[X] Talking to one person was boring. Find a board game, invite everyone to play, forget about resting.
Entering the airship entrance area behind Two, Yang took a moment to look around.
"Hi everyone!" Two waved. "I'm back! And I'm here with a friend 'cause Three says we get to abuse power."
"That's not a good thing, Two." Yang advised.
Two seemed to consider it for a moment, and in that moment, Yang looked around.
Ren and Nora were standing off to the side, and Piran was getting out of a seat as he noticed Yang, along with-
"Hey, Peri." Yang noted, as Periwinkle Flowers stepped forward to say hello. "Is it just me, or do I know everyone here?"
"Hey, everyone's friends!" Two cheered. "Except me and her, we haven't met."
"I also haven't met your two other friends before now." Peri noted, looking over at Ren and Nora. "Or your sister. And nobody's met my father, but he's gone to claim one of the rooms to sleep until we get to Atlas-"
"We don't have to stay here?" Taiyang asked. "Alright, bye everyone, wake me when we get there, Ruby you'll know what pipe Zwei is in because it'll be shaking and barking."
He wandered off before anyone could say anything, and Two watched him go.
"Yang!" Nora suddenly declared, getting up into Yang's face and observing her closely. "How are you? Are you alright? Are you okay? Ren says he'd been in contact with your sister and they talked a bit about how you were a bit overfocused but this is hardly the time or the place but now's not the time to talk if you're okay so are you all good?"
Yang blinked, then looked at Two, then looked at Nora.
"Is it just me?" Yang asked. "Or are you two basically the same person?"
"Pfft." Nora brushed off. "Nah. I'm me, and Two's Two. There's not Two Two's-"
Yang grinned.
"-And you just tricked me into saying a pun." Nora concluded.
"Yep." Yang nodded. "But you gotta admit, the two of you are rather similar. Both you and Two are over-excited fast talkers who happen to have a massive crush on a dark haired-"
Nora's hand shot forward and grabbed Yang's mouth. "We've been over this. No."
Yang tried to make another pun, but it was muffled by Nora's hand.
"No more talking." Nora continued. "You're going to smile, and nod, and then I'm going to say that our relationship is totally platonic and then you're going to keep nodding and we'll be in agreement."
Yang smiled, and nodded.
"Good." Nora decided, removing her hand. "Because Ren and I are friends, and nothing else."
Yang suddenly started shaking her head left and right.
"Ren, I'm breaking her arm."
"Don't break another persons arm, Nora." Ren sighed.
Peri looked back and forth between Yang and Nora, confused. "You... Said you were friends, right?"
"Fifty percent of Yang's shows of affections are when she makes fun of you." Ruby explained.
"It's true." Yang admitted, nodding again. "I'm terrified of emotional intimacy and I'm bad at it as well so it's always jokes."
And the best jokes are the ones that she makes and then instantly wonders how true it is.
"I... See..." Peri noted, confused.
"People are confusing." Piran spoke up, speaking sagely. He seemed like he was going to say something else, for a moment.
"...I was going to follow that up somehow, but philosophy isn't my strong point." He admitted. "So I'll let that comment stand.
"He has a point." Said a voice from behind everyone, as Cent walked in. "People are confusing. Which is why I like to focus on the simple joys in life. Like Two's bed."
And with that, he walked past everyone, out of the room and towards the sleeping quarters.
"...My bed?" Two asked, confused for a moment, before suddenly realising the implication, and turning bright red. "W-Wait, Cent, not here!"
She ran off after him, leaving Yang alone with her sister and everyone else.
"...So does anyone have any idea how to pass the time?" Nora asked. "Because I'm getting bored. Maybe there's a fight area? I got Magnhild fixed recently and I'm itching to see how well she does with breaking things."
"Oh, is that the hammer?" Ruby asked. "Does it work on the propulsive smash model, the Gravity Dust system, or a combination?"
"Gravity Dust right now." Nora noted. "Granted, not much. I was on a budget. For the most part, I just hit things really hard. I was gonna wait until I get the Beacon Scholarship before I upgraded again, you know?"
"The Beacon Scholarship does have a lot of money behind it." Ruby nodded along. "I suppose you'd be moving to make it completely Dust constructed, then?"
"I dunno." Nora replied, frowning. "I experimented a bit with practice weapons, and the weight really threw me off. It's such a pain to adapt, you know? I'm thinking of just making the smashy bit bigger with Gravity Dust so it weighs the same for me but does more damage. But then, it'd also get more unwieldy, right? I'm gonna have to think about it..."
Yang cleared her throat. "Guys, thanks, but I wanted to stay awake so this boredom aid isn't really what I was looking for."
"Yang..." Ruby complained, pouting.
Behind the group, the entry to the airship started to raise, as the airship got ready for takeoff.
