The Card Apprentice

Chapter 150: The Bet

Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio

“Didn’t Uncle Oscar pick up those cloud-bird eyeballs last time? It’s said that those eyeballs turn into crystals after it dies, and then turn into gems. Really curious! If I remember correctly, Uncle Bullet seems to have some anaconda jelly, which is really something special.” Li Duhong said laughing.

Oscar and Bullet looked at each other, both a little helplessly. They hadn’t thought that Li Duhong might know everything about them so well. It looked like the little devil had memorized what they had.

“OK.” The two answered at the same time, since they knew that they might as well gamble if Li Duhong had memorized that, since otherwise there would be more trouble later on. The little guy was so good at blackmail that no one in the village could fight it. Bullet patted Alfonso on his shoulder, “Alfonso, don’t drop the ball!”

Alfonso stared him down and said grimly, “Is that the kind of person I am?”

Bullet laughed, “No, no, how could we not have faith in someone like you?”

“As long as you know it.” Alfonso hadn’t quite been mollified.

Li Duhong wore a mischievous smile, looking like a fox. But he wouldn’t have had the guts to talk to Chen Mu that way. Every time his gaze fell onto Chen Mu, his expression became involuntarily serious, and he lost all his normal mischievousness. That was an unconscious reaction that even he wasn’t aware of himself.

Suddenly, he said to Wei-ah, “Do you want to participate Uncle Wei-ah?”

“Not interested.” As always, Wei-ah wasn’t showing anything on his face, neither happy or annoyed. Li Duhong wasn’t mad either, as he laughed, “That look of yours is really ugly, uncle.”

Wei-ah didn’t respond, and there wasn’t any change in his expression at all.

Chen Mu thought a while and then nodded, “If that’s the way it is, I’d better obey out of respect.” Seeing Chen Mu agree, Cheng Ying and Bo Wen were both elated. They were afraid that if Chen Mu didn’t agree, no one could force him, not Bo Wen, and not Cheng Ying. Since he’d agreed, the two of them were full of confidence, since Chen Mu was nothing other than an “A” level of contribution points card master!

The old man was all smiles as he looked at them all, wondering to himself what those people could bring to his village.

Chen Mu and the rest then settled down in the village, and Bo Wen stuck near to Li Duhong, even though that behavior drew unfriendly looks from the villagers.

Chen Mu followed Alfonso to his house.

Inside, it was more messed up than the most chaotic lab that Chen Mu had ever seen. There were all sorts of strange devices in all shapes scattered about on the floor, and he had to watch where he stepped. But Chen Mu had broadened his outlook, that being the first time he had seen so many things related to card appliances. Although the village called them ‘card matters,’ once he saw them Chen Mu could tell they were card appliances, just called by a different name.

Alfonso very languidly took Chen Mu to the materials room and opened the door to point out the mountains of materials, and then lazily said, “If you want to use something, take it. None of this is worth anything. If it isn’t here, you’ll have to get it yourself. Oh, you could also trade me something, if I think it’s useful.” People coming from outside always had one or two interesting things with them.

He basically didn’t believe that the furry-headed youth could have any ability. The clan elder had certainly been tricked by that fast-talking guy. The accumulation of knowledge was something that took time, and that guy wouldn’t have been able get anywhere even if he’d started studying in his mother’s womb. He himself had been studying card-matters for over thirty years.

Then Alfonso tossed a model to Chen Mu. It was completely identical to the village houses, except smaller.

“It’s just a model. Study it yourself. OK, if you don’t need anything then don’t bother me. Do what you have to do. Someone will send food when the time comes.”

After he finished talking, Alfonso burrowed into a room inside, and slammed the door shut with a bang.

Seeing that, Chen Mu simply sized the place up by himself. He could tell what some of the things he saw strewn about were, but he couldn’t understand most of them. He had only a limited knowledge of card appliances, and before then the only interaction he’d had with them was when he’d made the “mudfish card” for the “fiery mayfly” shuttle car.

‘Card appliances’ referred to mechanical devices which had card technology at their core, though they had some unique qualities. In many regards, they could bring more of a card’s power into play; like the shuttle car, which was a typical card appliance which allowed ordinary people to fly in midair. The study of card appliances was growing, and more and more card appliances of every sort where being integrated into peoples’ daily lives.

