Are You Deaf?

Splitting... This was also one of the rules of blackjack.

When the two cards in hand were the same, they could be split into two hands, which would be treated as two independent players for determining victory or defeat.

Cicero and Tull exchanged a glance. The delight in Cicero's eyes was almost impossible to suppress.

When he had first seen the two aces, Cicero had still been somewhat nervous, because Zhou Yun still had a chance of winning.

But now, Zhou Yun had chosen to split... This was an extraordinarily foolish decision.

After splitting, according to the rules, Zhou Yun had to draw one more card for each hand. For him to win, the drawn cards would need to be J, K, or Q to make blackjack.

But the problem was... there were no Jacks left in the deck, and only one King and one Queen remained.

Cicero did not believe Zhou Yun's luck was strong enough to draw both of those cards.

Zhou Yun must have made such a foolish decision because the Blind Witch's sorcery had begun to take effect...

The corners of Cicero's mouth lifted into an obvious smile.

Seeing the smile on Cicero's lips, Zhou Yun found it somewhat amusing.

As time passed, Zhou Yun's consciousness had sunk deeply into Cicero's mind, and he could read Cicero's thoughts.

When Zhou Yun had turned his head just now, he had also deliberately distorted Cicero and Tull's thoughts, causing them to ignore his movements.

Cicero believed that luck alone could not draw both a King and a Queen at once.

That was right. The Strange Luck effect on Zhou Yun alone truly could not accomplish something like that.

But in front of Cicero and Tull, Zhou Yun did not even need Strange Luck. He was certain to draw the King and Queen.

The misfortune on Cicero's body doomed him to suffer the greatest loss, and the way to make Cicero suffer the greatest loss was to achieve two blackjacks at once after splitting.

"Should we interrupt the game?" Libo looked warily at Zhou Yun's back. That glance Zhou Yun had cast just now had definitely not been an accident. This Scholar... was probably the same kind as the Blind Witch.

Then Cicero and the others could never win...

"Hm?" Libo turned to look at the Blind Witch, who had not replied.

The Blind Witch's hands were trembling. Veins stood out one by one on her fingers. Her toothless mouth hung slightly open as she panted heavily.

In that brief instant when Zhou Yun had looked at the Blind Witch, he had returned her clumsy sorcery and taught her what Telepathy School psychic power truly was.

He had used a Telepathy School psychic technique commonly employed by the Inquisition on the Blind Witch.

Fear Spell. The effect of this psychic technique was simple and direct: it awakened the deepest fears in the target's subconscious, plunging them into an abyss of terror.

In a sea of darkness, the Blind Witch saw. After more than ten years of blindness, she saw again.

She saw herself in shackles, curled up inside an iron cage with her sister. She saw the crowds gathered at the slave market.

She smelled the stench of rotten mud, the sweat on her sister's body, and that man's unbearably pungent perfume.

She heard that man's gentle voice, the conversation between the slave trader and him, and the clinking of Denar silver coins.

She and her twin sister had been bought because that man had recognized their talent. Then came... the torture...

The memories surged forth, sharp as needles.

Her eyeballs, her teeth, the organs missing from her body...

Torture, torture, torture. Every day, every moment, there was torture.

Her talent grew stronger through the daily torment. She began to see that extravagant, filthy court and hear the moans of the God of First Cry...

Her life continuously drained away. Her skin aged and wrinkled, while the blessings of the God of First Cry flowed into her body...

Yet she was still a failure.

The torture caused her pain. She could not enjoy it, and the direction in which her talent developed did not meet that man's expectations. She was abandoned, thrown out from that manor's dungeon, and cast here to use up what little value she had left.

But the end of the torture brought her not the slightest comfort. Her nerves had grown accustomed to pain. All she had gained was constant phantom pain and a profound emptiness deep within her soul...

"According to the rules, you need to place the same wager as your original bet on each hand," Cicero said to Zhou Yun.

Zhou Yun had just placed one hundred and fifteen chips in a single bet, a full eleven thousand five hundred Denar.

Zhou Yun shrugged, gesturing for the attendant to bring over a loan contract. He lightly borrowed another eleven thousand five hundred Denar and placed it on the other hand.

To make Zhou Yun incur an enormous debt, Libo had specifically ordered the attendants to allow Zhou Yun to borrow freely from the Semoneta Church.

But at this moment, aside from the Blind Witch, Libo had also been affected by Zhou Yun's Telepathy School psychic power and had temporarily forgotten that he could stop Zhou Yun from borrowing money.

It could only be said that in a place like Macragge, where psychic illiterates were everywhere, Zhou Yun's Inquisition psychic techniques from ten thousand years in the future were utterly overwhelming.

"Deal me the cards." Zhou Yun spread his hands toward Cicero.

Cicero wore a smile as though he were already celebrating victory and tossed the two cards in his hand before Zhou Yun.

"Tell me, what if this card is a Queen?" Zhou Yun pointed at one of the cards. "And this one is a King?"

Cicero froze slightly at his words.

A blackjack hand paid at 1.5 times the wager. Zhou Yun had bet eleven thousand five hundred Denar on each hand, so for two hands...

If Zhou Yun truly achieved blackjack on both hands, Cicero would lose thirty-four thousand five hundred Denar to him...

The number made Cicero dizzy.

As a professor at the Rhetoric Academy, one of Macragge's most renowned Scholars, and an adviser to numerous nobles and officials, Cicero's income was far greater than Zhou Yun's.

But thirty-four thousand five hundred Denar... even he found that number...

He could not help calculating his assets in his heart, calculating what price he would have to pay to barely cover the debt.

In the end, he could at most barely manage the first few payments... After that, if he could not repay it...

"But don't forget, if they aren't, there's a high chance you'll lose twenty-five thousand Denar to me," Cicero said to Zhou Yun after taking two or three deep breaths.

He believed the Blind Witch had already twisted Zhou Yun's mind and made him lose his reason. He would not lose this game.

"Find a more reliable witch next time." Hearing Cicero's thoughts, Zhou Yun could not help shaking his head.

"...Huh?" Cicero let out a bewildered cry, unable to understand what Zhou Yun meant.

I said: Find a more reliable witch next time. Are you deaf?

Zhou Yun's voice rang directly inside Cicero's ears.

This time, Cicero heard it perfectly clearly.

At the same time, Zhou Yun flipped over the two cards before Cicero.

A King and a Queen.

Both of Zhou Yun's hands had achieved blackjack.

Cicero suddenly felt a rush of air surge from his chest to his head. His heart pounded violently, every blood vessel in his face filled with blood. His temples throbbed painfully, and the scene before his eyes began to blur.

He stretched out a finger, opened his mouth, and pointed at Zhou Yun. His tongue twitched up and down inside his mouth, yet he could not say a single word.

Zhou Yun let out a soft sigh.

"Ah, trashy witches really do ruin people."