4 hours later.

[06:15pm]

BAM!

Leon's shoulder slammed into Sergeant Tyla's chest with force, knocking the air out of her lungs as she instantly became disoriented.

When she regained her bearings, instead of looking straight and seeing her opponent, she saw the exit door of the gym and instantly she understood what was happening. 'F*ck! I'm falling, he tackled me again!'

She couldn't help it as Leon slammed her to the ground with force. This time, she felt like a ragdoll as she hit the ground.

Before she could react, her left arm was locked in a tight arm bar. She tried to struggle but the grip of her opponent was like iron.

The pain made her face contort.

"Yield!"

"F*ck you!"

Leon chuckled then he let go of her hand.

After beating her for 20 straight fights despite how confident she usually was in her martial art skills as a soldier, instead of simply yielding, Tyla became vulgar as she muttered curses every time she heard the voice urging her again to yield.

For the next 8 fights till now, she always cursed when she realized that she was on the verge of losing again.

Leon let go because once she cursed, she already yielded.

DING!

~----~

[You have gained +3 Ascended Essence!]

[Ascended Counter: 801/2000]

~----~

Leon didn't stand up after releasing her hand, this was because he was also tired after fighting in 48 straight sparring sessions.

He rolled beside the Sergeant, panting heavily. His gym sparring clothes were now sticky with sweat, more sweat also gathered on his forehead.

Beside him, Tyla was in the similar state.

A few meters from them, there were 5 exercise bikes and Daren was currently on top one of them, lazily staring at the both of them.

He looked at Leon and sighed. "It's cheating for a Mechanist to be as skilled as you are at hand-to-hand combat and grappling, who did you learn from?"

Leon chuckled. "I have 3 teachers; one taught me grappling, the other taught me boxing, and the last taught me shooting skills to hone my accuracy".

"You wouldn't know them".

"Why?" Daren instantly retorted, feeling like Leon was once again subtly shading him.

"Are you looking down on my intelligence?" He scowled. "I may not know all those engineering nonsense, but I know all the prominent hand-to-hand specialists and fighters in the world, try me!" He challenged.

Seeing how pumped up his friend was, Leon chuckled again. "You wouldn't know them because they didn't exist in this era".

"Huh?" Daren was confused.

"They existed before Genesis".

Hearing that, Daren was stunned at first but then he sneered. "If so, then my Daddy is Bill Zefyr!"

"Who is Bill Zefyr?"

"He's the richest man in the world, and he's my father!"

Leon was stunned for a few seconds, then he burst out laughing. "Nice one, haha! Keep believing it, who knows? Maybe one day it'll become a reality".

He was in a good mood because his Ascended Counter was drawing increasingly closer to 1000 which was a direct validation of the principles of growth for E Rank Mechanists that he realized.

Originally, he intended to spar with Daren for just 3 hours but once Sergeant Tyla joined the fray, he lost control of time.

For over 4 hours, he sparred against both of them for 48 fights, 30 times against Daren and 28 times against her, winning all of them in the process.

Leon was beginning to appreciate how frightening the inheritance he learned from those 3 guys in a lucid dream was.

'Those lessons are invaluable in this world!'

He allowed them to rest for a few seconds then he finally sat up and looked at the Sergeant. "Are you not needed at your… um, wherever you base in?"

She smiled. "The Lieutenant gave me the day off".

"Why?"

"Because I asked".

"Oh, ok," Leon nodded as he looked at her. "Then will you follow us to the casino or you'll be going now?"

"I'll follow you to the casino!" She made her decision instantly.

Leon stared at her in a daze for a few seconds. 'What's up with her? Heck, what's up with that enthusiasm? And the way she's looking at me…' he shuddered.

They no longer hesitated.

With Leon taking the lead, they left the gym and went straight to the casino. They arrived after a small trek of 4 minutes.

Leon looked up at the glowing neon holo-signboard.

[Grand Mac Casino]

Daren led the way inside since he was most familiar with the casino, and in just a few minutes, they climbed to the 3rd floor where the lottery machine was.

There were a few people currently trying their luck with the machine.

While Daren and Sergeant Tyla stayed at the side, watching him curiously, Leon joined the queue even as he instructed his A.I in a soft voice.

"Update the jackpot time".

DING!

Davis didn't project a hologram since they were in a public space to avoid bringing suspicion to him. Instead, the A.I responded directly on the smartphone.

[Ticket no. 198: New Estimated Jackpot Time- 6:31pm]

[Ticket no. 108: New Estimated Jackpot Time- 6:37pm]

[Ticket no. 405: New Estimated Jackpot Time- 7:03pm]

Leon's eyes gleamed as he stared at these 3 different timeframes.

Just like Davis confirmed before Leon started this whole endeavor, Grand Mac Casino is one of the only few casinos in this world that are yet to implement modern true-random design algorithms for their lottery system.

Instead of modern algorithmic designs, Grand Mac Casino uses Pseudo-Random Number Generators (PRNGs).

And unlike modern designs, PRNGs are deterministic, which means if you know the initial seed and the specific formula, the sequence is entirely predictable.

