Elite Mages' Academy Chapter 278: Odds

Chapter 278: Odds

The ones who started the gambling pool never expected that it would turn so out huge. It absolutely exceeded everyone’s expectations.
After a few days, it was not just the students who were participating. Thanks to the Dawn Academy Evening News, even those in the New World started to participate. However, other than a few opportunists, most of the betters were fresh graduates, since they were the ones that needed the most money.
However, with the new participants they could not just limit themselves to redemption points anymore, especially since it was troublesome to exchange redemption points for New Dollars. Those graduates instead reopened the gambling pool using New Dollars.
Casinos were common in Planet Norma. Both the colonists and the natives were quite interested in that form of entertainment, as well as the idea of striking it rich overnight.
However, other than a few exceptions, most of the students in school did not care about the casinos. Only a few elites like Chen Yu actually had New Dollars with them, but in order to participate, they would need to get the upper year students to help them in the New World.
Based on Dawn Academy’s rules, other than a few exceptions, freely heading into the New World was a privilege reserved for graduates.
Xiao Lin heard about the matter from Song Junlang. It was obvious that Song Junlang wanted to make all the money he could from both the academy and the New World.
“How did you do it? I’m referring to the pool in the New World.” Xiao Lin already managed to get the odds from Song Junlang. He could only say that they were much crazier about this than the students. His own odds were 1:100, and it was in New Dollars. In comparison, the forums really looked like child’s play.
“It’s nothing; just set some waves into motion.” Song Junlang was not surprised by the development, saying, “There are plenty of similar gambling pools. There aren’t any sports tournaments on Planet Norma, but there are still plenty of things to bet on, such as inter-academy tournaments, which is a tournament between all the academies, or even the victors of war.”
“War? Hasn’t war stopped for many years?”
“It’s just between the natives. Even without us, Planet Norma had never been all that peaceful. Their wars are even more ferocious than what we see on Earth.”
“How much do you plan on putting inside?” Xiao Lin asked.
“How much do you have on hand?”
“9000 New Dollars and 2000 redemption points.” The redemption points were basically all his earnings from the monthly examination as well as what he made from classes. He had practically spent all of his redemption points from earlier. Thinking about it, Xiao Lin added, “If you need it, I can always exchange some more redemption points.”
“There’s no need, New Dollars are more valuable than redemption points. After this gamble, those who made a lot of money from it would definitely hurry to exchange their points, which will lead to a big drop in the exchange rate. There’s no way out of that. Redemption points can only be used here after all,” Song Junlang said.
“Are we throwing all of it in?”
“Of course, we go big or go home!”
The corner of Xiao Lin’s lips twitched, calculating it silently. His odds in the academy were one to twenty, so 2,000 points would get him 40,000. However, based on the New World’s one to one hundred odds, his 9,000 New Dollars would turn into 900,000 New Dollars.
“What, are you afraid you’ll lose?” Song Junlang thought Xiao Lin was hesitating.
Xiao Lin shook his head. Since Song Junlang was so confident, he would place his trust in him, but after some thought, he said, “The casino on the New World; if we need our real names to be able to bet, remember to use yours.”
“Why?”
“Ah, I’m afraid of what will happen if it becomes known I have that sort of money.”
Song Junlang rolled his eyes, saying, “That sum isn’t that much. Those capable of reaching Gold-rank and above would all have a lot more than that.”
No matter what, that sum was an eye-opening number for Xiao Lin currently. Even if he had not been too invested earlier on, he started to place more importance to winning the bet.
The other monitors were the same, but they were not fighting for money, but rather for their reputations. They did not have that much capital to begin with, but their reputations would definitely be bolstered if they won in the academy. That reputation would definitely be very useful when they eventually stepped into the New World.
Currently, the quickest way to increase their attributes was through combat training and learning related skills. That was the conclusion they arrived on after several months.
However, the speed that their attributes increased by was filled with uncertainty. Their innate talents, the intensity of their training, and even the state of their bodies and mental conditions could all affect it.
The monitors did have some problems with their training. Students with talents were naturally more skilled than most, so sparring with normal students yielded very little. To the monitors, their best sparring partners were each other, which caused problems to arise.
Not everyone was as honest as Cheng Ming. When training with their own competitors, tricks started to appear.
“You’re cheating! How could you not dodge that? Even if you wanted to slow down my growth, you don’t have to go so easy. This is a practical training session!”
“You’re way too quick, I couldn’t dodge it! Wait, don’t you know the Sweeping Strike skill? That attack hits a wide area. I’ve seen you use it during the monthly exam; why aren’t you using it now? You’re the one who’s faking it...”
...
Those kinds of conversations could be heard increasingly frequently on the training grounds. No one actually knew how effective it was, and it did not cause any grudges, but some verbal spats were unavoidable.
Some of them had wanted to spar with Xiao Lin as well, since his skills had been recognized now. Unfortunately, Xiao Lin chose to use the simulated combat system instead. It was a lot more convenient compared to fighting with actual opponents.
The simulated combat system was expensive and hard to maintain, so Dawn Academy had less than a hundred in the entire academy. It was widely used by the higher year students, so other than Xiao Lin, none of the other first years had convenient access.
There were naturally those who were unhappy with that, and there were even some who detested Xiao Lin’s special privileges. Even though they respected Xiao Lin’s skill, they did not think Xiao Lin would ever be able to compete with Chen Dao and Cheng Ming. Currently, only the two of them were regarded to have a chance to reach Black Iron-rank in the short term.