Lucky Cruise Ship
Chapter 554: Three Great Fools
Chen Mo was right.
It had been a day and a half since the Lucky Cruise Ship turned into a instance. The debts on the anchors were increasing hourly, and the outbreak of conflict was likely not far off.
“However, thanks to the limelight you stole last night,” Wen Ya began to analyze, her voice calm and rational, “even if someone wants to snatch chips, they probably won’t target us first.”
The deterrent force of Dan Zhu’s action this time was truly too strong, and Wen Jianyan, who acted alongside her, was also coated with a “not to be trifled with” aura.
With this premise, even if others wanted to make a move, they would be wary of the consequences.
“So don’t worry.”
Wen Jianyan patted Chen Mo’s shoulder with a beaming smile.
“There will be a way when the cart reaches the mountain. In the worst case, I still have you guys, don’t I?”
Chen Mo glared at him, obviously very dissatisfied with Wen Jianyan’s cavalier attitude at this moment.
“Alright, we’ve stayed here too long. Time to move.”
Saying this, Wen Jianyan turned to look at the entrance to the Negative Fourth Floor.
But unlike the previous three floors, the familiar blood-red counter and waiter were gone. The entrance was several times narrower, and the situation inside could not be seen clearly from the outside at all.
Wen Jianyan narrowed his eyes, revealing a thoughtful expression.
There were a total of six floors in the underground casino inside the cruise ship. They had already visited three of them. There was nothing much to say about the Negative First Floor; its form was almost a replica of the above-ground one. The content of the Negative Second Floor was alienated on this basis, not only adding five times the leverage but even carrying the risk of turning into a human gambling tool.
And the Negative Third Floor was the so-called “Welfare Floor.”
If gamblers didn’t actively choose to exchange for special game coins, they would almost trigger no crisis.
That meant…
There was a high probability that starting from the Negative Fourth Floor, this instance would truly enter the main topic.
“Let’s go.”
The group walked into the Negative Fourth Floor.
After passing through a narrow corridor, the view suddenly opened up.
Appearing before them was a magnificent blood-colored hall. The ceiling was red, the walls were red, and the carpet was also red. The area wasn’t large.
But what was more unexpected was… this place looked nothing like the previous three floors.
There were no gambling tables, no dealers, nothing.
Only rows of seats, and screens hanging directly opposite. The screens were black, seemingly in a closed state.
A few people sat scattered on the seats in twos and threes, unknown what they were waiting for.
And on the right side of the hall was a semi-enclosed counter.
The group exchanged glances, sharing a look of surprise.
This place was somewhat strange.
Wen Jianyan walked toward the semi-enclosed counter.
He curled his fingers and knocked on the glass. Behind the counter, a woman who looked like a staff member raised her head. She was expressionless and looked at Wen Jianyan gloomily.
Wen Jianyan blinked: “May I ask…”
“In two hours.” The woman’s tone was indifferent.
Huh?
Wen Jianyan couldn’t help but be stunned.
But after throwing out these three words, the staff member buried her head again, ignoring any more of Wen Jianyan’s questions.
Wen Jianyan hit a snag and turned away from the counter.
“How was it?” Wen Ya pressed.
Wen Jianyan repeated honestly: “In two hours.”
“What?” Wen Ya frowned. “In two hours? What will happen in two hours?”
Wen Jianyan shrugged helplessly:
“I don’t know either.”
He walked toward the row of seats: “But I think we’ll know when the time comes.”
…True.
The group looked at each other.
They walked toward the row of seats and found a few random spots to sit down.
Two hours was neither long nor short.
If they were in a crisis right now, two hours might pass in a flash. But sitting here idly like this, two hours seemed exceptionally long.
So, taking this opportunity, Chen Mo decided to start organizing the team’s current financial situation.
“Nine million points.”
Chen Mo spoke first.
Since becoming the actual manager of the guild, he rarely entered instances, so naturally, the points in his personal account weren’t high.
Wen Ya: “Thirty-six million.”
She was the most senior among everyone, formerly a core member of the Eternal Day Guild, with substantial assets.
Chang Feiyu, as a former mercenary, had a full eighty million in assets.
The points of the other few people were relatively normal, basically fluctuating around eight or nine million.
Ji Guan’s assets surprised Wen Jianyan; he actually had a full twenty million.
He touched the green scalp on the back of his head and said somewhat shyly: “Took some private jobs in the last instance and earned quite a bit, hehe.”
