Lucky box? Caesar had never heard of that kind of thing. From context, it seemed like it was a box that tested a person's luck. But how would this work in his mind?
[Lucky box menu opened!]
[ 10 loot boxes obtained!]
[Each box contains 1 item]
[80% chance of common item spawning]
[15% chance of rare item spawning]
[4.995% chance of exquisite item spawning]
[0.005% chance of Legendary item spawning]
[Open? Y/N]
Filled with curiosity, Caesar picked the 'yes' option, and immediately, a commemorative and happy jingle sounded on his mind. It felt like he was right next to a musical band in a merry festival.
Then, Caesar saw a huge circle appear in his vision. The circle had 4 different sections. The biggest section was named common, which was gray in color. The second section was rare, with a blue color, the exquisite had a violet color. The gold legendary section was so small that Caesar could barely see it.
Then, the wheel started to spin and spin until it started to slow down and stop at the gray color. He got a common item.
[Black Leather Jacket obtained!]
[Claim Y/N]
[If not claimed, the item will be stored in a temporary spatial storage. If not claimed after 24 hours, the item will disappear forever.]
[Note: Cannot put anything inside the spatial storage. This is only for the purposes of loot boxes. Spatial storages can be obtained through loot boxes.]
Caesar did not claim the item for now. His excitement was overflowing so much that he wanted to open more and more loot boxes. He never knew gambling was this much fun.
After that, the wheel started to spin again.
[Chicken Tofu soup recipe obtained!]
And again.
[Scrap metal (1 kg) obtained!]
[Headache relief pill obtained!]
[...]
Caesar continued to get common items in his lucky box. Most of them contained everyday items that had no real value and could be easily bought with money.
[Water bottle (200 mL) obtained!]
That was the ninth spin on the wheel with no luck getting items above the common rank. Was his luck really that bad? He was hoping for a rare item at the least, seeing that it had a 15% chance of occurring.
Luck was one of the things Caesar hated since he could not control them in any way shape or form. With gambling in real life, he could always count the cards or cheat in some way, but with this, it was purely luck.
Caesar shook his head as he saw the wheel spin for the last time. He held his breath and hoped that his luck would finally turn for the better.
The wheel spun and slowed down after a few revolutions, but it was still on the common section. The wheel continued to spin only through the remaining inertia and Caesar's eyes opened wide as it passed the gray area as it was slowing down. He finally got an item above the common rank.
The wheel continued in the rare area until almost stopping at the very edge of the exquisite item. It stopped directly in the middle of the two areas. Caesar didn't know what rank he got.
[Congratulations. Exquisite item obtained!]
[Miracle Drug*: Xyra's Mythical Lightning obtained!]
[Description:]
[User who consumes this drug will obtain Xyra's tyrannical lighting. Xyra lived in the mythical times, and in her prime, dominated the heavenly space with her fast and all-encompassing lightning.]
[Note: Despite its name, the Miracle drug is no gift. According to ancient archives, the real names of Miracle drugs were called Limit Curses.]
[Warning! Do not consume for yourself.]
[Side effects:]
[Heaven's Punishment. It will be impossible to surpass the human limit.]
Caesar frowned as he read the description of the Miracle drug. He knew that consuming it would bring miraculous changes to a person by giving them magic and super powers. Everyone wanted to obtain one for themselves, no exceptions.
But Caesar didn't hear anything about Heaven's Punishment. If this was true, there would be at least some rumors about this effect of the Miracle drug. There was no way everyone would happily consume a Miracle drug knowing of this curse.
This was a dealbreaker.
He was planning on obtaining a Miracle drug for himself at some point. And now that one was handed to him for free, he could not be more happy.
But the curse was something he cannot have. The curse limits you to never being able to surpass being a human.
You can think of this another way. This means that there is a level above being human; he could surpass humans and become a god or a myth.
That possibility was now ingrained into his heart. He would not sacrifice that future just to gain some power. But, it was also impossible to get to that future without obtaining power. It was a paradox.
So, Caesar concluded that there must be some way to obtain power without him consuming a Miracle drug.
But that didn't mean that this Miracle drug was useless. It would not have been in the loot box to begin with, much less in the Exquisite rank, if he could not benefit from it in some way.
And there was no way that Caesar would give this Miracle drug away for free to someone else. He was planning on researching more to find out if there was some way to obtain this power without getting Heaven's punishment.
Where better to get that information than the black market.
—----------------------------
Early in the morning, Caesar returned back to the orphanage after retrieving 5 more kilograms of Joy from the underground laboratory.
He immediately came to Rola. She was busy replanning their map on where to sell this new batch of Joy. She made sure not to hit the same place as yesterday for precaution.
"Do you know what this is?" Caesar said, holding a pill that was colored black with some white marbling design. It was half the size of his pinky, too big to be a normal medicine pill.
Rola's eyes went wide. She immediately recognized it as she saw it multiple times displayed at the black market but couldn't purchase one. The color was different and the shape was more perfect, but it had the same general form as the Miracle Drug.
"Where did you get that Miracle drug?!"
Caesar nodded in his head. It looked like Rola could see the Miracle drug on his hands. This proves that the items he got from the loot boxes were real.
Yesterday, he wondered if the items were just a figment of his imagination. He could touch it, smell it, and it could interact with other objects, but he couldn't be sure if that was just his mind playing tricks on him.
Now that it was proven to be real, there was one thing for certain. Caesar's 'schizophrenia' was not a disease at all. A person with that disease would not be able to pull out an object out of thin air.
It must be something else, something out of the realm of logic and physics. Caesar had no clues as to where this 'thing' came from or where he got it, nor did he care. It was helping him achieve his goals, and that was all that mattered.
"Introduce me to the black market, will you?"
Rola was still in a state of shock seeing the Miracle drug in Caesar's hands, so she did not answer him for a long time. Once she composed herself, she asked him.
"Are you going to sell that?!"
"No. I just need some information."
—------------------------------------
Silas dropped Caesar off at the slums where garbage and squatters littered the streets.
Caesar looked at the normal wooden door in front of him. And just like Rola instructed, Caesar knocked at the door five times in very different and specific order.
Knock….knock..knock.knock….knock
Caesar did not have to wait long as the door opened and a lovely old lady with a bright smile greeted him.
"What brings you here, young fella?"
Ordinary people would have dismissed her to be a simple old lady not connected to such a shady business like the black market. Those who didn't know how to get in would have thought that they were in the wrong location.
"I came here because the weather was as sunny as your face,"
The old woman smiled and her cheeks blushed red as she heard Caesar's compliment. The passerby would have no idea that her smile was fake and this was merely the passcode to get in.
The old woman's eyes shone an imperceptible light as she observed Caesar. This didn't take long as she quickly replied to Caesar.
"Oh my! The young'uns these days are so bold! Come in for some tea," she said as she turned around and walked inside. Her smile faded as soon as her face was turned away.
Caesar followed her inside and closed the door behind him. The room was dark with no light shining inside. He saw the old woman's figure disappear into the darkness.
CLICK
The door behind him locked shut and Caesar heard five footsteps encircling him. Rola's words of warning echoed in his mind.
'I suggest you don't go there, but if you do, you'll surely get ambushed. If they do, do not ever fight back. Or else you'll suffer a fate worse than death.'
Caesar smiled as he waved away her words. He looked around casually and said,
"Come all at once, bitches."