Everlast Online

"Don't come back here you dirty thief!" A man yelled, throwing a pasty and malnourished girl out the back door of his restaurant, "You're lucky I'm not calling the police!"

The door slammed and after sitting for a while in the rain and garbage, she got up and started walking home.

She was Elizabeth Gray, and yet again she had been fired from her job.

Elizabeth, or Liz, was an unfortunate child; her parents abandoned her and her younger sister, Piper, when she was 10 and Piper was 6. This left a significant strain on the pair and Liz was forced to start working, losing the chance at an education.

Unfortunately, even in the year 2144, the general public did not look kindly upon the poor. For some time, Liz was able to manage, getting food and a decent home for the 2 of them to live in, but that changed when Piper developed CLS: Contaminate lung syndrome.

In 2100 scientists made significant breakthroughs in filtration technology, essentially creating devices that would fix the Earth corporations had destroyed, but this never came to be. Instead of using the machines to improve the air quality around the globe, the scientists monopolised the tech and began charging extreme amounts of money for the rich to live in 'Clean Zones' where the air was completely filtered. The poor were left to sit in their squalor, and soon many began displaying symptoms of an illness.

First they would cough; next blood would come from their coughs as their lungs become damaged; next was the eyes, the infected would slowly become blinded. Finally, they would die. This later became known as CLS, and Elizabeth's sister began showing signs, putting a strain on the pair.

Liz began working much harder, trying to earn enough money for the necessary medicine to combat the illness, but the weight of it became too much. Food began dwindling, they soon had to move out of their apartment and into a cheaper place in the slums. All because of the greed of a few people.

The worst part was Liz knew the illness was curable, even in the latest stages. Many wealthy, more susceptible, people who have suffered from CLS were perfectly cured, with no chance of relapse, yet because she was poor; Liz's sister would die.

And now, Elizabeth Gray had been fired from her job. She had lost the source of income that was keeping her sister in stage 1 of CLS and could do nothing about it.

Liz had worked incredibly hard at every job she worked at, but always suffered. Overworked and underpaid, Elizabeth lost countless jobs for many reasons. This time, the owner's daughter stole money from the register, everyone knew this fact and yet Liz was blamed. She didn't even bother to complain either, should he have called the police they would have sided with him, not even looking at the camera's that pointed directly at the register. 

"Life is just unfair I guess." Liz sighed, keeping her composure, but in her mind she was plunged into despair: My sister's going to die!

Tears began forming in her eyes, she needed this now it was gone.

She walked home, dreading the talk with Piper that was to come, she worried Piper would be disappointed, never once considering Piper had never been disappointed in her. With her head down she noticed something on the floor, barely hanging on to the drain as rain water rushed by.

A small ticket, with familiar writing. Liz reached down and fished it from the gutter ignoring the looks she was getting from the snobby passerby. 

VIGHT LUCKY RAFFLE: 01/12/44 → 31/12/44 (00:00)

It was a raffle for Vight Industries, ending today at midnight. 

What the hell, maybe I'll win her a prize. Liz thought, truthfully hoping to prolong getting home.

Vight Industries was one of the largest gaming retailers, nationwide. It sold high end devices for lower than average prices and was widely praised across the board and soon Liz arrived at theri City-Z headquarters.

She looked at the fancy glass doors, and clean, golden shop; it was completely different to the slums where she lived.

City-Z was the lowest of the cities in Labrys, still the upper city was much different to the lower city and especially the slums. The job Liz had gotten in the upper city was like a miracle, making the loss of it much worse.

In her dirty, ragged clothes, Liz entered. She immediately noticed the disdainful stares of both workers and clientele as she walked to the back section and entered the raffle booth. The reason she knew the ticket was unused was that it lacked a puncture hole.

As she put the ticket into the machine, it lit up and began making a show of spinning. Liz didn't have many expectations of this as it was merely a way for her to waste time before having to go home; but to her surprise she won, and more than that she won something of great value.

The machine had stopped in 3rd place. Liz looked at the machine with a face full of shock as it displayed what she had won; joy built up inside her as she saw an opportunity.

