Play a Hand - An Extra Chapter Sponsored by Snow Moon Night Purple Bamboo

The bright room was filled with a strong, strange smell, a mixture of perfume, Kolef, and other unpleasant odors.

Despite its reputation for being fragrant, it doesn't actually smell very good.

But while it smells bad, you can still detect some fragrance.

Before they knew it, the sky had darkened. Richard was not as triumphant and domineering as he had expected; instead, he was frowning.

The chip box next to him had been emptied three times already. This was his fourth time exchanging chips, each time for two thousand yuan. In a short period of time, he had already exchanged eight thousand yuan worth of chips, and it seemed that the chips in the box wouldn't last much longer.

He glanced down at the three cards in front of him. The smoke from the cigarette dangling from his mouth stung his eyes. He blinked a few times, rubbed his eyes, swallowed, and felt a sore throat.

He took a sip of wine from the glass and then placed the glass on the card.

"Mr. Richard, won't you take a look?" a very gentlemanly gentleman asked casually. He picked up the three cards in front of him, glanced at them quickly, then put them face down in front of him again. He then picked up a few black chips and threw them into the betting area. "Raise, two hundred."

"I trust my eyes more than my feelings!" he said, seemingly offering a well-intentioned reminder, but Richard took it as a trap, an offensive tactic.

Looking at the cards in such a game is not a smart choice, as most of the battles between card combinations are limited to some "small cards".

It's not easy to get three cards that can form a big hand in a deck of cards; most of the time, you get small cards.

Having a weak hand means that looking at the cards will bring a lot of pressure. Even if the opponent's hand is weaker than yours, you will feel timid and afraid.

The saying "ignorance is bliss" is most fitting here, because by not looking at the cards and firmly believing that one can definitely get a big hand, the pressure is transferred to those who are looking at the cards.

Sometimes you don't even need to show your cards; just following along can make those who are looking at the cards voluntarily "jump ship."

Jumping out of the car is a tactic that signifies an act of escaping, indicating that the player has lost their hand and chosen to concede the round. The chips they previously invested in the betting area are now irrelevant to them.

After going around in circles, some people gave up, some followed, and the sequence of cards circled back to Richard's side.

He pursed his lips, picked up a chip representing one hundred yuan, and tossed it onto the table. "Call..."

"Looks like our friend is very confident!" joked the player sitting opposite Richard.

The betting went round and round, from five people to four, then three...

"Give me a box of chips..." It was Richard's turn to place his bet again. He touched the chip box next to him and found it was empty. He had to take out a check, sign it, and hand it to the waiter.

The waiter quickly brought him a whole box of chips, two thousand dollars. These round little thin chips represented wealth here, wasn't that amazing? He hesitated for a few seconds, then took out a thousand dollars' worth of chips and threw them into the betting area, saying with a slightly annoyed sarcasm, "One hundred at a time is too slow, a thousand dollars."

With three people present, the game would never end. Whether it was Richard's taunts that had an effect, or Richard's crazy betting without even looking at his cards that made people hesitate, the person sitting to his left eventually threw away his cards.

This also meant that his previous bets of thousands of dollars had gone down the drain. He shook his head, threw his cards into the fold area, and sighed.

The man sitting opposite Richard glanced at the mountain of chips piled up in the middle of the table and asked softly, "This is terrible. I think we should stop here!"

He pushed his chips into the betting area, and the hand was over. He used even more chips to end the game, and Richard didn't need to put in any more chips. The two only needed to compare their hands.

The gentleman sitting opposite Richard casually flipped over his cards. "A pair, Mr. Richard!"

"Next up is the performance by our 'blind' gentleman!"

"Blind man" refers to the cards Richard has covered up. The cards that have been turned over represent normal people who can see, while the cards that haven't been turned over are like blind people who can't see anything.

Richard held the cards in both hands, elbows on the table. He lowered his head, brought his hands close, and awkwardly turned over the first card, the second card, and the third card!

A classic swear word burst from his mouth as he slammed his cards onto the table. He also had a pair, but it was the lowest pair, and he lost.

In just over three hours that afternoon, he lost nine thousand yuan. The speed at which he lost money today broke his previous record once again. He was a little irritated and wanted to light a cigarette, but found that there was nothing in the cigarette pack.

"Give me a pack of cigarettes!" He crumpled the empty box in his hand into a ball and threw it hard on the ground. Losing money made him extremely irritable.

Just as the waiter was about to get the cigarettes, he stopped him again, saying, "Never mind, I'll buy them myself. Just collect my chips."

No cigarettes or alcohol are sold here; they are not for sale but are offered free of charge to guests by the owner of the house.

