I typed it into the search bar, my fingers heavy with exhaustion:
The screen flickered to life, showing a hyper-realistic forest buried in white. In the center of the clearing stood a character that looked exactly like me, wearing the same gray hoodie I had on. The character wasn't moving. It was just staring out of the screen, its breath visible in the digital air. I typed it into the search bar, my
I reached for the power button, but my fingers wouldn't move. They were numb, pale, and dusted with snow. I looked down to see that the carpet beneath my desk was gone, replaced by a deep, freezing drift. I wasn't in my apartment anymore. I was in the game, and somewhere out in the digital pines, something was crunching through the snow toward me. It was just staring out of the screen,