Chapter 48 - Millionaire Card
Translator: Lav
Editor: Levs
Although its sentence was like a tongue twister, but Shi Lei quickly understood what the Scepter meant.
“Are you saying that I have another two chances?! As in, my chance to make a draw increased by one? No, originally, I would have two chances, but one have to wait till I did that sort of thing with Yiyi. Then, my draws will double, which means I’ll have four chances at it. Today was only twice, but after I do it with Yiyi, I would earn another two chances.”
The Scepter roared: “Stop daydreaming!”
Shi Lei frowned and said: “You are too rude; I don’t think there is anything wrong with my way of calculating that!”
“Don’t even think……” The Scepter stopped in the middle of its sentence and a light ‘eh’ escaped from it.
Although it was rather light, but Shi Lei caught it sharly.
“What are you ‘eh’-ing at?” Shi Lei asked.
The Scepter ignored him and remained silent. The disk for the draws already disappeared, even the Scepter on the screen vanished. All there was left a night sky like whirlpool.
“Hey! Why did you disappear? Stop joking around, hurry up and come out!”
“Does this mean I can quit?! If you disappeared, I would no longer need to play this life-risking game, right?”
“Hey, where did you go? Aiya, don't tell me you were killed due to violations against the rules?”
Shi Lei talked to himself for a while but the screen had no other reactions.
“If you don’t come back, I’m really leaving! I’m ejecting the card!” As Shi Lei saw that it still didn’t have any reactions, he pressed the ‘eject’ button. But the black card did not appear in the card slot, but the gold dot finally appeared in the whirlpool on the screen.
The ball of light grew bigger and finally formed the complete shape of the Scepter.
“You are finally back. Did some accidents that you can’t control happen? Such as I can quit this game of spending money?”
“You are daydreaming!” From the Scepter’s voice, it seemed rather depressed.
But in reality, Shi Lei knew that it was impossible and he just randomly thought of that.
“Then what’s the situation, tell me!”
The Scepter said disheartenedly: “You are right. Your chances will increase to four times. The doubling of your reward is only targeted to all the chances you have now. Although you haven’t earned the next chance to make a draw, but it’s already listed down. You can draw twice today and after you complete the agreement on yourself, you can have another two draws.”
Shi Lei laughed happily as he finally knew the reason behind the Scepter’s depression.
And according to the Scepter’s reaction, Shi Lei was further assured that the Scepter was simply the communicator for the black card.
Combining everything and Shi Lei could come to a truth that’s extremely close to the fact: it is highly possible that the black card was a technological product which came from another planet in the universe. Or, it itself is a system which possessed supernatural powers and the Scepter acted as the butler of the system. The system itself has its entity, and its only acting according to a set of rules. This was like a computer software; when the software was successfully written, it will operate according to what it was appointed to do. The Scepter was the artificial part of it as it was in charge of communicating between the employer and the employee, as well as following all the orders of the black card. But the Scepter itself does not have the authority to create orders.
To be frank, the black card’s existence was that of something that possessed mystical powers, equivalent to a tool, except that it had the ability of binding the employee forcefully.
Since it was a tool, in the end, it was still a service to the host. If he could use it well, he could be extremely successful. But if he didn’t know how to use it well, he would lose his life.
This discovery, or rather, this guess, finally made Shi Lei face the black card’s peculiarities. Of course, this was a thought on his side only. Whether the fact was like that, Shi Lei was not too sure. But at least in a stage like this, Shi Lei’s guess was not too far off from the correct answer.
Shi Lei rubbed his temples and thought that the most annoying part of the black card was not that he would be killed for violating the rules, but rather, this damned Scepter.
Because the existence of an artificial intelligence, which is the Scepter, an invisible barrier rose between Shi Lei and the black card and prevented Shi Lei from understanding all the rules and functions of the black card. Shi Lei didn't know what the Scepter’s purpose was, but obviously if the Scepter didn’t exist, Shi Lei should’ve known about all the rules of the black card at the very beginning. He would most likely give up this wealth that was within his grasp as his fate of possibly getting killed was hidden behind the surface of the wealth.
But it was too late as Shi Lei had no way of breaking the binding between him and the black card, he could only follow the black card’s rules and advance forward.
Shi Lei could almost see that in the future, he would be constantly trying to outwit the Scepter in order to know about the black card’s functions and rules as quickly as possible, especially the rules. Shi Lei could only guarantee his safety to its max after familiarizing with everything about the black card’s rules.
“Stop staring into space, hurry up and make the draw.” The Scepter was getting impatient.
Shi Lei snapped back to reality and looked to the disk that was still in front of him. He took a deep breath and pressed the button down.
The disk did not even have a speed up process. From motionless to spinning crazily, it seemed to all happen in an instant.
Shi Lei breathed and pressed down the button again. The spinning of the needle gradually slowed down and Shi Lei could see where the needle was pointing towards……
Finally, the pointers slid across the surface of the disk and stopped.
The grid in which the needle pointed towards did not have any words but a golden thumb and it was pointing upwards proudly. Although it was just an image, but Shi Lei could feel the bright golden beam it emitted.
“Eh……”
Shi Lei heard a small exclamation of the Scepter’s asexual voice again. Although he didn’t know the meaning behind the golden thumb, but Shi Lei knew that luck was on his side and he drew a rather good award.
There was another chance. Shi Lei didn’t even bother to ask the Scepter what the golden thumb meant, he pressed the button down again without hesitation and said at the same time: “Second draw.”
The disk began to spin at a speed that was impossible for human eyes to catch. Shi Lei smashed down the button and the disk’s spinning speed decelerated……
This time, the needle finally pointed towards something Shi Lei could understand. It said ‘millionaire card’ and as the pointer completely stopped, a ‘+3’ appeared on top of ‘millionaire card’.
As the symbol rose, its effect seemed to be much better than the 3D in the cinemas. Shi Lei even thought that he could reach out and touch the ‘+3’ on the screen.
“Is this the luck beginners should have?” The Scepter seemed to find a sense of balance from this draw and its tone was no longer enigmatic.
From its tone of voice, Shi Lei could guess that although this ‘millionaire card’ sounded awesome, but in reality, it was a rather bad award.
“What are the meanings to these two awards?” Shi Lei composed himself and asked.
The Scepter seemed to be in disdain and he snorted to Shi Lei’s question: “Stupid human, do you really need me to explain such a simple thing to you?”
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