CHAPTER 819: 819: DIVINE GAME – CARD SWAP 68

When Rita lunged at Mojie, the chaos on the field dropped by almost eighty percent.

The ones who had been enjoying themselves the most—the loudest and wildest in the stands—were also the players who knew the Divine Game best. And these were exactly the kind of people who studied each year’s standout contestants in obsessive detail.

Both Rita and Mojie were on that list.

Rita’s time stop, Mojie’s deprive skill—neither were secrets.

And everyone knew Rita wasn’t the type to act impulsively or without a plan. If she was doing this, she had a reason.

Just like earlier, when she didn’t hunt for hints but instead let the white bear smack her back and forth on purpose.

"She’s not worried that Mojie will get desperate and burn his match just to steal all her god hints?"

"So... when she was messing around with the white bear earlier, did she actually learn something big?"

"Has to be. I even saw GodDraw77 laughing—her mouth was wide open. First time I’ve seen that."

"Ohhh, here we go—Mojie’s making his move. I told you, you can’t push someone like that too far!"

Three heads popped up from under the seats.

Even the last few spectators still brawling and yelling stopped to look at the largest screen.

On it, Mojie’s smirk—sharp, smug, certain of victory—was impossible to miss.

Everyone who saw that expression thought the same thing: he must have stolen every single one of Rita’s god hints.

But when Mojie was kicked out of the game and appeared beneath the light curtain...

The screen showed Moonlight Marsh’s Rita standing calmly in place, taking from her shadow a white robe covered in god hints—the school uniform of Golden Hills.

Golden Hills’ students and alumni erupted in curses, but Moonlight Marsh’s cheers drowned them out.

Even with her hint count displayed as zero, everyone knew she hadn’t truly lost them—they’d simply found another way back to her hands.

And more than that, she must have gotten something out of it. Maybe the same skill she’d used to reclaim all her wealth in the final moments last time. Or maybe something new entirely.

The audience, for the moment, set aside their grudges to speculate.

The black cat patted Maple Syrup, who had just sat back down. "She’s got some kind of copy skill, right? Or maybe one that bounces back whatever gets taken?"

Maple Syrup quickly turned to Mistblade. "Got any food left? I’m starving."

Mistblade dug into her backpack. "I’ll check. You check yours too, I think I put something in there."

Fat Goose stared stiffly at the field, but out of the corner of his eye, he could see the blood elf drawing closer. He hurriedly opened his own bag and started rummaging.

The three of them suddenly looked very busy.

The black cat just clicked her tongue. "...Tch."

...

Rita prowled a nearby street until she spotted a lone contestant. She closed in fast, and before the other girl could react, Rita earnestly topped up her HP.

The older student, a bit embarrassed, lowered her blade and smiled. "Thanks."

Rita smiled back. "You’re welcome. You’re exactly the god I’ve been looking for."

The words were barely out before [Brief Hibernation] hit its mark.

Then came the knife.

If it had to be a solo kill, every drop of HP needed to be hers to take.

[Debone·Lightchaser]! [Backstab·Lightchaser]! [Throat Slash·Lightchaser]!

This set of skills was lethal because of how they chained together. Landing any one of them doubled the damage of the next Lightchaser-series skill, and the third hit would trigger the finisher, with damage multiplied by five.

The combo dropped the girl before she was even fully awake from hibernation.

Whether her academy had lost many people already or had any revive slots left—none of that was Rita’s concern.

If you came to the Divine Game, you should be ready to die here.

Like her—she’d already made peace with it. If she died here, all the gold she owed Lightchaser would vanish with her.

Every time she thought about that, she became fearless.

But even after "finding her" and "solo killing" her, the personal match task still didn’t complete.

So Rita decided to try another contestant with a [Demon’s Pass].

She slung the older girl’s longsword over her back, then glanced toward the nearby garden.

...

Inside, the white bear sat cross-legged, tinkering with his capsule machine.

Without looking up, he asked, "What are you doing here?"

Half a small head peeked over the wall. "Why are you so nice to me?"

"I hit you, and that’s ’nice’?"

Her voice was still childlike, but she said, "You let me see that fighting trick of yours on purpose, didn’t you?"

The bear sneered. "Narcissistic, arrogant, self-important."

The head vanished in a snap.

The bear blinked. Was BS-Rita always this quick-tempered as a kid?

Ten minutes later, the head rose again.

She carefully set five cups of liquor on the wall and hung a bag of clinking objects from a branch. "I know you hit me to teach me. This is thanks. Thank you."

Then she ran off.

The bear fiddled silently with the capsule machine for a while longer, then set it down and grumbled, "Why does she like collecting teachers so much? I thought she only started doing that when she grew up. Guess she was born with it. Would it kill her to recognize fewer?

"And the worst part—once she gets a new teacher, she forgets the old ones. Does she even remember Hetchipa? No. She doesn’t care how he’s doing."

The orchid mantis perched by the cups dipped a leg into the liquor and tasted it. "This wine’s no good. Why’s it sour?"

The bear went silent.

The drummer, appearing on the other side without warning, picked up a cup, took a sip, and said, "Hilarious."

A spinning capsule machine flew at the two of them a second later.

...

Watching from the big screen, GodDraw77 suddenly asked, "Where did Lightchaser find her?"

Wail replied, "Under the Gilane Bridge, by the lake. She was homeless then."

GodDraw77 had only ever heard Rita talk about scrounging for work with Mistblade and Fat Goose, making light of eating expired scraps to fill their stomachs. She’d talked about how beautiful Gilane’s jewelry shops were at night, how she could overhear secrets from caravans crossing the bridge. She never mentioned being homeless.

GodDraw77’s thoughts of poaching the apprentice flared up again. "Do you think Lightchaser actually knows how to teach? Can she even take care of herself? She’s always sending those awful candies—no wonder the kid’s short."

Wail hesitated. She couldn’t bring herself to say those candies were Lightchaser’s custom order, made purely to mess with the kid.

A principal’s voice spoke up behind them. "Lightchaser always takes her to Garbage Street during holidays. I have reason to believe she has an extremely dangerous skill that violates Moonlight Marsh’s rules. I suggest she transfer to our Bug Marsh—"

The words were cut off as the Bug Marsh principal was launched into the air by a unicorn’s horn.