Date: July 17, 2025
Let me get this out of the way—my name's Jessic Lim. I'm sixteen, from Singapore, and yes, I'm that "good student" type. The kind who brings extra pens to class, hands in homework on time, and doesn't start drama. Teachers love me. Parents trust me. Boring? Maybe.
But here's what nobody knows: I'm not built for school. I'm built for games. Especially the kind that chew you up and spit you out.
Twisted dungeons, cruel puzzles, bosses so brutal they make full-grown streamers rage-quit on camera? That's my playground. That's where I come alive—not some classroom with bubble-sheet tests.
This week was my escape. Summer break, seven days long. And I spent every second in Backrift—the hell-difficulty game with no walkthroughs, no cheats, and no second chances. They say no one's ever beaten it. They say the final boss deletes your character file for good.
Guess what?
I beat it.
At 3:07 a.m. this morning.
No sleep. No snacks left. Just me, my keyboard, and the biggest win of my life. I even screamed a little—okay, a lot.
And then the screen went black.
Not "game over" black. Not crash-black.
I mean gone. As if the monitor itself just stopped existing.
A high-pitched beep sliced through my headphones, sharp and rising. My head throbbed, my vision twisted, and then—
Gravity disappeared.
I wasn't sitting anymore.
I wasn't even in my room.
The world pulled away like a drain. I fell into nothing. My stomach flipped inside out. And then—
Boom.
Grass.
Cold, damp grass under my palms.
Smoke in my lungs. Ash in the wind. The sky overhead was shattered—veins of yellow lightning crawling across dark, cracked clouds like someone had tried to rip the sky in half.
This wasn't a dream.
This wasn't virtual.
This was real.
I scrambled up, coughing. My hands shook. A scream rang out in the distance—raw and human—and I turned just in time to see a creature I couldn't even name tear through a burning house.
Everything smelled like metal and fear.
Then came the voice.
"You finally woke up," it said, cool and distant.
I spun around.
A boy stood behind me. Silver hair. Green eyes so bright they looked unnatural. He was my age—maybe. But something about him felt older, like he'd been through more wars than he could count.
He held a sword. Black metal, glowing faintly. Blood crusted the edge.
I backed away, breath caught in my throat.
"Who—where—what is this place?!" I stammered.
He didn't blink. "You crossed the rift."
The rift?
The word hit like a lightning bolt.
Backrift.
No. No way.
"This isn't the game," I whispered. But even I didn't believe it.
I looked around again. The monster screams. The broken sky. The burned-out houses.
It was the game. Or something worse.
The boy turned, sword raised toward the smoke-filled village.
"If you want to survive," he said, "stay close. And don't die."
I stared after him, heart pounding.
That was the moment I knew—
I hadn't just beaten the game.
I'd entered it.