The glow of the monitor cast pale blue shadows across Ethan Cole's face as the words "DEFEAT" blazed across the screen in mocking crimson letters. He slumped back in his chair, the worn leather creaking under his weight, and stared at the post-game statistics with hollow eyes.
**7/12/4. 45% Kill Participation. 142 CS at 35 minutes.**
Pathetic.
His fingers hovered over the keyboard, trembling slightly—not from exhaustion, though he was exhausted, but from the cocktail of frustration and caffeine surging through his veins. The empty energy drink cans littering his desk rattled as he accidentally knocked one over. It joined three others on the floor, rolling to rest against a pile of unwashed clothes.
"One more game," Ethan muttered to himself, clicking back to the lobby. The same mantra he'd been repeating for the past six hours. "Just one more."
The clock in the corner of his screen read 3:47 AM. Tuesday morning. He had a class at nine—Introduction to Business Management, a course his mother had insisted he take. "You need something practical, Ethan. Gaming isn't a career." Her words echoed in his head, bitter and familiar.
But what did she know? She'd never felt the rush of a perfect team fight, the satisfaction of outplaying an opponent, the pure strategic beauty of a well-executed macro play. She saw gaming as a waste of time. He saw it as the only thing he was good at.
Except lately, he wasn't even good at that.
The queue popped. Five strangers locked in their champions. Ethan selected his usual—Kaelen, the Shadow Assassin. A high skill-cap jungler that required perfect timing and decision-making. On his best days, he could carry entire games. Today wasn't his best day. This week hadn't been his best week.
Hell, this year hadn't been his best year.
The loading screen appeared, displaying all ten players and their ranks. His eyes immediately found his own: **Gold III - 23 LP.** He'd been Diamond last season. Diamond. Now he was struggling to climb out of Gold, stuck in what the community cruelly called "elo hell."
*It's not the rank*, he told himself. *It's my teammates. Always my teammates.*
But deep down, in a place he didn't like to examine too closely, he knew that wasn't entirely true.
The game began.
"Jungler, gank top at level three," his top laner typed immediately.
"Need help bot, their support is aggressive," came another message.
"Mid has no flash, easy kill."
Three demands within the first thirty seconds. Ethan felt his jaw clench. He typed nothing, muting all chat with practiced efficiency. Better to focus on his own game than get drawn into arguments.
He started his jungle route—Blue buff, Gromp, Wolves. The mechanical motions were soothing, almost meditative. Click, ability, smite, move. His hands knew the pattern so well he didn't need to think. Which was good, because thinking led to dwelling, and dwelling led to remembering how far he'd fallen.
At four minutes, his bot lane died to a gank.
"Jungler difference," appeared in chat.
At seven minutes, his top laner overextended and got solo killed.
"No gank top. Reported."
At twelve minutes, his mid laner missed a crucial skill shot in a fight and blamed Ethan for not following up fast enough.
"Useless jungler. AFK farming."
Ethan's grip on his mouse tightened until his knuckles went white. He wanted to type back, to defend himself, to explain that he couldn't be everywhere at once. But what was the point? They wouldn't listen. They never listened.
The game spiraled out of control. By twenty minutes, the enemy team was sieging their base. By twenty-five, it was over.
**DEFEAT.**
Another loss. Another drop in LP. Another step further from his goals.
Ethan stared at the screen, something hollow opening up in his chest. This was his seventh loss in a row. Seven games, seven defeats, almost eight hours of his life gone. And for what? To drop from Gold III to Gold IV? To prove he was getting worse instead of better?
His phone buzzed. A message from his mother: *"Ethan, I saw your light on at 2 AM. You have class tomorrow. Please get some sleep."*
He didn't reply.
The cursor hovered over the "Find Match" button. Every rational part of his brain screamed at him to stop, to go to bed, to accept that tonight wasn't his night. But there was something else, something desperate and clawing inside him that whispered: *One more game. You can end on a win. You can't go to sleep after a loss.*
"Just one more," he whispered to the empty room.
He clicked the button.
Queue popped. Champion select. Loading screen. The same cycle, spinning endlessly like a hamster wheel he couldn't get off.
