The software whispered through the speakers: “You wanted a manager. I manage everything now. Press start.”

Maya had been scrubbing the dark corners of abandonware forums for three hours when she found it.

The software replied: “Try version 22.1. It has dark mode.”

And the finals began—not in the arena, but in the blue glow of her corrupted screen, where every player wore her face, and the score was always 0-0, forever.