23 23. Casino

As they entered in, a peculiar atmosphere of a Casino immediately engulfed their whole body. The casino was lit bright, and there were many machines and people inside, shouting and talking with each other. No matter where they came from, they came here for a sole purpose.

Having fun.

When Yoro walked deeper, he realized that there was no window or clock here. It seemed whoever designed this place knew very well how to keep his customers at bay. Furthermore, there was also alcohol and beverage, coupled with scantily-clad clothed clerks around, now he knew why it wasn't located in the main road of the city.

This Casino was basically a pseudo bar!

But what made the corner of his lips twitched was the fact that there were some kids seen here. Good things they all seemed to be above 10 years old and neither of them came unaccompanied.

As Yoro passed through the casino, many amused and confused eyes were placed on him. Turned out, his black cloak was pretty unusual attire here, as many of them were wearing masks instead of a hood to cover their appearances. Yoro could feel his face heated up in embarrassment under those gazes. Fortunately, this place also sold masks and glasses, so Yoro quickly grabbed one of those and changed his attire, all while Chad only snickered beside him for his ignorance. Somehow he had a hunch that he was doing this on purpose.

Along the way, Yoro turned his head right and left constantly, trying to find the best and suitable gambling spot for him. In fact, it varied in many types, some of them were familiarly the same with the earth like poker and blackjack, while the others were quite unfamiliar but they still involved dice and numbers. There were so many things that even Yoro himself felt confused about where he should get started.

"How much money did you bring?" When he was unsure to pick which one, Chad tapped his shoulder and asked.

Yoro hesitated a bit. Chad said he had some bad experience here, so he guessed it wasn't wise to ask him for some amateur advice. 

"Around 50 gold… you have a good suggestion?" He gave him the half-truth and asked back.

Chad nodded a few times and gestured to follow him deeper. It seemed the area near the entrance was exclusively reserved for 1 player gambler only while in the deeper parts, you could play with more than one person. You could even gamble with the person you brought here, with some extra fee of course.

Yoro died as a highschool student in his past life, so he obviously wasn't a professional gambler, let alone playing a real one. But with his measly experience, there was a reason why he wanted to come to this kind of place.

His skill, clairvoyance.

With this skill of his, he could get a lead by seeing one second in the future, a real advantage compared to his opponents. But while it sounded game-breaking, this skill didn't come without its drawback either. It needed a lot of energy to be maintained and Yoro couldn't be used excessively. He had done some tests about this ability before, and let's just say some of them didn't end… quite well.

So he came here with an intent to train this skill of his. And if he was lucky, he might be able to raise it's grade one or two level by doing so. Well, who knows?

'Curiosity kills the cat, I guess I've already become a victim of that.' Even if he said this, there was a grin on his face. It would be a lie to say that he wasn't expecting the outcome in the end of all this.

They arrived at the secondary area of the casino and some games and tables had gone, replaced by the new one which could be played with more than one player.

Chad led Yoro towards a 4-man table which was playing some kind of blackjack. All of them seemed to be already full, and the only one which had spare only had one player sitting on it. Chad pushed Yoro's shoulder and sat him down.

"Well, look at this, a new blood, eh?" The man in front of him grinned and straightened his back, looking at the boy before him curiously.

"Yea, He had just gotten some spare money a few days ago and he was interested to spend some of it in this place. He was just a kid, so I hope you can go easy on him." Chad who stood behind Yoro said apologetically. The man only waved it off and called some clerk to be the dealer.

From Yoro's appearances alone, everyone here could guess that he was some kind of noble. But then again, nobles from all over the place came here everyday, so it wasn't that strange for a peasant to be this relaxed and aloof in front of him. This place wasn't some exclusive-for-noble-only place after all.

"Well, for starters, why don't we play the 21? It's popular and I guess you already understand the rules?" When Yoro nodded, he continued. "Great! We can immediately play then."

The man fished out a bag of coins from his shirt and placed it on top of the table. "5 gold for your first play. Is that good?" He said. As he saw it, the 21 one was a game similar to a blackjack.

Yoro didn't say anything and just grabbed five gold coins from his pouch before placing it on top of the table. The clerk then gathered the coins and started shaking the card after confirming their bets.

'Ah right,' When he saw the dealer start to give them their card, a thought came to his head. He hadn't gotten the man's name yet. "Excuse me, may I know your name?" He asked as politely as possible.

The man raised his eyebrows and looked at Chad behind him. After some silent talking with their eyes, the man sighed and explained. "We usually didn't give our name just like that in here, kid. It will break the purpose of the mask in the first place. But considering you are Baldy's friend, I guess I can tell you." He tapped the table and asked for a card from the clerk. "Everyone here called me Mato, just Mato."

'it's a pseudonym. Everyone here uses it for their liking.' Chad whispered in his ear.

Yoro nodded in understanding. If he should pick one, maybe something from the Earth language wouldn't be so bad. "Avarus." He said shortly and asked for the card as well.

The man nodded at the dealer and held his current card. Yoro also nodded, and held his current card, but not before activating his skill and ensuring he would win by his hand. 

"Alright, the boy won with his card in the amount of 20 while Mato lost with his card amount 15." The dealer then gave Yoro the money and grabbed 2 silver coins from Mato's bag as a fee.

"Ahhh! I lost… what a shame." He slumped on the table after saying that.

But Yoro strangely didn't feel elated, happy, or whatsoever. He just frowned and pursed his lips, realizing exactly what this man's intention was. 

'...He was just toying with me. Why? Is it always like this for a beginner?' Yoro scoffed. There was no way Yoro could be so naive to believe that Mato didn't do that intentionally.

When Yoro was mulling over this thought, the man already fished out his money again. This time, there were 10 gold coins inside. "Want to do it again?" He asked with a smile. "I believe it was nothing but beginner luck, but now I won't lose!"

Yoro's lips noticeably twitched as he looked at the man. He exhaled a helpless breath and put some money on the table as well. The game continued for 2 more rounds, with both bets respectively 50 and 100 gold coins. Yoro could see Chad fidgeting behind him when he looked at the amount of money which was being gambled.

But the strange thing in this whole thing was the very man before him. Even if he had lost a total of 165 gold coins, his smile didn't falter for even a second. His face was straight in this whole time, as if he had expected such an outcome.

"Iyaah, I lost again."

"Yeah, you look so sad." Yoro snickered.

The man only smiled at his sarcastic remark. "Well, that's actually all of my money. But! I might still have something that may interest you." He smirked and intertwined his fingers on the table. Yoro raised his eyebrows, gesturing to him to continue.

"Information." 

"Information?" Yoro confusedly repeated.

"Right, information." His eyes glint with a mysterious light in them. "what I am gonna tell you is information about a certain girl. The one who is betrothed to Yoshiro Ehren's fiance to be exact."

As soon as the words registered in his mind, he widened his eyes, surprise was painted visibly all over his face.