Poker
Poker.
A simple enough game. The dealer sends cards however they please, you build a hand, you put your chips on the table, and when the cards are turned over, the highest ranking takes the entire pot.
Memorize the hand rankings and you barely even need to learn the rules, which is precisely why poker was one of the most popular games in any casino.
The black market casino was no exception. There were more than twenty poker tables, yet strangely, every spectator in the room had packed themselves around a single table at the far end of the floor.
"H-how many in a row is that now? Four? Five?"
"Looked like six to me."
"You idiots. The streak isn't even the point. He's playing like he already knows every card in everybody's hand!"
"So how is he that good?"
The onlookers stared at the man in the black robe seated at the center of the table and clicked their tongues in disbelief.
"It's not just the streak. His win rate is insane. He's taken more than seven out of ten."
"That kind of luck is no joke. I used to have runs like that."
"Bullshit. You've always been broke."
"Look at those chips. He's piled up a whole damn mountain. I'm so jealous."
They weren't exaggerating. In front of the man in the black robe, the chips had risen into a hill.
"Hah…"
"Nngh…"
"Damn it."
The gamblers sharing his table watched it happen with cold sweat on their brows, or with their faces twisted into scowls.
"Is he a pro? A card shark, or whatever they call it?"
"You moron! The inside of the black market casino is magically warded so you can't use mana. And if he were a cheat, that dealer would've caught him already! The man's been dealing for over twenty years!"
"Oh. Right. They did swap the dealer."
The man in the robe had won so many hands in a row that other patrons had protested, and the dealer had been replaced once. Even after that, the man hadn't lost a single coin.
"So it's actually just luck?"
"Man, if I could catch a streak like that…"
"Luck's a given, sure. But his judgment looks sharp too. Those eyes aren't playing around."
"Urgh…"
Dorian, who had been listening to the spectators with his nails between his teeth, finally approached the man in the black robe—Raon.
"Y-Young Master. Let's stop now. Beginner's luck stretched this far is like a rubber band pulled to the limit—this is your chance to walk! Everyone's calling it luck!"
"How long is beginner's luck supposed to last, exactly?"
Raon glanced at Dorian's anxious eyes and let out a quiet snort of laughter.
Well. It is about time to quit.
He swept a hand over the mountain of chips and nodded. The auction estimate for the Black Butterfly ran from ten to twenty gold coins. He had just made thirty-five. That was enough.
Push any further and someone might pick a fight.
He'd run up the streak because he was short on time, but the proper way to do this was to bleed a table slowly, over several days. Winning more than this could become a problem.
"I'm done here. Convert it to gold, please."
Raon pushed his chips toward the dealer and stood.
"Wait! You're just leaving?"
The woman in the fox mask—who had followed him from the dice tables all the way to poker—shot to her feet after him.
"I made what I came to make."
"You don't just win and walk out!"
"That's… what you come here to do?"
"One more hand. I haven't beaten you even once!"
"I don't have much time."
"Tch!"
The woman in the fox mask bit down on her lip, her eyes turning vicious. She had lost twenty straight hands from dice through poker, and her temper looked ready to blow.
Who asked you to follow me?
He hadn't invited her. She'd come on her own, picked the fight herself, lost, and now she was acting like this.
"Mm…"
"Ahem."
"G-guess we should try another table."
Strangely, the moment the woman stood up and started shouting, the spectators' eyes snapped away. They looked almost afraid of her.
As he'd suspected, she was from a well-known house.
"You've still got plenty of money. Don't mind me—enjoy yourselves."
"You think you can gamble a little and start acting like you own the place? Don't get cocky. Stay right there!"
"Ah. Sure."
Raon ignored her and turned his back. He was leaving anyway. Whether her status was high or not made no difference to him. He let the sound of her grinding her teeth slide off him and headed for the exit.
"Let's go."
"Ah—yes!"
Apparently convinced that his advice had actually landed, Dorian let out a breath of relief and hurried after him.
"Raon Zieghart. You remember our deal, I trust?"
Of course.
"Had you forgotten, This King was prepared to kill you. Come. Let us conclude the transaction."
The voice was heavy and cold. The fact that the transaction in question involved ice cream and food, however, made Raon want to laugh.
Understood. Let's go.
Raon snorted softly and left the casino behind.
