I didn’t want to drink too much wine with Jiannan. After a few glasses, I stopped to drink.
But he wouldn’t let me go and said he wanted me to be with him until at least twelve o’clock. I was reluctant, but I did so.
After dinner, he took me to a nightclub, but not for drink.
There was only one floor button in the elevator, but he took me to B2, which had no access to elevator. It was a basement, but it was richly decorated, like a palace.
There was a tall black-clothed man guarding. When he saw Jiannan, he bowed to greet and called him ‘Master Nan’. It wasn’t ‘Brother Nan’, but ‘Master Nan’.
After going in, there was wine, desserts, and all kinds of fruits on the table. Young girls that were hot, scantily clad walked around. serving the customers.
The table was very long and the customers were seated on two sides, enjoying themselves.
They were enjoying gambling.
Although they played different items, they were all doing the same thing gambling. I didn’t expect there to be such a big underground casino in Hai City. In a moment, I thought I was in Macau.
To my surprise, there were even a lot of celebrities and even politicians, many of whom were familiar to me.
Luckily, they were all busy with gambling, with their attention focusing on the table and they didn’t notice me.
Jiannan handed over a pair of sunglasses, “If you’re afraid of being recognized, you can put it on.”
He was sweet. I took it and put it on, feeling much safer.
“Aren’t you in a bad mood? Go and gamble. I’ll given you two million chips and you can gamble whatever you want. You take the money you win and the lose on me.” Jiannan said.
I shook my head, “No, no. I don’t know how to gamble.”
“There’s nothing you can’t do. I can find an expert to teach you and you’ll catch it. Gambling is a good way to reduce your stress. You’ll know it after you try.” Jiannan kept encouraging me.
Although he was hospitable, I was still reluctant. I knew that gambling was addictive and the money earned from business couldn’t be compared to the pleasure of getting money for doing nothing. The money came so easily, hundreds of thousands of dollars in the blink of an eye, making people addictive.
“Thanks, but I don’t know how to play. I don’t like it.” I explicitly refused.
“Alright, then let’s sit over there and chat.” Jiannan pointed to the lounge area.
As soon as we sat down, a pretty girl brought over champagne.
He looked at me, “How is it? It’s a nice place, isn’t it?”
“I’ve never thought that there would be such a large-scale underground casino in Hai City. And…”
“And there are officials here to play, right? This is too normal, for they are human beings too. There are good and bad officials and you can’t ask all of them to be good officials who are dedicated to the people. Every field is like this.”
I agreed with this.
“Casino is the best place to know human nature. You may see the cowardice, greed and so on. It’s a pity you don’t have a try.”
Jiannan held a cigarette, but he didn’t light it. Then I suddenly noticed that the place was orderly and smoke-free and there was a big ‘No Smoking’ sign on the wall.
It’s interesting that a place like this could actually ban smoking when it’s useless to ban smoking in public places?
I pointed to the sign, “These gamblers don’t even smoke?”
“Of course they want to smoke. When they lose, they want to smoke, but we have a rule here that smoke is not allowed. People can smoke in the smoking room. If one smokes here, the fine is 100, 000. Because there are female customers, many of whom hate second-hand smoke, so if the environment is not pleasant, then many of them won’t come. They will think that this place is a smoky mess, a place that can’t be upscale.”
“100, 000? Can you execute it?” I was more curious.
“Yes. Everyone who comes here has to follow the rules here and no matter how high his social status is, when he comes here, he’s just a gambler. If he dares to break the rules, I’ll let him break his arms and legs. Do you think what is more important?”
I nodded, “That’s true. If one loses something, he can’t even call the police. So, here, violence solves everything.”
“People get suddenly rich or lose everything here all the time, some of whom even want to commit suicide here after losing all their savings, but we stopped them in the end.”
“Wow. I’ve never thought that you could do such thing. How did you persuade?”
Jiannan laughed, “You want to hear it?”
“Say it. Show me. I’ve never thought a man like you would be able to persuade people not to suicide.”
“I told him, ‘you don’t need to die if you lose. You can cheat your friends to get their money to gamble. You can tell him that you have a very profitable project, asking him to invest a million dollars and get ten million dollars after a year. He’ll definitely invest and then you can take the money to win back. Maybe in this way, you’ll get what you have lost.’ Then he really cheated his friends two million for a week, but lost it all again.”
“What you’re doing is not saving him!”
“You can never wake up a man who is pretending to be asleep. Since he wanted to die, he should understand the dangers of gambling. That I stopped him was trying to make himself understand this. But a week’s time couldn’t make him figure it out and he still chose to cheat money to gamble, so who could save him? The only way to save him is himself to save himself.”
He said it with arrogance, but it made sense.
“Since you know the dangers of gambling, you still run a casino? Aren’t you setting a trap for people?”
“I’m not harming anyone. Gambling is their business and I never ask them to gamble. If they don’t want to, can I force them? If they want to, even if they don’t do it here, they’ll go somewhere else, so it’s really nothing to do with me. It’s not a very good business, but it’s not sinful. What’s more, business is business, how to say it’s good or bad?”
I didn’t expect Jiannan to be so eloquent and I couldn’t say anything else.
“If people are all like you, who won’t gamble though the chips are free, then my business won’t survive. If they gamble, it’s because they’re undisciplined and it’s none of my business. Don’t you think so?”
I didn’t say no, nor did I agree with him. All I could say was that there was a rule in every field.
After sitting for a while, I stood up and wanted to leave. Although I didn’t gamble, I still saw something.
Jiannan walked me out, saying that it was the weekend, so it was crowded. Then he had to watch the place, so he was unable to drive me back. He also invited me to come back often.
When I got in the car, he came to me and asked me if I had seen who was in the casino tonight.
I was a little puzzled, asking what he meant.
“I mean, if you need those people to help you in the future, you can just come to me and I’ll let them do it. They gamble at my place and often ask me for money when they lose, so most of them owe me money. If I want them to do something, they dare not say no.” Jiannan said with a smile.
I now understood a little bit why he could have such a power. Everyone did have their own way of living in the society.
I said, “OK. I got it.”