Chen Mo looked at Wen Jianyan: “And you?”
Wen Jianyan thought for a moment: “Mn… one billion two hundred seventy-nine million.”
What?!
Everyone present couldn’t help but suck in a breath of cold air.
Even though they all knew clearly that Wen Jianyan, as one of the Nightmare Top Ten, would have the highest net worth among them, but… this was way beyond everyone’s expectations.
They looked at Wen Jianyan with shocked faces, almost unable to believe their ears.
Chen Mo: “Wait, how much?”
Wen Jianyan looked profound and unfathomable: “See, I told you I’m rich, right?”
In the “Integrity First” live room chat:
[…Too pretentious, really too pretentious. Watching him makes me want to hit him.]
[Holy crap, didn’t expect the anchor to really be a super rich guy. No wonder he dared to throw out millions at a time when playing dice on the Negative Second Floor. So this is where his confidence comes from.]
[Come on, don’t be happy too early, people above. Other anchors aren’t planning to participate in the auction.]
“Of course, I didn’t have this much before,” Wen Jianyan shrugged and said sarcastically. “Isn’t this thanks to the selfless sponsorship of the casino before the instance started?”
Only now did everyone hear about the high-stakes gamble before the start of the instance from Wen Jianyan for the first time.
Wen Jianyan spoke very briefly, omitting almost all details. Even so, everyone could still feel the soul-stirring thrill and surging undercurrents within.
One had to realize, this was billions in gambling funds…
The vast majority of people would even collapse before sitting at the gambling table.
After listening, the air fell into a dead silence for a long time.
Until Chen Mo suddenly spoke, breaking the silence: “You just said your total assets after the gamble ended were one billion three hundred fifty million?”
Wen Jianyan nodded.
“How much do you have left now?”
Wen Jianyan: “…”
His gaze shifted for an instant, and even his voice seemed to lose its strength: “One, one billion two hundred seventy-nine million.”
“So you spent seventy-one million, correct?”
Chen Mo stared at him.
“Today is the second day of the instance.”
Wen Jianyan’s eyes darted around, giving a dry laugh: “…Haha, you calculate really fast.”
Under the premise of his huge asset base, the expenditure of this number didn’t seem too obvious. But when the number was calculated separately, it was suffocatingly massive.
“…”
Chen Mo wasn’t amused. His expressionless face looked like he was wearing an iron mask.
In the “Integrity First” live room chat:
[Chen Mo: Tired, destroy it all.]
[Hahahaha dying of laughter, the prodigal Guild President and his unlucky Vice President.]
Chen Mo took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and then turned to look at the others: “Anyway, everyone don’t get too used to the current situation… this situation won’t last long.”
The reason they could push to the Negative Fourth Floor at the fastest speed and encounter almost no danger was that Wen Jianyan had sufficient funds to escort them. Under this premise, it could be said that they were isolated from the real dangers within the instance… so, up to now, they hadn’t been directly attacked by the rules of this instance.
However, this situation wouldn’t last long.
To maintain this illusion of safety, seventy million was spent on the first day. The amount needed later would only get higher. Even if Wen Jianyan had abundant funds now, he probably couldn’t withstand this level of consumption.
The others obviously understood this principle too.
Although the instance hadn’t been open for long, the net worth of the vast majority of anchors had already suffered a great loss, and a large portion of them had even started to go into debt.
Wen Jianyan’s money power couldn’t hold out for long.
Moreover, he still had an auction to attend.
Soon, Chen Mo finished tallying the team’s assets: “Nothing else, right?”
He pressed.
“Oh, right, almost forgot,” as if suddenly thinking of something, Wen Jianyan looked up at Chen Mo. “I still have a little something here.”
Saying this, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a red circular metal coin.
This was the special gachapon coin exchanged on the Negative Third Floor earlier—one worth one million, minimum exchange of five at a time.
Wen Jianyan drew a total of four times, using four coins. He drew ghosts twice, an item once, and finally the group pass for the Negative Fourth Floor. So, he had one last coin left.
Maggie: “Guild President…”
Her voice was inexplicably strange.
Wen Jianyan paused, subconsciously looking up, only to see that the other party’s usually rosy face had lost its color at some point. Her eyes stared straight at the gachapon coin in his palm, and the expression on her face seemed to be… fear?
Wen Jianyan couldn’t help but be stunned.
“What’s wrong?” Wen Ya beside them also noticed Maggie’s abnormality and pressed.
