Chapter 12: Tang Da Shao Loses His Wife

  On this day, Jun Xie was idly chatting with Xiao Er, and during this period of time, due to Jun Xie's greatly changed behavior and personality, the little girl finally no longer feared him as she used to. Although she still refused to get close to him, she was no longer extremely repelled by him, especially when it came to the stories he told. Every time this happened, the little girl would sit quietly in front of Jun Xie with her small hands supporting her cheeks, her big eyes blinking occasionally as she listened intently to the story, afraid of missing a single sentence. Moreover, as the characters in the story experienced joy or sorrow, laughter or tears, their eyes would widen in excitement...

  Jun Xie told a story about a mermaid, which directly moved the little girl to tears like a river bursting its banks, and she cried for a whole day... From then on, Jun Xie made a vow to himself not to tell tragic stories to women again!

  Tears... will drown people!

  "Young master, Tang Gongzi has arrived." Just as Jun Ye was telling the story of Sun Wukong being trapped in the Eight Trigrams Furnace, the little loli in front of him was listening with rapt attention, her eyes wide with excitement, her small hands clenched together, showing how tense she was about Sun Dasheng's situation. Suddenly, a guard rushed in to report.

  "Tang Gongzi?" The gentleman looked up in surprise, and then immediately flipped out his memories about this person: "Quickly invite him."

  A meatball rolled over from the yard, shouting as it rolled, its voice extremely mournful: "Third Master, Mo Xie brothers, save me! This is terrible!"

  Jun Xie stared with wide eyes and an open mouth, looking at the rolling meatball in shock, unable to imagine that a meatball could actually talk! It wasn't until the meatball approached closer that Jun Xie realized it was actually a person!

  This person's neck is non-existent, at least it can't be seen with your eyes. His shoulders are wide and thick, his arms extremely short and stout, his round head flows into a streamlined body, his two legs are no more than a foot long, but as thick as a bundle! When he walks, the fat on his body ripples like the Yangtze River's waves; in short, except for saying he looks like a bamboo pole, it's not like anything human.

  From the entrance of the courtyard to here, it seems like only a few steps away, but he's already panting and wiping sweat non-stop, clearly very exhausted. This person is none other than the young master of the Tang family, another prominent family in Tianxiang City, rivaling the Jun family - Tang Yuan!

  It's indeed very similar, just a few sizes larger.

  "Huh... Young Master Tang, what's going on with you? How did things escalate to the point of risking your life? Did that blind fool provoke you?" Jun Xie asked, suppressing the laughter in his heart as he looked at this close friend of Jun Wu Xie.

  "Damn it, it's those good-for-nothings from the Li family and those guys from the Meng and Song families!" Tang Da Shao was furious, struggling to open a slit in his eyes from amidst the fat: "For the past few days, I've been stuck in our Qian Jin Hall, brother, I haven't come out for ten days, and I lost a total of 150,000 taels of silver! Third Young Master, you must save me, or else when I go back, the old man will surely beat me to death!"

  "150,000 taels of silver!" Jun Ye jumped in fright: "How could I have lost so much? Where did you get all that money from?"

  Tang Yuan sighed: "At the beginning of the day I was still winning, I won a total of 50,000 taels..."

  "Would you still gamble if you weren't allowed to win? What exactly did you lose at? You really dare to play!" Jun Xie glared at him.

  Tang Yuan didn't dare to retort, muttering in his mouth: "Last month you also lost 100,000 taels, I just lost a bit more than you, and yet you..."

  "What's the point of saying that? Ah, I'm talking about a mere 150,000 taels of silver, Tang Da Shao, you're not someone who can't afford to lose, are you? Do you have to come find me and cry for help?" Jun Xie suddenly remembered, these people in front of him couldn't be judged by ordinary logic, they were all typical prodigal sons! "Even if it was your father, he wouldn't kill you just because of a mere 150,000 taels of silver, would he? You're not someone who's never lost that amount before..."

  "But, I didn't have any money later on, I said I'd go home to get some, Li Bo urged me on, saying everyone was tired, if I left it would be better to disperse; I steeled myself and...” Tang Yuan looked at Jun Xie with a pitiful expression, his face full of regret.

  "What's wrong?" Jun Xie suddenly felt something was off.

  "I didn't lose the battle, but I lost the war... I was in a hurry and put up both my treasured jade and precious sword as collateral, worth 300,000 taels of silver. I thought I could win it back quickly, but... but... in the end, I still lost," Tang Yuan said with a crestfallen face, wanting to speak but stopping himself.

