Chapter 118: Are You Two Seriously Having an Acting Contest Here?

"So you're telling me... Alexis attacked my face this morning?"

By the time afternoon rolled around and Rowan had gotten his fill of sleep, he woke with a yawn. Propped up against the raised pillow on his bed, he soon spotted three palm-sized spirits floating nearby, yellow, green, and black, each one looking thoroughly mischievous. They'd been filling him in on what had happened that morning, right after he'd first drifted off.

Hearing the disbelief in Rowan's strange tone, the three Ojama brothers all nodded together to confirm it.

"It's true, Boss. That woman really did attack you," Ojama Yellow said first, firm and certain.

"She stood right in front of you, agonizing over something for the longest time, and even said something about how no one would ever see it anyway."

Ojama Green nodded along immediately, backing him up, and laid out what he'd seen.

"Of course, there's also a chance that woman just kissed you," Ojama Black added at the end.

At the commotion, even the round Kuriboh, having just gotten its own fill of sleep, materialized alongside them.

"Kuri kuri."

From its cry, it seemed to confirm that the Ojama brothers' emotional readings weren't lying.

Rowan's expression turned faintly strange. "So you three really weren't making it up..."

Then his gaze drifted, subtly, over toward the other bed across the room, where Alexis sat in the chair keeping watch over her brother, now slumped forward asleep with her arms folded on the edge of the mattress.

Don't tell him Alexis had actually...

Exactly what he'd suspected!

Rowan couldn't imagine, given how proud, unyielding, and fiercely proper Alexis's personality was, that she'd go kissing someone out of simple gratitude, or for any other reason. The thought alone was enough to chase away every last trace of sleepiness.

Rowan rubbed his chin, turning the matter over in his mind. If he wanted to confirm it further, that actually seemed simple enough now. Alexis's ridiculous, long-missing older brother, Atticus Rhodes, had already been found, lying right there on that bed. The weight she'd been carrying for so long was finally lifted, which meant she no longer needed to keep coming to him, someone with a little inside knowledge of Shadow Duels, asking after any leads on her brother's whereabouts.

There was no longer a reason for that kind of contact.

As far as Rowan was concerned, all he had to do from here was keep an eye on Alexis, and he'd have his answer soon enough...

"Rowan, you're awake!"

Just then, Alexis's voice came from nearby. Rowan glanced over and saw that she'd woken up at some point without him noticing, and was rising to her feet now, smiling as she looked his way.

"Nurse Fontaine dropped off two boxed lunches earlier. I put yours in the warmer, I'll go grab it for you."

Alexis walked over to the counter nearby and took the lunch box out of a small clear warming case, opened it, and brought it over to him.

"Ahem... um, Alexis, my hand seems to have fallen asleep. I can't move it at all right now. Whatever will I do."

Rowan cleared his throat, playing up the numb hand act. Time to bring out the real acting chops.

"Huh?" Alexis blinked, caught off guard for a moment. Then she quickly composed herself, feigning nonchalance.

"W-well, since you did just save my brother, I suppose I can make an exception and feed you. Just this once."

"And listen up! This is a one-time thing, understood!"

Catching the faintly odd little look on his face, Alexis quickly glared and added the firm addendum. Rowan, however, wasn't fooled in the slightest by the attitude she was putting on. He almost wanted to say something about it.

Miss, are we really doing a whole acting battle here?

He'd thought his own numb hand performance was already a masterclass, but it turned out Alexis was in an entirely different weight class, pulling it off so well he could barely spot a trace of acting at all. If it weren't for the unanimous four-way confirmation from the Ojama brothers and the round Kuriboh, he honestly wouldn't have caught on at all.

Truly, the prettier the woman, the better she lies...

But now, at least, he had his confirmation!

Rowan couldn't help feeling rather pleased with himself. He settled back comfortably against the pillow, munching on the little octopus-shaped sausages Alexis fed him, chatting with her all the while.

"Alexis, has your brother woken up at all?" Rowan asked, mouth still full, tossing the question out casually.

He'd already had Buster Blader hold back on the force of that final strike, so her brother's injuries should have come out on the lighter side.

"Not yet. But now that we've found him, and there's no danger to his life, I think he should wake up soon."

Alexis shook her head, but quickly answered with a small, hopeful smile.

"You really don't need to worry about that part. Whatever dark power was controlling him should already be sealed away entirely, inside that card from before."

Rowan nodded, giving her a definitive answer. It wasn't hard for him to sense that the reason her ridiculous brother hadn't woken up yet came down to two things working together: the lingering effect on his consciousness from having been possessed by that dark power, and the accumulated injuries from however long he'd been fighting Shadow Duels.

Rowan had to admit, the Crimson Dragon's spirit communication ability from the Mark of the Crimson Dragon — Dragon's Heart, that he'd redeemed earlier, turned out to be genuinely useful. It let him easily pick up on all sorts of subtle details about other people, and about spirits too. It wasn't limited to simply sensing good and evil, the way he'd originally assumed. If anything, it was every bit as useful as the protective power from the Mark of the Crimson Dragon — Dragon's Head.

"Kuri kuri!"

Just then, the round Kuriboh suddenly cried out, as if it had spotted something. At the sound, Rowan glanced toward the infirmary window in the distance, and soon spotted, hanging upside down just outside the glass, a small, strange-looking bat, its eyes glinting like faceted crimson gems, watching everything happening inside.

It looked, for all the world, exactly like a Duel Monster spirit given physical form.

him lunch, had without a doubt been a scout sent by the enemy.