You have mastered the art of thunder and you tell me that it is in a strange world?

Chapter 111: Blinded by greed, it's hard to control

"Hermit, where is the Bo Xifang you mentioned?"

"Brother Dao, please follow me."

Wuweishan walked in front, and Zuo Chen and his group followed behind.

I walked for a while on the main road, then went around a few small alleys, and walked forward for a while. When I came out from the street corner, I felt a sudden brightness in front of my eyes.

Suddenly it became lively.

This is a street along the river. The water is relatively calm everywhere and even expands outward to form a small lake.

There are several flower boats on the small lake, some private and some belonging to brothels.

Close to the center of the lake are private flower boats. You can vaguely see people drinking and singing on the boats, and beautiful women playing the pipa and dancing to accompany them. It is quite pleasant.

Close to the shore are the brothels. The girls, who are somewhat thinly dressed, lean against the side of the boat and wave with handkerchiefs in their hands, while they exchange glances with the rich young men and scholars walking on the street.

There are also many vendors selling miscellaneous food on both sides of the river bank, selling everything from candied haws to Hu bing to dried fruits drying in the sun. It is very lively.

Caiyi finally came back to her senses at this moment, and pointed at the gorgeous girls on the river, saying that this one had a bad figure, that one had bad taste, and that one's rouge and powder were not right.

"You seem to know quite a bit about it." Zuo Chen teased her.

"After the old man ran away, I relied on the help of the sisters in the alley to get through that period." Caiyi blinked: "Unfortunately, the madam always had bad intentions and wanted to sell me, so I ran away later."

Without continuing to chat, Wuwei Shanren pointed in a direction to Zuo Chen. Looking in the direction of his finger, he could see a tall building at the end of the street.

I looked closer and found red paper hanging on both sides, with the following couplets written in black ink:
God of Wealth will give you a smooth journey.

Keeping gold and silver will only cause trouble.

There was a big sign hanging on it:

"Let's have a gamble"

"It doesn't make sense, it's just crap." Wuwei Shanren had a deep resentment towards these places.

Seeing that they had arrived at the place, Caiyi asked Zuo Chen:
"Master, how do you want to deal with them? Do you want to bring down a thunderbolt to paralyze them?"

"Of course not. This is a serious business. If I just chop them all up in the city, it won't be good." He shook his head slightly: "I didn't come to Youzhou to make enemies."

"So what are you going to do, Taoist priest?"

Caiyi didn’t think that Zuo Chen would just rush in and reason with them.

Zuo Chen chuckled.

As soon as Caiyi saw his smile, she knew that Zuo Chen might do something bad.

"A gambling house, what can they do here? Of course they come here to gamble. As long as we bring them down using the same methods as the gambling house, even if the city officials come, they won't be able to say anything."

After saying this, Zuo Chen walked straight into the Bo Xifang.

After entering the Bo Xifang, the whole lively level instantly increased to a higher level.

"Bet on the big one! Bet on the big one!"

"How do you play cards? Do you know how to play? Don't lose all my money!"

"This is my precious chicken. How can your inferior chicken be a match for him?"

Looking up, I saw people playing gambling games everywhere.

This is a three-story pavilion. The first floor is the largest, with many tables set up around it. In the middle is a large open space surrounded by wooden fences where cockfighting takes place.

The second floor seems to be full of rich young men having fun, which is more "funny and elegant" than the bustling first floor.

As for the third floor, there are private rooms one after another, blocked by thick curtains. Only occasional bursts of silver bell-like laughter can be heard. I guess these are where some nobles who cannot show their faces are.

The most lively place in the entire gambling theater is the cockfighting area in the middle.

A large group of people surrounded the large open space. There were young masters in rich clothes and scholars who looked a little poor. They all raised their arms and shouted, calling for the rooster they supported. In this casino, a strange state of equality was achieved.

Inside the cockfighting arena, the ground was covered with chicken blood and feathers, and occasionally some broken chicken meat could be seen. At this moment, two ferocious roosters were attacking each other with their claws and beaks in the cockfighting arena, bringing fanatical joy to the onlookers with their victory.

"Hey, there are a few Taoist priests in our shop?"

As he was watching the situation in the field, a vagrant suddenly walked over from a distance. He was wearing a coat of animal fur on the outside and a torn linen coat on the inside. He was sloppy and half of his chest was exposed.

He looked up and down at Zuo Chen and the others, and finally his eyes fell on Wuwei Shanren. His expression was a little strange:
"I've always heard that the Taoist priest is aloof and doesn't like these mundane things. I didn't expect that you would bring someone here again today. What? Are you planning to cause a big commotion in my store and then get arrested and spend a few days in jail?"

