“Boss! Bring out two jugs worth of rye liquor!”
“Yes, right away!”
Melina had already forgotten when the last time she was so busy. While the business she used to have did pretty well, never once did her business reach such prosperity.
Ever since a group of dwarves rushed into the tavern four hours ago, the desolate tavern turned lively in an instant.
“Bring out all the liquor from the warehouse! Bring out every single one of them!”
Melina was ordering the tavern servers she hired a day earlier. There were a total of three servers. But, even with those three servers and her adopted son Ynor, they were still unable to serve all seventy-plus dwarves in time.
Those dwarves were simply too capable of drinking. They could gulp down an entire jug of ale in one go.
“Don’t slack off!” Melina shouted at one of the servers. That server was staring at a special ‘table’ in the tavern.
It was those special tables that lured all the dwarves over. Those dwarves surrounded those tables, it was like they were all infatuated with them.
Melina knew that those were arcanotech devices Joshua made. At the beginning, Melina didn’t really believe in Joshua when he mentioned that those arcanotech devices would be able to bring massive business to the tavern.
But, from what was happening today, it would appear that all the liquor she purchased from that liquor merchant would be exhausted in a single night.
This was an enormous amount of sales. While the sales were all liquor, Melina had been doing business her entire life. She was certain that she had never seen such a massive amount of profit in a single night.
“Ynor, if you’re sleepy, it’s alright to go and take a nap.”
Melina placed two jugs of rye spirits on the counter. Ynor picked up the two jugs and was about to deliver them to their customers.
It was already late night into the wee hours. Ynor needed to attend magic school in the morning. While Ynor has been doing his best to help the tavern, Melina didn’t want the tavern to affect Ynor’s study.
“It’s alright. I’m very spirited at night...”
Ynor shook his head to express to his adoptive mother that she didn’t have to worry. Strictly speaking, all scubbi were nocturnal.
Ynor picked up the two jugs of rye spirits and brought them over to two dwarves. Once they got their alcohol from Ynor, they placed six silver coins onto her Ynor’s alcohol platter.
This table might be the one with the most dwarves surrounding it. The reason why the dwarves were all surrounding this table was because the behind-the-scenes boss of the Hearthstone Tavern, Joshua, was opening card packs.
Frostaxe picked up his jug of liquor and gulped down a mouthful of liquor. He looked to Joshua sitting across from him and shouted, “Hahaha! Your luck is as bad as mine!”
“Luck is something extremely inconsistent. Perhaps my luck will show itself with the next pack.”
Joshua inserted three golden coins into the machine and purchased another card pack. Following the pack’s explosion animation, four common and one uncommon card appeared in Joshua’s card collection booklet.
This was already Joshua’s forty-seventh classic pack. All of them gave him common and uncommon cards. In other words, he was having a legendary streak of blue skies and white clouds.[1]
Joshua didn’t expect for a legendary card to be that difficult to appear after he removed the guaranteed legendary per 40 pack mechanism that was present on earth’s Hearthstone. It was so much that even Epic cards were extremely difficult to obtain.
“Ciri, how about you try opening a pack for me?” Joshua said to the lucky woman beside him.
“No can do. Why should I use my luck on your card collection?”
Sitting nearby and enjoying the show while eating barbeque, Ciri shook her head and refused Joshua. She opened three card packs herself. And, of the three, one of the packs ended up giving her the Epic card ‘Ice Block.’
Ciri has worked as Joshua’s illustrator for Hearthstone. Being fair, Joshua paid her for her work everyday. She was paid so much that she would never go hungry for the rest of her life. It was enough for her to become an ordinary mage of Norland.
Because of that, spending some money on three card packs was not an issue for Ciri.
“Great Elder, maybe I can try opening a pack for you?!”
Suddenly, a dwarf that was standing beside Joshua for a very long time suddenly spoke with a loud voice.
“Tokin, have you forgotten what you ended up excavating in the mine last time?”
“Nuclear Crystal Dragon’s feces! You even thought those feces to be treasures!”
