A text box appeared in the air before his new, spectral eyes: V1.0.1 INSTALLED. LEGION ACQUIRED. COMMENCING EXTRACTION.
The progress bar crawled across the screen like a digital centipede. 10GB... 15GB... 20GB. As the file finished, a strange prompt appeared, one Leo had never seen before: INITIALIZING SYNC... NEURAL LINK ESTABLISHED.
The last thing he saw before the sync became permanent was his own hand, controlled by someone else, reaching out to click Share on the download link.
Leo reached out, his fingers brushing the light. A jolt of electricity surged through him, and suddenly, his vision shifted. He wasn't in his room anymore. He was seeing his room from the ceiling , through a red-tinted lens. Below him, he saw himself—or rather, his body—slumped in the gaming chair, his eyes glowing a vacant, digital blue.
"Neural link? It’s just a game," Leo muttered, double-clicking the .exe file.
The "Free Download" hadn't given him the game. It had turned his computer into a Gate, and he was the one being tethered.
The prompt " Astral Chain Free Download (v1.0.1)" usually appears on sketchy websites promising free versions of Nintendo Switch games. In reality, these "downloads" are often traps for malware or phishing.
The screen didn't launch a game. It went pitch black. Then, a thin, glowing blue line appeared in the center of the monitor. It didn't stay on the glass. It drifted out into the air of his bedroom, a literal chain of light pulsing with a low, hummed frequency.