The Notorious Misadventures of an Alchemist and a Phoenix, Chapter 25

If Margo could record the reactions on each invader's face, she knew it would keep her warm through the coldest nights. There was a grand feeling when someone tried to bully you and they got their just desserts. The Hulking mass of stone caused Turan to rub his knuckles a little harder than usual.

A soft cough broke the silence and Turan slowly, as to show no hostility, moved towards the golem.

"WE...ARE...HERE... BECAUSE..." Turan spoke slowly like a jerk in a foreign country. Thankfully, Turan was interrupted when the golem using unbelievably speed for a rock, shoved his giant rock fist under the nose of Turan causing an up gust of pressure that almost knocked Turan on his ass. The sound of weapons being drawn was half-hearted. Hitting stones with weapons was useless but hitting magical stone men that could hit back like a landslide was frightening. Despite weapons at the ready, none used them.

Golem number 1 witnessed things that shouldn't be. Many small bags of meat moving things that shouldn't be moved. One of the bags of meat was holding a hose that was sucking at the teat of the large barrel. The golem picked up the hose and tied a knot in the hose. Leaking containers were a bad thing, it was his duty to fix things.

A small chuckle broke the silence, the merchants hated the thieves guild and it always brought great pleasure when something like this happened to them. The small chuckle was joined with yet more laughter and that turned into a roaring laughter. The only people who didn't laugh were the ones who were in danger.

"Isabella, this is unexpected I think a different approach is in order" whined Turan

The woman in the suit agreed but her face told a different story. Her bright red face matched her red hair and she was shaking from anger, it would seem that her sin of anger was strong.

Isabella, or Bella to her friends, if she had any, was the enforcer of the Casino. If there was a problem that needed a quiet but vastly forceful hand, she was there.

The Casino didn't like to wash their dirty clothes in public but they also wouldn't allow zero retaliation. The phoenix was a rare species and few ever saw them. This was how they knew the Alchemy Bank was involved. How many phoenixes could there be? And so they sent their enforcer to......make amends.

Pride was another sin Bella had that was messing with her thought process right now but it was being somewhat controlled by the fear of wrath from the golem. It stopped her from doing her job but possibly saved her from a beating that would knock the piss out of her.

The conflicting feeling she felt was causing her to turn a deeper red, fortunately for her, the thieve guild crew picked her up and left. A single old man tried to leave with what he had but was picked up by the helmet by the golem and only release when the old git dropped the item.

The cheers that came from the merchant were infectious, they whooped and danced on the spot. The only person who wasn't dancing on the spot was the fierce eyes that belonged to Noah who was in the shadow of the hall.

Noah had a temper that he had long ago learnt to control, it help that he wasn't able to use a physical attack to get revenge. And yet that didn't mean he was above it all, there were other ways to get revenge. And he would get revenge equal to his rage.

Noah looked at his clock and pulled out a tin filled with a new product, he called them mellow yellows. A medicine that helped him to keep a calm mind when using the skill "Rage". It was the only solution he had found to his "rage" problem, it wasn't perfect but at least he could think and remember what happened when Rage was activated. Still, Noah needed to make some calls.

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When attacking a guild there is one thing you have to remember, guilds, are like corporations. They don't care if you are right and they are wrong, they aren't your friend, no matter how long you've been with them, and they only care about money and never about their customer's wellbeing.

So, if you want to grab their attention and wring their throats to inspire change, you have to do it in a way that will make a lot of money or lose them a lot. Anything else and they will ignore you.

What's the best way to get revenge on a guild?

The answer is simple but costly, Lawers. You send an army of money-hungry Lawers and watch as the piranhas circle their prey to take little bites out of them, and when they do find a weakness enjoy the devastation they wrought. Noah would have to pay the initial cost but after that, the lawyers would find other disgruntled customers of the thieves guild and go into a partnership with them.

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Noah was happy to leave it with them but there were things he could do about the Casino and that something was what all Casino hated, A winning gambler.