The dwarven spectators began to expose their fellow dwarf without any hesitation.
“You bastards! How could you call the Nuclear Crystal Dragon’s bodily materials feces?!”
The young dwarf Tokin’s face turned red like an apple as he shouted at his peers.
“Sure. Kiddo, come over and give it a try.”
Frostaxe felt that it was time for these young dwarfs to test things out. There were only twenty Hearthstone machines in the entire tavern. It was simply not enough for the seventy-plus dwarves present.
Apart from the few dwarves that were lucky enough to seat themselves before the machines, the remaining dwarves could only stand around the machines and watch helplessly.
They were not allowed to forcibly pull others away from the machines as Frostaxe had threatened them with feeding them to the Lava Dragon should any of them break one of those arcanotech devices.
After receiving Frostaxe’s permission, Tokin took out the black originium crystal he purchased from the counter earlier. He placed the black crystal that served as Hearthstone’s card collection booklet into the slot present on the arcanotech device.
This dwarf did not bring a lot of gold with him. Thus, he purchased only twenty packs. Unfortunately, the end result of his twenty packs was the same sort of despair.
He opened five packs himself and they were all composed of commons and uncommons. Then, a friend of his decided to step forward to help him unprompted and opened five packs for him. Those five packs produced only a single Epic.
While all that was happening, at a table nearby, the dwarf playing Hearthstone on that table managed to open a Legendary card. It was as if luck was ridiculing that young dwarf Tokin.
“What are you laughing at?! Didn’t none of you manage to open any good cards yourselves?!” The young dwarf pointed angrily at his friends.
“Might as well have someone else try now.”
Joshua refused to believe the arcanotech device before them was incapable of producing Legendary cards. Since his lady luck Ciri was unwilling to help, Joshua felt that there was no need to force her either. After all, there were still some people in the tavern that hadn’t touched a single card pack before.
“Ynor!”
Joshua called to the succubus standing nearby.
“Is... there something you need? Mr. Joshua?”
Ynor immediately came to their table. A thick wall of dwarves surrounded this table. While this wall was only a meter tall, it was still an insurmountable wall for Ynor.
“Please excuse me. I want him to give it a try.”
The dwarf stepped aside. Ynor walked in from that opening. While he felt quite uncomfortable being stared at by that many people, he was still unable to contain his curiosity toward the arcanotech device.
“Ynor, drag that card pack into the center with your finger,” Joshua said to Ynor.
“Okay...”
While Ynor had no idea what was going on, he still did as Joshua instructed and dragged the card pack to the center with his finger. The moment he did that, the card pack exploded. Five cards appeared from the explosion.
“Point at them in succession.”
Ynor extended his fair finger and pointed at the first card. Common. Then, he took a glance at Joshua. He felt that Joshua would be disappointed by this outcome.
But, Joshua did not mind about it. Instead, he made a motion telling Ynor to continue.
Soon, a second common. A third common. It was only when it was the fourth card...
“Woah! Legendary!” [2]
A dialogue of amazement sounded from the Hearthstone machine. It informed everyone that a Legendary card has appeared.
‘Leeroy Jenkins’ [3]
The surrounding dwarves immediately started moving the moment that card appeared. Ynor was terrified by his surroundings. As for Joshua, he was a Hearthstone veteran that had witnessed the birth of countless Legendaries. Thus, it was only natural that he was able to remain calm. He instructed Ynor to reveal the final card.
“Epic!”
Another exciting voice line. Ynor managed to open a card with a quality second to only Legendaries... Epic card ‘Shield Slam.’
At this moment, the way the dwarves looked to Ynor had changed completely. Seeing their gazes, Ynor felt an urge to hide behind Joshua.
“Next pack! Next pack!”
The surrounding dwarves actually began to shout in unison.
“Okay then. The truth has spoken, luck also operates in a law of conservation.”
Joshua looked to the slightly confused succubus . It was impossible for someone to be unlucky all their life. That was something very true for demons too.