The woman in the fox mask glared at Raon's retreating back with bright yellow eyes, sharp enough to draw blood.
"Setar."
"Yes."
The large-framed man standing behind her bowed.
"Find out who that bastard is and what he's after. Everything."
"Your High— I mean, Lady Jayna. We were ordered not to cause unnecessary trouble…"
"I already granted your request by not going down to the underground den, didn't I? How much longer am I supposed to sit on my hands?"
This was not the only casino in the building. The real one—the one with no betting limits, where people gambled with their lives—was on the floor below.
"But my lady. You're still under disciplinary confinement…"
"Shut up and go. That son of a bitch definitely cheated. Winning like that is statistically impossible! I'll cut his hands off myself!"
"Hah. As you wish."
Setar let out a sigh that said he had no choice, and vanished from the spot.
"Hmph."
Jayna snorted and turned. She was about to leave the gambling floor when the dealer approached her.
"Y-you left your chips, miss."
"I don't need them. You take them."
She didn't even glance at the chips—more than ten gold coins' worth—as she shoved them at the dealer.
"Pardon? Ah…"
The dealer stood there at a loss, but Jayna was already walking toward the exit.
Money isn't the issue.
Jayna's smile was cold. She had so much money it could rot. What mattered was not gold. It was winning and losing. Born of noble blood, she could not swallow a loss to an ordinary human like that and simply walk away.
Whatever it takes, I'll block your path.
"Hmmm."
Wrath's voice sat a full register higher than usual, and a smile crept across it.
"This King is drawn to that one."
He shaped a finger from blue frost and pointed at a particular ice cream.
That?
Raon frowned at it. The base was some indeterminate shade between green and blue, studded throughout with chocolate chips—a bizarre-looking thing.
Runaan showed me this once, I think.
"Correct. The ice cream you refused to eat. It even appeared in This King's dreams."
Wrath could not tear his eyes from it. He was practically panting.
"One of those, please."
Raon let out a small sigh and ordered the ice cream Wrath had chosen.
"Oh, a customer who picks mint chocolate! You, sir, know your ice cream."
A large man who looked to be the shopkeeper beamed as he scooped it up.
"Mint chocolate?"
"Ack!"
Dorian, who had been eating strawberry ice cream, nearly jumped out of his skin and rushed over.
"Y-Young Master. Did you just order mint chocolate?"
"That's what he said."
"Hah, this is…"
"What?"
"Young Master, you know peppermint, right? That sharp, biting stuff."
"I know it."
"This ice cream is made from that. It sets your whole mouth on fire! There's no flavor to it at all!"
Dorian shook his head hard. Raon had seen him frightened plenty of times, but he had never seen him look this genuinely pained.
"This customer simply doesn't know taste. To not understand the joy of mint chocolate—starting with the sweetness of chocolate and finishing clean and refreshing, without a hint of cloying aftertaste."
The shopkeeper, by contrast, narrowed his eyes at Dorian.
"Mint chocolate, coming up."
He came out from behind the counter himself to hand it over. The ice cream sat in a cone-shaped wafer.
"Hurry. Eat it at once. This King can endure no longer!"
Wrath's frost spread and spread until it blanketed the entire ice cream shop.
I got it, so sit still.
Raon sighed and looked down at the green ice cream. He could feel eyes on him from the side. The shopkeeper and Dorian were both watching, waiting for his reaction, their gazes bright.
Over a thing like this.
He thought it was a remarkably stupid thing to fight about, and put the ice cream in his mouth.
"Mm."
At first, it was like any other ice cream—cool and sweet, wrapping around his tongue. The problem came after. A sharp peppermint bite bloomed through his entire mouth.
How to put it. It wasn't that it tasted bad. It just felt awkwardly in-between.
"Oooh! Delicious! This harmony of sweetness and purity exists not even in the Demon Realm. This is a revolution!"
Wrath, apparently delighted, let out a bizarre shriek and began to dance in midair. Raon had no idea what kind of dance it was, but the joy was unmistakable.
"How is it?"
"Young Master. Are you all right?"
Dorian and the shopkeeper asked about the taste at the same time, closing in together.
"Not really my thing."
"Urgh!"
"See, Young Master has a palate! Anyone who likes mint chocolate has something wrong with their tongue."
The shopkeeper's face tightened. Dorian's broke into a wide grin.
"What are you doing?! Eat more! More! Quickly!"
