Fatty Ben danced up beside him before he could reach the quarters.
"Master, do you hear that sound?" he asked, grinning like a cat.
Kent raised an eyebrow. "What sound?"
"The sweet music of mana crystals tumbling into my vault. Three million, Master. A 3 million. They thought you'd fall in the forest. I told them you'd bury them instead. And you did — quite literally."
Kent smiled and gestured Fatty to raise the heat before continuing toward the pleasure palace allocated to qualifiers. Fatty trailed after him, already pulling out a fresh betting slip for the next round.
The plaza's mood was shifting. So still scoffed, so doubted, but others… others were beginning to eye Kent with a different kind of curiosity. Those skulls might have been mocked now, but in the quiet corners of the gambling houses, cautious whispers began.
"If he can qualify without being caught by the Aurora Glass, who knows what he's hiding?"
"Maybe betting against him isn't so safe anymore…"
"Or maybe… that's exactly what he wants you to think."
By the ti the evening lanterns lit the Phoenix Range, Fatty Ben's coffers were heavy, Kent was gone from the public eye, and the gamblers who had tried to destroy him were left with only one bitter certainty—
They had just made their enemy richer. And he hadn't even started showing his real strength yet.
-
After a few hours…
The Phoenix Range had barely quieted after the end of the second round when the streets once again began to pulse with noise. The portal gates were still shimring faintly, the night wind still carrying the faint scent of scorched beast blood, when a certain voice bellowed across the district like a battle horn.
"Odds for the third round! One to thirty! Special offer—one to forty for bets above ten thousand mana crystals!"
The crowd froze for a heartbeat… and then chaos exploded.
The Golden Rat Gambling House lit up in an instant, golden lanterns shimring like liquid sunlight against the black velvet of the night. Above the entrance, Fatty Ben himself stood with his enormous belly proudly protruding, one hand waving a thick account scroll, the other slapping the polished rail as if it were a war drum.
Even after losing two tis, many continued to bid in hope of recovering their losses.
"Don't miss your fortune, brothers and sisters! Do you think such odds grow on trees? One to thirty! And for the real warriors of fortune—one to forty if you dare to wager like a true master!"
The reaction was beyond anything he had calculated. People poured into the streets from every direction—disciples flushed with victory, rchants slling profit, old gamblers clutching dusty spirit coin purses from under their robes. Even wandering cultivators who had sworn never to gamble again found themselves drifting toward the Golden Rat's glowing signboard as if pulled by an invisible spell.
Within minutes, a line wrapped around three whole blocks.
A potbellied rchant elbowed his way forward, thrusting a jade credit slip at one of the house clerks. "Forty thousand mana crystals on the brat Kent to lose in the third round!"
Behind him, a young noblewoman with a fan tipped in phoenix feathers whispered to her maid, "This is the perfect chance. Everyone says the boy just got lucky. One loss and we double our fortunes." She handed over a glittering spirit pouch without even glancing at the clerk's counter.
Even the owners of other gambling houses, who had sworn to themselves they would never again feed Fatty Ben's monopoly, stood in line with dark expressions. One muttered bitterly to another, "If you can't beat the beast, feed it."
Inside, Golden Rat's counting hall turned into a storm of clinking coins, shifting crystal stones, and frantic scribbling of bet slips. Clerk girls worked with talisman-enhanced quills that smoked from the speed of their writing. Sacks of mana crystals were stacked like fortress walls behind the counter.
Fatty Ben, of course, floated through it all like a kingfish in a rich pond. Every few minutes he would pause, rub his double chin, and shout sothing to stir the mob further.
"Don't be shy! If you believe Kent will fall, now's the ti to stake your claim! And for those betting big—rember my gift to the bold, one-to-forty! Make your children rich before sunrise!"
The syndicate soldiers, stationed outside to control the mob, looked more like helpless onlookers than law enforcers. One whispered to another, "At this rate, Fatty's going to need his own army."
By midnight, the Golden Rat Gambling House did not sleep. Lanterns blazed, incense burned, and the air was thick with the heat of greed. So gamblers stood in line with bedrolls, refusing to leave their spot for fear of missing the odds. Street vendors set up right beside the queue, selling at skewers, spiced wine, and steaming buns to keep the bettors fed while they waited.
Upstairs in the private balcony, Fatty Ben leaned on the carved railing, looking down at the river of custors flowing in and out. His servant girls, draped in silks, whispered the tally in his ear—already more than 5 million mana crystals pledged before dawn.
He chuckled, his belly shaking like a sack of spirit coins. "My master hasn't even stepped into the third round yet, and we've already bled the Phoenix Range dry. Oh, just wait… this is only the beginning."
In the streets below, the chanting had already started.
"Thirty! Forty! Thirty! Forty!"
It was no longer just gambling—it had beco a festival of risk, and the Golden Rat was its emperor.
But the Golden Rat's fever wasn't the only thing heating the city.
As the betting lines swelled, so did the rumours.
They said the third round would be different—no more sudden-death eliminations. Instead, all one thousand surviving disciples would be sent into the sa treasure land. The goal? To determine ranking by points, not survival.
And there would be treasures.
Herbs older than kingdoms. Rare ores steeped in spiritual energy. Pools of heavenly nectar said to heal any injury. The disciples could keep whatever they found—so long as they survived the wilds long enough to carry them out.
"Did you hear?" a thin scholar whispered in line. "They say the inner ranges are blooming with hundred-year moon orchids. One petal can fetch ten thousand crystals!"
Another gambler leaned in. "Forget orchids—there's a rumour of an ancient God scale. Whoever finds it could make a divine-grade weapon."
The talk spread like wildfire, fueling both excitent and greed. Many now believed Kent wouldn't focus on fighting at all—he'd wander off treasure hunting, leaving himself open to ambush from faster, flashier disciples.
In the Golden Rat's counting hall, Fatty Ben overheard it all… and grinned wider. The more they underestimated Kent, the sweeter the harvest would be.
- Tq all for Golden-Tickets!
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