What is it that people desire the most? Power, the ability to do whatever they want with their lives, to live without a care in the world. Until a few years ago, the only way to acquire that power was to have a large amount of money on one's bank account and a well-paid job, however, that changed with the introduction of the Dream Machine, a revolutionary invention. The Dream Machine allowed people to create their own virtual reality, in which they could do anything and everything they wanted to do including hiking, pretending to be a company's CEO, have a pleasant conversation, or they could even use it to commit indecent acts. Of course, for a while, this invention was only available to a select few, but then, it started to spread rapidly.
Within a span of a year, the users of the Dream Machine increased from a few dozen to hundreds of thousands of people, all of whom lived in their own dreams and had every fantasy of theirs fulfilled. It was during this time that the first problems surfaced with the system, as it was discovered to be highly addictive to people who were depressed, or had a job that they particularly hated. They would do anything if it meant an extra hour on the Dream Machine, and beyond a certain point, that meant leaving their jobs, abandoning their families, and then abandoning life. People were often found dead inside their Dream Machines, so the manufacturing of these devices quickly grinded to a halt, most variants were recalled for safety inspections, and access to the dream world was restricted.
Of course, people were dissatisfied with this course of action, and soon, the world-wide protests started. Everybody who had been a regular user of the Dream Machine demanded to have it back. Soon, the protests started turning into riots as the governments refused to switch the Dream Machines on again because they deemed them dangerous to human society as a whole. In several countries, even the army had to be mobilised to keep the users of the Dream Machines at bay. Eventually, the riots turned incredibly violent as the former users of the Dream Machines somehow acquired weapons, and started to use terrorism as a way to get their beloved devices back. After a few weeks of desperate fightning, the governments of the world had no choice but to allow the use of Dream Machines again if they wished to keep their countries intact.
Within the first few days, millions of people have died from Dream Machine addiction. After such a long break from the system, their minds got fully immersed in the virtual environment, and they have become so focused on living out their fantasies that they neglected their physical body. Human society, which was already barely hanging by a thread, collapsed in a matter of weeks as the use of Dream Machines spread to even wider circles. In the end, humanity's desire for comfort and total dominance of the factors in their lives lead to their downfall.
