A/N: I want to try to do something interesting with this story. So I'm only going to voluntarily write one main route. But I'd like readers to request what they want the main character to do. So I won't leave off on boring questions, like "What's next?". All end questions will end with a situation where the main character has to make a choice. Sometimes, it might be as simple as "Go left or right". Other times, it might be something more complicated, like stat point allocations. And I'll listen to reader requests and write branching paths based on the answers readers want to see, in addition to my own main path. This way, I can interact with readers through this story.
Now, to make it clear, anybody can still write their own branching paths if they want to. I have no issue with it. This option to request a path from me is simply to grow interaction between author and reader rather than just having separate authors work on separate branches within the same story. It also serves as a convenient way for those who are too busy or lazy to write themselves steer the story in the direction they want to go.
Having said that-for readers who make requests to me, I'm only changing the main character's actions based off the request. In other words, while the main character can be influenced by the reader, so long as I'm the one writing it, the rest of the world is determined by me.
Now that I've cleared that up, let's get started:
---
[Back-Story]
The year is 2221. With increased land through colonizing other celestial bodies, and increased manpower through the growth of robotics, the working world has taken a shift-with many more options being available in fields requiring creativity, or fields based on entertainment. One of the biggest booms is in the competitive gaming industry.
That doesn't mean that anybody can be a competitive gamer professionally. The world is still very much a meritocracy-where those who aren't as skilled as others struggle. With less job opportunities in areas such as sales or factory work, unemployment has only increased-many competitive areas, from sports, to esports, to even industries like music have become much more cutthroat.
And, like in any poorer environment, the world is still populated by sharks looking to take advantage of those down on their luck. In the world of esports and competitive gaming, that comes in the form of Underground Release games.
With the rise of competitive games, many different formats for creating a popular and sustainable professional scene rose. And with the rise of sustainable extended-dive VR technology, the cruelest of these formats came along in the Underground Release variety. Underground release games are games in which a gamer agrees to a contract that practically sells their soul to the company that makes the game. The gamer than gets brought directly to the companies facility, where they are placed in a safe room with a VR dive to allow them to dive for an indefinite period of time-anywhere from days to years, to even the end of their life. Anything that the company does to them under this contract is legal. Meanwhile, the company funds for all housing, food, electricity, etc for the gamer during the contract.
Because of these terms, Underground Release Games are almost always death games-where death in the game means death in the real world. The company is able to make money off of this because they are funded to make the game and hold the competition by extraordinarily wealthy backers-who are able to keep any police force off of the companies backs through the rampant corruption and their overwhelming amounts of money.
In short-underground release games are a way for the extraordinarily wealthy to gain sick amusement from watching competitive gamers who have lost almost everything to pursue their dream partake in a death game. Sometimes these games, are PvP, sometimes they are PvE, and many times, they are both.
You sit down at your table and sift through the mail. Most of it is unimportant and useless advertisements to be tossed away-but one envelope catches your eye. You open it and examine the letter before gasping. You've been invited to compete in an Underground Release Game-and know that you have a tough decision to make.