Chapter 1

I’m currently sitting outside my apartment staring up into the yellowish blue sky, waiting for the right time to get back into Noah. Remember when I said oil is running dry? Well the world wasn’t exactly lacking in alternative energy source to meet life necessity, it was just the luxury stuff that was beyond the average family.

Every household nowadays had some form of green energy generator, mostly solar panels and underground heat pipes. In order for me to use the VR capsule, I have to wait till the solar panels on our apartment building to charge up the batteries to max and this usually happens around the late afternoon where the sun was the strongest. Humanity has come a long way from the non-viable 20th century solar panels that can only power a calculator.

My agitated body couldn’t stop twitching as my heart pounded with every passing second. There’s a good reason why I’m so desperate you see. A few months back when my school summer vacation just started, I was welcomed home by my father who was getting himself drunk on the sofa.

Looking up, my father garbled his words as he looked at me “heuy Jack, I’m soory yoo haf a useless dod.” Drops of tears trickled down his eyes as he spoke with a bottle of beer in his hand.

Twenty long years of loyal service to the government’s energy plant located a couple of miles from my home, did nothing to help save his job. He was sacked that day by his manager and finding a steady job in this kind of economy was like winning the lottery.

Watching my old man like this was causing me to get emotion. As long as I can remember, it has always been me and pops. Never once did he cry like this and it hurts me seeing him like. It was clear to me how serious our situation is. With the ever increasing cost of living, it was not the best time to lose our only income and get our life turned upside down.

That night, I cooked dinner for us from the government welfare frozen dinner boxes handed to us from the food bank. We didn’t speak; it was painfully quiet as we ate, so as a way to help lighten the mood, I flicked on our hand me down holographic TV.

We couldn’t afford legitimate cable for quality channels so we paid some illegal company to hotwire our place to tap into our neighbors signal. Whatever they watch, we watched and luckily for me, they were mostly into things I loved like news on the hottest game Noah. I knew it wasn’t helping my father in his depressive mood but I was still a kid, can’t expect me to console a 40 year old man.

The women on the news show were really hot and truly skilled at her job. They had to be, having looks just won’t cut it in this competitive work environment. Every movement she made was like hinting erotic images at every man watching. If there was still a censor committee in this age, she’d be flagged for indecency.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

But that wasn’t what caught my attention. The news story was what really caught my attention. Due to the wave of negative opinion by the older generation regarding Noah, the government decided to hold a contest to reward real hard cash to the monthly top contenders in the state owned game Noah.

“Dear viewers, the government have just announced the highly controversial contest in the popular Noah VR game. The top ten players in the monthly ranking will gain real monetary prizes from the government. The amounts are based on your ranks in game and rumor has it, the prize could reach up to tens of thousands of dollars!”

It wasn’t all that surprising actually, since the inception of the game. The government has been raking in advertisement fee and other income from across the globe. The deficit incurred by the VR capsule program would soon be blotched out with what they were making. There was no way they would want to lose the cash cow that has landed in their lap.

So, some finance minister in the government came up with the idea. Since the economy is so bad, which is true and it was this guy’s job to fix it… This corrupted official decided to hand out a small percent of the monthly income in Noah as a prize to the player. This was all advertisement to change public opinion regarding protesting parents that didn’t like their kids spending so much time playing Noah and who can say no to real cash?

I couldn’t sleep that night, staring mindlessly towards the moon in the nightly sky. The news of the contest kept biting at my mind. The cash prize each month was more then what most full time workers made and every player was eligible to win.

Noah had a built in ranking system that gets wiped at the end of every month. How a player gain points was anyone’s guess because simply grinding or leveling in Noah would only gain you so much points. Just last month, a new player was ranked first out of millions of players just for talking to different NPC’s in the game. Who would have guessed right?

I was stirring in my bed for hours and by the time I fell asleep, the sun was about to rise in the horizon. Even then, my dreams haunted me with images of us begging on the streets, with my relatives and friends snickering at me with the face I despised so much. By the time I awoke, my shirt and shorts were stained with sweat.

A person can only take so much when backed into a corner. With no income and no hope of achieving anything significant in my life, I decided that morning, I will win the contest!