Chapter 190: Chapter 190: Eleven Sending Arhats
Feeling the sting of his losses, Stark stood up and called on Happy and his bodyguards to head towards the surveillance room of Caesar's Palace. He wanted to see exactly how he had lost.
Led by the manager, Stark walked into the surveillance room and immediately saw that annoying William laughing and chatting with the old guy, Smith, while watching the surveillance footage.
Upon hearing the report from his subordinates, Smith stood up with a smile to greet Stark, while William, grinning, stared at the bad luck curse hovering over Stark's head.
Releasing his mental power to lift the bad luck curse from Stark, William extended his hand, "Good morning, Mr. Stark."
Stark merely nodded at Smith, completely ignoring William's outstretched hand, and addressed Smith, "Mr. Smith, I would like to see the surveillance footage from last night."
Old Smith nodded with a smile, showing no sign of displeasure, and said, "Of course, Stark, that is your right."
"Please, follow me," Old Smith led Stark to the monitoring station and began to introduce the poker table they used last night. He explained, "For fairness, the table you used last night is a professional poker tournament table. Each player's seat has a camera, and every hand you played can be displayed here. For fairness, we also have cameras under your seats, on the chairs, and even focused on your upper bodies. I assure you the game was fair and just."
After explaining this, Smith noticed Stark nodding. These details were already mentioned to Stark and William before the game started. They also had signal-blocking devices on-site, which Happy and the bodyguards had checked, and Jarvis had found no issues with the surveillance, so Stark had no doubts in this regard.
Smith instructed his subordinates to play the video from the beginning. William and Smith remained silent; they had already watched it once before. When Stark arrived, the two were rewatching it, with Smith listening to his subordinates' analysis and William's self-praise.
Smith instructed two professional card players to explain to Stark and sat quietly by his side, accompanying him as he watched.
The more Stark watched, the darker his face became. This time, it seemed his luck had truly abandoned him. Listening to the analysis from the hotel's professional card players and looking at the statistical data provided by the hotel analysts, Stark understood that he had lost fair and square.
William's cards were 75% better than his own, and when he had good cards, William's were also decent. Stark's expressions, mouth movements, fingers, and even his heels had slight movements, especially when his heel moved, causing the red pocket square in his suit jacket pocket to move.
The video repeatedly showed William's expressionless stare at these small movements of Stark. Initially, William would randomly follow a few hands, but later he always folded. To avoid revealing his weakness to Stark, William deliberately let him win a few hands.
Most critically, Stark had a habit of drinking or eating snacks, playing with his fingers, or staring at the community cards when he had good cards.
Once or twice, even three or four times might not mean much, but when the analysts compiled all the videos of Stark's bluffs or attempts to lure William into going all-in, these small actions became glaringly obvious.
Watching the video of his own glaring weaknesses, Stark blushed. He was arrogant and proud, but not someone who couldn't accept defeat. Even with Jarvis's help, he couldn't beat William, leaving him with no grounds to complain.
But the thought of losing $4 billion in just four hours made his heart bleed, and he said unnaturally, "Alright, consider yourself lucky this time. I hope we can have a rematch next time." Stark decided to upgrade Jarvis immediately, input all the cards from this game into the program for analysis, so he could win back his losses next time.
William smiled at the stubborn Stark and shook his head. Seeing Stark's face darkening, William said, "Sorry, I wasn't mocking you. Stark, although you are one of the smartest people in the world, you can never beat me at cards."
Hearing William wasn't mocking him but instead praising him as one of the smartest people in the world (though Stark thought the "one of" part should be removed), he was still pleasantly surprised by this genius's compliment, though he quickly became wary.
Seeing Stark's face lighten a bit, William pointed to his own head and continued, "I can remember anything I want to notice. You know how good I am at archery; when playing cards, I can even notice the slightest movement of your pupils. So, no one can win against me in their first game."
Before William could finish, Stark laughed.
"You talk too much. I get it now. Your winning has nothing to do with all that. You're just trying to lure me into playing another game," Stark stared at William and said, "Using technology worth tens or even hundreds of billions of dollars to lure me once is enough. Goodbye, no, let's never meet again."
Seeing Stark not taking the bait, William regretted it but understood that tricking Stark once was already an achievement.
However, William wasn't ready to let Stark go that easily. "Maybe we should go somewhere for a drink and talk about the player project. What do you say, Stark?"
"Not interested. That small thing doesn't interest me anymore. I can design a better player than what you have with just a little time and effort," Stark looked at William and couldn't help but taunt, "Some people can't even drink. Do you want to watch us drink?"
"Sorry, in England, we can drink at 18. My favorite is whiskey, and I just won $4 billion, so the fine isn't an issue. Right, Mr. Stark?"
Seeing the two about to argue again, Old Smith quickly intervened, "Alright, gentlemen, let's be civil. Let's not forget who we are. We are billionaires. Drinking is not a big deal, let's move on. Come on, Tony, we haven't met in years, keep this old guy company."
Seeing Stark remain silent, Old Smith smiled and said, "I'll take you to my private wine cellar. I have quite a few aged whiskeys there. I think there are some rare Macallan vintages too."
Hearing about the rare Macallan vintages, Stark eagerly said, "Let's go. It would be great if you have the 1962 vintage."
As they walked past the lobby downstairs, William suddenly spotted two familiar faces, George and Peter, sitting at a table.
Seeing these two troublemakers, William couldn't help but wonder what they were doing here. Was something about to happen?
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