Le Yao's Poker Cards

The next day, when Le Yao woke up, it was raining outside. He sat up with chicken-coop like messy hair on his head and his sight was still a little bit blurred. Upon hearing a familiar ringtone, he suddenly got excited and looked at his communicator. He was relieved to see that his loan had been paid off in full. 

"What are you doing? Are you afraid that the money will be transferred again?" The General beside him said in a hoarse voice.

"No!" Le Yao stared at him. Xu Yao's voice sounded deep and hoarse when he had just woken up. It created a strange sensation in his heart and he felt kind of hot. It would be better if Xu Yao's expression didn't look like that of someone who had bad intentions of teasing him everyday.

After staring at him for some time, Le Yao stood up and walked into the kitchen pridefully, with his head high and a puffed-out chest, with a vigour full of fighting spirit.

As soon as Xu Yao saw his little wife stride like a rooster, his mood to stay in bed disappeared, so he also got up. Although the sky hadn't become bright, he went to take a bath and then came out with only a towel around his waist as usual. He sat on the sofa, lit a cigarette, put his pair of long legs on the tea table as he did habitually, and listened to the morning military news broadcast for him by his intelligent assistant, Leslie. 

After a while, Xu Yao shouted, "Le Yaoyao, get me a glass of water!"

Hearing this, Le Yao instantly thought about two million yuan plus some that he owed. How dare he disobey his benefactor? So, he asked like a good wife, "Cool or warm?"

Xu Yao said, "Cool."

Le Yao quickly got a cup of cold water for Xu Yao and handed it to him. He uttered these words like an obedient puppy, "General, your water."

Xu Yao took the cup and raised his eyebrows as he asked, "How is it that I remember a certain someone telling me last night that they owed me money in the name of a wife? What did you just call me?"

Le Yao made a quick decision, "Brother Xu!"

"I don't lack brothers," replied Xu Yao flatly.

Le Yao: "…" Xu Yao, damn you! If I ask a group of ghost brothers to trample on your body tonight, would you still dare to tease me? 

The little-white-rabbit's red eyes glowered into the dark-as-an-abyss eyes of the big wolf. The rabbit was naturally defeated and said, "Ah! My breakfast is going to be destroyed!"

He ran quickly to the kitchen after saying that. Xu Yao looked at the figure running away hurriedly as if he had just stepped on his tail.

While making breakfast, Le Yao tried to call him more intimately in his heart. 'Husband'? 'Dear'? My god, how can I call him that? I feel goosebumps all over my body! He furtively turned around to see what Xu Yao was doing. When he found that Xu Yao was staring into the kitchen, he quickly turned back and continued to cut the vegetables.

'Clank-dang Clank-dang!' Early in the morning, the General's wife had managed to make the kitchen so lively just by himself. 

Xu Yao didn't feel upset by him at all. He just continued to watch the military news. When the aroma of food emitted from the table, he sat at the head of the dining table. He realized that today's breakfast had a different menu: bread, barbecue, fruit salad, a jug of juice, food which looked full of color, and was fragrant and varied in nutrition. He suddenly felt comfort in his heart, glad that someone had prepared this breakfast for him alone.

"I don't know if you're used to eat this kind of food," said Le Yao. "Anyway, I'll try to do different things every day, so you won't be bored. If you don't think it's delicious, you can tell me directly. Next time I won't cook it."

Xu Yao had suffered through a long war before. Not to mention eating well or not, when they didn't have plenty of food, who would dare to refuse when being served so affectionately by his own wife like this? He couldn't help praising, though it only partly sounded true, "Little rabbit, why are you being virtuous this morning?" 

"It's not called being virtuous, it's called being able to see the situation clearly," answered Le Yao. "I have to serve my benefactor well. By the way, is there any place for me to work here?"

Xu Yao replied, "No. We're on military grounds, so we mostly need soldiers to work. You're an Omega, who is a rare existence here so there's no suitable job for you. And what do you think you can do? If I remember correctly, you're still a student."

Le Yao added in his heart silently: Yes, and I also had poor grades in school.

In fact, he was a good student when he was on Earth 500 or so years ago, but the things he had learned before were totally unsuitable for application or use here. Hence, it was very difficult for him to find a better job with those skills. Moreover, there was no one to believe in the metaphysics that he was most familiar with here. 

