Sunlight streamed through my bedroom window, illuminating the disaster I called "my personal space." Empty soda cans, chip wrappers, and a game controller held together with more duct tape than working buttons.
"Another sleepless night…" I murmured, my eyes bloodshot from eight straight hours in front of the screen.
Yeah, I'm that kind of person. A gamer to the core, though my mom had another name for me: "a lazy loser with no future." The truth? I was twenty-two, had zero stable jobs, and a record of online defeats that would make any motivational coach cry.
But tonight was different. Tonight I discovered a game that everyone was talking about: "The Judgment of the Gods."
A brutal, realistic, merciless MMORPG where the real world merged with mythology. The premise was simple: gods descend to Earth to destroy it, and humanity must choose champions to survive.
There were six starter characters to choose from, each with unique abilities:
Storm Paladin: tank with lightning and armor.
Crimson Assassin: master of daggers and poisons.
Desert Guardian: controls sand and has absurd endurance.
Sorceress of a Thousand Seals: devastating arcane magic.
Celestial Shooter: specialist in blessed firearms.
And… Wanderer of the Dawn.
The last one was… well, a joke.
Forums called him "the cursed tutorial." He had the ability to receive powers from the gods, but only temporarily and depending on the continent he was on. That meant if you crossed from America to Europe, for example, you lost all progress. Like playing fifty hours for nothing.
No one picked him. No one had ever made it past the first continent with that character.
"And guess who my favorite was?" I asked the ceiling, laughing to myself.
Yep. The idiot who picked the useless one. Me.
I don't know, there was something about his design. A guy with a ragged jacket, a strange pendant, and that aura of an endearing loser. While everyone went for OP characters, I grew attached to him.
Of course, that also meant that when I played online, everyone insulted me.
"Why are you picking the useless one? Restart, bro."
"You're a burden, leave the lobby."
Bah. As if I cared. He was my character. The Wanderer of the Dawn was mine.
---
The next morning, after another gaming marathon, I stumbled out onto the street. Raccoon eyes, empty stomach, and a dumb smile still on my lips.
"One of these days, this game is going to kill me…" I said, yawning.
The sun blinded me. The avenue was packed with cars, trucks, and street vendors. I just wanted to get to the corner store for some cheap pastries and coffee.
Then I heard it.
A roaring engine. A desperate horn.
I turned my head and saw it: a truck barreling straight at me.
"Wh-what the hell—?!"
Pure instinct. I jumped to the side with all my strength, rolling clumsily across the pavement. The truck passed brushing me and demolished a taco stand.
"I dodged it!" I shouted, raising my arms like I had won a world championship. "I dodged the reincarnation truck—!"
BAM.
Darkness.
Because of course, just as I celebrated, another truck came from the other lane. And this one hit me full on.
The impact was the last thing I felt. Or so I thought… because an instant later there was no pain, no sound, nothing. Just silence.
Then it appeared.
A white light. Intense, blinding. It wasn't like the sun, or a lamp—it was a brightness that enveloped me completely, as if trying to erase me.
"Wh…what the hell…?" I whispered, though I wasn't even sure I still had a mouth or throat.
There was no ground beneath my feet, no sky above my head. Just that white expanse that seemed endless.
And then, the light shattered. Like a crystal breaking into pieces, it revealed a scene I would never forget.
A world… destroyed.
Mountains split in half, oceans roaring against sunken cities, jungles devoured by black fire. In the sky, colossal shadows walked among the clouds—figures so enormous I could barely tell if they were human, beasts, or… gods.
The very air vibrated with a strange sound, a mixture of screams, storms, and roars of impossible creatures.
I froze.
"No… this can't be."
I recognized it instantly.
That scenery, those ruins, those gigantic monsters… I had seen them before, on my computer screen, while eating cheap chips at three in the morning.
It was the world of The Judgment of the Gods.
And I… was there.
End of Chapter
Continuation?
Yes
No