Lith, Ralph, Dennis, and Emilia were looking at each other. Each had seven cards in their hands. The card to be played was either a red or a number 8 and it was Lith’s turn.

Lith took a green number 8 card and placed it on top of the red number 8 card present on the table.

It was now Emilia’s turn. The order with which they played was: First it was Lith, then Emilia, followed by Dennis and lastly Ralph.

Emilia played a Red 5. Dennis followed with a Red 2 and Ralph played a Red 9.

It was back to Lith again. Lith looked at his cards and smiled. He really was lucky, it seems. Lith turned his head to look at Emilia and saw her looking back at him with her beautiful blue eyes through her round gold rim glasses and with a gentle smile.

Such a beautiful face of hers made him want to not cause problems for her. She seemed so gentle and innocent that he felt like protecting her and not bringing harm to her.

But, a game was a game. Everything was fair. So what if her angelic charms were extraordinary and seemed out of the world? A game was going on and one should never show mercy to anyone in it!

Lith took out a card out of hand, looked at Emilia and with a smile, he placed it down on the table.

Red Draw +2.

“Hey, hey, Your Highness, go easy on teacher. She might not be familiar with the game.” Dennis said from the side.

Emilia turned her head to look at Dennis and made a ‘what do you mean’ type of expression.

Dennis looked at his teacher’s expression and said, “it’s fine, teacher. We’ll go easy on you.” Dennis smiled after saying that.

Emilia blinked her eyes twice and tilted her head slightly. What did Dennis even think of her? Did she look like someone who doesn’t know things? She wasn’t even that old… She knew about almost all the current things there were. How did he assume her to not know of this card game?

Even though she had many thoughts, she didn’t say it out to Dennis. She didn’t want to come out as rude to him in any form or way. She cared a lot about the feelings of other people and Dennis was a student, she would think of his feelings even more so.

Emilia simply shook her head with a helpless smile and drew two cards from the deck. She picked a card out of her hands and placed it on the table.

Red Skip.

“Pfft.” Lith and Ralph covered their mouths and tried to suppress their laughs as they saw such a scene.

What a nice reply to Dennis!

Dennis looked at the card and then at Emilia. It was only now that he fully understood what being passive aggressive was. He didn’t say much and simply looked at his cards.

It was Ralph’s turn, now that Dennis’s turn was skipped. Ralph took a Green 4 out and placed it on the table.

Two rounds passed.

No special cards were played in the previous two rounds. Lith and Ralph had 3 cards left with them, Dennis had 4 and Emilia had 6 after the two rounds.

It was now Lith’s turn again. He took a card out and placed it on the table.

Yellow Reverse.

Emilia’s turn was skipped when he did that. He looked at her and smiled. Emilia smiled back. She wasn’t worried even though she had the most cards in her hands.

Such a reaction from her worried not just Lith, but also Ralph and Dennis. What was she up to? Did she have some sort of scheme or something? The three put up their guards against her.

Ralph took a card out and placed it on the table.

Red Reverse.

It was now Lith’s turn again. Lith turned his head at Ralph and smiled. ‘Good job, Ralph!’ He internally commended him.

Lith only had two cards in his hands in his hands right now. He looked at Emilia and stared at her. She too stared back.

She was the biggest threat to him currently. He had to say ‘NUO!’ as soon as the card touches the discard pile on the table and hope that she doesn’t say ‘caught’. With the vast disparity in their strengths, it would be difficult to do this. But Lith clinged onto a small hope that he may win this round.

He took a deep breath and stared the two cards in his hands. It was now a make or break moment for him. He felt tense and slowly moved his card towards the discard pile on the table.

Ralph and Dennis leaned forward as the card was moving towards the discard pile. They were ready to say ‘caught’ at any moment’s notice. Dennis was even chanting ‘caught’ softly as he leaned forward.

Lith looked at the two and didn’t feel anything. He knew he could beat them. But, he was tense because of Emilia, who hadn’t even moved or showed a reaction. She just had a gentle smile on her face. This smile, to Lith, looked anything but gentle.

He stared at her and focused only at her as he moved his card towards the discard pile. He didn’t even bother with the other two.

Lith’s card was finally very close to the discard pile. And it wasn’t just the card close to the discard pile on the table, there was Dennis’s face too.

Dennis was following the card’s movement and had half of his body on the glass table and his face close to the discard pile. He was staring at Lith’s card and was ready to shout ‘caught’.

Ralph was close to the glass table too but not like Dennis. He had only leaned forward from his seat.

Lith stared at Emilia and kept his card just a few centimetres above the discard pile. It was so close to the pile that even a single gush of wind would make it touch the pile.

Lith took a deep breath and shifted his focus from her to the card. ‘Don’t worry too much. Focus, focus, focus. Okay, here I go. 3…’

‘2…’

‘…1…’

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