The screen didn’t flash or stutter. It breathed . The flat LCD panel seemed to deepen, the blacks becoming the kind of infinite dark you only see three hours past midnight. Then, pixels coalesced into snow. Not digital snow—actual, cold-looking snow drifting across a frozen lake. The resolution was wrong for a game. It was too sharp, too quiet.

Panic flared. He tried to stand, to tip his chair back, to shout for Mr. Harrison. But there was no chair. There was only the creak of saddle leather and the vast, unforgiving sprawl of Ambarino. A notification flickered in the corner of his vision—not a game UI, but a raw, bleeding scrape of text: . It pulsed like a heartbeat.

“You sure you want to see what’s on the other side of the Grizzlies, partner?”

Leo smirked. He clicked.