After hearing his words, several gamblers nearby raised their heads and looked at Zuo Chen and the others with smiles.

"Isn't that Wuwei? Are you here to be scolded again?"

"Haha, you're a bit stupid to come to our gambling house and talk about the harm of gambling."

"After all, his name is Wuwei, which means doing nothing. How suitable it is for him."

"That young Taoist priest over there looks handsome. He should be a lucky guy. We should play a few rounds with him. Even if we lose, we can still get some good luck."

While chatting and idly talking, a few gamblers looked at Wuweishanren with some mockery, and regarded Zuo Chen as if he were their prey.

Wuwei Shanren wanted to explode to some extent, but after glancing at Zuo Chen twice, he finally just shrank obediently behind Zuo Chen without saying a word.

Zuo Chen was not annoyed and said cheerfully:

"I have traveled a lot and have never come into contact with these things before. Now I come to see them and want to try them out. I wonder if anyone is lucky enough to have a try with me."

Hearing what he said, the gamblers around him laughed even more happily:

"Listen, this is just taste. Traveling around the world and still going to a gambling house, how interesting!"

"I'll do it! Young Taoist priest, I'll do it! I'm not lucky today, so I'll give you a few taels of silver to improve my luck."

The playboy also looked up and down at Zuo Chen and said with a smile:
"Master, it's not impossible for you to gamble in our restaurant, but you have to at least give us some money. There's no point in gambling without any capital."

"That makes sense." Zuo Chen nodded, reached into his sleeve and took out a large ingot of silver.

It weighs one kilogram!

This was taken from the River God’s Water Palace. It hasn’t been cut with scissors yet, so it’s very complete.

When people saw the silver ingot, the surroundings became quiet for a moment.

Zuo Chen could clearly feel the greedy looks emerging from the eyes of this group of people.

Hooked.

"I didn't expect that the Taoist priest is quite rich." The playboy came back to his senses and looked at Zuo Chen with a strange look in his eyes: "I'll prepare a good table right away, please take a seat."

With a wave of his hand, the guys in the gambling house actually moved a table up and placed it in a conspicuous place. Many gamblers around even stopped playing and gathered here to watch the fun.

Putting the silver ingot on the gambling table, Zuo Chen lifted up his Taoist robe and sat on the chair. Caiyi stood on Zuo Chen's left, Wuwei Shanren stood on Zuo Chen's right, and Wuhui just stared blankly at the people gambling around him, not knowing what they were doing.

Seeing such a large ingot of silver, many people around were eager to try it, and it seemed that many people wanted to get at the table.

"Master, we are all experts here, who do you want to gamble with?" The wanderer asked Zuo Chen. "Before I came here, I heard from the hermit that there is a man named Zhao Laosan here, who is a first-class gambler. I wonder if he is willing to compete with me."

really!

The playboy laughed secretly in his heart.

The other party came over so aggressively and said that he was just here to make trouble. No one would believe it.

It's obvious that he is here to cause trouble!
But the libertines knew that their gambling house could not back down.

The Taoist priests were neither coming to fight nor making a scene at the door. They were following the rules of the casino. If they did not accept the challenge, the reputation of their casino would probably be ruined!

Where will the gamblers come by then?
He lowered his body and said a few words to his men beside him. His men immediately nodded and left. Not long after, a young man squeezed out from the crowd.

He had a plain appearance, a sturdy build and dark skin, and was dressed like a rickshaw driver. He looked like an honest man, but he had a huge black mole on the left side of his lip, and even had a few hairs on it, which ruined his overall image.

After seeing this man coming out, Wuweishanren immediately clenched his fists tightly, his eyes almost spewing fire, and stared at the other party fiercely.

The young man didn't care. He sat in front of Zuo Chen and crossed his left leg on the chair, looking like a bandit.

"I didn't expect that the young Taoist priest would come to play with me. Of course, there is no problem! You are much better than the guy behind you. He came to us without any tricks and just wanted to beat me up. How can this be allowed?"

Zhao Laosan's eyes were full of provocation, but Wuwei Shanren just snorted coldly in the end and suppressed his anger.

Seeing that the mountain man did not refute, Zhao Laosan was even more pleased and relaxed, and then he introduced the things in the casino to Zuo Chen:

"Little Taoist, what do you want to play? We have everything here. The easiest one is dice, the harder one is leaf play, and as for cockfighting, it may be a little difficult now. What do you want to play with? There is a chicken."

"We just got here, so let's not play anything too complicated. Let's just play dice." Zuo Chen said.

As soon as he finished speaking, someone nearby brought over two dice cups.

The three dice in each cup are all six-sided and look delicate and small.