Hah.
A promise was a promise. Raon frowned the entire time, but he finished every last bit of the mint chocolate ice cream.
"Huk! Young Master! Why would you eat the rest of that?!"
Dorian waved his arms, wearing the expression of a man who had just bitten into a lemon.
"Bwahaha! You can lie with your mouth, but you can't lie with your heart! That feeling of thinking it's not for you and still being pulled back in—that is the charm of mint choc!"
The shopkeeper scooped another mint chocolate and forced it into Raon's hand, insisting it was free.
"Charm, my foot! It's just an awkward, weird flavor!"
"I pity any customer who cannot grasp the greatness of mint choc."
Raon shook his head at Dorian and the shopkeeper, who had started arguing with each other as if he weren't even there.
"What genius created this?! Ask at once! This King shall take them as a subordinate!"
"Who made this ice cream?"
"Ah, now you're interested in the history as well?"
The shopkeeper muttered something about how mint choc was truly magnificent, then continued.
"I believe it was created by a lord in the southern provinces, a region famous for its ice cream. They even have a Mint Choc Society down there."
"Mint Choc Society? Is that a bandit gang?"
"Of course not! It's a gathering of people who love mint chocolate!"
"Anyone who likes that stuff might as well be a bandit."
Dorian clicked his tongue at the shopkeeper.
"Take that back, customer!"
The shopkeeper's hands trembled as if he were about to leap over the counter.
"Haa…"
Raon looked at the two of them and let out a long, deep sigh.
No matter where you go, there are strange people.
"Raon Zieghart! Order another mint chocolate! This dessert has captured This King's heart completely! This King shall open a mint chocolate shop in the Demon Realm!"
Of course, the strangest one of all was this creature.
The next day.
Raon went back down to the black market an hour before the auction was set to begin.
My mouth still feels a little minty.
"This King is satisfied. One day, This King shall turn the seas of the Demon Realm into mint choc."
Wrath had fallen so thoroughly for mint chocolate the day before that he had chosen it for all four of the four ice creams. Something about it satisfying his absolute sense of taste, or whatever he had said.
Regardless, Raon had called it not his thing and then proceeded to eat four mint chocolates in a row, which was a deranged thing to do. Dorian had shaken his head the entire time. The shopkeeper had been so pleased he'd thrown in several more ice creams for free.
"No mint chocolate today?"
"I told you I don't like it."
"You said that, and then you ate four of them in a row. I tried it again myself. It really isn't my taste."
Dorian's face had gone lemon-bitten again, same as yesterday.
"There were circumstances."
He couldn't exactly explain the deal, so he brushed it off.
"To not understand the taste of mint chocolate… what a pathetic creature!"
Wrath looked at Dorian and clicked his tongue, declaring that the coward had a terrible palate on top of everything else.
"Well, there's still time before the auction starts. What would you like to do?"
"Let's look around. We didn't get to yesterday."
"Understood."
Even after buying the Black Butterfly, they would have a fair amount of money left, so they decided to walk the black market.
Unusual goods flowed through this place in volume. With a little luck, you could pick up a treasure for cheap.
They stepped into the nearest stall. Rings, bracelets, necklaces, earrings—precious metals hung on display. An accessories shop, apparently.
The merchant didn't seem interested. He had his chin in his hand at the table, nodding off. He looked like he wouldn't even notice if someone walked off with the stock.
Steal anything, though, and all hell would break loose.
Both the goods and the stall itself were fitted with mana stones and mana-based surveillance and security. Anyone foolish enough to steal would be subdued on the spot and dragged down into the black market's underground.
"See anything, Young Master?"
"Nothing special."
Raon shook his head. The pieces here looked fine, but they were ordinary. What he was looking for was a treasure whose true power had not yet been revealed.
They went into the stall right next door. Accessories hung here as well, though the pieces looked a little older and more antique than the ones they had just seen.
Nothing here either.
He looked over everything on display, but nothing pulled at him, and nothing stood out. He was about to click his tongue and leave when his gaze caught on a rusted ring sitting by the entrance.
What is that?
A memory of that ring surfaced.
Except it was not his memory.
The knowledge of the Cultivation of Ten Thousand Flames, etched into his mind. That ring was inscribed within it.
"Hah."
Raon swallowed dryly and closed his hand around the rusted ring.
To think this ring would be here.