Alexander lived in a small apartment tucked away in a drab concrete complex somewhere in Germany. The building was gray and anonymous, surrounded by streets riddled with cracks and littered with trash nobody bothered to notice. His room was sparsely furnished—a battered old sofa, a wobbly desk covered in empty energy drink cans, and stacks of books and manga strewn across every surface. The only source of light came from a flickering screen. Behind half-closed curtains, he spent nearly all his time alone, sheltered in the safety of his fantasies.
He was intelligent—sharper than most of his teachers, certainly more than his long-gone parents. He held several academic degrees—history, philosophy, comparative psychology, and economics—all obtained through online courses and distant learning. Not officially accredited, but comprehensive.
On a gaming forum, he had once posted a 30-page meta-analysis on asymmetrical balance in MMORPG design. The opening line—"True balance is not fairness, but negotiated asymmetry"—became a minor legend across niche design communities. He argued that class imbalance wasn't a flaw but an emergent narrative tool, drawing comparisons to Cold War diplomacy and predator-prey relationships in evolutionary biology. The post earned him a cult following and was quoted across game design circles.
Under a pseudonym, he'd authored essays like The Necropolis of Empires: Late-Stage Hegemony in Byzantium and Brussels, analyzing the cultural entropy of imperial bureaucracies. The piece was reposted on academic subreddits and even cited—unknowingly—in a master's thesis. One thread preserved the essay's opening line like scripture: "Every empire dies twice: once in memory, once in imitation."
On another platform, his blog featured an essay titled Empire in Collapse: Byzantine Decay and the Paradox of Decentralized Efficiency in the Postmodern West. It was so rigorous in tone that a university forum mistakenly assumed it was written by a professor. A Discord moderator once messaged him, asking, "Which department are you with?" He had simply replied: "The Department of Nowhere," and logged off.
Each identity—strategist, essayist, analyst—was a mask that let him be more than his body. Online, he wasn't Alexander the reject. He was Alexander the mind. on asymmetrical balance in MMORPG design that had sparked a heated, week-long debate. On a blog hidden deep in the internet, he'd dissected the political structure of the Byzantine Empire in comparison to modern bureaucratic decentralization. A Discord moderator once asked if he worked in academia. He had just laughed.
Books were his candy—history, fantasy, war theory. Anything, as long as it didn't concern his own reality. Because Alexander's reality was miserable.
He was overweight. Not endearingly chubby—just fat. At school, they laughed at him in the locker room and called him names like "fat freak" or "creep." His skin was pale, his glasses constantly sliding down his nose, and his clothes always looked rumpled and smelled faintly musty. He walked hunched over, avoiding eye contact like it burned—a reflex born of a thousand humiliations. Inside his head, voices from years past replayed cruelly: laughter in the locker room, the smirk of a teacher who gave up trying, the whisper of someone saying, "What a freak." He'd think, "Maybe if I shrink small enough, they won't see me." But they always did. Each glance from a stranger felt like judgment—his skin prickled, cheeks flushed hot, stomach twisting like a knot being pulled tighter with every passing second. Even when people weren't looking directly at him, every casual giggle seemed like proof they'd seen something, some flaw he couldn't hide. They know, he'd think, the voice in his head hissing with venom. They always know. His thoughts spiraled: "They're laughing at you. They know you don't belong." Each step outside his apartment chipped away at what little self-worth remained, dragging him deeper into the mental fog he'd never fully escaped. In public, he barely spoke—and when he did, he stuttered or turned bright red. He felt uncomfortable around people. Their laughter echoed in his ears like cruel reminders of everything he wasn't.
All his relationships were virtual. His friends lived in forums, Discord servers, and online games—places where no one could see the real him. Online, Alexander was someone: a respected strategist, a lore interpreter, a deep contributor in roleplay communities. In one forum, he was known as the "Archivist"—a user who reconstructed lost knowledge and helped others create layered, believable characters. He remembered spending one night helping a player named NightRaven build a flawless endgame tactic. NightRaven had typed, "You're a genius, man. Honestly, you should be designing games." It was a rare moment of real pride.
He had written lore compendiums that read like oral epics, carefully constructed wiki entries full of cross-references, even a mock interview in character that some users thought was real. On a geopolitical strategy server, he once deconstructed the Treaty of Westphalia to draw parallels to faction diplomacy in a sprawling modded campaign—prompting one user to call him "the Clausewitz of 4X."
But the moment anything personal came up, Alexander withdrew. He feared even his virtual friends would mock him if they saw who he truly was. Sometimes, he imagined revealing his face. Saying, "This is me." But the thought turned his stomach. What if they laughed? What if NightRaven was just being polite? He told himself he didn't care—but he always did.
Inside his apartment, though, he ruled like a king. The walls were covered with posters of dark elves, orc women, dwarf warriors, and exotic fantasy beings from games and anime. His shelves were packed with figurines, books, and fan merchandise. His hentai collection was legendary: 800 gigabytes of carefully cataloged fantasies—dark elves, orcs, beastfolk—all complete with notes and ratings. He loved them not just erotically, but with a deep, aching yearning—a longing not merely for contact, but for a reality where his mind was honored, his differences revered. Each image, each fantasy figure, was a symbol of a world where his intellect wasn't a burden but a crown—where his theories were gospel, his words sparked revolutions, and his mind built empires instead of walls. In those worlds, he wasn't hiding; he was ruling. for a world where intellect was power and the marginalized were exalted—where his mind, not his awkward body, would define his place. for a world where things were different. A world where strength came from intellect, and power didn't rely on charm, wealth, or brawn.
Family? Practically nonexistent. His mother had vanished one day without a word. He suspected she'd run off with another man—he'd once overheard her laughing softly on the phone, a warmth he'd never received from her. She hadn't beaten him. But she was a ghost—physically present, emotionally absent. His father had been distant for as long as he could remember, always absorbed in work, ignoring Alexander's attempts to connect. Eventually, he too disappeared. Alexander was left with a hollow apartment, filled with silence. A silence that didn't scream—it whispered. Constantly. Unrelentingly.
He never learned to truly bond with anyone. No one had ever held him close. And a girlfriend? Unimaginable. That kind of closeness felt as far away as the fantasy worlds he dreamed about—worlds he escaped into daily, where sexy orc muscle-mommies and cute beastgirls with twitching cat ears promised the affection and validation real people never gave him. In these imagined realms, he wasn't a reject—he was a hero, a scholar, even a lover. The line between fiction and yearning blurred more and more, until the characters in his posters and figurines felt closer than any human ever had.
He even earned some money online—writing niche articles, doing small programming tasks, and analyzing game mechanics for clients. It barely paid the bills. But money wasn't his biggest obstacle. His crippling social phobia kept him from ever gaining a foothold in the real world. He'd once set foot in an actual university—for one single day. It was the first orientation. The place was packed with strangers, loud voices, and overwhelming noise. The lecture hall was enormous, the acoustics chaotic, and every move felt like it drew eyes. When the professor asked him to introduce himself, he panicked. He stammered, failed to form a sentence. Faces stared at him like knives. His cheeks burned. His hands shook. His mouth was dry as sand. He fled mid-sentence—out of the building, never to return.
Now, even his meager savings had run dry. For days, he ignored the problem and hid deeper in his virtual realms. But the fridge was empty, and his bank account was too. Worse: today, his favorite food delivery service was down—pickup only.
Why today?
Reality forced him to leave his lair.
"I guess I have to go out," he muttered, sighing as he grabbed his faded jacket. His heart thudded in his chest. His hands trembled. Going outside meant being seen. Judged. The outside world reminded him of everything he wasn't.