Chapter 1: A 5GB App?!

Han Jing was the worst kind of gamer.

At least that was what his peers told him, he was the filthy casual and the mobile gamer at that. He couldn't even afford a decent PC for him to use, but those were the purpose of internet cafe shops.

And yes, he was at one right now.

There was a strange lull inside the small cramped room, a certain charm in the complete darkness except for the alluring neon lights that illuminated alongside the hundred blindingly bright-white screens. He was hunched up against one of the monitors, his foot tucked beneath a leg on the oversized gaming chair as he click-clacked away.

He was going at 80 words per minute, a pace that was nearly within a Pro's level.

Han Jing stared at the nonsense that was his resume, countless of words that meant absolutely nothing to any employer who'd be willing to even hire him. "Geez," He muttered to himself and closed the document tab, paying attention instead to the list of odd jobs posted on a job-hunting site. An email notification popped up in one of the twenty-three tabs he had opened up.

It was a strange email from an unknown sender:

Greetings, Han Jing!

We would like to thank you for your interest in partaking in the closed-beta game of Races: Online. It is an immersive project that took several years to complete. We are proud to present a Life Simulation game that has never been seen by the likes of anyone before. After taking in hundreds and thousands of interested individuals from across the planet, you are one of the selected to participate.

Click the link below to download the game on your computer or phone.

PS.

As a small thank you gift for signing up, we've sent you a sum of $1000.

"What?" Han Jing stared at the email, he couldn't recall signing up for anything at all. Unless it was one of those drunk nights… he shuddered at those chunks of his life that he didn't remember or had a clue of. "But this is probably a scam or something, pfft. A thousand dollars." He sipped the remaining soda in his can, shaking his head.

He said that to himself but he checked his online bank account.

$1000 received from Races: Online Game Company

He tried not to spit out the soda in his mouth.

Was this his good fortune? What kind of company was dumb enough to throw away $1000 for beta-testers, no matter how closed the beta-game was supposed to be. He had taken in some game-testing jobs at the sum of $50-$100 but never a thousand dollars. Han Jing pinched himself for good measure.

"Ow…" So he wasn't dreaming or hallucinating. Han Jing immediately transferred the amount to his mobile payment app. "Might as well put this for good use, now onto other matters..." He looked at the link, hovering his pointer over it and frowned a bit. "What if this is illegal or something?" What if it led him to a sketchy site or the deep web? He felt a tingle in his spine, getting involved with that would... "But I already accepted the money, so I might as well download it."

But better do a little bit of snooping first.

Actually, he should have done that before transferring the money.

Han Jing tried searching for the game on the search engine but nothing popped up about any game being pre-released nor any other individual sharing about their good fortune on any online forums and such. "Was it that exclusive? Er..." He looked around at the other people currently focused on their own businesses.

It might be safer for him to download it on this PC instead of his own phone… but he needed to get going home anyway. He also didn't feel comfortable if some weird site popped up and he had to explain it to the people here. Grabbing his phone, he activated his mobile data and opened up the email from his phone. He clicked the link and was led to a huge popup:

[ File is too large, please uninstall some apps ]

"What?" Han Jing frowned, what kind of mammoth size app was this? He uninstalled his favorite life simulation game, that weird shoot raiding game he downloaded on a whim, his farming game where he was a level 100 now, and even deleted a few of his beloved videos for good measure.

Reclicking the link now brought him to the downloading page.

[ Downloading Races: Online… 1% of 5 GB ]

"What the—?!"

Some of the people looked his way, but the rest simply kept to their business. Getting noisy and reckless in an internet cafe was quite a normal occurrence after all. Han Jing looked at his poor phone that was trying to cater to such a huge size.

"This is just for the installation of the app… what about the additional data?" Han Jing stared at his precious mobile data that was getting consumed with each passing minute. What kind of creator made a game that was too huge?!

It better have awesome visuals and smooth gameplay or else he'd feel cheated even with the payment!