The middle-aged man was not a person of any status; he was just an ordinary gambler!
My previous deductions were all wrong!
The great detective Sherlock Holmes once said: When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.
Therefore, I was certain that the middle-aged man's true identity was a well-disguised gambler!
Compared to the vast majority of gamblers, the identities of a cheat or a highly skilled individual were too sensitive.
If nothing else, anyone with this level of skill in Baccarat couldn't be an ordinary, unknown person, could they?
Whether a cheat or a highly skilled individual proficient in algorithms and formulas, it would be easy to find out with a little effort and means.
Thus, only a gambler was the most suitable.
Because the base group of gamblers is simply too large!
Since the goal was to target me, only by taking an unconventional approach could victory be achieved.
Just like when I set a trap for Kang Muru, it didn't take much effort. I just needed to find a gambler from another venue who wasn't too conspicuous and hadn't yet fallen into debt, and offer them a small reward to get them to cooperate.
Of course, the prerequisite was to keep the person firmly under control.
...
After figuring out the intricacies, only one question remained before me.
How did the middle-aged man know what cards would be dealt in each round?
During this period, before the long streak trend emerged, he would deliberately lose some inconsequential rounds, but I knew that was just to cover his tracks.
It was certain that the cards in the venue were definitely not the problem.
Because these were Bee poker cards specifically for casinos, and they were shuffled from eight decks.
The only person who could mark or tamper with the cards was the dealer.
But if the dealer had a problem, they wouldn't have signaled for help by crying "stop thief."
Moreover, when I was dealing earlier, I had discreetly checked, and there were no signs of tampering on the back of the cards.
So, the dealer can be ruled out.
Just as I was about to skip the dealer and return to the middle-aged man, a sentence that had flashed through my mind earlier suddenly reappeared.
Crying stop thief...
"Crying... stop, thief?!"
As I savored the meaning of these four words repeatedly in my mind, I suddenly thought of a possibility.
Since it was confirmed that the middle-aged man's identity was that of an ordinary gambler, then besides the dealer, there was another point that could be exploited for him to accurately know the outcome of each hand:
The surveillance camera!
Or rather, someone working in the monitoring room!
Just like in the movie "God of Gamblers," where the real God of Gamblers, Chen Xiaodao, was spied on up close and without blind spots by the fake God of Gamblers, Hou Saiyin, using a high-definition camera!
The more I thought about it, the more I felt this possibility was very high!
Because in the VIP rooms, the dealers manually shuffled and dealt cards to the guests.
Unless the guests specifically requested it, automatic shuffling machines and card shoes were generally not used.
After all, the guests were spending a lot of money to enjoy (lose) money, and they expected something different from the main hall, didn't they?
And VIP rooms primarily focused on providing a hospitable service experience. To make guests gamble (lose) happily, they went all out with both substance and style.
Why do many people know that a casino is a place of no return, a money pit that devours but never spits out, yet still fall victim to it?
It's precisely because they have a strong sense of self-conceit.
Anyone who has gambled outside knows that compared to casinos, card rooms are the truly deadly places!
Because card rooms cheat everyone!
As long as you dare to gamble in a card room, regardless of whether you've shown your wealth or not, you'll be taken down!
Casinos are different.
Apart from deliberately malicious cheats, in most cases, casinos only target two types of people.
One is the clueless fool who gambles for novelty and excitement.
These fools usually don't enter VIP rooms, fearing being ripped off, so they only play in the main hall.
As for the other type, they are the "smart" ones who believe they have figured out the casino's tricks and want to outsmart the casino.
And often, the fate of these "smart" ones is quite tragic.
Putting aside other tricks, how many people's wallets have been ruined by just one high-definition surveillance camera?
Do you think it's to ensure the fairness and justice of the game, and the basic rights of the gamblers?
Wrong! It's to secretly film your cards!
Of course, small-time casinos wouldn't bother.
If they're going to do it, they go for the big fish.
The trick is to first bait the hook, giving the target person some benefits.
Then, during certain crucial gambling rounds, they use surveillance cameras to secretly film the target person's hole cards and inform the dealer of the results.
Upon receiving the feedback, the dealer would use the hidden compartment in the card shoe to deal cards specifically designed to defeat the target person.
As for the dealers serving in VIP rooms, although most of them don't know any cheating techniques, they are capable of performing simple sleight of hand with props or other high-tech methods to switch cards.
They don't fear you winning money; they fear you not gambling!
So, as the old saying goes, not gambling is winning!
...
Connecting all the deductions and running through them like a whirlwind in my mind, I was certain...
This was a "crying stop thief" setup!
It truly lived up to a line from those crime-solving detective dramas: the informant is the murderer!
And the mastermind has been firmly identified as Da Fei!
It would be impossible for an ordinary person to persuade or bribe employees within Tian Du.
Now, only one final step remained before the net could be cast and the situation resolved.
Evidence of crying stop thief.
Compared to the middle-aged man, who was purely a tool, the mole in the monitoring room was the key to breaking the case.
How did the other party transmit signals to the middle-aged man without being discovered?
With this thought, I shifted my gaze from solely focusing on the middle-aged man's hands to his entire face.
The middle-aged man's hands had been on the gambling table the entire time, so the possibility of sending signals via mobile phone could be directly ruled out.
If the phone was ruled out, then to receive signals from the mole in the monitoring room remotely, there was only one way...
A wireless micro-earpiece!
There was no need to listen to voice broadcasts. As long as they had pre-arranged special codes, the mole could use intermittent coughs, finger taps, or other slight sounds from objects to transmit the card path for each round silently.