Dice

Finally entering the city, the group instantly received many stares from bystanders...

A blind man looking around for some reason as if he really could see, a cute girl guiding the blind man and pointing at various buildings like a tour guide, yet...how would he know where she was pointing at? Many bystanders thought these two were the weird ones in the group but then they noticed the others...

A creepy looking fatty, an old drunk man and a one armed kid eating a huge slab of meat whilst holding it like a grocery bag. Yet upon noticing the group, some people in the crowd promptly turned pale as if they owed someone money and instantly left.

others that noticed the group had no reactions at all, yet there was one cultivator in particular that started screaming when he saw the innocent looking girl...

Fang Qui noticed the commotion and looked behind him towards the others in the group, Fatty Zhang was awkwardly scratching his face, Su Meimei was hiding the golden cat behind her back, his master was staring intensely at his wine as if trying to see through the bottle, and Blind Ye....wasn't looking anywhere at all, obviously.

"How guilty can you guys look, what happened last time you all were here for them to react this way? Did you rob the entire city?" He told the others faking an angry voice.

"Don't be stupid, how could stealing be allowed in this city overseen by a massive killing array. At most we just won some bets here and there, but master was the one that taught us how to do it, you can't blame us for winning every bet we ever made in this city." Meimei replied.

Fang Qiu even faintly noticed a smile on the old man's face, was that...pride? This is only the first place Fang Qiu went to as a disciple of the old man and already they seem to be having a reputation here, and not in a very good way.

"what kind of bets did you guys do to make them this scared of seeing you all back again?"

Blind Ye was the fastest to respond saying "I just stood in the battle arena and let people hit me, master told me to bet all my money on myself winning."

Fang Qiu could understand this, Blind Ye had the rare mirror Battle body which reflected 70% of the damage coming his way, so obviously he earned big time in the arena if he caught people unaware.

"I just used my ability at night to see which city officials had affairs, then I bet them I could convince their wives they were cheating..." Fatty Zhang said next.

"How is that even a bet? Fatty Zhang was just blackmailing rich officials into giving him money and disguising it as a bet." Fang Qui had the urge to talk some sense into this fatty but seeing the creepy smile on his face made Fang Qiu realize he probably didn't just do this for the money.

"Don't worry junior brother, Fatty Third might be a creep but at least I found my treasures fair and square!" Su Meimei interjected. Yet, seeing how the others got their money through "betting" Fang Qiu could already guess how she made her money, she probably had her cat steal the contents of people's storage rings without being found out by the massive killing array covering the city.

And after hearing her explanation he was once again horrified by the luck aura innate ability. Turns out she straight up forgot about the array like the true airhead she was. The only reason she is still alive right now is because the array missed after she had her cat steal from someone. Fang Qiu didn't even know an array could miss, let alone hit the wrong person killing the cultivator she was stealing from! Hence how she "found" a bunch of treasures.

and as for the old man, Fang Qiu didn't even feel like guessing...

_________

After taking a fast carriage for most of the day since the city was almost the size of a kingdom they arrived by nightfall at a big residence with several courtyards.

Fang Qiu knew this would be the place they were going to stay for the next year at least. The sun was already down but the city was still brightly lit with floating light orbs all over the place like tiny white suns making the city a truly magical place.

After leaving his courtyard in the morning he promptly made his way over to the main living area since the old man would be joining him today in order to gather the resources he needs and the old man would know best what those were and if he was getting scammed or not.

The rules of the bet allowed him to spend up to 1000 spirit stones over the course of this year so he would make full use of it! Money not spent is useless anyways.

Becoming an archer whilst only having one arm...the old man would pay for this...figuratively and especially literally.

A bit later that morning, a youth could be seen walking on the road holding a pretty large drumstick whilst the old man next to him was sipping from a jar of wine....

"This is the center plaza of the city which is about the size of a regular town, every merchant and cultivator that has treasures or resources they don't need will come here and set up a stall."

Looking around all Fang Qiu could see was a sea of stalls almost reaching the horizon, He expected shouting and yelling but somehow it all remained very civilised and calm, turns out you can't cause a commotion here or you would be kicked out no matter if you were a stall owner or a passing cultivator. Yet the reason they came here was not for these stalls, but the big buildings around the edges of the plaza.

"Surrounding the plaza are the eight most important buildings in this city for cultivators, each owned by one of the city's top powers and separated by the eight main streets going to the eight city gates.

The first building over here is the vermillion auction house owned by the Vermillion clan, it has a huge arena capable of holding hundreds of thousands of cultivators which is where the biggest auctions on the continent are held.

Second is the martial skill pagoda, owned by the Chen clan. The Chen clan used to be one of the biggest mixed element sects of the continent before they moved over here, they own skills for most of the three thousand rare elements and have libraries full of skills for the eight main elements.

Third is the Treasure city pill pavillion, every city on the continent has a pill pavillion and all of them are branches of this main one. This one in turn is a branch of the central continent pill pavillion owned by the alchemy sect.

Fourth is the treasure tower, similar to the pill pavillion it has branches in every city and their main sect in central continent is called Treasure sect. Treasure sect is not the owner of this city though, treasure city is not owned by any major force but by a false immortal going by the name of treasure immortal. Every cultivator on the continent gets a title when they ascend to false immortal given by the ancient Tian sect. This title is usually related to their spirit ability or battle record or a certain famous skill they made. Treasure old man was famous for creating treasure city from scrap thousands of years ago hence why they gave him this title."

Listening to the old man explaining about the first four buildings and their respective powers backing them made Fang Qiu really feel like a frog in a well. Back on the eagle the old man already talked about many things related to the city and many things related to cultivation, but it seems he intentionally didn't mention these places yet in order to let Fang Qiu experience their grandness for himself.

"As for the other four buildings, they are not as important for you today. They are the battle arena, the residence of the treasure immortal, the slave market and lastly the most famous restaurant on the continent: four rivers restaurant.

Of course hearing the word "restaurant" together with "not important" made Fang Qiu flare up. How could a restaurant not be important, this is basically the most important building of them all!

"Let's go inside old man! I need to try this so called best restaurant for myself" Fang Qiu urged, still slightly mad at the old man for saying it wasn't important.

"Little Four, don't you remember the rules of the bet? You can only use my resources to buy things for increasing your cultivation or strength! And why do you keep calling me old man? I'm your master after all so you should show some respect." The old man replied whilst faking an angry expression.

"Of course I remember, it's you who doesn't remember old man! Or did you forget how my spirit ability works? And Look who's talking about respect, the old man who told his one armed disciple to become an archer for god's sake!

After hearing that last line the old man got a bit embarrassed and quickly coughed to hide it. "I remember now...let's go see what this restaurant is all about, shall we?"

Yet, right before they arrived at the restaurant Fang Qiu saw something roll past his foot after which he heard a shout coming from behind...

"Master! I knew it had to be you, you came back for me! The dice is never wrong..look! The dice rolled a twenty, right when I wished for master to come back!"

Fang Qiu looked behind him only to see a youth around his age clutching the leg of his master, then looked back behind him at the item that rolled past his foot...and as he guessed, a twenty sided dice.

"Wait, can this kid not read? The dice clearly has the number five facing up, how is that twenty? Don't tell me this youth really is my senior brother? A drunkard, an airhead, a creepy Fatty, a blind guy and now a kid who throws a dice yet can't read the numbers?

If only I wasn't so perfectly normal....