Maggie swallowed with difficulty, almost forcing herself to look away: “That gachapon coin, something’s wrong…”
“What do you mean?”
Wen Jianyan frowned.
Maggie thought for a moment: “One of my Talents allows me to see visualized supernatural power. In my eyes, they are like black dust, tiny particles floating in the air. I can judge the degree of danger and how long the danger will last through their concentration and drifting direction.”
“And it…” Saying this, Maggie looked at that gachapon coin again, her face turning even paler, whispering, “is currently continuously releasing that black substance outward. And as time goes by, there’s more and more of it. It clearly wasn’t like this when we were on the Negative Third Floor before!”
Hearing this, everyone’s back went cold.
Wen Jianyan lowered his head and looked at the coin in his palm.
He couldn’t see the dust Maggie described. The cold, heavy red metal lay in his palm, looking no different from when he first got it.
But precisely because it was unknown, it appeared terrifying.
“…Oh.” Wen Jianyan nodded.
Maggie: “Captain you—”
Before she could finish her sentence, she saw Wen Jianyan suddenly stand up, raise his hand, and throw that coin fiercely into the distance. The whole set of actions came too suddenly, startling everyone around.
Before everyone could react, the glint of metal flashed in the air. The coin traced a perfect parabola and disappeared from everyone’s sight in an instant.
“…”
Maggie’s expression was dull.
Wait, what just happened?
In the “Integrity First” live room chat:
[?]
[???]
[Ah? No? Is it this simple and crude… just threw it away??]
However, as if to answer the doubts in the audience’s hearts, Wen Jianyan sat back in his seat and then put his hand into his pocket again.
His movement paused slightly.
Wen Jianyan pulled his hand out and opened his fingers—in his palm lay that blood-red coin quietly.
Seeing this, everyone’s heart sank.
Couldn’t throw it away.
“Looks like there’s only one answer.” Wen Jianyan narrowed his eyes and put the coin back into his pocket. “—It can only be used up.”
This was probably the real reason why the minimum purchase quantity was five.
The gachapon machine contained not only prizes but also malicious ghosts.
After discovering this pattern, once an anchor twisted out the item they wanted, they wouldn’t continue, because they didn’t know what they would open next.
So, it was very easy to have leftover gachapon coins.
Every gachapon coin was bound to the purchaser, and… once they were taken away from the Negative Third Floor, they would begin to mutate.
“Don’t forget what the dealer on the Negative Third Floor said before,” Wen Jianyan said slowly. “This floor is different from the others; you cannot return at will.”
“That means, you need to win another pass?” Wen Ya was stunned and continued.
Wen Jianyan smiled instead of getting angry: “Correct.”
In the “Integrity First” live room chat:
[Damn.]
[Vicious, really so vicious!]
These few rules added together didn’t seem remarkable individually, but combined, they were a deadly strangulation.
If you didn’t waste the gachapon coin, you had to face the risk of twisting out a ghost.
If you kept it without using it, you would be attacked by the unknown danger released from the gachapon coin—to avoid it, you had to go to the gambling table again to obtain a pass for the Negative Third Floor.
It could be said to be interlocking, every move fatal.
Wen Jianyan turned to look at Maggie: “About how much time until the coin completely mutates?”
Maggie shook her head hesitantly: “What I know isn’t specific enough… but it should be counted in hours, probably won’t exceed three hours.”
“…” Wen Jianyan lowered his eyelids, falling into deep thought.
Whatever the project on the Negative Fourth Floor was, it would open in two hours.
He couldn’t afford the price of enduring a double attack.
However, if he took the squad and left now, there was a great possibility of missing the opportunity. Who knew when the next round would be.
Wen Jianyan didn’t want to see this happen—one had to realize, there must be a reason why Oracle was urgently and desperately pushing downward. Every bit of time he wasted on this floor might become an insurmountable gap later.
That meant he had only one best solution right now.
“Let’s split up.”
Wen Jianyan said: “You guys stay on the Negative Fourth Floor, I’ll go to the Negative Third Floor to use up this gachapon coin.”
Everyone present was startled.
“But—” Chen Mo frowned tightly, obviously not approving.
However, before he could finish his words, he was interrupted by Wen Jianyan: “Relax, you guys don’t need to worry about my safety.”
He blinked smilingly: “Your Guild President, ah, has his own ways.”
Chen Mo: “?”
Everyone present: “??”
The audience in the “Integrity First” live room chat: [???]
