Toshiro reached for his bedside lamp, gently turning the switch with a soft click. It was an outdated model, and almost every household opted instead for the automatic lights that lit up with an easy flourish of the hand, the same ones he had everywhere else in the house. But he preferred the lamp in his bedroom for inexplicable reasons. Perhaps it was sentimental value; it had been a gift for his eighth birthday. Perhaps he preferred the soft orb of light it emitted, patiently taking its time reaching into the nooks and corners of the room, rather than the harsher and brighter models; he didn't really know.
He squinted as the light, however gentle, illuminated the previously pitch-black room. Glancing at the digital clock on the wall, he found the time to be 3:42 AM and sighed. He'd been trying to fall asleep for the past hour, tossing and turning to no avail. But he supposed that this was what he got for losing track of time with work the night before, only noticing that it was nearing morning when he was about to go to bed.
If he wasn't going to be able to sleep, though, he might as well get up and make use of the time. Stepping onto the sleek hardwood floor barefoot, he shivered, making a mental note to put a rug in as the chilly winter progressed. But for now, he walked with soft but deft footsteps to the closet, and pulled on a thick coat.
Even though there was no one else in the penthouse, he stepped quietly, not wanting to disturb the almost comforting silence that came with being awake in the middle of the night, save for the occasional howl of wind.
He made his way over to the study and grabbed his headset. Being one of the newest models, he barely had to blink before it finished loading and took him inside the Oasis. The virtual world was bustling with activity — even if it was an inhuman hour in Columbus, players from the rest of the world with all the different time zones quickly filled up the screen anyway.
Toshiro checked his notifications. Most of them were the standard reminders from the system, announcing an update in one of the worlds or a new quest somewhere. He was about to close them when he came across a curious one:
Sho has accepted your request for a partner challenge!
Confused, Toshiro wondered where that had come from, until he remembered the invitation he had sent out a few days ago. He'd figured that Sho had simply ignored it, as it was uncommon for there to be longer than a 24 hour gap between responses, and that was accounting for remote time zones.
Anyhow, long response time or not, the pop-up window appeared, asking Toshiro to select a time and challenge. He scrolled through the relatively short list, but really didn't care whether it was set in a volcano land or tropical jungle.
"Pick a number from one to" — he did a quick scan of the list — "seven," he commanded.
"Your number is five," the automatic assistant responded, sounding from the speaker was tucked into a top corner of the room.
"Five it is," he said to himself, and tapped it without looking at what the challenge was. At least there were still some things in life that didn't require extensive contemplation.