Chapter 173: Heaven-Defying Fortune, Advancing to the Second Tier

Hearing Tiger's words, the gambling cultivator let out a cold sneer.

Fearing the gamble before it even began—he had already lost mentally.

"You want smaller stakes? Fine."

The gambling cultivator looked at Tiger and said, "If you use yourself as the wager, we bet one hand. If you use the human beside you as the wager, you bet his life."

"Wait, hold on a second."

Tiger was dumbfounded. "The two of us are gambling. What does he have to do with it?"

"Just tell me, are you betting or not?!"

The gambling cultivator's eyes were bloodshot.

For the vast majority of gambling cultivators, losing was completely unacceptable.

Gambling cultivators fell into two categories: those who gambled to win, and those who gambled to lose.

For the former, winning even once increased their fortune. If they lost, however, their opponent would take their fortune away.

The latter were the exact opposite: every loss accumulated fortune, while every win consumed it.

Most gambling cultivators belonged to the former category, and the man before them clearly did too.

"The point is, even if we really did bet his life, you couldn't take it..."

Tiger said weakly, "He has a halo around him."

"..."

The gambling cultivator choked on his words. Finally, he snapped viciously, "That's none of your business!"

"Forget it, forget it. I'm not gambling."

Tiger reached out to close the shop doors. "If you want to block the door, go ahead."

The shop didn't make much money anyway; it mainly served as an intelligence post in East Street. Besides, Mr. Yi Ji would be returning soon. If this guy wanted to block the entrance, let him.

At worst, it would just take a little effort to wipe the blood off the front steps later.

Seeing Tiger about to close the doors, the gambling cultivator grew frantic.

"Why are you such a coward?"

"Who's a coward?"

Tiger puffed out his chest. "What kind of sane person bets their hands or their life?"

"I already said I'd lower the stakes."

"Then we'll bet on something else."

Refusing to give up, the gambling cultivator said, "Since you don't want to get hurt, let's bet our luck!"

"..."

Tiger's eyes shifted thoughtfully. "Fine."

He didn't have much of that anyway.

"Good."

Seeing Tiger agree, the gambling cultivator rejoiced inwardly.

To actually dare bet luck against a gambling cultivator—this robed guy might as well be marching to his death.

He was clearly a complete amateur...

"What are we betting on?"

Tiger asked.

"Best two out of three. I'll set the rules for the first round, you set them for the second, and for the third, we roll Dice. The winner decides the rules," the gambling cultivator said coldly.

"Alright, you go first,"

Tiger said.

Hearing this, the gambling cultivator laughed coldly in his heart.

Truly an amateur.

He had already fallen for the trap.

Letting him set the rules for the first round was essentially handing him a free win. Once he won, his fortune would increase while his opponent's decreased, allowing him to seize the upper hand in the second round as well.

"For the first round, we bet on Dice. Two Dice. The highest roll wins."

The gambling cultivator declared, "But so you don't think I'm using sleight of hand to cheat as a gambling cultivator, you can pick a random passerby to roll the Dice for me."

"Sure."

Tiger nodded. He immediately hailed a random passerby, offering 20 gui yuan as a reward to roll the Dice for the gambling cultivator.

"I'll roll first."

Tiger picked up the dice cup, brought his hands together, and put on a devout expression. "Spirits of heaven, spirits of earth, give me a six, give me a six."

"I need a six, I need a six!"

Clack—

The cup stopped, and the Dice tumbled out.

Seeing the numbers facing up, Tiger's eyes widened.

He had rolled a two and a one.

How was he supposed to win with that?

Tiger's mouth drooped uncontrollably, but he still looked at Yan Jing and forced a smile.

"It's fine, Xiao Yan. No one ever wins the first hand anyway."

"Haha, my turn."

As the gambling cultivator spoke, the passerby casually rattled the Dice.

Standing behind the passerby, the gambling cultivator smiled where Yan Jing and Tiger couldn't see.

He didn't need any skill at all. One of a First Tier gambling cultivator's abilities was called Borrow Fortune.

He could temporarily lend his own fortune to the passerby. That way, against an opponent who had only rolled a three, it was absolutely impossible to lose.

Faint Weird Energy trembled at his fingertips. Soon, he formed a bridge of fortune between himself and the passerby.

Just as he sneered, continuously channeling his formless fortune across the bridge to the passerby, a sudden, soul-piercing blast from a Suona sounded right behind him, making him flinch in terror.

The bridge he had painstakingly built with the passerby...

...snapped in that fearful flinch.

His eyes widened as sheer panic set in.

His fortune had already been sent over!

Now that the bridge was broken, he temporarily had no way to take it back!!!

What was he going to do?!

Breaking out in a cold sweat, he tried to recall exactly how much fortune he had channeled to this passerby.

The more he thought about it, the more he sweated.

Right at that moment, the dice cup came to a halt.

