“Father, do you think those two women will be able to deal with Baron Ronald Tang En?”
Roland didn’t immediately say what to bet on, but instead asked Soren, wondering what would happen next.
Soren looked toward the window of Box Seven.
It was now intermission, and the curtains over there had already been drawn.
As the head of the Ophield Family, Soren being able to reach this stage proved he was far from any soft-hearted fellow. If those two women had no means of resistance, what would happen to them…
He knew all too well.
Thinking back to the beginning of the auction, and that glance in the main hall, Soren carefully pondered every detail.
To be honest, he felt the gray-haired woman acted extremely arrogant, as if she didn’t see Ronald as anything at all.
Or perhaps, she didn’t even know Ronald?
If so, these two women must have only entered the city in the past day or two and hadn’t checked out which local overlords controlled White Stone City.
Both of them exuded Fifth-Tier mana—quite decent for White Stone City—but merely having Fifth-Tier strength wouldn’t be enough to act so high and mighty.
While Fifth-Tier practitioners were indeed rare in a place like White Stone City, they weren’t exactly precious either. His own Ophield Family alone had no less than several thousand Fifth-Tier mana users.
That meant, throughout all of White Stone City, there were surely more than a few hundred Fifth-Tier practitioners. Their levels might differ, but all were at least Fifth-Tier.
So what were these two women relying on?
Was there someone powerful supporting them behind the scenes?
Soren couldn’t make a judgment about these two nearly-unknown outsiders, but that didn’t stop him from having his own opinion.
“I think those two women absolutely cannot match Baron Ronald Tang En.”
“Good, then let’s bet on whether they can escape White Stone City from Baron Ronald Tang En’s grasp. Father, what do you think of this wager?”
Roland rested one arm on the table, his eyes locked onto Soren, his tone steady and powerful. He looked very confident in his own luck.
Soren gave a small laugh, didn’t say anything, but nodded, agreeing to the bet.
Roland burst into silent laughter.
When he’d had enough, and calmed down a bit, Soren spoke.
“Actually, your chances of losing are much higher.”
“No matter, I like to seek victory in the face of risk.”
Roland shook his head with a faint smile. His luck in gambling had always been exceptional.
The reason Soren said Roland had a higher chance of losing was because he’d seen far too many people who, while having a bit of strength, behaved with extreme arrogance—and every single one of them had ended up miserable.
He didn’t think these two outsiders were any different. Perhaps they were from the West Wind Empire, so looking down on a backwater city like White Stone City and its local overlords was normal.
Soren had been to West Wind and had personally experienced the arrogance of those from the Empire.
These two women were the very epitome of arrogance.
And arrogance would cost them dearly!
That was his intuition, and it was relying on this intuition that Soren had built such a mighty noble family as the Ophields.
Now, it was a contest between his intuition and his son’s luck.
In the other private rooms, although everyone enjoyed watching the show, they all believed those in Box Seven who had offended Ronald were doomed. Compared to those two mysterious women, they had a much clearer sense of the power Ronald possessed.
Anyone able to make it big in White Stone City, no matter who they were, had a solid background, and countless subtle connections with all sorts of organizations.
Every local power also monopolized a certain sector.
For example, the Ophield Family basically monopolized White Stone City’s commerce and the sale of its ores; the family controlled it all.
That was only because they had connections in West Wind.
As for the powers behind Ronald…
In the Golden Town Casino building, inside a special, spacious room—
On stage, a woman in a purple long dress was gently waving a folding fan.
The fan had a black wooden frame and a deep purple, high-quality cloth for the leaf, decorated with embroidery and white lace.
This fan was crafted with exceptional care and would be considered a luxury item in this world.
The woman in purple was Sharon. She was currently seated on a chair, positioned in the shade of the balcony, staring absentmindedly at the nearby greenery.
After putting away her folding fan, Sharon let it rest on her full chest.
Suddenly, a man burst in.
But he wasn’t here to see her; there was another well-fed middle-aged man in the room—the owner of the Casino.
The newcomer was a male attendant from Golden Town. Upon entering, he gave the casino boss his report.
“Boss, those two women suddenly started going against Baron Ronald Tang En. Should we still continue with our previous plan…”
“What? They’re going up against Ronald?”
The casino boss wiped the sweat from his forehead with a handkerchief, his small eyes straining to open wide. He seemed quite shocked by the report from his subordinate.
W-what should he do now?
