What Will the Result Be?

After subtracting the seven million Rena already spent, I entrusted forty-three million Rena to Lucy.

The expected value of Mythic-grade gear sat at fifty million Rena, after all.

If Lucy could pull it off with this much, I would be over the moon.

"Lucy, please!"

"Lucy unnie, do it!"

Every single employee was raid-watching Lucy's stream, hands clasped in prayer. This was money they had all earned by working themselves half to death. If those funds vanished into some formless mist without producing a single scrap of value, the mental damage would be catastrophic.

Oh Yeong-jun, who had already bombed his own pulls, had apparently ranted like a madman from the summit of Hannam Peak before throwing himself off in a suicide dive. Sure, it had been kayfabe for the stream, pure WWE theatrics—but there had to be a real core of despair mixed in. Amassing that kind of fortune meant suppressing ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠every urge to go out and play just so you could grind nonstop. Watching it evaporate in an instant would leave anyone hollow.

And then there was the disappointed fandom atmosphere to consider. That part left me feeling guilty. Putting Lucy forward as our representative for something this critical meant that, depending on the outcome, she might end up catching heat from the fans.

Roughly the kind of chat spam I was expecting. But this time, even I had no choice. The entire content was pure luck, and Lucy had posted the best score in the representative selection through the Book of Fortune.

"Alright. Going in."

She spent the remaining forty-three million Rena on additional Fortune Coin Fragment pulls. Normally, burning fifty million Rena was said to yield somewhere between fifteen and eighteen complete Fortune Coins. Sometimes the letters clustered on certain alphabets and you came up short, but in those cases you could just barter fragments with other streamers until the numbers lined up.

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

"Pleeeeease!"

Everyone locked onto the log window on Lucy's stream. Every time a string of failure messages scrolled past, sighs erupted; every time a Fortune Coin Fragment dropped, cheers exploded. Riding that roller coaster of hope and despair made my heart clench. So this was the true flavor of gambling?

About ten minutes later, the stretch of time that had felt eternal finally ended. Chat was already losing its mind. Some viewers had been tallying the fragment counts live in Notepad and were spoiling the totals early, while the rest swung wildly between optimism and doom. Even Lucy seemed tense; she let out a short breath.

Then came the results check.

Wait… averaging that out gave only fourteen complete Fortune Coins? The absolute worst data from anyone who had attempted Mythic gear pulls so far was fifteen.

At the dismal result, Lucy's face—and the faces of every employee including me—went rigid. But only for a moment.

"It's fine, it's fine. The essence synthesis is what really matters anyway. Let's just call this the bad-luck tax."

"Y-yeah. Something huge is definitely going to hit on the synthesis."

"Mayo believes in Lucy unnie, geosida."

You couldn't dump the entire burden on one person. Moments like this were exactly when mental management mattered most. Separately from that, though, Lucy's chat was already flooding with doomsaying and negative predictions. Half of those viewers were probably rival company fans, pretending not to gloat while secretly celebrating the bad pull.

Using my manager privileges on Lucy's stream, I did everything I could to keep the chat atmosphere under control.

"Let's just craft five for now."

Mayo had farmed more than enough materials, so converting complete Fortune Coins into essences took no time at all. Five gray-tinged Witherite Essences sat ready. Now came the most critical final gamble of all, which meant we needed a change of venue.

"Where should we do it?"

Enhancement and synthesis in games always came wrapped in superstition. For that reason, the old Oh-ha Company building—where Rim-ani had succeeded on her fourth try—had already earned a reputation as a synthesis hotspot. Conversely, the summit of Hannam Peak, where Akatsuki had suffered their crushing failure, was considered the absolute worst place possible.

"Sky Island, maybe?"

"Or the Underground Mega Farm?"

Opinions flew back and forth among the staff until, inevitably, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠every gaze settled on me as the boss. I wanted to keep believing in Lucy to the very end.

