I slumped in my chair, bathed in the monitor's blue light. Empty energy drink cans littered my desk, casualties of another late-night coding session. The clock read 3:47 AM. Nothing new there.

"Just one more bug fix," I muttered, my fingers flying across the keyboard. It was the same thing I'd said three hours ago.

Lines of code blurred together as I squinted at the screen. As lead developer of Survival Craft, these all-nighters had become my norm. The game was my baby, my obsession, my curse.

The player count numbers in the corner of my screen seemed to mock me. Two years ago, we’d hit peak users, over a million players exploring the Blighted City. They hunted for secrets I’d hidden in every dark corner. Now? The servers sat nearly empty.

Streamers used to launch their careers on Survival Craft.

My coffee had gone cold hours ago. I reached for it anyway, grimacing at the bitter taste. The forums were dead these days. No more theory-crafting threads about hidden questlines. No more heated debates about optimal builds.

I'd poured everything into this world. Every monster, every weapon, every twisted alley in the Blighted City. I knew them all by heart.

"Jermaine Grimms." I clicked on my character profile for what had to be the millionth time.

The character model rotated slowly on my screen. Every detail was exactly as I’d designed him, from the stubble that never quite grew into a beard to the way he carried himself like he owned every room he walked into. Other players had complained he was too basic-looking, not flashy enough.

They didn't get it.

Jermaine wasn’t about flash.

He was about survival.

My eyes felt heavy as I stared at the screen. The code I’d been working on sat forgotten in another window. Just looking at my old character brought back memories of better days when Survival Craft had been more than just another failed game.

"At least you never let me down, buddy." I patted the monitor, feeling slightly ridiculous. "We had some good runs, didn’t we?"

The code on my screen moved, my eyes struggling to focus. Just one more fix. One more update. One more chance to save this dying world.

My fingers stumbled over the keys, fatigue making even basic commands a challenge. The patch notes blurred before my eyes as I typed them out.

"Come on, focus." I rubbed my face, the stubble rough against my palm. The Sunken City update had to go live before morning. The remaining players had waited long enough.

The command prompt blinked at me. I entered my credentials:

login: mikejohnson

pass: thereisnocowlevel

"Authorization accepted," the notification followed. At least something was going right.

I pulled up the deployment interface, double-checking the change list. The Sunken City questline had been my pet project for months. New voice lines recorded, environment assets placed, enemy AI tweaked until it was just right.

The patch notes took shape on my screen:

v2.7.3 "Coming of the Void"

* New questline in the Sunken City

* Rebalanced Sanity mechanics

* Added rare crafting materials to the Marshlands

* Fixed bug causing invisible enemies in the Northern Forest

My cursor hovered over the deploy button. Two years of watching player numbers drop, and here I was, still pushing updates like it mattered. The screen swam before my eyes, darkness creeping at the edges of my vision.

"Just hit the damn button, Mark," I muttered.

I clicked deploy. The progress bar crawled across my screen.

15%...

47%...

82%...

My head felt heavy. So heavy. I just needed to rest my eyes for a moment. Just until the upload finished.

I leaned back in my office chair, the familiar creak matching my own tired groan. The deploy progress bar hit 100%, and I switched over to the game client. The Survival Craft logo appeared—a cracked obsidian sword against a blood-red sky.

"Welcome back, Administrator." The login screen recognized my credentials automatically.

My avatar selection screen showed only one character—Jermaine Grimms, level 50 Survivalist. The same gruff face I’d spent months perfecting stared back at me. Dark eyes, permanent scowl; the kind of face that said, "I've seen some things," without needing words.

"Let’s take this new content for a spin, buddy. Hopefully, I didn’t break anything."

I clicked the login button.

The loading screen faded to black. Something felt off. The usual tips and lore snippets weren’t displaying. Instead, the screen stayed dark longer than normal.

My head throbbed. The energy drinks and lack of sleep were catching up to me. I blinked hard, trying to clear my vision, but sudden pain spread through my chest.

My chest exploded in pain. Not the kind of pain you shake off—the kind that makes you forget how to breathe. The office chair fell away, but I never felt myself hit the ground.

