The Slot Machine
I decided to get another new feature.
I’ve wanted it for a while, but I was always busy with one thing or another and kept delaying it. Things have calmed down recently, though, so I jumped in and bought it…
“Get one free with a winner.”
“All right, all right, come on, seven, seven, siiiiix, whaaaaaaaaaat?!”
“Too bad.”
Yes—I can finally use these voice lines for their original purpose. I added a slot machine. The kind everyone hopes for at least once, where you get a second item for free if you line up three sevens.
Ever since introducing it, my sales have gone up almost 30 percent. This settlement has few places to go for entertainment, so even a simple slot machine is hooking in one after another.
Aside from that, a shady rumor has been going around that if you hit the jackpot, you’ll have good luck all day, and it seems like there are more people buying just to try their luck.
My aim was that they could enjoy a little more spice in their day-to-day lives, but one of my regulars has gotten more addicted than I thought he would, and today he’s buying too much again.
“Calm down—just calm down. This is the last one. I promise. The statistics so far say that water is most likely to win. Therefore, buying water is a shortcut to certain victory!”
I think that’s because you almost never buy anything but water, Pops.
He scratches his white hair madly, his eyes bloodshot and breathing ragged, putting his finger on the button and pumping himself up. It’s the old man who always comes in the morning in the group of three. His face seems incredibly sober and dignified. Now, if he’d just keep his mouth shut… What a shame.
Until now, he was usually coming here with the old lady, but ever since implementing the slot system, he comes alone, early in the morning when nobody is around, tries the slots at least six times, then goes back home.
For what it’s worth, the people who install the slot-machine function in vending machines can freely change the probabilities.
And as a piece of trivia, there’s a rumor that if you want to hit the jackpot, you should buy unpopular items.
Even though it’s a slot system, because of a law called the Premiums and Representations Act, there is a set limit to the value of premiums you can give as general prizes. The prizes are set at 2 percent of the total expected profit margin.
In other words, I can provide two prizes per every hundred purchases.
Anyway, what I’m trying to say is that it all comes down to luck. If you really want to hit the jackpot, you’ll have a certain chance if you pour all your money into everything the vending machine has in it, but… Oh, and I made my machine’s probability 2 percent. If this were Japan, the setting would keep my conscience clear.
“Everything rests on this one coin! My gambling life comes down to this one coin!”
“What are you doing, honey…?”
The old man gives a start and turns around to see the old lady waggling her cane at him with a smile on her face. She finally found him out. It was inevitable—he’s been sneaking out of the house early in the morning every day.
“I swear I thought you were back to your old habits, chasing after the girls’ bottoms again…but to think it was this disease that relapsed.”
“N-no, honey, that’s not… L-look, I was just thinking of buying you a soup, too, and— Ouch!”
As the old man makes excuses, the old lady brings her cane down onto the crown of his head. It was a pretty merciless blow. Is he all right?
“Don’t worry. If your skull splits, I’ll heal you.”
Right, the old lady can use the Blessing of Healing Light, can’t she? Then I don’t have to worry…do I?
“I swear. You haven’t forgotten what today is, have you?”
“I know, I know… Just one more.”
“Hoooneeeey.”
The old lady twists the cane and pulls on it, and I glimpse the sharp glint of a blade. That was a sword cane? The old man is wholly retreating from this peacefully smiling, sword-cane-brandishing old lady.
She has a refinement to her features; I can easily imagine her being a beauty back in the day. The smile on her face would normally be attractive, but why do I feel a chill?
“P-please stop! Your skill is no joke. Fine—I’m sorry.”
“As long as you understand. Let’s be off now.”
The old lady starts dragging him away. He casts several reluctant glances back at me. Normally, it feels like the old lady does what the old man says, but maybe he’s actually a henpecked husband.
His slot-playing was more on edge than it usually is. From the way the lady talked, it seems like there’s an important event today. Maybe he didn’t want to go and came to me to escape reality.
If I could talk, I’d offer to listen to his complaints, but vending machines can only sell things.
I provide my usual products while thinking about the old man, and the next thing I know, the settlement is dyed in scarlet. Evening… We’re inside a dungeon, but the sun still rises and sets as if we aren’t. Plus, it’s starting to feel normal to me. Maybe I’m getting used to this alien world.
Lammis seems busy today; she’s been on autopilot near the Hunters Association all day.
I’ve been hearing a lot lately about eateries and stalls feeling provoked by my vending machine products and improving their own flavors. I think the settlement getting energized is a good thing, so I don’t stock edible items from evening until night.
