The afternoon's competition had just begun, and before I could devise a perfect strategy to break the deadlock, suddenly…
I was dealt my hole cards.
A pair of Jacks. While not an earth-shattering pair, it was certainly not insignificant.
In Texas Hold'em, for a cheat, receiving a pair as hole cards is a double-edged sword.
This is because the winning hand is determined by the five community cards dealt face-up on the table.
To win, one must rely on the sequence of the five community cards to match the hole cards in hand.
However, with a pair as hole cards from the start, the amount bet is crucial.
Betting too little is essentially giving others an opportunity.
Betting too much, if the subsequent community card sequence is unfavorable, is like jumping into a fiery pit.
As I mentioned earlier, the betting order in each round of Texas Hold'em is different, and this premise leads to…
The order in which the cards are dealt also being unpredictable.
If the community card sequence is unfavorable, and you still wish to win, you would inevitably have to cheat and switch cards. However…
Once the dealing order for that round is against you, for instance, if you are in a later position to reveal your cards, as long as there's a card clash, the dealer can directly rule you out according to the rules.
Therefore, holding this pair of Jacks as my hole cards, I was quite frustrated.
This was because, in this round, I was in the last position.
Moreover, the sequence of the first three cards dealt had little correlation with a pair of Jacks.
Should I play it safe and wait, or go all-in to grab some chips?
After everyone before me had finished betting, I hesitated for less than three seconds before choosing to go all-in.
There was no other choice. Before it was my turn to bet, three out of the four people ahead of me had raised their bets.
The most aggressive raise came from Isabella, who directly pushed her bet to one million!
It was clear she had good hole cards.
Initially, the others, upon seeing Isabella raise to a million, were already struggling to decide whether to call. When they saw me go all-in directly…
Without a moment's pause or hesitation, those three individuals chose to fold.
Seeing this, I couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief inwardly.
The all-in move was quite intimidating.
As long as you truly have a strong hand, others are unlikely to call.
This is because losing an all-in round means the tragic outcome of all your hard work over half a year vanishing overnight, returning you to square one.
Next, if Isabella also chose to fold, I could directly take the approximately 300,000 chips on the table, which would be a nice gain.
But what I didn't expect was Isabella calling my all-in bet, which was around 11 million.
And after calling, she even winked playfully at me.
Upon seeing this, my heart sank.
She had started the competition with just over 30 million chips, and had already eliminated one person earlier.
Combined with the scattered chips she had accumulated, she now had close to 50 million chips, making her the undisputed leader at my table.
Even if she lost this hand, it wouldn't be a significant blow.
But for me, it was different. Isabella could afford to lose… I absolutely could not!
If I lost this all-in round, it would mean I was directly eliminated.
Could it be that Isabella's starting hand was even better than my pair of Jacks?
Or, as a professional player, did she clearly know the sequence of cards the dealer would deal?
Unlike other card games, the shuffling process for Texas Hold'em dealers is very particular.
After unsealing a new deck of cards, the dealer never shuffles them all at once.
Instead, the deck is divided into four parts, with 13 cards in each part. After interleaving and shuffling them, the card order is mixed without any discernible pattern or rule using single and cross-shuffling methods.
Furthermore, since this competition involved a fresh deck for each round, even with my exceptional memory as a cheat, I couldn't keep up with the shuffling and changing of cards from one round to the next.
If, at the beginning, I could vaguely remember the order of a dozen or twenty cards, then as time went on…
After so many rounds, with my memory constantly being overwritten, the probability of me remembering and predicting the upcoming cards is infinitesimally small, to the point of being negligible.
Only professional Texas Hold'em players, through years of repetitive training, can discover a special method for predicting card sequences.
At this critical juncture, Isabella daring to call my all-in bet must mean she had confidence.
Could it be that my participation in this gambling tournament, intended to get closer to Yun Jin, was about to end at Isabella's hands?
………………
After the all-in, the dealer dealt the cards without pause, completing the distribution of all cards in one go.
2, 6, 9, Q, Q.
The two Queens dealt at the end, in sequence, slightly boosted my chances.
There was still a chance!
As long as Isabella's two hole cards were not a pair of Queens, no matter what cards she held, I could win by cheating and switching cards!
With this thought, I exhaled a silent breath.
At the same time, using the opportunity to reach into my pocket for a lighter, I secretly prepared two other Queens, different from those on the table.
The sleeves held the hidden cards, ready to be deployed as soon as Isabella revealed her cards!
What I didn't expect was that Isabella, going first, revealed her hole cards as a 6 and a 9!
Combined with the five community cards, that made three pairs in total.
According to the rules of Texas Hold'em, the best five cards are formed by taking the highest cards from the hole cards and the community cards.
In other words, her two pairs were a pair of 9s and a pair of Queens, which were inferior to my Jacks, Queens, and Queens.
I didn't need to cheat… I could win directly!
Honestly, when I saw Isabella reveal her cards, I was stunned. It was a feeling of utter disbelief.
Was this… a pure luck turnaround?
As I was contemplating this in my mind, I saw a flicker of cunning in Isabella's eyes, and I suddenly realized…
She was deliberately letting me win!
I wasn't sure if the card sequence was clear, but I was certain that Isabella had thrown this round.
This is because professional players never passively call an all-in.
With this realization, as the dealer announced me as the winner of the round, I smiled and nodded my thanks to Isabella.
She, however, nonchalantly played with her chips, seemingly unconcerned.
Following this, whether it was my luck truly turning or Isabella wanting to slow down the pace, I actually started to gain momentum!
Over the next hour or so, my chips began to climb steadily. From being second to last, I had won chips to a number almost equal to Isabella's.
Meanwhile, the person who had been ranked last was eliminated directly after losing all their chips.
Around 4 PM, as another person at the table lost all their chips, the top three players at our table… were determined ahead of time!