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

The Horizon did not have mornings.

No sun rose. No birds called. There was just a slow change in pressure, a subtle shift in color that turned the air from dreamless void to something closer to 'awake'. Still bleak. Still unnatural.

Miles stirred with a grunt, blinking up at the ceiling of twisted sheet metal and rotted support beams. His body ached in the familiar way. The dull, bone-deep exhaustion that said he was alive, but not particularly grateful about it.

Pain flared across his shoulders and ribs, courtesy of yesterday's encounter with a lesser Revenant that thought gnawing through human torsos in the middle of their sleep was a good idea.

His shirt was soaked through with cold sweat. The trinkets he had summoned the day before still laying around, like toys that belonged to a child who did not like cleaning up their mess.

Across from him, Kurt was already awake.

Ch116. Luna Sea