Ankit's new phone was more than a gadget—it was his gateway to a dream. Sitting beside his father, he downloaded Free Fire for the very first time, both excited and mildly amused by the early graphics and quirky character animations. His father chuckled at the simplicity, surprised that this was the game Ankit claimed would soon grip millions.
Navigating the menus, Ankit was struck by how barebones the experience was. The in-game store offered little, events were simple, and everything felt a world away from the polished version he'd known in the future. But this was his chance, and he embraced the moment, queueing up for his first ever match.
The wait felt endless, a relic of the game's infancy. When he finally spawned in the lobby—a grassy field dotted with wooden boxes—Ankit realized just how different things were. The airplane sequence took him across a map marked by unfamiliar names: Outpost, Construction, School. He chose Hangar as his landing spot, curiosity burning.
Struggling with the awkward controls and slow movement speed, Ankit did his best to adjust. Basic features like auto-swap and quick reload were missing, and headshots felt tougher to pull off than he remembered. Drag headshots were impossible at this stage. But undeterred, Ankit bested his first enemy with raw instinct and a flurry of punches.
Filled with determination, he refined his settings mid-match and ended up with 12 kills out of 36 players—most of them won through smart aiming and sheer grit. When the final victory message appeared, Ankit felt both proud and underwhelmed: these players were almost like bots.
Resolved to improve, he recorded his gameplay and uploaded his first silent video to a newly minted YouTube channel, "Returner." There were no views at first, but Ankit knew the value of persistence. He kept uploading, footage after footage of impressive matches, sometimes with 14, 17, or more kills.
As weeks passed, Free Fire updated. Ankit's daily cycle—play, record, edit, upload—became second nature. Eventually, his efforts began to pay off: his first subscriber arrived, reaching out both in-game and on YouTube.
Group matchmaking was still rudimentary, but now he had a friend, and his audience started to grow. After another update, Free Fire introduced the "drag fire" button, revolutionizing gameplay and introducing new weapons and finished map locations.
With renewed excitement, Ankit carefully tweaked his controls and played in his first group match, inviting his subscriber to join him. From that day, every match felt like a new adventure, every video a fresh step toward something bigger—a future he was determined to shape from the ground up.