Cheating Craft Chapter 3

10 Million HKD

Abby stood there in front of the door, refusing to move. The man in black in front of her took out two cards and showed them to Abby, “Look closely. One of the cards is the Big Joker, and the other is the Small Joker.”

There was a colorful Big Joker and a black and white Small Joker in his hands. After Abby had verified that there was no mistake, he flipped the cards back and forth. He then displayed them face down and said, “If you choose the Big Joker, it’s your win. Otherwise, I win. How about it?”

Abby swallowed. She didn’t see anything wrong with it, “Alright, let’s do that.”

Meng Ming thought to himself behind the door: No, you can’t! That guy is from a casino, he’ll definitely cheat! Abby doesn’t know this…what do I do…”

Meng Ming was separated from Abby by a door, so communicating with her was a bit difficult. He looked out from the crack between the door, and saw that Abby’s ear was near it. It was then that he realized that Abby was waiting for him to speak.

“Abby, can you hear me? He’s going to cheat!” [Meng Ming]

“Cheat? How will he cheat?” [Abby]

“For that type of bet, he’ll most likely change both cards to Small Jokers while shuffling. Abby, you have to concentrate your attention. If you see him cheat in any way, you have to take the opportunity to grab his hand!” [Meng Ming]

He believed that doing this would be easiest and most feasible option for Abby.

The man in black began to shuffle. Although there were only two cards in his hands, his technique was still exquisite. After many confusing rounds, the two cards had already shifted positions countless times.

Finally, he held the shuffled cards up with a single hand, the back of the cards facing Abby. “Come, choose one.”

“He already finished shuffling?!” [Meng Ming]

“Wu, I didn’t see him cheat at all…” [Abby]

Could it be that his skill is just too fast…or he didn’t cheat at all? What if Abby chooses the Small Joker…!

“Then I’ll draw one!” Abby said.

Meng Ming was feeling both anxious and powerless. Before he had the time to stop her, Abby had already quickly arrived in front of the cards and chosen one of the two. Her fingers pinched the corner of a card, the card’s back still facing her.

Which card was it?

Meng Ming saw it from the crack. c.r.a.p, Abby drew…the Small Joker…

Before a single second had pa.s.sed, Abby’s finger moved, and flipped the card over. The face was suddenly revealed!

“Wow! It’s the Big Joker. I won.” Abby happily smiled. The colorful Big Joker was tightly grasped in her hand!

Ah? How… [Meng Ming]

“Ah, I guess it’s your win.” With a sneer, the man in black turned around, prepared to leave the female bathroom. “I’ll leave now. Do your best…if you’re constipated, remember to eat more fruits.”

After confirming that the man in black had gone far away, Abby opened the stall door.

Meng Ming was still holding the clothes. He was still stunned as he thought: Why…why was it a Big Joker…?

“Hey, they’ve already left! Hurry up and give back my clothes, and get out!” Abby kicked Meng Ming out of the female bathroom. This action scared the woman that was just about to enter.

There was only a few minutes left before boarding time. As they sat at the gate, Abby said to him, “You owe me a lot of favors! You have to help me with this exam.”

After confirming that there were no more people from the casino around, Meng Ming pulled out a wallet and tossed it at Abby, “Here, when you said you wanted me to help you with the exam, you meant this, right?”

“This, where did you get this…” Abby took it, but she could tell that it wasn’t Meng Ming’s.

Meng Ming replied, “I stole this wallet from the man in black that you made a bet with earlier.”

“What?! You stole…?” Abby was completely shocked. “Just now, you stood behind the door, and were even separated from me…yet you were still able to steal that person’s wallet?!”

Meng Ming explained, “This is one of the amazing points of Zhuge Style Cheating Technique: Secret Exchange! Since I believed that the man in black had switched the cards, I took advantage of when he showed the cards to you to secretly open the door and reach a hand out from your waist to search his pockets. The Secret Exchange’s finger method is extremely fast, so there’s no way anyone can see it. However, I hadn’t imagined that he wouldn’t switch cards…”

Meng Ming had originally thought that if the Big Joker was swapped, then he’d steal the Big Joker back. But in the end, Meng Ming had only stolen a wallet. Because of Abby’s bad luck, she had chosen the Small Joker.