She quickly took the delivery tracker and left the store, making for her house as quickly as possible. With the tracker her prizes would be delivered to her house within an hour of activation and prevent any attempts at stealing it.

Unfortunately, Liz met someone she was hoping not to: Aurelia Kim. A beautiful woman who hated Liz. Aurelia was from the Kim family, they normally lived in City-B, but Aurelia currently went to school in City-Z.

This may come as a surprise but one of the best schools in the country resides in City-Z: Basilicus, School of Excellence. It was built by the current President of Labrys, Alexandria Mag, and first President born in City-Z

When she came to power she did everything she could to solve the rampant wealth inequality in her country, having suffered under it herself. Despite being blocked by other politicians on most fronts she was able to build this school in order to give the 'underclasses' a chance to succeed as she did. Among the upper classes she was one of the only people Elizabeth didn't despise.

Anyway, Basilicus is a great school, but is still seen as inferior and a place where upper city students, who couldn't enter City-A schools. Aurelia had hated Liz due to her being better than her.

To put it simply, Aurelia's ego refused to believe Liz was smarter than she was, despite coming from City-Z. Up until Liz was forced to quit school and get a job, Aurelia bullied and tormented Liz and now she was stood right in front of her.

"Hey povvo." She mocked, her friends snickering behind her, "Guess what my father just bought me, now that I've finished school."

"Haa. What." Liz sighed, resigning herself to the conversation she was about to have.

"A BioSphere Chip." Aurelia's smug look pierced into Liz, searching for the look of envy she so wanted to see. A frown formed when Liz failed to care.

"With it I can access the internet whenever I please." Her smug jabs continued, bragging about all of the functions that Liz would never be able to acquire. BioTech was so egregiously expensive, very few people in even the upper cities had them - besides the prosthetics, which were cheaper.

"It will even allow me to play Everlast Online with it." This caused Liz to flinch slightly, a fact that did not go unnoticed by Aurelia.

"Yeah. My brother is going to create a guild in Everlast Online, he’ll probably become the top player in a week. It's a shame you'll never get to play. Haha." Aurelia continued to mock Liz for maybe 10 more minutes, until she was tired of Liz not responding.

Soon she shoved past Liz, causing her to fall in the puddle, further increasing how wet she was. 

At least her holobrella kept me a little more dry. Liz mused, getting back up and rushing back home.

She hadn't flinched from envy earlier, but rather joy. A secret, smug joy.

Everyone had heard of Everlast Online, it was the latest leap in both VR and gaming technology. A game taking place inside a living world, no engine before this had ever managed such a feat before, it simply wasn't possible. But with ELO they found a way: GAIA. Galdrash. Artificially intelligent. Apotheosis: An artificial God.

It was an AI used to generate an entire game world, named Galdrash, with endless possibilities, adventure and a world of NPCs so realistic one could never tell the difference between them and a regular human. However, this was not what enticed Liz, no it was the statement made by the Unified World Bank, UWB, about the game.

Due to the revolutionary nature of Everlast Online, we have decided to approve its status as a real, yet artificial nation, therefore we allow for its currency to hold real value.

We approve ELOC's request for 'Currency Conversion' from Gladrash to Earth!

This was groundbreaking really, but Elizabeth had not really cared. It was just a way for the bigwigs to make even more money they didn't need, but now it mattered. It mattered due to what Elizabeth Gray had just won:

Congratulations you have won the 3rd prize:

[1 copy of 'Everlast Online'] [1 Voyager Viser]

The reason the raffle ended tonight was because that was the release of Everlast Online, and Liz had just won the opportunity to play it. The opportunity to make money in Galdrash and provide for her family, and if not she will just sell it.

Voyager viser's are exceptionally valuable. This thought had ran through her head, but she was still determined to try and win big in-game before simply giving up. But more than that, Liz had been robbed of her childhood by her greedy parents who had abandoned her after winning a large sum of money, she just wanted to play games.

Soon she arrived home, keeping her head down as she made her way through the slums. She was friendly with the gang leader who owned this area, but it still wasn't entirely safe here; at the very least no one would knock down their door.

