Maluck walked out of 7-24 with a stack of scratchers clutched in his hands like they were gold bars fresh from a heist. This was it. The first real test of the Appraiser’s Lens.
He slid into the driver’s seat of his car, locked the doors, and laid the tickets out like they were ancient scrolls containing the secrets of the universe.
“Alright, let’s see if this thing actually works.”
With calculated precision, he started scratching.
First ticket: $10 win.
‘Not bad.’
Second ticket: Another $10.
‘Okay. Solid start.’
Third ticket: $100.
‘Now we’re talking.’
Ticket after ticket, the glowing ones that he had bought, had indeed proved to be winners.
He was flying through them, his car now filling up with an ungodly amount of silver scratch-off dust that was coating his fingers, pants, and dashboard like some kind of broke magician’s failed confetti trick.
By the time he was halfway through, he had already won back what he spent.
And then—
BAM.
One of the big winners.
$1,200.
Maluck let out a laugh, half disbelieving, half maniacal.
“Oh, hell yeah. This is just as good as a casino!”
He continued scratching, watching his total winnings climb higher and higher.
A few more $20s, another $100, and then—
BOOM. Another big one.
$2,900.
Maluck stared at the ticket like it was a winning lottery jackpot.
If this had happened a week ago, he probably would have passed out from sheer shock.
Now?
This was good, and caused him to smile.
When the last ticket was scratched, he did a final tally.
$4,807.
Off a $460 investment.
This was stupidly broken.
Why even bother with casinos anymore?
He leaned back in his seat, letting out a deep sigh of victory.
The Appraiser’s Lens had officially paid for itself.
But now came the real challenge—
Cashing these in without looking like he just robbed a gas station.
***
Maluck knew that scratchers had time limits to claim them because, well, of course he did. His bad luck had made sure of that.
Once, he had thought he finally broke his cursed streak when he scratched off a birthday gift scratcher and saw a $5 win.
For a brief, shining moment, he had felt what it was like to be a winner.
Then he checked the back.
Expired.
Completely void.
The universe had taken his one tiny victory, crumpled it up, and yeeted it straight into the void.
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Since then, he always checked expiration dates.
But now?
Now he was sitting on $4,807 worth of certified, in-date scratch-off winnings.
And while cashing them in immediately was tempting, he had plenty of money and under 5 hours left on his Appraiser’s Lens.
No way was he wasting this waiting in line behind some guy trying to cash in a single $2 ticket while arguing with the clerk about how his “lucky numbers” were “supposed to win.”
The scratchers could wait.
For now, he had a different kind of hunting in mind.
Pawn shops.
If there was one thing about pawn shops, it was that they were like roaches.
You didn’t just find one.
They infested entire areas, clustering together in the rundown, sketchy parts of town where payday loans and weird discount mattresses thrived.
The signs were always aggressively neon, the windows cluttered with a mix of electronics, guitars, and tools that were probably stolen at some point but were “definitely legit” if you asked the owner.
And inside?
A treasure trove of bad financial decisions.
Unpaid engagement rings.
Broken PayStations.
A full set of golf clubs from some dude’s divorce.
But more importantly—
Hidden value.
Maluck cracked his knuckles.
“Alright, let’s see if I can find something worth flipping.”
And with that, he walked into one.
***
Maluck continued his hunt, weaving through shelves of forgotten dreams and poor financial decisions. The first shop had a few decent glows, buried in a sad pile labeled “Five Bucks for Any Hardcover.”
One book in particular caught his attention—a first edition of… something.
Did he know what it was about? Nope.
Did he care? Absolutely not.
If it was glowing, it was valuable. That was the only rule that mattered.
Further down, he found some underpriced electronics—a fancy blender among them.
Did he need a fancy blender? No.
Did he grab it anyway? Yes.
Because why the hell not?
The second pawn shop was a disappointment. Almost completely empty, and the only glow came from a couch.
An actual couch.
Maluck absolutely was not about to haul an entire sofa from Calgary to Edmonton, no matter how valuable it was.
