Chapter 17 The Ace of Clubs... is exactly what you see on playing cards...

That whole afternoon, I was walking in the lush garden when I suddenly saw two people in the distance.I jumped up for joy. I am saved.Maybe this is somewhere in America. I walked towards them and suddenly thought that I might have difficulty communicating with them in language.I speak only German, English and a little Norwegian - the latter I learned as a sailor on the "Maria" for four years.The inhabitants of this island may well have spoken a completely different language. I took a closer look and saw the two men bent over, looking at the small field below them.Only then did I notice that they were much shorter than I was.Are they children? I went up and saw they were digging up some plant roots and putting them in a basket.Suddenly they turned around and looked up at me.The two men were a bit fat, less than my shoulder height.They have brown hair and greasy, auburn skin.Both wore the same dark blue uniform, the only difference being that one had three black buttons sewn into the sleeve, while the other had only two.

"Good afternoon!" I greeted them in English. The two short men put down the tools in their hands and stared blankly at me. "Do you speak English?" I asked. They waved their hands and shook their heads. On a whim, I switched to talking to them in my native language.The man with the three buttons on his uniform replied in fluent German: "If you have more than three points in hand, you can beat us, but we sincerely beg you not to." It is conceivable that I didn't know how to answer for a while.On a deserted island in the Atlantic Ocean, someone spoke to me in my native language, and I couldn't understand what he was saying. What exactly does "three points" refer to? "I strayed into your place, and I did not have any malicious intentions." For my own safety, I have to say this.

"Fortunately, you have no malicious intentions, otherwise the king will punish you." Is there a king here? I froze for a moment.Obviously this island is not in North America. "Can I have an audience with His Majesty the King?" I asked. The man with the two-button uniform joins our conversation now."Which king do you want to see?" he asked. "Didn't your friend just say that the king is going to punish me?"' I said. The man with two buttons looked back at the man with three buttons and said in a low voice, "As I expected, this man doesn't understand the rules."

The man with the three buttons looked up at me. "There is more than one king here," he said. "Oh, really? How many kings are there?" The two dwarves showed disdain on their faces.Obviously, they were laughing at me for asking stupid questions. "Each set has a king," the man with the two buttons answered me with a sigh. I noticed only now that their stature was really very small, almost like a dwarf, but the proportions of their features and limbs were the same as those of normal people.At the same time, I also doubt whether the minds of these two dwarfs are a bit dull.

I was about to ask them how many "groups" they were talking about, so that I could find out how many kings there were on the island, but on second thought I decided not to raise the question for the time being. "What was the name of the most powerful king?" I asked. The two dwarves looked at each other and shook their heads. "Is this man trying to trick us?" said the two-button dwarf. "I don't know," answered the three-button dwarf. "But we have to answer the questions he asked." The two-button dwarf stretched out his hand, brushed away a fly that had landed on his cheek, and said, "According to the rules here, the black king may attack the red king, and the red king may strike back as the case may be."

"Isn't it barbaric to fight and kill?" I said. "This is our rule." Suddenly, we heard a loud bang in the distance, as if a piece of glass had been smashed.The two dwarfs turned their heads at the same time, looking at the place where the noise came from. "The idiot cursed the two-button dwarf." More than half of what they made was smashed. " At this moment they were standing with their backs to me.I suddenly saw that there were two black plum blossoms painted on the back of the dwarf with two buttons.On the back of the dwarf with three buttons, there are three flowers painted on it.These clubs; are the patterns we see on our playing cards.It seems that there must be some kind of mystery in what the two dwarves said just now.

As they turned back to face me, I decided to take another tactic. "Are there many inhabitants on the island?" I asked. The two dwarfs looked at each other with a puzzled look on their faces. "He asks too many questions," said one of them. "Well, the man has no manners," said another. I thought to myself, this conversation is as bad as it gets, because although I can understand every word they say, I can't make out what they mean.If we compare hands and feet, the communication effect may be better. "How many people are there on the island?" I began to feel impatient.

"Look for yourself! There are two of us, one is 'two' and the other is 'three'." The dwarf with three plum blossoms on his back replied: "If you need glasses, then you have to go to Floyd, Because only he knows how to cut glass." "What about you? How many of you are there?" asked another dwarf. "Only me." I replied. The two-button dwarf looked back and saw the three-button dwarf, and suddenly whistled. "He's an Ace!" he said. "Then we're doomed," said another dwarf, panicked. "Even kings will be defeated by him."

As he spoke, he took out a small bottle from his underwear pocket, put his mouth on the mouth of the bottle, took a sip of the crystal liquid contained in it, and then handed the bottle to his partner for him to take a sip too. "Isn't Ace a lady?" the three-button dwarf exclaimed. "Not necessarily," said the other dwarf. "The queen is the only card that remains female forever. This guy could have come from another deck." "Nonsense! There's only one deck of cards here, and Ace is a woman." "Maybe you're right, but he only needs four buttons to beat us."

"It's easy to beat us, but it's not easy to beat our king. This guy played us both." The two dwarves drank from the bottle while talking, and their eyelids gradually became heavy as they drank.Suddenly, the two-button dwarf began to jerk and jerk all over.He looked up at me and said, "Goldfish don't tell the island's secrets, but Buns do." The two dwarves lay down on the ground and murmured: "Rhubarb root...mango..."strawberry...date...lemon...coconut...banana..." They named a succession of fruits and varieties of berries, some of which I had never heard in my life.While chanting, they turned over and fell asleep on the ground.

