Surprisingly Ryou was the first one to wake up, he turned onto his side and slowly sat up so he wouldn't upset his wounds yet again, and as he listened closely outside he could hear movement so after carefully getting up he slowly walked out of the hut and down the stairs and was greeted by none other than the annoying group they found.
"What are you all doing here, this mine and my friends' home?" Ryou growled.
"And what a lovely place it is, isn't it Hugh?" The dark skinned woman asked.
"It sure is, I must say Ryou you've gone from stowaway to steward in no time" Hugh replied as he looked around the outside of the hut.
"Ah there you are my boy" Ryou recognized the voice.
Ryou turned to the voice "oh Winford, I was wondering when I'd see you again" he put on a polite but somewhat fake smile.
"When I get back home I'm going to have a long hot bath, what's the longest bath record in the world?" a voice said behind Ryou.
"Can one of you please tell me what I did to deserve this?" Ryou wondered to himself.
"Be careful Ryou, we may need their help later on, but it may be best not to tell them about the raft" Winford said as an afterthought.
"Your right sir" Ryou then placed another fake smile on his face as he said "please excuse me everybody, I've been recovering from an illness, what I was meant to say was, whose hungry?"
Akefia was the next one to wake up; his right side was numb after lying on the floor, but since he had to sleep on the ground when he was in the desert, this was more comforting, the first thing he heard as he removed the sleep from his eyes were distant noises, and since these voices sounded familiar he instantly knew that it was the group they found after putting the statue onto the stone slab. Slowly inhaling and exhaling his breath he stood up and left the hut, only to discover that two of the five survivors were sitting on the two chairs just outside the frame.
"What are you two doing here?" he asked while trying to hide his annoyed features.
"We just wanted to visit, plus we were kind of jealous that you guys had the best place compared to our old place" the dark skinned woman replied.
Akefia just raised an eyebrow but dropped it when he saw them eating what looked like mush "what are you eating?"
"That boy, Ryou I think you called him? He made it for us, he called it cat fish chowder" Akefia recognized that person as Hugh "He's down near the waterfall if you want to talk to him, he's finished making us our food" he then began to continue eating his food.
Akefia looked at them in disgust and left them to eat in peace (even though he didn't want to) as he walked down the stairs he noticed Ryou standing next to the Professor and both looked like they were talking to each other, he waited for the old man to finish and leave before he continued his walk to Ryou "what was that about?"
Ryou looked at him before looking back at the Professor who had just disappeared "he was just telling me that he was off to study some ruins and would get back to us on how to make a sail"
"I know how to make those, people in Egypt did it all the time"
Ryou looked at him and raised an eyebrow "and what did they use, because last I checked it was made from cloth and the boat was made from reeds"
Akefia then realized his mistake and slapped his forehead before he realized something "what about tall grass, if weaved right you could make it into a sail"
"That is true, but we don't know how to make them and I doubt you even know how"
For some reason Akefia blushed "yeah well I was a thief, I didn't have time for stuff like that"
"Can't say I blame you" Ryou mumbled before carefully sitting down on the grass to lay on his front, Akefia copied him but his arms were under his chin "it's times like this that I am happy to have been stranded, but the other part of me wants to go back home"
"Why would you want to do that?"
"Because it's my home, it's where I grew up, it's the only place I know, what if this is just a dream and I wake up to find myself alone with only Malik to keep me company" he didn't realize that he was crying until he felt something wet on his cheek and looked away from Akefia before he could notice.
"You shouldn't have to hide your tears Ryou, trust me on that" Akefia mumbled as he removed some of Ryou's tears with his right index finger, both were surprised by this.
"How would you know about tears, from what I heard you haven't cried since the incident with your village" this was a bad choice of words as Ryou soon found himself on his back with a very angry Akefia.
"How do you know about the incident with my village? Were you there when it happened? Were you there when you saw your people be thrown into a hot cauldron? Were you there when you saw them be turned into the Millennium Items? No you weren't because you weren't even born" he shoved Ryou's arms before getting up and leaving the area not even realizing that he had slightly re-opened Ryou wounds.
Ryou lay there for a while in a daze, but shook himself out of it when he heard Malik calling his name.
"Ryou you idiot you know you shouldn't be laying on your back otherwise it could easily get infected" his mother instincts kicked in as he got closer to Ryou.
Ryou carefully got up without the aid of Malik and carefully brushed his trousers off.
"Hey host where did the thief go?" Bakura called out as he came down the steps.
"He ran off, I accidently said a touchy subject and he got a mood on and left, although I think I know where he went" he said as an afterthought.
"And where would that be?"
He was cut off by the Winford "ah there you are my boys, I was just about to tell you what you could use for a sail"
"Thank you Professor, but we already know what to use for the sail, unfortunately we don't know how to weave one" Ryou replied kindly.
"Well historically the Eloni people are friendly people but they haven't accepted outsiders for…well a long time" there was a tense pause when he had hesitated.
Ryou didn't know how, but something was telling him to hurry to the area with the stones "I think I may know how Professor, and thank you for the help" he motioned the others to follow him and went the same way Akefia went.
"What exactly will you do in doing in order to allow the people to help you?" Bakura asked as they made their way to the area where they found Ryou unconscious.
"No idea, but something tells me that we have to go to the area with the stones today"
Bakura raised an eyebrow and looked at Marik who had followed them after he found them leaving the hut.
It wasn't long till they found Akefia in a fetal position against one of the stones, Ryou was about to say something to him when they heard a distant howling and scream coming from what sounded like a child.
"Did you guys hear that?" Akefia asked as he lifted his head up from his knees.
They didn't answer as the question was answered as a girl ran passed them and up a tree to avoid the wild dogs that were chasing her.
Ryou then realized that he had a bone in his pocket, quickly pulling it out he jogged towards the dogs before anyone could say anything and called out to the dogs "here doggy's who wants a tasty treat" he waved the bone in the air so they could see it.
And it worked; the dogs looked away from the kid and turned their attention on the bone and Ryou.
Using quick thinking Ryou chucked the bone away from him when he was sure that the dogs had their attention on the bone and all four dogs ran towards it fought over the bone for a while and ran off.
"You can come down now kid its safe" Bakura called when he noticed the dogs had disappeared.
The kid which they now noticed was a girl slid down the tree and carefully approached them.
"Don't worry little one we aren't going to hurt you, if we did do you think we would have saved you from the dogs, we probably would have left you" Bakura added the last bit.
Ryou shot him a warning look but the kid said "you have a point, but what if you wanted to do the damage instead of letting the animals do it?" she shot back.
"We aren't the kind of people who hurt children, only those to people who deserve it" Akefia shot back as he got up.
"Alright then you got me, my name is Nanahi, daughter of the chief of our tribe" she introduced herself when she knew they weren't a threat.
"Ryou and this is Malik, Bakura, Marik and Akefia of Japan" Ryou introduced them all.
"Normally outsiders aren't welcome in our village but I think my dad would want to thank you all for saving my life, if you kindly follow me I can help you get in, but keep close otherwise they'll see you as a threat" she warned them before skipping off to her village.
"Cheery little girl isn't she?" Bakura asked aloud.
"Who knows" Ryou replied "but we should hurry otherwise we won't be able to get in" he jogged off in the girls direction with the others trailing behind, but Ryou already knew that he would have to apologize to Akefia for bringing up a touchy/sensitive subject.