He doubted it had gold bars stuffed inside. Maybe it belonged to a 19th-century poet.
Didn’t matter.
Pass.
The next shop made up for it, though.
Buried in a one-dollar bin filled with forgotten comics, he spotted a bright glow.
He reached in and pulled out…
XXX-Men #1.
The first-ever adult-rated superhero comic.
And—critically important—the pages weren’t sticky.
It was professionally bagged, sealed in an acid-resistant Mylar sleeve, complete with a backing board.
Whoever had tossed it in the bin had no idea what they had.
And now? It was Maluck’s.
At the last shop, he hit two surprises.
The first was a baseball.
It was beat to hell, the signature smudged, barely readable.
But squinting at it, he made out the words:
“Babe Roofed.”
Obviously, the previous owner had assumed it was a terrible fake and dumped it for a buck.
But Maluck had the Appraiser’s Lens.And the ball was glowing bright like a diamond.That was all he needed to know.
He snatched it up immediately. Then he noticed the second glow.
It wasn’t an item.
It was a person.
The girl behind the counter.
Maluck froze.
‘Oh, hell no.’
This was going to be a problem.
Everything that had glowed so far had been an object—something he could flip, sell, or hoard.
But a person?
That was new.
What did it mean?
Was she secretly a genius?
Was she the greatest undiscovered rapper of their generation?
Was she a ninja? A cook? The next big writer?
No clue.
But what he did know was this:
There was no socially acceptable way to tell a random pawn shop employee that she was glowing.
“Hey, you have hidden potential!”
“Oh wow, what really? What is it?”
“No idea. My magic eyeball thing just says you’re valuable.”
Yeah. That sounded insane. Maluck panicked. So he did the only rational thing.
Pretend like nothing was weird—and buy the damn baseball.
***
[System Task Issued] You’ve found undiscovered potential. Someone with hidden talent is standing right in front of you, and they don’t even know it.
Find out what makes them special before someone else does. Bonus LP will be determined based on how much value you uncover. Don’t let this talent go to waste. That would be a shame, wouldn’t it?
Maluck rejected the task immediately. There was no way he was going to walk up to a pawn shop employee—who, by the looks of her, had enough hard edges to cut glass—and somehow convince her to chat, let alone reveal some hidden talent.
After he hit NO, another System task popped up.
[System Task] This girl is just ripe for discovering her own awesomeness in the universe. It’d be good for you too. Help her out.
[System Bonus]:
+0.01 Charisma if you get her number.
+0.02 Charisma if you land a date on the spot.
+0.03 Charisma if you convince her to close the shop and leave with you right away.
Maluck stared at the task list, now featuring not one but two challenges related to this pawn shop girl. He was tempted—who wouldn’t want a free charisma boost?—but after a few seconds of real-world logic, he shook his head.
“System, there’s no way I can do this,” he muttered.
It wasn’t that he had never talked to a girl before. He wasn’t some socially awkward hermit. He’d had a girlfriend once—well, more like a human leech in the shape of an ex-girlfriend. But randomly picking up a badass, possibly knife-carrying pawn shop employee in a part of town that looked like a crime documentary waiting to happen? That was way above his skill level.
[System Response] Sometimes, you don’t have to take on all the tasks. You can just ignore them and hit no, just like you did before.
Maluck blinked. “Huh. That actually sounds really reasonable.”
[System Response] No problem. Remember, in life, balance is important.
He exhaled in relief. For once, the System wasn’t being a manipulative little gremlin.
Maluck didn’t realize that Temperance was in charge of System responses today. That was why, for once, it wasn’t screaming at him to take every ridiculous challenge thrown his way.
The two tasks? Those had been issued by Envy and Lust—and those two had no way of telling him who was responsible for what. But in the Astral Universe? Oh, they were furious.
In fact, their frustration was so obvious that, just as Maluck was about to relax, a new System Task popped up.
[System Task] Say this to the girl: “Hey, I don’t know you, but I think you’ve got some real hidden potential.”
Reward: +1 LP
Maluck narrowed his eyes. Oh, come on.