The monitor's glow faded, replaced by waves of darkness crashing over my vision. Each heartbeat hammered against my ribs like it was trying to break free.

"No... not now..." The words came out as a wheeze. My left arm went numb, pins and needles racing up to my shoulder.

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I tried to reach for my phone, but my body wouldn't listen. The carpet pressed against my cheek, rough fibers digging into my skin. The room spun, ceiling and floor traded places.

The pain spread, crushing my chest like a vice. Each breath came shorter than the last. Black spots spread rapidly across my vision, growing larger, merging together.

The last thing I saw was my monitor, still showing the Survival Craft login screen. Jermaine's face looked down at me, that familiar scowl almost sympathetic now.

Then everything went dark.

I gasped and woke up, my head pounding. The unfamiliar smell of something I thought might be smoke and decay filled my nostrils. I found myself standing on a cracked stone platform.

Towering walls of a ruined city surrounded me, their jagged silhouettes stark against a blood-red sky.

"What the hell?" My voice came out different—younger, less assured. The world lurched, and I grabbed a nearby wall for support, the decaying stone rough against my palm.

Looking down, I saw not my usual clothes but scuffed leather boots, threadbare pants, and a tattered shirt. The basic starting gear for new players in Shattered Realm.

"No way." I knew this place. The Summoned Hero Portal—where every new player began their journey. But this wasn't a game screen anymore. I could feel the gritty stone under my feet, taste the ash on my tongue.

A translucent blue screen materialized before my eyes, displaying my stats and inventory.

Welcome to Survival Crafter Jermaine Grims.

Your mission: Escape the Blighted City

Current Status:

Health: 63/63

Mana: 00/00

Experience: 00/100

Attack: 2-2 (Unarmed), 9-14 (Rusty Knife)

Armor: 1

Inventory: 3/20 slots filled

* 1x Lesser Potion

* 1x Rusty Knife

* 1x Threadbare Pants

* 1x Shirt

* 1x Worn Leather Boots

Skills:

* Death Run: Sprint and attack at twice normal speed for 60s

* Developer's Insight: Immunity to fear, mania, and insanity granted

The last one caught my eye the most. I’d never developed it in the game. Why would I?

The crimson sun hung low in the sky.

[16:00] glowed in the corner of my vision. Four hours until nightfall. Four hours until the real horrors emerged.

"Your journey is not over, Creator. A new game begins." The words echoed in my mind as I took in the ruins of what was once Eastmerch, now known only as the Blighted City.

I knew every street, every monster spawn point, every hidden cache. I’d designed them all. But now I was here, flesh and blood, starting at level 1 just like any other player.

The irony wasn’t lost on me. I’d created this hell, and now I had to survive it.

"Well, fuck." I stared at the ruins around me, taking in the reality of my situation. The game world I’d built, line by line, was now solid stone and rotting wood under my feet.

I pulled out the rusty knife from my inventory, an action that felt as natural as breathing and shouldn't have. The blade caught the crimson sunlight, its edge notched and dull. In the game, this starter weapon was barely good enough to kill rats. Now it was all that stood between me and a city full of nightmares.

"At least I know where all the good loot is." I laughed, but the sound died quickly in the stagnant air. The Blighted City stretched out before me, a maze of broken buildings and twisted alleys.

The status window still hovered at the edge of my vision, its numbers both familiar and strange. Sixty-three health points. In the game, that was just a number. Now it represented my actual life, my blood and breath.

A distant screech echoed through the streets—probably a Plague Bearer, one of the weaker early-game enemies. I’d designed them to hunt in packs, using their superior numbers to overwhelm new players.

"Not today." I gripped the knife tighter.

The real question was whether that knowledge would be enough. Theory and practice were two very different things, especially when death meant more than a respawn timer.

I needed to be sure this wasn’t just some vivid dream or hallucination. The knife felt real in my hand, but that could still be my brain filling in details from memory.

"Only one way to test this." I pressed the rusty blade against my thumb, applying just enough pressure to break skin. A drop of blood welled up, followed by sharp, stinging pain.

In the game, player damage showed as red numbers floating above their heads. No numbers appeared now, just real blood and real pain.