He hesitated for a moment, then suddenly slapped the table and said,
“No need, just keep an eye on things!”
“Yes, boss!”
The male attendant accepted the order and left the room.
On the balcony, Sharon narrowed her eyes.
Sophia had already eaten almost all the desserts on the table. She kept eating as she widened her eyes at Enya.
Just now, Enya had tossed out twenty thousand gold coins as if she were watering flowers—showing not the slightest bit of heartache.
Twenty thousand! Twenty thousand!
Even if the Elven Missy didn’t care about money or had no interest in it, she could tell from the ten gold coins it took to hire Enya what sort of figure twenty thousand gold coins was.
Ten gold coins could hire the senior.
Two thousand sets of ten gold coins was twenty thousand—could it unlock even more of senior’s…
Hm?!
Money could be used like that?!
Sophia’s small mouth hung open, her pink lips still dusted with bits from the pastries she had been eating. If you tasted them…
Surely they’d be sweet, right?
She looked at Enya and called out blankly,
“Senior…”
“Hm? What’s the matter?”
Enya slowly turned her head, her expression calm and unruffled, as if she weren’t the one who had just tossed out twenty thousand gold.
Sophia glanced left and right, sweeping her gaze over the maids standing silent as statues at the side.
She swallowed and said,
“Senior, do you really have that much money?”
“Money?”
Enya looked at Sophia, lips curling into a slight smile.
“Yes, of course I do.”
After all, it was only twenty thousand gold. She was carrying with her the hundred thousand gold from the Mist Lord Faith Cult’s peace offering. Besides, wasn’t her purpose in coming here to collect debts?
The Mist Archbishop Order still owed her nine hundred thousand!
If they didn’t pay up, they’d have to use something else to settle the debt. As for what that would be, Enya would decide for herself.
Seeing the absolute confidence on Enya’s face, Sophia nodded and reached for the remaining delicacies on the table.
Enya glanced down at the table and chuckled at the maids.
“Why aren’t you serving more for my Missy?”
The maids froze for a moment, shocked by Sophia’s appetite. An entire table’s worth of desserts had been eaten by this hooded young lady alone!
Don’t you get tired of eating so many sweets?
How terrifying!
The maids quickly fetched new treats from the food cart, cleared away the empty plates, set new ones in place, and quietly retreated.
Their work was simple: to satisfy whatever the guests in this room required, no matter what the request!
All they received was a comfortable maid’s dress and delicious food to eat each day, along with the hope of catching the master’s eye and being bought as a concubine.
Even so, not everyone had a path in.
As the elegant, soothing symphony gradually came to an end, the second half of the auction was about to begin. The maids drew open the curtains once more.
Enya’s pale golden eyes turned toward the stage outside.
Sophia shot her a curious look and asked,
“Senior, was that dragon bone from before really important?”
She knew Enya was from the Dragon Tribe.
The Dragon Tribe surely shared some bloodline with the Flying Dragon Overlord.
But then Sophia remembered Enya mentioning that internal strife among the Dragon Tribe was fierce, and they even had customs of devouring the losers.
Was senior planning to make bone soup?
Gulp~
She imagined the pot bubbling away, thick white steam rising, a massive dragon spine rolling inside…
Hiss, that must smell wonderful!
Just picturing it made Sophia giggle.
But spending twenty thousand gold coins on a single dragon bone soup—wasn’t that just a bit too extravagant? If you used that much money for food, how many delicious things could you eat?
“Ahem, what are you thinking?”
Enya could tell Sophia was daydreaming. She glanced up and down at her own Elven Missy, sighing a little in disappointment—she was getting a bit too big.
Sophia had the figure of a young girl, just half a head shorter than Enya, and was already blossoming into a graceful lady, with her curves starting to develop as well.
Sigh, Nina was better—small and cute.
The thought of Nina’s brilliant golden hair made Enya remember her own two little ones at home, gone for several days now.
The second half of the auction began.
As the curtains opened, the host in his red tailcoat stood beside a large cube draped in red cloth, once again delivering a simple opening speech to the audience.
Enya narrowed her eyes, staring at the shrouded cube.
The cube stood about one and a half meters tall, solid and blocky, carried up by two burly men. It looked heavy.
With the appearance of the red cube, Sophia stopped reaching for food and fixed her gaze on it, almost standing up, but Enya pressed her back into her seat.
Enya smiled at the tense Sophia.
“Don’t worry, with me here.”