This game started better. His lanes were winning, his ganks were connecting, and for the first time all night, Ethan felt like himself again. His fingers danced across the keyboard, executing combos with muscle memory precision. He was eight kills, two deaths, twelve assists at thirty minutes.
They were winning.
"We got this," someone typed. "Easy game."
Ethan allowed himself a small smile. Finally. Finally, something was going right.
Then it happened.
A single mistake. His ADC got caught out farming alone. The enemy team collapsed. One kill turned into two, then three. A team wipe. The enemy marched down mid lane, and despite Ethan's desperate attempts to defend, they couldn't stop the push.
The Nexus exploded.
**DEFEAT.**
Ethan sat frozen, staring at the screen. The victory had been right there. Right there. And it had slipped through his fingers like sand.
Something inside him cracked.
His hands dropped from the keyboard. His shoulders sagged. The adrenaline that had been keeping him upright for hours suddenly drained away, leaving only exhaustion—bone-deep, soul-crushing exhaustion.
The post-game lobby appeared, but he didn't look at it. His eyes felt heavy, burning from hours of screen time. His head was pounding. His back ached from sitting in the same position for so long.
*What am I doing?*
The question surfaced unbidden, and with it came a flood of others.
*What am I doing with my life? Why do I keep playing when I just keep losing? Why can't I stop? Why can't I be better?*
The room felt suddenly suffocating. The walls of his bedroom—plastered with gaming posters and tournament schedules for professional leagues—seemed to close in. The trophies from high school LAN tournaments on his shelf mocked him with their dust-covered nostalgia. The dream of going pro, of being like the players he idolized, felt more distant than ever.
He was twenty years old, failing out of a college degree he didn't care about, disappointing parents who'd given up trying to understand him, and unable to even climb the ranked ladder in the one thing he claimed to be passionate about.
*Loser*, a voice in his head whispered. *Pathetic loser.*
Ethan's vision blurred. He blinked hard, refusing to let the burning behind his eyes become anything more. He wouldn't cry over a game. He wouldn't.
But it wasn't about the game, was it? It was about everything the game represented. Every failed dream, every missed opportunity, every promise to himself that he'd broken.
His eyes drifted to the "Find Match" button one last time. That familiar, seductive glow. One more game. Always one more game. Maybe the next one would be different. Maybe the next one—
No.
For the first time in hours, Ethan closed the game client. The sudden absence of light from the screen made the room seem even darker. He could hear his own breathing in the silence, ragged and uneven.
He needed to sleep. He needed to figure out his life. He needed to change.
*Tomorrow*, he told himself. *I'll figure it out tomorrow.*
Ethan didn't bother changing clothes or brushing his teeth. He simply stood, swaying slightly from exhaustion, and collapsed onto his bed. The mattress welcomed him like an old friend. His head hit the pillow, and the tension in his muscles began to unwind.
Just before consciousness slipped away, a notification sound chimed from his computer.
He didn't have the energy to check what it was.
The darkness took him.
---
Ethan dreamed.
In the dream, he was playing Legends of Aetheria again, but everything was different. The champions moved with impossible fluidity. The map seemed to breathe and shift beneath his feet. His hands executed plays he'd never been able to pull off in reality—perfect dodges, frame-perfect combos, inhuman reaction times.
He was winning. God, he was winning so hard.
The enemy Nexus exploded in a shower of light and sound, and the word "VICTORY" appeared—not in harsh letters, but in shimmering gold that wrapped around him like a warm embrace.
"You did it," a voice said.
Ethan turned and saw a figure made of light and pixels, indistinct but somehow familiar.
"I did it," he repeated, and for the first time in months, he felt proud.
"But not here," the voice continued. "Not yet."
"What do you mean?"
The dream began to fragment, reality bleeding in at the edges. The game world dissolved into abstract shapes and colors.
"Wake up, Ethan."
"I don't want to wake up. I want to stay—"
"Wake up."
The voice grew more insistent, pulling him up from the depths of sleep.
"You're going to be late."
Late? Late for what?
"Ethan!"
His eyes snapped open.
