Chapter 69 Real-Life Puzzle & Casual Card Game
Previously, it was said that Lu Yusheng kept Sikong Zhaixing's matter in mind, and this was not just empty talk.
She has always been quite good at hands-on activities. Previously, in order to play chess with her friends in real life, she made a set of chess pieces by hand.
Because Hua Manlou has poor eyesight, he specially changed the way the chess pieces were distinguished from each other by their shape instead of color when making them. Now, it is only natural that he wants to find some relaxing leisure activities for Sikong Zhaixing.
After browsing through the casual and puzzle game section for inspiration, she finally settled on a popular gacha-style competitive game.
Such products probably didn't exist at that time, making it extremely difficult to get started. In addition, there were fewer passersby in the winter, which meant that Lu Yusheng had to spend even more time on it.
Finally, one afternoon, after finishing his meal, Lin Pingzhi consciously maneuvered his wheelchair to his personal computer. The middle-aged man who usually accompanied him was nowhere to be found.
Life here is so boring that even when he's occasionally forced to listen to the progress of the young镖头's game, he feels like he's going to get sick from boredom.
In order to avoid his martial arts skills becoming rusty, Chief Escort Cui took the initiative to ask Lin Pingzhi for permission to go hunting in the forest, and the game he caught could also nourish the young chief escort.
Although the number of wild animals decreases sharply in winter, this place is nestled between mountains and water, so you can always find something if you search every day.
Of course, the reason he dared to leave the injured young镖头 alone here was also because his trust in Lu Yusheng and his group had gradually deepened over the past six or seven days.
In addition, he doesn't go too far, nor does he try to do too much; he leaves for at most an hour each day, so he can return in time to deal with any unusual situations.
Occasionally, if they were lucky enough to hunt some clean and beautiful animal pelts, the young apprentice who often sat under the lamp with two long bamboo needles would buy them directly.
...This was the first time he had ever seen a man with such skillful hands, although the man's lightness skill was even more impressive than his crochet skills.
But when it comes to craftsmanship, one can't help but think of another quiet young man in the shop.
Because he occasionally saw the young master gently inquiring about the young镖头's health recovery, and seemed to know some medical knowledge,镖头 Cui always treated him very kindly.
The past few days had already made Chief Escort Cui notice his eye ailment, but he never expected that such a physical condition would allow him to make such rapid progress in wood carving.
The bird and animal patterns carved in the previous times were already very lifelike. When we set off today, Chief Cui took a few more glances at them. At that time, the Guanyin statue in Hua Manlou's hands had basically taken shape, and only the details were left to be finely carved.
Just as he was admiring the appearance of the wood carving he had seen earlier, a slight noise in the distance brought him back to his senses.
In winter, the tree branches are bare, and without any cover, Chief Escort Cui spotted the grayish-brown wild rabbit at a glance.
It's not a large item, but it's enough to pass the time.
So he stopped thinking about the people and things in the shop and focused all his attention on the prey running and fleeing in front of him.
Inside the room, Lu Yusheng, sensing that the time was ripe, looked at the remaining two people on the table and pondered, "We now have three people."
Realizing that she was referring to himself, Hua Manlou silently stopped what he was doing and waited for her to continue.
Sikong Zhaixing, who had been lying on the table, turned her head towards her, glanced at her for a moment, and then slowly asked, "...And then?"
Both of them were very serious at first, which is good.
Lu Yusheng nodded, then took something out of his pocket and spread it out on the table.
Sikong Zhaixing immediately sat up, took out a few cards, and examined them carefully.
They were thin pieces of wood of the same size, each engraved with a different pattern.
When he turned the piece of wood over to the front, he was somewhat surprised to find that although the wood was thin, the pattern was only engraved on one side. The other side was completely empty, and there was no trace of carving on the back. When he ran his fingers over it, there was not even a slight tactile sensation.
"Xiao Lu's carving skills are quite good too," he exclaimed. "His control of the force is quite satisfactory."
Hua Manlou, who had also picked up a card and was stroking it, exclaimed in admiration, "Was it carved with the thin-handled carving knife I gave you?"
She accepted their praises without question, as usual, and even responded to Hua Manlou's question. She no longer focused solely on one aspect of strengthening her body; her progress after several upgrades was quite evident.
The control over force is also much more precise.
Upon hearing Hua Manlou boast about his achievement, Sikong Zhaixing calmly reminded him, "The wood chips were the kind I bought for you in the city."
