As of 2030, the latest life-changing breakthrough is in the field of human augmentation. Many corporations and medical institutions had been looking into ways of improving the human condition (and make profits) using advanced biotech and robotics, but nobody expected the fashion boom that suddenly made advanced prosthetics into something that any self-respecting contemporary would be considered naked without. Fueled by eased legislation on human augmentation (which were limited to a very tightly controlled set of applications before) and advent of cheap and available compound rapid manufacturing technologies that allowed making of reasonably priced tailor made devices, human augmentation spread like wildfire across the world. And it took many by surprise. Suddenly, you had to get your lungs cut out and replaced if you wanted to keep your job as a fireman. Not everyone reacted nicely. Most people just refused to allow the invasion of their body’s integrity. Some others went for everything they could afford to put into their body. Compared to the former, they became supermen. Their capabilities were in high demand, so they quickly rose to the higher end of the socioeconomic scale. Such a high-g ascent proved to be too much for many of those and they lost touch with their former self. They began to see themselves as gods, and the rest as insects. Only a handful managed to keep their humanity intact after their transformation. They became the latest generation of edgerunners.