The Loaded Dice
A sudden shout cut through the noise.
“Fight broke out!”
“Run!”
The people nearby seized the chance, snatching up their money and bolting from the gambling house. In the end, the only ones left inside were the ones I figured belonged to the Haomun.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing!”
They swarmed around the manager and quickly encircled me.
“Sanlong-nim! Sanlong-nim!”
Gi Chae-yun was completely flustered, yelling without knowing what to do, so I smacked the back of his head.
“Get a grip and prepare what I told you about on the carriage ride here.”
“You’re… actually going to do that? This isn’t a joke?”
“I don’t waste long conversations on other guys unless it’s serious.”
Gi Chae-yun took a deep breath and shouted, “Don’t come any closer!”
It was absolute pandemonium, yet the guy who had caused the whole mess—me—was the calmest person in the room.
“There was just a little commotion~”
Manager Jo Sun’s face twisted with rage. “Young Master Sanlong, what exactly do you think you’re doing? We will be billing the Tang Clan for today’s damages.”
“Report it if you want. But I need to collect payment for the little tricks you people pulled.”
“Tricks? What are you talking about?”
“Oh? You really don’t know?”
I picked up one of the dice on the table. Every eye in the room locked onto it.
“It looks like an ordinary die at first glance, but—huh? Why are the only numbers two, four, and six?”
Anyone could see it was obviously rigged.
“Chae-yun, grab that guy.”
Gi Chae-yun aimed the Poison Bullet Launcher at the man beside me who was pretending to be scared.
“D-don’t move!”
“Search him.”
“W-wait a second!”
Clatter.
Several dice spilled from the man’s clothes. Rigged gambling always has an accomplice, and this bastard was the one swapping the dice. Working together, they could force odd or even whenever they wanted.
“Oh my~ What’s all this?”
“Y-Young Master Sanlong! That’s—!”
Jo Sun put on an expression that said he had no idea what was going on, but I kept talking.
“That’s pretty low, Manager.”
“You… you!”
“Manager! That’s… that’s—!”
Ignoring the flustered fool, I raised my voice so everyone could hear. “Man, this is too much. I know everyone who walks into a gambling house is basically a sucker, but cheating this openly is just bad for business. Guess I’ll have to spread the word across the entire city of Chengdu.”
With irrefutable evidence staring them in the face, Jo Sun’s expression flipped from the wronged innocent he’d been playing to a cold, ruthless mask. He spoke to the Haomun men.
“Boys, we’re shutting down for the day.”
They closed the gambling house on the spot and started pulling weapons out of every hiding place. The preparation was impressive—exactly what you’d expect from a Haomun branch.
“Young Master Sanlong, your luck seems to have run out.”
“You think you can just erase me? Are you really underestimating the Tang Clan that much?”
“Don’t worry. You won’t have been killed by us. You’ll have died after picking a fight with a drunk customer in the gambling house. The Tang Clan doesn’t bother itself with a troublemaker like the third young master anyway.”
“Wow… aren’t you going a little too far? Chae-yun!”
“You really want me to do it?”
“Do it! This is all valuable experience~ Just think of it that way.”
Who risks their life for experience? Still, in a situation like this, Gi Chae-yun’s options were limited.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
He started firing the chili-powder capsules from the Poison Bullet Launcher in every direction.
“It’s poison!”
“It’s not poison, actually.”
Wearing a mask, I hid inside the thick cloud of chili powder smoke, darting around and flinging concealed weapons.
“Gunan-sal!”
The daggers slicing through the mist were lethal to opponents whose martial skills weren’t particularly high.
“Aargh!”
“Aaaah!”
“Ugh! It’s paralyzing poison!”
The weapons were coated with paralyzing toxin taken from the Heuk-shi-bong wasps of Guya-rim. One after another, the men collapsed without being able to put up a proper fight.
“Damn it!”
Jo Sun barely dodged one of my throws. Eyes stinging, he tried to locate me.
Damn it! Where are you!
“Aaaagh! It burns!”
“Cough!”
“My eyes! It burns!”
Amid all the screaming, Jo Sun’s senses finally locked onto me.
“Young Master Sanlong! You’ve been toeing the line for a while, but you’ve finally crossed it!”
Was this what they meant by the pot calling the kettle black? I was honestly dumbfounded.
“You people are the ones who messed up, yet you’re talking about crossing lines? You’ve got no conscience at all.”
“Shut your mouth! Oseon Gwaegeom!”
It carried the crude flavor typical of Haomun martial arts, but the internal energy behind it was anything but crude.
First-rate, huh!
Swish!
Jo Sun’s sword path was rough, but the sheer tenacity and obsession with taking his opponent’s life rivaled even the highest-level techniques. It was practical, irregular, and exactly what you’d expect from a heretical sect.
“Gunan-sal!”
“Oseon Gwaegeom! Block!”
Clang!
The daggers fell harmlessly. But the real strength of Tang Clan martial arts was using multiple weapons to dazzle the eyes while hiding one lethal strike.
“Gunan-sal!”
“The same… ugh!”
A hidden blade slipped through the barrage and struck his shoulder.
“Argh! Damn it!”
The paralyzing poison was already slowing his movements.
“Gi Chae-yun! Give me that.”
“Catch!”
I caught the iron fan he’d prepared in advance and met Jo Sun’s ferocious sword strikes.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
I’d never specifically learned fan techniques, but Tangga-gwon was the foundation of every Tang Clan art, so wielding it with an iron fan felt completely natural.
“Damn it!”
Every attack was blocked. Jo Sun was growing desperate. Being poisoned, the longer the fight dragged on, the worse it was for him.
I need to get out of here, at least…
As he seemed ready to flee alone, I unfolded the fan with a flourish.
“You’re distracted.”
Whoosh!