"What are you going to do today?" Xu Yao suddenly asked.

"Let's see. If it keeps raining the whole day, I will just stay at home and draw something to pass the time."

"Can you draw?"

"Of course, everybody can do that, right?" If he couldn't draw, then how would he make a deck of playing cards for his brothers? 

Originally, Le Yao had wanted to see if Uncle Ming was free after breakfast. If he was free, he would go to the mountain with Uncle Ming. He wanted some tree branches as materials for incense. But as it was raining today, he would have to cancel this plan. It was obviously impossible and dangerous to go up the mountain in such weather.

Xu Yao didn't ask any more questions. He had work to do even if it was raining, so he wore the military uniform he had prepared before, straightened his collar and waved to Le Yao, "Yaoyao, come here."

"Hmm, what is it?" Le Yao asked.

Xu Yao grabbed his hand, selected one of his fingers and pressed it onto his communicator screen without asking, "Leslie, record my wife's biological data and allow him open access to the second level of authority at the same time." 

Leslie replied, "Yes, General."

A spot of blue light flashed on the communicator, and then the light expanded rapidly, forming an aperture with a diameter of one meter. This aperture directly covered Le Yao's whole body and scanned it from the bottom to the top and vice versa. Leslie said, "Reporting to General, Madam's biological data has been recorded and the second level of authority has been successfully opened for him."

When Le Yao saw that the aperture disappear, he wanted to draw his hand back, but Xu Yao did not loosen the grasp he had on his hand.

"What are you doing?" asked Le Yao. 

Xu Yao slowly rubbed his thumb against Le Yao's palm, "What have you been eating all this time? How can your skin be so smooth?"

After he finished saying this, Xu Yao let go of his hand and smiled, "I'll give you a task. Think about what you're going to call me before I come back. Remember, I want something unique and affectionate."

Then, without a care of whether Le Yao disagreed with him or not, he just turned and left to walk through the rain.

Le Yao rubbed his palm, which felt like it had been burnt, furiously while his heartbeat raced fast. He quickly used his hand to fan his face to cool down, and then went to drink a large glass of cold water. Hmm, what just happened to me? 

Uncle Ming and Yan Jie had just walked into the yard at this time, and soon, they all boarded Xu Yao's hover car. The hover car took off slowly.

"General, Madam's terminal communication device shows that his temperature has presently increased between one and two degrees," said Leslie.

"With the terminal communication device, remind him about the specific powers contained within the second level authority," ordered Xu Yao.

Leslie: "Yes, General." 

Yan Jie was shocked, "Brother Xu, you opened access for the second level authority to Le Yao? Isn't that too risky?"

Every soldier on Huaxia had a certain level of authority. Xu Yao was at the highest level. Uncle Ming and around five or six other regiment heads including him were also at the highest level. Then there were ordinary level 1, level 2 and level 3 authorities. Although level 2 appeared to be very low, it still allowed free access to most areas of the Flying Wolf Division Camp.

Xu Yao said, "There is no risk. When he came, he told me that he wanted to find someone here, but there hasn't been much movement in the last two days. I want to know who he's looking for."

Yan Jie asked, "What if he is just using the cover of looking for someone, but is actually going to do something else?" 

Xu Yao glanced at Yan Jie lightly, "Have you ever met anyone who dared to play me under my eyes?"

Yes, I have seen it happen!

Yan Jie wanted to add something more, but Uncle Ming held him down. Uncle Ming said, "Mr Xiao Le's performance these past few days is really quite different from our investigation. Although we can't confirm his real purpose for coming to Planet Huaxia, we shouldn't put any labels on him until we understand his plan. But then, General, do you intend to continue keeping Mr Xiao Le as your wife?"

"Do you think I can spit out the meat that is already in my mouth?" 

At this moment, his expression was obviously a little bit playful. But strangely, it was impossible for the others to question his words.

Uncle Ming and Yan Jie didn't continue to talk about this problem anymore. Suddenly, Le Yao sent his first voice message to Xu Yao at that moment.

Little white rabbit: "General, can I use your printing paper? I think there's some printing paper here."

Xu Yao gently clasped the handrail and said with a smile, "Of course you can, but it's one bite for one piece of paper, how about it?" 

He didn't know whether Le Yao was scared or something, but there was no response to his message.