Lu Yusheng nodded generously, then listened as Hua Manlou continued, "Next time something like this happens, just come to me. What if you hurt your hand?"
Feeling guilty, she quickly hid the band-aid in her palm and began explaining the four suits and thirteen patterns of playing cards.
After giving a basic description and feeling that nothing had been missed, he turned around and went behind the bar to get a small bag. When he poured it into the plate on the table, it turned out to be a bunch of small black spheres.
“I know that, Maltesers.”
Having gotten used to touching her snack shelf, Sikong Zhaixing naturally recognized what was in front of her and grabbed several pieces from the plate that was placed in front of her and put them in her mouth.
"Hey you?!"
Unable to stop him in time, Lu Yusheng could only watch as he accepted the chips he had prepared.
Seeing her strong reaction, Sikong Zhaixing immediately stopped chewing and pointed blankly at her tightly closed mouth, as if he would spit out all the food he hadn't had time to swallow at Lu Yusheng's command.
Looking into those bewildered and helpless eyes, Lu Yusheng couldn't say anything. It was just a few chocolate beans; he could just buy another bag.
"It's okay, you eat."
She paused for a moment, then continued to explain, "This is also one of the props we'll be using in the game later. It's not called Maltesers anymore, it's called Happy Beans."
Then, the chocolate chips in the plate were divided into three portions, and to prevent the air conditioner from melting them, the airflow direction was specially switched.
Although it was initially said to be for Sikong Zhaixing to pass the time, it was later seen that he became more and more addicted to crochet, and that he could knit almost as if it were his own arm. So the previous reason was no longer valid.
But she not only didn't give up, she also devoted even more energy to it, because...
Now they've all found new hobbies, and nobody plays with her anymore!
It wouldn't have been so bad before, as I didn't have much free time when entertaining guests. But now that the weather is getting colder, there are noticeably fewer people on the road.
Although Hua Manlou accompanies her every time she goes out, and Sikong Zhaixing chats with her from time to time, they still do their own thing most of the time.
Lu Yusheng wiped her face in anguish, but fortunately the new game should be easier to increase cohesion and friendship points. She quickly adjusted her expression and smiled, "The assessment time is before the game starts."
He then held up the cards and asked them several times for the names corresponding to the cards.
Both of them had good memories, but... Sikong Zhaixing was alright, but Hua Manlou was slower. He could only give an answer after touching the patterns on the cards.
"When we play again, we'll announce each card we've played."
Because in a real game, there might not be enough time for him to check every single card, so this is the only requirement we can set for now.
Thinking of this, Lu Yusheng made sure to assure him, "Don't worry, I won't team up with him to lie to you."
Although Hua Manlou simply smiled and said, "I believe in Xiaoyu," she felt a strong sense of responsibility welling up in her heart, so she responded even more firmly.
"Are you going to play or not? Are you going to play or not?" Sikong Zhaixing interrupted the two by tapping the table with her knuckles with her backhand, somewhat annoyed.
"immediately."
Sensing his urging, Lu Yusheng stopped wasting time. The wooden deck was inconvenient to shuffle, so she could only repeatedly cut the deck to shuffle the order.
Fortunately, the thin wooden slabs used as raw materials were custom-made by a carpenter in the city with the help of Sikong Zhaixing. This row of wooden slabs, which were of uniform thickness and size, was not too heavy to hold. Although they were many times thicker than ordinary playing cards, they were still manageable to grip.
Even when dealing the cards, she had to manually pass them one by one to the three people. After a game, Lu Yusheng's wrists were sore from shaking them back and forth.
This reminded Sikong Zhaixing of the last time the two of them competed in rhythm games, and she couldn't help but laugh. At the same time, she didn't forget to comfort him, saying, "Alright, Xiaolu, I understand now. Let me do the 'roulette' next round. Don't really get tenosynovitis."
The term "tenosynovitis" wasn't something she used to scare Sikong Zhaixing. When she was an intern before graduation, she was treated like a nuclear-powered donkey and had to work overtime every day. She really did suffer from it and it took wearing a wrist brace for half a month to get some relief.
So I didn't argue with him and reluctantly agreed.
Forget it, I'll just go back and check if there are any plastic cards in the system, buy them, and reprocess them.
She had already thought of a solution in her mind, and her eyes unconsciously fell on the cards in her hand.
...Then he raised an eyebrow and couldn't help but chuckle to himself.