The moment the fan opened, poison scattered across his face.
“Aaaagh!”
The burning pain tore a scream from his throat. On top of that, his vision was failing. It must have been maddening.
“Nice sound.”
“Argh!”
Crack!
I poured internal energy into the iron fan, snapped the wrist holding his sword, and drove a hard kick into his stomach. Then I slipped my hand into my sleeve and gathered my energy.
After reaching the Shipdok Shingong, I managed to drastically shorten the preparation for Chuhon Shimpyo!
Before going to Guya-rim, I had to make a big production of it. Now it was much simpler. Proof that my internal energy had grown significantly.
“One arm should be enough to keep the conversation going, right?”
“Young Master Sanlong! W-wait… just wait a moment!”
Even with blurred vision, Jo Sun could sense the snake-like energy coiling toward his right arm.
“Chuhon Shimpyo!”
Swoosh!
The razor-sharp throwing blade tore through the air, aimed straight at his right arm.
Clang!
I’d been certain it would pierce him, but a woman in luxurious silk robes appeared, her elegant sword dance deflecting my Chuhon Shimpyo.
“That’s enough.”
The veiled girl who looked to be in her late teens spoke. I folded the iron fan and asked, “You’re the branch master?”
She slowly sheathed her sword and nodded.
“If you were looking for me, you didn’t need to cause such a troublesome scene, did you?”
Now that I looked, her clothes were far too expensive for a mere musician. If my observation skills had been a little sharper, I would have noticed.
“Who made things troublesome first, I wonder?”
When I slowly reached into my sleeve again, she let out a small sigh.
“Haa… Let’s move to a different location first.”
“Shall we?”
Meeting the branch master sure wasn’t easy.
“Please, drink.”
“Is this poisoned?”
“Poisoning the tea of a Tang Clan member? What an amusing joke.”
I took a sip of the steaming tea and continued.
“Didn’t expect a place like this inside a gambling house.”
A secret room hidden deep within the establishment. Only the girl and I remained.
I looked around for a while before speaking.
“By the way, isn’t running a rigged gambling operation a bit much, even for the Haomun?”
If I hadn’t fallen for a similar scam in my previous life, I never would have noticed.
“We truly had no idea they were doing such things.”
Her expression looked sincere, but after watching the manager’s shameless acting, I didn’t buy it.
Revealing the rigged gambling had only been an excuse to meet the branch master anyway.
“Let’s set the past aside. Is it normally this hard to request something from the Haomun?”
“I have a question first.”
“A question? And I’m supposed to answer it?”
“If you answer me, I’ll overlook today’s events. We make sure to clearly distinguish favors and grudges—even if we aren’t quite as strict as the Tang Clan.”
“Sounds like a threat.”
“We call this a transaction.”
Facing her sharp, murderous gaze, I nodded.
“Hmm… Fine. Ask.”
“How did you know I was here?”
To her edged reaction I answered casually, “Isn’t this the Haomun branch?”
“Pardon?”
Her eyebrows twisted in a bizarre expression. After thinking for a moment, she looked at me with pure disbelief.
“Then why were you looking for me?”
“To make a request.”
“…Is that truly all?”
“Yep.”
The woman was momentarily speechless. Her strange reaction only made me tilt my head further.
“Why are you acting like that?”
She pressed a hand to her forehead and answered.
“This location is merely one of our branch’s business operations.”
“Oh? Really? So what?”
“It means the place that actually receives requests is separate. This is both a business venue and an information-gathering point. If you go to the proper request office, you can file one anytime, even without me present.”
“Huh?”
Suddenly the puzzle pieces started clicking together in my head. Come to think of it, it had been strange that the money-obsessed Haomun would hesitate to accept requests.
Oh?
Now Jo Sun’s reaction made sense too.
It wasn’t the branch headquarters, nor the request office. So when someone from the Tang Clan started asking about the branch master’s whereabouts, they got wary.
From the very first meeting, everything had been off-kilter.
“Last time I heard… this was the branch?”
“Are you certain?”
“Well……”
“You nearly destroyed one of our branch’s business locations over uncertain information?”
Since I’d been drunk and couldn’t remember clearly, I naturally avoided her piercing stare.
“Well… as long as we reach the capital, the path doesn’t matter, right?”
“Excuse me?”
“The important part is that we’ve met like this. Ahem.”
“Ha!”
Facing her genuinely irritated gaze was too much, so I cleared my throat and kept going.
“Besides, if you people hadn’t been cheating, none of this would have happened, right?”
“We really……”
“Even if you didn’t know, it still happened in your territory. Don’t try to blame someone else. Should I head out into Chengdu right now and spill everything?”
“Th-that… I’m sorry.”
I barely managed to wrestle back control of the conversation I had almost lost.
Whew.
As expected of the Haomun. The moment they see the slightest opening, they dig into it like madmen.
Calming my still-pounding heart, I looked at her.
“Since I’ve faithfully answered the branch master’s question, you’ll accept my request, won’t you?”
“What kind of request is it?”
After causing this much chaos, what could the request possibly be? The tension was thick.
“Do you know Tang Chil-ju, the instructor for Tanggidae 7th Class?”
“Yes.”
He frequented gambling houses and bars so often that even if she wanted to ignore him, she couldn’t.
“I think that guy is skimming—no, outright embezzling—the 7th Class operating funds. Find me some proof.”
“……”
For such a ridiculously trivial request—especially after the incomprehensible word I’d used—the girl was left speechless.
Was one of their business locations nearly destroyed just for this?
They said that once elders took the branch master seat they experienced all sorts of things. It clearly wasn’t an empty boast.
“Is that all?”
“Yes. When can you have it done by?”
As I asked with a bright expression, the girl looked like she wanted to dump the entire teacup in her hand right over my head.