Anchor Hall
Chapter 539: I feel like I’ve been played
“…”
The entire second floor of the casino was shrouded in a deathly silence. The air grew thick and oppressive, flowing into one’s lungs like a heavy liquid.
Watching Wen Jianyan’s eyes, the corners of Mesvis’s mouth slowly pulled wider bit by bit. Uncontrollable laughter spilled from his throat, gradually becoming manic: “Haha… Hahahahahahaha!”
The high-pitched laughter echoed throughout the second floor of the casino, making one’s scalp tingle involuntarily.
After an unknown amount of time, Mesvis, who was laughing so hard he was rocking back and forth, finally stopped.
Clutching his stomach, he raised a hand to wipe away the physiological tears at the corners of his eyes and said with a smile, “Oh my, my apologies, I lost my composure a bit.”
Mesvis stared intently at Wen Jianyan with those terrifying eyes that had very little white, the smile on his face deepening:
“It’s just that I haven’t encountered something this interesting in a very long time.”
He slowly stood up from the sofa. Only then did Wen Jianyan realize that Mesvis was extremely tall, standing at least two meters.
“Ten times leverage, right?”
The casino manager lowered his head, revealing a terrifying smile: “I agree.”
Even though he received an affirmative answer, Wen Jianyan’s heart suddenly relaxed.
Everything was moving in the direction he expected.
Mesvis was a seasoned gambler—this wasn’t just evident from the orders he gave the dealers.
For people like him, the obsession with high risks and high stakes had penetrated deep into their bones like an addiction. The more dangerous, the more addictive; the more stimulating, the more irresistible… This was the instinct of a gambler.
Because of this, he couldn’t refuse Wen Jianyan’s bet.
However, after a brief moment of relaxation, a new wave of pressure hit him again.
One must know, this was a bet of 1.5 billion points.
—1.5 billion.
A number that caused infinite panic just by imagining it.
Wen Jianyan raised his eyes and looked at Mesvis not far away.
The other party currently had his hands behind his back, smiling as he watched the waiters bustling about—in the blink of an eye, a clear space was cleared in the salon, and a gambling table covered with a blood-red cloth was placed right in the center.
“…”
He slowly took a deep breath.
Is there a chance of winning?
Hard to say.
Wen Jianyan didn’t like gambling, and he disliked casinos even more.
If the situation wasn’t so extreme this time, he would absolutely never have chosen this method.
Just as Chen Mo said… there were too many high-level anchors on the ship.
Not only were there anchors like Figaro who came specifically to participate in the auction, but there were also instance survivors invited on board by the Nightmare after the recently concluded Top Ten Challenge. They were basically the backbone anchors of major guilds.
There were even four from the Top Ten!
In other words, once this instance truly formed, its difficulty would be terrifying.
The rating of the [Yuying Comprehensive University] instance was SS, and the survival rate out of thousands was only in the double digits.
What about this instance?
The answer was chilling.
Based on the analysis of the data on the screen earlier, the cruise ship ran on the points lost by gamblers as fuel. Under the sweet trap deliberately concocted by the Nightmare, it had already swept all the gamblers on the ship into this frenzied vortex. In this mass hysteria, no one could stop anymore.
This is gambling.
The more they gamble, the more they lose; the more they lose, the more they gamble.
And all the points they lost would turn into mileage for the cruise ship’s forward journey.
The rope of death was constantly tightening, threatening to strangle everyone on this ship.
If Wen Jianyan had a choice, he wouldn’t want to get involved in this fatal gamble either, but… this was the only chance now to level the score again.
As long as he could earn back the points lost by others on the ship, the ship’s speed would be suppressed—as long as he could delay for 24 hours, Wen Jianyan could send the others in the guild off the ship.
As for the life and death of the others on this ship of death afterwards, that was not within Wen Jianyan’s scope of concern.
After all, gamblers will always reap what they sow.
Wen Jianyan looked down at the time.
Unknowingly, it was already past midnight.
