"Higher or Lower?"

Takuto gazed down at the two cards in front of him, one being a six, and the other face down. To win the bet, he only had to correctly guess whether the face down card would be a higher or lower value than the six.

The way he saw it, there was about a sixty percent chance the face down card would be higher than six, so he simply went with that. "Higher."

Grinning as if he couldn't contain himself, Ranmaru flipped over the second card. "Ah!" He laughed when he revealed a ten. "How are you doing this?" He excitedly added another eighty chips to Takuto's already exponential pile.

"OK, again, again." The ten remained, and a new face down card was placed next to it, ready to be guessed again. "Higher or Lower?" Ranmaru waited for his answer, raising a now half empty glass of beer to his lips.

He'd confiscated it from Takuto earlier.

"Lower." It didn't even require thought. There was now a seventy percent chance the face down card would be lower than ten. It was rather simple.

"Ahaha!" A two. "Although I shouldn't be laughing, I'm almost out of chips..." Though despite that, he didn't hesitate to say: "Play again! I wanna see how lucky you really are."

But upon seeing that two card, Takuto had suddenly felt a little too tired to go on. There was practically a hundred percent chance the face down card would be higher, so what was the point?

He didn't even have any alcohol to make it slightly less boring...

"It's just probability, Ran. That's all there is to it." Though he did find Ranmaru's amusement to at least be enjoyable, even if he was exaggerating a bit.

"Aw, don't say that, it takes the fun out of it. You're just really lucky!"

Takuto didn't look impressed. Luck was always what people called what was actually simply applying a minimal amount of thought or effort. To be honest, he'd been wearing that look ever since they mindlessly started flipping over cards.

"As far as I'm concerned, the only real lucky thing that's ever happened was getting to meet you..." Takuto rubbed his own neck, he was beginning to feel a bit tired.

It was only about midnight, but he wondered if he should turn in early and get a head start on work the next morning. The dim lights of the room were making him feel drowsy anyway...

"Hm... So I guess these chips..." Ranmaru scooped up a handful of chips and slowly scattered them all over the floor. There was no way to tell whose was whose now. "....mean nothing to you, huh?"

"You weren't trying to actually win money from me, were you?"

"Of course not."

Takuto sighed. "I can see how you would enjoy this, but to me, gambling is much more than this. A game as simple as higher and lower is nothing more than..."

"Like, a pastime?"

"Right. A time waster." He flipped the cards around in his hands. A sign he was getting lost in his own thoughts again. "Suppose if there was something more interesting at stake, then I'd be a little inclined to pay more attention..."

Ranmaru tilted his head. "Well, I don't know what to tell you Taku. But I see what you mean, it was a bit foolish of them to assume that the absurdity of betting millions of Yen on mere chance would be enough to garner the interest of such a refined gambler like you." Ranmaru began flipping the cards in his hand as well. "In such a simple game of... probability."

Takuto simply shrugged.

...

"Come on, just one more round." Ranmaru slid five cards in front of Takuto again, wearing a soft smile. "I promise it'll be fun, when you're gambling anything can happen."

Sigh...

"Please?"

Takuto plopped his head in his hand, but complied. After ending up with a four-of-a-kind-- "Oooh~" --to move on to higher or lower, this time, Ranmaru placed only one card in front of him, face down, instead of two.

Hm. Without a second card to help guess, the probability of higher or lower was exactly fifty/fifty. Though now the game was a bit harder, the lack of that tiny bit of complexity drained his interest even more. There was literally no thought to the game anymore, so he just threw out a random guess. "Higher." He groaned.

Ranmaru flipped over the card to reveal a Jack. "You win!" He grinned, as if that truly was an exciting accomplishment. It only meant a few more meaningless chips would be added to the pile--

...

Takuto stared at his somehow more interesting new reward: A pair of silly black bunny ears. Ranmaru simply placed the ones he'd been wearing into his hand...

Well, it was... different. Though it still wasn't exactly thrilling gambling yet. Takuto already had a pair of his own anyway. He was wearing them now. But when Takuto gave Ranmaru a questioning look, he only received the usual pleasant smile in return.

Fine... If he really wanted to continue with this game, then fine.

Ranmaru placed another card in front of his now four-bunny-eared friend, and Takuto threw out a random guess again. "Lower."

A five. Ranmaru smiled, he won again. And as per the new rules, Ranmaru slowly undid his silk red tie and placed it in Takuto's hand.

...

...

Maybe higher or lower could be a bit interesting. Or maybe he really was lucky.