[Congratulations on completing the game! Would you like to claim your reward now? Yes | No?]
"Hmm…"
Caleb's amber eyes stared at the bright winning notice on his phone, flashing in front of his eyes like one of those questionable advertisements.
At this moment, the blonde was lazily lounging on his sofa bed, with the only source of light in the room being the distant moon, the night light, and his epilepsy-inducing phone.
Who'd have thought he'd actually win this? He couldn't help but remember when, a month ago, he encountered this game for the first time. It was a colorful pop-up that appeared on his screen all of a sudden.
Win the game and get a chance to get your own land!
Though reason triumphed in the end, he was tempted to click on it for a second.
Like any other youth, his dream was to be stable enough to own a house. Sadly, in today's economy, that was a bit difficult for him, a poor orphan found in the garbage bin.
Even if, at twenty-five years old, he just got promoted from Newbie Corporate Slave to Junior Corporate Slave, it would definitely take a while for him to save up for an apartment.
Anyway, he didn't click the questionable ad and cleared out all windows lest he accidentally clicked on something. He couldn't afford a new phone to risk it getting infected by a virus.
Unexpectedly, the ad would appear every so often, and sometimes it was even when he was messaging or calling clients. Worried, he got the phone checked, but there was no malware detected at all.
It bothered him a bit since this phone had been with him since he was a teen, and there was a lot of data, documents, and photos in there.
He did not worry for long, though. Not because it got fixed, but because he was (sadly) too busy being a slave to keep worrying. Not long after that, he was distracted with a project and didn't think about it at all.
Who'd have thought that, one day, after a long and hectic meeting, he accidentally clicked 'yes' and ended up downloading an entire app?!
And it couldn't be deleted!
When he got it checked again, the technicians reassured him it wasn't dangerous. In the end, he just accepted it as it was and ignored it for a while.
A week ago, a work accident happened and cost the company a lot of money. As the supervisor, he was pushed to take the blame (also because the person at fault was a parachute hire). He got fired, and he ended up playing the mysterious game while job hunting.
At the time, Caleb told himself that a little brainless activity wouldn't hurt. It might even help him decompress. Anyway, he had enough savings to live respectfully for another month or two.
Who'd have thought that he'd end up getting addicted?
Like, really addicted.
It was to the point that, except for eating, sleeping, and shitting, it was all he did. Ah, no, even when shitting, he had his phone with him.
It was really weird. On the surface, it was nothing special.
It was just a simple pixelated lifestyle game where he would build his own village while fighting monsters. The setting had a mix of infrastructure management and a little adventure, which was quite fun.
He didn't have time to play so many games growing up (too busy working), but he knew enough (mostly from friends) to know it was nothing unusual.
It was like he caught up to the childhood he lost, and he—a workaholic—was surprised to realize that he did not feel guilty wasting so many hours on it.
Rather, while playing mindlessly, Caleb even got into some sort of existential crisis.
He began to question why he worked so hard in the first place. What was the use of working so hard, when all he could do was survive?
Playing a game like this without worrying about anything else felt new, like he was rebelling against how he lived his life before, and it was likely the biggest reason he got so addicted in the first place.
Now, a few days later, he finally completed the game (allegedly), and then he received this congratulatory notice, which asked him to claim his reward.
Unlike before, he did not ignore the choice and directly clicked [Yes]. Hopefully, the reward wasn't a virus.
The next moment, his vision tumbled, realizing he had fallen down on the sofa.
Then his sights shifted away from his phone to a place that was way too bright.
And hot.
"OUCH!" he screamed, feeling the sting of the heated ground underneath him. This was in stark contrast to the soft sofa he had just been lying on, or even the discounted carpet he placed underneath it.
He instinctively stood up, holding the nearest vertical surface. It was wood, but it was very rough and dry, almost like charcoal. Was it even really a tree?
Still, shocked by the imbalance, he found himself leaning on it.
Crunch! Crack!
The weight seemed too much for the kinda-tree and it fractured helplessly until it wasn't even standing anymore, falling down on baked earth underneath it.
Bam!
"..." He didn't gain that much weight, did he?
It was then that Caleb's eyes turned to the surroundings, vast and wide and bright and definitely not his comfortable bedroom.
Rather, it felt like he was thrown straight into a running oven.
What the f—
[Transfer Complete!]
[Sync Complete!]
[Player #7923100263 Caleb Harlow is now online.]
[Class Determined: Oasis Owner (SSS)]
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