In a sense, his day had been a bit too fulfilling—from the casino to the celebration banquet, from the banquet to the cockpit, from the cockpit back to the second floor of the casino. He had been spinning like a top all day, and a whole day had passed without him realizing it.
Wen Jianyan thought for a moment, looked at Mesvis, and asked, “Do you mind if I start a live stream?”
Since it was past twelve anyway, he might as well start a stream to complete some tasks and earn some points.
Although these points were somewhat insignificant compared to the numbers he was betting now, even a mosquito’s leg is meat—especially for him, someone who might go bankrupt today.
Mesvis: “Of course I don’t mind.”
With Mesvis’s approval, Wen Jianyan started the live stream.
After a brief blank period, scattered comments began to appear in the [Integrity First] live stream room.
[?]
[Damn, did I wake up too fast? I seem to see the anchor actually streaming at midnight.]
[What? I just clicked in to try my luck; is he really streaming?]
[Wait, such a big anchor streaming a late-night show for us? Am I dreaming?]
[By the way, where is this?]
“Good evening.”
Wen Jianyan blinked.
“As everyone can see, I am currently on the second floor of the casino. Next, a gamble worth 1.5 billion is about to begin immediately.”
The young man narrowed his light-colored eyes and smiled: “Thinking everyone would be interested, I started the stream in advance.”
In the “Integrity First” Live Room:
[…]
[…]
[…Wait a minute?]
[What second floor of the casino? What 1.5 billion gamble?? Wait a damn minute! What is all this? What exactly did we miss in the few hours we were offline ahhhh!!!]
Wen Jianyan ignored the screen full of question marks and closed the interface directly.
Anyway, he had just started not long ago. Even without explanation, the audience would probably understand after watching for a while.
“How much do you know about the rules of the red gambling table?” Mesvis asked.
Wen Jianyan: “Not much.”
“Alright, then I’ll start from the beginning.”
Once it involved his professional field, Mesvis was surprisingly patient.
“First, what is in front of you now is a red gambling table that only appears when the chips reach one million. Unlike any other table in the casino, there is no distinction between Banker and Player on this table.”
…What?
Wen Jianyan was startled.
It was the first time he had heard of such a thing.
“That’s right.”
Mesvis smiled and clapped his hands. Several footsteps came from the depths of the darkness.
Soon, four dealers in crisp tailcoats walked out of the darkness, one female and three males—obviously, these were the core dealers belonging only to Mesvis, mentioned by Figaro earlier.
“Only head-to-head gambling can be conducted on the red gambling table.” Mesvis pointed to the four people behind him and introduced, “And they are your opponents.”
“You can negotiate the specific gambling content yourselves, but once decided, it cannot be changed within ten rounds. Of course, if you choose a project with a distinction between Banker and Player, then you and your opponent need to take turns being the banker.”
Wen Jianyan digested this amount of information in his mind.
As he guessed from the beginning, the rules on the red gambling table were very special, completely different from ordinary casinos.
In ordinary gambling games, the dealer is only responsible for dealing cards, collecting (taking the gambler’s money when they lose), and paying (paying the gambler when they win). However, on the red gambling table, the dealer is in a position equal to the gambler.
Admittedly, the gambler has the right to decide the method of gambling, but that is the limit.
In other words, even if the gambler chooses a gambling method with a Banker-Player distinction, both sides will take turns being the banker to show fairness—the reason Wen Jianyan could join Dan Zhu’s bet in the underground casino and bet on the dice with her was probably because it wasn’t Dan Zhu’s turn to be the banker in that round.
Rather than saying this is a gambling game organized by the casino, it’s better to say…
This is a 1v1 gambling game.
“Secondly, on the red gambling table, besides betting points, you can also bet physical objects—as long as you can produce chips of equivalent value,” Mesvis said.
Wen Jianyan almost immediately associated this with Dan Zhu’s bet in the underground casino.
After she won, the dealer gave her the corresponding chips and also invited her to leave with him.
