Hollow Twilight - A LitRPG Novel

Chapter 5

"No, I've never heard of it."

"Ah, never mind then." Reid stood over the captain of the esports club, Carlos, watching his game from over the back of his chair. The clicking of mechanical keyboards and mice filled the tiny space as the five other people on computers played. When all seven of them showed up like this, where they only had six computers crammed into what used to be a storage room, somebody had to rotate out. It was Reid's turn.

Carlos slammed his fist into the desk beside his keyboard, yelling out a string of Spanish. Reid couldn't even pick individual words out to try and translate. The captain sighed and leaned back in his seat, running his fingers through his short black hair. Reid felt slightly envious of him as he thought to his own hair colour.

"Weird name though," Carlos said, starting the conversation anew. "Maybe I'll check it out, kind of interesting."

"Oh, yeah." Reid glanced around the room as he tried to think up different excuses to dissuade Carlos from downloading Hollow Twilight. "It's not really that good, just wondered if you knew anything about it. It's small, it'll probably shut down soon anyways."

"Hmm, too bad." Carlos returned to his keyboard and queued up another game. It popped up faster than either of them expected, and he settled into preparing for the game to start, leaving Reid on the outside looking in and killing any further discussion.

With the day winding down, Reid decided to call it an early night and head home, scooping up his bag and wandering out of the room, waving goodbye to nobody in particular. With all their faces glued to screens, he was unnoticed.

He only got around the corner in the hallway before he bumped into someone and stumbled backwards. For a moment, he was hit with a smell. Coconut. From a shampoo or hand lotion or something. And then he was looking at a teen girl, probably a year under him. With long, black hair and beautiful, smooth brown skin, the little twinkle of a stud in her nose...and fading henna tattoos on one arm.

"You!" Reid immediately covered his mouth after his exclamation, embarrassed to be calling out random people he had just collided with like an idiot. The recognition had overtaken him. He had never seen this girl in school before. It was entirely possible he just had not noticed her amidst everyone else, since he had no reason to be looking for her.

"Hmph." The teenager straightened herself out. "I had planned to talk to you when I found out you were in that club."

"That...club? Oh!" Reid glanced over his shoulder, down the hall where he had come from. The school looked somewhat eerie when it was in this empty state. He was just so used to it being crammed full of bodies. "You were looking for me?"

"New players can be really annoying." The girl reached back and pulled her purse out from around her hip, rifling through it until she withdrew a card. "But if they get good, it can be really valuable. Call me, next time." She handed off the card to a somewhat dumbstruck Reid before walking past him and down the hall, towards the exit at the far south of the building.

"Ri...right." Reid fumbled with the card. He had just been given a girl's phone number. And earlier today, he had walked to school with a different one. This had never happened before. He was really unsure how he should feel about any of it.

Reid examined the card, turning it over to find a number across it in black marker: 28503. That was it. That was not a phone number. That couldn't call anyone. Just to check, Reid pulled out his phone and punched it in, trying to hit dial. His phone simply didn't accept. It wouldn't even try to dial it out. He turned to ask the mysterious girl about it, but she was already gone, the door at the far end swinging shut.