Virtuoso

Virtuoso is a megacorporation with a wide-reaching influence over the galaxy. With their headquarters located on the ringworld of Torus, they serve as an unofficial galactic level government, taking over after the collapse of the Federation of Stellar Systems. The current CEO is Lucian Virtuoso.

Virtuoso began its roots by selling blockchain-based virtual real estate. They quickly rose to power, taking advantage of the wide tracks of virtual land available in Mobius OS, the system that operates the consciousness uploads for its citizens. Their market, for a very long time, was exclusively targeted towards androids and cyborgs who could most take advantage of their services. However, Virtuoso wanted to expand their market towards non-cybernetic humans by designing a system of cryptomines that could adapt to their physiology. They saw the perfect opportunity to intervene after the end of the Virtual Wars to rebuild society from its post-war state.

Since then, Virtuoso has expanded to being a general purpose corporation providing a variety of services beyond their original products. They are slowly buying up other companies, unimpeded by weakly enforced antitrust laws. Virtuoso seeks to establish a foothold on Yeddo, one of the most populated planets in the galaxy, and one of the key centers of commerce.

Overview

Virtuoso desires to economically dominant the galaxy by standardizing all virtual reality technologies under its name. It does this supposedly in the name of offering universal personal convenience and safety. Though they like to maintain a good public image, it's an open secret that they have ties to the criminal underworld. They regularly engage in various forms of racketeering to exert control over the population. Their vast network of bribes and corruption also extends across the Federation's law enforcement and politics making it very difficult to hold them accountable for their actions. While Virtuoso has also engaged in humanitarian work by providing job opportunities to poorer sectors of the galaxy, this has mostly been in interest of fueling their ambitions towards their non-violent conquest of the galaxy.

Virtuoso's main platform for communicating with its citizens are the Virtus, autonomous hive-minded robots which inform other citizens of the latest news about Virtuoso and providing tips on how to improve their economic standing.

Virtuoso is noteworthy for its extensive advertisement campaign. While they accept local currency as payment for their services, they also accept watching ads or donating personal information as payment. In the case of watching ads, they have systems in place to ensure users properly watch their ads by tracking their eye movements, with more advanced systems including a quiz about what the viewer just watched.

Notable members and affiliates

• Lucian Virtuoso - The CEO of Virtuoso. He is very charismatic and is good at playing the long game.
• Dr. Hala Celeno - The head of Virtuoso's weapons development branch. She is cold, calculating and ruthless.
• Ezekial Hughes - The CFO of Virtuoso, Ezekial Hughes has ties to the criminal underworld, specializing in moving money.
• Benedict Crowley - A bounty hunter from the planet Salvaxes who is frequently hired by Virtuoso. He has a ruthless demeanor, known for using a special type of gun that can induce an excruciatingly painful sense of phantom touch.

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