He earnestly asked, “However, I clearly saw that the card you had was a Small Joker. How did it suddenly become a Big Joker?”

“Huhu, I knew from the beginning that I’d win.” Abby said confidently. Laughing, she extended her hands towards Meng Ming and said, “Watch my hands!”

He watched as the color from the makeup on Meng Ming’s face suddenly appeared on Abby’s finger.

“Kaito Abby’s Master Disguise Technique. I colored the Small Joker to transform it into a Big Joker─! Haha!” Abby gleefully laughed. This was the happiest smile that Abby had ever shown a stranger.

Abby had begun to feel more and more confident that the boy next to her wasn’t simple. After they boarded the plane, she listened to Meng Ming tell her everything that had happened that day, and found it quite difficult to believe.

She asked, “The thing you used just now, that whatever Zhuge Cheating Style Technique, what exactly is it?”

Meng Ming told her that it was “Zhuge Style Cheating Technique”. It had been created by Zhuge Liang* 2000 years ago during the Three Kingdoms period. This method made the minority able to defeat the majority, the weak able to defeat the strong, and its name spread even outside China. It’s an extremely precise and cautious type of cheating technique; a quintessence of its type. No matter how good or bad a situation was, it could never be treated lightly!

That year, when Zhuge Liang was called Wo Long and joined the Shu Army, his wisdom fell short of Zhou Yu**, and his experience fell short of Sima Yi***. Yet how had he led them to victory over and over again? There was only one answer─all’s fair in love and war; Zhuge Liang had used sleight of hand.

Meng Ming’s father had been sentenced to death. But even if he still owed a debt, there was no reason to pa.s.s it to his son. The people at the casino wanted to capture Meng Ming to force him to “repay the debt”, but it was possible that they wanted to completely obtain, and maybe even eradicate, the Zhuge Style Cheating Technique. When he thought about it, Meng Ming’s mother’s last words had been: You have to protect our Zhuge Style Cheating Technique!

This was the first time Abby had ever seen this type of Cheating Technique. Just the two moves that Meng Ming had already displayed were enough to make her sigh in admiration.

Thanks to Abby, Meng Ming had calmed quite a bit. He stopped his apprehensions about what had happened to the Zhuge family, and began to think: Since there is a path that I have to take in front of me, I’ll just walk it and see where it goes.

The plane took off, and Meng Ming was safe.

As for Meng Ming’s journey, the only thing he remembered was his mother’s parting words about returning to China for the college entrance exam. However, he hadn’t realized exactly what this “entrance exam” really was.

“So you don’t even know about the exam…” Abby helplessly explained the concept of the exam to Meng Ming, “The so-called examination tests your ability to take exams…the college entrance exam is the uniform exam taken by any high school student or other person in China that wants to attend college.”

“Then, how…how does one take the exam?” Meng Ming was still very puzzled.

You really don’t know anything… Abby could only continue explaining, “Basically, the content of the exam is high school knowledge. One must get a specific score in order to attend college! There’s literature, maths, foreign language, physics, chemistry, biology, history, philosophy, geography, etc….”

“What are all those things?” Meng Ming was even more confused.

“Things you need to learn.”

“No way! I’ve never learned those things before…!”

Aside from learning how to read and write, the children from the Zhuge family had only learned skills in their trade since they were young, and had rarely came into contact with the profound knowledge of academic discipline. China’s terrifying college entrance exam was particularly difficult to Meng Ming, a level of difficulty that he couldn’t even describe in words.

“With that college entrance exam, they can select the best and most talented people.” Abby began to talk non-stop once more, “Historically, it was an imperial examination system, which lasted for 1300 years. Only afterwards did it evolve into the college entrance exam. For the past many years, China’s people have all believed that if one doesn’t partic.i.p.ate in the college entrance exam and attend college, there is no point in living! Failing the exam means that one’s future is like suffering through h.e.l.l. Because of this, people have to start studying for this exam starting from primary school, all the way up until high school.”

