Page 2551 -- CCXXXV.

~~((National Senior Citizens Day -- page 23 of 24))~~
Chapter Two Hundred Thirty-Five: 'O, twisted Mover...'
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'Please tell me you are done with this nonsense,' said Bool privately.

"It's not nonsense," said Morgunov. "It's a great humanitarian effort. This could change the world for the better if I decide to mass produce it."

'Setting aside the first absurdity you uttered--how, pray tell, would a vending machine be able to change the world?'

"Because! It'll feed people! While also imparting a valuable life lesson that everyone should understand!"

'Which is?'

"That pain is incredibly valuable."

The truth was, he was nearly done. When it came to machinery, he didn't usually need very long unless it was something truly cutting edge. It had only taken him a couple hours to jury-rig the thing to his liking. He'd actually spent most of his time trying to decide on what the appropriate prices for each product should be.

A slap to the face for a pack of gum seemed fair, as did a boxing of the ears for a bag of chips and a purple nurple for a candy bar. He wondered if anyone would go for the bag of mini-donuts, though. Maybe a needle in the eye was too much to ask.

Eh, oh well.

The real problem was that servants with strong enough passive soul defenses would be able to just shrug all this stuff off. The longer he'd spent on this thing, the more he'd realized that he really wanted to make a version that could assess the buyer's soul power and adapt accordingly in order to ensure that they experienced the optimal degree of pain.

But that would obviously be a much more involving project. He'd have to invent a mechanism that could analyze soul power, and as far as he was aware, there was no modern technology that could accomplish that.

Dang, that sounded like fun.