But there were two very different points of view regarding card appliances. Ordinary people naturally welcomed them, but there were quite a few card masters who weren’t enamored of them. They considered the strategy to be a kind of trick to steal from machines, and only card artisans who weren’t good enough would pay any attention to card appliances. In the point of view of traditional card masters, A card master should dedicate himself to the theory of energy composition and the uses of perceptual control, instead of trying to use the power of machines.

But not every card master excluded card appliances from their point of view, and there were some more open-minded card masters who had started to focus on that kind of research. But overall, there was a large gap between the level of card appliance development compared with cards. Card appliances were just a newly developing thing. Chen Mu didn’t discriminate at all against card appliances, but on the contrary he felt that they could allow ordinary people to use the power of cards, which wasn’t a bad thing in itself. And moreover, if they were powerful, it didn’t matter where the power came from.

But in that village, Chen Mu had discovered that the villagers seemed to make more extensive use of card appliances.

Chen Mu crouched, and fiddled with the card appliance parts on the floor with a great deal of interest. The parts had strange shapes, and most were made of metal. That wasn’t what Chen Mu had expected. The metallic parts all had shiny undamaged surfaces. He hadn’t thought that the level of metalworking there would be so much higher than anybody could have imagined.

The card appliance in front of him had a drill bit about thirty centimeters in diameter, and Chen Mu guessed that it very possibly was used for drilling. It must have been part of a medium-sized card appliance, but there were really too many card appliances on the floor, and he didn’t know which one was related to it.

Alfonso’s house had many rooms, but most of them were closed. Chen Mu was in the living room, but with the card appliances piled everywhere there wasn’t any furniture there for entertaining guests.

Chen Mu saw a card appliance that could be used for short flights, different from a shuttle car. Compared with the shuttle car, it had a lot smaller volume. It was a small metal square with a buckle about half the size of a brick, and probably tied to a leg. It could fly over ten meters at a time, a little bit like the gliding of birds, and wouldn’t be much use to Chen Mu and the rest of them. But thinking of that man with the demonic pace he’d chased that day, the little gadget could be very effective.

He didn’t really understand most of the card appliances. After all, he didn’t specifically study them and while he could understand a little, that was entirely due to his card making ability.

His gaze fell onto the model which Alfonso had tossed him, and he thought about the so-called “exchange,” which gave him a headache. If he weren’t in that kind of situation, and if Bo Wen hadn’t reminded him, he certainly wouldn’t have participated in such an “exchange.” Card appliances were a rather unfamiliar field for him.

But it would be hard to refuse in that situation, and he would just have to bear it.

Card appliances weren’t what he was good at, and he didn’t use them himself! What he was best at were cards, the core technology of card appliances. He had a lot more confidence with cards.

He understood the composition of quite a few kinds of energy cloaks, and each type had unique advantages. And when he was looking around the materials room just then, he saw some materials he needed. Many of those materials were rare, in his opinion.

In the city, the materials that were the easiest to buy were minerals. Most mineral materials came from mineral veins, and once they’d been discovered, there would be stable continuous production. And the rarest were the living materials which came from the jungle. The materials which came from the bodies of wild beasts were much harder for people to get.

In that materials room, it was the opposite. Most of what he saw there were biological materials. With so much biological material available, Chen Mu became somewhat excited. By nature, card masters were fond of materials, and Chen Mu was no exception.

He needed to do his best that time. What Bo Wen said was right, that the more he put into it, the more respect they would get from their adversary, and then their probability of survival would go up. Survival was their biggest problem just then.

Since that was how it is, then take it seriously!

Chen Mu carefully examined that model of the house. It was about thirty centimeters high and was extremely detailed. Every part of it could be taken apart, and then snapped back together. The internal structure was identical to the real thing and separated into lots of rooms. The rooms had doors and windows, and the walls could all be activated.

He didn’t know what the models were made of, but it was very hard, and the spikes on the top were really sharp. If you weren’t careful it would be easy to stab your finger. There wasn’t anything inside the models and he could put anything he wanted into them.

Remembering seeing the houses in the village which all had protective card appliances on them, Chen Mu couldn’t help contemplating.

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