As she said this, Abby fished out the wallet that Meng Ming had stolen earlier and counted the money.

“There’s only 103.50 RMB!!” Abby threw the wallet onto the ground, “So poor!”

Abby had finally regained her senses. After talking so much about examinations, she realized that her own examination had yet to end! ─While speaking for so long, she had completely forgotten the time!

Abby’s feeling of urgency was almost burning.

Her examination was stealing! Before the plane landed, she had to steal something that was of high enough value and bring it back home with her. Only then would she be able to pa.s.s the test.

Abby grabbed Meng Ming’s clothes and began to shake him as she vented, “It’s all your fault for wasting my time! Aren’t you about to take the college entrance exam? Hurry up and help me take my test!”

“Hey, what exactly is going on? And what exam is this?”

Abby could only repeat once more, “I’m currently taking an exam. If I don’t pa.s.s, I can’t graduate! The condition of the test is that I have to steal a large amount of money during this flight home!”

“Then how much money have you stolen as of now?” Meng Ming asked.

“Only 103.50 RMB!”

“How much more do you need? Hurry up and continue stealing!!”

Abby said, “You make it sound so easy…as a Kaito, I need to first use the ability to judge an item’s value, and then watch it closely before I steal it.”

She told Meng Ming that because the Kaito exam required her to steal a large amount of items, she had to first find items that were of high enough value. In other words, Abby thought that the examiner had surely arranged the flight so that there were enough things for her to find and steal to reach the quota. It was even possible that the examiner was disguising himself and was on the plane, defending these items. But she was already on the way back, and had yet to discover any traces of this.

There were only 30 some pa.s.sengers on the flight. Every person was muddled with sleep.

“There must be something!” Abby believed her judgment wasn’t wrong. “No matter if it’s money or goods, the examiner and those items are definitely on this flight. Hurry up and help me think! If you can’t even pa.s.s this kind of test, don’t even think of pa.s.sing the college entrance exam!”

Meng Ming understood. I must pa.s.s this test to have the qualifications to attend the examination in China.

Meng Ming carefully inspected every pa.s.senger, but he didn’t discover any sign of suspicious people. The stewardesses walking back and forth didn’t show any abnormal behavior either.

Abby pretty much searched everyone’s belongings, but she wasn’t able to find any items of worth.

She couldn’t act brazenly, but she couldn’t do nothing either. As they neared their destination. Abby began to panic more.

“c.r.a.p, we’ll arrive in Hong Kong in 30 minutes…” Abby said sullenly as she looked at the time.

Although he hadn’t gained any intelligence on the matter, Meng Ming remained calm. This was the result of his years of training in the Zhuge Style Cheating Technique. Although this was his first experience with a test, he still remembered the essence of the Zhuge Style Cheating Technique: Even if it’s the last minute, there is still a chance of success; concentrate, and concentrate some more. You must consider every possibility!

The sky was beginning the darken, and the sun’s rays poured through the window, lighting up every corner of the cabin.

Meng Ming said, “You don’t have to necessarily steal items from luggage, right?”

“I’ve considered that before. Human organs are worth quite a lot too….” Abby said. “But everyone knows that Kaitos absolutely cannot kill people. That’s why injuring people to remove their organs to obtain 10 million HKD isn’t allowed…”

10 million? Meng Ming suddenly thought of something.

“Meng Ming!” Abby abruptly pointed outside the window, “Look, that’s my home!”

The view outside the window was a boundless sea, and one could just faintly see the coast of Hong Kong along the water.

She introduced, “Our Sky Kaito Rabbi’s school is right underneath that part of the sea. It’s a few dozen kilometers away from the coast.”

Meng Ming didn’t seem to be paying any attention to her words, “What did you mean just now when you said 10 million HKD?”

Abby said, “I have to steal that much money!”

“Why didn’t you say that earlier! I get it now!” Meng Ming said, “10 million HKD is right here!”

“Here? Where?” Abby asked.

“This plane! It’s worth more than 10 million HKD!”