3. [WP] Equivalent Exchange is the absolute law in the universe you live in. If you...

[WP] Equivalent Exchange is the absolute law in the universe you live in. If you gain something, you will lose something equivalent in value, and vice versa. One day, you won a $10 billion lottery. You try to find out what price you have paid.

Do I believe in karma? I didn't used to.

I live in Las Vegas. It is a wild city, constantly full to the brim with people looking to forget about their lives, party like they are in college again, and perhaps lose some money. I don't mean that as a joke. These people know that they don't have a chance at winning. But they continue to travel to Las Vegas once every year or so in order to deliberately lose money. I'll tell you more about that in a minute.

As the owner of a small casino, I enjoyed raking in their cash. I wasn't making Bellagio money, but believe me, even a small casino in Vegas is worth billions. The casino came into my possession after my uncle had died in a mugging. I had actually never met him before, but he never married and had no children of his own, so he left it to me. It felt like I had won the lottery.

Before then, I was working as a manager at Staples. It was a shitty job, and I had a shitty life. I was single, broke, and lonely. As soon as I heard the news about my newly discovered uncle, I moved to Vegas and my quality of life improved tremendously. I remember how much I used to love going to comedy shows. Especially Mitch Hedberg, before he died.

My second favorite joke of his was this one: "Rice is great if you are really hungry and want to eat 2,000 of something." It reminded me of myself. I was hungry for money, for women, for power. I didn't just want 2,000 of something, I wanted all of it.

I had owned the casino for about a year when the so called "Karma Craze" went viral. I'm not going to lie to you, it really helped business. You see, some people started seeing a pattern. After a few good things happened to them, a few bad things would also happen. It didn't take long for the media to pick up this idea and spread across the entire US. Eventually, someone realized that you could intentionally have bad things happen to you as a form of payment for a better life. And like that, casinos in Las Vegas started seeing more people gambling away their money than ever before.

At first, I loved every minute of it. I couldn't believe how rich I had gotten so quickly. You can probably guess what happened next. I lost everything.

A young man, only 23 years old, named Donald Burke claimed that my casino was his. His father owned the casino before my uncle, but had died in a plane crash with Burke's mother and only sibling. Apparently, my uncle had forged some papers saying that he had purchased the casino soon after Burke's father's death.

Although he hardly had any proof, he was successful when he took me to court. I'm positive that the jury felt that he deserved to win because of his previous miserable life experiences. I tried to tell them that this karma idea was bullshit, but that just made them despise me. When it was all said and done, I had to give up the casino and all that I had earned from it.

My life was miserable again. I didn't have to go back to my old job as a retail manager, though. I was given a job as the casino manager. I thought Burke had felt bad for taking everything away from me, but that wasn't the case at all. I think that he had a perverse sense of satisfaction from watching me work for a sliver of the money I was making before in the very casino that he had stolen from me. Every day, he would discuss the casino with me and flaunt the wealth that should have been mine. I hated him for it.

But perhaps I was lucky. Perhaps karma was, in fact, real. Because during his second year owning the casino, that bastard Burke died of an aneurysm. At the age of 25.

I thought about trying to take the casino back, but I was hesitant. No matter how foolish the idea was, I wasn't going to let the karma destroy my life again. It didn't matter what I wanted, though, because Burke's brother suddenly showed up. Which was nearly a huge mistake.

You see, the public had been made aware during our trial that Burke's sister, his only sibling, had died during a plane crash. It was a massive oversight to have someone claiming to be his brother take over the casino. But the mistake wasn't to perilous. With most of the media in our pockets, we could make sure the press wouldn't reveal the contradicting facts. It was much more difficult - and expensive - to remove all Google records of a plane crash taking Burke's only sister.

That was all decades ago, now. My casino, as well as all in Vegas, have cycled through many owners. The story of each one coming to power after their terrible childhoods tugged on the public's heartstrings. And as empathetic as the public could be, they loved it just as much when a the life of a greedy owner was destroyed.

Very rarely does anyone question the fact that karma is a real force. And when they do, believe me, it doesn't take a fraction of our wealth to keep them quiet. So you can ask me that question again, and I will quote my favorite joke.

Do I believe in karma? I didn't used to. I still don't, but I didn't used to, too.

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