  "This is called losing the battle but not the war! I remember your sword was that famous Snow Blade that your father bought back at a high price? That's a divine artifact that can cut through iron like mud! Plus, you have that top-quality warm jade pendant, I recall those two items cost 1 million taels to purchase back then? You're actually selling them together for only 300,000 taels? Even if it's a fire sale, it shouldn't be sold at this price!" Jun Xie was speechless, this guy... is really good at losing the family fortune!

  "I'm not out of luck, am I? It was stuck there at the time! And then, for some reason, my head got all muddled up and... " Tang Yuan muttered to himself.

  "Even if you lose these two things, they can be redeemed later, and your father will scold you at most. He won't kill you, will he? Your family has a lot of silver! 180 million in silver, do you really care about it?" Jun Xie sneered.

  "Nonsense! These two things are treasures, don't I want to win them back on the spot?" Tang Yuan was somewhat indignant: "You're not unaware of Lao Ye's family law, last time you watched me experience it once... that can peel off a layer of skin!"

  "So you're still betting? What did you stake this time? You have a lot of valuable things, but nothing worth 1.8 million!" Jun Xie was well-versed in human nature, especially the psychology of gamblers. This fat man must have staked something he shouldn't have, or else he wouldn't be so anxious.

  "Yes, I really didn't have anything valuable on me at the time... in the end, I was so anxious that... I... I... I ended up using my wife as collateral..." Tang Yuan cried with a grief-stricken face, looking like he wanted to kill himself: "That was my wife who hadn't even entered my household yet."

  "Ah?" Ke'er exclaimed on one side, her beautiful big eyes wide open as she stared at Tang Yuan, her eyes full of incredulity and a hint of disgust in the depths of her pupils. In her heart, she grumbled: The young master had just gotten better, and these fox friends and dog buddies came again!

  "What? You've got your wife crushed? You're still taking her with you on this kind of thing?" Jun Xie almost fell off his chair, nearly fainting! He was too shocked! It was simply unbelievable!

  Tang Yuan's fiancée is not only his wife, but also the daughter of Sun Chenghe, the Minister of Justice. She is a talented and beautiful woman from a noble family! If this gets out, it will be a huge joke.

  The son of the Minister of Revenue gambled and lost the daughter of the Vice-Minister of Justice... If this gets out, Old Master Tang will have to strip this fatty bare and make him light incense candles!

  "I... I didn't take her there..." Tang Yuan was almost in tears: "But I wrote an IOU, using her as collateral for 1 million taels... it's all written down in black and white, this thing... and my painting is also being held..."

  "Pig! You're just a pig!" A daughter of the Minister of Justice, a daughter-in-law of the Minister of Revenue, this matter concerns the reputation and future of two big families! It's actually only mortgaged for one million taels! Jun Xieqi laughed instead: "You actually drew a pawn... where is that one million taels?"

  "Lost... also lost..." Tang Yuan sat on the ground with a thud, wailing loudly, and the ground shook momentarily. "They said that if we don't bring 1.5 million taels within three hours, they won't want this money or us, they'll just publicize this IOU..."

  "Ah!" The gentleman was speechless, "How can it be 1.5 million taels? Isn't it supposed to be 1 million taels?"

  "This... this is the condition of giving me a three-hour deadline..." Tang Yuan was tearfully and nasally pleading: "Third Young Master, you must save me, I... have no other way out anymore."

  "I'll save you, how can I save you? Where do I have so much silver?" Jun Xie flatly refused, joking that this kind of person would be killed by his father, and yet he still wanted to take out silver to support such a gambler? Don't mention not having it, even if he had it, he wouldn't lend it!

  "You don't need to pay!" Tang Yuan suddenly gained spirit, his small eyes blinking, saying: "Li Feng and Meng Haizhou proposed a condition, saying that Jun San has not come for a long time, as long as I bring you there to gamble with them for a few rounds, the debt can be returned to me."

  "How can I have such a big face?" Jun Xie shook his head, and with the usual behavior of this young master, he was probably not much better off in the casino, as for reputation... probably notorious to the extreme!

  Something embarrassing happened these past few days, actually two things. Three days ago I posted the group number under my book's introduction page, but no one joined for two days, which was strange, so I went to check and... oh dear! It turned out I wrote a wrong digit... I quickly corrected it, then waited another day, still no one joined. Sweetie10 left a message saying that the group rejected her join request, I rushed to take a look, turns out I set it up wrong... Good grief, I almost smashed my head on the group number...

  Thank you "Ren Pao Feng", "Meng Huan Xin Hai", "Fan Jian Jin Lin", "Ye Ye Cha Bu Ting", "Ye Mu", "Dao Ban Du Zhe", "Xuan Huan ~ Mi", "Shu You 100114122717088", "Tang Guo 1O Fen Tian" and "Yao Nie Feng Huo" for your rewards! Some brothers even did it for the third or fourth time! Wind Ling expresses heartfelt gratitude.