The people of this world seem to have an early bedtime. Even at the latest, all the stores are closed by ten PM. After that, I’ve taken to stocking warm cup ramen, cans of oden, and lately, cans of curry udon.
There’s a mode that lets me heat up frozen foods, too, but said feature would take up half the vending machine when I used it, so the problem is whether to use beverage mode for the other half or to put cup ramen there.
“Grandpa, Grandma, are you hungry? That square thing is the box that gives you lots of food, right? May isn’t hungry, but do you know if it’s good or not?”
I hear a young girl’s voice. Sounds like an indirect request. The stress she puts on not actually wanting to eat anything is kind of cute. A slightly precocious child, maybe?
“Oh, that’s right. Should we buy something? What do you want to eat, May?”
Hmm? Isn’t that the old man who frequents me? His irritable attitude from this morning is gone, replaced by a full smile as he holds the girl’s hand. Next to them are the old woman and a mature-looking lady with braids who appears to be in her twenties.
“I’m glad I took the plunge and came… I’m sorry my daughter is so undutiful.”
“For a parent, the most undutiful thing a child can do is to die before us. Anyway, you were born when we were rather old, so I think we spoiled you a lot, too.”
They step right into a heavy conversation. I know it’s rude of someone unrelated to listen in, but I can’t even plug my ears, so give me a break.
Is that woman their daughter? The old couple looks to be in their late sixties, so if their daughter is actually in her thirties, the age difference isn’t that strange.
“He was reluctant until the end, though. Deep down, he wanted to see you. He’s always so dishonest with himself.”
“I was prepared to be disowned when I eloped with him, so of course. And with someone Grandpa didn’t like. I couldn’t come back home so shamelessly after that…”
“You’re wrong—he was worried about you. Say all you want about this place, but it’s still a dungeon infested with monsters. We just had another monster attack recently, after all—our defenses are thin. And then you write to us saying you’re coming to visit whether we like it or not. He was worried sick.”
“Really?”
“Really. And because you left to come visit so suddenly, he was so stressed that his gambling addiction from so long ago came back,” explained the old woman, gazing at the old man and their granddaughter as they stood in front of me picking out something to buy.
Ah, so that’s why the old man has been playing the slots so much recently, searching for a way to beat it. It was to prepare for this day, to cling to straws, to try to hit the jackpot rumored to grant good luck for the day.
“Grandpa, what are these numbers for?”
“Ah, well. You see, when you buy something, they spin. If you get all the same number, you get another one for free. And if you win, everyone says you’ll be lucky for the whole day.”
“Wow, really? May wants to try! I’ll win it for sure!”
The girl raises her hands and bounces up and down. The old man narrows his eyes and smiles, as though his granddaughter is giving off a brilliant light. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him make such a kind face.
“Then give it a try. I’ll put in the coin, so choose whatever one you want. By the way, I recommend the water.”
“Okay, I’ll try!”
I switch a few things around to put the orange juice on the bottommost row, where she’s likely to reach.
She stands on her tiptoes, trying as hard as she can, and touches the button for the orange juice. As it drops into the compartment, the numbers on the slots begin to move.
“A seven and a seven! We just need one more, right?”
“Well, that’s the part that never works. Even I’ve gotten this far.”
“Seeeven, seeeven, seeeven, seeeven… It’s a seven! We won!”
“Wh-what?!”
A fanfare plays, and the lights indicating warm and cool items begin to light up in sequence. The girl jumps for joy as the old man stares, at a loss for words.
He probably can’t believe what he’s seeing. He’s gotten the jackpot only once after all the money he’s poured in, and yet his granddaughter won on her first try.
“May, you have to choose soon, or else you won’t have time to pick your free one.”
“Then I’ll pick this!”
The girl chooses the item next to the orange juice—the mineral water.
“This is for you, Grandpa!”
“You’re giving it to me? Thank you. But if that day of good luck only starts now, then it will be over soon. What a shame.”
“Huh? Why? I was really lucky all day, since I got to see Grandpa and Grandma! It’s not a shame!”
When the old man hears that, he looks up at the reddened skies. I have a full view of his face from my height, and I see a shining drop at the edge of his eye.
An old man, an old woman, their daughter, and their granddaughter. As they walk away in a line, their shadows stretch out far across the ground. They sway and wave, mingling with one another, until they eventually disappear.
I don’t think I need to say whether it was coincidence that May won the jackpot.
