Chapter 7: Interlude I

Day after day. Moment after moment. The dull grind of reality dragging me away from my paradise.

I pressed the conveyor stop button, sighing as yet another worker passed out. His body fell limp, his air filter failing him. He had been desperate, ekeing out another shift even after he was meant to go home. Pushing himself and his air filter beyond their natural limit, all in pursuit of a bit more pay. His rent was due in a day's time, his license had expired, and his daughter had a birthday coming up. Too many bills, never enough time.

He wouldn't be around when he woke up. He would be politely informed that he had been replaced, and then his world would fall apart. Just as the last man had. And the woman before him. That was the way the world worked, drive by the slow dirge of capitalism.

Of course I didn't have a job as a programmer. I was born as a child in a foster program with no means of making money, how the hell would I afford the ridiculously expensive education such jobs needed? Even if I caught up to the modern world of code within a matter of months, if I didn't have a fancy piece of paper or a family connection in a high place, I was effectively stuck with nothing but bad options.

The day came when I was no longer allowed to stay at the foster home I grew up in. The day my acting parents were no longer legally required to feed and clothe me. I didn't blame them for shunting me out as soon as possible, the government only paid them according to how many eligible children they had in the home and feeding me took up more of that check than feeding a wide-eyed toddler would.

So I gathered my meager possessions, stepped out into the world, and was promptly stonewalled.

There was no middle class in this day and age, your wealth depending entirely on the simple lottery of your birth. There was no means of advancement, no reason to strive for anything. Even the very air you breathed sucked the life from you, draining away the years of your life if you didn't shell out the cash to purchase another air filter every few days. Even those who tried to improve their lot in life through higher education were shafted in the end, the hundred million-yen price tag for such establishments clasping a ball and chain around your leg that would follow you all your life.

There was no way up. There was no way back. So I went forward, accepting that I would never again return to the keyboard I knew so well. The only job that would take a gawky young man with no education or credentials was the factory, a center for human rights violations so egregious that it was a wonder that they hadn't been given an award.

There I stayed.

And there I slaved away during work hours, forever repeating the endless loop.

For years, I've stood at this machine. Pushed this button. Stared blankly forward at the half-made mass-produced items moving by. The economy grew worse, and the fact that I was a good worker became the only reason I was still alive at all.

This station was my life, so long as I continued to man it. It would be my death if I ever stopped. No matter what, I could never stop. Not even through injury, sickness, or excruciating pain. For as long as this job funded my paradise… I would do whatever I had to.

This world was ruled by megacorporations. I had known that before, had known that even back in my first life. But in this cataclysmic future, the truth was all too clear to see.

Touch Me was a police officer paraded around to give a mere façade of justice being upheld.

Ulbert and Momonga slaved away each day at a dead-end job, where the only possible means of promotion was quite literally dependent on their supervisor dying of overwork.

Bellriver would find something out soon, something that would paint a target on his back for simply knowing it. I already sent a vaguely-worded message to the man through email telling him of various places where he could hide, including numerous people I knew for a fact were direct subordinates of Touch Me. Combined with the message I sent to Touch me, he might even survive.

Might.

But I didn't care about that.

All of this? All of this is just a passing-through point. A place for me to be tested before I enter eternity. The real-life representation of a religious experience. If I could wait these final few days, if I could log in just long enough to pass midnight, if I could stay alive just a bit longer…

My arms were frail, weak, malnourished. I couldn't afford food, not when my daily wages were half what a loaf of bread cost. I did jobs on the side, shadier jobs, just to pay for my own living. I had numerous loans out, and whenever I needed to pay one off I just took another loan from a different source. The final loan's money would run out just after the game's server shutdown, a move I had calculated many years ago. After I left this hell to ascend to paradise, all my mortal trappings would cease to be.

The game was all that mattered. Electricity, a fresh supply of nanomachines, and a steady connection to the server. Nanomachines that were cheaper than even the food on my plate. My apartment was located in the safest region in town, fortified by a heavy iron door and enough security measures to ensure no one could ever disturb me while I played. The price of the apartment reflected its state, utterly disgusting with everything falling apart around me, but that didn't matter.

None of it mattered.

That was what I had to keep telling myself.

None of it mattered. It would all be going away soon.

A world torn by human greed, air scorched by the remains of a war I heard only whispers of, my every breath filtered through a mask. This factory made it all the worse, since it was one of the places unaffected by the government's rules on pollution or safety standards. The smog was thick in the room, so thick that I couldn't see my own hands. Anyone who carelessly removed their mask would gradually suffocate, punishing anyone who dared to try to hold a conversation with their fellow man.

No one looked up, no one said a word.

We were human machines. See item, add part, move on. We were hired in lieu of expensive metal monstrosities that would break down under the constant strain, simply because we were cheaper. We could be replaced in a heartbeat with another desperate man who needed to eat.

Like the worker who was being dragged away from his post.

It was a story told so often the lips telling it had grown numb from movement. A world that crushed the hopes and dreams of human beings, removing even the very concept of happiness. They had made a market of despair, selling hope at the cheap price of your patronage. Full-Dive technology was made to herd the masses, the same megacorporations who worked us to the bone selling us their equipment and gear. Different corporations sold us games, sold us escape, sold us brighter dreams.

Games built on the backs of more human machines, no doubt working different jobs for better pay, only to have to spend more of it on more expensive food and rent on their fancier apartments.

A giant machine, that's what humanity has become in the year 2138.

And I was the only one around who could bear the idea of being just another cog.

It was hell.

It was hell.

It was hell, but I held on for the hope of a heaven.

Because that's all I could do. It was all I knew how to do.

The final years of my first life were spent with my body slowly failing, my mind desperately trying to come to terms with the coffin I had once called my greatest tool. My mind had been the only thing left intact, the only thing left for me to use even when my bones broke and my heart spasmed. All I could do is wait for death, hoping for something better.

I could wait a little while longer. In my mind, I'm still an old man, held down by the weight of his own body. The smog over my vision is just my eyes failing me, the factory's constant whirr a white noise created by deafened ears. It's easier to pretend I was never reborn, and that all of this was one long dream leading into the paradise I had been waiting for all my life.

I'll be free, soon, free from this hell.

No more will smog choke my lungs, not when I have lungs that function even when full of smoke.

No more will my body fail me, no more will the scars of my accidents haunt me, no more will my mutilated leg be a grim reminder that this factory cares nothing for my health.

I'll have a new form. A form towering above even the highest skyscrapers, scales invulnerable to even the harshest of blows. I'll be able to eat my fill and drink until I burst, enjoying good food prepared by beautiful women.

My body will never again fail me, never again be ravaged by time. I'll remain young forever, standing within a fortress so impenetrable that not even a hundred thousand Gods could scratch its walls.

One day. A day coming very soon.

My calloused fingers snapped the next part into place, ridges in them forming perfectly around the edges of the metal piece. A testament to how long I had been at this station. Months, years, more. All in this one spot, installing this one part, receiving this one paycheck to put into the one lifeline I had.

Time crawled. The conveyor belt whirred. The parts snapped. My drill hummed.

I could ignore all the pain.

I just needed to wait until my final hour came.

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