19 A Two Way Street

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Despite their complaints and protest, those at the mat could only sigh under their breath as their request was denied, and the Riza-Azir dealer was switched out.

The new Riza-Azir dealer arrived at the tatami mat and took their place where the previous roller was stationed.

'What an amusing excuse. Well? Have you searched enough?'

Linkin inwardly grinned as Valka finally shifted her gaze away from him.

Switching rollers? That was only an excuse for the Den of Everdreams to buy some time.

Valka also stopped watching Linkin; however, it was not because she lacked suspicion towards him. Rather, she probably hoped that he would slip up and give himself away.

'One... Two... Five... I see. So that's your play.'

As Linkin was still portraying an eager and energetic individual on the outside, he had been keeping a close eye on his surroundings from the moment he set foot into the Den of Everdreams.

Among the so-called guests, there were several individuals in particular that stood out like a sore thumb to Linkin. These individuals and their actions would have gone unnoticed by the average person; however, Linkin was different.

As someone who constantly had to escape from underground casinos where things could go south at any given moment and often dealt with shady clients, Linkin had trained himself to spot irregularities.

In total, Linkin counted twelve individuals who moved and behaved in a way that was outside the norm of a typical casino dweller. It was small details like how they moved to different games or places in the Den of Everdreams in precisely five-minute intervals, as well as how they used certain phrases to communicate.

For example, whenever one of them said, "My luck is finally starting to look up." while rubbing their chin, it meant that they were suspicious of someone at their table. And, if they said, "I could use a drink." while touching their throat, it meant they wanted to close the game out.

There were several of these phrases and gestures that Linkin had picked up on and deciphered through his initial movement through the Den of Everdreams.

As for why the dice landed on Riza so many times in a row without fail, of course, it had nothing to do with luck.

Rather, Valka was right to be suspicious of Linkin. After all, he was blatantly cheating!

The reason Valka was unable to uncover this fact was that the cheating did not happen by Linkin's own hands. To be precise, it was actually the Den of Everdreams cheating for him!

But why would the Den of Everdreams cheat itself out of profit?

Well, it was not as if it were their own choice to do so.

If one took a moment to observe the three tatami mats where Riza-Azir was being played, one would notice two things.

First, each mat had a dealer who handled the cup and rolled the dice. Secondly, each mat also had a second person acting as the eyes. This person was responsible for spotting cheaters, directly handling the betting pot, and distributing the winnings.

But, if one looked a little closer, they would also notice that the second person at each mat had a glaring commonality—they were all members of the race with cat-like features.

Of course, to the people of this world, such a thing was probably not an unusual sight and would be ignored. But Linkin was a person who did not believe in coincidences.

This is how he discovered the hidden system being used by the Den of Everdreams involving those like Valka. And the secret began with a feature unique to the cat-like race—their tail.

As he was playing at the first tatami mat of Riza-Azir, when Linkin placed his wooden plate down with a slight push of force, he felt the hollowness beneath the mat itself.

This led Linkin to believe that a hollowed-out space was positioned underneath the mat. As for what this hollowed-out space was used for, it did not take a genius to put the pieces together.

Without a doubt, that space had a person within it who was in charge of manipulating the dice the instant the cup touched the mat.

Though they were not blindly manipulating the dice. Those below received a signal that consisted of a specific number of soft knocks. Depending on the number of soft knocks, the person below would shift the results to Riza or Azir. And, the origin of the soft knocks was none other than the tails of those like Valka, who sat on the side of the Riza-Azir dealer.

Linkin took advantage of this so that whenever Valka sent the signal, he discreetly changed the sequence number by curling his big toe and mimicking the soft knocks.

By doing this, even if they did catch Linkin cheating, it would be no different than acknowledging their own dirty tactics. The most they could do was to either stop manipulating the results or change up the sequence numbers!