"Mm, thank you."
The Red Queen smiled as she accepted the beer from the clerk, popping the tab and tilting her head back to drink.
After a few gulps, she asked lightly, "Is that matter from earlier handled? Do you need to take care of it for you?"
"...The captain already took care of it."
Since they were out in public, Gao Fan couldn't speak too openly.
"That's wonderful."
The Red Queen sighed. "It seems your team is truly united."
She turned her head, beaming at Gao Fan. "But didn't you say... you don't like teams led by the Domain of Slaughter?"
Gao Fan shuddered.
Ming Po finally realized why Gao Fan was so afraid of her.
This "Red Queen" clearly belonged to the Domain of Slaughter!
A Silver of Moon from the Domain of Slaughter!
"Um... may I ask a question?"
Ai Shiping spoke up again, breaking the awkward and tense atmosphere.
He looked curious, his eyes as clear as a child's. "Does a big shot of your level also need to recruit team mbers from the outside?"
"Ah, yes."
The Red Queen nodded with a smile. "Our original Guide was a 'Lucky Navigator'. You don't understand yet, but Luck is a very important prefix. Only truly lucky people can obtain it.
"And as long as you have this prefix, it's equivalent to solidifying that particular stroke of luck.
"In low-level gas, many rely on raw strength. But in high-level gas, 'dying without any rhy or reason' becos more common. Because by that point, Luck itself is a talent."
"...That sounds very unreasonable."
Ai Shiping thought about it and shook his head. "Isn't that just randomly eliminating a group of people?"
"Could it really be that simple?"
The Red Queen smiled mysteriously.
She reached out, picked up a piece of horse at, dipped it in soy sauce, and popped it into her mouth.
"For example... coming here and eting you all. Isn't that also a form of luck?"
She said aningfully, "As Deceivers of the World, you can't possibly think that the randomness of 'luck' still applies to us, right?"
"...Is Luck also an 'attribute'?" Ming Po suddenly asked.
"Bingo."
The Red Queen snapped her fingers.
Her smile was incredibly bright. "Higher-level Luck suppresses lower-level Luck. For us, Luck is absolute, not random. It can even be used in Confrontations... or to cancel each other out.
"Luck-borrowing rituals exist, and so does changing one's luck. Similarly, swapping fates is real too. As for children whose strength isn't quite high enough yet... they need a Guide to use their own Luck to lead the way for them."
As the Red Queen spoke, her fingers lightly tapped against the beer can. "But I cut off the head of our team's previous Guide."
"...Cut off their head?"
Ai Shiping froze, asking to confirm.
"Yeah! I accidentally chopped a few too many tis, and ended up cutting off the Guide's head too."
The Red Queen's smile was as innocent as a little girl's.
She didn't explain why she'd chopped off the head. Was it to quell a rebellion? A trial? An execution? A punishnt?
She simply treated it as a matter of course, as if it were sothing everyone would naturally understand without any special explanation.
"Little brother, we're colleagues, so you must understand, right?"
Her bright eyes locked onto Ming Po, filled with delight. "I want to take you back with too, what should I do? Such a rare Title... the last ti I saw a Madman, they were still Day's False Gold!"
"Sorry... I still have to take care of my team."
Ming Po shook his head, changing the subject sowhat stiffly. "You said appearing here was also because of 'luck'... Do you usually use Ti Chips in daily life as well?"
"Yes, indeed!"
The Red Queen said excitedly. "I usually stay in the Material Realm. If you want to find , just Manifest in the Material Realm. As long as you think about it, I can find you. Or you could all co over to my side... I have a lot of people here, there's plenty of room for you."
"You usually stay in the Material Realm? Then the chips..."
"You'll know once you reach the rank of Zhou's Azure Lead~"
She seed to grow even happier after drinking. "By that ti, winning a single ga can earn you several weeks' worth of ti. Carving out a few hours from that basically allows you to stay in the Material Realm indefinitely."
She spread her arms, beaming. "Think about it! There are twenty-four hours in a day, and you have to sleep for eight hours, right? Ordinary people also have to work for eight hours a day! In the remaining ti, excluding eating and resting, aren't you only left with four or five hours?
"So as long as you exchange for four or five hours, isn't that equivalent to spending a whole day playing in the Material Realm?"
"...Uh."
Ai Shiping showed so interest in this topic and asked, "Then what happens if you run out of money?"
As if amused by the question, the Red Queen's smile grew even wider.
"You're so cute!"
She praised him bluntly. "If you run out of money, just beco a boss!"
Smiling, she picked up her chopsticks and unabashedly dug a piece of beef intestine out of the offal pot. "My current enterprise is actually quite large—it ranks among the top in the country.
"Isn't it simple for Deceivers to make money? Just steal so business intelligence and technology from the future and send it to the past. Find a random proxy, and even an idiot can make a profit. A round trip doesn't even cost many chips. When you return, you'll find yourself rich. If that proxy really is a massive idiot, just finish him off.
"If soone tries to deal with you, just finish them off. Whether they're competitors or bosses, just take them out in the distant past and no one will ever find out. We are the masters of the world, after all.
"As for running out of chips, that's simple too—just have the lower-ranking mbers of the team pay tribute to you."
The Red Queen's smile was exceptionally radiant as she ate, speaking nonchalantly. "If they don't give them up, just kill them. Chips can be extracted from corpses anyway. If you can't find any teammates for the ti being, just go to the subway station and kill a few people. Though not many who hang out there are rich, you can still squeeze out a few chips."
She didn't shy away from being in a public place at all, unscrupulously discussing ti travel and murder.
At that mont, Ming Po finally noticed the abnormality.
The Red Queen seed to be happy all the ti... inexplicably happy.
Ever since she appeared, she had been smiling.
At first, Ming Po thought she just had a cheerful personality, was a natural smiler, or was rely offering a polite smile.
But later they learned... the Red Queen was a Deceiver from the Domain of Slaughter.
She could kill her own teammates with casual indifference. Given that, this state of non-stop, joyful amusent seed abnormal instead.
Right at that mont.
She suddenly put down her chopsticks, and the smile on her face faded slightly.
The next instant, Ai Shiping and Gao Fan's expressions changed simultaneously, as if they had sensed so kind of danger.
"Regrettably, so..."
The Red Queen stood up.
Before her voice could fade, the izakaya instantly exploded!
Ming Po's pupils contracted sharply.
But in the very next instant, ti and space froze completely.
The debris from the explosion, frozen mid-air, looked like a brilliant flower.
As an erald green glow spread out, ti flowed backward.
It was as if nothing had ever happened.
"...Regrettably, so little fellows with rather poor brains always want to make a move on . I'm truly sorry for involving you." The Red Queen stood up. "But don't worry, they have already been caught."
The bright, gentle smile on her face vanished entirely, revealing a cruel and ferocious countenance. "I have to go chop off their heads."
The next instant, with a surge of crimson firelight, she vanished like an illusion.
That wasn't teleportation, but using chips to escape into the crevices of ti, entering the future an hour from now.
Ming Po clenched his hands.
His expression grew more solemn.
Without a doubt, this was his first ti witnessing a Deceiver using Ti Chips to fight in the Material Realm.
Though it lasted only an instant...
He felt that in that mont, he was utterly helpless.
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