Between the detached villas, the Dodge Hellcat moved slowly, Felicia's smile somewhat stiff, while Luo An's face radiated calmness, leisurely enjoying the sea breeze.
After Felicia's introduction just now, Luo An realized that the club's activities tonight resembled instances in some games.
Unlike games where instances are always present and can be entered sequentially,
this club's "instances" have time restrictions; you can choose only two per night, one in the early half and one in the latter half, the rest must be forsaken.
This also means that selecting the correct activities is necessary to maximize benefits.
Why the club's management designed it this way—whether to assess new members' agility in thinking or to test their luck—Luo An didn't have enough information at hand to figure out.
Unable to guess, Luo An decisively chose to visit each site in turn, making decisions based on the situations encountered.
However, the distances between activity locations were quite vast, making driving somewhat tiresome, so Luo An delegated this task to Felicia.
At this time, Felicia was seething internally, expecting that Luo An might ask a lot of her, even some excessive demands, but never imagined he would simply have her drive!
As Felicia drove, she internally ranted non-stop. After passing eight activity sites, Luo An suddenly exclaimed:
"Stop the car!"
Screech—
Felicia immediately stepped on the accelerator and stopped the car, Luo An pointed to a single-story villa nearby and asked:
"What activity is happening there tonight?"
Felicia instantly brightened up with a vibrant smile and replied:
"There's a card game tonight that complies with Massachusetts law, starting at 10 o'clock."
"OK."
Without hesitation, Luo An got out of the car, patted the door, and said:
"Park in front of the villa number 33, come back to pick me up when I call you."
Watching Luo An, who showed no interest in her and walked away without looking back, Felicia muttered disapprovingly, turned the sports car around, then pulled out a small phone from her lower back and dialed a number.
The call was quickly answered, a somewhat elderly male voice emerged:
"Which one did he choose?"
Felicia responded somberly:
"Site number eleven."
"How many decisions did he make?"
"Just one. He had me drive around all activity sites, and when we reached site eleven, he immediately had me stop the car and chose it."
"..."
The breathing on the other end of the phone suddenly became slightly rapid, and without much further talk, the call was abruptly hung up.
Felicia put away her phone and continued driving. At site number eleven, in a room behind the villa, an elderly white man with grey hair and a face full of wrinkles sat on a chair, turning his head to his side and asked:
"Did you make prior contact with that young guy?"
"Do you think I would do something that boring?"
On the other side, an elderly white man with the same weathered face and wearing tea-colored glasses, looked disdainfully at his friend and said:
"Obviously, this Luo An Greenwood's perfect case-solving rate isn't some gimmick fabricated by Clement.
Either he's very lucky, very intelligent, or he can notice things in details that ordinary people can't."
The grey-haired elderly man set his phone aside, his expression somewhat wistful:
"I heard this young guy is not even thirty yet, just twenty-seven or twenty-eight, truly an enviable age... His father wasn't even as outstanding as him at that age."
"Yes."
The tea-colored glasses elderly man glanced at him, took a small sip of red wine from the table, and said:
"Let's go out and have a chat with him."
"No rush."
The grey-haired elderly man waved his hand and said:
"Let him play in the card game outside for a while, we'll chat with him after he loses a few rounds."
The tea-colored glasses elderly man looked disdainfully at his friend:
"Again with your method of dampening someone's spirits first, aren't you tired of it?"
The grey-haired elderly man chuckled:
"As long as it works."
————
Meanwhile, walking into the lavishly decorated foyer of the single-story villa, Luo An saw several conspicuous gaming tables appear before him.
"Good evening, Mr. Member..."
As Luo An entered the foyer, a staff member immediately approached him, but before he could finish speaking, a charming young girl came up, waved her hand to send him aside, and then looked at Luo An with a smile, asking:
"Why didn't you call me?"
The girl was none other than Sweety, who had a very generous demeanor. Luo An looked down, smiled at her, and said:
"Sorry, I just forgot."
"..."
Sweety rolled her eyes dramatically, not wanting to dwell on it, and pulled Luo An's arm, walking deeper into the hall as she asked:
"How did you choose this place? Where did you find the clue? Can you share it with me?"
Luo An raised an eyebrow and replied:
"What clue?"
"?"
Sweety paused, looking up at Luo An with a surprised expression:
"You didn't find a clue? Then how did you come here?"
Actually, Luo An used the "emotional perception" in his mind, sensing some familiar emotional fluctuations in this single-story villa.
Moreover, the people in this villa had much happier positive emotions than those elsewhere. Combining this with the rules previously explained by guide Felicia, Luo An immediately concluded that this place was most likely the correct location.
However, there was no need to explain this. Luo An spread his hands:
"Maybe I'm just lucky."
"Wow."
Sweety looked at Luo An with admiration. Knowing that it was Luo An's first visit here, there was no need for him to lie. She gave him a thumbs up while walking and introducing:
"This is one of our club's little games. Every two months, on the gathering occasion, a primary location is randomly assigned, and clues are distributed around the club.
Those who find the clues and reach the primary location are successful, and the successful person will receive a Gold Coin, which is a currency used to trade information within our club."
Luo An squinted slightly and asked:
"Is there a punishment for failure?"
"Does not getting a Gold Coin count as a punishment?"
Sweety laughed, patting Luo An on the arm, and said:
"You're really lucky, finding the primary location on your first visit."
Luo An then asked:
"How did you find this place?"
Sweety didn't seem like someone particularly good at finding clues.
With hands on her hips and a proud tilt of her head, Sweety declared:
"I bought the clue with a Gold Coin."
"..."
Finding the primary location earns one a Gold Coin, but Sweety spent a Gold Coin to buy the whereabouts of this location… Luo An blinked, not quite grasping Sweety's logic.
But soon Luo An learned the reason behind Sweety's actions. She pulled him close to a gaming table and whispered:
"See these card games? We don't play with external money here; winnings and losses are paid with our club's Gold Coins.
How good are you at cards? Want to play a round?"
Luo An's eyes flickered, smiling, he said:
"But I don't have any Gold Coins right now. Even if arriving here earns me one, I only have one, which doesn't seem enough to play."
"That's okay."
Sweety waved extravagantly, her eyes twinkling, and whispered:
"I can lend you Gold Coins. How about borrowing 10 and returning 13? Fair and square, right?"
Luo An: "…How did you even get into this club?"