Chapter 66: The Gambling King, Wang You Cai
This novel is translated and hosted on BCatranslation.
At six years old, Yu Zhao was discovered by Master Qing Yan and brought to the Five Elements Dao Sect, severing her mortal ties to embark on the path of immortality.
Before this, she was an unnamed beggar in a remote frontier town, spending her days scrounging for food alongside a group of similarly destitute beggars. If fortune smiled, she could have a full meal; otherwise, hunger stretched for days.
The most vivid memory Yu Zhao had of those days was encountering a girl her age while begging. The girl, adorned in silk and brocade, was attended by servants and maids. A brilliant East Pearl shimmered on the tip of her shoes, and the sweets she discarded were flavors Yu Zhao could not have imagined tasting.
Though the exact taste of the pastries had faded from memory, the fleeting brightness they brought to her dark life lingered deeply.
“Freshly baked pastries! Sweet and fragrant!” The clear, melodic cry of a vendor interrupted Yu Zhao’s thoughts. She looked up to realize she had unconsciously wandered to the entrance of a pastry shop.
The shop assistant, a bright-looking young man, noticed her pause and redoubled his sales pitch.
“These are hot out of the oven, fragrant and sweet. Would you like to try one, miss?”
Yu Zhao, drawn by the sugary aroma wafting through the air, approached. “One of each, please,” she said after scanning the vibrant display. A sudden desire stirred within her to rediscover the taste of that childhood pastry.
“Certainly!” The assistant beamed and swiftly packed a sample of every pastry, quoting the price, “That’ll be seventy-two Spirit Beads.”
Spirit Beads, a type of Spirit Stone in their smallest form, were commonly used in the mortal realm. Even a novice cultivator could fragment a low-grade Spirit Stone into thousands of beads without expending significant spiritual energy.
Yu Zhao casually transformed one Spirit Stone into beads using her Storage Bracelet, then handed over seventy-two of them.
Although Spirit Beads had minimal variance in value, those with better appearance—rounder, glossier, and fuller—were more desirable. Yu Zhao’s beads, with their rare, premium quality, delighted the shop assistant, who expressed heartfelt gratitude.
Carrying the freshly packed pastries, Yu Zhao entered a restaurant adjacent to the pastry shop. Despite it being an off-hour, the place buzzed with patrons engrossed in lively conversations over tea and an assortment of snacks.
The moment Yu Zhao stepped in, all eyes turned to her. In a small town where residents recognized each other at least by face, her unfamiliar presence and the bundles of pastries she carried piqued curiosity. A warm-hearted customer called out to summon the staff.
The restaurant assistant emerged hurriedly from the backyard, where he had been tending to the stove, and greeted Yu Zhao with enthusiasm. She seated herself at an empty table and, on his recommendation, ordered two signature dishes and a pot of house-brewed rice wine.
While waiting for her meal, Yu Zhao unpacked the pastries. A wave of aromatic warmth rose as the lid lifted, filling the air with sweetness.
She picked up a flower-shaped pastry with her chopsticks and took a delicate bite. The rich floral fragrance blossomed on her palate, lingering long after the pastry was gone.
It tasted delightful, but it was not the taste she was searching for.
At that moment, the waiter of the restaurant came out carrying two signature dishes. When he saw the unwrapped cakes on the table, he chuckled and said, “The bakery next door has been around for decades. Everyone who tries their cakes praises them. Even here, we use their cakes to entertain guests.”
After speaking, he placed the dishes on the table and then turned to the counter to fetch a pot of rice wine. “Here are all your dishes. Please enjoy,” he added.
Yu Zhao picked up her chopsticks again and tasted the two dishes she had ordered.
To be fair, the chef’s skills were quite average, and the dishes weren’t as delicious as the cakes from the bakery next door. It wasn’t surprising that the restaurant’s owner relied on those cakes to attract customers.
However, the small pot of rice wine was unexpectedly rich and mellow, possessing a unique flavor.
Thus, with the rice wine, Yu Zhao nibbled on the cakes bite by bite. She blended in perfectly with the other diners.
The other customers had only glanced at her briefly when she first arrived. Once their curiosity wore off, they resumed discussing the latest happenings in the small town.
“Stop! Don’t run!”
“Wang Dashan, if you keep running, I swear I’ll break your legs later!”
“Chase him! Quickly!”
“…”
The sudden commotion from the street outside caught everyone’s attention.
Sitting by the window, Yu Zhao looked out and saw a panicked man sprinting down the street. Behind him, a group of over ten burly men wielding wooden sticks and other items were chasing after him, shouting angrily.
“Hey! Isn’t that Wang You Cai? Did he go gambling again?”
“The Wang family is done for.”
“If the late Master Wang knew that most of his hard-earned family fortune had been squandered by this unfilial descendant, he’d probably rise from his grave out of sheer fury.”
“Master Wang was a good man, but his descendants are such disappointments.”
“…”
The diners, ever eager for gossip, quickly exposed all the details about Wang You Cai.
“Ah!”
Under the intense pursuit of the fierce men, Wang You Cai, already nervous and stressed, stumbled. His left foot tripped over his right, causing him to fall flat on the ground.
The delay was all it took for the pursuers to catch up. The leader, a tall and sturdy man, stomped on Wang You Cai’s back, pinning him to the ground as he struggled to get up.
Wang You Cai wailed in pain.
The tall man sneered, “Run! Go on, run! You owe our gambling house so many spirit beads, and now you think you can just walk away without paying? Dream on! Pay up!”
Wang You Cai, his face smeared with tears and snot, pleaded, “Third Master! Third Master! Please, give me more time! I really don’t have the money right now! I promise, as soon as I have it, I’ll pay back every bead… Ah! Stop stomping! You’ll kill me!”
Leaning down, the Third Master pressed his hand on Wang You Cai’s leg, smirking, “I have a way for you to repay your debt. Want to hear it?”
Wang You Cai nodded frantically like a chicken pecking at grain.
“It’s simple, really. Look, you owe us so much money, and that’s all the hard-earned sweat of me and my brothers here. So, how about this—you let each of us stomp on you once. When we’ve had our fill, we’ll call it even. Sounds like a good deal, doesn’t it?”
Before, they said that Su Ming was the prince of a country but was poor in the sect because he only had gold and silver, mortal currency. But now this random town with no cultivators is using spirit beads as currency… so why did the prince only have gold?