Chapter 54: Winning by Not Gambling

Upstairs.

Liu Shen and Qian Yousheng sipped their tea leisurely, watching the butcher sharpening his blade, preparing to slaughter pigs and sheep.

Meanwhile, at the gaming tables downstairs…

Pei Hongyu paced like a restless beast, his eyes bloodshot with anxiety.

After a long wait, the owner of the gambling house approached with a smile, carrying a tray laden with silver notes in denominations of a hundred and a thousand taels.

Seeing this, Pei Hongyu looked as if he had spotted his savior. He hurried to his feet, reaching for the silver notes—

But just as his hand hovered over the tray, before he could touch the notes, someone grabbed his wrist.

"Young Master Pei, no rush, no rush…" The owner pressed his hand down with a genial smile and advised, "We’re old friends now. If it were just a few hundred taels, you wouldn’t even need to ask; you could take it and play. But this is a sum of fifteen thousand taels. And with the fifteen thousand you previously took, that’s thirty thousand taels—no small amount, you see..."

"I know!" Pei Hongyu's eyes were wild with loss, so much so that even his own father couldn’t have convinced him otherwise. He wasn’t about to listen to reason now.

"So I owe fifteen thousand more, is that it?" he snapped. "Let me use this fifteen thousand first. Next round, I’ll win it all back, with interest!"

"Young Master Pei, I urge caution," the owner feigned concern. "If you stop now, it’s just fifteen thousand taels. With the Song family's holdings in Heyang County, you could scrape that together. But if—"

"What do you mean, 'if'?" Pei Hongyu shook off the owner's hand, his patience spent. "I’ve already lost five rounds in a row. In all my years of playing, I’ve never lost six straight. Bring the ledger!"

"Alright, alright, my mistake…" The owner grinned sheepishly, slapping his own cheeks. "My fault, Young Master Pei, please calm down."

With that, he signaled for one of his attendants, who fetched the private ledger prepared for Pei Hongyu.

Pei Hongyu gave a disdainful snort, took up the brush, and wrote his name in the ledger, pressing his fingerprint beside it, before finally sweeping up the stack of silver notes.

"Such extravagance, Young Master Pei…" chuckled the high-roller across the table, raising his eyebrows mockingly. "But I wonder, how many more rounds do you plan to play with these borrowed fifteen thousand taels? Better not lose your very undergarments before you leave."

"Shut your damn mouth!" Pei Hongyu, now quite out of his senses, showed no trace of composure. Gritting his teeth, he slammed the silver notes onto the table and sneered, "Let’s play for this amount. Do you dare?"

"What a joke!" the other gambler scoffed, flinging his own notes onto the table. "Young Master Pei, after all this, I’m the one winning now. Why wouldn’t I dare?"

"Then deal the cards!" Pei Hongyu shouted.

The attendant acting as the dealer wiped the cold sweat from his brow but began to shuffle the tiles as instructed.

Once the tiles were shuffled and stacked, he forced a smile. "The tiles are ready. Would either gentleman care to cut?"

"Why ask me?" The high-roller waved his hand carelessly, shooting a provocative glance at Pei Hongyu. "I’m not the one on a losing streak. You should ask Young Master Pei."

"You…" Pei Hongyu’s temples throbbed, his features contorted. He slapped the table and barked, "No cutting! Deal now!"

"Very well, very well…" The dealer nodded and deferentially handed out the tiles.

Pei Hongyu snorted, drew his tiles from the table, and after glancing at the first tile, shielded his hand while his thumb anxiously rubbed the surface of the second.

"Red head… red head… let it be a red head…" he muttered through clenched teeth, beads of sweat breaking across his brow, his hands trembling as he squeezed the tile.

"Come on, red head!"

When at last he saw the tile was indeed what he wished for, his face twisted with excitement. With a flourish, he revealed the pair—it was exactly the combination he’d hoped for.

"Ha ha ha ha! Earth Pair!"

Pei Hongyu burst into laughter, leaping from his seat and slapping the Earth Pair onto the table.

There are thirty-two tiles in Pai Gow, with countless possible combinations, but the Earth Pair ranks just below the Supreme and Heaven Pairs.

To draw such a hand meant he had a ninety-eight percent chance of winning the round.

The gamblers crowding around gasped in astonishment at the heavy wager and rare hand.

On a small table, even the Supreme Pair would not intimidate. On a large table, even a slightly strong hand could mean a windfall.

"Ha ha ha ha—" Pei Hongyu taunted, watching his opponent nervously squeeze his tiles. "What’s the point? My Earth Pair is already revealed. Unless you’ve got the Supreme Pair, I’ll eat all thirty-two tiles right here!"

"Alas… no Supreme Pair," the high-roller sighed theatrically, then revealed his tiles: the Heaven Pair, the only hand higher than Earth Pair in Pai Gow.

As Pei Hongyu’s laughter froze on his lips, his opponent smiled and teased, "Well, I may not have drawn the Supreme, but this Heaven Pair is more than enough to beat your Earth Pair."

Pei Hongyu stared in disbelief at the Heaven Pair, dumbfounded for a long moment…

Suddenly, it was as though the very bones had been pulled from his body. His knees buckled, and he collapsed into his chair, eyes vacant as he stared at his Earth Pair and the Heaven Pair across from him.

The onlookers gasped, but he heard nothing.

The high-roller stood, smiling as he clasped his hands in a polite gesture, then took the stack of silver notes from the attendant and flicked them with a meaningful click of his tongue.

"My thanks, Young Master Pei…"

The sun set behind the western hills…

Pei Hongyu, disheveled and filthy, was thrown out of the Fortune Source Gambling House, clearly having taken a beating. His usual ‘friends’ had all vanished.

He wandered the street, dazed, as if his body had emerged but his soul remained trapped in the gambling den.

After losing his final fifteen thousand taels on that fateful round—Earth Pair against Heaven Pair—he felt as though everything around him had changed.

The high-roller, flush with winnings, gathered up his money and left the table, no longer interested in gambling.

The ‘friends’ who lingered nearby offered a brief farewell and slipped out of the house, vanishing from sight.

Even the crowd of onlookers who had relished the spectacle scattered with mocking smiles.

Pei Hongyu tried to borrow more money from the house to win back his losses, but the owner refused with excuses: "Small business, funds are tight," "Young Master Pei already owes thirty thousand taels—no more loans," "No one left to gamble with you," and the like.

Unwilling to accept defeat, Pei Hongyu vented his anger and tried to take some money by force.

But he didn’t realize that his status as ‘Young Master Pei’ no longer held any value. Not only did he fail to get any money, but after a heated argument, he was beaten by the very attendants who once groveled before him.

When he saw the owner, now ‘angry,’ take out the ledger and prepare to go to the Song family to collect the debt, only then did he awaken from his stupor—only then did regret and fear take hold.

Thirty thousand taels in gambling debts!

His family’s business had never amassed such a fortune in all its years, and he had lost it all in a single day.

How could he not be terrified?

After being beaten, Pei Hongyu finally recognized reality. He wept and begged the owner not to go to the Song family, pleading for a few days’ grace, promising to gather the funds.

For old times’ sake, the owner relented and gave him three days.

Pei Hongyu returned home to the Song family in utter despair.

Staring up at the Song family’s plaque, he remembered his parents’ careful plans. At last, he summoned a little courage and, trembling, stepped through the gates.