Then, what Dan Zhu bet on at that time should have been some kind of physical object.
“Finally, cheating is allowed on the gambling table,” Mesvis looked at Wen Jianyan, the smile at the corner of his mouth slowly deepening, “Once caught, you will pay ten times the bet—of course, since you have added ten times leverage, if you are caught cheating, the amount you need to pay is one hundred times the bet.”
One hundred times.
This was a terrifying ratio that made one’s heart skip a beat.
Wen Jianyan didn’t show it on his face, but he couldn’t help shivering inwardly.
A waiter stepped forward, holding a transparent box in his white-gloved hands. Inside, blood-red chips were neatly stacked—a full one hundred and fifty of them.
Each was worth one million, totaling 150 million worth of chips.
And according to the leverage agreement Wen Jianyan had previously drawn up with Mesvis, a chip worth one million on the table was worth ten million off the table.
In other words, the chips in this box now were worth a full 1.5 billion.
The waiter bowed and placed the box full of chips on the edge of the table in front of Wen Jianyan.
Seeing this scene, Mesvis seemed to suddenly think of something and spoke again: “Oh right, one more thing… Because your gamble has leverage added, once you lose chips equivalent to your entire principal, you cannot leave the gambling table early before all chips are lost.”
The so-called “bottoming out” meant that the value of the chips would multiply tenfold off the table.
For an ordinary gambler with 150 chips, if they lost 20 chips while gambling on the table and stopped, they would still have a principal worth 130 chips left.
However, in the case of bottoming out, a gambler with 150 chips, even if they only lost 20 chips on the table, would be equivalent to losing 200 chips.
Not only would the entire principal be lost, but they would also owe the casino 50 chips.
The rule Mesvis just added seemed very simple, but it was actually extremely vicious.
In a casino, once a gambler realized their luck was bad, the option to cut losses in time existed (of course, very few gamblers could grasp this opportunity, and even if they cut losses once, they couldn’t possibly cut losses every time).
But for Wen Jianyan, who had added leverage to his chips, once the chips he lost fell below the limit his total points could pay—that is, 15 chips—he couldn’t leave the gambling table until he lost all the chips in his hand.
The subtext here was:
Either win. Or owe 1.5 billion.
Earn, or die.
There was no middle ground.
The viewers in the live stream room understood what was happening by now.
[…Holy crap, this isn’t ordinary gambling anymore; this is a damn life-and-death gamble!!! I’m starting to shake just listening to the rules.]
[I was scared too, ahhh, what kind of spell is the anchor under? How could he let himself fall into this kind of gamble? It’s too terrifying. The consequence isn’t just bankruptcy; it’s a suicide mission!!]
[Does anyone know the consequences of owing money to the casino?]
[Negative points, subsequent instance clearances go to repayment—of course, the Nightmare will charge interest and a commission.]
[Ordinary debt is like that, but what if you owe 1.5 billion?]
[…]
[Who knows, I’ve never even heard of such a huge debt!!!]
“Those are roughly the rules.”
After introducing the rules of the red gambling table to Wen Jianyan, Mesvis stepped aside with a smile. “Alright, you can choose your opponent now.”
“…”
Wen Jianyan’s gaze swept over the four dealers, finally resting on Mesvis at the very front. Wen Jianyan narrowed his eyes thoughtfully and suddenly asked:
“What about you?”
Mesvis: “Hmm?”
Wen Jianyan smiled and asked, “Can I choose to gamble with you?”
In the “Integrity First” Live Room:
[…]
[Heart, heart stopped.]
[Who? Who did you say? Gamble with whom?]
[Ahhhh I’m panicking, anchor wake up!! Where did the old Wen Jianyan go? I’m so unused to this maniac now!!!]
“…Me?” Seemingly unexpected that Wen Jianyan would ask such a question, Mesvis was slightly stunned and showed a surprised expression.
Wen Jianyan blinked and asked innocently:
“What? Is that not allowed?”
