116: Torture

[ Ding! ]

[ Today's Intelligence (Level 2): Inside the discarded box at the Guanlong South Road lottery station, there is a scratch-off lottery ticket worth 50,000 RMB. Because the winner did not notice, it was discarded as a non-winning scratch-off lottery ticket, and currently, this scratch-off lottery ticket has not yet been cashed. ]

[ hidden easter egg (Attribute Reward): Successfully obtain the winning scratch-off lottery ticket from the lottery station, the Host can receive two points of [Charm] as a reward. ]

"Why is it [Charm] again? This thing doesn't seem to be of any use."

The [hidden easter egg] had given him [Charm] attribute rewards twice in a row, making Ye Su suspect that the system was looking down on his Charm.

Fortunately, the intelligence refreshed today was the kind Ye Su liked best—lottery intelligence that allowed him to get money directly, which made him forgive the system for its suspected passive-aggressive behavior.

Unlike the scratch-off lottery tickets he had to buy and scratch himself previously, the intelligence given to him this time was about a scratch-off lottery ticket that had already been discarded.

"Some people buy scratch-off lottery tickets their whole lives and never win the big prize, while some people win the big prize but, because they didn't see it, casually discard the scratch-off lottery ticket. Sure enough, people without good fortune just don't have it."

Since the opportunity was given, and the winner was incompetent, Ye Su naturally had to reluctantly help him retrieve the scratch-off lottery ticket.

...

Early Wednesday morning, Ye Su drove his car to the front of the lottery station on Guanlong South Road.

The timing was just right; the lottery station had already opened, but customers had not yet started coming to make their fortunes.

The owner was a middle-aged man. Seeing Ye Su enter, he immediately stood up to welcome him: "Hello, are you here to buy lottery tickets?"

Just as Ye Su was parking, the owner had sharp-eyed spotted that Ye Su was driving an Audi.

Coupled with Ye Su's attire and appearance, the owner felt that a big business deal had arrived.

"Hello." Ye Su politely greeted the owner: "I would like to ask, do you have any scratch-off lottery tickets here that others have already scratched?"

"Yes."

The owner kicked the cardboard box at his feet, but since Ye Su was outside the counter, he could hear the sound but couldn't see the cardboard box containing the scratch-off lottery tickets.

However, the light from the system's prompt told Ye Su that the scratch-off lottery ticket worth 50,000 was inside the box the owner had kicked.

"What do you want these scratch-off lottery tickets for?"

"It's like this, our school is preparing to hold an art creation competition, and I plan to buy some discarded scratch-off lottery tickets to take back and make into a collage for the competition."

"Oh, so you're into art." The owner seemed to understand: "Just like those things on mobile phones where they make clothes out of newspapers, right?"

"Something like that."

The owner was originally a bit surprised that Ye Su was a student but could drive an Audi.

Once he heard that the other person was studying art, the owner felt it was reasonable.

Those who study art and have money at home, it's not surprising that they can drive an Audi while studying.

Sigh, truly, comparing people to people, it makes one want to die.

If you are born well, you can drive an Audi while studying, unlike himself, middle-aged and still driving that old Nissan.

While sighing inwardly, the owner also lifted the cardboard box at his feet onto the counter:

"These are all scratch-off lottery tickets that others have scratched. They were originally going to be sold as waste. You can take as many as you want, and I'll estimate the price."

"Can you give them all to me? I'm afraid there won't be enough later."

"Of course you can." The owner weighed the cardboard box again: "There's at least several pounds here, I'll sell it to you for twenty yuan."

This price was definitely more expensive than selling it directly as waste, but Ye Su didn't haggle: "Okay, thank you, boss."

After scanning the payment, Ye Su carried the large box of discarded scratch-off lottery tickets to his car and returned to his rental apartment.

Sitting directly on the floor, back against the sofa, with the cardboard box between his legs, Ye Su began to search for the scratch-off lottery ticket worth 50,000.

"Ah—"

Ye Su still underestimated the difficulty of finding the winning scratch-off lottery ticket.

A large box of scratch-off lottery tickets, at least over a thousand, and Ye Su checked one every ten to thirty seconds, while also having to confirm the winning rules.

An hour later, only a small portion of the scratch-off lottery tickets in the box had been checked.

"No wonder the lottery station owner didn't have the idea of checking the scratch-off lottery tickets for any omissions himself, selling me the whole box so readily!"

Ye Su rubbed his sore eyes: "Turns out this work is so torturous. Even if I knew there were a few scratch-off lottery tickets worth a few dozen yuan inside, it wouldn't be enough to pay for the labor of finding them!"

When the intelligence refreshed in the early morning, Ye Su was still happy that another piece of intelligence had arrived that could get him money directly and was also very easy.

Now it seems he was happy too early.

"I thought I could finish dealing with the three things in the room today. At this rate, I guess there won't be enough time."

Getting up to stretch and drinking a glass of water, Ye Su continued to bury himself in the work.

Working until twelve o'clock, seeing that nearly half of the scratch-off lottery tickets in the box had been checked, yet the scratch-off lottery ticket worth 50,000 had still not been found, Ye Su's brain was already muddled, and he felt as if a large pile of numbers was circling around him.

"Something's not right. The scratch-off lottery tickets that didn't win yesterday should have been collected at the very top of the box. How come I've searched half of it and still haven't found it?"

Looking at the hundreds of scratch-off lottery tickets picked out, Ye Su even began to suspect whether he, like some winner, had also missed it.

"It's impossible that this whole pile of scratch-off lottery tickets was all sold yesterday, right?"

A lottery station can sell over a thousand scratch-off lottery tickets a day, and Ye Su would die before believing business was that good.

Re-opening the system to confirm the intelligence, Ye Su realized that the intelligence did not mention that these scratch-off lottery tickets were sold yesterday.

It was just that he was too presumptuous and defaulted to the scratch-off lottery tickets being from yesterday.

"I'm really at a loss!"

Having worked all morning, Master Ye could only order takeout for himself before continuing to bury himself in the work.

"Finally found you, good thing I didn't give up!"

After ordering takeout, Ye Su thought he would search for a while longer, just in time for the takeout to arrive.

Unexpectedly, on the next scratch-off lottery ticket he picked up, Ye Su found that next to an apple pattern on the top and the [¥ 50000] amount on the bottom, there was a [Happy] winning symbol.

The winner probably never thought they could win a 50,000 yuan grand prize, which is why they missed this scratch-off lottery ticket.

"Damn it!"

In his excitement, Ye Su wanted to kick the cardboard box away.

Fortunately, he realized that he would have to clean it up himself after kicking it away, so he sheepishly retracted his foot.

"Perfect, this afternoon I can take the scratch-off lottery ticket and the super lotto to the Lottery Center to redeem them."

The takeout would be delivered in a moment, so Ye Su also seized the time to put the winning scratch-off lottery ticket into the cabinet first, and put all the scratch-off lottery tickets on the floor back into the cardboard box.

As for whether there were any other winning scratch-off lottery tickets in this pile that hadn't been discovered, Ye Su no longer cared and didn't intend to continue looking.

This work was truly too torturous. If the intelligence hadn't tipped him off first that there was a 50,000 yuan scratch-off lottery ticket inside, Ye Su would never have done such a foolish thing.