"Haha, triple fives! Three of a kind! You're definitely losing this round. Open it." Tsunade laughed arrogantly, skillfully tossing the dice cup up and down in her hand. She looked exactly like a professional gambler who had spent years haunting casinos.
"Do you really like gambling that much?" Keiko casually shook his dice cup. He truly had little interest in gambling.
"It runs in the family. Ever since I was old enough to understand things, my grandfather had been carrying me to the card table."
"Oh? My apologies, then. So how good was Lord Hashirama at gambling?" Keiko asked.
"Uh, naturally, he was... Oh, your dice are practically about to shatter from all that shaking. Hurry up and open it." A trace of embarrassment flashed through Tsunade's eyes, and Keiko could not help laughing to himself. It seemed that Lord Hashirama, hailed as the God of Shinobi, was also terrible at gambling yet hopelessly addicted to it.
"Open! Triple sixes! Pay up!" Keiko lifted the dice cup and smugly waggled his brows at Tsunade. The famed sucker of the gambling world truly lived up to her reputation.
"No way! That worked too? Did you use Iron Sand to cheat?" Tsunade's eyes widened as she unwillingly tossed the coins in her hand to Keiko.
"What kind of person do you take me for? Cheating while playing with my own girlfriend?" Keiko was so irritated that he laughed. Then an idea flashed through his mind like lightning, and he abruptly grabbed Tsunade's hand tightly.
"Is gambling popular in Konoha?"
"Very popular. My grandfather started the trend. My second grandfather, Teacher Hiruzen, and several of the village's consultant elders are all old gambling addicts. Every Konoha shinobi I know likes to play a few rounds whenever they don't have missions."
"What do they play? Where do they play?" Keiko's expression grew somewhat excited.
"What do they play? Everything. Slot machines, pinball machines, cards, dice, pai gow, baccarat, mahjong. There's an entire street in Konoha full of little gambling stalls like those. Why, do you want to go?" Tsunade asked in confusion.
Keiko carefully calculated in his head, gradually refining his train of thought. No matter which parallel world it was, gambling was undoubtedly one of the most profitable industries in the world. Just look at Macau. Its land area was only 32.9 square kilometers, and its total population was merely 683,200. Yet gambling generated more than 240 billion Australian dollars in output every year. Combined with related industries such as real estate, tourism, dining, and entertainment, it was a business worth nearly a trillion. If Americans could build a Las Vegas in the western desert, why couldn't Sunagakure build its own gambling city in the Land of Wind?
Keiko had read The Biography of Stanley Ho before he transmigrated. There were three essential elements to running a casino: first, enormous cash flow; second, powerful security forces; third, extensive connections. Counting them on his fingers, it seemed he had all three!
As for wealth, Sunagakure was no longer the destitute place it had been two years ago. Hourglass Group had completely opened up the market and made a fortune reselling supplies during the war. Shinobi blades, canned food, tactical boots, and tactical vests sold as fast as they could be made. Monthly profits exceeded eighty million ryo at the very least!
Agricultural development in Moon Lake New District had also begun taking shape. Grain, pork, mutton, chicken, vegetables, fruit, and medicinal herbs could not only meet local needs but had even begun gradually supporting Sunagakure. Once the Sand-Moon Expressway was completed, Keiko believed that Sunagakure's food shortage would become history. It might even become a food-exporting village. At present, Sunagakure's treasury had five hundred million ryo in available funds. By year's end, that figure would reach at least one billion ryo! Money was not a problem!
Then there was security. Sunagakure was one of the Five Great Shinobi Villages, after all. Although it had lost some manpower during the Second Shinobi World War, thanks to Baki's tireless recruitment efforts in Moon Lake New District, the village's overall strength had recovered considerably. There were clearly more Kekkei Genkai clans and secret technique clans, while many renowned wandering shinobi and missing-nin had openly or secretly joined Sunagakure's forces. Sunagakure was now even stronger than before the war and could easily field ten thousand shinobi. Security and military force were even less of a problem.
As for connections, that was even easier. Keiko himself was the Kazekage, and his relationship with Konoha's upper ranks was excellent. Sunagakure had never fought Hidden Cloud or Hidden Stone Village. Did he want diplomatic ties? Once the war was over, he could make the diplomatic rounds, then invite them over for a few games. Wouldn't that establish connections? As for Hidden Mist Village, there was no need to consider them for now...
As his chain of thought gradually came full circle, Keiko slowly smiled.
"Hey! Hey! Wake up! What are you thinking about? Since when did you develop the habit of grinning like an idiot?" Tsunade waved a hand before Keiko's eyes, utterly baffled.
"Haha, darling, how about I build you a gambling city?" Keiko held Tsunade by the shoulders and shook her slightly in excitement.
"A gambling city?" Tsunade looked completely dumbfounded.
"That's right, a gambling city! Just imagine it: a city centered on gambling and entertainment! The entire city would be filled with high-end casinos, hotels, and all kinds of entertainment venues. There, you could drink the finest wine, eat the most delicious food, and play every form of gambling you could imagine in magnificent top-class casinos..."
As Keiko continued describing it, a grand blueprint for a gambling industry gradually unfolded. Tsunade's eyes grew brighter and brighter as she listened, until she finally hugged Keiko and asked with sparkling eyes.
"Really? Could such a place really exist?"
"Not now, but it definitely will in the near future! I'm going to lay the first brick for this city right now!" Keiko put away the gambling tools and loose change, then turned to leave.
"The first brick? What's that?"
"You silly girl, of course it's the report for the Hearing Committee. I can't do something like this alone, but a group of people can." Keiko smiled and tapped Tsunade on the forehead.
"I'll help too!" Tsunade excitedly raised her right hand.
Perhaps even Keiko himself had not expected that his report would cause such a huge reaction from Sunagakure's Hearing Committee. No one objected. Instead, everyone insisted that this venture could not be nationalized like Hourglass Group. Everyone had to be allowed to enjoy the benefits of reform, and it would be best if families raised their own funds to buy shares!
Several old men nearly came to blows at the hearing over the allocation of share percentages. By that afternoon, someone somehow leaked the news, and several clans that were not part of the Hearing Committee actively demanded to join the meeting as well. Why should you old fogies keep it all to yourselves? We want shares too! What had begun as a simple hearing had no choice but to turn into an expanded conference. How expanded did it become?
Put it this way: by the following afternoon, Baki and Garukei from Moon Lake New District had arrived with representatives from the district. In the end, even Rasa and Yura, far away in the Land of Rain, heard the news and said they would send representatives to attend. After all, everyone could clearly sense that Keiko's initiative might become one of the most profitable businesses of the postwar era. To prevent leaks, Keiko simply made the decision to convene the first Hidden Sand Village Representative Congress and resolve a whole series of issues at once.
This move directly alarmed all the forces around the Land of Wind. They thought Keiko was reorganizing the army and preparing to launch a new war. Even the Third Hokage, Hiruzen Sarutobi, wrote a letter asking about the situation—hoping that Brother Keiko would temporarily quell his anger, cherish the hard-won peace in the current Wind-Fire-Rain-River Region, and not raise the weapons of unjust war, lest countless living beings suffer an undeserved calamity... His words were exceedingly earnest, carrying all the bearing of an elder. Keiko did not know whether to laugh or cry when he read it. I'm just doing a little construction. Is it really necessary?
Before you continue