"Well, we could have some fun rather than just lazing around." Yang noted. "Anyone up for some board games? My scroll's set up to project a virtual version of Rebuild."
"Rewhatnow?" Nora asked.
"I'm going to need an explanation too." Ren spoke up.
"Oh, right." Yang noted. "You two were from outside the Kingdoms, you wouldn't know."
"The board map is a map of the world." Peri spoke up. "Every player takes control of a Kingdom, with different expansions set up for fictional factions for when there are more than four players."
"Most of them are kinda lame, and pretty much all of them are ridiculously overpowered." Yang noted. "But the Bandit Faction is a pretty good one. Mobile starting base and works outside the Kingdoms, meaning they have less starting material but don't need to conquer a way to areas."
"We'll explain as we go." Piran advised, as Yang pulled out her scroll and walked over to a nearby table, pressing a button to create a hologram, which quickly formed into a spinning circle.
"Long story short." Yang spoke up. "You want to be the last Kingdom standing. Taking over another Kingdom by accepting their surrender or subverting their culture counts. There's a card system involved but it sounds more complicated than it is when you describe it without playing."
Ren and Nora nodded.
"I'll be one of the Bandit Factions." Yang decided. "It's been a while since I played that."
"Dibs on Vale." Ruby called.
Ren and Nora talked amongst themselves for a bit.
"Can we be a team?" Nora asked. "Just to make sure we can work better against the people here."
"Yeah, sure." Yang noted.
"Is there a benefit behind each decision?" Ren asked.
"Yeah." Yang nodded. "They all have different benefits and stuff. Atlas has higher starting resources but have to take an event card whenever they lose Morale, Vacuo gets more Hero Cards-"
Yang noted the confused expression on everyone's faces, and sighed. She pressed a button on her scroll, and Nora's scroll beeped.
"Here's the rulebook." Yang decided. "Read it, and we'll get started."
"Let's go." Ruby nodded. "Okay, I'm playing Vale, so I get an extra Food Resource at the start of my turn..."
She moved up a slider on her side of the holographic board, and looked over the cards hovering in front of her.
"No useful cards." She noted. "So I'll just discard this card to move my War Potential up one, and use that to take an extra territory."
"Is that all?" Yang asked.
"Yeah, that'll do." Ruby decided.
"Ren, Nora, you're up." Yang continued.
Ren and Nora whispered something to themselves for a moment, before nodding.
Nora cleared her throat. "It says here we get to play a Hero Card to make use of it's special ability? I'm playing Shadowy Overlord."
"That's a drop to Morale." Peri pointed out.
"But a plus one to War Potential." Nora pointed out. "War Victory seems like the most simple, so I'm going for that. And we'll copy Ruby and take another territory. Next."
Peri nodded. "Okay then..."
Five turns later, and the game was still quiet.
Mostly because Peri was cheesing things out by throwing all her War Potential on the one entrance to Atlas, but still, nothing bad so far.
And that was boring.
"Ruby, I'm raiding your territory." Yang declared. "I'm taking one of your Food Resources."
"Why the Food Resources?" Ruby asked.
"Because I need them to move around and you've got more than anybody else does." Yang decided. "Like seriously, you realise you don't win if you have all the Food Resources, right?"
"I know what I'm doing." Ruby replied.
"Anyway, Piran's turn."
Piran looked down at his board again for a moment. "I'm moving my War Potential closer to Atlas."
"Are you threatening me?" Peri asked.
"Yes."
"Oh." Peri replied. "Okay then."
"Ren, do the thing!"
Ren placed a card on the table. "Behold, another Hero Card. To the surprise of everyone."
"Hold on." Piran said, looking over. "Isn't that your fifth? And you only have four territories?"
"Shadowy Overlord lets me discard a Hero Card if I use too many. I'm discarding Dragon Knight because nobody's gone for a Morale Attack as far as I can determine."
"Speaking of which." Yang suddenly spoke up. "I'm playing a Crisis Card because I can do that whenever. Everyone loses half their Morale because of Grimm Tales."
"Aw, and we just got rid of the Card that lets us ignore that." Nora sighed.
"My turn?" Peri asked, looking at the section of the board where Piran was gathering forces.
"Yep." Yang noted.
"Oh, good." Peri decided. "Yang, do you have any Research Cards? I'm willing to trade three population."
"Literally selling people for my science." Yang noted. "Interesting."
"It's just a game." Peri replied.
"Hey, I never said I wasn't taking the deal." Yang replied, making the trade.
"Good." Peri nodded, as she got another two cards. "In that case, I have enough Research Cards to take a Crisis of my choice."
Discarding her three cards, Peri grabbed the Crisis Card deck and started flicking through them. Eventually, she got to the end of the deck, and got the last card.
"Not the best." Peri admitted, as the cards started shuffling themselves. "But I would like to point out that the Famine Card is not in the Crisis Card desk, and Ruby's been stockpiling food exclusively."