The Federal has strict standards and regulations. Only businesses with licenses to sell tobacco and alcohol are allowed to sell these two items, and these businesses are subject to slightly higher tax rates than ordinary businesses.

Richard pushed open the door and stepped out. The sweltering wind outside calmed him down a little, and he suddenly realized that he had acted too impulsively.

That's for sure. He was too impulsive. If he had checked his cards a few rounds earlier, even if he was going to lose, he wouldn't have lost this much.

He was affected by these jerks after a series of defeats. In this last round, he wasn't playing cards, but rather venting his anger and betting that his luck would be better than others.

But as the gentleman opposite him said, a person with eyes can never be afraid of a blind person, so his defeat was inevitable.

"A pack of cigarettes..." He walked into a shop, pointed to the kind of cigarettes he liked, paid for them, and lit one while standing at the shop entrance.

After taking a puff of his cigarette, an annoying feeling of unease slowly spread from his chest. He only took two puffs before throwing the cigarette on the ground.

On the way back, he lit another cigarette. His hand trembled slightly as he lit it; he had lost too much today.

Since he became obsessed with this gambling game, he has never been able to make money as fast as he loses money. Even though he knows that this kind of loss may not be normal, he has no clear evidence to prove that others have cheated in the game.

Sometimes he would win, and he would win big money, sometimes tens of thousands, sometimes even thirty thousand!

However, he has lost too many times recently, so many that he has had to divert a portion of the company's profits to fill his financial gap, but only a portion.

For someone who is driven by money, it is not difficult to find loopholes to make money, and this is not the first time he has done it. In fact, when he was in Kuli Lan City, he had already tried to make money under Lin Qi's nose.

His approach is actually very simple: the company auctions will have a printed booklet that lists some of the auction items and their starting prices.

By observing people's expressions and demeanor, he can find customers who have a strong desire for a certain product but cannot afford it in a short period of time, and conduct private transactions with them.

He would find a way to get those goods out, sell them to these customers and profit from it. Then he would get a similar product at a very low price, pass it off as the real thing, arrange for his own people to buy it, and then return it for reasons such as quality issues.

This method is very secretive. Even if an investigation is launched, it will only reveal that some goods were returned due to quality issues. No one would suspect that there is anything else involved.

Richard did consider manipulating the accounts directly, but ultimately gave up because such a method was too difficult.

Each city has at least two accountants, both of whom are Vera's subordinates. They are difficult to bribe at the same time, and his methods are more effective than manipulating the accounts.

However, this method is not without its flaws. Too many valuable items fail to sell at auction due to quality issues and are returned to headquarters, which will inevitably raise suspicions at headquarters.

Once they send people to investigate thoroughly, Richard, as the supervisor here, will definitely not be able to escape, so he will have to deal with those counterfeit and shoddy products.

The only solution is to lower prices. This is one of the problems Vera discovered: each time there are not many unsold goods at the auctions in the capital, the selling prices do not match the prices assessed by headquarters, and there are often unplanned reductions.

If you really want to find any obvious loopholes, you can't. The starting price and final price of each item are clearly displayed. Apart from the decrease in total revenue, there really aren't any major problems.

This method had no problems before. At that time Secondhand Goods Auction just starting out, and the transaction amount every week could repeatedly reach new highs.

However, as the auctions have been held so many times, the hype has gradually subsided. In the past, a difference of 10,000 or 20,000 per week would not have been noticeable to anyone, and the difference between 310,000 and 330,000 was not significant.

Now that the transaction volume has decreased, it's easier to be noticed if the amount is too small. He already intercepted more than 14,000 yuan last week, and if he tries to do it again, he might be discovered.

But he had no choice but to do it. His mansion, luxury cars, the henchmen he kept, his socializing with local socialites—maintaining this glamorous lifestyle always required money, not to mention his current gambling addiction...

Stepping back into the room, Richard made a decision: today was... his last time gambling this month. Win or lose, he would leave immediately if he lost another five thousand. He had made up his mind.

He walked into the room and was somewhat surprised to see a strange figure sitting at the table with his back to him.

He doesn't really like people who join the game halfway through, because it makes his luck worse. For example, the cards that should have been dealt to him might be dealt to someone else, thus reducing his chances of winning.

But this place isn't his, and he has no right to tell everyone what to do. The only thing he can do is leave; he's already lost enough.

Just as he was asking the waiter to settle his bill, the person sitting at the table with his back to him suddenly asked, "Won't you come and have a game before you leave?"

Upon hearing this voice, Richard froze on the spot.

yes...

Lin Qi!