MrBoness

-- WSA 2025 Entry --

“Five… Four… Three… Two… One…”
As the countdown towards the new year went on to the last second, Miles looked up to the sky, just as everybody else did.

In the middle of the crowded street, Miles for once felt like he belonged. Being a teenage gamer, living with his parents, and trying to build a life as a streamer, he did not feel like leaving his room every day.

But there, in the middle of that crowded street, with everyone around him paying attention to the sky, the countdown on the digital billboard, and mostly anything else but him., Miles felt like a ghost.

A welcomed ghost, but a ghost, after all.

With a smile on his unseen face, he looked up as the countdown reached one, and everybody sang in unison.
‘HAPPY NEW YEAR!”

But Miles’ eyes widened as he watched in utter horror, and curiosity, even, hovering above him, a holographic screen with a few lines of text written in it.

All around him, although he did not pay much attention to it, a few other people seemed to experience the same situation.

[Updating home-world 39515’s version]

[Version 20.25 update brings a lot of fun and games with the new and improved survival mode]

[Do you want to convert your previous avatar to home-world 39515’s latest version?]

[Yes] [No]

“Survival… Mode?” Miles’ lips quivered.

Before he could think of anything else, though, the people around him began to scream…

Mad Hatter's Guide to Clearing The Game

Days turned into nights, and Sarissa found herself glancing at the quest window at least once each day, its words burning themselves into the back of her mind.

[Quest Information: The player Miles has the fragment of an item that can enhance your Regression skill. Kill him and take possession of the item to deepen your powers.]

No matter how many times she looked at it, how much she tried to reason with herself, the notification never disappeared. It lingered like an uninvited guest, a whisper in the depths of her thoughts, waiting for her to acknowledge it.

At first, she had considered the possibility that the quest was but an error of the system. She had thought about testing it, about searching for whatever fragment the message mentioned, but the idea of even entertaining the quest's objective made her feel sick.

Ch43. RE: [World Quest]