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

Sarissa watched Miles fight, her blade still, her body poised but unmoving.

However, under the poised mask and body language, she was shaking in fear, anticipation, and…

She could have interfered. She should have, by all rational accounts. But something held her back. Something cold and calculated in the depths of her heart.

Her grip tightened on the hilt of [Aria of the Lost] as her keen eyes followed Miles' every movement. He was fast, but not faster than she had anticipated. His attacks were wild, driven by raw emotion rather than precision.

Power without control, drenched in a recklessness she had never witnessed before. Did that boy, Diego, mean that much to him, that he could not even refrain from losing his cool before a menace such as Shinji?

But what she was truly looking for was something else.

Ch74. It ain't human