Last month, it was uncovered that the OGAT government is developing bots to mitigate OGAT's population decline. By the end of April, an accident occurred at the testing facility, causing a large number of bots to escape and begin terrorizing the public. In response to the breakout, the government enacted a bounty system for eliminating the bot menace. Bot hunters—referred to as Operators by the officials—are rewarded medals for successfully destroying hostile bots. With these medals, Operators can procure new equipment from specially designated government armories.
Unfortunately, due to the urgent need to produce medals in large quantities, the government failed to add security features that would prevent forgeries. The OGAT criminal community quickly exploited this deficiency, producing counterfeit medals and selling them on the black market. The forgeries are virtually indistinguishable from the genuine government-issued medals, as they look exactly the same. Officials have been puzzled when Operators began showing up at the armories with large amounts of medals. Many Operators have been buying these counterfeit medals from the black market, hoping to instantly purchase top-tier equipment.
"I deny ever buying medals from the black market. They were all earned through hard labor," said an operator known as M., who currently has almost 4,000 medals, while the government's total reserves number barely 3,000. The government never anticipated such rapid accumulation of medals and, as a result, has not stocked the armories with enough weapons. Numerous Operators who do not participate in the black market trade are inadequately equipped and are forced to carry only basic weapons for hunting bots. It is still unclear when the government will be able to supply them with proper weapons.
