Ch.59[Episode 59] Limited Edition

“Well, drawing attention like that actually makes the content less valuable. When you try to gather people with sensational content, you end up distorting proper information.”

The dragon stroked its long beard while looking at the astonished Sir Dominic.

“Anyway, you came to register for the gacha pool, right? For Sir Dominic, things are different. The event starting in two days is peak season. If you put in a bit more effort and make it to pickup, you could get really good results—”

“Before that, I’d like an explanation of what a gacha pool is.”

The dragon glared at v.a.l.l.o.c., who had started eating donuts in the distance after hearing Sir Dominic’s question.

v.a.l.l.o.c. felt the gaze but deliberately pretended not to notice, turning his head away while eating his donut.

“That friend dumped the explanation on me because he found it bothersome.”

The dragon sighed and said:

“I should have known when he used that method of making an offer I couldn’t refuse.”

“An offer you couldn’t refuse.”

Sir Dominic stroked his chin as he spoke.

Was this some kind of back-alley request method?

“It’s a promise between v.a.l.l.o.c. and me. I think I’ve already repaid all the favors I owe him, but he always uses that method when he needs something.”

The dragon blamed his own soft heart for being unable to turn v.a.l.l.o.c. away.

“Anyway, you wanted to know about gacha.”

The dragon stroked his beard, wondering where to begin.

“One of the ways to generate value in Gachaland is through the gacha pool. It’s the process of inputting your information and making it available to others.”

Sir Dominic was confused by these difficult concepts from the start, but decided to listen to everything before asking questions.

He knew that interrupting such explanations only led to greater confusion.

“The gacha pool can be seen as a process where other people draw and copy your information. How should I put it… Like merchandise, cards, or posters? Though it’s a bit more advanced than that…”

The dragon’s explanation grew increasingly lengthy and verbose.

Finally, Sir Dominic couldn’t bear it anymore and stated what he understood so far.

“So, you put in information about me, and other people ‘draw’ that information?”

“Yes. To summarize, that’s how you could see it.”

Sir Dominic didn’t particularly like the dragon’s vague way of speaking, but currently, the dragon was his teacher.

He had no choice but to rely on the dragon’s help until he learned what he wanted to know.

“It’s difficult to explain with words, but you’ll understand immediately once you try it. Sometimes it’s easier to learn by doing.”

The dragon placed a white card between himself and Sir Dominic.

“Place your card here. Then the card will be automatically completed. Let’s make one experimentally first, then make the next card.”

The dragon’s instructions skipped several explanatory steps, but trusting that he would understand by doing, Sir Dominic placed his card against the white one.

The white card emitted a golden light, and a card with Sir Dominic’s face appeared.

The difference from his own card was that instead of having a System menu on the back, it had something like a stone attached to it.

“This is your copy. It contains your information. And now I’ll put this in the box… Since this is just for demonstration, I’ll only put in your card. Let’s try a single pull.”

The dragon put the card in the box. After adding some fake Gacha Stones, the box emitted light and his card popped out.

The floating card briefly showed the side with Sir Dominic’s face before disappearing.

“Since there’s no entrance scene or dialogue yet, it went straight to the confirmation process—just wait a moment.”

The dragon put Sir Dominic’s card back in the box, added fake Gacha Stones, and did another single pull.

Sir Dominic’s card appeared again, but this time after showing the portrait, it displayed the strange stone attached to the back of the card.

“This is what we call a duplicate. And this stone contains fragments of your information. When you gather complete information, you can exceed the card’s limits.”

When the dragon placed the stone drawn from Sir Dominic’s card back onto the card, the card emitted a brilliant light and changed slightly.

The number of stars increased from one to two.

“How fascinating.”

Sir Dominic immediately understood what gacha was, but still had questions.

“So what exactly is this card used for?”

“Outside.”

The dragon answered immediately, as this was something he could explain.

“Your information will be taken by exploration teams from outside. You might have heard some titles like commander, admiral, teacher, knight, exorcist, summoner, traveler.”

“Knight?”

Sir Dominic reacted to the word “knight,” but the dragon shook his head.

“Not the knight who rides horses, but the knight who deals with strange occurrences.”

It seemed to be a homonym.

“The exploration teams lead dolls. When they input your information into those dolls, androids that mimic your actions are created.”

Androids.

