“Over here, sisters!”
“Yes, I’m coming.”
Yeo Il-ye looked at Tang Rye-ah with a gentle smile. The age when one has an illusion about being an adult. It’s that time when the innocent desire to be seen as mature shines brightly.
“This is the Tang Clan’s workshop! The internal area is where the Vision Hidden Weapons are being developed, so outsiders can’t enter!”
Tang Rye-ah proudly introduced the clan’s facilities. Seeing her, the Black Cat nodded. Unlike her usual bouncy attitude, the Black Cat maintained a graceful demeanor, prompting Yeo Il-ye to suppress a laugh.
For Tang Rye-ah, the Black Cat and Yeo Il-ye were undoubtedly admired as amazing adults. The Black Cat exuded a fatal charm that seemed beyond this world, while Yeo Il-ye was a name known throughout the Central Plains. Both were seen as successful and splendid adults that Tang Rye-ah could only look up to.
And the Black Cat was at a loss on how to react to Tang Rye-ah’s gaze.
“Sister, you’re so beautiful…! That elegant posture! That haughty gaze! Can I become like you?!”
“Eh, yeah…? Well…”
“Is it really that difficult?! I’ll work hard!”
Receiving Tang Rye-ah’s longing looks, the Black Cat, unsure how to respond, realized that Tang Rye-ah expected her to embody the “wonderful sister” image.
“Wow, there are two cute kids here.”
One was a bouncy child shouting, “Amazing! Awesome!” while another was trying to appear dignified with shoulders squared.
“Ah, Yeo Il-ye is just standing behind, laughing. Come on!”
“Hehe, yes, I’ll go.”
Yeo Il-ye grinned and approached the two, thinking that her time at the Tang Clan might be quite enjoyable.
As the lively Tang Rye-ah acted like a splendid woman and the Black Cat portrayed elegance while Yeo Il-ye simply smiled, the Poison Doctor was feeling the universe.
“The world of gambling… is this vast?”
The Poison Doctor truly couldn’t hold his head up in shame. Until he heard Ho Cheon-an’s lecture, he thought gambling was simply honing his skills in hidden weapons or medicine.
The theories pouring out of Ho Cheon-an’s mouth felt like a vast universe itself.
The gap in perception. The angles of thought. Concepts that mocked the word common sense. Theories analyzed and predicted human nature to deceive opponents.
Even the Poison Doctor, who had dedicated his life to medicine and was confident in his understanding of the human body, realized he had only known parts of it from experiential learning, while Ho Cheon-an presented it armed with meticulous theories.
The Poison Doctor pondered while watching Ho Cheon-an’s theoretical lecture and demonstration.
Gambling.
A small space where three cups and a die could move about. A simple act involving just two hands moving within that space encapsulates everything in the universe!
“I have a question.”
“What is it?”
“Aren’t there various types of gambling? Is it necessary to study as hard for other types as well as this?”
“Gambling is just one type of wager, after all.”
Ho Cheon-an’s calm reply left the Poison Doctor speechless.
“Put aside your curiosity about other forms for now. Focus solely on winning against the Tang Family Head with the gambling we have here.”
“…Understood.”
“It’s not bad.”
After the theoretical training ended, Ho Cheon-an nodded inwardly while observing the Poison Doctor’s efforts.
The Poison Doctor’s hand skills weren’t bad. No, they were even better than expected.
It was just that he had accumulated rust over the years.
After gaining the title of one of the Central Plains’ Three Great Names and leaving the Tang Clan, the Poison Doctor had no opportunity to gamble ever since. The reason he wandered the world was due to poisons and herbs. He had lived a life traipsing through remote mountains, far removed from gambling.
It had already been decades since he had dabbled in gambling, half voluntarily and half involuntarily.
But now, the rust on his hands was slowly starting to shed, revealing his true self.
“Elder’s skills seem to be gradually awakening.”
“In the elder generation, the Poison Doctor was surely at the pinnacle of the Tang Clan’s gambling board.”
“Hmm.”
Tang Do-gyeong calculated the odds coldly for a moment.
Could the Poison Doctor truly defeat the Tang Family Head? He was regaining his rusty hand skills, but Tang Do-gyeong still considered the Poison Doctor’s chances to be quite low.
“Fast…”
Tang Do-gyeong felt nostalgia for the former clan head in the Poison Doctor’s motions. Only speed. Pursuing a speed so extreme that even the Tang Clan’s internal law couldn’t catch it.
The virtue sought by the gambling masters of the old Tang Clan.
The Poison Doctor had also been someone who pursued the aesthetics of speed, just like the Tang Family Head, Tang Guanglie.
However…
“Objectively evaluating, the Poison Doctor won’t match up to the clan head’s dexterity.”
The Tang Family Head’s speed was the zenith of the clan.
No matter how established an old master he was, fundamentally, the Poison Doctor had practiced hidden weapons rather than focused on poisons. Thus, the absolute speed of the Tang Family Head would always be faster.
Being of the same type of gambler, a faster Tang Family Head would naturally hold the advantageous position.
“Although Senior Ho might have a plan… it won’t be easy for the elder at this age to adapt to new types of gambling techniques.”
