Timeline / Dark Deception

1930s

Bierce came to Hollywood to become a popular actress.

• She married Edgar at some point due to his wealth.
• She then met with Victor in one of the fake satanic rituals that was held by Edgar.
• For months, learned the true ritual she had to do to get her wish (become a popular movie star) from Victor.
• Bierce did the ritual by sacrificing Agatha, the daughter of a maid for the ritual. Malak compelled her soul for an exchange after 7 years and a day as a price of the ritual.

Victor disappeared.

• Bierce poisoned her husband with arsenic and inherited his wealth.
• Bierce didn’t plan to stick to her and Malak’s deal, so she looked for a way to repel him. She learned of a ring called The Riddle of Heaven, which could strip Malak’s power away. She found it in China or possibly Tibet, and when Malak came to finish their deal, Bierce tried to suck away Malak’s power with the ring.

While she did gain a bit of his power, Malak ended up shattering the ring, taking its pieces, and banished her to the Dark Dimension. Unbeknowest to him, however, one of the pieces bonded with Bierce's soul and sealed her within a pocket dimension resembling her ballroom. Since he couldn't directly enter the ballroom, Malak gave the ring pieces to his loyal minions and entrusted them to protect them - all while Bierce remained stuck inside the ballroom, which became a purgatory for souls who did both good and bad in their life.

1955

Doug Houser is born.

1959

Elise Houser is born.

1960

Doug celebrates his fifth birthday, and his mother gives him a teddy bear as a gift.

• Three years later, Doug's mother starts to think her son reminds her more and more of her abusive husband. The day before, he accidentally broke one of the glasses, and she punished him by locking him inside a dark closet for several hours. She then starts to regret marrying her spouse and being forced to take care of the boy alone. But instead of abandoning him, she decides to make him suffer just like she had.

1980

Doug Houser and Elise Houser get married.

• Tammy Houser is born.

After 1980

After being married for nearly two years, Elise begins to wonder why she hasn't met Doug's mother yet since she was absent from her wedding and the birth of her daughter. When she asks him about her, he refuses to answer and so she decides to dig up the truth about his mother.

• Doug's daughter had a history of mental health disorders dating back to 1988, including spontaneous mood swings, panic attacks, and impulsive behavior. As her conditions worsened over time, Doug had to constantly admit her to the Pittsburgh Psychiatric Hospital, where she was diagnosed with early bipolar disorder.

Before 1991

Doug then started merely seeing Tammy for her flaws and considered her a financial burden. Growing tiresome of his family's responsibilities, Doug opted to abandon his wife and daughter. He devised a plan to escape them, use his wealth to start a new life, and forget they existed.

1991

Elise Houser started to take antidepressants due to her bipolar diagnosis.

1992

Elise and Tammy died in a car crash on Mc Kees Rocks Bridge.

After 1992

Doug fled to New York City.

• Doug came to regret his decision. Fully realizing the depravity of his actions, Doug fell into madness, left with a burning reminder of his mistakes. Crippled by remorse, he began to hallucinate his family in public, as well as in his dreams.
• Doug devoted himself to a Christian group in hopes of seeking a faithful cause. However, unable to fully embrace religion and spiritual guidance, he resorted to charitable causes and community work. Despite his actions, he felt empty and unfazed, even after taking medication and therapy to forget.
• Doug then turned himself into New York City Police Department and was subsequently arrested under alleged sexual misconduct, sexual abuse, and sex act charges involving five separate women.

Present

Elise was sent to Bierce's Ballroom and refused to work with her. She then left her tablet behind and faked her death at hands of the Murder Monkeys. She finds the hotel she is in to be familiar with and discovers that she can sense the monsters around her, allowing her to peek into their souls and read their desires. The Murder Monkeys for instance were killers in life and could tell the Chef Monkeys were somehow worse. From that point, she refers to herself as "E".

