(2/3)
Lucky Cruise Ship
Chapter 545: Stop causing trouble everywhere!
After parting ways with the other guild members, Wen Jianyan stepped into the elevator.
The attendant asked politely, “Honored guest, which floor would you like to go to?”
Still the same phrase as always, not a single word changed.
Wen Jianyan: “Basement level seven.”
“Very well, please wait a moment.”
The attendant raised a hand and pressed the button.
The next second, the rusty elevator doors slid shut. With the creak of turning hinges, the elevator began to slowly rise.
On the old display panel, the numbers ticked up, from -8 to -7.
With a soft “ding,” the elevator stopped.
“Basement level seven has been reached. Please watch your step,” the attendant said.
“Thanks.” Wen Jianyan stepped out of the elevator.
Before him stretched the familiar blood‑red hall. Thick carpet covered the floor, giving the illusion that fresh blood would seep out with every step. Huge portraits hung on the walls to either side.
Wen Jianyan’s stride faltered as his gaze was drawn to the paintings. Just like last time, the upper halves were still hidden in darkness, their true faces impossible to discern.
He couldn’t help recalling what had happened on his previous visit.
The man with golden eyes had stood before one of the paintings, expressionless, some strange, deep glint flickering in his gaze.
What had he seen then? No one knew the answer. Perhaps not even Wu Zhu himself.
Just as Wen Jianyan was about to look away, something seemed to cross his mind and he froze.
He turned his head and looked back at the portraits on the wall.
Wait.
If he remembered correctly… there had been similar paintings in the ‘Xingwang Hotel’ instance as well.
On the road that led to the land of death, there had been a framing shop.
In that shop, a corridor had been lined with oil paintings.
And deep within that corridor, a fragment of Wu Zhu had been hidden.
Those paintings, too, had crimson frames, and each portrait inside had a blurred face.
No matter the angle, no matter the lighting, the figures’ faces were always covered in darkness—as if, conceptually, they simply “could not be observed.”
Could these be the same kind of thing?
If so, what were the paintings actually depicting?
—The “ghosts” imprisoned in ‘Changsheng Building’, or the “people” being protected in ‘Xingang Hotel’?
A soft cough from behind pulled Wen Jianyan out of his thoughts.
He turned around.
It was Figaro.
As always, he was impeccably dressed. Today, he’d even changed into a fresh suit.
He held a black cane in one hand, and a light blue pocket square peeked from his breast pocket—the only splash of color on him.
Figaro tipped his hat, his long, fox‑like eyes narrowing with a smile.
“Good morning.”
Wen Jianyan glanced at him and nodded. “…Morning.”
Leaving aside the twelve billion he’d won, the “cooperation” with Figaro had been an unexpected bonus.
It wasn’t that the man was particularly trustworthy—quite the opposite, actually. Figaro’s fundamental nature was unruly and fickle, just like the codename he’d chosen for himself: theatrical and unpredictable. As a mercenary driven purely by profit, he had no such thing as moral principles like “serving only one master.” He would only stand with a side temporarily and could betray them at any moment.
On top of that, Oracle’s kill bounty was still active, and Figaro could set another trap for him at any time.
But last night’s gambling session had allowed Wen Jianyan to glimpse something surprising beneath that ever‑shifting exterior.
That was:
Figaro, unexpectedly, had professional ethics.
Although he’d hidden information while under Wen Jianyan’s employ, he’d only done so because he “hadn’t taken payment.”
And to complete a commission, he was even willing to risk everything to cheat.
To be fair, he had also picked his moment well.
Because he and Wen Jianyan hadn’t staged anything beforehand, they’d managed to lower the croupier’s guard. While everyone’s eyes were glued to Wen Jianyan, Figaro had found his opening to rig the game.
Thanks to this mercenary’s sense of “professional ethics,” his business was far better than Orange Candy’s.
Although Orange Candy was stronger and more ruthless, she was also too capricious—if she was in a bad mood, she might turn around and kill her own employer.
Even so, Figaro’s cheating had been a double‑edged sword.
