Chapter 361: Dedicating the Light to the Lord (4k, seeking monthly votes)

The duel ended.

All the anomalies in the surroundings began to recede.

The dark clouds began to dissipate, the sun and moon reappeared, and the boundary between light and darkness gradually intersected. Only the blue flames continuing to burn on the semi-transparent seal declared everything that had occurred here previously.

Here, the god of machines and demons had once clashed with the fallen angel who approached the divine.

The images slowly faded, and the giant form of Tierra turned into flames, slowly burning away. A moment later, it transformed back into a human shape and drifted slowly onto the dueling field.

Manjoume and Edo stared in a daze, feeling as if they were seeing Tenjou Hikari for the first time.

After quite a while of shock, the two of them gradually regained their senses.

Regardless of what Tenjou Hikari’s "soul" was mixed with, that wasn't very important. What mattered was that as long as Tenjou Hikari was still the Tenjou Hikari they knew, that was enough.

Tenjou Hikari put away his Duel Disk and walked forward a few steps; Edo and the other followed hurriedly.

Although the duel was over, who knew if Professor Seraf would act like a cornered beast or use the power of Lucifer to pull one last stunt?

"Guh..."

Professor Seraf was lying half-reclined beside a tree that had been burned to white ash by the purgatory flames. His eyes had lost their color, and his halo had completely shattered, lying on the ground.

A bit exaggerated—

Tenjou Hikari thought it was absurd.

Tenjou Hikari had been filled with anger toward Darkness at the end, attacking with the intention of going all-out, and Tierra wouldn't have held back against a human either. How could Seraf still be breathing?

Then, Tenjou Hikari noticed a card flickering with light in Seraf’s Graveyard.

Solemn Warning?

That card was emitting a radiance. As Seraf gasped for air, the light on the card grew dimmer and dimmer until, finally, the card stopped flickering and, as if it had grown wings, slowly dissolved into the world.

That was...

The *true* Solemn Warning!

Tenjou Hikari was shocked in his heart.

In this world, "Solemn Warning" and "Solemn Judgment" weren't actually extreme spirit cards; in fact, Judai possessed Solemn Judgment and had used it several times.

But just like the world with magic, as long as it was a card, it naturally had its own "spirit" behind it.

Seraf was a genuine "blessed one of God."

The other two students also realized this.

Seraf gasped for air; his eyes lost their color, and his body became gradually powerless.

Despite having the final Solemn Warning protecting him at the cost of its own dissolution, the winner of the duel was Tenjou Hikari. Clearly, that Solemn Warning was by no means a true descent; the person who was meant to die would ultimately die.

"...God... thank you, I finally understand..."

Seraf tremblingly raised a card, slowly holding it out.

Tenjou Hikari reached out, and the card was placed into his hand by Seraf.

As the card fell, Tenjou Hikari gave a violent jerk, his right hand feeling as if it had been electrocuted, and he threw the card away.

Beside him, Tierra was quick-eyed and fast-handed; several puppet strings wrapped directly around the card. However, the moment the strings touched the card, a radiance like the sun instantly scorched them into dust.

Tierra frowned, and before the card hit the ground, she snapped her fingers.

*Click, click.*

A grayish-white mechanical demon spread its wings, materialized, and caught the card with its body. The light dissolved its palm, but the moment the palm dissolved, blue flames burned the ashes, reconstructing its body.

It was only under these circumstances that Tenjou Hikari finally saw the card.

The First Darklord.

Tenjou Hikari looked back at Seraf.

Seeing this scene, Manjoume ran to Seraf’s side, trying to lift the professor up, while shouting, "Professor, hold on—"

Seraf’s lips curled slightly; it looked like he wanted to smile, but soon, his smile vanished in pain. His eyes completely lost their color, and he dropped his arm powerlessly.

As he passed away, his body seemed to melt, turning into specks of golden light that dissolved into the world. Accompanying his departure were the white and black cards in his deck; card by card, they slowly dissolved. In the end, it seemed as if Seraf no longer existed in this world.

Returning the glory to the Lord.

"This..." Manjoume looked at his hands blankly, then could only grit his teeth and shake his head.

On the other side, Edo picked up Seraf’s Duel Disk. There was still one card inside—the Darklord Lucifer in the Graveyard. However, when Edo tried to touch that card, it erupted with a radiance even more intense than the First Darklord, making it completely impossible for him to touch.

"It seems only the Department Head has a chance to touch it..."

Edo analyzed.

Judging by this situation, if Professor Seraf hadn't handed the card to Tenjou Hikari at the very end, Darklord Lucifer would likely have disappeared from this world along with the other Darklord cards after Seraf’s death, returning to some "Heaven" or "Hell" dimension they knew nothing about.

