Just one more level: Oldest lie in the digital world

I have always worn one particular badge of honour rather proudly: I have never been addicted to anything. Not in my reckless youth, not in my supposedly wiser middle age. Well, unless one counts books and K-dramas, but those are cultural pursuits, not addictions—or so I have always argued in my own defence.A few weeks ago, however, during a family trip, my nephew borrowed my phone and downloaded a harmless little business game so that we could while away the journey playing against each other. It seemed perfectly harmless. For nearly a month, all was well. I played occasionally—me versus the computer—a few stolen moments during the summer vacation, and perhaps an hour or two after returning from college.Then came that fateful Sunday.As I was busy building my virtual business empire, an alluring suggestion flashed across the screen. Try this, it whispered with all the subtlety of the serpent in the Garden of Eden. The premise sounded absurdly simple: all I had to do was find objects hidden inside a picture.How difficult could that be?As it turns out, difficult enough to make me lose all track of time—and just easy enough to convince me that the next level would finally be the level where I would stop. Somewhere between locating a misplaced teacup, an elusive feather and a suspiciously well-camouflaged pair of spectacles, I realised I had stumbled into the very thing I had spent decades smugly believing I was immune to.I began with Level 1 at exactly twelve noon. The plan was simple: play for a few minutes, satisfy my curiosity, and move on to more meaningful pursuits.However, except for brief interruptions for lunch, tea and the occasional visit to the washroom—those unavoidable inconveniences of being human—I remained steadfastly committed to my newfound mission. The levels rolled by with alarming ease, each one whispering the oldest lie in the digital world: Just one more.When I finally glanced at the clock, it was midnight.There I was, eyes glued to the screen, poised to conquer Level 86 as though civilisation depended upon my locating one more cleverly disguised magnifying glass. It was my conscience, rather than common sense, that finally intervened. "Enough," it pleaded. "You have college tomorrow." Reluctantly, I put the phone away.Sleep, unfortunately, refused to cooperate. For another half hour, hidden objects continued to beckon from the darkness. Even after I drifted off, my subconscious faithfully carried on the search. Somewhere in my dreams, I was still hunting for umbrellas, keys and teacups concealed in impossible corners of blurred, cluttered rooms.When the alarm rang at six the next morning, I woke up with a heavy head and an even heavier heart. That was the moment of uncomfortable clarity.I, who had always congratulated myself on being gloriously free of addictions, had been outwitted by a game. What had entered my phone as an innocent pastime had quietly marched into my routine and claimed squatter's rights in my mind.I had become addicted—not to anything glamorous or scandalous, but to the urgent business of finding things that did not really exist.It was a painful revelation: addiction doesn't always arrive with a cigarette, a drink or a deck of cards. Sometimes, it tiptoes in, disguised as a missing umbrella in an impossibly cluttered drawing room.