The story takes place in an alternative Japan, where nobility still holds a notable status in society. Our protagonist, Ichijouji Reina, is a daughter of a duke, whom she deeply hates. Her mother, the only person she ever cared for, is long dead, and she spends most of her time alone in the mansion with her butler. At one time, she discovers new VRMMO game called "Karma Story Online", or KSO. This game has a karma system built around decisions players make while they play it. If you complete quests, kill NPCs or players, cause war, etc., your character will get or lose karma points. The game has 3 factions you can be member of depending on your karma points:
Order - positive,
Neutral - neutral,
Chaos - negative karma.
Reina has found this game as a perfect opportunity to get rid of her stress from the real world, where she is seen as a tool for her father. After joining the game, she immediately kills a soldier NPC that helps new players, cause havoc by slaughtering many innocent newbies and civillians, thus marking the start of her adventure as a member of Chaos in order to have "fun".
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Genocide Online provides examples of:
- Cast from Hit Points: "Oath" boosts player's stats significantly, but it also drains your HP every second, so it must be used wisely.
- Blended Family Drama: Some parts of the plot involve Komari and Seigi trying to bond with Reina, their step-sister, despite the fact that she hates them.
- Deadly Euphemism: Rena frequently uses word "play" when it comes to killing and wreak havoc in gerenal. Justified, since it IS a game.
- Early Game Hell: After Rena caused slaughter in the City of Beginners and overthrown it's rulers, it became harder for new players to develop quickly. Soldier NPC, which was answering the questions about the game, is dead, most of the experienced players no longer play on this starting location, so you have to learn everything on your own, unless you have made up with a friend that is a pro player in advance, like it happened with Komari and Seigi.
- Easter Egg: Yuu is a member of verification team, which lets him use skills that do not fit the game at all, like Wall from the World and Toxic Replies.
- False Flag Operation: In order to cause war between Kingdom of Hermagne and Bourfoin Empire, Rena decided to mess with corpses of a squad, which commander is an Emperor's daughter, so it seemed like daughter was raped by the soldiers of Hermagne by spilling white magic fluid on her body. After she sends a message to the Emperor about this act in the name of the Princess, he was outraged and immediately started a total war against Kingdom.
- Gorn: Usually what happens when Rena fights a large group of people weaker than her. The fact that the game has realistic option doesn't help.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: When Belzenstock's lord let Rena sign the contract backed by God, he thought she will free the slaves and force him to give her his money, since he could be getting rich again later and take revenge. Instead of that, Rena ordered him to walk to the main square, get naked in front of the slaves and beg them for mercy. Also he cannot speak human language. All of this caused slaves to hate him even more, so he won't get redemption and lose his status as noble forever.
- Misplaced Retribution: Reina can't help but hate Komari and Seigi for being kids of father's new wife. Because that hate isn't logical, Komari tries to сhum up with her despite all of this.
- Mutual Disadvantage: Each faction gives buffs and debuffs against opposing faction members:
- Order deals and receives bigger damage to Chaos, and vice versa.
- Neutral deals and receives bigger damage to both Chaos and Order.
- Loophole Abuse: In order to avoid restriction to buy from stores in City of Beginners, Reina decided to overthrow the ruling family of the city that imposed it, and forced her people instead.
- Phlebotinum-Handling Requirements: Priest's Necklace, which Rena got after killing him, has lower stats than a gift from NPC in Belzenstock, even though it's a copy of other necklace and Priest's Necklace gives huge buffs to Order. Since Rena is a member of Chaos, she cannot benefit from those buffs, so she happily exchanged it.
- Port Town: Belzenstock is a town that relies on a slave work and it's a port town.
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Squick: The way Tarou was born. Even Eren, bandit in the past, had to look away. - The Reveal: Karma Story Online is not just a videogame, it's a project of Ichijou Naoshi to gain data about human behaviour through safe environment in order to better advance his interests in congress.
- Price on Their Head: Rena got one after slaughter in the City of Beginners and it keeps increasing across the story
- Valentine's Day Episode: Valentine Special covers Mai making chocolate for Yuuki and Rena, who gives it to Masaki, much to his embarassment.
- Violence Really Is the Answer: As Blossom explained to Rena's brother and sister, in order to grow fast in this game, you have to kill players, especially of higher level, since they give a lot of XP. You can try being peaceful, but the progress will be much slower.
- Vulnerable Civilians: Every NPC in KSO can be killed with no exceptions. You will get punished for killing them by losing karma and possibly even be restricted from buying in stores in a city where you killed it, and have a price tag on you.
- World War Whatever: As we learn from Rena's father Naoshi, the story takes place after World War IV, consequences of which he wants to resolve by his bill to the government. Since that bill relies on long term profits instead of short, it is denied by most of the votes.
