chapter 2 A gaming pad

Saachi was reborn into the time he was in college leading a carefree life unaware of horde of problems rushing his way. His painstakingly earned college degree was not even worth the paper it was printed on when he had started searching for jobs. In the end, he had turned into menial worker in a gaming workshop.

It was era of FIVR game- Escape into new world, or simply - escape. Though the game started late when multiple VR games were in limelight, hogging the gaming market, it had turned into monopoly few months later. Other VR games just had to close their doors. After all, Escape has high subject interaction, immersion, satiation....blah,blah, blah. Basically, it was the best game out there and nearly all people played it. And the game was famous initially because of two reasons: one - its program model was subscription based. Meaning the gamers had to pay certain amount every day or week or month to use the game. It was unprecedented move as nearly all games worked on freemium mode( free + premium mode) or one time purchase mode. Industry people had laughed. 'No one would pay day after day, just to play.' The catch phrase was used so many times that people automatically skipped that portion while reading. 'Escape' was confident on the game. They countered the industry with one of its kind - 'play for free for a month, if not satisfied no need to pay a cent.' And the gaming company would pay subscription fee for the basic gaming gear during the free month usuage. Yep, even the gaming gear had to be paid extra by subscription to play the game.

The freebie was happily accepted by few , many had turned fence sitters. But even they turned fanatics due to second reason - gaming money to actual cash conversion (minus transaction fees and conversion fees).

Escape was not the first game to offer such trade but it was first to offer such open trade. In other games, gamers could buy things from company or game auction and pay in cash instead of coins. But 'Escape' said directly that if you don't have items to sell in auction, no problem; go to trading centre to convert gaming coins to cash and get it deposited in your bank account directly (of course, minus the transaction and conversion charges).

So many more had rushed to try. If they could make money in game, they could put it back as subscription fee. Anything extra, it would be second salary. If no money could be made in 1st month, give back gears and stop playing the game. True gamers felt spending nearly a month in new game and coming back to old VR game was no big deal. It would be change of pace.

And the rest was the history.

Few months later, only this game was running and others were slowly shutting down.

Saachi was a good boy in previous life. He had no patience or free time to play any games. He had to earn while learning and get the college degree certificate. It was his goal. He worked for it and finally achieved it too. Only to find that it was like luck, useful for certain few and Mirage or Myth and useless for nearly all others.

So Saachi came in to gaming scene a lot later. When companies invested a lot into guilds and like, when guilds needed coin and resources making workshops. These workshops would be given daily or weekly target, if they were not reached, the guilds would try other workshops. If target was reached, there would be small bonus.

So these greedy workshops would work the 'dregs' in three shifts round the clock. And they had equipped these dregs with VR head sets, though they came with time restriction (6 to 8 hours of play after which the gear would have heating issues and the gears had to be cooled and charged before next session) because human life was cheap, cheaper than slightly costlier 1st generation gaming pods.

These pods took lots of space compared to newer sleeker versions. They needed continuous electric supply to massage muscles of gamer within.(continuously lying down in same position let to loads of muscle cramps and posture problems.)

So in this lifetime, as he was given a chance to re-live his life again, he had decided to start anew. His first goal- earn enough money topay as deposit to gaming pad. Next, earn extra for miscellaneous- like a room to host the 'pod' (the gaming pad), electricity and other utility bills etc. After long and hazardous year's work, he finally had enough to pay deposit with Laim's 10,000 bucks wholesome payment.

Just when Saachi was blessing rich client like Liam and wonder if such 'meaty' client may appear before the game started, Liam knocked the door.