She was the landlord in the first round. Of the 20 cards she received, she had four bombs, one big joker, and the remaining scattered cards were easy to play.
Unfortunately, the teaching bureau had agreed to reveal their cards, and in order to allow the two to better learn game skills, she had to hold onto her bombs until the very end, even breaking up two pairs.
She undoubtedly won this round. The two "farmers" who lost accepted their bet and handed her chocolate beans, which Lu Yusheng then returned one by one.
"We agreed that the first two rounds were for familiarizing ourselves with the rules, so they don't count." With that, she handed the stack of wooden cards, which had been cut twenty or thirty times, back to Sikong Zhaixing.
It had been agreed beforehand that he would deal the cards, and the latter naturally had no objections.
But when he took it, his expression turned strange for a moment. Then he quickly glanced at Lu Yusheng, who was completely unaware of what was happening, and smiled without saying anything.
Since it's a fair game that Xiaolu wants, even if he knows that his finger only needs to shift slightly in a specific position when dealing the cards, he can deduce each person's final hand by looking at the different markings on the cards...
Sikong Zhaixing, being a gentleman, simply changed his hand gesture to avoid touching the pattern as much as possible.
Of course, in a showdown where the cards are out in the open, he doesn't need to take shortcuts.
After the three of them arranged the cards, they spread them out on the table one by one. Hua Manlou touched each suit from left to right and couldn't help but smile again: "Yu Sheng has very good luck."
Lu Yusheng was also a little proud. This time he had a royal flush with two ordinary bombs and two sets of three-of-a-kind with one extra card. So he easily became the landlord and won the victory.
The victory continued until the fourth set.
After several rounds of playing cards, Sikong Zhaixing, the landlord, threw out two threes.
Lu Yusheng, not to be outdone, played a one-on-two strategy.
But she didn't expect that Sikong Zhaixing had a royal flush in his hand, and she didn't expect that he would use a royal flush to beat all his other pieces. After he played all his pieces, of course no one could catch them. Then he threw out a pair of sevens at his own pace.
But just as Sikong Zhaixing announced the information on the card, before Lu Yusheng could even take a closer look at the scattered suits on the table, he heard Hua Manlou interrupt him.
“I’ve roughly remembered that you played one '7' card, Xiaoyu played two, so there shouldn’t be a pair left now.”
Upon hearing this, Lu Yusheng immediately retrieved the two wooden plaques that had just fallen, and sure enough, the last one was an "8" belonging to the same club suit.
Sikong Zhaixing, who had no intention of cheating, immediately took back the cards, feeling embarrassed: "I was too close and misread them. Let me change them to a pair of 10s."
Even without explanation, no one would think he did it on purpose.
Lu Yusheng didn't think anyone would cheat in such a casual game for a few Maltesers, while Hua Manlou knew that if he really wanted to cheat, his methods would never be so simple.
"no……"
Seeing that the game was about to continue, Lu Yusheng realized that no one seemed to be paying attention to the key point in Hua Manlou's words, so he repeated, "I've roughly memorized it?"
The latter nodded with a smile.
"You really remember the cards? Then tell me, how many bombs are left to play?"
She asked incredulously, and then heard him confidently state four sets of numbers that had not yet appeared, including the two bombs she was holding.
Lu Yusheng fell silent. "Manual card counting device, huh? How is she supposed to play like this?"
She initially thought her previous victories were due to her skillful play and dominance, but now she has to admit that luck played a part.
At that moment, Lu Yusheng, who was silently searching for ideas from the discarded cards on the table, suddenly felt a weight in his hand.
Turning her head, she discovered that Lin Pingzhi had somehow moved his wheelchair and appeared beside her.
At this point, while giving guidance, he said, "Hey friend, believe me, next time you play these two cards, if you still crave victory and have the virtue of listening."
The subsequent card plays seemed to be fast-forwarded.
Lu Yusheng, who dutifully followed the instructions and played a pair of preserved eggs, was once again crushed by Sikong Zhaixing's pair of two. The next second, his teammate Hua Manlou shouted "No!"
She thought to herself, "It's over. If there really are four bombs left on the field, the remaining two should both be on Sikong Zhaixing, who is her opponent."
Sure enough, his next "four of a kind with two extra cards" was suppressed by his own bomb, and he quickly used the remaining four cards in his hand to form an even bigger bomb to suppress her and win the game.
—When the results were announced, Lu Yusheng hadn't reacted yet, but Lin Pingzhi had already awkwardly chuckled.
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