I started the skill unlocking process for ancient weapons with great enthusiasm, but right from the start, only the lowest-tier skill scrolls appeared, and my spirit is on the verge of breaking.

  Well, maybe I just happened to hit the bad probability twice in a row, but these things tend to have streaks.

  There are streaks when things go badly, and streaks when things go well.

  If I had to say which this feels like, my gut says it's the former.

  "Is this one... 'Walking'?"

  "What kind of effect is it?"

  "It's a skill that lets you enjoy pleasant walks."

  First a pedometer, now walking - is God telling me to walk more or something?

  At first gnce, the "Walking" skill seems like it might have a minor recovery effect while moving in-game. But no, this one's clearly another joke skill.

  When I obtained and checked this skill during the game era, this was the description that appeared:

  ["Effective for stress relief. Best used in nature-rich locations."]

  That's it.

  While it technically has a recovery effect, it's for stress relief - essentially a joke skill no one would ever seriously use in-game.

  "Does it have any effects like making you walk faster or something?"

  "Nope. It's literally just for enjoying walks."

  "...Maybe it'd sell to stressed-out office workers? Though I wonder if anyone would actually waste a precious skill slot for that..."

  Nell is desperately trying to think of ways to sell it, but even during the game era, the only option was selling it to the guaranteed buyback statue of Gordo for pocket change.

  I remember it only fetched 30 zeni - barely enough to cover the cost of the transfer paper. The memory just makes me gloomier.

  But even so, I won't give up! After all, I have a trump card!!

  "...Let's do the third one."

  "Somehow I'm getting nervous too."

  "Right? I don't know why, but this excitement is actually kind of fun."

  "It's probably the unique thrill of gambling. I must admit, even I'm starting to look forward to it."

  "Really?"

  "Lady Ingrid's expression hasn't changed at all though."

  "Yes, but I am enjoying this."

  While I'm happy the girls are starting to understand the fun of gacha, I simultaneously feel a sense of crisis - if they all fall into this pit, our party is doomed.

  800,000 yen per pull... when you think about it calmly, that's pretty insane.

  At this point, I'm so timid I'm half-expecting another dud.

  Actually, isn't this how everyone feels when they think their gacha luck has turned bad?

  "Third time's the charm! Nell, I'm counting on you!"

  "Eh, me?"

  "Yeah! If anyone can break this bad streak, it's you with your insane luck!"

  If there's any randomness involved, Nell with her incredible fortune should be able to turn things around. Unless the contents were predetermined when we bought it at auction... but that can't be possible, right?

  Trying to push such thoughts aside, I slowly hand the transfer paper to my trump card, Nell.

  "Hmm..."

  "What's wrong?"

  I thought she'd do it immediately, but Nell is staring intently at the ancient weapon.

  "Probably... this one's a dud too."

  "Eh? How can you tell?"

  "I don't know. I just don't feel like it'll be good."

  What does that mean? Nell's never said anything like this before.

  "I'll do it anyway, is that okay?"

  "Yeah."

  After making that ominous prediction, Nell presses the paper against the axe-like object.

  "Yep, white."

  "White."

  "It's white."

  "Whoa, how did you know?!"

  Getting three whites in a row at 50% each time is a 12.5% chance! That's crazy! I wanted to compin about the odds, but I was more shocked by Nell's prophetic words.

  "Liberta, are you okay? You're sweating a lot."

  "Ah, no, I just saw something unbelievable. Don't worry about it."

  Normally, Nell's prediction would just be a 50/50 guess. But there was something unnervingly certain in her tone.

  "Hey Nell, how did you know it would be white?"

  "Really, it was just a feeling."

  In the game, money came easily and we spent it like water, but here in reality, that money is hard-earned living expenses.

  At this point, we've burned through about 24,000 zeni - 2.4 million yen.

  If you bought lottery tickets in real life and got nothing worthwhile, you'd feel chills down your spine. But right now, what terrifies me is Nell's unnaturally sharp intuition as she holds the scroll with a troubled expression.

  Wait a minute.

  If Nell's usual incredible luck works by probabilistically attracting good outcomes, then it wouldn't make sense unless the contents were undetermined - a Schr?dinger's cat situation.

  Could it be that the ancient weapons' skills are predetermined when they drop?

  To properly test this, we'd need not hundreds but thousands, maybe tens of thousands of ancient weapons for data. But as a hypothesis, it's pusible.

  Is that why Nell reacted negatively? Though the fact she can sense "duds" is terrifying in itself. Just coming up with this hypothesis makes me fear how powerful Nell's luck truly is.

  "...Amina, has Nell always been like this?"

  "Hmm, she's always been lucky, but I feel like it's been more extreme tely."

  "I see."

  So Nell's insane luck is the natural enemy of desire sensors?

  If true, for any pyer rolling gacha or farming drops, Nell would be like a goddess.

  FBO was a game where even top pyers often ran out of money - an environment where you could never have enough.

  The main reason was losing probability battles in the many RNG systems, leading to bankruptcy.

  If Nell's intuition and luck can mitigate that, it's nothing short of revolutionary.

  "By the way, what was the third skill? We didn't check."

  "'Good Sleep' skill. Is it any good?"

  "Ah... well, it's usable depending on how you look at it."

  The third result was another mediocre skill.

  From the sword-like object: Pedometer.From the bow-like object: Walking.And from the third axe-like object: Good Sleep.

  Yeah, these definitely belonged to the same person. Someone who carried a bow while walking, checked their steps with a sword, and used an axe as a hugging pillow to sleep.

  Just your average dangerous individual.

  "What does the skill do?"

  "It prevents sleep disturbances - things like noise, bad smells, insomnia, etc. At higher levels, it guarantees quality sleep."

