Chapter 129.
After the card game, Hillis covered her face with a black veil once more before walking energetically around the casino, peeking here and there. Rosellis and I followed Hillis, enjoying the casino games.
To be honest, the dealers’ tricks were obvious, and the opponents’ hands were too easily predictable, so it was more enjoyable to screw with them rather than gamble. In terms of their tricks, my eyes were faster than the hands of the dealer. In addition, it was easy to guess which face would come up in the dice game based on the sound of the dice rolling in the cup.
However, with the slot machines that ran on magic, as long as I didn’t use magic, I could play the game with its fixed probability. But at some point, I got familiar with the magic, and I could see which slot machine would hit the jackpot.
Rosellis was happy to see a jackpot on the slot machine I told her about but was puzzled when she saw my face. "You look bored."
I grinned, "No, it’s not boring when the food is so delicious."
It really wasn’t boring. It was a lot of fun to send the gamblers who were playing tricks on me into despair. Come to think of it, didn’t a famous gambler once say not to hope for miracles?
To win, you needed to make the path to victory, not leave it to chance. I only made myself win a little more perfectly than the ones who were playing tricks on me.
"You don’t like the games?” Hillis had come close to me at some point, and she asked me while pulling the lever on the slot machine. Since we were of the same kind, she was immediately able to hit the core of the matter.
"Just a little.”
In my past life, I enjoyed the psychological warfare, but because I could predict the opponents’ hands now, it was not fun. It was so boring that I even considered helping the suckers who were getting sucked into gambling.
However, helping those who already had a taste for gambling would only lead to them falling deeper into the abyss. As such, you should not assist them unless you had some responsibility for their lives.
When I gave a lukewarm response, Rosellis looked at the huge clock in the center of the casino and said, "Then shall we go back?"
The clock was already passing eleven o’clock at night.
"What? You’re going back already?” Hillis, holding onto more than six times as many chips as when we first saw her, looked at Rosellis and me with pathetic eyes.
You should not be fooled by those eyes as she has already sent more than ten gamblers into the abyss while bearing a benevolent smile.
I had gotten goosebumps when I heard her say, "Ah, this must also be a divine ordeal," as she took the gambler’s money. That remark was indescribably to my taste.
"Won’t your guardian worry if you play for too long?"
As Rosellis stroked Hillis’s hair, Hillis looked like she missed something.
"Oh, okay." With a slight blush and a lowered head, Hillis looked somewhat lonely.
At that expression, I unknowingly spoke to Hillis, "Well, we can play again later."
Rosellis smiled and agreed with me. "Right! If you come to the adventurer’s guild, he and I will always be there, so come and see us."
"Oh, can I?” Hillis’s eyes opened wide and switched between Rosellis and me.
No, I’m not really okay with you coming to hang out at my workplace.
But contrary to my feelings, Rosellis smiled cheerfully and slapped her on the shoulder. "Of course!"
Hillis smiled brightly. "Okay! Then I will come over later with some friends!"
"Yes! Friend or subordinate! Come visit us."
Hillis smiled brightly as if her bitter look had never been on her face. Yet, why is she bringing up inviting friends like this? How uncomfortable.
"Then let’s retrieve Flam and go back," I said.
As I spoke, I was pushing forward a container holding a dozen times more chips than what I received from Rosellis. I’ve been throwing out a lot of tips here and there, but it was still overflowing.
When I was thinking about how to handle all of this, I felt a familiar presence at the entrance of the casino. This feeling, was it divine power? Hillis seemed to have also felt it as she looked at Rosellis in surprise.
Rosellis said, stroking Hillis’s hair once again, "Oh, he’s here. I called."
"How? The accommodations where I’m staying would have been confidential."
When Hillis looked at Rosellis with incredulous eyes, Rosellis shrugged. "Oh, I don’t know where you’re staying."
"Then?"
"Instead, I know someone who knows."
Hillis looked at Rosellis like she had never considered this possibility before. "You called the Adventurer’s Guild Director.”
Ah, there was a moment earlier when she went away for a while, saying she was going to contact someone. However, it seemed she sent a letter to the Guild Director Glont. Indeed, it wouldn’t be unusual for Guild Director Glont to know the confidential location of the saintess’s residence.
"I never thought you, a warrior famous enough to be called Bloody Rosellis, would have used your head to this extent." Hillis was shocked. It seemed she didn’t think the warrior, Rosellis, would be this smart.
"Huh?" Rosellis looked at me, flustered by Hillis’s reaction.
I nodded slightly towards Rosellis, and she affirmed Hillis’s words a little awkwardly, "Uh...yes. Sure.”
Actually, I was the one who advised Rosellis to contact someone who would know Hillis’s guardian. I didn’t know that person would be Guild Director Glont.
"As expected, not just anyone can have a platinum plate.” Hillis convinced herself and admired. The paladins who came to pick up Hillis approached us.
"Sain...! Keuhmm! Hillis-nim!" For a moment, a paladin spotted Hillis and tried to say saintess but was able to correct himself.
"We were worried!"
At the paladin’s scolding, Hillis gave a mischievous smile like a kid caught in the midst of a prank. "Hehe, come on in, Albatoss. Do you want to play a game too, Albatoss?"
