Half a million will actually go far irrespective of your location and your choice in any of these three mentioned investments.
1. Real estate - It's probably one of the safest investment option out there. Inflation rises, rent and apartment prices rise too, if inflation turns into deflation, your rent/apartment price still remains the same. With half a million, you can buy two or more good apartments in eastern Europe and live on your rent income.
Real estate is one safest investment that exists because it has less risk associated with it and have a future benefit when properly managed. As you mentioned inflation, people that are already into real estate are gaining massively because the cost of renting an apartment is becoming high due to inflation and maintenance costs, going for Real estate will be good for but requires time before one have profit from the investment.
2. Cryptocurrencies are very volatile but rewarding. If you have a discipline and don't let your emotions take control over your decisions, then you can probably grow your capital by 200-500% a year. At least I think so, I think that's possible if one spends most of his time on exchanges and if necessary, spends some nights. So, crypto is very volatile and rewarding but another problem here is that you are dependent on exchanges, what will you do if they don't let you withdraw? Another problem is that you have to take care of your coins because once they are gone, they are gone forever.
Crypto investment is profitable but very risky especially if you want trade and don't have the basic knowledge to trade crypto.
I consider buying and holding BTC for a while, it is safer than investing on any coin in an exchange because of the risk of centralization.
3. Business - It's like an income generated by Proof Of Work algorithm. Depends on the business and the person, one can achieve a huge financial success and influence or a total failure. But a big and successful business can outperform real estate and crypto investments. To my mind, proof of work is the only thing that can deal with absolutely any kind of financial crisis and disasters.
Business is safer amongst these three but depending on the type of business because there is risk associated with everything. Since you can diversify your money into different aspect of business, you stand the chance making profit in any of the business you started running and the profit will keep the business growing.
Which one would you choose from these and why?
I will choose business not because it is lower risk than the other two, but because it has a quick return on investment.
Because of inflation and rising living costs, businesses will be easier to generate profit. Due to how expensive everything is becoming, having a good business will keep you busy and provide you with a steady income, unlike to cryptocurrency investment, where the bitcoin market condition will determine when to become profitable, whereas real estate will require you to wait for a certain period of time before you make a profit.