He had sped up the instance’s progress, but at the same time, he’d handed Wen Jianyan a handle to grab him by.
【The price of being caught cheating is terrifying. No one can bear it.】
The reason Figaro had been so desperate to get off the second floor earlier was largely self‑preservation.
But Wen Jianyan had blocked his escape first.
You could say the threat had struck dead center on Figaro’s weak point. In both timing and place, Wen Jianyan’s move had been almost surgically precise.
So, no matter how reluctant he was, Figaro had been left with no choice but to accept Wen Jianyan’s offer and take the job.
Figaro gave a neat little bow. “After you?”
Wen Jianyan glanced one last time at the portraits on the wall, then turned away.
“…Let’s go.”
Regardless of whether the instance had formed, Wen Jianyan had only one purpose in boarding this ship: the 【Dead Sea Scrolls】.
His commission was singular as well: Figaro was to help him obtain that auction item—no matter the cost.
As for whether Figaro planned to cheat again or even try to kill him in the process, Wen Jianyan didn’t particularly care. As long as the man was useful enough, a little danger was acceptable.
Led by Figaro, the two of them walked through the empty front hall.
Carl Bell, the one in charge of the auction, was nowhere to be seen.
“Normally, the auction runs for three days in a row, with one session each night. But since the entire ship has become an instance this time, I’m not sure if it’ll still follow that pattern,” Figaro said as they walked.
“Still, the basic rules shouldn’t change.”
He stopped in front of the heavy doors to the auction hall and pointed with his cane at the blood‑red poster pasted there.
“There.”
“One day before each auction, they’ll publish a list of the items going up the following night.”
Wen Jianyan’s eyes scanned the poster.
【Saint’s Finger】
【Death Lamp】
…
And so on.
These, clearly, were the items that would be auctioned off tomorrow night.
Although their names were visible, there was no information on the grade of each item or what they actually did.
He skimmed through the unfamiliar, tongue‑twisting names quickly, but from beginning to end, he didn’t see the 【Dead Sea Scrolls】 anywhere.
“Usually nothing too valuable goes up on the first night,” Figaro explained. “The later the auction, the rarer the items.”
“Even if there’s nothing you want, I still recommend you come by tomorrow—at least to get familiar with how the auction works.”
“I know,” Wen Jianyan nodded.
Something occurred to him, and he turned to Figaro. “By the way, yesterday on the second floor, when Carl Bell said ‘same as always,’ what did he mean?”
“I was hoping you wouldn’t notice that,” Figaro sighed.
Wen Jianyan gave him a polite, empty smile. “Too bad.”
“You should already know from my ex‑subordinate that I’m a regular supplier for the underground auction,” Figaro said. “Some of the items I find on my own, of course. But there are also some that Carl Bell commissions me to collect for him.”
Commissions from Carl Bell?
Wen Jianyan immediately caught the implication. “The ship’s managers can’t leave the ship?”
“And what about the captain, the one at the top of the leaderboard?” he pressed.
Figaro’s expression turned complicated. “…Looks like I’ll have to watch what I say around you from now on.”
“Answer the question first,” Wen Jianyan said.
“Fine, you’re hard to fool,” Figaro shrugged helplessly. “You’re right, the three managers can’t leave the ship. As for whether the captain can, I don’t know. I already told you, there’s very little information on rank one. Even I haven’t managed to dig much up.”
So his guess hadn’t been far off.
“Got it,” Wen Jianyan nodded, dropping the subject.
“In any case, that’s the general situation,” Figaro went on. “Today is just the announcement. The auction itself won’t start until tomorrow… and we’ll only know then if the process has changed.”
He leaned on his cane and looked at Wen Jianyan. “Of course, if your auction budget ends up being tight, you can always sell items through me.”
A gleam of avarice lit his eyes.
“My fee is modest—only five percent commission.”
“…I’ll keep that in mind,” Wen Jianyan said.
Just as Figaro had said, there wasn’t much to be done on B‑7 today. The main event would be tomorrow.
