The Card Apprentice

The fatty was in a glum mood when he left.

Maybe there were a lot of stories there, but seeing Bogner’s dejected look, Chen Mu discreetly didn’t ask. In any case, Bogner suddenly pulled himself together and became a different person. Although there was still a teary look in his eyes, he was mostly firm and determined.

That man had certainly been someone who rocked the world!

“Let’s talk about my duties,” Bogner said respectfully. His sunken eyes, skinny face and his stubble like a wire brush made him look like a sword drawn from its scabbard; its point was hard to disguise. Lu Xiaoru looked on radiantly with her lively, beautiful eyes. Only Wei-ah kept watching the fantasy card receiver in front of him selfishly with the brown fat dog snoring beside him.

Could this guy really have a lot of experience? Chen Mu felt puzzled. Although, for Bogner to have been able to find him, he clearly must have known about his making that numbered series of cards. He wasn’t going to hide that now, so he said directly, “I believe you understand my situation. What would you propose?”

Bogner was erect and proper with his spine ramrod straight. His worn-out clothes could never hide the imposing manner of his body.

“I need to know what you’re thinking. If you wish to join the Big Six or some other power, then we would only need to reach out to them; they would arrange the rest. If you don’t wish to join, then the matter might become more troublesome.”

Chen Mu said peremptorily, “I won’t join.”

Bogner didn’t show anything unexpected by his expression. “If that’s the way it is, then I think you will need sufficient self defense power. If your numbered series of cards hadn’t made such a splash, I might recommend you expose your identity. But now, with the strength you’ve shown, no power would leave it at that. You are truly in everyone’s sights. If you were to expose yourself, there would be no way to keep their claws off you.”

Chen Mu’s question got to the heart of the matter. “How do we establish sufficient power?”

“Money!” Bogner’s expression remained the same as he spat out that one word.

Chen Mu furrowed his brow. “I don’t believe money can solve this problem.” He had never doubted the power of money, but at the same time, he didn’t blindly believe in it.

Without changing his expression, Bogner said, “It would be impossible to establish enough power to contend with the Big Six. The only ones who could contend with such huge powers as the Big Six and Faya would be themselves. But, among local powers such as in Pomelo, it wouldn’t be impossible. Pomelo’s local power is very low-key. I think we could hold out for a certain amount of time in such a situation. We won’t need to establish power equivalent to theirs; we would only need to establish enough power to give them some misgivings. That way, they wouldn’t just act without thinking.”

Chen Mu was chewing over what Bogner said in his mind, and he was largely convinced until he thought of an issue. “And after the situation has stabilized?”

“We move away,” Bogner said without hesitation. “There are a few places in the federation where the tentacles of the Big Six haven’t reached yet.”

Chen Mu found that strange. “Then why wouldn’t we leave now?”

Bogner gave Chen Mu a look and made a mocking smile. “I don’t know how much you know about power, but in my understanding, a solitary power can never contend with a group. The reason they would dare to do something to you would be that they saw you as isolated and without help. If you have a certain power under you, then before anyone would do anything, they would carefully consider the gains and losses. They would likely choose a different means, such as cooperation.”

Bogner got right to the nub of the matter. “As you are now, your power isn’t sufficient to make them choose to cooperate. In their eyes, they could make you yield and serve them with only small losses. Once you have a certain amount of power, however, they would likely consider that after using drastic means, the losses you would bring to them might not be made up for by the profits. What we have to do is increase the costs to them. With increased risk, their profits would be less certain. You would be safe that way! In truth, they are a bunch of businesspeople, just a little smarter than Yang An.”

Chen Mu was silent.

“Another thing about not leaving now is that you might make a lot of money in a short time. That might enable you to temporarily establish fledgling power. Although it wouldn’t be very powerful, it would still give people pause. That way, you could have a buffer for a while to be able to get some more money to develop your power. The more power you have, the more apprehensive others would be, and the safer you would be.” Bogner spoke in a deep voice, his narrow eyes shooting out an astonishing brilliance.

Chen Mu asked with a serious expression, “How much money do you need? How long?” Bogner’s organized way of speaking moved Chen Mu. He realized the guy in front of him, who looked so destitute, was a real talent.

“Two billion. You’ll see results in a month.”

Chen Mu was taken aback. “I don’t have that much money.”

Bogner said calmly, “You don’t need to spend it all at once. You’ll only need 200 million to start.”

Chen Mu calmed a little and thought it over. He pushed the 350 million the fatty had given him over to Bogner. “There is 350 million here. Deducting 100 million for your pay, you can allocate the rest.”

Bogner didn’t immediately take the money card. He looked Chen Mu over deeply before he silently took it.

Bogner stood up. “I need a high-grade card artisan to help me out.”

That matter was a little awkward for Chen Mu. He looked at Wei-ah and immediately nixed that idea. His gaze finally fell onto Lu Xiaoru. “You accompany Bogner, and protect him. Do as he says.”

Lu Xiaoru obediently responded. She was good at reading words and body language. Although Bogner looked like a bum, the presence he displayed made her inwardly alarmed. Previously, that guy was certainly someone important. What made her still more admiring was how cautious he was. After Bogner took the money card, he took the initiative to ask for someone to accompany him. He sized up the situation discreetly, and he deeply knew how to get things done with integrity.

When she heard what Bogner had said, it was analytical, well-organized and in a such a practiced fashion that it stunned her. That was why she had responded so obediently.

