A tear rolled down her cheek in shock as she removed the FullDive helmet from her head to look at her chat scrolling across her second screen, which was in complete turmoil.

[I fucking cried.]

[The developer needs to see a psychiatrist.]

[I can't believe I thought I was watching a movie when it was actually a game.]

[Was this really made by one person?]

[That developer is a fucking genius.]

The chat was quite divided, with one side wanting to condemn the developer for the violence, emotion, and ultra-realistic scenes the game portrayed, while the other side was in complete awe of this developer who had seemingly come out of nowhere and managed to create a state-of-the-art game in every way.

As Hylia gradually regained her composure and returned to reality, she softly exclaimed, wiping her eyes, "I'm sorry I cried, but the ending was so moving, and I really felt like I was losing my daughter, even though I've never had children..."

[It's okay, don't worry.]

[We cried too, so you're allowed to!]

[What's the name of the game?]

[We want to talk to the developer!]

Reading her chat while trying to fix her appearance, she smiled at the hysteria in her stream and opened her eyes wide when she saw that her stream now had over 3,500 viewers. Seeing the numbers and realizing how she looked in the camera, she quickly apologized.

"I'm sorry for anyone who's new here and seeing me like this, it's just that I wasn't prepared for an experience like this," she stammered, trying to justify herself a bit shyly to the more than 3,000 people who were now watching her.

Remembering that she was on a sponsored stream and looking at the chat, where dozens of questions were being asked every second, she exclaimed, "For those of you asking about the game, it's The Last of Us, published by Naughty Dog, a brand-new independent studio. It's their first game, and you can access their entire network by typing !sponso," she said, calming down a bit to do her job as an influencer for one of the few sponsors she'd managed to land.

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

As she watched the stream spamming the command and making the chat unreadable, she shared how she felt while looking at the few questions she'd managed to catch through the !sponso spam.

[Hylia, we want a debrief!!!] she managed to read.

Thinking about what she wanted to say, she began, "So, a little debrief on how I felt... Where to start? If I didn't have the chat, I don't think I would have noticed any difference between reality and the game. The actors were really good; I could only think it was a real family during an apocalypse. The choice of words, interactions, and actors was so realistic that I felt embarrassed at first, like I was intruding on someone's private life."

[It's true! Even for us...]

[Don't you want to play again?]

[How did he make it so realistic all by himself?]

[He's going to single-handedly ruin the whole industry :kappa:]

She continued her debrief, "The worst part was the final scene; it broke my heart. The girl's screams seemed so real, everything felt too real—the general chaos, the sticky blood running through my fingers, the trembling, her breathing, the father's words that I felt like I was really saying, so much was I in character."

"At that moment, I was running too. I'm sorry I didn't speak much, but it was like being in the apocalypse, living in the moment, and having to save my daughter at all costs..." she apologized for her lack of speech during the stream, though her viewers didn't seem to mind.

[We were so into it that it didn't bother us xD]

[For a game of this size, I think it was the right choice...]

[10 subs and you're forgiven ;)]

[Are you planning on playing again????]

As she looked at her chat, smiling at the positive atmosphere, she said, "I don't plan on playing again today, but I must confess that even though I only played for 30 minutes, it feels like I had an unforgettable experience that left me exhausted... For all those who want to be there for future updates on the game, you can follow all the social networks by typing !sponso!"

As Hylia continued to interact with her viewers somewhere in the city, she was extremely happy with the experience.

POV Arthur:

Looking at his mission, which had already passed the halfway mark and continued to climb slowly but surely, he couldn't help but smile as he saw that Hylia was doing her job well. Seeing that all the social networks had surpassed the 1,000 follower mark each, his lingering worry that the game wasn't meant for this world and that he had made a huge mistake began to fade.

"Who knows, maybe I should have made a game like Farming Simulator," he laughed, releasing the tension, "how I love it when everything's going well and all I have to do is watch..." he murmured, sighing in satisfaction.

As he pondered these thoughts, he considered what he could do once the game was released. He thought it might be fun to jump into someone's game and give them the scare of their life, or help players who were stuck in a fight.

Mulling over his next move, he turned off his computer and got up to go to bed. As he drifted off to sleep, he thought it might be time to go outside and see a bit of this new world he'd stumbled into.