I put out my foot and kicked them to wake them up, but they didn't budge. This left me alone.I must have thought that this small island might be a sanctuary for incurable mental patients, and the drink that the two dwarves drank just now was most likely a sedative.If so, doctors and nurses could show up at any moment and accuse me of trespassing and harassing patients. I took a step, ready to leave.A short, stout man walked towards me.The dark blue uniform he was wearing was the same style as the two dwarfs just now, but there were two rows of buttons on the chest, a total of ten buttons.His brown skin also looked greasy. "The master dreams of meeting Duke Zhou, the dwarf is free and easy!" He danced and sang, and glanced at me slyly. I thought to myself, maybe this guy is also mentally ill. I stretched out my arm and pointed to the two people lying not far away. "The two shorties appear to be asleep." Hearing what I said, the fat man who just came ran away immediately.Although he strode hard on his two stubby legs, he couldn't run fast, and he fell down before running very far, and just ran away stumbling all the way.I saw clearly that there were ten plum blossoms painted on his back. After walking for a while, I saw a narrow ox cart road. After walking along the path for a short time, I heard a clamor like thunder behind me, which sounded like horseshoes, gradually approaching me.I quickly turned around and jumped to the side of the road. A pack of six-legged monsters I had seen that morning on the island were now running towards me.Two of them had a person riding on their backs.A dwarf followed, brandishing a long stick in his hand as he ran.All three of them wore the same dark blue uniform with four, six and eight buttons on the chest. "Stop, stop!" I yelled as the team rushed past me. Only the guy running down the road (he had eight buttons on his chest) turned around and slowed down a little. "Fifty-two years later, the shipwrecked grandson returned to the village and yelled madly at him. In a blink of an eye, the three dwarves and a group of monsters disappeared without a trace.I found that the number of plum blossoms painted on the backs of the dwarves was the same as the double-breasted buttons on their chests. Palm trees with a bunch of yellow fruits stand on both sides of the road.Under one of the palm trees was parked a two-wheeled cart with many yellow fruits inside.It looked like the wagon my father used to deliver bread, but here it was a two-wheeled cart, and the carts were not ordinary horses but six-legged monsters. It was only when I got to the front of the car that I spotted a dwarf sitting under a palm tree.The buttons on his chest are single row, five in total.Other than that, his uniform is identical to that of the other shorties.The gnomes I've encountered on the island so far all have one thing in common: their round heads are covered with thick, brown hair. "Plum Blossom Five, good afternoon, let me say hello to him. He raised his head and glanced at me lazily: "Noon——" Before he finished speaking, he suddenly sat up straight, stared at me with wide eyes, and remained silent for a while. "Turn around and he finally speaks. I turned around as ordered.After a while, I turned around and faced him, and saw him sitting on the ground, stretching out two fat and short fingers, scratching his head non-stop. "Trouble!" He sighed and raised his hand in the air. Two fruits swished down from the palm tree, one of which landed on Mei Huawu's lap, and the other almost hit me in the head.A few seconds later, I saw plum blossom seven and plum blossom nine climb down from the tree.Now I have seen nine cards of clubs from two to ten. "We're going to hit him on the head with a shuka fruit," said Seven of Clubs. "This kid is really clever, jump aside." Mei Huajiu said. They sat down beside Five of Clubs under the palm tree. "Okay, okay," I said. "I can forgive you, but you have to answer a few simple questions, or I'll break the necks of all three of you! Understand?" I managed to scare them off.The three dwarfs were so frightened that they sat obediently under the tree, not daring to make a sound.I looked at their faces in turn, looking directly into their dark brown eyes. "Tell me, where are you from?" They stood up one by one, and each uttered a strange sentence: "The baker hides the magic island and the treasure." Said Five of Clubs. "The truth lies in the cards," said the Seven of Clubs. "Only the lonely buffoon sees through the deception." Mei Huajiu finally said. I shake my head. "Thank you for the information," I said. "But you haven't told me, who are you?" "Club Blossom Card." Five of Clubs replied immediately.It seemed he was worried that I would break his neck. "I can see that. But where did you come from? Did it fall from the sky, or come out of the soil like clover leaves?" I questioned the three dwarves in front of me. The three dwarves looked at each other.After a while, Plum Blossom Nine answered my question: "We are from the village." "Oh, really? Then let me ask you, how many...field workers like you live in the village?" "No." Plum Blossom Seven said. "I mean, it's just us who live in the village. There are people who are exactly like us. " "Of course. But, generally speaking, how many field workers live on this island?" I kept asking. The three dwarves glanced at each other quickly again. "Let's go!" Meihuajiu said to his partners, "Let's dodge!" "Can we beat him?" Plum Blossom Seven asked. "I meant 'flash', not 'beat'!" As they spoke, they turned over and climbed onto the two-wheeled vehicle.One of the dwarves slapped the hexapod on the back.The white animal immediately spread its six hooves and galloped on the road. I am very frustrated.Of course, I could prevent their escape, I could even break their necks, but doing so would not solve the mystery in my mind.