Five Steps Away from Dying

Janine had entered her twenties with cautious optimism and a meticulously crafted path: Ace the Aptitude and Practicality Exams for mechanical engineering, graduate with an influential sponsor (preferably from the government), and begin her career in the heart of Caballeros City while occasionally going back home to fix whatever was wrong on her mother's farm. It was a great plan by her standards, one that had nearly every month mapped out with what to do, and the only real risk was that she doesn't qualify for engineering and is instead assigned to another career path.

As a way for the Southern State to maximize productivity and minimize competition for professional careers, they give citizens the option to take the APEs, a way to find a career path that would best fit an individual's knowledge and skillset. By taking the exam, entrants are legally bound to work in their assigned field for a minimum of fifteen years. When Janine entered the exam room, she had no way of knowing that when she stepped out, her world was going to drastically deviate from that plan for good.