Jack listened, then slapped his coffee cup down on the table with a sharp smack, clearly annoyed: "You ran into it too? That kind of pain-in-the-ass thing… That dumb woman should've just stayed a proper reporter, but no, she had to go dig into some secret case…"
"She said she'd found a huge exclusive scoop that could shock the world, then went off alone." Bringing it up, Jack looked seriously irritated.
So that's how it is?
Tenjo Hikari had been wondering how Carly Nagisa, who hadn't been killed by the Arcadia Movement on this side, still ended up tied to an Earthbound Immortal—turns out it was Numbers-related.
According to Jack, those Number Cards seem to trigger the user's innermost feelings. Carly Nagisa kept saying it was nothing, but she still brooded over not being able to help Jack before—though from Jack's point of view, helping him resolve his emotional baggage was already more than enough compared to anything else, she still carried it in her heart.
So first the Number Card stirred up the desires in her heart, then it awakened a sleeping Earthbound Immortal, and just like that she got muddled into becoming a "Divine Chosen".
"Idiot—" off to the side, Crow, who happened to be passing by, couldn't help snapping at him, "Isn't it because you, you idiot, never speak like a human being?"
"What's that got to do with me?" Jack shot back.
"Wait—" Tenjo Hikari quickly cut off their usual bickering, "You mean Carly was influenced by a Dimensional Card and then became a Divine Chosen, right? So where did that Dimensional Card come from?
Did someone give it to her? Where's the card now?"
Jack held the coffee cup to his lips, brows knitted tight as he thought back: "That card flew off afterward… judging from the direction, it should've gone toward the Nobles' side?"
"There are still Nobles?!" Tenjo Hikari was stunned. "You people still have living Nobles?!"
They've already been wiped out twice, and there are still Nobles alive!?
Did Goodwin not finish the job?
"No—" on the other side, Yusei cut in, "I get it now, Hikari, this is a blind spot."
True, most of the Nobles colluding with the Fusion Army are already dead.
But at the end of the day, it's hard to go from luxury to frugality. Among the Nobles who are still alive, there might well be some who want to use the war with The One to claw their way back into power.
It's not impossible for them to chase after power from the Other Dimension!
And not just that.
The Nobles who worked with the Fusion Army once dabbled in Dimension technology as well, so their territory might still have Subspace residue.
All of this lay outside the range of what he'd been watching!
"I see—" Jack set down what he was holding with a crisp clack on the table, then picked his helmet up and hugged it at his waist.
"Jack?" Yusei asked.
"Tenjo, you're looking for your friends, aren't you?" Jack Atlas looked at Tenjo Hikari and laughed, "Since you chose to hide your identity, you don't want to expose yourself lightly, whether it's actually necessary or not.
Maybe you can sneak in again like you did back at Arcadia Movement, but you still wouldn't be able to investigate thoroughly.
Consider it my way of paying you back for messing up and not making it to the prelims—I'll use my authority and go conduct a direct search.
And… I also want to make sure they understand what happens when they piss me off."
As he spoke, he'd already walked out the door, saying goodbye to the others.
Tenjo Hikari and his two buddies looked at each other, then couldn't help saying, "Has he always been like this?"
Meaning abusing his authority.
The two silently nodded.
Tenjo Hikari was a bit speechless.
Forget it, it works. One more helping hand.
But at the same time, Tenjo Hikari was still a bit troubled.
No matter which of the two possibilities Yusei had laid out it turns out to be, it felt like Caesar and Mitsuzawa's situation wouldn't be very good either way…