• E soon finds one of Malak's relics, which apparently whispered its location to her. The relic allows her to move between realms, but she quickly realizes that the relic will only take her to places Malak has visited and decides to use it sparingly to avoid being caught by him. The relic transports her to a school, wherein she senses only one malicious soul, Agatha. The demented girl allowed the woman to peek into her soul, and E was horrified to discover she was indeed a genuine child, but one that has been so tragic and tormented that her soul has been corrupted by hatred and vengeance. She then could hear the girl running towards her and used the relic to escape, but not before Agatha was able to use her long claws to slash her shoulder, all while laughing manically.
• E nearly passed out from the pain, but she then realized her wound had healed instantly and wondered how that was possible. She assumed it may be because the dark dimension had rules that were very alien in nature, and theorized someone could be controlling it all. She then realizes she had stumbled upon a gilded manor that was inhabited by the Gold Watchers, ruthless golden golems who are the results of greedy cursed souls of men drawn to the manor that willingly encased themselves in the very wealth and gold they cherished in life, and they attacked anyone who they felt like would try to steal from them.
• At some point, E visits a Dollhouse and manages to escape from it.
• After fleeing from the dollhouse, E begins to wonder how much longer she can endure these hardships as even though she has the relic, she fears that it may eventually stop working. She then enters the sewer in hopes of finding an exit, but instead, she finds the unusually large duckies, each one containing the souls of liars that have flushed down into the sewers, now living out their days as creatures of deception. Luckily she is able to sense them and avoid them easily. However, she also sensed a bigger threat lurking in the depths; the Doom Ducky. She could hear it in the distance and decided to leave once she realizes that it knows where she is hiding.
• When she entered the circus for the first time, she felt surprisingly weaker. This then caused her to come to the horrifying conclusion that the relic was slowly sapping away her life force every time it was used. She begins to wonder if the dark dimension is hell and wonders if she was a terrible person in life. However, what irritates her the most is that she isn't able to remember anything and suspects that Bierce may be hiding something from her. She then stumbles upon the Clown Gremlins, who she could recognize as being small-minded cowards who liked to provoke others simply for their own amusement.
• At some point, E visits a cathedral which was nothing more than a dead end, as it didn't help her in finding the truth.
• After yet another jump, E is becoming exhausted and feels herself dying because of her over usage of the relic. She then entered an ominous hospital that was inhabited by strange women known as Reaper Nurses who are actually misandrists that are born to serve the demon and prey on misogynists. However, unlike the other monsters E had encountered, the Reapers were completely passive, with one even offering tea and laughing at the idea that she poisoned the drink. The Nurses then huddled together with each other before offering E a proposition to become one of them. They state she had all the requirements to be a Reaper, and all she had to do was say the word and she would become one of them. Seeing their syringes, she felt that if she refused they would kill her. So with the relic in hand, she prepared to leave while politely declining the offer. But instead of being attacked, the Nurses just laughed and simply stated that she should make herself at home since she would be with them for a while. And although she could go anywhere she desired, the restricted areas were off-limits. With curiosity getting the better of her and hoping to find an exit, E decides to venture into one of these areas. This quickly earned her the ire of the Reapers who then proceeded to chase her out of their hospital and forced her to go to a different nightmare.
• Paralyzed by the last jump, E finds herself in Joy Joy Land and is greeted by Lucky the Rabbit, who is standing on top of the draw bridge of the faux castle. While Lucky acted friendly, she knew he had malicious intentions. In fact, she could see that he was nothing but a violent killer robot that was powered by an inhuman soul. E tried to run from the rabbit, only to bump into Hangry the Pig, who tried to knock out the girl with a single good punch. Although he missed, he ended up smashing down a good chunk of the castle wall. E tries to escape, but Lucky grabs her by the throat and strangles her while laughing manically. However, one of the bricks falls and lands on his head, causing him to drop E on the sharp and barbed rubble of the wall. E then rolls into the water before Lucky could get another chance to grab her. This caused Lucky to lose it and begin cursing her while rapidly throwing bricks into the moat. As E began to sink into the cold water, mere moments from drowning, a sinister voice called out to her. It was Malak, the demon all the monsters had worked for. He appeared to her in a vision and states that he could sense her suffering and told her to use the relic to find him when she was ready. Upon taking a good look at the twisted projection, a crushing feeling filled E's head as the words "Don't you have someone to kill?" echoed in her mind. E then is able to resurface and discovers the two animatronics are gone. Clinging to the castle wall, she begins to wonder what the demon meant and how she could possibly find him. She then drags herself out of the moat and leaves her message on the now-broken wall. She then encourages those who come to this theme park to leave before it is too late.
• While her arm was burning from the last jump, E discovers that Malak's influence was able to make a few glimpses of the memories of her past life resurface, but they have no meaning to her at the moment. She finds herself deep within a cavern and could hear dozens of voices from the souls that perished there. She then quickly realizes this place was Malak's execution site and served as the home of the Trigger Teddies and Mama Bear. E notes that Mama Bear is a conglomeration of the souls of abusive mothers and wonders if she could even be slayed. She then finds herself being caught in a trance and walking towards this being who causes her immense pain but is able to stop herself at the last moment. E begins to wonder why she is being drawn toward her. However, she decides to prioritize her own survival then tying up some loose ends, and hopes to search the cave for some clues.

Now under poor health, Doug uses a blood ritual to save his soul, preventing him from fully dying. As he embraces his fate in a void-like area, he is greeted by Bierce, who remarks that she's aware of everything Doug has done and what he wants to do now. She further tells him that while she can certainly help, it won't be easy, as he has to do something for her first.Doug is transported to Bierce's Ballroom not long after. She explains that the task in question involves rearranging the Riddle of Heaven, the pieces of which are hidden behind the portals around them. If he brings her all of them, she'll grant his wish, but if he fails, then he will likely suffer a fate worse than death. Bierce then opens the first portal, and she quietly tells Doug that his time is running out. With that, Doug enters the portal into a long hallway, in turn entering an open void at the end of it.

• The first portal leads to a hotel, a place Doug may remember. After a harmless encounter with a Murder Monkey in the lobby, he takes an elevator up to the hotel's main floor, revealing the ring altar protecting the ring piece. Bierce explains that the soul shards found on that floor belong to the people who died there, but he must collect them all to get the ring piece. To further help in his endeavor, she grants him a tablet showing both the soul shards and the maze layout, left behind by the person before him (E). Now on his own, Doug begins collecting, triggering the Murder Monkeys into hunting him down.
• After a short endeavor, Doug collects all the soul shards, enraging every single monkey in the hotel. This also triggers the Chef Monkeys into pursuing him as well. Nonetheless, Doug manages to collect the now exposed ring. A voice suddenly demands who's dare, forcing Doug to flee into an elevator from a frenzied Murder Monkey. The elevator leads him back down to the hotel's lobby, and, despite the voice's remark that he can't escape, narrowly escapes more monkeys and enters the portal.

Back in the void, Bierce congratulates Doug for making it back, but she then notes that Malak has now taken notice of him. In door form, Malak warns Doug that she'll betray him after they complete the ring, but Bierce tells Doug to ignore him and place the ring at the ballroom altar. She also tells Doug about the ring's theoretical purpose.Back in the ballroom, she orders Doug to enter the second portal. However, the hallway within is blocked by a speed barrier. To bypass it, Bierce uses the new ring piece to grant Doug speed boost, allowing him to run fast enough to break the barrier and pass through.