Stacy was feeling rather pleased with herself when she heard Nero's voice. She lowered her head and said, "What, you little brat, you want to challenge me too? Can you even afford the stakes?"
To show off the bearing of a gambling master, before the match, she clearly treated men and women, young and old, all the same.
Nero patted the treasure chest he had brought over. "Will this do?"
Stacy glanced at it and said, "Sure!"
And so, she and Nero started another round of Paper Bird Match.
Then, something shocking happened.
Firefly watched Nero with her own eyes. This game partner and opponent who had tormented Silver Wolf endlessly had somehow turned this match-three game into something that seemed almost mystical.
While Stacy was frowning deeply, carefully observing the fruits she could manipulate on the screen and calculating based on the number of moves available to her, doing her best to maximize her gains, Nero, without even thinking, would spot an available match and immediately drag the fruit on the screen to make it happen.
And then, a chain reaction comparable to a series of explosions unfolded on Nero's game screen.
Although it had been nothing more than a casual drag, whether it was because of sheer luck or because Nero had already finished calculating everything, as the first group of fruits disappeared, the screen in front of Nero began to flash so rapidly that it was almost dazzling.
Countless fruits naturally formed matches, as if the game itself were clearing the entire screen. The second group of fruits did not clear the whole screen, but it still cleared nearly half of itself.
Naturally, Nero's score shot up, and even after Stacy used up all her moves, she still could not close the enormous gap.
The result was obviously devastating, at least for Stacy.
She had just become a gambling master, only to encounter a cheater on the Huilongshi, and even after giving it everything she had, she still could not win.
Stacy lost in spectacular fashion all the wealth she had just won, and could only kneel on the ground and curse Lady Ciyu for being a liar.
"Wh... what the...?"
Firefly was deeply shocked by Nero's unstoppable way of winning. Then she thought of the confident expression Silver Wolf had worn earlier.
"Sil... Silver Wolf... Against an opponent of this level, can you really win?"
Although Silver Wolf was a companion she spent every day with, and her gaming skills were certainly worthy of recognition, at this moment, Firefly simply could not imagine what Silver Wolf would look like after defeating Nero. Instead, she felt as though she could already see the result of Silver Wolf's upcoming match in Stacy.
If losing once meant having a line drawn on her body, then Silver Wolf would probably end up covered from head to toe in writing because of Nero, with not even a gap left.
A moment later, Stacy ran off crying.
Just then, a blond man happened to return carrying two ice creams.
Aventurine handed one of the ice creams to Nero while looking at Stacy's retreating figure in confusion.
"What happened to her?" Aventurine asked.
Nero took a bite of his ice cream, patted the treasure chest that had been filled to the brim, and casually said, "We played a game against each other. She lost, so she lost everything to me. She's got nothing left now."
"Mm... I see..." Aventurine pondered for a moment. "Then do you want me to play with you?"
"Mm!"
And so, a new match began.
Firefly had originally thought that in the match between Aventurine and Nero, Nero would once again win without any suspense. However...
Something shocking happened again.
Firefly had no idea how good the two of them were at games, but she was certain that both of them had incredibly good luck!
You only had to look at the dazzling flashes on their screens and their constantly rising scores to know.
"I... I didn't expect there to be someone else who could reach this level too... Should I remind Silver Wolf that next time she challenges this kid, she should pick a game where luck plays a smaller role...?"
Without a doubt, even for a gaming expert like Silver Wolf, the match between Nero and Aventurine was practically a clash between two immortals.
Perhaps even a genius like Screwllum would have endless questions popping into his head if he saw such an absurd scene.
These two were practically about to make probability itself cease to exist.
Coming back to her senses after watching the two immortals, Nero and Aventurine, clash, Firefly turned around and discovered that Stelle had disappeared.
All that remained was the male Intellitron, looking completely bewildered as he searched everywhere for the treasure chest he had no idea where he'd lost.
It was likely that when Nero returned the treasure chest later, this male Intellitron would be overjoyed to discover that he had somehow made a fortune for no reason.
Firefly did not stay here any longer. She decided to look around somewhere else. When she reached the area near the bow deck, she saw two people discussing something.
A woman said to her companion, "Hey, did you see that? That gray-haired person outside..."
There was curiosity in the woman's voice.
But her Pepeshi companion was extremely cautious. He quietly scolded her, "Don't stare. Drink your wine! That person doesn't look quite right in the head..."
As the saying went, ever since getting a mental illness, a person became mentally energetic.
Firefly quickly caught the two key words, "gray-haired" and "mental," and arrived at an answer in her mind.
Then she walked up the stairs and onto the bow deck.
There, she saw that the bird-shaped sculpture at the bow of the Huilongshi was covered with Origami Birds.
And Stelle had agilely climbed onto the sculpture, crouching down behind one of the Origami Birds.
Then Firefly heard Stelle pinch her voice while teasing the Origami Bird with her finger, making sounds like these, "Chirp chirp, chirp chirp... Origami Bird... little chirpy..."
Below the bird-shaped sculpture, the girl named March 7th was both embarrassed and somewhat worried.
Clearly, Stelle's behavior had triggered her tendency to feel secondhand embarrassment for other people.
"Hey, I'm talking to you... Come down already. Everyone's watching!"
But Stelle clearly did not care in the slightest. The girl even climbed up to the bird sculpture's head, stood up, spread her arms wide, and shouted, "I am the king of the world!"
Who knew whether this girl genuinely wasn't afraid, or whether she had already gotten used to falling in her dreams.
Maybe if she jumped from here now, she could land on the plaza of the Golden Moment, on the Avenue of Glaux, in a perfectly horizontal pose.
However, whether it was in a dream or not, falling from such a height would definitely hurt.
Firefly moved slightly to the side and came to the railing.
Although Silver Wolf had said not to make too much of a commotion, if Stelle accidentally fell, she should still catch her as quickly as possible.