Under the simultaneous, tense stares of Tiger and the gambling cultivator, the cup was slowly lifted, revealing the numbers beneath.

"Holy shit!"

Tiger, who hadn't even dared to breathe, rubbed his eyes in disbelief. There, beneath the cup, sat two ones.

"I won!!!"

He jumped up in joy, then wiped the sweat from his brow.

He had thought for sure he was going to lose. Even though he felt his luck was useless anyway... losing never felt good.

Little did he know, the gambling cultivator across from him currently felt as if he had plunged into an icy cavern.

The passerby had taken his fortune, but that didn't mean the passerby would definitely roll high numbers. Because whether the Dice won or lost had absolutely nothing to do with the passerby; the one it truly concerned was him.

So, he lost.

Which meant that his current fortune was even worse than the guy across from him who had rolled a three.

"Give my fortune back!!"

He went completely mad.

Leaping up, he reached out to grab the passerby's throat.

But with a backhand slap, the passerby sent him sprawling to the ground.

"This guy's out of his mind!"

As it turned out, the passerby was actually a Second Tier cultivator. Before leaving, he stomped ruthlessly on the gambling cultivator, breaking his remaining hand.

The gambling cultivator crawled up. By this point, he could no longer feel physical pain. To a gambling cultivator, losing their fortune meant losing everything.

With a numb face, he stared blankly at Tiger. That unblinking gaze gave Tiger the creeps.

"It was just one game of Dice. No need to go that far, brother."

"Let's gamble... continue gambling..."

The man stared vacantly.

He had nothing left. If he wanted to survive in this city, his only hope was the gamble in front of him.

Like a gambler on the brink of bankruptcy, he had reached the edge of the cliff.

"I said let's gamble! Let's gamble!!"

His voice grew louder, trying to use sheer volume to hide his anxiety.

"Fine, we'll gamble. Stop yelling..."

Tiger thought for a moment and looked at Yan Jing beside him.

"Xiao Yan, do you have any suggestions?"

"Manager, just do whatever you think is best."

Yan Jing smiled.

"Then let's play a coin toss."

Tiger pulled out a gui yuan and placed it on the table.

"I'll flip the gui yuan, and you guess whether the 'Lake' is face up or the 'Character' is face up."

"Alright."

The gambling cultivator gulped, staring intently at the gui yuan in Tiger's hand.

His opponent was a novice; there was no way he knew any sleight of hand.

Which meant that as long as his eyesight was sharp enough, he could easily win this round.

Moreover, this was a type of gamble frequently played in Minhu.

So there shouldn't be any issues.

As long as he concentrated... concentrated...

He fixated on Tiger's hand movements, his nerves strung tight as sweat rained down his body.

He seemed like a completely different person from just a few minutes ago.

The next second, Tiger tossed the coin high into the air.

The gambling cultivator's gaze followed it.

The trick to guessing a coin toss lay in narrowing the window of observation as much as possible. By focusing entirely on the final split second before it landed, one could make a highly accurate judgment.

Good, it was close. It was almost within the range for a precise judgment. There were no obscuring gestures, no throwing tricks...

Good, just like this!

Watching the coin get closer and closer, he felt his heart pounding furiously.

Almost, he was almost about to win this round...

It was, it was the Character... it looked like the Character...

"Manager, why didn't you deliver my wooden sticks today?"

A sinister voice suddenly rang out, drawing both the gambling cultivator's and Tiger's attention for a split second.

Standing to the side was a man in rough, short clothes, holding a wooden box.

Sugar Figurine Wu.

He was the same man Yan Jing had seen that morning with sugar dripping down his face.

"Oh, right, right. I forgot, my apologies."

Tiger slapped the coin onto the back of his hand and called for Yan Jing to fetch the wooden sticks.

"Are you two gambling?"

The man's expression remained calm. "May I join?"

He looked at the ashen-faced gambling cultivator. The man was currently trembling all over, looking as if he were struggling just to breathe.

"This brother here doesn't seem to be in very good shape."

"..."

It was over.

The gambling cultivator could hear nothing now. Because this man's sudden appearance had caused Tiger's hand to flinch for a second.

His focus had been absolute, entirely undistracted, but that one brief jitter...

He felt like he had seen the Character face up just as it landed, but he wasn't sure.

That uncertainty was like a cavity gnawed open by a moth, growing larger and larger until it completely hollowed out his mind.

Was it the Character... Was it really the Character...

A voice kept echoing in his heart.

"This is a private gamble between the two of us. Sorry, Boss Wu."

Tiger looked at the gambling cultivator. "Hurry up, brother, we're waiting for your guess."

"It's... it's... it's..."

The gambling cultivator opened his mouth. "It's... it's the Character... No, no, no, not the Character, it's the Lake... No, no, it's..."