Once he’d gotten the information he needed, Wen Jianyan left the seventh floor.
In the elevator, he texted Chen Mo, asking where they were.
Soon, a reply came back.
“We’re on B‑2.”
Wen Jianyan paused, slipped his phone into his pocket, and turned to the attendant. “Basement level two.”
“Very well, please wait a moment.”
The elevator began to rise.
No one knew how long it took before it finally came to a gentle stop.
“Please watch your step,” the attendant said.
Wen Jianyan stepped out.
The familiar casino spread out before him. Attendants in sharp suits stood behind the counter, ready to exchange chips, and behind them stretched the vast gaming floor, as luxurious and private as he remembered.
This time, the casino wasn’t empty. It was crowded and buzzing with noise.
Wen Jianyan frowned slightly as the image of that dead eye peering through his ceiling this morning flashed through his mind.
Even though B‑8 was on the verge of being breached by the supernatural forces on deck, B‑1 through B‑7 seemed completely unaffected… perhaps because they were governed by a different rule system.
“Over here,” Chen Mo called, waving him over.
The rest of the guild stood behind him, all present and accounted for.
Clearly, even now that the instance had begun, they were still strictly following Wen Jianyan’s earlier orders and hadn’t casually gone into the casino.
Wen Jianyan walked over.
“Well? Find anything?”
“A lot,” Chen Mo nodded.
“While B‑1 through B‑6 are all casinos, the capital requirements to enter each floor are different,” he said. “B‑1 doesn’t have a minimum. B‑2 requires fifty thousand points to enter.”
“Unfortunately, for some reason we’re only allowed to go to the first two floors.”
When they’d stepped into the elevator and called out their desired floor, the attendant had replied, “I’m sorry, you cannot remain on that floor.”
Unwilling to give up, they had tried every floor from the bottom up, only to discover…
That even though there were six basement casino levels, they could only visit B‑1 and B‑2.
“There’s something else,” Chang Feiyu added. As the one most familiar with casino rules, he looked serious. “From what I can tell, this underground casino has leverage.”
Leverage?
The word instantly caught Wen Jianyan’s attention. He frowned slightly. “How much?”
“None on B‑1,” Chang Feiyu said. “But B‑2 forces a 2x leverage.”
One hundred in stakes meant winning or losing two hundred.
“…”
Wen Jianyan’s eyes narrowed.
No wonder Mesvis had agreed so readily when he’d suggested increasing the leverage on the second‑floor bet. It had been a rule built into the underground casino all along.
“Anything else?” Wen Jianyan asked.
“B‑1 is basically the same as the casino upstairs, which is why there aren’t many streamers there,” Chen Mo said.
By now, even the slowest streamer had realized one of the core rules of the 【Lucky Cruise Ship】 instance: money was life.
Even if they didn’t move down to B‑9, just staying on B‑8 cost a million a night. On top of that, many of them had already taken on terrifying loans at three percent per hour. In those conditions, playing ordinary games was practically suicide.
The greater the risk, the greater the reward.
Under crushing debt, there weren’t many options left.
“But… B‑2 is different,” Chen Mo went on, his gaze darkening.
“How different?” Wen Jianyan asked.
“The entire second floor has only one game,” Chen Mo said. “Dice.”
This time, it was Wen Jianyan’s turn to freeze.
An entire casino floor with only one game?
And that game was dice?
That really was unusual.
Just then, a surprised voice sounded from behind them.
“…Hey, Wen Wen?”
Wen Jianyan blinked and turned.
A familiar figure stood there.
Tall and handsome, with a rakish air of careless charm, he stared at Wen Jianyan with wide eyes of surprise.
“You’re here too?”
“…An Xin?” Wen Jianyan said.
[Huh? Who’s that?]
[!]
[Old viewers should remember, right? He went into the ‘Changsheng Building’ instance with the anchor before!]
[Ohhh, that guy!]
An Xin walked over, eyes bright. “After the instance ended, you never replied to my messages. I thought you’d forgotten all about me.”
