Ten Days End

But what's the reason?

Obviously, you can use wood chips to make a box directly, which is more convenient for surface engraving and gilding, but someone has the ingenuity to hollow out each side of this box. Now, to be precise, this is not a box, but a closed structure made up of six wooden boxes.

Moreover, according to the rules, this wooden box will not participate in the game at all, but it has been placed on the table. Could it have other uses?

Before Qi Xia could figure it out, Di Hou had stood up and reached out to take the wooden box back, then wiped it carefully, checked the corners, and put it back on the table after confirming that there was no damage.

"Please give me a heads up before touching my things in the future." Di Hou said with a somewhat unhappy look, "Even if you want to commit suicide, I will give you a knife as soon as possible. Why bother with a box?"

Qi Xia stared at the other person's eyes and slowly revealed a wicked smile.

His red face, evil smile, and slightly trembling right hand made him look like a devil, which made the monkey lean back.

"Now I finally wake up a little bit..." Qi Xia said, "You just told us that "Frost Descent" is "September 23", right?"

"...Yes." The monkey agreed.

Qi Xia nodded after hearing this. Zheng Yingxiong's question pointed out the most critical point. Now he seemed to know how to conduct this "big or small competition".

The fog was partially dispelled, and the hidden knowledge emerged.

The twenty-four solar terms are neither the solar calendar nor the lunar calendar, but the lunar and solar calendar.

So whether it is the solar calendar or the lunar calendar, the date of each year will change. If you want to deduce the numbers on all the cards, you can only think of two ways at present.

First, know a year exactly.

Second, know the exact date of one of the days exactly.

"Traditional festivals" are naturally easy to say, and the "lunar calendar" is unchanging.

For example, the "Qixi Festival" in his hand must be the seventh day of the seventh month, the "Lantern Festival" is the fifteenth day of the first month, the "Double Ninth Festival" is the ninth day of the ninth month, and the "New Year's Eve" is the thirtieth day of the twelfth month.

So if you want to compare the size, the Earth Monkey cannot use a controversial "solar calendar", otherwise the answer will not be convincing, and the gambling will become more difficult.

In summary, if this "comparison" really uses the key point of date, it will inevitably use the relatively fixed "lunar calendar".

Now the problem lies in the dates of each "solar term".

Fortunately, the Earth Monkey gave the most critical point-the date of "Frost Descent" is September 23.

In this way, there is no need to know exactly which year it is. Even if this year is fictitious, you only need to reverse the information given by the Earth Monkey.

Because all the information will be clearly visible, each solar term is fifteen days apart, and the twenty-four solar terms of this year are all known. At this time, the cards on the table have become groups of numbers in Qi Xia's eyes.

He looked at the "July 7th" in his hand, then looked at the "July 15th" on the table, and finally looked at the "May 21st" in the ground monkey's hand.

As long as the ground monkey announces the biggest card after this round, all the rules of the game will be clear.

Qi Xia reached out and wiped the blood on his right face, then raised his head and said, "Ground Monkey, can we continue?"

Ground Monkey found that the look in the man's eyes was completely different from when he just entered the venue, but he didn't know where the problem was.

"Spring rain shocked the spring and cleared the valley, summer was full of grain and summer heat was connected. Autumn dew fell in autumn and frost fell, winter snow fell in winter and small and large cold." Qi Xia used his clear mind to decisively find the sealed knowledge in his mind, "The first half of the year falls on the 21st of the sixth month, and the second half of the year falls on the 23rd of the eighth month. The difference between "End of Heat" and "Frost Descent" is 60 days, so the date of "End of Heat" is July 23. ”

All dates in the first half of the year are the sixth and twenty-first day of the first lunar month, and all dates in the second half of the year are the eighth and twenty-third day of the first lunar month. Add the months of the solar calendar, and these are the dates used in this game.

Qi Xia finally understood what Di Hou said before the gambling started.

He said that the people he met over the years had gambling skills but no knowledge, and those who had knowledge had no courage, so no one could gamble with him.

This deck of cards really requires too many things, and gambling skills alone are far from enough.

After all, there are only two Chinese characters on each card, but you have to use these Chinese characters to compare the size. If you don’t have enough knowledge, this step alone will get you stuck.

In addition... the only thing that Qi Xia couldn’t figure out was the name "synodic month".

If I remember correctly, the synodic month is also called the lunar month, which represents the cycle of the moon's waxing and waning phases, which is the same asWhat is the connection between this game?

If we have to explain, the sun is "yang" and the moon is "yin". When the ancients compiled the "lunar calendar", they referred to the waxing and waning of the moon phase.

"So it is really a "lunar calendar"..."

The moon goes from being completely bright to disappearing, which is considered a "reverse" process by the ancients, so they took the initial form of the word "逆" "屰", added "月", and regarded it as "屰月", which is "new moon".

When the moon is the brightest and can be seen when looking up, the ancients called it "full moon", which is "望". "Shi Ming·Shi Tian" explains: "望 is the name of the full moon."

Therefore, "new moon and full moon month" refers to the time required from "new moon" to the next "new moon" or from "望" to the next "望" within thirty days.

Because it depends on the waxing and waning of the moon, these thirty days are called a "month".

The calendar compiled by the waxing and waning of the moon is yin, so it is called "lunar calendar".

"That is to say, this game has revealed the method of comparing sizes to us since its name..."

Qi Xia slowly narrowed his eyes, feeling that he could temporarily control his chaotic brain.

He looked at the cards on the table. There were only more than 30 cards in this deck, with two words on each card, and at most more than 60 words.

But if it really needs to be studied, it will be much more complicated than the poker and tarot cards introduced from the West. Once this game is not called "New Moon" and is changed to "Solar Calendar", the gameplay will be completely different.

Qi Xia sighed that the ground monkey is worthy of being the representative of controlling "intelligence", and the strength of the short and fat ground monkey in front of him should be more than that. If he can be recruited, he will definitely be of great use, but the smarter the person, the harder it is to control.

Locking his eyes on the game in front of him, Qi Xia knew that as long as the ground monkey could tell the person with the largest card when the cards were finally opened, he would also be able to deduce the rules of this game.

The plan went much smoother than expected, thanks to the help of Zheng Yingxiong this time.

After everyone placed their "secret" bets, the ground monkey asked again, "Does anyone else want to place a bet?"

Everyone didn't know the rules, so they naturally had no idea of ​​the size of the bet, and shook their heads.

But the ground monkey slowly raised the corner of his mouth and looked at Qi Xia.

"What?" Qi Xia asked.

"I want to raise the bet," said the ground monkey.