Noah was sitting at the Tom Tom Dive card game. It was a weird game with convoluted rules that change depending on the day of the week. Noah was only playing it because it paid out the best odds.

Noah knew that the Casino was on to him, almost immediately the pit boss hovered near him, and while he didn't see the woman in the suit known as Bella, he didn't doubt she was watching.

The cards were dealt, it was moon-day and so an extra card was dealt. Noah discarded a single card and shuffled the eight cards in his hand.

A cocktail waitress delivered a free but suspiciously strong drink, Noah downed it and winced at the taste, "Make the next one sweeter" the cocktail waitress went and did her job

The dealer picked a card at random from Noah's hand. The spice card of abundance. The dealer played it and picked up two extra cards from the deck. Noah played a card from his hand, the berry of life. Noah expected two cards from the dealer but only got one. Moon day decreased the effect of plant cards by half. It was a useless card.

The game was won when your opponent ran out of cards, so if you played a card that didn't weaken your opponent or didn't strengthen yourself, it was a pointless move

The dealer continued to play and Noah lost the game without doing much to the dealer.

After Noah lost his chips, Noah sprung his plan.

"Why don't we make this interesting? Add six new players, all of them Casino employees" requested Noah.

"A seven against one" exclaimed the dealer "the odds are going to be tremendous"

The pit boss nodded to the dealer, six more players entered the game. The odds were stacked against Noah. When it was many VS one the ideal tactic was to make sure the dealer was supported using the cards from the other players.

A new drink was placed near Noah. With amazing hand speed, Noah pulled out a bottle and poured it into his drink and before anyone could mutter a response, Noah stuffed the bottle back into his pocket.

The speed at which Noah did this caused the hair on the back of the dealer and pit boss's neck to stand on end. With that kind of speed, cheating was a real threat. More subordinates of the pit boss kept an eye out for Noah's abilities.

The cards were dealt and Noah downed his drink. The dealer picked one of Noah's cards

and played it, the peasant card meant Noah had to pass one of his cards to the right. A terrible move for Noah as he would be playing with only six cards while everyone else had eight, but due to the rules of the game, if there were more than five players, the peasant card turned into a revolution card. This meant everyone had to randomly pick a card from their hand and play it immediately. This was where the game became interesting. When multiple cards were played at once, strange effects happened.

One card was the smiling joker, A shield-based card that reflected other cards at the users. The dealer had the smiling joker, the next card to be played was rainbow light but that didn't do anything. The second player put down the man-eating bar plant. The card would eat two cards on the left but it was a plant base card so that turned into a single card because of Moon day.

Instead of discarding the card like the game said to do, the next user played an identical man-eating bar plant and against all odds, the next and then the player after that also played the man-eating bar plant card, all the way up to Noah, stacking the effect. All together, in one turn Noah lost five extra cards.

Noah had no choice but to play his final card, after the effect of the card Noah would lose yet again.

I am rubber, you are glue.

Within one turn, anything negative that happens to the player of this card will affect the next player, and can't be blocked or redirected.

And just like that, the dealer lost five cards in one turn. But it didn't matter, Noah didn't have any cards left and was knocked out. Except that the odd rainbow card that was played had the effect of resurrecting the first person to lose all of the cards they lost in that round of play.

Boom, just like that the dealer was down by five cards and Noah had six. The standard play was to take Noah's card but the last move had shaken the dealer.

He briefly looked up at the pit boss and watched the angry face of his boss.

The Casino didn't like losing but they hated losing big. The dealer's hand shakingly hovered over Noah's cards and picked one.

The sacrificial dagger

Discarded a card to play two cards for double the effect

The dealer was sweating bullets. If you picked a card from an opponent's hand it had to be played and the dealer only had three cards left. He was going to lose and if the dealer lost, the opponent won automatically. The dealer tried his best to think of any combo that would win but there was no combo.

The win went to Noah and the chips were paid.

"Let it ride," said Noah

The next couple of games magically went in the odds of Noah and his winning turned into a mountain of chips. The odds were against him but he was winning and winning big

It helps that every dog has its day and Noah was having a dog's dinner with the Casino