Leakage/intentional seeding of mythology/ideas.
Most books limit this to background ideas. While it could be said that escapism is on the rise because of the system that we live in, and our need to escape more, a good alternative, at least for fiction, is that it’s intentional and part of prep. People exposed to ideas through fiction can result in introspection, denial, suspicions of delusions or mental breakdown, or acceptance. If the intent was to increase survivability, then if this would increase survival chances would depend on the percentages of those chances.
Beyond that though, the longer term survival is worth considering. Folks who determine that they haven’t had a mental breakdown, are they more likely to survive long term? Folks that accepted the situation, are they able to use parallels to adapt, or are they more likely to fall prey to making assumptions? Folks who are in denial, how long do they stay in denial, and does that stubbornness benefit them in the long term?
So, playing into the tropes, one could write a litrpg where the rise of litrpgs is a plot point, part of the system attempting to warn people in advance.
The other idea I had was the idea of projection crystals, an item that allows an entity partially/virtually to enter a “dungeon”, face the various monsters and bosses, and have their consciousness ejected without harm should they fail. In a capitalist society, either the folks can get their hands on them be likely to hoard those for themselves, or they’d sell them as entertainment, especially if the gains weren’t reflected in reality.
Therefore, a system prepping a world for adoption would ensure that these access points became available, but weren’t able to provide visible advantages, so that capitalism would be used to spread these seeds.
There’s a thought here, for sure, about infection and salvation. Using a parasite to spread the cure.
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