Cras was on the fence because on one hand he could try the alcohol of another world, but he should also try to stay sober to make sure he doesn't slip up and lose his money. In the end, he grabbed a nice water on the rocks. He moved through the casino floor to the poker tables, and there weren't many people playing. The only table he found with an open seat was taken by four old men, each dressed in fancy attire. Fancy was almost an understatement, their suits were adorned with gold trim and gems embroidered into them. Each suit was a distinct color, and Slye noticed one of them had the house colors of house Williston.

Before he could double guess himself, one of the men called over to him "Don't be scared, you looked so confident before. Take a seat." and gestured towards the open seat on the table.

Slye gulped as he sat down and he saw the chips on the table read in the hundreds of thousands to the millions, "Do you even have chips small enough to play with me?" he said a little sheepishly.

The man in the house Williston colors laughed, then whistled and an employee rushed over to the table, and he handed her a 100k credit chip and told her "Break this into 5,000's for me if you would not mind.". The other men followed, handing the lady chips to get broken into lower denominations.

"That solves that, does it not?" The Williston grinned and spoke to Slye.

"I guess it does." Slye sipped his water after responding. They already probably thought he was just an arrogant kid who feels nervous around the real high-rollers, and while that is right he decided he would play into it to his advantage.

For the next couple of hours he played against the men, acting like a new player with obvious tells and not really having a poker face, and he was down to just 20,000 credits when he finally got the chance to make his play. He got a royal flush, and it was time to play it out. He started at first acting like he was upset at his hand, though also acting like he didn't want to give the impression he was faking it. He only matched the bets at first, but made what seemed like a very obvious bluff at the very end to go all in. Only one of the old men folded when he did it, but the other three called his bluff and went all in themselves, matching his 20,000. Then the last card flipped, and Slye revealed his royal flush. The three old men looked on in disbelief, and the one that folded laughed. Slye took the pot, stood up, and said a small goodbye before leaving the old men almost fuming in the table. They weren't mad at losing 20,000 credits, to them it was nothing but it was the principle of having the wool pulled over their eyes by someone who looks a fraction of their age that made them mad.

While Skye was cashing out his check the one elder who folded pulled him aside, "You are a sly one, I haven't seen anyone pull a move like that on Williston in years.".

"Oh trust me, Williston's going to lose again in a couple days. What's it to you?" Slye replied to the man.

The man grinned and pulled out a business card, "I'm the patriarch of the Golden Merchants, I'm sure I don't have to tell you what that means.". Then he continued, "On the surface, the big families of the city seem to be on friendly terms, but in reality we all want to expand our control over the city.".

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Slye took his business card and asked, "And you think I could be an investment, someone my age being able to trick some of the great houses of the city?".

"You're smart for your age, give me a call if you want to talk more." He said before starting to go back to the poker area. Slye looked at his business card and saw his name was Richard Ermine.

Slye grinned and told him one last thing as he was walking out the door, "Rich, you were right in some ways, I am a pretty Sly guy.". Rich looked back as if a realization struck him, and Slye heard him laugh more as he left the building.

Slye did want to call him and possibly get some items from him, but there was one problem. He didn't have a phone. Living in poverty and having almost no savings meant he never had the time or money for one. He also needed a bank account, he never had enough money he was worried about losing it. Slye had 80,000 credits now, so he was going to get a phone and see if Richard could hook him up with a good bank. After that, he would try getting a weapon and then either try to learn a cultivation technique or start magic.

Since he was already downtown, it was a short walk to the phone store. It was a high-class one, the walls made almost entirely out of glass. It took less than an hour to find a phone and buy it in cash, it was a bit of an older model just to save some money, and it came out to about 1,500 credits. He also got a phone plan, all that boring stuff but he has a working phone at the end of it. He ended up texting the rich guy telling him that he wanted a bank account. He didn't get a text back immediately, texting at the poker table has been bad manners here too it seems. Before going back home, he decided to check out some shops before he was going back home.

Slye walked into the first shop that caught his eye, a small smithy hidden away near a back alley. There was no one at the front desk, and he looked through the works in the almost dingy looking front room. Average looking equipment bordered the walls, nothing fancy, flashy, or fantastic really jumped out to him. It all looked really simple, and he found the weapon he was looking for. It was a simple quarterstaff, made out of a kind of wood he couldn't quite identify but long enough for him to use like the one he had back in the cultivation world. If he was going to fight beasts, he would also need a spear, since quarterstaffs were blunt and weren't as good for fighting beasts. He was going to take a bet that his opponent in three days was going to have armor, and he simply just preferred the quarterstaff opposed to the spear.

He brought the quarterstaff to what looked like the front counter, a large wooden desk with a door labeled "staff only" behind it. Slye put the staff down and coughed loudly, hoping to alert whoever worked here that someone was here. Minutes passed, and no one came out. Slye coughed louder, and for minutes still no one came out. Slye used the staff to knock on the staff only door, and he realized how hard the simple looking staff was.

He looked at the staff, it was denser than he thought it was, and was heavier than he expected it to be. After about a minute, a gruff old-looking worker came out with a blacksmithing hammer in one hand and a simple sword in another.

"You're lucky I was almost done with the sword and you didn't have to wait long. Quit making so much noise while I try to smith." he said.

"I just want to buy this, if you wouldn't mind." Slye said.

The blacksmith took it out of his hands and inspected it, then put it back on the counter, "25,000 credits."

Slye seemed taken aback by the price and said "Seems a bit steep, do you make many sales like this?".

"I care more about smithing than selling, and if you knew how to tell what a good weapon was, you'd think that's a steal." He responded like he had said this a thousand times before, most likely because he has.

Slye took 25,000 out of his wallet and dropped it on the table and took the quarterstaff, leaving the store.