Demon Sword Maiden

Volume 5, Chapter 65 - Riku’s compensation

A blue demon stepped forward to drag the two beaten demons.

“I say! You’re the boss? How should we settle this?” The gamblers all gathered around.

“Everyone, please listen. Today, those two demons violated the rules of this casino, they will be severely punished! I will take care of all expenses today, if you win, you win, if you lose, I will settle it.”

“You, for real?”

“Yes, if you’re tired of playing, you can also visit the second floor kabuki theaters to rest. I will settle the bills. Give me some face, let the matter end here.” Riku’s smile revealed some savageness.

Against Fuyutsuki’s boss, even if the gamblers were unwilling they could only obey. There were also those who had not lost too much money, they were overjoyed and felt like they had benefited, especially the two who had just joined for the first time, their faces were beyond smug. Riku signaled the blue demons, two massive blue demons led the gamblers out of the room, bringing them to another gambling parlor.

“Riku…you’re Fuyutsuki’s boss?” Lily asked curiously.

Riku smiled handsomely, though it would have mesmerized a normal female, the target was Lily.

“Ahaha, I’m only looking after this ship for a powerful entity. Instead of the boss, it would be better to think of me as someone who runs errands. Young lady Lily, although I admire your deeds, business is business. Please give an explanation as to why you can accurately guess the result every time. If the young lady insists on luck, then I think you’re underestimating me.”

“With brother Riku’s realm, do you still need to ask?”

“I’ve opened this parlor for a while and customers who are experts aren’t that rare. However, someone who is as accurate as young lady Lily has never appeared before.”

“I watched ten rounds before placing any bets. Just watched and used the results to verify my understanding and judgment of the dice and the cup.

“Judgment?”

“That’s right, if you listen closely, every facet of the dice is different, the sound of each facet colliding is different, after listening and paying attention I could tell how the dice were moving just by sound alone. Naturally, what the dice was showing is easy enough.”

“Is that so? So it was like that, ehehehehe. Young lady Lily is a really wondrous girl. Looks like in the future we will also have to cover our customer’s ears.” Riku laughed.

“Only…” Riku’s eyes narrowed, “The last roll, what was with that?”

Lily smiled guilessly, “The last roll, I cheated.”

“Nn?”

“My guess of three sixes clearly came out, but who told your dealers to use the mechanism under the table to flip one of the dice. Since your men cheated I simply used my domain to flip it back,”

“Uh…” Riku’s stern expression melted into laughter, “Ahahaha! Very well! I can’t counter that, originally it was your win! Little lady, well done! I admit my loss!”

Riku took out a tiny black wooden box, “Even if this is the Fuyutsuki, it still needs time to transfer funds. A hundred magatamas at once is a bit difficult. Please look at this young lady Lily, the true value could be said to be beyond a hundred magatamas. However the market has been bad recently, it was unsold over several auctions. If the young lady doesn’t mind, you can keep this first. In the future, if you need money, you can exchange this for regular magatamas or you can entrust us to auction it.”

Lily took the box and opened it for a look. A gleam of blood red glimmered, that red magatama emanated a soul shaking aura.

Lily was shocked, “Blood spirit magatama!”

“Good eyesight. If you want to buy this, a hundred magatamas is not enough. But to the majority of people, regular magatamas are more practical. So, I’ll take the loss and hand this to the young lady, how about it?”

Lily immediately accepted, “It’s ok.”

Though Lily floated a serene expression, she was overjoyed. She had over two thousand magatamas, one hundred more wouldn’t do much. But this blood spirit magatama was a life saving treasure! If she encountered real danger, no matter how much money she had, it would do her no good. To others, this blood spirit magatama would be 1500 magatamas, but to her, it was priceless! However Lily would not expose that fact to Riku, just in case he regretted it.

“Since young lady Lily has agreed, then the debt is clear.”

“My apologies brother Riku, to earn so much of your money on our first day of acquaintance.”

“Ahahaha, since I’ve opened such a parlor, I’m naturally willing to pay the price. This is young lady Lily’s abilities, lots of people want to get rich in a night, but end up going bankrupt, naturally I don’t apologize for that.”

Lily smiled without saying anything.

