Troublesome Love

At Binossus Study Hall, dozens of erudite scholars sat around a round table carved with reliefs, listening to the latest intelligence being read aloud by a female assistant seated beside the president.

Meanwhile, Joey Cleveland, the washed-up president who had failed at fangirling, was wholeheartedly dealing with a plate of "Golden Thread Grubs," making slurping noises as juice splattered everywhere.

The presidential assistant was a young woman with smooth golden hair and an impressive bust. Her nameplate identified her as Ivanka.

She was intently reading the compiled intelligence from the document in her hands.

Mysterious incidents involving more than a thousand people had been occurring continuously throughout the Federation during this period.

"Lone Star State. Starting three days ago, more than two thousand people within a circular area radiating outward from Trafford, the state capital, received 'Mysterious Express' parcels. Each contained a Curio and an instruction manual. The Curio was a Riddle Glass Box whose interior could not be seen through."

"The manual states that the glass box contains numerous mechanisms. Each time someone reaches a hand inside, there is a fifty percent chance of triggering a mechanism, and a fifty percent chance of obtaining a three-kilogram gold brick from within."

"On the first day alone, this incident caused hundreds of people to lose their hands after triggering the Amputation Mechanism."

"On the second day, casualties continued to rise. Greed caused some lucky survivors of the first round to fall in the second. The mechanism they triggered had escalated to Unknown Snake Venom, which took effect within seconds and caused death."

"On the third day, the Investigation Bureau intervened and contained all the Curios. But before that, hundreds still triggered a new mechanism: an Implantable Bomb, which caused extensive collateral damage and killed several agents in the line of duty."