Tenjou Hikari nodded.

Were the two "Lucifers" the same "spirit" or... angel?

In any case, it seemed that at the very end, in his dying moments, Seraf had heard the true "Apocalypse."

Regardless, when "returning to the Lord," he had made up his mind to entrust the true "Darklord" card to Tenjou Hikari, a duelist who, like him, had once "summoned demons."

Tenjou Hikari sighed.

The two cards were picked up by the Infernoid demon controlled by Tierra and then transported to the Great Universe Workshop.

Tenjou Hikari was not a "blessed one," and Lucifer was not a Darklord like *Zera the Mant* that anyone could use upon obtaining. Unless Tenjou Hikari wanted to directly refine Lucifer into "Infernoid Tierra," he shouldn't be able to use it in the short term.

However—

Although that wasn't impossible, Tenjou Hikari only let the thought spin in his mind once before hurriedly deleting it.

Tenjou Hikari had seen "Fleurdelis, the Sworn Sword" in the Magician’s domain. Although he hadn't had time to ask that spirit because he was reuniting with Professor Daitokuji, and hadn't found that spirit when he left, Tenjou Hikari had made inquiries.

The dimension where Fleurdelis resided was a dimension strongly influenced by "red light." Ordinary spirits and humans were not qualified to go to that dimension.

Because the danger level was far higher than that of ordinary dimensions.

But that wasn't the point.

The point was that such a "dimension" really seemed to exist.

That was quite worth looking forward to for Tenjou Hikari.

Before the support cards for *Despian* were complete, *Despia Darklord* was a very popular build, and also one of the first few builds for *Despia*. Since such a dimension really seemed to exist, keeping Lucifer obviously had more significance.

Tenjou Hikari tidied up the scene and chatted with Edo for a while about why they had appeared here.

Of course, both were smart people who had actively sought this place out, so they could easily understand Tenjou Hikari’s idea of waiting for a rabbit to hit a tree, and were not surprised.

Honestly, under normal circumstances, the deck Tenjou Hikari usually used was not like this at all.

Infernoid, Flame Swordsman, Fluffal, and the "Earthbound" he hadn't used—Tenjou Hikari’s current deck was built from the perspective of "maximum spirit power." Not to mention Tierra, Tenjou Hikari had even put Super Polymerization into his deck, just in case he encountered Yubel, so he could end the trouble once and for all. If he didn't see it on a daily basis, that was nothing major.

But if he did encounter it, Tenjou Hikari would not hold back.

But unexpectedly, the one who came was Professor Seraf.

Honestly, Tenjou Hikari still didn't know where Yubel was on this island.

Tierra had observed Yubel before. If they encountered it again, she could distinguish it instantly. But clearly, Yubel was cautious and hadn't given Tenjou Hikari a chance to find it.

If he directly challenged Professor Cobra, Tenjou Hikari was worried about alerting the enemy, letting Yubel run off to hide somewhere else, so he could only wait like this.

Now, Darkness had taken the opportunity to make a move on Duel Academy. Of course, it was possible that Darkness had long since cooperated with Yubel; that wouldn't be strange at all.

But since they had decided to do this, it meant they had decided to make a full move; otherwise, there wouldn't be so many "blessed ones" starting to act.

Tenjou Hikari rubbed his hair.

This was a good opportunity.

If the opponent could come out, it was a good chance to catch them all in one net.

But, as a price, his classmates would inevitably face all kinds of challenges or even torture.

Tenjou Hikari had done everything he could for his classmates. Next, he could only watch whether those classmates could hold on themselves or believe in humanity.

After dealing with the scene, the three of them prepared to split up. Tenjou Hikari went to find Professor Chronos, while Manjoume and Edo hurried to the professor’s single dormitory to see if there was anything useful, like diaries or notes. If there was a way to break the outer wall, that would be a huge gain.

Taking advantage of the fact that there were no people or spirits around to destroy evidence, the two of them didn't feel embarrassed at such a time and nodded hurriedly before leaving.

Tenjou Hikari checked his deck, looked at the energy requirements for the cards he was "refining," and headed toward the Principal’s Office at full speed.

It was afternoon now. At this time, the professor should have finished his rotation and returned to his office. He had to report the situation to the professor.

As a price, the three of them might not be able to attend their afternoon classes.

Precisely because of this, when Tenjou Hikari’s friends arrived at the classroom, they were surprised to find that Tenjou Hikari, who was the most studious, hadn't come to class.

But—

This time, it wasn't just Tenjou Hikari.