The paladin called Albatoss sighed. "Hillis-nim!"
"Ayy, it’s a joke. Then see you later, Miss Rosellis. See you later, Den."
When did you decide to drop the honorifics? At least, until this point, we had been using honorifics with each other. The paladins looked at me with a fierce look when the saintess didn’t use honorifics for me.
To think that you would play around until the end. Then I will have to match you. "Okay, see you later, Hillis."
The eyes of the paladins got hotter. How can you be this jealous?
"Let’s go."
I asked Rosellis when Hillis led the paladins out. "I guess her position is quite high. That Hillis."
Firstly, I technically didn’t know Hillis’s identity. When I advised Rosellis to contact someone, I was only told that she was a person of high status.
"That’s right." Rosellis nodded awkwardly.
I asked with a mischievous smile. "How did you get to know each other?”
"Oh, I just got to know her a little bit through a request."
Rosellis suddenly took the lead to avoid the topic. "Rather than that, let’s go pick up Flam.”
I laughed and followed Rosellis’s improvisation. It seemed awkward for her to suddenly go looking for Flam after all that cursing.
* * *
Rosellis and I looked around the casino for quite a while as we searched for Flam.
"Where’s this bastard?”
I calmed Rosellis down as she started to get annoyed. "We still haven’t looked downstairs yet. Let’s try heading down.”
When I pointed towards the stairs going downstairs, Rosellis looked at me with disapproving eyes. "We do have to go down. The original purpose was to go down there, but take a deep breath before you go. That place is, like, a little dirty."
Rosellis looked at the stairs with disgust. I didn’t know what the place down there was like, but I thought Flam was probably down there.
"You said that was the original destination?"
"Yeah. So you thought I brought you here just to play at the casino?”
I did think that.
"What kind of place is it down there?"
At my curious gaze, Rosellis replied in a bitter tone, “There’s a gladiator ring down there.”
“What?” I couldn’t help but to carelessly question her immediately.
In the Empire, gladiator rings were prohibited by imperial law. The public reason given was that it was harmful to the Empire’s beautiful and fine customs. However, in reality, this was to prevent nobles from hiding the number of soldiers they had by disguising some as gladiators.
The former emperor, the Blood Emperor, did everything he could to strengthen imperial power and weaken the power of the nobles. The closure of the gladiator rings and prohibiting training of gladiators were also part of this plan.
"Ah, they don’t use a sword, so it’s hard to call it a gladiator ring, but it’s a bare-handed fighting ring.”
"Bare-handed fighting ring?" What is this? The UFC?
Considering how much Rosellis didn’t like it, this gladiator ring didn’t seem to be as protective of the fighters, nor were its competitors as clean as my previous life.
Rosellis walked down the stairs with a sour face, and I followed her. As soon as I went down to the basement of the casino, what I saw was a place full of madness.
In the center was a closed-off space like an octagon. [1] And inside the octagon, two bulky men hit each other without any protective gear, wearing knuckles or spiked gloves. The bottom of the octagon was blackened with an unknown number of blood clots.
People around the scene shouted in a deranged voice, "Kill me dead!"
"This place is..." I lost my words at the sight of this crazy place.
Looking at the fighters brawling inside the octagon, it seemed like a normal bare-handed fight like in my hometown. Yet, the surrounding people were going crazy. It would have felt normal without the gallery.
Feeling both unpleasant and bitter, Rosellis clicked her tongue and asked, "Do you know what kind of people are fighting in that ring?”
I shook my head, and Rosellis said with a bitter smile, "This is usually the tomb of has-been adventurers or mercenaries. It’s a place where young adventurers who have been forced to retire, whether it be due to injuries to their legs or other serious wounds, head. They end up crawling in to make ends meet as a last resort."
It was a tragedy for someone to throw away their safety and risk their lives fighting.
Rosellis sighed as she said, "It’s because this place exists that the custom of bringing new civil servants here was created. The adventurers you’ll be dealing with in the future could face this miserable end. That’s why I’m showing you the truth and asking you to take good care of the adventurers."
I looked at the ring sadly. The defeated blood-stained man was dragged out like luggage, and the winner limped out on his own.
In the massively swollen face of the winner, there was no glory or joy from the victory. There was only relief at having survived and pessimism about his own situation. There was also a mixture of feeling sorry for the loser being dragged away like luggage.
An insanity-filled roar, which was more of a jeer, sounded at the loser in place of a cheer for the winner. Indeed, this was a crazy place.
At that moment, the fight commentator next to the ring shouted into the air.
- Next game features a rookie! The undertaker of the underground ring! Underground Under~ Taker!
The man who appeared at the commentator’s cry was a muscular man wearing a black mask with a yellow cross drawn on his forehead.
Rosellis and I couldn’t shut our mouths when we saw the man.
"Why, why is that bastard over there!?” Rosellis shouted in surprise, pointing to the Underground Undertaker.
I also couldn’t help but frown. "Oh my god, what are you doing, Flam?"
The Underground Undertaker was Flam.
1. UFC is a famous American mixed martial art (MMA) promotion company that hosts a lot of fights. The fighters fight in the Octagon, an octagon-shaped ring that’s enclosed by a fence/barrier.
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