Fly Angels: How a Baker Got Hooked on a Telegram MMORPG and Forgot About the Dough
Hi, everyone. My name is Zoya, and I bake bread. Not metaphorically, but for real: a little bakery by the market, shifts starting at four in the morning, baguettes, Borodinsky rye, and croissants on Saturdays that the grandmas from the neighboring building would fight over. A baker’s professional secret: half the job is waiting. The dough proofs for forty minutes, and there’s nothing you can do about it.
One day, our delivery guy Timur, a twenty-year-old with headphones permanently glued to his ears, saw me getting bored over the proofing dough yet again and said, “Zoya Andreyevna, here, this is right in Telegram—you don’t have to download anything.” Then he sent me a link to the Fly Angels bot. I snorted.
You can guess what happened next. This isn’t an ad, I don’t know the developers, nobody paid me, and the link will be at the very end, as it should be. It’s just that over the past month, I’ve caught myself displaying a whole collection of signs that I’m hooked. Here’s my list, baker to baker.
1. When I picked a hero faster than a pie filling
I opened the bot, saw this screen with pink trees, a little bridge, and a hero on a circular platform, and that was it. Somehow, the “Start Game” button pressed itself. I chose the warrior because she has beautiful hair. That’s now my main criterion in life.
2. When the dough had proofed and I hadn’t even noticed
My very first shift ended with the proofing timer beeping while I sat on a stool, watching my heroine run around the location on her own and scatter monsters. There’s auto-battle: you turn it on, and your character finds opponents, uses skills, and collects experience all by themselves. You can portion dough into pans while they do it, and they don’t mind. For someone with flour up to her elbows, it’s a real gift.
3. When I started checking in in the game before I did at work
At work, we have a paper logbook where you have to sign in at the start of your shift. I regularly forget, and the owner, Galina Petrovna, reminds me about it. Well, in the game, I haven’t missed a single day. Not one! Every morning at 3:52, still on the minibus, the first thing I do is tap “Check-in.” There’s a monthly calendar, with a gift for every day, and extra rewards for streaks of 7, 14, and 28 days. Galina Petrovna, I’ll do better. Probably.
4. When I found out my power level in numbers and got proud
Every hero has BR, or Battle Rating, and that number goes up from practically everything: gear, wings, amulets, costumes. Timur showed me a friend with a rating close to two hundred million, and I froze like I was standing in front of a three-tier wedding cake. Now I check my own number about as often as I check the oven. And yes, every morning it’s a little higher than the day before.
5. When I texted Timur “let’s hit the arena” and scared myself
The arena here is simple and fair: you’re shown several opponents and their ratings, you choose who to challenge, and then you fight. Win, and you move up the leaderboard. One day at lunch, I texted Timur first: “let’s hit the arena.” He replied with an emoji that meant, “I made you what you are.” I think that was the point of no return.
A quick note about the duels themselves. The arena looks like something out of a samurai movie: banners with crests along the sides, drums the size of my proofing cabinet, pagodas, and cherry blossoms all around.
6. When I put the in-game event schedule on the fridge
On my fridge, I have the shift schedule, Mom’s gingerbread recipe, and now a note that says “Battle of the Gods: Mon, Wed, Fri, Sun, 8:30 p.m.” It’s a battle where players from several servers face off, and it looks the part: giant torii gates and a stone staircase leading up to the sky. My husband asked why the gods have such a busy schedule. I said gods, like bakers, run on a timetable.
There’s another note underneath: “World Arena, Wed and Sun, 9:00 p.m.” It has its own season and ranks, and it all starts at “Iron.”
7. When the “Battles” menu got longer than my price list
Our bakery’s price list has nineteen items, and I used to think that was a lot. Then I opened the “Battles” tab: leaderboard, arena, dungeons, Great Yokai, cross-server world, foreign lands, World Arena. And that’s just one tab. Right beside it are “Events,” “Growth,” “Bonuses,” and “Shop.” I thought a game in a messenger app was just a five-minute tapper, but this is a full-fledged MMORPG living inside Telegram, like a cat in a box.
