“Now then...” Adek took a seat at the square table in the middle of the room, the kind often seen in casinos. “Let me explain the rules of our game. We’ll need four players.” When he snapped his fingers, a black shadow appeared next to him and took the shape of a troll demon, which then sat down on his left. “Please select a partner of your own, Queen.”
“Come, Alicia.” Isabella immediately called on her attendant.
“As you command.” Alicia gave a short bow and took her own seat.
Alicia and Isabella had been joined at the hip for decades. They’d even been classmates back when Isabella attended the academy for nobles and royals. She had Isabella’s deep trust even when it came to government affairs. It was only natural for her to be chosen in this situation.
Isabella was the last one to sit.
“We will be playing rummy today,” Adek said. He placed his hand on the table and revealed a deck of cards in it as smoothly as any stage magician.
“That deck is from the castle’s lounge, isn’t it?” Isabella asked.
“Indeed. You would suspect me of cheating if I prepared everything from my own possessions, no? A game is only interesting when it’s fair. Go ahead, you may inspect the deck.”
Isabella picked up the deck and inspected each card. “There don’t seem to be any tricks in place.”
“Yes. It’s an ordinary fifty-two-card deck with no joker. Now, are you familiar with the rules of rummy?” Adek asked.
Isabella nodded. “Yes, it’s a game of efficiency.”
In rummy, players start the game by drawing seven cards each. On each of their turns, a player draws an additional card and discards one card. Three or more cards of the same rank, as well as three or more consecutive cards of the same suit, form a meld. Players can place melds on the table to reduce their hand size. The player who empties their hand first—also called “going out”—is the winner for the round, while the rest of the players lose points depending on the ranks of the cards remaining in their hands. Everyone starts at 100 points. When someone’s points are reduced to 0, the one with the highest points is declared the winner of the game.
Each card’s value is as follows: Kings, queens, and jacks are worth 10 points each. Aces are worth 1 point each. And numeral cards are each worth the same as their number, from 2 to 10. When a player goes out, each other player loses as many points as the cards left in their hand are worth in total.
In short, just like Isabella said, the key to victory in this game is to quickly and efficiently empty one’s hand while the other players still have many cards in theirs. It’s similar to mahjong, in a sense. Much like mahjong has a powerful winning hand worth a lot of points called a “yakuman,” this game has something called a “rummy.” If a player goes out all at once without previously placing any melds on the table, they get a rummy, a finisher that rewards double the points.
“However, there isn’t much strategy involved in the game like this, so let’s add some rules to make it more tactical,” Adek said.
Under the normal rules, everyone discards their cards in the same pile, but under Adek’s revision, each player has their own discard pile in front of them. If a player needs one last card to go out and another player discards it, they can take it from them to go out on the spot. If a player goes out by taking their last card from an opponent, it becomes a “direct hit” and only the player who had their card taken loses points that round. If a player has a card they need to go out in their own discard pile, they can’t take a card from another player to win the round.
Under the normal rules, a player can choose to pick up the card the previous player discarded, but under Adek’s revision, if a player can make a meld of three or more cards of the same rank with a discarded card, they can pick it up no matter which player discarded it. If two or more different players want the same discarded card to go out or to use it to make a meld, priority goes to the one whose turn is closest after the player who discarded the card. Additionally, if a player discards their last card and another player can use it to deliver a direct hit to them, the direct hit takes priority.
Finally, since this is a personal fight between Isabella and Adek, the one to reduce the other to 0 points first wins.
“So, what do you think?” Adek asked.
“I can agree to them,” Isabella replied.
With these new rules, the game became much closer to mahjong, with an emphasis on strategy and reading one’s opponents.
“So, what will we be betting?” Isabella asked.
Adek’s Destiny Bind would give the winner of a game possession of what the loser had bet. What they would each be betting was equally as, if not more important, than the game they would be playing.
“Our lives, of course,” Adek replied without hesitation. “The loser will have their life taken. It makes for a fair battle. Rest assured, my ability will take my life if I lose.”
“I would think so. Otherwise, it would be too strong.”
If Adek could start one-sided games with zero consequences if he lost, he’d have likely conquered the underworld long ago and would have no reason to follow Beelzebub.
“But your proposal is not enough,” Isabella continued.
Adek raised an eyebrow. “Care to elaborate?”
“I doubt I can kill you by betting one life against another. I imagine an ill-natured man such as yourself has more than this castle or our works of art to act as your substitutes. Undoubtedly, you’ve also picked up a great number of lives from this kingdom’s people as scapegoats before coming here. In other words, even if I defeat you once, it will only lead to the death of one of my subjects.”
Alicia and the soldiers were at a loss for words; they hadn’t thought that far.
“Ah, I see. I was thinking you agreed to our game a little too readily, but you did understand the extent of it,” Adek said.
“The casualties for defeating you head-on would be far too great, so I decided to participate in your little game and kill you this way,” Isabella explained.
“However, we must make bets of roughly equivalent value. What will you bet in addition to your life?”
“Everything.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Everything in the Fourth Kingdom. My life, Alicia’s life, these soldiers’ lives, the people’s lives you don’t possess yet, the land itself, its resources, and even the thing you demons want the most: the seal stone hidden underground. I will bet everything. In exchange, you will bet your entire stock of lives. That’s my condition for accepting the game of rummy you suggested.”
“Heh heh heh, very well. That is truly a game worth playing,” Adek said, clearly pleased. “However, as meticulous preparation is in my nature, I have also acquired a stock of underworld lives equal to five times this kingdom’s population.”
“You coward,” Alicia said through gritted teeth.
Adek had made it evident he never intended for his defeat to be an option in this fight.
Isabella, however, didn’t voice a single complaint. “Then you may start the game with five times more points than me.”
Even Adek couldn’t conceal his genuine surprise at that statement. A gap of five times the points was massive. Yes, in a game where player skill made all the difference, it was possible to win even with such a handicap. However, it was still a card game where luck was a significant factor, despite the additional rules to make it more tactical. The point gap suggested by Isabella would put her in a hopeless position.
“But, in exchange, allow me to suggest a rule of my own,” Isabella said with a finger raised, before raising an additional two. “Let’s make a ‘direct hit’ or a rummy worth three times the points.”
Adek blinked in surprise. This was somehow more absurd than her first proposal.
“Mistress Isabella, that seems far too reckless,” Alicia said.
“Do you understand what you’re saying? You only start with 100 points. Even a single direct hit would be fatal.” Adek also chimed in with a warning.
“I don’t mind. In fact, it has to be this way. A risk like this is necessary to bridge a fivefold gap in points,” Isabella said calmly.
“That confidence, the courage to disregard risks, and your collected behavior... You’re quite an intriguing person. Very well. When a direct hit occurs between the two of us, or when someone scores a rummy, the point loss will be tripled. Acceptable?” Adek asked. A slippery smile slithered across his face.
Isabella nodded. “Very. Let the game begin.”