The Seven Wonders of the World

24. Poker Face

The next day, Rater, Sora, Alucard, and Zoela would wake up in their rooms as Zoela would be the first one to wake up.
She would be brushing her hair as the others were starting to wake up, as Rater yawned and turned to her.
“What time is it?” said Rater.
“Eight o'clock, maybe,” said Zoela, “quite early if you ask me.”
Rater nods in agreement as he looks around a bit. “Yeah, it really is quite early. I feel like I could sleep a few more hours before actually having to get up and ready for the day.”
Sora rolls his eyes and says, “Well good for you, I don't think I can really go back to sleep after this, I am already awake now.”
Rater then looks over at Sora and smiles, as he shrugs his shoulders. “Oh well, I'm sure we can do something while we wait for everyone else to wake up, we could always play cards or something.”
They all turned to Rater as if they saw a ghost.
“What?” said Rater.
“You? Playing cards?” said Sora. “Give me a break.”
“What's that supposed to mean?!” said Rater.
“Do you actually know how to play cards?” said Alucard, waking up as he was stretching his back. “Off topic, but this floor is really uncomfortable.”
Rater grins as he hears their responses. “Hey now, I am sure I played a few games of cards before. It might not have been a lot, but I must have played at least once or twice.” Alucard then laughs and says, “Oh really now? Do you want to prove it to me that you've played cards before?”
Rater nods proudly, as he smiles confidently. “Of course, let’s do this! I’ll prove to you that I know how to play cards better than you think.”
Sora chuckled, as he said, “Well, it will be interesting to see that for sure.”  Rater smiles again, as he walks over to the table and sits down against Sora. Sora then pulls out his deck of cards, as he then shuffles and deals the cards to the players. “Alright, let's get this started then!”

The game of cards has started.
Rater nods and looks at Sora with a confident look. Rater then takes the cards and looks at them, as he seems to think for a long moment. “Hmmm, I should be able to make this... let's go with this,” thought Rater and places a card down on the table.
Alucard smirks as he seems to be ahead in the game, getting some rather lucky cards and laying them down in a way that helps him score more points. “Man, this is certainly easy,” Alucard thought to himself, following with a chuckle in his inner monologue.
Alucard smiles as he continues to lay down more cards, still in the lead by quite a decent margin. “You guys sure you know how to play this game? I am still far ahead, and it feels like an easy game to me.”
Sora and Rater give each other dirty looks, before they then both place down the cards they have and take their turns. The game continues from there, with Alucard still in the lead and Sora having been close to catching up and with Rater seeming to be struggling with his cards and struggling to make a comeback.
Alucard continues to pull out more and more cards, scoring points and keeping the lead of the game. Rater continues to try and pull out good cards, but for some reason he just keeps getting dealt bad cards that he can’t get rid of and that he has already used most of his higher cards already. Sora is continuing to catch up though, and is now about level with Alucard in points.
Sora places down a card and says “This brings the total up to 20 points, so that means I win.” Rater looks at them all in anger, as he grumbles something angrily under his breath. “I could’ve won if I’d just had better cards.”
Alucard chuckles as he nods at Sora, “It looks like you beat him fair and square, he really had some bad luck today.” Rater looks away and grumbles to himself angrily.
Sora chuckles a bit as Rater finally speaks. “Ok, ok you all can enjoy your win now, the fact that I have such poor luck is a little frustrating.” Rater stands up from the table and leaves the room, as Sora chuckles to himself and Alucard says, “Man he sure can get really salty when he loses.”
Alucard continues to pull out cards and to lay them down, slowly pulling ahead of Sora with each round. “Hey, it looks like you are really catching up to me in this game. You are certainly putting up a good fight, but you can still see the point difference!”
Sora shakes his head as he grunts, “I’m not sure how you can say that you’ve got a point difference, I am only like 2 points behind you.”
Sora continues to try and get ahead of Alucard, and to close the gap. After a few more rounds, they are both finally tied in the game, as Sora looks at him and says “Haha, and I still think I’m putting up a good fight. This is far from over!”
Alucard lets out a laugh, “Oh really now? It’s like you think you can actually beat me, I’ll be looking forward to seeing that.”
*Alucard chuckles sarcastically as he smiles, as Sora chuckles as well. “Well, the game is certainly still going on, so don’t give up just yet! I have managed to not only reach your points, but stay there as well.”
Sora smirks as he lays down another card and says, “This game might be pretty close, but I do think that I am going to take the win from you.” Alucard smirks at this and says, “Just you wait, I will take this game from you and make my victory the sweetest.”
Sora chuckles and says, “Well I will do my best, you bastard! I won’t be giving up just yet!”
“Oh don’t worry, I am sure you will put up one heck of a fight!” Alucard then lays down a card and says, “This brings the total up to 29 points, so I think I am still doing pretty good here.” said Alucard.
Sora smiles and nods as he lays down another card, “Well I am at 28 points now, so it looks like the game is certainly close.” said Sora.
As Sora and Alucard continue to go back and forth, Alucard finally lays down a good card that gets him ahead by a decent margin. “See?! This is what I mean by putting up a good fight, I am still in the lead and now it looks like I am really going to win from here unless you start pulling out some magic!”
Sora chuckled, as he said, “Don’t give yourself too much credit, I am starting to feel it and I am pretty sure I am about to play my ace.”
Sora lays down the card he’d been saving, and says with a proud smile “See, I think I have you beat here.” Alucard leans back and crosses his arms as he smirks and says, “So you think you've finally pulled out your ace? Well I'll guess I will show you mine.”
Alucard lays down the card he'd been saving up, as Sora's smile quickly fades to a look of surprise. “Impossible!” said Sora.
Sora lets out a gasp of surprise as Alucard lays down his card and says, “Looks like I was the one with the real ace all along.”
“Well played.” said Sora, with a defeated sigh.
He looks down at the cards for a few seconds, before finally nodding in defeat. “I guess I will have to take my loss with dignity, but you gotta admit that I gave you a good game.”
Alucard looks at him and nods, as he lays back in his seat and smiles, seeming a bit proud of himself for his victory.