Bogner seemed as though he had long since noted Lu Xiaoru’s power, and he didn’t show any surprise. After he saluted Chen Mu and walked out the door, Lu Xiaoru looked at Chen Mu and rushed to accompany Bogner.

Although he’d just tossed out 350 million, Chen Mu didn’t hang on to the brief pain. What the fatty said was right; no matter how much money you had, life was still more important. He threw himself back into the mysterious card. Even though there was someone to protect him, his own power was extremely important. Chen Mu still hadn’t placed all that much hope on what Bogner had said about being able to set up a fledgling power within a month.

Chen Mu also wasn’t used to delegating his fate to someone else, no matter how close that person was to him.

Chen Mu sat back down in the middle of the rotating turntable for the perceptual sensitivity training. He initiated his concentration on the training, and bit by bit and over and over again, he went through the boring, tedious repetitions. Chen Mu didn’t seem to have the slightest feeling as he kept it up.

* * *

At the Central Repository of the Classics, Madam Zhi Lian was holding a card in her hand. The card was none other than the Super 007, which had just rocked the federation.

“It is as I thought, after all,” Madam Zhi Lian murmured excitedly, though she still couldn’t help but show a somewhat puzzled expression.

Madam Zhi Lian had rushed back to the Central Repository of the Classics from Pomelo, wanting to see if that card corresponded to her conjecture. As the dean of the card making division, the strength of her perception wasn’t beneath that of any first-rate card artisan. But the perception of a card master didn’t have any aggressive quality. It was used to perceive the energy composition within a card, where it was utterly efficacious.

She had just been looking up in the annals for the record of a card. The bipolar card was magical. It would only form two completely opposite energy bodies having entirely different properties, which would then undergo countless transformations. The bipolar card was the life’s work of a card master famous in the history of the Central Repository of the Classics. He hadn’t thought the way to make the Bipolar Card wouldn’t be passed down, though the tricks of controlling it had been preserved.

In her youth, when Zhi Lian had read about how to control the bipolar card, she’d wanted to reverse-engineer how to make it.

The Big Six Academies had quite a few card masters who would engage in such research. But she hadn’t realized that no matter how diligent she was, she could only reduce the number of thunderballs to 60. That was far deficient compared to the original two.

That didn’t mean Zhi Lian’s ability fell far short from that card master from the earlier generation; the difficulty of reverse-engineering far exceeded the invention of a new kind of card by a long shot. For Zhi Lian to squeeze out 60 thunderballs was already the most stable composition she could achieve. She couldn’t complete even 60 since there were certain crucial characteristics she had never been able to break through. She’d had to put that plan on hold indefinitely.

So, when she saw 007, she was startled. She recognized at a glance that 007 copied the bipolar card. When she found out the count of the energy balls was 60, she was still more startled.

She hadn’t thought the thinking of her counterpart would actually correspond so well to her own. She became curious and wanted to see how her counterpart had broken through those critical spots.

So, she bought it regardless of the high price and immediately returned to the Central Repository of the Classics to do the research. Just as she was about to leave, she instructed Jie Yanbai that no matter how, he had to find the one who made that card.

When the card was in her hands, she still didn’t have any way to understand how her counterpart had broken through those obstacles. There were quite a few patterns on the card she couldn’t make out. She had never thought someone would actually add so many utterly useless camouflaging lines on the cards he made himself.

No card master would do that; from their point of view, there was utterly no need for it. A card’s pattern wasn’t the most important thing. What was important was how the lines of the composition were fitted to the card by perception. That kind of fit was itself a kind of password. If you weren’t the card master himself, it would be difficult for others to guess it. Already having a layer of password protection, who would add another password?

But Chen Mu did it every time.

Just because of that, he’d completely confused Madam Zhi Lian. She couldn’t figure it out no matter how hard she tried. Those compositions looked so strange. She had never seen anything like them. Judging from the patterns, its composition was utterly complex.

There were countless types of complex card patterns. The methods for making cards were actually rather similar to the various schools among card artisans, though it wasn’t so obvious as it was for the card artisans. Madam Zhi Lian was only well-versed in a small slice among all the card patterns in the ocean of cards. She was like an oceanographer, who might be well-versed in only a few kinds of ocean creatures while still having a certain understanding of all the other creatures in the ocean.

She had never seen those strange patterns, which was one of the reasons she was so surprised.

But, although that made her curious, it didn’t make her feel greedy. If the 007 Chen Mu had made didn’t have 60 energy balls, but had 30 instead, she believed she would likely have done whatever it took to find that card master and kidnap him back to the Central Repository of the Classics.

She had originally wanted to use that card—which had parts of no value—to understand how her counterpart had broken through those few critical places, never having thought she would open up to yet another fog in her head.

But that card still had plenty of value. It was the most successful imitation of the bipolar card up until then. Perhaps she could try those methods of controlling it that had been passed along.

She decided to find a student to try it out. She had been moved that day when Jiao Si had played out all that power. Although a student’s power couldn’t compare with Jiao Si’s, it would still be the most authentic way to control it. She really looked forward to 007 under the method of controlling the bipolar card. What kind of power could it put out?

Zhi Lian thought of a different issue. It wasn’t so rare that Bei Dong knew about the bipolar card. The Big Six had been rivals for many years, and they all had so many records of each other. In the book repository of the Central Repository of the Classics were countless records of every sort of card from the other five of the Big Six.

But where did the one who made 007 find out about the bipolar card? Moreover, it couldn’t have been a complete coincidence to be able to make such a successful replica.

Could her counterpart have had some relationship with the Central Repository of the Classics? Madam Zhi Lian knitted her elegant brow.