  This "Good Sleep" skill from some dangerous ancient person's equipment was another skill that saw little use in-game.

  While you could sleep at inns to recover, you were rarely disturbed. Even insomniacs in real life could sleep in-game.

  My expnation comes from fvor text - in practice, sleeping in-game triggered an automatic logout process. If you fell asleep IRL ("sleep-crashing"), you'd just log out on the spot.

  So its actual effects remain hypothetical, with some pyers ciming it helped them "sleep-crash cleanly." It's somewhat of an enigma.

  "Sounds like a good skill for people who struggle to sleep."

  "Well, yeah. Useless in combat but helpful for daily life."

  "Returning soldiers with trauma might appreciate it."

  "Oh! There's someone in our neighborhood who can't sleep at night."

  "Maybe we could sell it to them. Or give it free depending on their condition."

  Maybe we could bundle the pedometer and walking skills as a "health set"? They're just taking up space in our drawers otherwise.

  "Alright, let's do the fourth one. The weapons were bad, but maybe armor will change our luck."

  "I've never known anyone who said that and had it work out..."

  "Me neither."

  "...I shall refrain from comment."

  "Ingrid, not saying anything is saying something!!"

  I'm aware I'm getting reckless after so many losses, but let's hit something big here!

  The word "microtransactions" fshes in my mind, but when your luck turns, it turns!

  Normal mobile games might cost a few hundred yen per pull, but this is 800,000 yen per attempt with the same odds.

  You've got to psych yourself up to face such terrible game design.

  As the saying goes, "Laugh and good luck will come" - rare drops don't come to the faint-hearted.

  "Which is why I'm asking you again, Nell!!"

  Once more, I turn to Nell.

  "Alright. This time I feel like it might be good."

  "Eh? You can tell?"

  "Yes! This one feels different!"

  Does Nell have some kind of scan ability? Her demeanor completely changed as she confidently holds the transfer paper before the helmet-like object and presses it against it.

  "It's red!!"

  "Wait, there really are different colored lights?"

  "Does that mean..."

  "No way!!"

  After beating the 12.5% odds of three whites in a row, we finally see a different color - but what shocks me more is Nell's intuition.

  The red light slowly seeps into the transfer paper, creating a skill scroll. Red light means we hit the 15% probability.

  "Hey! Hey! This is a good skill, right?!"

  If the previous scrolls were Common or Uncommon, this one's like an SR (Super Rare).

  For reference: Blue would be R (Rare), gold SSR (Special Super Rare), and rainbow LR (Legendary Rare).

  Though these are just pyer-made terms, not official rankings.

  "So? So? What skill did we get?"

  Amina runs over to Nell, who's jumping for joy at the light.

  "Red means it's better than white, right?"

  "According to Liberta's expnation, it's the third rarest tier, so we can reasonably expect something good."

  As I approach the excited pair to check the skill, Amina turns to Ingrid to confirm how significant this probability is.

  Adjusting her gsses with a kira, Ingrid - while expressionless - watches me with expectant eyes.

  "Okay, okay, I'll check what skill we got, calm down."

  An SR-tier red scroll could very well contain something useful for our current needs.

  Let's see what we got...

  "Ahh..."

  I can't help but let out a disappointed sigh.

  "That reaction... is it bad?"

  "No, as far as rarity goes, it's a hit. A really good one actually."

  "But Liberta, you look really disappointed."

  Now that I think about it, this was always a possibility.

  "Well... it's just not a skill we'll use. It's not combat-reted but a production skill."

  "Production skill?"

  "It's called 'Hammer Artisan' - a bcksmithing skill."

  I'd assumed rare skills would be combat-reted, but production skills exist in equal measure.

  Including support skills, the probabilities are roughly divided into thirds: 30%+ each for combat, production, and support skills.

  "This is separate from regur bcksmithing - it provides bonuses to hammer-reted tasks. Extremely valuable for smelting and such. Having this or not makes a huge difference in equipment quality."

  "Wow, sounds amazing."

  "But none of us are bcksmiths. Should we give it to Ganji? He always makes our weapons."

  "That's an option. But this skill scroll is worth at least 40,000 zeni."

  And so, within that 30% probability, we lost the roll and got a production skill we can't use.

  "40,000 zeni? That's more than we've spent so far!"

  "Exactly. For aspiring bcksmiths, it's a must-have. The price is justified - might even sell for more."

  During the game era, the market price was around 40,000 zeni, and it circuted fairly among pyers, so that's a conservative estimate.

  At least we've recouped our losses.

  "We can't just give this away for free, right?"

  "No way! Absolutely not!"

  Even without immediate use, its value makes Nell cross her arms in an X gesture, firmly against giving it away.

  I'm not particurly eager to hand it over either.

  "But realistically, can Ganji afford to buy it? His business doesn't seem prosperous enough."

  "...True. His shop didn't look that busy."

  "He might insist on buying it even if it bankrupts him."

  Ganji only came to mind because he's our acquaintance who could use it and makes our weapons.

  "Well, we can decide how to use this scroll ter. Let's do the st one."

  With no objections, we agree to store the scroll for now as I stand before the final shield-like object with transfer paper in hand.

  After white, white, white, then skipping two tiers to red, surely the fifth will be...!

  "Nell, I'm counting on you!!"

  "Okay, but..."

  Huh? Where's the energy from before?

  Despite my faint hopes as I hand it to her, Nell seems unenthused. Meaning no guaranteed good outcome this time.

  "Yep, white."

  "White."

  "White."

  "I knew it. I knew it!!"

  The desire sensor was working perfectly all along.

  Our experiment suggests that for ancient weapon skills, Nell's dropped items might be better than auctioned ones.

  Which means... a new farming route for ancient weapons is forming in my mind.