Sir Dominic thought of Code Back Zero, whom he had met during indie game development.

Zero had called himself a combat support android.

He wondered if these were different kinds of androids. Sir Dominic’s curiosity was piqued, but there was no way to confirm it right now.

Instead, he asked another question to resolve a different curiosity.

“Then won’t these androids with my information replace me or cause some kind of accident?”

“Not at all.”

The dragon laughed as if Sir Dominic had said something amusing.

“Outside androids have clear limitations. They don’t think and act like us; they move according to the information programmed into them. That’s why things like ‘Why would they do this in this situation?’ happen frequently. As long as there’s a central system, androids can never become like humans.”

“The data-filled monsters that make up the stages would be more human-like,” the dragon chuckled.

“If there were androids that acted exactly like humans, I’d rather put them in the gacha pool. Information about androids loaded onto androids. That would be quite interesting.”

The dragon, who had been laughing for a while as if hearing an amusing story, slowly stopped laughing.

He had laughed so much that tears welled up in his eyes.

“Anyway, this event is a major one with two overlapping events, so external pioneers will definitely return to Gachaland to spend money. That’s why I called it peak season. How should I put it… They say they’re ‘salty’ if they don’t draw new characters… what was it… Right. And if they draw one immediately, they call it ‘deception.'”

“Stop. What are the benefits of registering in the gacha pool? Let’s talk about that first.”

“Ah, right. You really are a Newbie. You know absolutely nothing.”

The dragon grumbled at Sir Dominic’s interruption, seeming slightly offended.

“You decide how much of your data you want to distribute and which categories to put it in. For example, if you say you’ll distribute 100 pieces of data and choose the Tanker Pack and Old One-Eye Pack, your data will be mixed with all the data collected in those packs so far. Then people will buy packs from these categories, and 100 pieces of data will be randomly drawn from them.”

The dragon’s explanation was messy, but Sir Dominic understood perfectly.

“Like drawing desired candies from a candy bag?”

“Similar! Though they use a more sophisticated and elegant method.”

The dragon, pleased with the summary that matched his intended explanation, fiddled with his beard.

“However, the rewards you can receive depend on how much data you provide and how high your tier is. Usually people prefer to receive 10% upfront and the rest as it sells. This is because some packs don’t sell well if they’re unpopular.”

The dragon thought he was explaining very well, but all Sir Dominic understood was that he could receive money.

Sir Dominic decided to register for the gacha pool while he was here.

The idea of androids mimicking him with his information was somewhat creepy, but he determined it wasn’t enough of a threat to his original self.

“I’d like to register for the gacha pool.”

“Good. Since you seem to understand roughly, let’s do it properly. First, I’ll destroy the sample information we created. We had a spy steal information before, so we make it a rule to dispose of it in front of the person.”

The experimental Sir Dominic card disappeared into a shredder.

“Now, fill out this form. The essential parts to fill in are here, here, and here. You don’t need to enter the date. It will be updated with today’s date anyway.”

Sir Dominic entered his tier and the amount of data to register in the pool.

He thought he’d start lightly with ten pieces. Since nobody would know he was registered in the gacha pool anyway, he thought it would be good to start casually.

Surprisingly, Sir Dominic was quite modest in his self-assessment.

In the section for desired packs or packages, Sir Dominic chose the Starter Pack and Knight Pack, then read through the form once more.

Finally, after all entries were complete and Sir Dominic’s name and signature were added, the dragon took back the form and read through it carefully.

“Are you sure about just 10 cards? You should have at least 100. There’s no harm in making more. I’ve seen a tier 1 who demanded 10 billion cards, intending to live off it like a pension.”

But Sir Dominic was immovable.

In Feralant, scarcity was considered more virtuous than excess. Sir Dominic, who embodied Feralant itself, believed it was better to print fewer copies than to have too many.

He considered 100 cards to be far too many.

Finally, the dragon sighed and warned Sir Dominic.

“Since you’re tier 2, you can register for the gacha pool once more, but you might suffer a bit in the meantime. Are you okay with that?”

“Well, what could possibly happen?”

Sir Dominic nodded.

Who would cause a commotion trying to draw a card of someone as unknown as Sir Dominic?

The dragon sighed and took out ten white cards.

Sir Dominic placed his card against the white cards.

Finally, ten tier 2 Sir Dominic cards were added to the card pool.