The gentle, familiar rhythm of my fingers combing through Emily's hair was a soothing, human counterpoint to the silent chaos playing out on the TV screen. The inane morning show had shifted its focus from celebrity gossip to tech and entertainment news, and there, front and center, was the familiar, fog-drenched screenshot from Silent Hill: First Fear.
The female anchor, her face an animated mask of professional excitement, was speaking with sharp, quick gestures. A red chyron below her confirmed my assumption: "{MYSTERY CONTINUES: Meteor Studio's Cryptic Tweet Sends Gaming World Into Frenzy!}"
I reached for the remote and turned the volume up slightly, just enough to catch the details.
"{—absolutely unprecedented engagement}," the anchor was saying, her tone a perfect blend of alarm and triumph.
"{The tweet, which simply questioned whether popular streamer GasFunk had actually completed the game, has been liked over ten million times and has sparked a massive resurgence in players returning to the title, all searching for what the developer might be hinting at.}"
Emily stirred in my lap, the warm weight shifting slightly. She cracked one eye open to squint at the bright screen. "Are they still talking about that?" she mumbled, her voice thick and drowsy with sleep.
"Looks like it," I said, my tone casual, the reality of the situation already boring to me. The victory had been secured; now came the predictable cleanup.
She shifted, turning her head to get a better view, one hand absently rubbing my thigh. "So… is there?" she asked, the question laced with genuine, sleepy curiosity. "A real ending, I mean. Not the one that guy got."
I looked down at her, at the genuine, innocent curiosity in her sleep-softened face, which I found surprisingly endearing. My inner otaku kicked in, demanding I adhere to the narrative logic. "Yeah, Em… There is," I said, as if it were the most obvious, factual thing in the world. "A game's gotta end at some point, right? Otherwise, what's the point? It'd just be… I don't know, a tech demo. Kinda useless."
It was a simple statement, but it carried the quiet, self-evident weight of an entire design philosophy from another world. A finished story, a satisfying conclusion—for me, that was non-negotiable.
The news segment changed again, now showing a clip from last night's Game Dissect. There was Director Martin Berg, his eyes alight with intellectual fervor, dropping the "alternate endings" bombshell. The panel's collective stunned faces filled the screen, a masterpiece of arrested disbelief.
Then it cut to a social media feed, a cruel cascade of hateful comments and memes directed squarely at GasFunk. "FRAUD!" "LIAR!" "DELETE YOUR CHANNEL!" The news anchor narrated it with a kind of gleeful, barely concealed schadenfreude.
I felt a slight, involuntary frown crease my brow. Watching the carnage now, in the calm light of morning, the spectacle felt… hollow. The enjoyment was gone, leaving only the grim reality of the internet mob.
"He's not really a liar, you know," I said, more to myself, the analytical side of my brain processing the data on human cruelty.
Emily looked up at me, confused. "Huh? But he said he beat it."
"He did beat it," I explained, my voice quieter, more thoughtful. "He found an ending. A conclusion to his story. It's a valid one. He just… jumped the gun. He thought it was the only one. He wasn't actively trying to mislead anyone; he was just proud he'd made it through the horrors." I sighed softly. "But the internet… it always needs a villain. Someone to blame. They build you up just so they can enjoy tearing you down. It's not really about him. It's about them."
There was no malice in my observation, just a weary, factual understanding of the digital mob mentality. I'd won, I'd achieved my goal, but the sheer viciousness of the internet sometimes left a slightly bitter aftertaste. Still, that's just how the game was played in this world.
The wonderful smell of sizzling bacon and Nadia's perfect, golden frying eggs finally pulled us all away from the mesmerizing screens and to the small kitchen table. The atmosphere was warm, noisy, and absolutely chaotic—a classic family breakfast in this new, expanded dynamic. Nadia was flipping pancakes with practiced, military ease, Cathy was carefully setting out plates, and Vera was very, very carefully lowering herself into a chair, still moving with a hint of tenderness she couldn't fully hide.
We passed around plates of food, the comfortable clatter of cutlery filling the quiet spaces. After a few minutes of eating, Vera took a long, restorative sip of her coffee, set the mug down with a firm click, and looked around the table.
"So," she began, her tone deliberately casual, but her eyes sparkling with hidden mischief. "Sael wants to buy a new place."
Cathy paused, a piece of buttered toast halfway to her mouth. "A new place? What, a bigger apartment? That's a good idea, baby, with all of us in here and the business growing. It's getting cramped."
Vera shook her head, a small smile playing on her lips as she prepared the bombshell. "Not an apartment. Un edificio de apartamentos.A whole apartment building."
The clattering stopped. Nadia's spatula hovered over the frying pan, dripping batter. Cathy's toast remained rigidly suspended in mid-air. Even Emily, who was shoveling eggs into her mouth with single-minded focus, froze, her fork halfway to her lips.
"A… a whole building?" Cathy finally managed, her voice faint, her face instantly paling with financial shock. "Baby, that's… that's…"
"Cincuenta millones," Vera finished for her, delivering the number with a bluntness that made both Cathy and Nadia simultaneously gasp for air.
"Fifty million dollars?" Cathy whispered, her eyes wide with fear. "Sael, that's… that's an impossible amount of money! The risk! What if something goes wrong? What if the game fails?"
Nadia looked equally worried, her fierce eyes pinning me to my seat. "Malchik, is this wise? This is everything you have! It is too much of a risk to put your women in harm's way!"
I held up a calming hand, chewing slowly on a piece of bacon. "It's okay. It's not everything. I've already set the money aside for it, and the profits from the last twelve hours alone have covered that. It's a good investment. A solid one. The building is prime real estate with reliable cash flow. It's not a risk; it's a necessary step up. For all of us." My goal wasn't just to be rich, but to be safe, and owning the land was the only way to be truly safe in this society.
The silence stretched again, the sheer scale of the number—fifty million—hanging over the table like a physical, suffocating weight. Then, Emily broke it. She slowly pointed her fork at me, her eyes wide with a dawning, hilarious realization.
"Mom… He's rich," she stated, her voice full of awe, her earlier fatigue completely vanished. "Like, for real rich. Not just 'new PC' rich. 'Buy-a-city-block' rich."
I burst out laughing, the tension shattering like fragile glass. "Yeah, Em," I said, grinning at her across the table. "I guess I am."
The worry on my mother's and grandmother's faces slowly began to melt, replaced by a bewildered, staggering acceptance of our new, unbelievable reality.