His throat tightened, rendering him utterly unable to speak. In the end, looking as if he had just been drenched in a rainstorm, under Tiger's relentless urging, he finally opened his mouth like a rusted iron man, his voice trembling.

"It's... it's the Lake..."

"You're sure?"

Tiger lifted his hand. "Oho, it's the Character."

"Well, you lose. Your luck belongs to me now."

Tiger pumped his fist, feeling pretty good.

But that was about it. It didn't seem... all that thrilling or dangerous.

He hadn't expected to win, nor did he feel like he had absorbed the so-called luck of his opponent.

But the very next second, the gambling cultivator across from him began to convulse violently.

Throwing his head back, he stared at the top of Tiger's head, as if witnessing something unspeakably horrific, his pupils quivering.

"Impossible... impossible... this is impossible..."

As if he had seen a ghost, he scrambled up from the ground and sprinted madly down the street. But before he could get far, a massive stone block plummeted from the sky with a sickening crunch, crushing him into a meat paste.

"Sorry about that! The stone I use for physical training accidentally slipped! Didn't hit anyone, did it—"

A body cultivator poked his head out from the roof, but upon seeing the crushed body, he immediately yanked his head back in.

"You won all his luck."

Sugar Figurine Wu accepted the wooden sticks Yan Jing handed over. "But he shouldn't have died. It's likely he didn't have much luck left to begin with."

"It can't be that bizarre, can it..."

Tiger swallowed hard.

Didn't that mean...

If he hadn't won just now, the one smashed into meat paste would have been him...

At the thought, a chill ran down his spine, and goosebumps covered his skin.

"Xiao Yan, you chat with Boss Wu. I'm going to take a rest."

Tiger took two steps back, nearly losing his footing.

Watching the scene unfold, Yan Jing smiled.

Tiger's luck was a crucial factor, otherwise their group might not have conveniently landed in Bianliu County.

He had always harbored the thought of utilizing it, but many things still required verification.

Today could be considered a partial verification.

With this, it seemed... there was now a countermeasure for that Baile Manor in Eldest Young Master Luo's memories.

For this trip to Bianliu County, Yan Jing held massive ambitions.

He wanted to find a place to call his own and establish a firm foothold.

Therefore, many things had to be planned out slowly.

As for chatting with this Boss Wu...

Yan Jing looked at Sugar Figurine Wu, whose face was beginning to turn to sugar again, and reached out to close the door.

"Time to sleep."

The next afternoon.

Yan Jing went to Old Monkey's shop and met Dong An.

At this moment, the boy looked completely different from yesterday. Those previously fair hands were now stripped of their skin, revealing bloody flesh, and in some spots, even bone was visible.

His frame also seemed a size smaller than yesterday; his originally modest stature had become even more diminutive.

Yet he looked extremely happy.

"I really entered the ranks. Sir, please convey my thanks to Mr. Yi when you go back. I won't be able to repay his kindness in this lifetime."

He continuously plunged his hands into a pot of boiling water, rapidly fishing out coins one by one with his index and middle fingers, tossing them into a pan of hot oil, and then plucking them back out.

This wasn't something that could be achieved overnight; as expected, Old Monkey harbored some secret arts.

"Alright."

Yan Jing nodded. Immediately after, he received a prompt indicating the completion of his task.

During this Stage A, without the presence of other players, there were no major disturbances, and everything had proceeded smoothly.

Now, it was time to reap the rewards.

[Personal Dungeon Bianliu County Stage A completed]

[Dungeon tallying in progress]

[Task 'Be a Good Shop Assistant' tallied. Player successfully became a shop assistant and received first-class ratings in all of the manager's evaluations. Based on the comprehensive assessment, the task evaluation is: S (Highest is S-grade)]

[Task 'Helping Others is the Essence of an Assistant' tallied. Player successfully helped an unranked individual in entering the ranks, spending a total of two days and reaping an extreme level of gratitude from the target. Based on the comprehensive assessment, the task evaluation is: S (Highest is S-grade)]

[Stage A comprehensive evaluation: S]

[Reward tallying in progress]

[Base Reward: 3% Experience, 10,000 Eerie Coins]

[S-grade Evaluation Bonus Reward: 20% Experience, 10,000 Eerie Coins, Dungeon Selection Voucher x1, Physical Enhancement Potion x1 (Bound Item), Inner World Box Key x1 (Bound Item)]

[Detected that player experience is full. You have advanced in tier]

[Excess experience is automatically converted to the next tier's experience at a 50% ratio]

[Second Ritual Calming Rite can be initiated]

It was finally here.

Looking at the long-awaited tier advancement prompt, Yan Jing couldn't help but clench his fists.

Immediately, his personal status panel appeared.

[Player Name: Yan Jing]

[Player Title: None]

[Player Level: Second Tier, Experience (0.5%/100%)]

[Ritual:

Day Selection Ritual: Fear Sapling (Purple-Black)

Calming Rite: Pending Selection]