I sat looking at the screen.
I sat there in silence.
The silence felt so loud I could hear my ears ringing.
My name flashed on the screen. The familiar words flickered and reflected off of my pupils. Something that was meant to be fun had become completely unnecessary to my life. Then again, that was a lie. Truth be told gaming was necessary to my life, because it was how I put food on the table. It was how I kept clothes on my back. It was how I kept food in my stomach, and water to drink whenever I was thirsty.
My name is Souta Takahashi. I live in complete solitude. I have no friends. I have no girlfriend or boyfriend. I have no pets. I have no acquaintances. I have nothing but this, and cup ramen that usually sat on my desk for three or four days before I would finally gather the energy to toss it in the trash.
I am one of the top gamers in the world, and if i'm not participating in a tournament that housed some ridiculously high price prize I was practicing day in and day out to prepare for said tournaments.
My connection with my mother and father was completely severed when I decided to pursue gaming instead of school. Not that it didn't work out well for me. Not like I even cared. Who needs them when you have yourself? Who needs anyone when you have yourself? I had always felt selfish. Possessive over my seclusion. Even in my job, if you could even call it that. I always queued up solo. I mainly participated by myself at all times and if I absolutely had to team with someone I made it clear that our relationship must stay professional for the sake of both of us.
My mother and father had split when I was small, and from that moment I always questioned the idea of human connection. Sure, everyone had different levels of skepticism when it came to being around others but after seeing my rose colored glasses shattered in front of me, I no longer had any interest whatsoever in being around anyone.
It was about 3am. I had been up for the last forty-eight hours practicing for a big tournament that was meant to come this weekend, but with the huge storm that hasn't stopped for the past week raging on I was anxious that something was going to happen. I didn't care about myself in particular, but I did care about the power going out and me losing the tournament. Embarrassment was always the worst feeling one could feel but what was more important than that was that this was my only reason for living. I have nothing else and nobody. One would say it's pathetic, I say it's lucrative.
I turned my high-end computer off for the night and I flopped on my stomach on to my bed. My diet wasn't the best but I was slim, even considering myself in shape. Hey, what more could someone ask for? I suppose if nothing else I was accepting, key word being accepting, not grateful, of my life.
I pulles my phone out and scrolled, watching different videos of people. Strangely enough they were all happy. There were times where I wished I understood what that felt like. To be truly happy. To actually look forward to the next day in your life. Yes, I lived better than others but an emptiness met me everytime I stared into the mirror. Everytime I looked at a photo of myself. Everytime I saw that same reflection in that screen.
If there were a God I truly wondered whether or not he made me this way for a specific reason. Why was everything so meaningless? So dull. Even my life's purpose felt obnoxiously redundant. Almost as if I was meandering. How pathetic.
I closed my eyes, slowly drifting off to sleep. Today was thursday and if I didn't get some sleep I would miss out on saturday when I eventually succumbed to exhaustion. Would be a pretty bad move on my end.
Before I fully drifted off into sleep, I forced myself into full consciousness and I got back up, turning back on my PC. If I wasn't waking up until tomorrow-I probably should just keep my system on so when I wake up I don't have to wait for anything. I can get right back into a game.
I started the game. It's title: Into Our Paradise. It was the hottest game and had been for at least five years now. A massive MMO game that continuously expanded monthly. Players had fully customizable characters that could level up and learn different skills based on a variety of things, such as the bloodline they chose, the class, race, and even gender. Players had full creative control, and the game was hyper realistic acting as a RPG game secondary to it's MMO style. Players could virtually do anything in the game, not that doing those things interested me. What was more interesting and damn near suspicious was that the game allowed you to literally do anything you could do in real life in the first place. Allowing anyone with fifty bucks to do anything to anyone in a game had to be illegal somehow. If I had to suspect the government sees such a return on in game purchases that they refuse to let the game go to waste. Fuck. Who am I kidding? I meant the money to go to waste.
I laid back down and slowly drifted to sleep, not thinking much else of the day today.
The rain scratched at the roof above, thunder slamming against the very fabric of the area Souta lived in. It was annoying but he was a heavy sleeper. Nothing could possibly wake him, especially not a storm like this.
Suddenly that changed.
A bolt of lightning rained down on his home, destroying the roof and letting the water flow into his room. He suddenly woke. He looked at the hole in his roof. This was ten times worse than if his power went out. Now he would have to pay to get this fixed. Great. He grunted, before walking towards a closet outside of his room, grabbing a broom and dust pan.
"What a fucking drag."
Souta began sweeping up any piece of debris he could in order to get the pieces off the floor. It was the least he could do until he could call someone tomorrow morning. Annoying yes, but what else could he possibly do in an obscure situation like this?
The rain continued to fall into his room, the floor, and more importantly his PC were soaked in water. He didn't even know how to react at this point. He walked over to the computer and unplugged it completely, tossing the wires onto the ground which began to spark. He was completely unsure about the safety of this, but it must be done to save the game. He looked inside of his room closet and pulled out a towel, trying to wipe the ground so the cords could sit on a dry surface for the time being.
And that's when it happened.
Another beam of lightning struck again, this time striking the poor man. He felt a pain like never before. What the hell?! Twice in a row?! Any normal person would never see something like this. It was a stretch to even say Souta saw what just happened, because moments later he had no consciousness. His body slumped over as his head slammed into his desk ripping it over completely, the computer falling on him. Luck had taken an all time low for the kan and water had gotten in the socket the PC was initially connected to, and sparks flew as they hit the corpse of the man. The results leavinf him completely dead on his bedroom floor.