The Big Landlord - Chapter 92.1

Because of An Zi Ran and Fu Wu Tian’s extraordinary identities, Li Zhen did not dare to neglect them and took the initiative to lead them to the reception room inside the workshop.

A worker there recovered his senses and hurriedly picked up the wooden box to catch up to them. On the inside, he was very excited, because he was able to see the rumored God of War with his own eyes. For commoners like them, this was a very nice surprise!

Upon entering the reception room, Li Zhen politely invited them to sit down.

Li Zhen went to the door and took the wooden box from the worker who had just arrived. After sending the worker away, he went back into the room and took the wooden box to An Zi Ran.

“An gong zi, everything you want is done. There are twenty sets*. All in here.”

[*T/N: 副 fu – translation sites say this means “pair,” but from my understanding, it can also mean “set,” as in a set of cards, which makes more sense to me in this context]

An Zi Ran opened the box and took a glance to confirm that it was indeed twenty sets. Li Zhen had made twenty sets of paper boxes according to An Zi Ran’s specifications. All fifty-four cards were contained within the box. At a glance, they looked like modern poker playing cards.

Poker cards were rumored to have stemmed from ma diao*, and later generations generally believed that ma diao was very likely to be the prototype of modern playing cards. No one knew the specifics. However, it was necessary to use coated paper to make poker cards. Coated paper was a type of high-grade copy paper made by coating the original base paper in a layer of white paint.

[*T/N: ma diao – a late imperial Chinese trick-taking gambling card game according to wiki https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madiao ]

In this time period, there was no such thing as coated paper yet.

Fortunately, he later found a type of paper material that could replace coated paper.

This kind of paper material was the most superior official card paper, mainly for the wealthy people to make business cards. It was also the type of paper used in making wedding invitations or for other joyous events. Because it was thickened with a thin sliver of bamboo material, the price was comparatively expensive.

Li Zhen used up quite a bit of official card paper to make twenty sets of playing cards, but An Zi Ran gave him a lot of money, so he did not feel bad about it.

An Zi Ran opened up one of the decks and took out all fifty-four cards. One by one, he carefully looked over them. The patterns were basically the same as the drawings he gave as blueprints. Although it was incomparable to modern printing, he was already very satisfied with these results.

Li Zhen saw Fu wang fei nod his head with satisfaction and breathed out a sigh of relief.

It was quite difficult to print on official card paper. Because he couldn’t touch the pattern with his finger pad, he had to try many times before he succeeded.

At that time it was in order to fulfill the customer’s request. Now he was sincerely happy that he had done his best.

Fu Wu Tian picked up a card and turned it over to see that there was also a pattern on the back. The difference was that the backside was covered with dense colors. There were two characters encircled in an oval on the top and bottom. The two characters were tian meaning ‘sky or heaven’ and long meaning ‘dragon.’

“Wang fei, what does this mean?”

An Zi Ran saw that he noticed the back and replied, “This is the name of the gambling house.”

Fu Wu Tian rubbed his fingers over the tian character and suddenly said, “Wang fei, isn’t this one of the characters in this prince’s name? Could it be…”

An Zi Ran took the playing card from his hand. “Tian Long means flying dragon in the heavens. Don’t be smug.”

On the side, Li Zhen secretly wiped his sweat. He felt like he had heard some extreme secret, furthermore, it was more than one secret.

An Zi Ran put the cards back into the paper box, placed it inside the wooden box, and then he looked at Li Zhen. “Boss Li, I have a business proposal for you, don’t know if you’re interested or not?”

Li Zhen was faintly startled.

An Zi Ran never thought that he could fool Li Zhen. Once news of Tian Long Gambling House spread, Li Zhen would be able to guess his identity sooner or later. Moreover, the amount of playing cards he wanted to make wasn’t just twenty sets. After the playing of poker cards become widely circulated, the production of poker cards would become a big business.

“Boss Li can think about it. There’s no need to rush. After the opening of Tian Long Gambling House, you can come find me anytime at the Imperial Fu Palace.”

After saying this, An Zi Ran and Fu Wu Tian left together.

Only then did Li Zhen come back to his senses. Fu wang fei wanted to do business with him. And what was this matter about Tian Long Gambling House? He has never heard of a place called Tian Long in Jun Zi City.

With his mind full of doubts, Li Zhen immediately found a worker to inquire about Tian Long Gambling House, as a result, the worker brought back shocking news. He had also heard about the matter with Feng Hua Gambling House, but he never expected that the bankroller was Fu wang fei.

Li Zhen shuddered and immediately had people seal things* up. He also ordered the workers under him not to tell anyone about the paper cards, not even to family members. He had a hunch that the business proposal that Fu wang fei spoke of will be a big business opportunity. When all was said and done, everything would become clear on the day that Tian Long Gambling House open for business.

[*T/N: 东西 dong xi – literally “things.” The text did not specify what.]

The two did not return directly to the prince’s palace.

An Zi Ran wanted to go to Tian Long Gambling House to take a look, not go inside and look around, but to see the outside.

Fu Wu Tian accompanied him to circle around the outside of Tian Long Gambling House. The renovations of the casino went smoothly. During this period, there were people who came to look for trouble, but they were all blocked.

Even before the renovations started, Fu Wu Tian had already premeditated this situation. He was the one who found all these construction workers, and they were not ordinary people. These people were all selected from his army. Each and every one of them was a skillful expert. Most importantly, very few people have seen them before, so there was no need to worry about someone recognizing them.

After looking over the place, the two of them returned to the Imperial Fu Palace.

Just as they arrived in front of the prince’s palace, the people guarding the doors told An Zi Ran that there’s someone looking for him. Because that person had a letter personally written by An Zi Ran, Steward Zhou didn’t dare to neglect him and invited him inside to wait. Right now, that guest was waiting in the main hall.

Once the letter was mention, An Zi Ran guessed who it was right away.

When the guest heard the approaching footsteps, he turned around immediately.

An Zi Ran was met with an ordinary face. It was different from what he had imagined. He thought that A Ye would be a suave and astute person. As they drew near, A Ye hurriedly stood up and raised his cupped hands respectfully.

“This little person pays respect to wang fei, wang ye.”

A Ye has never seen Fu Wu Tian before, but he was able to accurately address him. Moreover, he only seemed to be about twenty years old, give or take, and when he saw them, he was not as overcautious as Li Zhen.

An Zi Ran knew that he was very smart. “Rushing on the road for a day, you must be tired. If there’s anything to talk about, let’s save it for tomorrow. I’ll have Steward Zhou show you a place to rest.”

A Ye nodded and obediently followed Steward Zhou away.

“What is his full name?” Only after the person had left did Fu Wu Tian reveal his interest.

An Zi Ran thought about it for a while. It has been some time. “Steward Su seemed to have said that his name is Ye Yu. It’s a very nice sounding name, but it doesn’t feel very suitable for him.”

When one hears the name Ye Yu, meaning ‘night’ and ‘feather,’ most people would think of a man with a handsome face, not a young man with an ordinary face, and even one with a somewhat deadpan expression. But no matter what the reason, An Zi Ran would not ask him deliberately, because everyone deserved his or her own privacy.