon if people don't die! How are we going to farm Terror Value without a body count?]

The system had always operated on the logic of an infinite-flow death game. It tried to reason with its new host. [Host, reconsider. Human fear peaks at the moment of death. That's the fastest way to level up and get your new body!]

Silas smiled faintly. "I have a plan."

[You haven't forgotten that you're going to start rotting in a few hours, have you?]

Silas sighed. "System, you're thinking too small. It's a choice between one big meal and a lifetime of buffet. I’m choosing the buffet."

[Huh?]

"The galactic population is massive," Silas explained. "Death dungeons might pay out fast, but there are no repeat customers. Players have to be kidnapped, they’re single-use, and the word-of-mouth is terrible."

"But if I build a Dread Theme Park, it’s different. They come here voluntarily. They get scared half to death, pay for the privilege, and then tell their friends it was 'fun.' They provide Terror Value, they pay Star Credits, and then they come back for more."

The system was speechless. Turning a death game into a tourist attraction? It sounded insane.

But then it thought about it.

*Damn. He actually has a point.* One kill yields a burst of energy. One terrified guest who keeps coming back is a steady, safe, and growing stream of revenue.

[Fine,] the system relented. [But once the dungeon is live, the trial period ends. If your daily Terror Value ever drops into the negative, your soul will be consumed. You’ll be dead for real.]

Silas nodded. He understood. It was sink or swim.

He did one final check of the settings and clicked 'Generate.'

Instantly, the mists around the buildings thickened into a dense, roiling soup. Ghostly silhouettes flitted through the fog. The temperature plunged. The apartment and the alley took on a sinister, heavy weight that warned of something deeply wrong.

A chime rang in Silas’s head: [Mission Complete! Reward Dispatched!]

Finally. Five percent restoration.

Silas waited with bated breath, but as he looked down, his smile vanished into a flat, horizontal line.

"..."

Silas stared at the space below his neck. There was nothing. No torso, no arms, no legs. Just a head floating in the air.

"A head?" he muttered, his voice flat. "This is your five percent?"

How was this better than being a walking corpse?

---