“Royal… flush?” Qi Xia frowned slightly. “What exactly does that mean in terms of the hand?”
“To be precise, it’s a ‘straight flush,’ but the highest possible one,” said Qiao Jiajin. “From ‘Ten’ to ‘Ace,’ five consecutive cards of the same suit. Among all straight flushes, this is the strongest—hence called the ‘Royal Flush.'”
Qi Xia glanced at the Earth Monkey shuffling the cards across the table, mulling over Qiao Jiajin’s words.
Could a straight flush actually exist in this game?
This game used traditional festivals and the 24 solar terms, which coincidentally also fell into four seasons. If the “straight flush” rule applied here, the strongest hand would require five consecutive numbers all from the same season.
The cards flashed through Qi Xia’s mind once more.
From “Start of Spring” to “Grain Rain” was one season.
From “Start of Summer” to “Great Heat” was another.
From “Start of Autumn” to “Frost’s Descent” made up the third.
And from “Start of Winter” to “Great Cold” completed the cycle.
The calculations were complex, taking some time as Qi Xia mentally converted each card into numbers, including the twelve “festival” cards.
“Wait… twelve festival cards?”
Qi Xia’s brow furrowed. He remembered more than twelve traditional festivals—why were some missing?
He listed them one by one:
Spring Festival, Lantern Festival.
She Ri Festival, Shangsi Festival, Cold Food Festival.
Qingming Festival, Dragon Boat Festival, Qixi Festival, Ghost Festival.
Mid-Autumn Festival, Double Ninth Festival, Xiayuan Festival.
And finally, Laba Festival and New Year’s Eve.
Even excluding minority celebrations, there were at least fourteen well-known festivals.
So why were there only twelve in this deck?
Had two been deliberately removed?
Qi Xia quickly zeroed in on “Qingming Festival.”
This one was interesting—in this “lunar month” game, “Qingming” would only appear as a term, just like “Qixi.”
But “Qingming” wasn’t just a festival; it was also one of the 24 solar terms. Thus, the card labeled “Qingming” would only exist once—removed from the festival category and treated solely as a solar term.
That left one extra festival. Which one stood out?
“Cold Food Festival…” Qi Xia slowly opened his eyes. In his memory, this was the only festival that differed fundamentally from the rest.
All other festivals had fixed dates on the lunar calendar, but Cold Food Festival didn’t.
It fell either 105 or 106 days after the winter solstice, or one or two days before Qingming.
In a game where precise numerical comparisons were key, the ambiguity of “Cold Food Festival” would disrupt gameplay, making its exclusion necessary.
With that settled, the remaining festivals numbered twelve. Combined with the solar terms, the deck totaled thirty-six cards. Now, by analyzing the “face-up” cards and the “community cards,” Qi Xia could roughly deduce the Earth Monkey’s hidden hand, improving his odds.
After mentally organizing all solar terms and festivals, Qi Xia converted them into numerical sequences—a tedious and time-consuming process.
Soon, his mind was filled with numbers, grouped into four seasonal categories: spring, summer, autumn, winter.
Yet even after mapping everything out, something still felt off.
If “Royal Flush” was theoretically possible by treating a season as a suit, Qi Xia found an odd inconsistency upon reviewing the dates:
No season’s numerical sequence could form a straight flush.
Due to the first half of the year following the “sixth and twenty-first” rule, dates heavily featured “6,” “2,” and “1.” Meanwhile, the latter half’s “eighth and twenty-third” rule introduced “8,” “2,” and “3.”
The repetitive numbers drastically reduced possible combinations.
Qi Xia found the situation oddly amusing. While ancient calendar-makers could never have anticipated their system being used for Texas Hold’em, they’d somehow managed to avoid the possibility of a straight flush.
Spring lacked a “5,” summer was missing a “3,” autumn had no “6,” and winter skipped “4.”
No season contained five consecutive numbers, even with festivals included.
This serendipitous design gave Qi Xia a strange sense of connection with the centuries-old architects of the lunar calendar.
“Fists,” Qi Xia snapped back to reality, turning to Qiao Jiajin. “Aside from ‘Royal Flush,’ what’s the rest of the hand hierarchy?”
Qiao Jiajin mimicked Qi Xia by stroking his chin, then grimaced and pulled his hand away. “Right after Royal Flush comes a regular straight flush.”
Qi Xia nodded—straight flushes were off the table.
“Next is ‘Four of a Kind,'” Qiao Jiajin explained. “That’s four identical numbers—like what you just won with.”
“Got it.”
“After that comes a ‘Full House’—three of one number plus a pair.” He held up three fingers on one hand and two on the other.
“Okay.”
“Then ‘Flush’—five cards from the same suit. Below that is ‘Straight’—five sequential numbers, regardless of suit. Then it’s ‘Three of a Kind,’ ‘Two Pair,’ and finally ‘One Pair.'”
Qi Xia quickly assessed the feasibility of each hand in this game and frowned. “Seems the standard Texas Hold’em rankings don’t fully apply here.”
“Huh?”
“Some combinations that are rare in poker become easy here. Like ‘Flush.'” Qi Xia elaborated. “If you draw ‘Winter Solstice,’ the numbers ‘1,1,2,3’ are all from winter, making a Flush highly likely. So its value shouldn’t be as high.”
“Now that you mention it…” Qiao Jiajin narrowed his eyes. “Some poker variants adjust rankings based on deck size.”
“Exactly. So our next move is to test different hands and let the Earth Monkey reveal the true hierarchy.”
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