“…Haha, of course not,” Wen Jianyan said.
Behind him, Chen Mo and the others glanced between Wen Jianyan and An Xin, feeling the shift in the air.
Wen Ya asked, “And this is…?”
“An Xin,” the man said with a smile, extending his hand. “Dark Fire.”
His talent was a rare offensive type, and he was one of Qi Qian’s core subordinates.
He blinked mischievously.
“One of your president’s admirers.”
Chen Mo: “…”
Everyone: “…”
Well. That explained a lot about their president’s weird reaction.
Wen Jianyan: “…”
Sweat beaded at his temples.
He gave a stiff little laugh. “Hahaha! You’re still such a joker.”
[Oh my god, now I remember—didn’t the anchor use a female avatar that whole instance?]
[Hahahahahahahahaha yes, he scammed a pure boy’s heart.]
[Ahhhh I’m dying, this is literally a mess of his own making!]
[Zero sympathy!!]
Before An Xin could say anything else, Wen Jianyan cut him off and changed the subject almost instantly. “So, what are you doing here?”
“Don’t even mention it,” An Xin sighed. “Our vice president survived the Top‑Ten Challenge, right? Nightmare threw him a celebration party on this ship and comped his ticket. I just tagged along to enjoy the ride and relax a bit… and you know the rest.”
The others nodded, clearly feeling the same misery.
They’d only come aboard for a team‑building trip and to milk their president a little. Who would’ve thought they’d end up in a chain of disasters like this, capped with the ship itself mutating into an instance? Their luck had definitely bottomed out.
“Where’s your vice president?” Wen Jianyan asked.
“Inside.” An Xin jerked his chin toward the casino behind him.
“In there gambling?” Wen Jianyan immediately caught the implication. “You in debt?”
An Xin shook his head. “Not yet.”
He shrugged. “We’re just planning ahead.”
As veteran streamers, they’d already realized that as time went on, the cost of survival would only keep rising. Since that was the case, it made sense to prepare while the instance was still in its early stages.
Wen Jianyan nodded.
Just then, hurried footsteps approached from inside the casino.
He turned to look.
A short‑haired woman—her hair even shorter than last time—strode out with a cool, distant expression.
Another familiar face from the ‘Xingwang Tower’ instance.
He remembered her name was Tong Yao, a spirit medium.
“What are you still doing here?” she snapped at An Xin the moment she saw him. “Didn’t you see my messages?”
“I didn’t check my phone…” An Xin said, hastily pointing at Wen Jianyan. “Look who I ran into.”
Only then did Tong Yao notice Wen Jianyan.
She stared for a second, then gave him a quick once‑over, as if slowly putting it together.
“…Oh. You.”
Tong Yao said matter‑of‑factly, “I still liked you better in a dress.”
“???”
Every member of the guild whipped their heads around to stare at Wen Jianyan in shock.
Wen Jianyan: “…”
Eyes to nose, nose to heart.
Didn’t hear anything. Not a word.
“What’s going on?” An Xin asked her. “Why the rush?”
“There’s a problem inside,” Tong Yao replied crisply.
“What happened?”
An Xin’s expression turned serious.
“It’s not something I can explain quickly,” Tong Yao shook her head. “Just come and see.”
She turned to Wen Jianyan. “You coming?”
“Me?” he repeated, surprised.
“Yes.” Tong Yao nodded.
“Your ability is strong, and I need your help,” she said bluntly, wasting no breath. “In return, you want information without taking unnecessary risks, and we can provide that.”
With smart people, the more direct, the better.
A fair trade, mutually beneficial.
Wen Jianyan smiled. “Alright.”
With his agreement, the tension on Tong Yao’s face finally eased a little.
“Come with me,” she said.
Led by Tong Yao, the group strode into the casino.
Wen Jianyan’s gaze flicked over the surrounding tables.
Sure enough, just as Chen Mo had said, every table on B‑2 had only one kind of game piece: dice.
On this floor, dice were the only way to gamble. All other games had been stripped away.
