The Dialectic of Victory and Defeat
Mikhail tossed his outer coat carelessly toward Boris, who had approached like a shadow.
“Boris.”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
The butler accepted it without a word and draped it neatly over his arm. Mikhail headed toward the rest area tucked into a corner of the arena—a small sanctuary completely sealed off from the outside by thick velvet curtains. It had been prepared exclusively for him: a plush sofa, a low table, and the finest liquors and snacks ready to be enjoyed at any moment.
Without hesitation, Mikhail threw himself onto the sofa. He sprawled out fully, letting out a long, satisfied sigh.
“Ah, that was fun.”
He meant it. It had been a long time since he’d felt such pure, unfiltered joy. The same kind of thrill he used to get as a kid, holing up in a PC bang all night playing games. The sensation of forgetting everything else and focusing solely on the board in front of him.
“You worked hard today too. Go rest.”
“That won’t be necessary, Your Highness. I’m fine.”
Still lying on the sofa, Mikhail waved a lazy hand at Boris, who stood rigidly at his side. Only then did the butler bow with perfect, unyielding posture.
“In that case… the awards ceremony and closing will be held shortly as scheduled. I will return to escort you when the time comes.”
“Yeah, yeah. Looking forward to it.”
Mikhail shooed him away with another dismissive gesture. Once Boris withdrew silently and the velvet curtains closed again, perfect silence filled the space.
Mikhail closed his eyes and replayed the final hand in his mind.
Erika Cage.
The girl’s face floated before him. That expression she’d made when she checked his fold. Shock. Disbelief. And then the heart-wrenching humiliation that followed.
Khh, yeah. That’s the stuff.
Mikhail’s lips curled up without him realizing it.
To be honest, it had been a little bit of a waste. He never got to see what Erika was holding. At best, she probably had a flush. But his hand had been pocket aces. With four spades already on the board, the spade ace in his hand had made the victory almost certain.
Ace-high flush. The strongest possible flush.
He hadn’t planned to win in the first place. He simply wanted to drive that young girl to the brink, right up until the moment the cards were revealed, and thoroughly crush her last shred of hope. Then, as if granting her a generous favor, he would pretend to yield the victory and leave the table.
And once he was gone, if the dealer revealed his hand…
I won, but it wasn’t fun, so you can have it.
That was the greatest performance the organizer of this tournament could possibly put on.
Even if Erika Cage had miraculously completed a four-of-a-kind or a straight flush, it wouldn’t have mattered. There were still mountains of chips left; her ranking wouldn’t have changed. From the moment they entered this tournament, every participant had simply been dancing in the palm of his hand.
Winning or losing didn’t matter.
What mattered was how much more fun he could make the event. That was all.
In that sense, Erika Cage had been the perfect actress. The brightest star this tournament had produced. Young, innocent, and even beautiful. On top of that, a commoner rather than a noble. The story wrote itself.
A renowned gambler at the Academy, nicknamed the terrifying Apocalypse. Where could you find a better protagonist?
Of course, there were a few regrets.
It would’ve been better if there was a more tragic element.
Parents who died when she was young, or participating to support starving younger siblings because the family was dirt poor, or maybe a widow with a child. If any of those had been true, the buzz would have been explosive.
Unfortunately, according to the report, both her parents were alive and well. Despite being commoners, they were wealthy enough to send her to the Academy.
Well, this is enough.
Mikhail murmured in satisfaction and shifted his body.
Right then, the velvet curtains parted silently, and a woman stepped inside.
“Did you enjoy yourself, Your Highness?”
It was Laura Valeriano. A perfect business smile graced her lips as always, but her golden eyes sparkled with mischief. She approached Mikhail’s side and set a crystal glass on the table. The ice inside clinked, producing a refreshing sound.
It was his favorite cocktail—Mikhail Blue Label mixed with crushed mint leaves, lemon slices, and soda water.
Mikhail sat up, picked up the glass, and felt the pleasant chill of the cold crystal against his palm. One sip sent a cool, invigorating flavor spreading through his mouth.
“Get ready,” Mikhail said quietly. “We’re going to turn Erika Cage into a star.”
His voice carried absolute certainty.
“From the way things went, it looks like that girl will probably win.”
“Of course, Your Highness,” Laura replied with a sly smile, as if she had been waiting for exactly those words. Her smile bore an uncanny resemblance to his own.
“Even if she doesn’t win, I was planning to make her the face of the event anyway. Just as we originally intended.”
She continued without missing a beat.
“We didn’t create our own magazine for nothing. Feed the press a bit of money, sprinkle a few well-crafted articles, and manipulating public opinion becomes… cheaper than steamed turnips.”
“That’s exactly why I like you.”
At Mikhail’s casual remark, Laura’s shoulders twitched ever so slightly. Her posture remained perfectly composed, her expression flawless. But Mikhail saw it clearly—the way her pointed cat ears, hidden among her golden hair, perked up for the briefest moment before settling back down.
“You flatter me, Your Highness.”
