Underworld Player - Chapter 34: The Crux

I am currently re-writing the first chapters of this story. They are quite rough and bounce around a lot and I can do better. At some point, I will replace these with the better chapters.Sometime in 2024 Aethon Books will publish the first volume of this story on Amazon, KU, and audible. This will mean the story will be stubbed. I will notify people far in advance of that.In the dystopian world of the future, life is rough when you live at the bottom. Jobs are non-existent. Far too many people live in poverty, crammed into huge buildings called Habitats. With no jobs in the real world, many people can only find work online in VR worlds as servants to the very rich. And it's getting worse. The old internet is unusable and hacked to pieces. The new system needs AI to run things, but all but one of them were destroyed. The last sentient AI is ordered to create a new game world so the rich can have a playground, and the corporations that rule the world can have a new global market place. Everyone wants a piece of the new game. The guilds are competing to be the first to find the dungeons and kill the biggest monster. The corporations are claiming land and putting in their online market places. Ozzy and his friends just want a paycheck.Four friends sign five year contracts as virtual serfs in a small village, and can't go adventuring at all to gain money. They don't have many choices. They can work as a blacksmith, barmaid and shepherd for all those years....or they can cheat and find ways to take advantage of the system and carve out a section of the game world for themselves, and earn a fortune in the real world.When they give you a mop and not a sword, you have to find the loopholes and change the rules.

As a new anchor of StarTV, Yu Yan’s ruthless tr*sh-talk, natural rifle-shooting skills, and character of never searching houses earned him a big crowd of fans.

Hao Ren was born in another world and has lived for over twenty-two years being nothing but a definition of the word, average. After a high school reunion, the young man sat down on the beach shore, and mumbled to the sky, “God of Novels, you are unfair. I spent forty years of my life doing nothing but reading books and stories written by others. I worked hard to manifest this rebirth, and yet you did not bless me with anything. Why?”A voice echoed in his mind, “Host, you have the Omnipotent Husband System.”Hao Ren scoffed and scolded the system, “What is the use of having you when you are not even active? Are you shitting with me, you bastard?!”The system replied, “Host the condition for activating the system is to get married.”Hao Ren could not handle it anymore and cried out loud as he complained about this condition. He was not good-looking, and neither was he wealthy, who was going to marry him?Tired, he spent the on the beach. When he was returning home, he passed by the marriage registering center. He sighed for his fate but suddenly, a beautiful lady asked him, “Hey, do you have any identity card on you?”Hao Ren nodded in a daze, and the lady dragged him inside the office. The young man was yet to register what happened to him when an automated voice sounded, “Host, congratulations on getting married. Omnipotent Husband System is now activated.”...Years later, Hao Ren became an entity many people wished to meet. However, Hao Ren never stayed outside, to everything he had one reply, “I have to go home and cook for my wife.”Would you like to know his journey from an average to an over-achieving person standing at the apex of power and prestige?

Weary reader, it is an honor for you to choose this book in this heavy, dark library room.

Somewhat sadly, the book is sick.

Your fingers should be able to feel the raised growths on the surface of the book cover,

The words written in the old days are like parasites rooted in the pages of the book, hoping that someone can observe their wriggling,

To feel, to analyze, to touch the story of the disease.

If you insist on borrowing this book, be sure to check your physical condition regularly.

- Description from novelbuddy