Old Matters Revisited

The plane landed at three in the afternoon.

Mr. Russell returned from the restroom wearing a nightcap after washing up, then sat on the sofa beside Huai Shi and yawned as though he had not slept enough.

The plane taxied down the runway. In the distance, they could vaguely see the endless dusky yellow of the desert and the outlines of skyscrapers.

Huai Shi was still flipping through the travel guide, page after page, at an incredible speed.

In the end, he skipped through it entirely.

Casinos, casinos, and more casinos.

None of it interested him.

"Why are we here?" Huai Shi asked. "To take your student gambling?"

"Isn't it a little too much to come to the Present Realm and spend public funds, Huai Shi? Isaac will kill me." Mr. Russell shook his head, then suddenly found a new angle and became eager to try it. "How about you transfer some funds from Danbo? If we win, we split it fifty-fifty?"

"Heh." Huai Shi rolled his eyes and could not be bothered with him.

"Las Vegas."

Mr. Russell propped up his chin and gazed at the growing city beyond the window. "Ordinarily, I should be giving you a very impressive explanation of how this city was founded, how it swelled to its present scale beneath mankind's original sin, how it fell into decadence and drowned itself in luxury...

"But your teacher has no interest in any of that. If I had to put it simply, it is this big, it is here, and it is together with the thing we came to take back."

"What thing?" Huai Shi asked.

"Money."

Mr. Russell said, "A great deal of money. If you do not understand exactly how much that is, then all I can say is: a lot, a lot, a