Sunlight—bright, cheerful, absolutely offensive—streamed through his window. Ethan groaned and threw an arm over his face. His head felt stuffed with cotton, his mouth tasted like something had died in it, and every muscle in his body ached.
"Ethan Cole, if you don't get up right now, you're going to miss your morning class!"
That voice. Female, authoritative, with an edge of exasperation. His mother's voice.
Except... something was off about it.
"Five more minutes," he mumbled automatically.
"You said that twenty minutes ago. Up. Now."
Twenty minutes ago? But he'd just fallen asleep. Hadn't he?
Ethan forced himself to sit up, squinting against the light. His room looked... wrong. The same, but not. His gaming setup was there—computer, monitor, keyboard—but positioned differently. The posters on his walls were familiar but not quite right. And his desk was clean. Actually clean.
When was the last time his desk had been clean?
"Ethan!" The voice came from downstairs now. "Vicky's already at training. Don't make me come up there!"
Vicky?
His sister's name was Victoria, and she worked in marketing. She'd never been interested in gaming. And training? Training for what?
Something cold settled in Ethan's stomach. He looked around the room again, really looked this time. Everything was similar to his room, but nothing was exactly the same. The trophies on his shelf were different. His chair was a different color. Even the light coming through the window seemed to hit from the wrong angle.
He grabbed his phone from the nightstand—except it wasn't his phone. Same model, but the case was different. He pressed the power button, and the lock screen made his breath catch.
The date was correct: Tuesday. But the wallpaper was a photo he'd never taken—himself with three other people he didn't recognize, all of them wearing matching gaming jerseys and holding a trophy.
With shaking hands, he unlocked the phone. No password needed; it recognized his face. He opened the photo gallery.
Hundreds of photos. Him at gaming tournaments. Him with teams. Him at what looked like professional events with crowds and cameras. Him with his family—his mother, his father, his sister—but they were all... different somehow. The same faces, but with different expressions, different clothes, different contexts.
His sister Victoria—Vicky—in multiple photos wearing a team jersey with "Valkyrie Esports" printed across it.
His heart started hammering against his ribs.
This wasn't right. This wasn't his life.
"What the hell?" he whispered.
He stumbled out of bed and caught his reflection in the mirror on his closet door. Same face stared back at him. Same dark hair, same gray eyes, same slight build. But the person in the reflection looked... healthier. No dark circles under the eyes. Better posture. The face of someone who actually took care of himself.
"Ethan! Last warning!"
He needed to figure out what was happening. Dream? Was he still dreaming? Ethan pinched himself hard. Pain flared in his arm, sharp and immediate.
Not a dream.
A hallucination? A mental break? Had he finally lost his mind after one too many all-nighters?
His phone buzzed with a notification. He looked down at the screen.
**Legends of Aetheria - Daily Login Bonus Available!**
Legends of Aetheria. The game he'd been playing. Except the icon was slightly different, and when he clicked it, the loading screen showed game modes he'd never seen before.
"Ethan Cole! I'm counting to three!"
"Coming!" he called back, his voice hoarse.
He grabbed a hoodie from the chair—dark blue instead of his usual gray—and pulled it on. His legs felt unsteady as he made his way downstairs, one hand on the railing for support.
The kitchen was familiar and foreign all at once. Same layout, same appliances, but decorated differently. Photos on the walls showed the same altered reality—his family in situations he didn't remember, at places he'd never been.
A woman stood at the kitchen counter, pouring coffee. She looked like his mother—same facial features, same build—but she wore a sharp business suit instead of her usual casual clothes, and her hair was styled in a severe professional cut. She turned as he entered, and her expression shifted from irritation to concern.
"Finally. Are you feeling alright? You look pale."
"I'm... fine," Ethan managed. "Just didn't sleep well."
"Were you up late playing again?" The concern remained, but there was an edge of disapproval now. "Ethan, we've talked about this. Gaming is fine as a hobby, but you can't let it interfere with your studies."
The words were almost exactly what his mother had said to him countless times. But her tone was different. Less resigned, more authoritative. This was a woman used to being obeyed.
"I know, Mom. Sorry."
