1 It Wasn’t Supposed To Be A Death Game.

We gamers don't live very long. Arthritis gets our hands before our crushes know we exist. Our sedentary lifestyle reveals to us our afterlife if our rich exotic worlds haven't already.

That being said, when the government rounded us NEET Ass neckbeards into the back of trucks, the last thing I expected was to watch my funeral streamed live.

"Alright, you Giga degenerates! Any questions?" An agent-smith-looking motherfucker bellowed. He clapped his hands between each word as if he was training inbred golden retrievers.

"Yeah, none of us paid attention, Gaylord." A squeaker in the back snickered. A thousand thicc necks nodded. Then, as the midsummer heatwave slowly struck us down, a sweat puddle formed at the base of our feet, creating an Old Testament-style flood that would drown us in a hundred years.

"Jesus Christ almighty." The government man hung his head in his hands, almost crying.

"Sir, why did you show a Livestream of my funeral?" I nervously raised my hand. I blinked hard and rubbed my eyes, but it was unmistakably mine. Those charlestoning, breakdancing boomers were family. Before my body was cold, hell, before they even found it, they were already cheering my demise. A little cousin drew a mustache on my black and white portrait. My last farewell. Of course, I had sat silently and watched in the six hours we were here like I did my whole life.

"Wait, those partying grandmas and grandpas were your parents?" A 500-pound stranger next to me whispered.

"If you panty-sniffing, pop-chugging, IQ-lacking sons of whores listened to a word I said, maybe the government wouldn't have rounded you up!" The agent responded, finally using his megaphone.

"None of us did well in school, sir." I whimpered.

"Alright, imma go over this one more time, but I'm surprised you morons haven't figured it out yet. The economy's collapsing. As you drags on society are costing the taxpayers in healthcare, social programs, and lost taxable wages, we have decided secretly to get rid of you." The agent sneered.

"What, Gaylord?" The squeaker yelled again, unable to hear anything in the cavernous space of the empty stadium. This time, The agent tilted his sunglasses.

Bang! A camping sniper shot the forty-year-old-looking teenager in the arm.

"Jesus Christ." We collectively squeaked.

"Relax, morons. I shot him with a smart bullet."

A brainchild of tech billionaire Melon Dusk, the smart bullet was the latest fad the media wouldn't shut up about, like electric vehicles and Bitcoin in the 2020s. The smart bullet, premier in anti-protestor technology, was supposed to seal any entry wounds immediately and slowly dissolve into your bloodstream. It fucked you up for the next few years. So naturally, the pharmaceutical industry loved it, as you had to take meds for a long time if you didn't want to die painfully.

"Where was I? Right, we faked your deaths, not that society gives a shit. You fuckers like video games, right? So we paid our defense contractors billions to develop a final solution to our 'you' problem. Introducing Solar System online!" The agent turned the slide, then applauded to himself.

Was it a VR MMORPG? I can't even tell. I could literally count the number of pixels dashing across the screen. My little cousin could have drawn better art. But she has no hands. Everything was so Rng that skill expression became pointless. Most of the classes were unplayable.

All in all, a pretty good game.

"This will be the gladiator arena in which you prove yourself. Across this great country, there are one million of you bastards rounded up in facilities just like this, and nobody knows you're alive." The agent looked around smugly. "Nine of every ten will die trying to clear the game."

"Huh?" Whispers of confusion seeded themselves.

"If you die in the game, your immersion pod becomes an electric chair."

"Ooohhhhh. Oh." A long oh of acknowledgment was followed by a short oh of understanding.