"Which one was the Famine Card?" Ren asked.
"Whoever plays it discards Food Resources. Everyone loses that much Food Resources."
Nora looked at her side of the field, then at Ruby's.
"...I'm declaring war." Nora decided.
"I don't know what anyone's talking about." Ruby said defensively. "I don't have the Famine card."
"I really wanted to declare war Ruby don't take this from me."
Piran looked at the board, as he thought about his next move.
"You could try attacking." Yang advised. "I mean, yeah, Peri's got more War Potential there than you do, but that's also the only way in so if you just sacrifice everyone you have so I can sneak in and do some damage and beat you both."
"An interesting idea." Piran noted. "On the other hand, I could just draw a card."
He did so, drawing from the Hero Card deck, and went silent.
"Nothing?" Yang asked. "Alright then. I'm taking my turn. I play Beast of Legend, which lets me use any amount of War Potential to destroy something of any War Potential adjacent to it. I'm going to just hit Ren and Nora over here because don't think I didn't see what you were doing over here."
"Curses!" Nora declared.
"When these two eventually wipe each other out, I want to be the one wiping up after them."
Peri looked over her cards, and then over at Ruby.
"You're being too quiet." Peri decided. "Piran, ceasefire?"
"Piran, I'll trade you half my Food Resources if you keep her confined up there." Ruby suggested.
"Don't listen to her schemes-"
Piran ignored Peri and took Ruby's trade.
"Alright, enough of this." Nora decided. "Crisis Card, Grimm Swarm, everyone gets hit by a maximum War Potentia-"
Ruby threw down a card herself. "Crisis Aversion. Discard that and take a Morale hit."
"Drat." Nora sighed, as she discarded the Grimm Swarm card.
"Stockpiling is getting me nowhere." Piran noted.
"It's working for Ruby." Ren pointed out. "She's just gaining all the Food Resources to stay ignored in her little corner back there."
"I am aware." Piran noted. "And this stalemate has gone on long enough. Peri, I'm taking Atlas."
"And how do you think-"
Piran threw down a card. "Legacy Culture, I can convert all my War Potential into Culture Points, and I notice you aren't prepared for Cultural Defence."
Peri winced. "Please don't."
"We've been playing for hours."
Peri sighed, as Piran started counting the math behind his victory.
"If you want, Peri." Yang advised. "You can give me all your Crisis Cards so Piran doesn't get any of them."
"I'm not giving up yet." Peri replied. "I've got more territories to go."
"And that's Peri dealt with."
"Not quiet." The girl replied. "I have a Crisis Card here which says all of my Food Resources are destroyed and the Morale of the closest enemy territory is reduced by an equal amount. I'm using that, then I surrender."
"Ouch." Piran winced. "That's... Not good for me."
"It's really not." Ruby noted. "Hey, remember when Peri thought I had the Famine card?"
Yang quickly looked over everything.
"Oh no." She sighed.
"Using the Famine Card." Ruby decided. "And I'll discard about... Nineteen Food Resources, should be enough?"
"Ren, do the math, I'll plan revenge." Nora decided.
"I don't think there'll be a revenge." Ren replied. "We can't take that much Food Resources loss, which means we lose the rest in population, and that means we take a Morale hit to... We lose."
"I do as well." Piran noted, looking on his side of the field.
"Wow." Peri replied. "It's almost like I'm always right."
"It's not game over yet." Yang noted, as she did the math herself. "My sister might be sneaky and evil, but I still have one Morale point, which I-"
"I'll buy you a packet of cookies if you just surrender." Ruby interrupted.
"Ruby wins." Yang declared.
"Rematch?" Nora asked.
"She's going to keep asking until she wins." Ren advised.
Piran looked at a watch on his wrist.
"I'm not sure." Piran replied as he looked out. "We should be in Atlas soon. I feel like we should get ready to go, make sure all of our fragile luggage is being carried and-?"
"Luggage?" Ruby asked. "Wait, Zwei!"
There was a red blur, as Ruby ran off towards where a sign was pointing out a luggage department. Doors slammed open, and often a moment, a loud barking sound echoed through the airship.
"...Right." Yang noted, nodding. "The dog. Hey, if dad asks, we totally let Zwei out earlier, okay?"
It wouldn't be long now, before the group arrived in Atlas. Once the group does arrive, Yang and her family are taken to the building in which they will be staying, at the Schnee guest house, and told the rest of the guests from outside the Kingdoms would be arriving the next day. After Ruby and Taiyang are shown their rooms, Two leads Yang to hers, and the pair run into-
[X] Three, alongside a robot of some sort that seemed to be acting up.
[X] Roman and Neo, who were apparently living nearby.
[X] The two Atlesian students who were selected to interact with the guests.
[X] One.