8. When I spun Treasure Hunt with the excitement of a lottery grandma
There’s a woman called Nina at our market who buys a lottery ticket every Sunday and commentates on the draw out loud for the whole row. I used to quietly laugh at her. Now I’m Nina. In “Treasure Hunt,” there’s a beautiful prize wheel, and here’s the funniest part: the whole server shares a luck meter. When it fills up, everyone has a better chance of winning rare prizes. So you’re not spinning alone; it’s like the whole neighborhood is doing it together.
9. When I spent longer picking my heroine’s dress than my own wedding dress
This is where I was completely done for. Costumes. There are lots of them, and they come in sets—and completing a set gives you an extra boost to your stats. I stared at the “Date” set with its pink wings for about ten minutes, until I smelled something burning behind me. I saved the bread. But it was close.
My personal favorite is “Scarlet Moon Outfit.” The white kimono with red patterns looks like the fanciest cake in the display case: nothing extra, and still impossible to look away from. Every costume gives its own bonus to attack, health, and accuracy, so the beauty is useful, too.
10. When I heard about legendary armor and started saving like I was planning a vacation
I’ve always envied people who know how to save money. Mine slips away like starter spilling out of a bowl if you don’t punch it down in time. But now I’m collecting “Seven Seas” piece by piece: eight parts, with a new bonus for every two. Those are the kind of wings worth saving up for.
11. When I got a mount and started looking at pigeons differently
The rideable animals here are called mounts, and some of them fly. The Dark Phoenix Heron is purple and fluffy, with claws like a griffin from a fairy tale. Now, every morning at the market, I look at the pigeons pecking at the crumbs that fell from my loaves and think, “Well, you guys are pretty basic.”
12. When I got a fiery little helper, the kind I dreamed of by the oven
This is my favorite one. A samurai spirit named Flameweaver is a little girl with fire instead of hair. I’m a baker; my oven’s on from four in the morning, so I know all about fire. And now there’s a personal little fire fairy living in my phone, helping me in battle. If she could keep an eye on the deck oven too, I’d hire her.
13. When I hung a real omamori on my backpack
Omamori are Japanese charms—little pouches with a prayer inside. In the game, they’re their own upgrade path, and the amulet has skills of its own. I got so into it that I bought a real omamori online and hung it on my backpack. Timur said I’m “in the lore” now. Sounds like a compliment.
14. When I started reading the world map like the menu at a new pastry shop
Each location has its own map, with monster spawn points and their levels. Sakura Village is for beginners, followed by Akiba, Yamagami, and the Garden of Illusions, each with its own level range. I study it like the menu at a new pastry shop: first an éclair, then honey cake, and the pistachio tart can wait.
Akiba, by the way, is my number-one dream location. Scarlet maples, a circular plaza, little bridges over the water. And monsters named “Little Mushroom” and “Thieving Mouse.”
15. When huge damage numbers became my best stress relief
Some mornings, the supplier brings the wrong flour and the register freezes. Then, during my break, I open the game, turn on auto-battle, and watch numbers in the millions fly across the screen. It works better than chamomile tea. Especially in Yukimi, the snowy village, where my heroine spreads her icy wings and fluffy teru-bōzu dolls bounce around.
16. When I realized I’d been leveling up, too
The last one is serious, but short. Over the past month, I’ve learned to get up ten minutes earlier so I can check in. I realized that “Class Change” and “Rebirth” aren’t about a midlife crisis. I met a woman from Kazan in the world chat who bakes, too—custom cakes, though—and we swap recipes between battles. And I’ve gotten more relaxed about waiting for the dough. Forty minutes of proofing now means two arena fights, one dungeon run, and about three sighs over costumes.
In conclusion
The game opens right in Telegram, with no downloads and no powerful phone needed. Mine’s completely ordinary, with a cracked corner. It’s beautiful, cozy in a Japanese sort of way, and there are so many people on the server that you can barely move through the village because of everyone’s wings. Honestly, I never expected to find a new hobby at thirty-five in a messenger app where I usually write, “We’re out of flour, urgent.”
If you want to see what got me so hooked, here’s the link: Direct link to the game: https://t.me/GameFlyAngelsBot?start=ad_site Project website: https://flyangels.online
And now a question for you, friends: what was the point of no return for you in your favorite game? Tell me in the comments. I’m waiting for the croissants to proof, anyway.
P.S. A baker’s tip for beginners: don’t rush, just like with dough. Check in every day, turn on auto-battle, and calmly make your way across the map from Sakura Village onward. It’ll all come together on its own, I promise.