Time: 2:42 a.m.
Place: A bedroom.
Ali slouched in his chair, eyes fixed on the glow of his PC monitor. The room was a capsule of his own making: a single bed, a wardrobe, a smart TV playing a muted YouTube guide on trophy runs. The only light came from the screen, painting his face in shifting blues and reds.
On it, Fortnite was a slaughterhouse. He wasn't playing; he was conducting. Aimbot snapped his crosshair through walls. ESP painted enemies in glowing outlines. Fair play was for people who enjoyed losing. He enjoyed breaking things.
Victory Royale. 32 Kills.
He leaned back, the black fabric of his Solo Leveling hoodie—Commander Igris snarling in red across his chest—stretching with him. Black pants. Black belt. Black socks. A uniform for someone who lived in the shadows of servers and screens.
"Yawn…" He rubbed his eyes, the dryness a familiar complaint. "Man, I'm hungry."
The house was silent as a tomb as he padded downstairs.
The kitchen fridge door groaned open—a sound older than half his memories. The light inside was sickly, falling on wilting vegetables, packaged raw meat, condiments.
Ingredients. For people who cooked.
He stared, unimpressed.
"Yeah… no."
The door swung shut with a soft thump.
"My sister might have something."
Outside her door, he became a ghost. The handle turned without a click. The room was a mirror of his own, but softer—stickers on the wardrobe, a neat desk, a bed with custom-built drawers underneath. His father had made those. They held her secrets. Mostly snacks.
She was asleep, facing the wall, breathing deep.
Perfect.
He knelt, the floorboards holding their silence. The drawer slid open on well-oiled runners.
Bingo.
Lay's. Cheetos. He palmed a bag of Flamin' Hot, closed the drawer with glacial care, and retreated, a shadow dissolving back into the hall.
Back in his chair, he tore the bag open. The crrk was loud in the quiet. The first handful was pure chemical heat, biting his tongue. He chewed, tabbing over to a random movie for background noise. This was the ritual. The control.
Halfway through the bag, the world erased itself.
Not black. White. An absence so total it wasn't even bright. It was void.
He couldn't see. Couldn't hear. Couldn't speak. Couldn't move.
His body was gone. Only the falling remained—a plunge with no wind, no scream, no end.
Thump.
Impact. Not violent, but final. Like the world had been slotted back into place beneath him.
Darkness, thick and complete, swallowed everything.
Then, slowly, it began to peel away.
His eyes fluttered open.
Leaves. A canopy of them, dark green and tangled, blotting out a grey sky. Cold, damp air brushed his cheeks. The smell was overwhelming—rich, wet earth, rotting leaves, something sharp and green beneath.
He blinked. Once. Twice.
This was not his room.
His vision cleared, and the world resolved with terrible clarity.
A forest.
But not like in games. Not rendered. These trees were giants, their trunks wider than cars, bark deep-grooved and furred with moss. The light was thin, filtered, real. The rustle above wasn't a looped sound effect—it was the wind moving through a million individual leaves.
His back was pressed into cold, damp soil. A small rock dug into his shoulder blade.
He didn't move. His gamer mind, trained on instant assessment, scrambled.
Respawn point? Bug? Cutscene?
But the chill in his bones was no graphical setting. The ache in his lungs from holding his breath was no stamina bar. The silence, broken only by the forest's own breath, held no soundtrack.
He was here. Wherever here was.
And he was utterly, completely alone.
No HUD. No menu. No quest marker.
Just Ali, a half-eaten bag of Flamin' Hot Cheetos nowhere to be seen, lying in the dirt of a world that had not asked for his presence.