In the middle of the night, in the busy metropolis of the city of P, in one particular apartment building located near the border of the city.
Third floor building, inside one of the apartment room.
A young man could be seen from the outside of his window with his back hunched on a chair.
He was dressed in a hoodie, his hair was a bit messy, and there were dark circles around his eyes.
His focus was on the monitor screen in front of him, while his hands were on the desk, quickly moving and tapping across the keyboard and mouse.
It was already past midnight, but the young man had like full of energy inside him and kept constantly shouting inside of his room.
"Go to the right!"
"I mean my right!"
"Right there! At the back of that huge rock!"
"I'm charging in!"
"Help!"
He clicked and swayed his mouse repeatedly like a madman as he continuously presses and taps his mouse and keyboard nonstop.
His eyes were like about to pop out, and he grumbled, " One more... one more."
Shortly after...
«Floor Cleared Accomplish!»
A prompt appeared on his monitor screen with a glorious sound accompanying it.
Klay widened his eyes at the monitor. Both of his hands were shaking uncontrollably due to the high emotions he was feeling right now.
"Yes! I F***ing did it!"
Klay stood up from his chair and clenched both of his fists high. He was so happy that he could not stop being emotional.
"Finally!" he said in high spirits.
"I have been playing this game for about 4 years already, and I have finally made it to the 20th floor!" Klay said as he swept the tears that were coming out.
A minute later, Klay came back to his composure.
Klay typed a few sentences in the lobby and took a snap on his phone before logging out.
Feeling in a good mood, he then posted it on his social media accounts.
Meanwhile…
Inside the game's lobby chat:
[Im_Not_Weak - Player 5: GG guys! Let's play another time!]
[Notice: Player 5 has left.]
[CocoNutNut - Player 1:
Nope, there's no f***ing next time! Who the hell invited that guy to our party?!]
[Unnamed - Player 2:
GG? More like BS! Did you contribute anything besides screaming and terrible comms?! You almost got us all killed!]
[CocoNutNut - Player 1:
Right?! We just entered the boss room, and he charged in like a lunatic with no plan!]
[LaggingLobster - Player 3:
Seriously P4, how do you know this guy? My ears are still ringing from his yelling, and I couldn't focus because of his constantly shouting during fights.]
[BidetBandit - Player 4:
Sorry, guys. I messed up. I just met him earlier and picked him out in a hurry, also the name kinda looked promising tho...]
No comment proceeded after that. Everyone went silence.
[Notice: Player 4 has been kicked out of the team.]
.
.
.
Klay lives by himself in the apartment he rents. He is a college student and has average grades.
He is lean, 5'9" tall, and could be considered good looking. Although he had a good appearance, he was not popular among the girls in his school.
One of the reasons was his sloppy appearance with big dark circles under his eyes earning him the nickname zombie guy.
As a result, no one approaches or hangs out with him. The majority of his time is spent alone locked up in his room playing video games.
The game he was engrossed in playing was called, "Dungeon Thrive". A popular game that had already reached hundreds of thousands of downloads globally.
The game mechanics are based on the player with his team beating each floor of the dungeon and rising through levels. The lower the floor, the more difficult the challenges.
The company's developers even issued a statement, offering massive rewards to any player who could reach the end of the floor and clear it, along with various life insurance benefits. This, in turn, made the challenge highly sought after by players.
However, despite him spending several hours every day into the game, his gaming skills truly sucked.
Klay already knew this himself but it did not stop him from continuing to play the game.
He also had his own ambition.
"It is only a matter of time before my name will be recognized and be one of the players to have cleared all the floors of this game!" This thought was always engraved in the back of his head.
It is a big achievement for a player as there's no one yet to finish all the floors, despite it was already 4 years since the game has launched.
Because this game, as many know, doesn't just measure a player's skills…
.
.
.
Half an hour has already passed by when Klay finished everything.
"Alright, all finished." Klay grinned looking on his new post on social media. He felt satisfied.
"Yawn!"
Klay stretched his body up and looked at the time at the corner of his phone screen.
[4:52 a.m.]
"Woah, it's already past 4! I better go to bed."
Klay finally turned off his computer. He stood up on his chair and went to the bathroom first to wash his face before going to bed.
"I need to wake up early, or else that good professor of mine would beat my ass again." Klay reminded himself, reminiscing the past on how he was asked to ran around the campus just because he was late by 15 minutes.
I do not want to suffer that hell experience again!
It's already enough that I have to wake up early with only three to four hours of sleep.
I would rather die than do that again!
"Damn, I truly hate Mondays." Klay added as he turned off the lights and launched the bed quickly falling asleep.
Half an hour had passed.
Klay had already fallen into deep sleep, with his stomach lying down first on the bed with his head resting on the side of the pillow.
When suddenly, something strange happened.
Klay's steady breathing became erratic. His chest was rapidly moving up and down, and sweat began forming on the top of his forehead.
Both of his arms started to tremble softly. Although his eyes were still closed, his face was already pale and had a slight bluish tinge of color.
With all of this happening around him, Klay remained fast asleep in his bed, as if he had slipped into unconsciousness.
And until the last of his breath, he passed away without a sound, peacefully on his bed.