The problem was knowing the initial seed and the specific formula. Afterall, if it was so easy to crack, multiple people would have done this before Leon.

To solve this problem, with the help of his A.I, Leon surfed the psionic network with the filter set to Grand Mac Casino and all operations, posts, and internet tags related to them.

Through the psionic network in this highly digitized cyberpunk era, Leon found everything that he needed.

Davis found millions of historical data connected to Grand Mac Casino- from players who lost a lot of money and accused the casino of fraud, to players who lamented that they were just one step from hitting a jackpot, and to players who did hit jackpots.

With the help of all this historical data and the sheer computational power of his A.I plus his own intelligence, Leon cracked the code and found the specific formula.

With the specific formula being used by Grand Mac Casino which was the most important element of his heist, everything else became simplified.

Leon simply choose 3 ticket numbers that were not too close to each other to avoid arousing suspicion, and then he worked his calculations with them.

Ticket no. 198, 108, and 405 were his choice.

Still with the help of the historical data that he found in the psionic network with the formula that Grand Mac Casino used, Leon was able to reverse-engineer the PRNG through the massive historical data.

And now, with the help of his calculations, he built a system that could predict what specific time ticket no. 198, 108, and 405 would hit jackpots.

The time for jackpots was almost random, changing every few seconds for every ticket and it was what made hitting a jackpot exceedingly difficult.

Ticket no. 65 may be randomized to enable a jackpot by 1:25pm, and the duration was to last just 10 seconds. Once you miss that duration, it's over and the PRNG resets, meaning you had a 0% chance of hitting a jackpot with ticket no. 65 once it's 1:26pm.

To normal people, it was a game of trial and luck but for Leon, it was a game of calculation and timing.

When the people around him saw that he was holding 3 gold-colored tickets, the way they looked at him changed. Some treated him with more respect while others looked at him like he was a fool.

Afterall, which sane person in his right mind would spend 15,000 Neo Credits to purchase such expensive tickets in a game of luck?

Because he wore a face cap, they didn't realize that he was Thomas Riley yet. Those who felt that his face was familiar only thought he was a lookalike.

Nobody expected Thomas Riley to be such a fool.

Leon ignored all of them as he clutched Ticket no. 198 on his right hand and the other 2 on his left.

It soon came to his turn but the time was just 6:27pm. Leon magnanimously gave his spot to the player that was behind him, allowing him play first.

The middle-aged Geneform was surprised, players in casinos rarely relinquish their spot for strangers that they don't know.

But the man didn't think much of it as he muttered a word of thanks before facing the lottery machine. He held a long stack of twelve 1 pound tickets.

He pulled the lever down, and instantly the Slotomania machine started rolling. It showed 3 different columns of numbers rapidly rolling vertically.

The man held his breath and waited.

Click!

The machine stopped and with baited breath, he peeked at the 3 numbers.

[3/7/9]

He muttered a curse under his breath, then he tore his second ticket and pulled the lever again.

The machine rolled again, and once again he failed.

By his 4th roll, a mechanical voice suddenly sounded after the machine stopped rolling.

Click!

[2/2/5]

[Congratulations! You have won 2 pounds!]

Winning 2 pounds with a 1 pound ticket was still a win, but this was not the type of win that this man was looking for.

This middle-aged man gritted his teeth as he clutched his remaining tickets tightly, then he continued playing.

Click!

Click!

Click!

This man rolled 8 times and failed all 8 times!

By the end, his face was livid, twitching irregularly. He clenched his fists tightly like he wanted to punch the machine in a moment of impulse but then he saw the armed guards from the corner of his eyes and decided better of it.

Fuming, he turned and left.

He just spent 12 pounds in the game and won only 2 pounds in return, that was an atrocious return of investment.

12 pounds was likely a whole week of his savings and just like that, it disappeared like it was all a dream.

Leon saw this all happen, and he felt a bit bad for the man but he didn't focus on it because he knew he had a timing to meet.

As soon as the man stepped off, he stepped in front of the machine and looked at the time.

[6:30pm]

Leon took a deep breath and removed his face cap like the pressure of potentially losing 5,000 Neo Credits was finally getting to him.

With the face cap, he fanned himself and after a few seconds of this, he noticed that the time on his smartphone changed.

[6:31pm]

He tore one of the gold-colored tickets, ticket No. 198 and pulled the lever. Immediately, the Slotomania machine began rolling.

After a few seconds, it stopped.

Click!

[7/7/7]

[Congratulations! You have hit a Jackpot!]

[You have won 18,717 Neo Credits!]

Instantly, loud congratulatory music started being played as holographic celebratory ribbons and fireworks were shot into air. This attracted the attention of everyone present.

"Someone hit a jackpot!"

Within just a few seconds, a massive gathering occurred around Leon even as he kept Thomas Riley's persona- cool, calm, and reserved.

And then, someone recognized him. "It's Thomas Riley!"

"It's HIM!"

The crowd instantly turned frantic as they cheered for him even as the guards of the casino approached the scene.

As all this happened, standing a few steps away from him, Sergeant Tyla and Daren stared with a flabbergasted expression on their face.

'H-he really cracked the lottery!'

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