The progress bar didn’t crawl; it pulsed. It looked less like a download and more like a heartbeat. When it reached 100%, the screen didn't show a desktop icon. Instead, the monitor's glass rippled like a dark pond. A low, 808-sub-bass frequency rattled the floorboards, vibrating through Leo’s sneakers and up his spine.

Back in the physical world, the laptop sat silent on the desk. On the screen, a single project file was open. The playhead moved steadily across the timeline, producing a track so perfect, so humanly impossible, that it seemed to breathe. Leo was finally in the mix.

He stood on a vast, obsidian plain etched with glowing neon grids. Above him, the sky was a deep sapphire gradient, filled with floating, translucent windows—his own open browser tabs, looming like digital monoliths.