As she walked, Tong Yao said,
“The underground casino’s rules aren’t like the ones upstairs. Here, you can gamble with anyone you want.”
“How do you mean?” Wen Jianyan asked.
“If you want to gamble with the house, you can,” Tong Yao replied. “But if you prefer to gamble with another streamer, as long as both sides agree, that’s allowed too.”
They wove quickly between tables.
Wen Jianyan noticed that every streamer sitting at a table looked pale and tense.
“If you lose, you don’t just lose points—you also get a mark on your body,” Tong Yao said. “But so far, the marks’ function is unknown. At least, up until now, there haven’t been any obvious threats or side effects.”
“Then what danger did Qi Qian run into?” Wen Jianyan asked, getting straight to the point.
Tong Yao was silent for a moment before answering.
“I think the vice president discovered something… something very important at the table.”
She drew in a deep breath.
“He went all‑in.”
All in.
Everything bet in one shot.
Even though Wen Jianyan had done something similar himself, his heart still clenched at the words.
“And then?”
“I don’t know,” Tong Yao said, looking him straight in the eye.
“You don’t know?” Wen Jianyan frowned.
“You remember our captain’s talent, don’t you?” she asked.
“Of course,” Wen Jianyan replied.
That kind of talent was hard to forget.
Qi Qian’s gift was ‘Scapegoat’.
He could activate it before the instance began, leaving a paper effigy behind. If his real body died in the instance, he would slowly awaken in the paper body.
On the back of the effigy, a single sentence—his last words before death—would appear as a clue for his teammates.
It was an incredibly powerful talent, especially when it came to probing deadly rules that might otherwise cost lives.
“I don’t know what happened. I only know the captain vanished from the table right in front of us, but…”
For once, real worry clouded Tong Yao’s face. She reached into her pocket, took out a lifelike little paper figure with tightly shut eyes, and turned it over.
The back was blank.
“He didn’t leave us a single word.”
Wen Jianyan froze.
That really was… abnormal.
Tong Yao’s reasoning was solid. Qi Qian had almost certainly discovered something and gone all‑in because of it. With his Scapegoat talent, he was more than capable of facing danger head‑on.
But somehow, something had gone wrong.
Qi Qian had disappeared without leaving any message behind.
No wonder Tong Yao was this keyed‑up.
“The game can’t stop, so I left one teammate at the table, using the smallest possible stakes to keep it going while I came out to find An Xin,” she said.
She came to a stop. “There. That’s our table.”
Following the line of her gaze, Wen Jianyan looked up.
They’d reached the deepest part of the B‑2 casino.
Not far away stood a familiar sight: a large, blood‑red table—the same kind that only appeared once the stakes exceeded a million.
On the table was a half‑played game and a messy pile of chips.
A Dark Fire member Wen Jianyan didn’t recognize sat there, face chalk‑white, sweat beading on his forehead. Clearly, he’d been dragged in by Tong Yao as a temporary stand‑in.
His expression was bleak; things were clearly not going well.
Wen Jianyan’s gaze shifted to the opposite side of the table.
Sitting there was a baby‑faced dealer in a tailcoat.
The badge on his chest read:
【No. 8】
At the sight of that familiar face, Wen Jianyan’s steps came to a sudden halt.
Tong Yao picked up on his reaction and glanced at him. “What’s wrong? You know him?”
“…Something like that,” Wen Jianyan said.
Maggie tugged on Chang Feiyu’s sleeve, whispering, “Why does it feel like the president knows everyone?”
One love‑struck admirer, a Dark Fire vice president, now a dealer…
Chang Feiyu’s expression was grave. “Good question.”
He knew from experience that Wen Jianyan had managed to be on a first‑name basis with even his old boss. “Socially well‑connected” was an understatement.
In the “Integrity First” live room chat:
[…]
[The anchor really needs to sit down and reflect on why he has contacts everywhere.]
[In one sentence: stop running around starting trouble!!!]
__
Author’s Note:
Wen Jianyan, a brand‑new (reverse) social butterfly.
