This was the Imperial Palace, and the person shaking the dice worked for the emperor. With everyone's feelings at stake, no one dared throw their weight around. They could only obediently play by the rules.
Who wanted to be the first to lose their wager? Who wanted to spend the longest time locked in the Cold Palace and get an elder in their family suspended from office for a month?
This game was destined to remain at a stalemate for a very long time.
Long enough that, whenever these people heard the word "gambling" in the future, they would run as far away as their legs could carry them.
That night.
Chu Youning slept quite well.
Quite a few households in the Capital, however, lay awake well into the night.
Over the next few days.
Chu Youning went out every day to rescue wayward young buds who were sending chickens flying and dogs scrambling. Before those confined in the palace could be released, batch after batch of newcomers was locked up.
The previously empty palaces of the imperial harem suddenly found themselves filled with a good deal more life.
And...
Not a single palace repeated another's activities.
The only thing they shared was probably the wave after wave of pitiful sobbing from the boys and girls.
Chu Youning carried on like this for a fortnight.
Within that fortnight, almost every crooked practice and foul influence in the Capital vanished without a trace.
Any officials' children who loved playing and causing trouble had become incredibly well-behaved lately. They would rather stay home and sleep than go out to have fun.
Even those who could not bear staying indoors did no more than shop, eat out, or read and do good deeds.
For a time, Chu Youning's prominence in the Capital was