Chapter 3: ????

Trainer's Escape has been live for five days now and the public's opinion on the game was exactly has predicted.

For those who play games, we have become the game of the year. While those who are more casual or are more interested in the tech. Are raving about how the game pushes VR capabilities past what was expected. Mostly thanks to our implementation of high functioning and adaptive AI.

Though nothing has been more disappointing for the team than the players.

The players are amazed and talk about how "out of this world" the game is on every forum. However, everyone plays the game like another main stage Pokémon game. Not a single player has pushed the limits of the servers or the AI.

We gave the players absolute freedom over the domain and they have stuck to what they know and are comfortable with. Pokémon's formula of play.

"Public opinion couldn't be any higher." I say to myself as I lay my head on my desk. "But he couldn't be more annoyed at the pace that the world is adapting at. No wonder he's put me on observation duty."

I tilt my head forward so I can see all three of my monitors. Each one open to a different players profile listing all of their information. Public and private.

"A weird idol lover, the king of games, and the under-performer. These three so far hold the most potential in changing the games dynamic." I mumble to myself.

A player who has his avatar look like a famous idol but sets his name to something horrendous. Looking at his profile I can see that he's actually a male college student in Japan. Just turned 23 two days ago and shamelessly shows off his obsession with idols to his best friend. Real name Takashi Tendo, has so far played the game to his avatar's advantage. Not done a single gym challenge, only ever battled his friend, but has become one of the best Pokémon Coordinators in Pokémon Contests. Sometimes even turning the contest into his own little idol performance thanks to his voice mod.

The other player nicknamed "King of Games" has earned himself a 89% battle win rate. Blasted through every regions gyms and elite four and still holding his title of Pokémon Champion in five of the regions. Never lost a single Community and Pro Tournament in the game. Real name Roul Berger who's a player from France. A mostly private person who avoids having any personal information online. The only information that was easy to pull on him was that he's a pretty popular V-Tuber. Making him our unofficial public figure for our game.

Then there's Yuki, who I affectionally nicknamed the under-performer. I couldn't help but pull ALL of his information. In his younger years was the highest ranking student. Perfect scores the whole time until out of nowhere he started placing perfectly in the middle of his class. Staying like that to this day. Any club or sport he was apart of he performed the best. Causing coaches to fight over him when he entered High School. But by the second year he blended in perfectly to the team, going from the ace to invisible. Causing him to completely quit everything in his third year. A member of zero clubs and sports, the same situation as right now while he's in college. The only part of him that hasn't changed is his racing. World Champion in Karting and continued placing minimum top five as he moved forward. Until he received his first big contract offer for Super Formula. Where he turned it down and quit racing only to compete in Sim Racing under a false name. Which has become a global name in the Sim Racing community.

While I watched him play in the game I have not seen him take on a single gym challenge, contest, or player battle. Making his first player battle with Takashi his only.

Yuki's only been wandering around Unova almost completing the Pokédex for the region. Staying away from any of the Routes and only entering towns or cities to heal and empty his team. Only using his Turtwig that has just yesterday evolved into a Grottle.

"There's not a single thing I understand about you." I say to myself as I sit back up in my seat.

I close his profile and look up "Yuki Formula 3" with the hope of learning more about him.

After looking through some articles I stumbled upon a video with the title "The race that ENDED Yuki's career before it started". I clicked on the video that started with the driver leaderboard. Showing Yuki in second place with only a few points behind the driver in first.

Throughout the race he was aggressive. Scary aggressive. Not afraid to yell at his race engineer about how the crew messed up his pitstop. Or argue with what he thought was a better strategy.

"You need to back off Yuki. This rate the tyres won't make it to the end." His race engineer called over the radio.

"Fuck off! Don't tell me what to do! I am not taking second!" Yuki shouted back.

"You run the risk of a puncture Yuki. Maybe even some further damage to the car." The engineer protested in response.

"Stop talking! I'll make them last!" 

With that he inches closer and closer to first. Climbing from 11th all the way to 2nd with now only three laps remaining. Then down to two laps remaining with them now less than a second apart from each other.

It's the last lap of the race and with every corner they pass they over take each other. Until they reach the final corner where they race towards the checkered flag. Both cars practically side by side until one of his back tyres explode. Swinging the rear into the other car sending them both into a spin crossing the finish line like that.

Until the crash gets even worse when one of his front tyres hit barricade on the side. Bouncing the car upwards causing it to begin flipping across the rest of the straight into the other barricade at the end of it.

I watched the video in horror. Both hands covering my mouth as I watched.

As people ran over to help Yuki get out of the car he was able to climb out on his own. Taking off his helmet stood on the top of the destroyed car. Blood running down his face has he stares at the finish line.

Annoyingly that was where the video ended. Sending me straight to the comments to see if there was any more information on how the race ended.

"If my season ended like that just to end second on top of that I would have quit too." One comment read.

"Yuki was such a cry baby. If he only listened to his engineer this wouldn't have happened. Take second like a man." Another read.

"What the hell is that even supposed to mean?" I mumbled to myself in confusion.

"I wish Yuki would come back to racing. Made it so much fun to watch with all of his energy." Finally a good comment about him.

"Yuki was a handful to work with but he deserved better. He refused to even walk up to that second place podium."

"What am I supposed to do with all of this information?" I asked myself bitting my nail.