Gangs offer better protection than the goddamn police. Liz kept her head down as she noticed a man being beaten by 2 police officers, he looked to be a beggar and was no longer moving. Liz wanted to step in but knew better than to try, she had done so in the past and understood from experience the police weren't above beating on young girls.

She reached her door and quickly went inside, activating the delivery tracker immediately. Her package would arrive in an hour.

Only a few moments after entering she heard the patter of feet against the dirty floor.

"SISTER!" A little 14 year old girl jumped into Liz's arms. The damp girl's permanent despair disappeared in an instant as she caught her younger sister.

"PIP!" She yelled, hugging the girl tight, like that they held one another for a while. Until Piper asked the dreaded question.

"Why are you back so early?" She asked, the colour further drained from Liz's face, "What's wrong? Tell me."

On a 14 year old, a stern face was far from threatening, rather it looked cute, but Liz didn't have the time to savour this as she was too caught up in her own failure.

"... I was fired." She said in a small voice, barely meeting her younger sister's eyes, "They accused me of stealing."

"Did you steal?" Piper asked gently, Liz pouted and shook her head, tears forming. For an outlooker, if they disregarded size, it would be difficult to tell who was the older sister here.

"Damn them! Falsely accusing you! I should go give them a piece of my min- *Cough* *Cough* *Hack* *Cough*"

As Piper began coughing, Liz sprung into action, worrying about her, and yet again the roles were reversed. These sisters only had each other and would stop at nothing to help the other. It was only Piper's desperate begging that prevented Elizabeth from selling herself to a brothel after she lost her last job in order to pay for Piper's medication and life.

"PIP! Have you taken your medicine!?" Liz was immediately worried, checking over, tears threatening to burst from her eyes now.

"*Cough*, I'm, *Cough* I'm fine. It's just a small outburst." She said, waving her sister off, "Go clean up, dry off and after we'll eat. I'll make dinner ."

Although she didn't want to, Liz agreed and did as she was asked.

"What now then?" Piper asked as they were eating.

"That's for me to worry about, you just keep taking those online classes. I have something lined up." Elizabeth said, "It should arrive soon."

Elizabeth was especially glad Basilicus offered a program for sick students, allowing Piper, who passed the entrance exam, to participate in school.

Soon after she spoke, a drone appeared inside their small apartment. With it, a package.

PLEASE PROVIDE PROOF OF OWNERSHIP

Liz handed over the delivery tracker and the drone handed over the package, then teleported back to its warehouse.

Teleportation was developed in the 2090s, and although privacy concerns arose it became commonplace in most delivery systems due to it preventing any package thieves from taking what they would have normally found, it also saved CEO's having to pay delivery drivers, which was the major reason it was allowed.

"You didn't spend all of your money on something did you?" Piper asked worriedly, her sister was incredibly intelligent, but could sometimes be impulsive.

"Don't worry I won it, for free." Piper let out a sigh of relief, she often told her sister to spend her money, to not worry about her, but companies with teleport-shipping never offered anything cheap.

"So... What is it?" Piper asked.

Liz sat back at the table to eat and began explaining the series of events. Although Liz framed the reason for keeping it as purely for making money for medicine and food, her younger sister could easily detect the hints of anticipation and excitement in her voice. And she was happy her sister would finally enjoy something.

After dinner the sisters enjoyed some time together, watching movies on their phones. They lacked the money for a holoTV so the small screen would have to do, and as midnight approached Piper went to sleep, having school in the morning, while Liz set up the Voyager headset.

It was a simple process, retina scans and whatnot, the common stuff.

She would be playing Everlast Online instead of sleeping as modern VR systems could emulate sleep and prevent any tiredness after use, pods could even allow for players to enter VR for days at a time.

So as she finished registration, only 3 minutes until midnight, Liz activated the headset and entered the 'game space', waiting to enter the pre-downloaded game: Everlast Online. As the clock struck midnight Elizabeth entered the game.

"Here goes nothing." And with those words a legend began.