Yan Jie saw that even though Xu Yao appeared to be spoiling his wife, he was in fact holding the power to control his life and death, placing the person on the palm of his hand. Suddenly, he felt a bit speechless. Yes, how did he possibly think that Mr. Fox would get tricked by a little white rabbit? That was impossible, right?

The hover car neared a valley with a low-pitched roaring sound. When the hatch opened, Yan Jie went down without a thought of his anxiety towards Le Yao.

Someone came out from the cave not far from the river valley to meet Xu Yao, and called out, "General." 

"Are you sure this is the place?" Xu Yao asked.

"Yes. There was an unusual energy fluctuation here before dawn, but it suddenly disappeared after dawn," replied the man.

Xu Yao didn't ask anything more. He directly went and walked into the cave.

At the same time, Le Yao took a sheet of good quality printing paper. He measured its size and calculated the quantity of playing cards he could cut from it. He cut this piece of printing paper into sixty-four pieces of small rectangles. After cutting, he took a black pen and a red pen, and drew numbers from A to 10. He made several pieces of paper with the dimensions of 2.5 cm x 4 cm and drew a variety of hearts, spades, diamonds and clubs on them. 

Honestly, he thought that his eyes would go blind by the time he finished drawing on these small pieces of paper. But he was more afraid of the outcome of taking another sheet, so he persevered. Since the printing paper was placed in the printer's in-tray, the quality was very good, but the number of sheets in there was very less. He thought that if he took more paper, Xu Yao would immediately discover it.

It was relatively easy to draw from A to 10, all of which were simple and geometric figures. But when it came to drawing the J, Q, K and the two jokers, Le Yao hesitated. Those knights, kings, queens and so on, what could he draw ah? So after thinking for a long time, he came up with a brilliant idea!

Half a day later, Ji Fengyu and Song He, who were bored out of their minds, suddenly received a pack of playing cards! The writing on the playing card box said 'Poker Cards'. They were so happy that they couldn't wait to see the cards together. But when they opened the poker box and saw the size and the pictures on the poker cards in it, they were stunned speechless!

All was okay with regards to the card sizes and illustrations from A till 10. It seemed that everything was normal except for the next three cards in each deck! What the hell was with these J, Q, K, and the big and small 'ugly'? 

Le Yao had drawn four little stick figures on the J cards, each of whom held a different weapon,  which included a knife, sword, gun and dagger. On the Q cards, he had also drawn four little stick figures, each of whom wore a flower: a red peach blossom, a black peach blossom, a square flower and a plum blossom. On the K cards, he had again drawn little stick figures, with a crown on each of their heads, and did you know what was written on top of each crown?

King 1, King 2, King 3, King 4!

What was even more unpleasant were the jokers. The 'joker's card was also called the 'clown'. Le Yao must have been too lazy to properly write it, so he just wrote a big 'ugly' on the piece of paper belonging to the colored clown and a small 'ugly' for the monochrome clown. 

It was daytime, so Ji Fengyu couldn't fly over to Le Yao and complain about these cards in the first place. But they were bad! No! They were very bad! 

Song He held the corner of the red peach blossom Q card with his big mother's finger and index finger. "Brother Ji, are you sure that he can make the incense?"

Ji Fengyu stayed silent for a moment before he said, "Let's play with these cards first."

Generally speaking, the things burned for the deceased were not made to scale. They were made smaller and as detailed as possible, so Le Yao should've written the required size data behind the item. The burned items that go to the Underworld would then turn into the same size as the data written on it, with the sole exception being gold coins. But apparently, Le Yao forgot to write the size behind the poker cards.

Le Yao really had forgotten about the size thing. Making the detailed drawings on the cards had already caused his back and eyes to ache. It was very good of him to just finish the drawings! Then he took those small cards, burned them in the bathroom and went to make lunch for himself. 

It was still raining outside. He thought, Ji Fengyu and his brothers should probably be having a good time, right?

In fact, the current situation in the Underworld was like this:

Song He slammed the poker cards down and shook the table, "Three of a kind!"

Ji Fengyu looked at the cards and was confused, "Aren't there only two of them? Where is the third one?" 

Wang Feixia covered his face and shook his head, "It was too small and light. One of them was blown away by the wind before it reached the table. Didn't you see it?"

Song He: "…"

Ji Fengyu: "…"

…