“Ah yes, the auction is starting, will young lady Lily be taking a look?”

“Nn, yes. If there’s anything good I’ll buy it and let you recoup a bit of the loss.”

“Ahahaha, little lady is really kind, I like it!”

Lily didn’t want to get too close to this man, so she said her farewells and went upstairs.

The fourth floor contained stores selling all sorts of rare materials, but the auction was about to start. Lily called out Kagura and gave her fifty magatamas.

“Kagura, help me purchase usable materials, especially the materials used for creating domain treasures, such as the unmelted snow.” Lily requested.

“Understood master.” Kagura nodded and flew into the stores.

Suddenly Yuki-onna also requested to come out. Lily let her out, in this ship full of demons, yuki-onna would not attract additional attention.

“Shopping! I want to shop too! Master~ I want to join Kagura!”

“Huh?……”

“I sit in that mirror everyday, it’s so boring!”

“Might as well…but don’t buy random things…” Lily reminded.

“Don’t worry!” Yuki-onna floated toward Kagura.

“Oi! Don’t pull my arm!” Kagura complained.

Lily continued toward the fifth floor, leaving the two behind. The fifth floor was strange, no one could be seen, human or demon alike. Every room was pitch black, nothing could be seen inside.

“Lady, do you want to play? A life changing game.” From a shadowed corner, a strange voice sounded out.

Lily was surprised, she turned towards the corner, a shadow was there. No matter how much Lily examined, all she could see was a shadowed figure, a strange figure wearing a white mask with a crying expression.

“What game?” Lily was naturally curious.

“A game only beautiful women may join.”

“What?” Lily put herself on guard, this wouldn’t be some bad game would it? “Can you tell me more?”

“With yourself as a gambling stake, play a stage passing game in this fifth floor’s Cloying Dream Boudoir. Every stage you pass you will win prizes beyond imagining, but if you lose, you’ll lose yourself.”

“Lose myself?”

“Hehe…to be clearer, you’ll lose your freedom as a woman, you will lose everything.”

Lily felt a spine chilling horror. “Who would play such a game? I’m not interested.”

“Ehehehe…is that so…”

Lily didn’t like this atmosphere, she turned and walked towards the top floor stairs.

“Lady…” The shadow grinned strangely at her, “I feel…that we will meet again soon…”

“The possibility is not great.” Lily left without another glance.

As she was about to walk up the stairs, she discovered a human shadow flash past the corridor on the other side.

That shadow was wearing a beautiful white kariginu and a tall hat. Clearly a man’s outfit though feminine. This was a very tall and familiar figure.

“Lady Ayaka!?” Lily chased after, but the corridor was empty.

Was that her imagination going wrong? Why would someone like Lady Ayaka come here? But who else would have such a tall beautiful feminine figure in this Heian-kyo?

Lily carefully looked around, but still discovered nothing. Perhaps she was really imagining things? Perhaps… Lady Ayaka probably wouldn’t come to this sort of place. Lily continued towards the top floor with some doubts. The top floor only had one business, and that was the auction house.

A gorgeous gate with red pillars and decorated with lanterns. Two enormous sumo wrestlers guarded the door, they were extraordinarily fat and their faces had dramatic facial paintings, extraordinarily frightening.

“These two sumo wrestlers, very powerful!” Lily felt that both sumo wrestlers were both mid realmed permanence experts, and they were only guards. To think that two guards were more powerful than Amanojaku.

“Where did this Fuyutsuki come from? That Riku is unfathomable, and even the auction guards are so powerful. Who is the power behind Riku?”

“Entry payment, 50g of magatama fragment.” A sumo wrestler held out his large hand for payment. Lily placed a magatama fragment in that large palm and entered.

Entering the auction house, Lily saw a large spacious room, in the front was a large concave ebony table. Below the table was a large square stage with red railings, and on one side of the stage was a large golden drum.

A large two meter tall fat boy, wearing a red apron with a shaved head stood in front of the drums. He was carrying a large drum stick, and on his red apron was a large ‘Gold’ character.

Lily looked around, and saw two rows of low square tables with tea bowls and utensils on them. She found an unobtrusive table and sat down.