Chapter Thirty-Six: The Wager and the Partnership

Imperial Academy Cafeteria.

The moment Mo Dun entered the bustling cafeteria, carrying his newly purchased food tin, the noisy hall fell abruptly silent.

“The Mo family boy is here!”

“That’s him!”

The students whispered amongst themselves, pointing and staring. Some who had missed the morning’s events widened their eyes, eager to see what extraordinary abilities Mo Dun possessed.

“Did you hear? I heard his calligraphy isn’t bad on purpose—he’s just genuinely terrible at it,” one student whispered conspiratorially.

“No way!” someone else protested. Given Mo Dun’s scholarly reputation, how bad could his calligraphy really be?

“It’s true. Dr. Liu said so himself—he lost his appetite for an entire day after seeing it! Notice Dr. Liu hasn’t shown up today?” insisted the first student.

“Really?”

“If you ask me, Mo Dun is just putting on airs—throwing the match on purpose to save face!”

“So hypocritical!”

For a moment, the entire Academy seemed to have found a scapegoat for their collective disappointment, reducing Mo Dun to nothing with their words. Even the cafeteria cook eyed him with disdain, slapping the food into Mo Dun’s bowl as if Mo Dun owed him a fortune.

“Sir, harmony brings wealth. With this attitude, your business will never thrive,” Mo Dun reminded him.

“Eat it or leave it!” the cook snorted, his nose in the air.

Mo Dun laughed it off, took his food, and, seeing an empty seat, sat down.

At once, all the scholars around him rose and moved away. Not a single student remained within thirty paces.

Mo Dun touched his nose with a wry smile—he, a transmigrator, was experiencing the cold shoulder of campus bullying.

In stark contrast, Xiong Maocai was being treated like a hero. Surrounded by students, he basked in their praise as they belittled Mo Dun and extolled his own virtues.

“Hmph! I’ll make him pay one day!” Xiong Maocai thought, casting a contemptuous glance at Mo Dun. He was elated—he had single-handedly salvaged the Academy’s reputation after everyone else’s defeat. Wasn’t he now the foremost scholar here?

“Who needs the esteemed Cui family, the descendants of Confucius or the Zu family? All eyes should be on me,” his heart soared.

At that moment, Cheng Chumo set his oversized rice bowl heavily in front of Mo Dun. “Tell me—were you really that bad at calligraphy, or did you throw the match on purpose?”

Mo Dun glanced at his own bowl—only slightly deeper than Cheng Chumo’s enormous one—and thought, “What an appetite.”

Looking at the mountain of food in Cheng Chumo’s bowl, Mo Dun lost his own appetite and set down his chopsticks. “I really am that bad. Who would intentionally write so ugly?”

“Exactly! My own name is the only thing I can write well,” Yuchi Baolin chimed in proudly, cradling a bowl no less impressive.

Well, two gluttons had found each other.

“He’s telling the truth,” Qin Huaiyu joined, settling in with a bowl just as large, his eyes shining with confidence.

“But aren’t you worried about offending the others by sitting here with me?” Mo Dun gestured to the students who’d retreated to a safe distance.

“Ha! As if we care about those fools!” Qin Huaiyu scoffed.

“Gluttons!” someone muttered under their breath.

With a loud thud, Yuchi Baolin slammed his bowl down and glared around menacingly. The other students immediately withdrew, not daring another word.

“Anyway, we’re here on official business. Here’s your wager!” Qin Huaiyu placed five golden leaves before Mo Dun.

“Oh?” Mo Dun raised an eyebrow. “And what about the tenfold winnings?”

A heavy wooden chest landed on the table. Cheng Chumo opened it, revealing stacks of gleaming silver. The entire hall caught its breath, eyes turning red with envy.

This was their money. Because they’d lost so much, they were now forced to gnaw on dry, tasteless flatbread for at least a month.

Seeing the mischievous glint in Qin Huaiyu’s eyes, Mo Dun was sure the trio had planned this—publicly handing over the winnings in front of everyone as revenge for him taking the lion’s share.

Mo Dun closed the chest with a faint smile. “I heard you three won nearly five thousand taels yourselves.”

Though his voice was soft, it carried to every ear. All at once, the students’ wrath turned toward Qin Huaiyu and his companions—the real culprits behind the Academy’s gambling losses.

The three exchanged nervous glances. “You’re the big winner! We just have big appetites and are broke,” they protested, not caring about being called gluttons in their desperation.

Mo Dun’s mind turned quickly, and he said casually, “Big appetites are nothing. As it happens, the Mo family village is about to start a gourmet business. Since we’re short on capital, you’ve brought it at just the right time. You’ll be my guests—eat to your heart’s content!”

“Really? Now that’s friendship!” Yuchi Baolin cheered, delighted at the promise of free meals—a lifeline for his empty pockets.

“A gourmet business, you say? Will the food be good?” Cheng Chumo was more concerned with quality.

Mo Dun cast a disdainful glance at his bland cafeteria meal. “This is pig’s feed.”

“No way, it tastes fine!” Yuchi Baolin protested, stuffing his face, earning eye-rolls from the other two.

What a fool—he’d called it pig’s feed and still kept eating. But the other two soon realized: if Mo Dun’s food business was truly that much better, it was certain to succeed.

No one doubted Mo Dun’s knack for making money. The secret of keeping live fish alone sustained the five thousand residents of Mo family village. Even their own fathers praised Mo Dun, always comparing him to their sons, lamenting their own children’s lack of achievement and even reducing their allowances.

Their once-comfortable lives had plummeted to the brink of subsistence—no wonder they’d resorted to organizing a gambling ring.

“Mo Dun is short on funds?” Cheng Chumo and Qin Huaiyu exchanged glances and nodded slowly.

“Brother Mo!” Qin Huaiyu scooted closer, full of flattery.

“Just say what you’re thinking,” Mo Dun replied warily.

“How big will this gourmet venture be?” Qin Huaiyu wheedled.

“Five thousand taels is good, ten thousand is better,” Mo Dun replied languidly.

“We made a tidy profit thanks to you. How about we help you out? The three of us will put up another five thousand taels!” Qin Huaiyu declared, as if making a grand gesture. In truth, their original stake was five hundred taels; they’d won forty-five hundred, totaling five thousand.

“You want a share, then?” Mo Dun arched an eyebrow.

“Exactly!” Cheng Chumo and Qin Huaiyu nodded vigorously, with Yuchi Baolin following suit after a moment’s hesitation.

“How much of a share are you after?” Mo Dun inquired.

“How about a fifty-fifty split?” Qin Huaiyu ventured tentatively.

Mo Dun shot him a sidelong glance and let out a cold laugh.

“No, sixty-forty. You sixty, I forty,” Qin Huaiyu amended sheepishly. Though it sounded fair, given Mo Dun’s secret recipes and the labor and resources of Mo family village, it was hardly equitable.

Mo Dun’s cold smile lingered.

“Seventy-thirty! We’ll take thirty percent, that’s already a bargain for us,” Cheng Chumo declared firmly.

Mo Dun looked at him in surprise; he hadn’t expected Cheng Chumo to be the most decisive of the three.

“Very well, thirty percent it is. But you’ll be in charge of acquiring the storefronts,” Mo Dun agreed, adding the condition. In Chang’an, the three were notorious troublemakers—having them on board would smooth over countless difficulties.