"Wherever Lucy unnie feels most comfortable."

After a brief moment of thought, Lucy chose her own house in V-City. Most streamers would have picked a famous landmark or some company-symbolic location for the spectacle. The choice felt so perfectly Lucy that I couldn't help smiling as we all headed back to V-City.

On the way, an uninvited guest crashed the party.

"Ahaha, so you already bombed the Fortune Coin Fragment pulls? Not easy, right? Not easy at all."

It was Oh Yeong-jun, who—after cleanly torching forty million Rena—had reportedly gone a little unhinged. Apparently determined that he couldn't be the only one to fail, he now dropped whatever he was doing the second a cuckoo call went out about another Mythic gear attempt and came sprinting over. The absurd behavior had somehow become wildly popular with the floating audience. Mythic gear was currently the hottest topic in all of Rena World, and being able to watch the attempts live with his delicious reactions had created its own demand.

"Huh? Not Seo-a—Lucy-nim's doing the pull?"

He had been about to raid my stream, spotted Lucy's feed instead, and immediately clocked the situation. By then we were filing one by one into Lucy's house. The interior was simple and neat, exactly the kind of design that reflected her personality.

"Come on, this place? Seriously? This is totally dead air. How about I recommend a better spot? Top of Hannam Peak, right as night falls, challenging it under the moonlight. Huh? How cinematic would that look?"

"Yeah~ we all know that's the forty-million-Rena dump site."

His constant clowning was getting on my nerves, so I fired back one line and he nearly had a seizure. Fair enough—for a small outfit like Akatsuki, forty million Rena was no joke. The mental scars had to run deep.

"Got it, so if you're just here to watch, keep it quiet. Okay? Before my real personality comes out."

But did any of that matter right now? My oshi Lucy stood at a critical crossroads. Protecting her mental state was the top priority.

"Yes ma'am. I'll be quiet."

The moment I came on strong, whatever trauma he had accumulated from past encounters kicked in and Oh Yeong-jun instantly deflated.

I flipped off the troll chats with a raised middle finger, then we all formed a circle around Lucy. Oh Yeong-jun's shameless decision to quietly insert himself into the ring was a little ridiculous, but with over seven thousand viewers currently in his stream, being petty about it wasn't an option.

"If I can offer one tip as a senior, this is pure momentum. Don't hesitate and click one at a time—machine-gun the attempts as fast as you can. Somewhere in the middle the feeling will hit you. Ah! It's about to drop any second now."

"So does Akatsuki actually have any Mythic gear, then?"

"……"

The brutal fact-check crumpled Oh Yeong-jun all over again. We left him behind and focused on Lucy's stream.

"Can I… really do this?"

The poor fragment haul had clearly tanked her confidence. We each cheered her on in our own way.

"You've got this, Lucy. Even if you bomb this one, you won't get stuck with a nickname like 'Fail-Fail'."

"……"

Self-deprecating encouragement to start.

"It's the Mythic gear Mayo's gonna use, so pull carefully, geosida. As long as you get it before pity, Mayo will let it slide, geosida."

Someone was already acting like the future owner.

"If it fails, we can just recover everything together on the death double-shift."

Na-ro-si delivered the line in her usual flat tone, radiating the quiet confidence that such a thing was entirely doable. Han A-yeon and Miho poured every ounce of energy they had into cheering Lucy on as well.

"Being last is a little embarrassing. Even if you fail, none of it's on you, so don't feel pressured. I was originally going to do it myself, but I'm just not confident with gacha stuff like this. But if the pressure's really too much, someone else can—"

"No. It's okay. I'll do it."

That was a rare, direct expression of will from Lucy. With a resolute face she pulled out the smithing table, slotted the Netherite Ingot and Witherite Essence into their designated spots, and set her hands.

"Alright… here I go."

There was no hesitation left. In a solemn voice she clicked the mouse.

Sparkling effects flooded the entire screen.

And the result?