Negative First Floor.
“Way No. 1” and “Way No. 2” looked at each other expressionlessly. The atmosphere was frighteningly oppressive. The air seemed to have turned into some dense solid, pressing down on people until they couldn’t breathe.
“You called me here just for this?”
Qi Qian’s voice seemed to be squeezed out from between his teeth.
Chen Cheng slowly turned his head to look at Wen Jianyan, smiling on his face, but his eyes were extremely sinister: “Why is he here?”
In the “Integrity First” live room chat:
[…]
[Ahhh what is this Shura field!!]
[This… is somewhat too entertaining. I don’t know whether to say the anchor is brainless or brainless.]
[Cough cough.]
Wen Jianyan cleared his throat and inserted himself between the two with a beaming smile.
“I guarantee, everyone benefits mutually this time.”
Wen Jianyan turned to look at Qi Qian and got straight to the point: “Did you finish using your special gachapon coins from the Negative Third Floor?”
Qi Qian turned his head somewhat warily to glance at Chen Cheng. Chen Cheng scoffed to show disdain.
Wen Jianyan: “Mn?”
Only then did Qi Qian speak somewhat reluctantly: “No.”
“I guessed as much.” Wen Jianyan nodded.
The group pass for the Negative Fourth Floor was a common reward in the special gachapon machine. He was already considered unlucky, yet he only used four coins. Qi Qian and the others shouldn’t be worse than him—that meant they might have even more gachapon coins left.
“Did you show them to Tong Yao?” Wen Jianyan asked.
Qi Qian shook his head.
As expected.
Wen Jianyan wasn’t surprised by this result. If it weren’t for tallying the team’s total funds today, he wouldn’t have taken this gachapon coin out either, nor would he have been noticed by Maggie for its abnormality.
Immediately after, Wen Jianyan described his previous discovery in the simplest language.
The more he listened, the more solemn Qi Qian’s face became.
This was a solid crisis. If this was why Wen Jianyan sought him out to act together to solve this problem… then indeed, he couldn’t refuse.
Wen Jianyan: “So, how many do you have left on hand?”
Qi Qian said gloomily: “Two.”
“Haha.”
Aside, Chen Cheng let out a laugh of schadenfreude.
Qi Qian looked over, the glint in his eyes seemingly capable of killing.
Wen Jianyan: “Don’t laugh either.”
“You don’t want the invitation to the Negative Seventh Floor auction anymore?”
“…” The expression on Chen Cheng’s face froze.
Although his clearance speed was fast, he was far inferior to Wen Jianyan and Qi Qian in meticulousness. Asking him to lower himself to ask Dan Zhu for an invitation was absolutely impossible.
Qi Qian’s face cleared slightly, and the corners of his mouth curled up.
“Anyway, that’s the situation.”
Wen Jianyan cleared his throat and looked at Qi Qian: “You lack a pass.”
Qi Qian’s Talent was difficult to activate again in a short time. He couldn’t replicate the previous method to win a large amount of money.
He turned to look at Chen Cheng: “You lack an invitation.”
What Chen Cheng lacked was mainly information, and coincidentally, this information happened to be in the hands of the two of them.
Wen Jianyan pointed at himself again and blinked: “As for me, I lack bodyguards.”
In the “Integrity First” live room chat:
[…]
[How can someone display shamelessness so vividly?]
[How do you have the nerve to ask for bodyguards!! Shameless!!]
“So how about it,” Wen Jianyan curved his eyes, looking at the two people in front of him with a smile. “Want to come together?”
“……”
Qi Qian’s face was gloomy, staring at Chen Cheng, whose face was equally ugly. The two stared at each other coldly. The smell of gunpowder in the air was so strong it seemed it would explode the next second.
Finally, unknown how long passed, two voices barely squeezed out from their mouths.
Qi Qian: “…Fine.”
Chen Cheng: “…Tch.”
“Yay.”
Wen Jianyan nodded beamingly. His gaze wandered over the two, proposing:
“How about it, to celebrate the victorious rendezvous, let’s have a friendly handshake?”
Qi Qian and Chen Cheng turned to look at Wen Jianyan simultaneously, their eyes almost shooting knives: “…”
You kid, don’t push your luck!
In the “Integrity First” live room chat:
[…]
[Damn, the team is formed just like this?]
[Incredible… two people incompatible like fire and water actually both joined the team.]
[Mn. Welcome everyone to watch: The Dog Liar and his two big sucker friends!]
