Don lingered in the bathroom for a few minutes longer, letting the faint drip of the tap fill the space while he mulled over the recent system prompt. The numbers, the titles, the gains… all neatly packaged like some cosmic scoreboard.
He still couldn't decide if it was a blessing, a curse, or the universe's idea of an inside joke.
Sometimes he wondered if any of this was real at all—whether his victories, his close calls, even the people around him, were nothing more than pieces in some elaborate simulation.
But chasing that line of thought had never led anywhere worth staying. Whoever, or whatever, might be behind it—god, machine, or lunatic—wasn't answering questions.
So he let the thoughts scatter, like ash flicked into the wind.
He gave his face a brief rinse, ran a hand through his hair, and stepped back into the hallway.