Tang Guanglie had incorporated a new skill of controlling speed while maintaining his own advantage in speed.
However, for the Poison Doctor, whose goal was to defeat the Tang Family Head, it was hard to choose to play to speed.
If he ended up gambling similarly to the Tang Family Head, the faster Tang Family Head would inevitably be at an advantage.
And how about adapting entirely different new types of gambling skills?
How could he possibly catch up to the seasoned gambler, Tang Guanglie, by building new gambling techniques now?
“That’s impossible.”
Tang Do-gyeong observed the scene of the Poison Doctor practicing his skills and then thought about Ho Cheon-an.
“It’s an impossible task, but perhaps Senior Ho might pull it off.”
Tang Do-gyeong recalled various instances with Ho Cheon-an.
How he unfolded the gambling game to keep up with his own stubbornness and threw various topics at him.
How he had been invited to the Tang Clan and significantly improved the Tang Family Head’s gambling skills.
And not just that.
Within just two nights, he managed to rake in hundreds of nyang.
What about when mobilizing the city’s sects against the bandit eradication? Observing how the pledge system was adopted, all the sects turned upside down, capturing the bandits alive.
Then, within less than a year, he had suddenly appeared as a Peak Expert.
Tang Do-gyeong thought.
It seemed like expectations had emerged surrounding Ho Cheon-an’s name. The more he understood the Poison Doctor’s predicament, the more he felt the unfairness of it, yet the sole fact that Ho Cheon-an sided with the Poison Doctor gave him a sense of hope.
“Shall we see what else you’ve got?”
Tang Do-gyeong thought as he gazed at Ho Cheon-an’s figure.
* *
It had now been three days since the Poison Doctor was taken under special training.
Tang Do-gyeong was either rolling up his sleeves or practically alternating shifts to assist in the training of the Poison Doctor.
After finishing the theoretical lecture, seeking to soothe his hoarse throat, he requested tea from Maki, who promptly sat in front of him and began speaking.
“I just don’t get what those martial artists are thinking.”
“Why, what’s up?”
“I mean… Elder. Didn’t he get smacked by the clan head?”
I gazed at Maki for a moment. Only a few people, including the Feng Ying Hall Master and I, would know what had happened then… Even if Yeo Il-ye or the Black Cat sensed something was off, they wouldn’t know the exact detail of the Poison Doctor getting smacked by the clan head.
“Well, isn’t it obvious? Before you came, he was commuting from the Family Head’s Quarters and suddenly got heated over gambling and caught me to smack me. Anyone can tell he’s struggling with his emotions.”
“Tch.”
Admittedly, Maki could be considered one of the Poison Doctor’s confidants. He could probably guess things just from observing the Elder’s reactions to some extent.
“Even for someone like us, the head of the great Sacheon Tang Family, he’s just a kid to the Poison Doctor. Getting slapped by such a kid would surely make him angry, but… to practice like this day and night?”
I understood what Maki was saying.
The competitive spirit.
Those without a strong fighting spirit might not understand people who wager their lives on winning or losing.
Yet most who stand at the peak possess an intense competitive spirit. The desire to defeat the opponent is one of the strongest motivations for people to strive.
“What about you then?”
“Can’t answer, huh? What are you talking about?”
“Are you the Poison Doctor’s servant or his disciple?”
Maki scratched the back of his head.
“Well, I don’t really know. Sometimes he gives me lessons, but it’s never formal. It’s hard to say I’m a disciple since he tends to scold me and make me run errands.”
Why does the Poison Doctor drag this guy along? The Maki I’ve seen seemed too careless to fit the role of a disciple. Surely there are many who would be more obedient, fit, and smart than this guy.
“Anyway, what I want to say is that the Poison Doctor is very hard to serve. Just think about it—the man is one of the Three Great Names of the Central Plains, but here he is behaving like this. Considering that, it makes sense why the Tang Family Head would hit him. How much buildup of resentment must there be?”
Well… when I was accepted as a patient, it wasn’t the request of the Tang Family Head but a direct invitation from the Feng Ying Hall Master.
The clan head’s expression showed a sense of release, as if his decade-old resentment had finally been lifted after slapping the Poison Doctor.
It was indisputable that the two of them were rivals.
“When the Poison Doctor practices medicine, it’s like watching divine work… He can measure ingredients more accurately than anyone else even when doing it by eye, and when he needles or prescribes, it flows without a moment of hesitation… it’s incredible.”
The Poison Doctor’s medical skills.
If the Elder had dedicated a fraction of the time spent on medicinal practice to honing his gambling skills, he might not feel so lost now.
Three days into special training. The Poison Doctor slowly started regaining his skills, but merely finding those skills wouldn’t be enough to overcome the Tang Family Head.
A breakthrough. A breakthrough was needed.
“One might think a figure of the Three Great Names would be dismissive of patients, yet if there’s a patient in the room, he won’t disturb their rest. He organizes herbs without a sound, processing them silently as he cuts and grinds… it’s almost like a divine skill, isn’t it?”
“Wait a second.”
I interrupted Maki’s words.
“Could you elaborate on that a bit?”
This might just be.
It might very well turn into a breakthrough.