The moment the other party’s voice fell, a shiver-like smile seemed to flash across Mesvis’s face, but soon, the smile disappeared, and he returned to being the casino’s actual person in charge who strategized everything.
“Unfortunately, indeed not. It’s against the rules.”
He said.
“But don’t worry…”
Mesvis raised his eyes, staring unblinkingly at Wen Jianyan. He didn’t know if it was an illusion, but the whites of his eyes seemed to become even scarcer, looking very creepy under the light.
“Maybe there will be a chance in the future.”
Wen Jianyan exchanged a silent look with him. After a few seconds, he looked away nonchalantly:
“I look forward to it.”
After speaking, he turned back and carefully examined the four dealers in front of him again.
The first was a baby-faced male of indeterminate age. He smiled at Wen Jianyan looking over, revealing two sharp tiger teeth. A black and gold nameplate was pinned to his chest:
[No. 8]
A frosty-faced female with blonde hair and blue eyes, wearing a suit uniform tailored for her figure, with the same nameplate on her chest:
[No. 6]
[No. 4] was a robustly built, handsome male. Wen Jianyan found this person’s face very familiar—he was the dealer who served Dan Zhu’s table in the underground casino earlier.
The last one was a plain-looking middle-aged man with shrewd glints in his narrow eyes.
The nameplate on his chest read [No. 3].
“Do their rankings have meaning?” Wen Jianyan asked, his gaze lingering on the nameplates on their chests.
“Of course.”
Mesvis’s voice came from behind.
“I have a total of ten core dealers. The ranking is their win rate—these four just happen to be free right now, and the remaining six are currently at other tables in the casino.”
“How about it?” Mesvis asked. “Have you chosen?”
Wen Jianyan pointed to the baby-faced dealer with the lowest rank and said, “I’ll take him.”
In the “Integrity First” Live Room:
[…]
“Oh?”
Mesvis showed a somewhat surprised expression. “I didn’t expect your choice to be so conservative?”
Adding ten times leverage to bet 1.5 billion, making bold claims about wanting to gamble with him, and in the end choosing the dealer with the lowest win rate on the field?
Wen Jianyan nodded with a smile: “Yeah.”
He said shamelessly: “No choice, to win, of course, I have to pick the soft persimmon.”
Mesvis: “…”
Clearly shameless words, but the other party’s tone was so matter-of-fact that for a moment, one didn’t know how to refute.
In the “Integrity First” Live Room:
[…Okay, as expected of you.]
[Talking tough is talking tough, action is action, right?]
[Starting to feel unworthy for myself worrying about the anchor going crazy two minutes ago—your thick skin and guts are truly consistent!!!]
After being named, No. 8 slowly stepped forward and sat behind the blood-red gambling table.
He smiled at Wen Jianyan, revealing two sharp canine teeth:
“Shall we begin?”
“What would you like to play?”
Wen Jianyan thought for a moment: “Anything is okay?”
No. 8 smiled: “Of course, what do you want to play?”
Wen Jianyan: “Gomoku.” (Five-in-a-row)
Everyone around: “………………”
What?
After Wen Jianyan’s voice fell, the [Integrity First] live stream room fell into silence. Even Mesvis, who was watching from the side, had a momentary blank look on his face.
After a few seconds of silence, scattered comments finally began to appear on the screen again.
[What did he say? I didn’t hear clearly just now. What is he planning to play in the casino? He plans to use 1.5 billion in gambling funds to play what with a core dealer under the casino management on the second floor?]
[Gomoku.]
[…]
[What to do, feeling so weak.]
[Me too.]
[Feel like I’ve been played.]
[…………Me too.]
Even No. 8’s expression froze.
After a brief silence, he confirmed: “Gomoku?”
Wen Jianyan nodded with a serious face: “Mn.”
He asked: “Is that not allowed?”
“…”
No. 8 raised his smile again, but whether it was an illusion or not, the other party’s voice sounded a bit like he was gritting his teeth:
“Of course it is.”
