plumnovel #752 - Golden Hook Casino
#752 - Golden Hook Casino
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“Sir, is there something you need from this old one?”
An unremarkable old man, dressed plainly, who had never personally placed a bet but had only been standing on the side watching the excitement, saw Lu Jing walking towards him and took the initiative to ask.
“Old sir, are you the star croupier of this gambling house?”
The star croupier was the most skilled croupier in a gambling house. With him in charge, ordinary swindlers wouldn't dare to casually try to profit from the gambling house. Most of the other croupiers in the gambling house were his apprentices.
Lu Jing had just seen that the croupier responsible for dealing the cards at this table was very respectful to the old man, and always glanced over here while dealing. Besides, the old man had been standing here for so long without gambling, yet the gambling house's bouncers hadn't come to bother him.
“Why would I have a golden hook?” the old man asked back.
“Because I didn't see a golden hook in this gambling house, and in this situation, the golden hook is usually on the owner.”
The old man shook his head upon hearing this, “The reason my gambling house is called Golden Hook is because the gambling house I used to frequent was called that, and the owner there didn't have a golden hook either, only a copper hook, which he himself called a golden hook.
“I didn't have much money back then, and I could only gamble a few times a month, so I could only watch from the side, but I was always chased out by the gambling house's bouncers.
“So I secretly vowed in my heart that when I had money one day, I would watch to my heart's content in the Golden Hook gambling house. If anyone chased me away, I would slap a string of cash on his face.
“As a result, when I was forty years old, I finally made a fortune, but when I returned to the Golden Hook gambling house, I found that the place had been abandoned, and the owner seemed to have died.
“I was very disappointed. It was like you were wearing fine clothes, but you could only go out at night.
“Later, I came to the capital to make a living. Relying on that money, I continued to work hard and earned more money, but I always felt that there was a void in my heart.
“Until I bought this gambling house from its previous owner and changed its name, it finally cured my long-standing problem.”
The old man said, “Now I can stand here for as long as I want, and no one can chase me away anymore.”
After a pause, he added, “Alright, my story is over. Young man, it's time to tell your story.”
“I don't have a story. I'm here to find someone, looking for a new face who has recently appeared in the gambling house.”
The old man didn't rush to answer, but looked at Lu Jing and said, “Are you a government official?”
“No.”
“Then why should I tell you?”
Xie Lili was not surprised but delighted to hear this, and puffed out her chest, as if she was about to say to Lu Jing, 'Come on, beg me!'
But Lu Jing didn't even look at her. Instead, he rummaged in his arms for a while, and finally took out a agate dice and handed it to the old man opposite him.
Lu Jing wasn't sure if the dice would be useful.
After all, when Madam Qi gave him the dice, she also said that this thing was quite old, and she didn't know how many people in the martial world could recognize it.
The old man didn't pay much attention when he first took the agate dice, but after taking it and looking at it carefully, his expression gradually changed.
After that, he brought the agate dice to the oil lamp on the side and examined it carefully for a while, then sighed, “The treasure of the Thousand Gate Sect, the Five-Colored Dice, hey, I didn't expect the rumors to be true. This old man has learned something today.”
After saying that, he returned the agate dice to Lu Jing and asked, “May I ask if you are surnamed Qi?”
This time it was Lu Jing's turn to shake his head and say, “My surname is not Qi, but I do have a master whose surname is Qi. Everyone calls her Madam Qi. She gave me this agate dice.”
The old man looked at Lu Jing with a strange look in his eyes, “Your master seems to think highly of you. She even gave you the Five-Colored Dice, which has been passed down from generation to generation in the Qi family. With this dice, people from the Thousand Gate Sect will be driven by you.
“Are you also a member of the Thousand Gate Sect?”
“I am not,” the old man said, “but I always give face to the Qi family, and I happen to be troubled by something.”
“What is it?”
“You just asked me if there were any new faces who often come to the gambling house recently. Look, that young scholar at the third table on your right, I suspect he is cheating, but I don't have any evidence.
“He doesn't win much, and he disguises himself very well. After winning once, he always loses three or four times. At most, he earns about one hundred taels of silver a day.
“I don't care about this little money, I'm just a little annoyed that someone is playing tricks in front of me, but I can't do anything about it.
“I'm worried that the croupiers in my gambling house don't have good eyesight, so I specially invited the star croupier from the Ruyi Gambling House next door, but he still can't see anything. You came just in time. You are a descendant of the Qi family, maybe you can see through his cheating methods.”
Lu Jing looked in the direction the old man indicated, and sure enough, he saw a scholar in his early twenties playing dice at a table.
He was playing the simplest game of guessing big or small, and like the other gamblers at the table, he was staring intently at the hand of the croupier shaking the dice.
Lu Jing didn't move immediately, but asked again, “Are there any other people?”
“Are you asking about cheaters or new faces who have recently appeared? If it's the former, there are none for the time being. If it's the latter, to be honest, there are quite a few. This is Lintian Prefecture, and my gambling house is open for business.
“Some people lose their fortunes here and never come back, and naturally new people come to fill their place, otherwise where would I make money?”
“I'm looking for a group of strange people, just like that scholar, they all have… something different from ordinary people.”
“What do you mean by different?”
“Forget it, I'll ask myself.”
After Lu Jing finished speaking, he cupped his hands to thank the old man, and then walked towards the young scholar.
The latter's attention was all on the dice at this moment, and he didn't notice that someone was approaching him, but just as Lu Jing approached within ten steps of him, a look of surprise suddenly appeared on the young scholar's face, and then he stopped looking to see if he had bet correctly.
He stood up straight from the table and walked quickly towards the outside of the gambling house with his head down.
However, he only had time to take two steps before someone grabbed his hand, and then a cold, sharp object was placed against his lower back.
“Where is your accomplice? Where is he?” Lu Jing asked.
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