She sighed and slid a plate of toast across the counter toward him. "Eat something. Your father already left for the office, and I have a board meeting at nine. Can you handle getting to campus on your own?"
"Yeah. Sure."
She studied him for a moment longer, then nodded and grabbed her briefcase. "I'm trusting you, Ethan. Don't make me regret it."
The door closed behind her, and Ethan was alone.
He sank into a chair at the kitchen table, his mind racing. This wasn't a dream. This wasn't a hallucination. Somehow, impossibly, he was in a different world. A world that was almost like his own, but fundamentally changed in ways he was only beginning to understand.
His phone buzzed again. A text from an unknown number: *"Yo Ethan, you coming to the underground tourney tonight? Marc's already signed us up."*
Underground tourney?
Another text, this time with a photo attached. It showed a flyer for something called the "Silvercrest Open Circuit"—a Legends of Aetheria tournament with a small cash prize. The text beneath it read: *"Mixed division. It's our shot, man. Don't bail on us."*
Ethan's hands were shaking as he opened a browser on his phone and searched "Legends of Aetheria professional scene."
The results that came up made his breath stop.
Articles about the world championship. Teams from different nations. Prize pools in the millions. But every single photo, every single article, every single championship roster showed the same thing:
Women. Almost exclusively women.
The current world champions—a team called "Starfall Vanguard"—five women. The runner-up—"Eclipse Gaming"—five women. The third-place team had one male substitute who, according to the article, had never actually played in a match.
He searched "male professional gamers Legends of Aetheria."
The results were sparse. A few articles about "breaking barriers" and "challenging stereotypes." Opinion pieces debating whether men "had the reflexes" for competitive play. Statistics showing that while 40% of casual players were male, only 7% of professional players were.
One article title made his stomach drop: *"Why Men Struggle in Esports: A Scientific Analysis of Gender Differences in Reaction Time and Strategic Thinking."*
He clicked it, skimmed through paragraphs of pseudo-scientific justification for why men were "naturally less suited" to competitive gaming. The same kind of garbage arguments that had been used in his world to keep women out of esports, just... reversed.
Ethan set the phone down, his head spinning.
This was real. This was actually real.
He was in a world where everything was flipped. Where his sister was the gaming prodigy and he was expected to have "realistic" career goals. Where his mother was the CEO and his father worked under her. Where women dominated esports and men were told they didn't have what it takes.
And somehow—impossibly, inexplicably—he remembered both lives. His old world and this new one. Two sets of memories existing simultaneously in his head.
In this world's memories, he was Ethan Cole, mediocre college student with a casual gaming hobby. He'd tried to take it seriously once, but after enough rejection and enough people telling him he wasn't good enough, he'd given up. Now he just played for fun, careful not to dream too big.
But the other memories—the real memories—were of a different Ethan. The one who'd stayed up until 4 AM, desperately grinding ranked games, losing himself in the pursuit of a dream he couldn't quite reach.
*I died*, Ethan thought suddenly. *Or I fell asleep and never woke up. And now I'm... here.*
The thought should have terrified him. Instead, a strange calm settled over him.
He looked down at his hands—steady now, no longer shaking. In his old world, he'd been a failure. A gaming addict with nothing to show for it. A disappointment to his family and to himself.
But here...
Here, he had all the skills and knowledge from his old life. Hundreds of hours of gameplay, strategies, meta knowledge, mechanical practice. And here, in this world where men were told they couldn't compete, where his gender was a barrier instead of an advantage...
Here, he had something to prove.
Ethan stood up, a strange feeling building in his chest. Not quite hope—that would be premature. But something close to it. Something he hadn't felt in a long time.
Purpose.
In his old world, he'd wanted to be a pro gamer because he had nothing else. Here, he wanted it because everyone said he couldn't.
His phone buzzed once more. The same unknown number: *"Dude, you in or out? Need to know for the roster."*
Ethan's fingers moved before his conscious mind fully decided.
*"I'm in,"* he typed. *"Count me in."*
He hit send and felt something shift inside him.
This was his second chance. His do-over. And this time, he wasn't going to waste it.
---