There were other students who hadn't attended class during this period, such as... O’Brien, who came from a mercenary background and was investigating various places in the academy; Amon, who was helping out in the infirmary; and also...

Judai Yuki.

At this very moment, he had skipped class directly to follow the "security team" organized by the academy to patrol Duel Academy.

Because they didn't know when spirits would appear to attack, the academy had organized a rotation system centered on the principal and professors. Judai had no heart to study properly at such a time, so he simply slipped out, mixed into the patrol team, and followed them to face those spirits.

The patrol team leader for the afternoon was the "Mighty" professor from the Central Academy branch.

Mighty was muscular, with a sturdy build and broad shoulders, as if he could carry a horse.

Unlike Professor Cobra, Professor Seraf, and Professor Paladin, who specialized in various strange subjects, Mighty claimed to be a rough man, so he didn't teach students "knowledge" like the other professors.

On the contrary, the course Mighty taught as a professor was—physical enhancement.

How to efficiently use spirit power to quickly train the body, how to use spirit power to strengthen the body, how to react faster in duels, how to reduce the damage received to stay clear-headed, and so on.

Although Duel Academy also had "Action Courses," compared to Professor Mighty’s professional course, those were truly child’s play.

Mighty not only demonstrated the practical application of dueling spirits on the spot but also brought out videotapes, playing some of his own near-death experiences in various spirit dimensions.

Humans and spirits were different. When humans adventured in spirit dimensions, they had to pay attention to safety. Even if they reached a collaboration with spirits and had spirits flying them, if they weren't careful, they could get hurt because of the unique "natural environment" of the spirit dimensions.

These were all unpredictable things. As Duel Academy students who would likely be adventuring and exploring dimensions in the future, they all had to learn this seriously; it could save their lives at critical moments.

His course wasn't as vivid as the other professors', but if it were treated as a "collection of wilderness survival performances," it was actually quite interesting. Therefore, students would fill his classroom just the same, and among them, Judai was perhaps one of the students in the entire academy most interested in this course.

He was naturally tough, had heaven-defying physical fitness, loved adventure, liked to explore, and was proficient in fishing and mountain climbing. He could use many of the things the professor taught, so he was naturally excited.

Therefore, he, who didn't study well on weekdays, performed quite excellently in Professor Mighty’s class, and the two could be considered good teachers and helpful friends.

Now that such a thing had happened on the academy island, Professor Mighty, who was good at dealing with sudden wilderness events, naturally took on all the work of exploration, patrolling, and rescue. Judai simply skipped class and came out with the patrol team.

He originally felt that today would be a quite interesting experience.

After all, he could not only protect his classmates but also witness the professor’s dueling.

But he didn't expect...

"Bang! Bang!"

Mighty grabbed a spirit with his right hand, clutching its neck, his right hand emitting a strange fluorescent glow, and then slammed it against the wall just like that. Accompanied by a scream, the spirit uttered words of surrender.

However, Mighty didn't hesitate in the slightest and continued to slam it...

"Bang—Bang!"

With each muffled sound, Mighty’s expression didn't change, and he even said, "Everyone, do you see? This is how you can attack these beasts."

Generally speaking, humans couldn't attack spirits; they could only use spirits to fight against spirits. But today, Mighty taught the teachers and students of the patrol team a lesson.

He had beaten a spirit to death with his bare hands!

"Stop! That’s enough, Professor! It has already surrendered!" Judai couldn't help but jump out and shout at the professor.

"...Judai?" Mighty stopped his movements and looked back to see him. "Why aren't you in class??"

Judai didn't care about this: "Professor, it has already surrendered, there’s no need for this!"

The professor shook his head: "Judai, this is a *war*, a war between humans and spirits! Since it was prepared to invade our world, and even disguise itself as a human to attack classmates, then it deserves to die!"

"This—" Judai’s expression was quite terrible.

"Judai, I told you, this job doesn't suit you. You are too kind. Go back to class!"

Judai’s expression didn't recover, nor did he leave.

Mighty sighed lightly. He casually dropped the spirit. Judai ran over hurriedly to support the spirit and observed its appearance. However, the spirit only looked up at him once before completely losing its vitality, turning into specks of light, and finally completely transforming into a cold, lifeless card.

Judai gripped the card tightly.

A living life had died before his eyes.

A spirit that had already surrendered, that dared not do evil, had died completely!

In his mind, countless scenes he had once *seen* flashed by...

"Professor!! I challenge you!"

Mighty rubbed the back of his head.

"Sigh, it seems I’ll have to properly educate the students when I get back." His helpless expression gradually became serious, and then he said, "Fine, then Judai—I accept."