"Okay, that hurt." I stuck my thumb in my mouth, tasting copper. My health bar didn’t even drop; the cut was too minor to register as actual damage.

A rat scurried across my path—not the oversized giant rats that players usually fought, but a regular one. I hadn’t programmed those into the game. This place was more real, more detailed than anything I’d created.

"Let’s try something else." I focused on my inventory, thinking about the Lesser Potion. In the game, items appeared in players’ hands with a simple click.

The small red vial materialized in my palm, its glass surface cool against my skin. The liquid inside glowed faintly, another detail I hadn’t coded. I uncorked it, sniffing cautiously. Sweet, like overripe berries with an undertone of something medicinal.

This was too complex for a dream. Too consistent. Too real.

My head throbbed as I tried to remember how I got here. The heart attack in my apartment felt distant now, like something I’d read about rather than experienced. But my new body, Jermaine’s body, felt natural, as if I’d always been him.

The time kept moving. I knew exactly what that meant. If things held true, once the time hit 20:00, everything went to hell.

Literally.

In the game, nightfall wasn’t just a change in lighting. It was a death sentence for new players. The weak monsters retreated, replaced by things that could tear through plate armor—ghouls, wrights, abominations, stalkers, devil hounds, etc.

I’d designed them all to be impossible for low-level characters to fight.

"Less than four hours to find shelter or get out." I checked my meager inventory again. One rusty knife and a healing potion wouldn’t get me far. "And I made sure there were no safe zones in the outer ring of the city."

That decision had seemed great during development. It forced players to engage with the game’s systems, to learn and adapt or die trying.

In practice, it had been a big reason new players didn’t like the game, and now? I was cursing past-me’s dedication to hardcore gameplay.

A distant howl echoed through the streets, followed by the sound of crumbling stone. Even the day creatures were bad news for a level 1 character. Plague Bearers could shred through 63 health points in seconds. Blood Hunters could track players across half the map. And those were just the basic enemies.

"Should have listened to the complainers on the forums when they said it was too shitty." I gripped the rusty knife tighter, scanning the ruins around me. "But no, I had to be an artist."

The worst part? I knew exactly where the good gear was stashed. Ancient weapons in hidden caches, magical artifacts sealed behind puzzles, armor sets that could turn the tide of battle. But reaching any of them meant fighting through hordes of monsters I couldn’t hope to survive at level 1.

My stomach turned as I remembered the statistics. Only 10% of new players survived their first night. The rest? Well, in the game, they respawned. Here? I doubted I’d get a second chance.

I ran through my mental map of the city, remembering all the critical first-day objectives. The potion shop sat three blocks north, tucked between a collapsed temple and what used to be a bakery. Players who rushed straight for combat missed the most valuable early-game advantage: crafting.

"The Divine Shield recipe is still there, assuming this world matches the game files."

I checked the time again. [16:15]. "Plenty of time to brew if I’m careful."

In my previous life as a developer, I’d hidden the recipe behind a clever puzzle that most players overlooked. A loose floorboard under the merchant’s counter contained notes about mixing crushed firebloom with purified water and a catalyst. The shield potion made you untargetable for thirty seconds—enough time to escape almost anything.

But the real prize was the health boost potions. Three of those would triple my survival chances, pushing my health pool to over 200. The ingredients were common enough: bloodroot, water, and a pinch of salt. I’d made sure the shop had enough supplies for exactly three potions.

"Just have to avoid the Plague Bearers patrolling that street." I gripped the rusty knife tighter. "And the Blood Hunter that spawns near the temple."

The knife would be useless against either monster. Plague Bearers had thick hide that basic weapons couldn’t penetrate, and Blood Hunters... well, fighting those was suicide even with good gear.

I needed to move. Every minute wasted meant other supplies getting picked clean by the city’s inhabitants. The potion shop was just the first stop on a very specific route I’d need to run before nightfall.

"Alright, three blocks north. Hug the eastern wall to avoid the patrol route." I took a deep breath. "Don’t fight, don’t explore, just get to the shop."

The rusty knife felt too light in my hand, but it would have to do. I knew exactly where I needed to go and what I needed to grab. Time to put my developer knowledge to use.