Laura answered in an impeccably businesslike tone. But Mikhail noticed the tiny, almost imperceptible tremor at the very end of her voice.
Of course, he didn’t point it out. He simply swirled the cocktail in his hand with an amused expression.
She anticipates my needs and goes one step ahead without being told… This is why competent subordinates are so valuable.
If he simply set the stage and gave a rough direction, she would handle everything else and produce the best possible result. She even filled in details he hadn’t specified. That was the merchant known as Laura Valeriano.
And on top of that, she was easy on the eyes.
“By the way, where did Josepina go? I haven’t seen her since earlier.”
Mikhail asked as if the thought had just occurred to him.
Once again—twitch.
This time, Laura’s ears moved even more noticeably.
“Ah, you mean Administrator Jugashvili.”
Laura’s voice remained perfectly calm.
“She is currently finalizing the ‘Toto’ operations you mentioned and calculating the profits. She said she’ll probably have to pull an all-nighter.”
“She’s working hard. Good to see.”
When Mikhail tossed out a casual compliment, Laura’s cat ears trembled visibly, as if to say look at me.
Mikhail barely held back a laugh and took another sip of his cocktail.
Is she jealous? No way.
That couldn’t be it.
“So, how are the returns on this Toto event? Decent?”
“Quite profitable,” Laura began her report without hesitation.
“During the preliminaries, everyone was cautious and only bet small amounts, so the results were mediocre. But once we entered the main rounds, the stakes grew exponentially.”
Her eyes sparkled playfully.
“Especially Lady Victoria Mckenzie of the Mckenzie family—she poured an enormous sum entirely onto Erika Cage. Thanks to her, the odds became incredibly interesting.”
Laura paused briefly, gauging Mikhail’s reaction.
“It must be a very close friendship. I heard they were classmates at the Academy.”
“Well…”
Mikhail let his words trail off with a meaningful smile.
Friendship, huh.
From what Mikhail could see, it looked like something a bit stickier, messier, and hotter than mere friendship. He wasn’t sure exactly what it was, but it definitely wasn’t the clean, wholesome emotion usually called friendship.
“That aside, Your Highness.”
Laura changed the subject. Her voice carried pure intellectual curiosity.
“I’ve been wondering for a while. What does ‘Texas Hold’em’ mean? And what about ‘Toto’?”
Sharp as always.
Mikhail clicked his tongue internally.
He couldn’t exactly explain, There’s this thing called 21st-century Earth, and those are cultural products from that world.
“Ah… I just made them up. Does it really matter?”
Mikhail brushed it off and popped one of the snacks from the table into his mouth.
“Anyway, you made sure to keep the staff in line, right? It’d be annoying if rumors spread about insiders winning big on Toto. There’s also the risk of fixing accusations.”
“Of course.”
A cool smile curved Laura’s lips.
“The crackdown was perfect. However, a few short-sighted… foolish individuals couldn’t resist temptation.”
She added casually,
“So, I changed all of their professions to fishermen.”
“Fishermen… crab catching, I assume?”
Mikhail chuckled. Laura nodded.
“I’m quite looking forward to the crabs they’ll bring in. Let’s treat the kids to a big crab feast later. They worked hard too.”
“Understood.”
Mikhail set his empty glass on the table and leaned back against the sofa with a satisfied expression.
“For the next tournament, I need to harass those mages a bit. Have them use projection magic or something to float status boards in the air above the arena.”
The image of the next event was already forming clearly in his mind.
“Each table’s board situation, the number of chips each player has, the blinds—those should be displayed as standard. The audience will enjoy it much more that way.”
He continued excitedly.
“Once we have a winner this time, we’ll pay the journalists generously like I said and promote the hell out of it. Using that momentum, we’ll host several even larger tournaments across the Empire and give away a few membership tickets as prizes each time. Then, when our casino officially opens… we sell the remaining memberships.”
Mikhail’s eyes sparkled with mischief.
“The quantity released will be less than originally planned, but if we distribute the memberships as symbols of honor and skill this way, their value won’t drop. It’ll actually rise. Perfect, right?”
“A most reasonable plan,” Laura said, nodding deeply in agreement.
“Originally, we were supporting the price through the previous auction’s created value, the future value of the tourism special zone, and the probability mechanics of the gacha. There was a slight sense of instability. But by linking it to this intangible value called ‘honor’… the foundation has become far more solid.”
“Exactly. Those noble bastards stake their lives on that thing called honor.”
Mikhail let out a small laugh.
“Well, we’re constantly preaching that honor is what truly makes a noble a noble, so of course they’re obsessed. It’s a kind of… dialectic, I suppose.”
A slave who struggles desperately to be acknowledged by his master. A master who only confirms his own existence through that acknowledgment.
Who said that again? Hegel? Or was it Marx?
His memory was hazy, but the essence was crystal clear.
Whether in this romance-fantasy world or in the 21st-century Korea he came from, the way people lived their lives wasn’t all that different in the end.
“In the end, maybe everything is just a struggle to prove one’s own existence.”