Zuo Chen narrowed his eyes slightly and found that the dice were filled with mercury. As long as special techniques were used, the dice surface could be controlled.

They are all tricks used to cheat.

The more you laugh, the happier you become.

"I didn't bring my scissors today, so I just bet all the silver ingots." Zuo Chen pushed forward directly, "I wonder if you can still bet with me like this?"

Zhao Laosan, who wanted to ask Zuo Chen how much silver he was going to bet this time, was obviously stunned. He thought that this large ingot of silver was all Zuo Chen's gambling money this time, but he didn't expect that the other party would put it all out in one go, which made Zhao Laosan at a loss.

After coming back to his senses, he immediately said, "No problem! If you want to play this, I'll play with you!"

Naturally, he did not have such a large piece of official silver, so he searched his body for a long time and found a piece of silver as big as honeycomb briquettes, which he threw aside.

When he weighed the weight on a small scale, it was not enough, so he asked someone else to pick out some small coins, so that the weight was enough.

The gamblers nearby were all amazed. This level of gold and silver was almost non-existent on the first floor, and was also rare on the second floor. It was only commonly used by distinguished guests on the third floor. Today was an eye-opener.

At the outermost edge of the crowd, a bearded man walked over to the wanderer and whispered:
"What do you mean? Just let him play here?"

"What's wrong with that?" The vagrant said nonchalantly, "It's obvious that he's here to mess things up. We can't be scared. Let him win twice first, then drag him into the deep pit and ruin his fate. Kill the chicken to scare the monkeys. Don't let the people in the city think that anyone can come to our house to mess with us."

"You were given a prescription just now, and your life line was cut off. You are seriously injured." The bearded man said, "This Taoist priest is not weak, he is very capable."

"So what?" With a cold snort, the wanderer's face turned a little sinister. "Being good at fighting doesn't mean you're good at gambling. The entire gambling house is our altar! Can we still be afraid of him? We'll be done if we get rid of him!"

The bearded man didn't say anything, but just looked at the gambling table not far away with a little concern.

Just hope nothing serious goes wrong.

……

"Comparing size?"

"Compare the size."

“Is bigger better, or is smaller better?”

"Of course the bigger the better."

After preparations were completed, both sides began to roll the dice.

Zuo Chen just shook his wrist casually, while Zhao Laosan on the other side shook his palms cracklingly and his ears moved slightly, as if he was listening to something.

After a few breaths, both parties put their gambling cups on the table.

Zhao Laosan took the cup away first.

The numbers on the three-sided dice are one, two and four, which adds up to only seven.

This number is not high. If the comparison of the three dice is less than nine points, then half of the bet has been lost before the game is opened.

Zhao Laosan was very satisfied when he looked at the numbers. He had good ears and could hear that Zuo Chenli's dice should be 2, 4, and 6, which totaled twelve, a big number.

In this way, he would lose to Zuo Chen in the first round, and then he could play a few more rounds with the Taoist priest like a round-robin match, and then win a big one from him, and they would make a huge profit! They had always done this in the past, and this time was no exception.

As for whether Zuo Chen will win and run away?
That's definitely impossible!

People specifically called him out by name just to seek revenge. Although one ingot of high-ranking official's silver was not a small amount, it was far from enough to injure Zhao Laosan seriously. If the other side won, they would surely pursue him. How could he possibly run away?
Zuo Chen simply stretched out his hand and opened the gambling cup.

When Zhao Laosan looked at him, he took a deep breath.

one two three.

It’s just a little smaller than his side!
Is this what is going on?
Did I hear it wrong?
Zhao Laosan looked confused, but he felt that he might have heard it wrong.

The total of the opposite sides of the dice was seven. He heard Zuo Chen say two, four, and six. Two was definitely correct. Four and six turned over to be one and three. Maybe he had been busy all day and his ears weren't working well enough.

Zuo Chen seemed to show some regret on his face and pushed the official silver towards Zhao Laosan.

"What a pity! I only got this huge sum of money not long ago."

Zhao Laosan took it with a confused look on his face, not knowing what to say next for a moment.

But before he could react, Zuo Chen searched his pockets again.

This time he took out a gold ingot.

"Not so good, not so good. We have to keep going. This time we're betting on this!"

Zuo Chen said with a smile.

Zhao Laosan's eyes widened.

what?
Why does this thing exist?

But when he saw the gold, Zhao Laosan felt as if his heart was grabbed by something and he couldn't take his eyes off it.

Greed slowly rose in his heart, difficult to contain, like a flame burning, unbearable.

Ten thousand words today!

The writing feeling these two days is a bit off, I'll make some adjustments, but the daily writing is still a bit of a loss for the text
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(End of this chapter)