New Gods of North America

As it turns out,

fooling Lina isn't as easy as it seems.

“Hahaha, the last time you cut the cards, I knew the replacement card had been cut to the fifteenth position from the top, so I chose to replace all five of my cards.

Now that replacement card is mine, so I win this round.

“Let me see what my other cards are… Hmph, three Kings, a Queen, plus the ‘replacement card can be any card,’ my hand is four of a kind!”

At the other end of the table, Lina flipped over her cards one by one under the watchful eyes of everyone, and then raised her arrogant little head.

Everyone in the detective agency is an Awakened, and Lina's own rank isn't low either.

It's hard not to notice even the slightest fluctuation of spiritual power.

And Lina also has the great spider Peter to help her play tricks.

Although it has never been officially confirmed, everyone defaults that she is equivalent to having a dual perspective.

Therefore, everyone was not too surprised by this result, after all, Wayne's opponent was Lina.

It's just that since both sides of the game are partners in the detective agency, no agent cheered in advance until Wayne officially revealed his cards and confirmed his defeat.

The gameplay must be simple when two cunning guys play against each other.

Wayne and Lina were actually competing in drawing poker, taking out all the Aces, Kings, Queens, Jacks, and replacement cards from the deck.

The two sides first shuffled and cut the cards alternately, and then each drew five cards in turn.

Then there was another chance to exchange cards.

After drawing cards, you could exchange several cards in your hand and redraw the same number of cards.

Finally, the cards were compared according to the hand types in “Texas Hold'em,” which is already very close to modern society.

Due to the needs of frontier development and daily entertainment, after years of iteration, the shape of modern playing cards has been basically determined in America at this time.

The difference is that at this time, the official common cards only have 52 cards of four suits, and there are no so-called “Jokers” or “wild cards.”

However, manufacturers usually print an extra advertising card as a simple replacement for damaged cards, so the concept of “replacement card” was popularized earlier.

Lina's intuition is quite keen in this regard.

After Wayne explained the rules clearly and demonstrated them once, she realized that the “replacement card,” which can be used as any card, should be the key to determining the outcome of the game.

The logic is simple.

Drawing five cards from four different point cards, as long as you get the replacement card, then even if the bottom card is bad, it is a “three of a kind,” which is basically a lock on the victory.

So, as expected, after both sides drew their cards, Lina accurately exchanged all her cards.

Before Wayne started exchanging cards, she drew the most critical universal replacement card from the deck into her own hand.

Since only four point cards were used this time, there was no so-called “straight flush,” so the “four of a kind” in Lina's hand was already the largest hand combination.

Plus, the most critical replacement card was also in her hand, so it seemed that she was indeed very confident of winning.

Wayne let Lina be happy for a while before turning over his cards:

“Four Aces, one King, also a ‘four of a kind’ hand, but Aces are bigger than Kings.

“Sorry, I win this round.”

The bright smile on Lina's beautiful face instantly froze there, and she incredulously reached out to pick up Wayne's cards and check them one by one:

“Huh?! How did you do it?! I clearly got the replacement card.”

Wayne deliberately kept her in suspense and quickly slipped away, “You have to accept the bet, remember what you promised.”

“Hey! Don't go!”

How did he do it? Of course, he was bullying a newbie.

Wayne's layout actually started when he explained the rules.

By displaying the card types one by one in the form of a demonstration, he could secretly memorize the initial arrangement of the 17 cards before collecting and shuffling them.

Then, he could flexibly adjust them when it was his turn to shuffle, completing the entire operation.

From a technical level, Lina draws five cards first from 17 cards, and she will definitely aim for the universal replacement card, and she will keep it in her hand after drawing it.

Plus the “exchange card” operation, the upper limit of the number of cards she can handle is ten.

The two people can completely empty the deck.

Wayne only needs to ensure that when he starts drawing cards, the four Aces are within the range that Lina cannot draw and he can draw when exchanging cards—that is, use other “junk cards” to fill the remaining range, even if it doesn't matter if he uses the universal card to fill it—he basically wins directly.

To avoid controversy, Wayne also deliberately controlled a King by the way, so as not to let Lina argue with the saying of “five of a kind.”

But if it only meets the standards at the technical level, it is actually far from enough.

Wayne can do the same thing, then Lina can probably do it too, and maybe even do it better.

Therefore, the core of the entire performance actually lies in whether Lina can be successfully “misguided.”

Like a magic trick, before the audience realizes it, the real key point must always be hidden behind the focus.

Wayne deliberately pretended to care about the replacement card through his words and deeds, repeatedly hinted at its importance, and deliberately controlled the replacement card to a position that was not easy for Lina to get.

All of this was to mislead Lina, so that her thinking could slide along the direction of “the opponent wants to compete for the replacement card,” “the opponent wants to win,” and “cannot let the opponent succeed,” so “grabbing the replacement card is equivalent to winning” within the limited game decision time.

Otherwise, if she were to think about it herself, she might soon find something wrong.

The mantis stalks the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind, so naturally it can also be operated in reverse, first deliberately releasing the “cicada.”

……

In the carriage, Ineisha obviously really remembered the card sequence.

She felt that she might be able to restore the appearance of the deck after each shuffle and cut, instead of just grasping the approximate “range” like Wayne.

Therefore, she seemed to find this matter quite interesting, “I didn't expect Lina to be fooled by such a simple trick.

But after your last cut, she doesn't seem to have a chance of winning.”

Wayne nodded, “Magic, the stage that really consumes energy and has the risk of failure is often before the so-called ‘unveiling moment.’

Once the most critical steps are completed according to plan, the rest is just performance time.

That's why I have to slip away quickly, so as not to give Lina a chance to do it again and suddenly wake up…”

Noticing that Wayne suddenly fell into thought, Ineisha blinked her eyes and did not rush to ask.

When Wayne came back to his senses again, she continued to speak: “What did you think of again just now?”

On Wayne's face, at this time, there was a slightly playful curiosity:

“I suddenly thought, if Mr. Molier is really dead, I wonder how the third-party force that attacked him before will perform next?”

Ineisha thought for a while, “Maybe they will hide in the shadows again?”

Wayne's eyeballs rolled in his eye sockets, “If the magician wants to leave the stage halfway through the performance, the audience will not easily agree.”

After Ineisha took people and got off near the foothold of the local agent organization contact person who was betrayed by Tiriel, Wayne knocked on the partition of the carriage:

“Let's go to the cathedral first, and then report the case to the police station.”