Chapter 121: Invitation from the Academic Affairs Office

[Dragon Fang, LP 0]

Dragon Fang, his Life Points reduced to zero, let out a long sigh.

It took him several seconds to realize his fists had unknowingly clenched hard.

On one hand, he felt an impulse to beat the living daylights out of the fellow standing before him, who looked so deceptively proper.

On the other hand, he wanted to punch Professor Cronos, who had smirked slyly, told him to watch this student, and then arranged such a duel for him.

Do first-year students at Duel Academy have this level of skill these days?

And what was this duel all about? Had he been away from his alma mater so long that the educational policy had changed?

Who taught him to play cards like this!?

Dragon Fang had reason to suspect that Cronos's seemingly smiling face had harbored ill intentions from the very start.

Thinking about it now, no wonder that guy wore such a strange smile when mentioning the student assigned to fight him. At the time, Dragon Fang had been lost in his own world, dreaming of dominating the academy and reaching the peak of life after enrollment, so he hadn't noticed. But recalling it now, he suddenly felt there might be a trick involved.

Yet Dragon Fang felt that although he had ambitions, he should have hidden them quite well. In front of Cronos, he had always been respectful and humble, acting like a subordinate who revered his leader, so there shouldn't have been any slip-ups.

So what grudge did the professor hold to deploy such a newborn weapon against him!?

Asuka, watching from the stands, remained silent for a moment.

"Again, a WATER-attribute main deck, focusing on lockdown and control strategies..."

Asuka's expression turned somewhat peculiar.

Although it fit the stereotypical image people had of You Xuan—a shut-in tactic—and belonged to the category of "fun decks" that break an opponent's mentality before depleting their Life Points, it was still a new trick she hadn't seen before.

She grew increasingly curious about the construction of this person's brain; how could he constantly devise various bizarre strategies that sent one's blood pressure soaring, yet apparently possessed considerable combat power at first glance?

She couldn't help but glance at Daizawa beside her.

"Come to think of it, you two are similar types of duelists. If I recall correctly, you also have many deck builds based on different themes, right?"

Daizawa shook his head with a gloomy expression: "Don't mention it."

Ever since his loss in the card duel, he had already been headaches over the endless variety of countermeasures in You Xuan's changing strategies; he hadn't even figured out the previous ones yet, and today, upon seeing the duel, he discovered the guy had come up with even more strange tricks.

It felt like a math teacher assigning three difficult final problems yesterday; you racked your brain all night to solve just one, and with no clue for the remaining two, the teacher hands out three more today, causing your blood pressure to spike instantly.

Moreover, this was just the tip of the iceberg of what You Xuan revealed today. Who knew how much new dirty stuff he had developed behind the scenes?

Daizawa felt immense pressure.

The duel ended, and You Xuan happily claimed his predetermined reward. After watching the duel, Teacher Cronos looked as if he wanted to say something but stopped, seemingly wishing to offer commentary but unsure where to begin; ultimately, he said nothing, merely nodding slightly in acknowledgment.

As for senior Dragon Fang, he obviously had to say goodbye to his plans for a teaching career.

Furthermore, not only did the senior leave on his own, but he also thoughtfully offered his deck voluntarily. Although You Xuan intended to decline, considering that doing so might show disrespect to the duel and his opponent, he reluctantly accepted it with a smile.

To be fair, Dragon Fang's most prized rare card, "Cyber Dinosaur," seemed somewhat useless in You Xuan's eyes; upon acquiring it, he was already thinking of finding an opportunity to sell it for cash. However, the "Mystical Space Typhoon" the opponent had used during the duel was a good item, a backrow-clearing artifact that remained active in the real-card environment even to this day.

With a fresh wave of school credits acquired, the first thing You Xuan did upon returning was, naturally, to immediately exchange them for DP points used for shopping within the academy, and then, as per usual, casually browsed the new products listed on the academy department store.

He casually picked up a few loose cards that sparked slight interest, and when scrolling to the pre-built deck section, he discovered a somewhat interesting new build.

The Disturb series.

One of the signature series of Manjoume, who later completely transformed into a clown, a deck series he called "Even small fry have their uses," though it actually possessed some unique merits.

Moreover, this deck build might have been merely filler in the academy store, being quite cheap compared to other builds.

But thinking about it, this was normal. During the GX era, Disturb seemed to be a very common yet largely disliked series of small fry; even Manjoume's "Disturb Black" and "Disturb Green" were trash discarded by others who deemed them useless, which he had picked up.

Furthermore, the Disturb cards in the GX anime included many support cards that had not yet been released as real cards. Although their individual combat power was hard to call strong, there were indeed some strategies worth playing.

Since it was cheap anyway, You Xuan decided to buy one for the time being.

The Disturb deck might not be strong, but it was definitely skilled at messing with people's minds. Especially those three ugly and clownish brothers; in a duel environment with solid vision summons, their very images, enhanced by animation effects, could maximize taunting value against the opponent.

Not to mention anything else; in the anime, whenever Manjoume used the Disturb Trio to beat someone, the opponent often felt insulted and became extremely angry...

It was just that the build itself was far too useless, lacking any real combat power. To gain practical capability, one still needed to engage one's imagination.

Upon seeing this build, several interesting ideas, all derived from the wisdom of predecessors, had already sprung to You Xuan's mind. Early Disturb decks had indeed appeared in competitive environments, and judging from the characteristics of the Disturb deck itself, it was easy to imagine that any build involving them would inevitably revolve around shutting down opponents and messing with their minds.

It was just that completing a mature build still lacked a few components.

Speaking of Manjoume, in a couple of days, it seemed to be the time for the first round of the Duel Club tournament. Barring any accidents, You Xuan should be facing him in the second match.

He wondered how much Manjoume had improved after so much time had passed since the start of the school term.

However, before that, the Academic Affairs Office had finally taken action regarding the unauthorized intrusion into the old dormitory.

Early the next morning, a truck resembling a troop transport vehicle parked aggressively downstairs. A large group of men in black wearing sunglasses marched straight to the door of the Red Dormitory and began pounding on it, startling the sleepy-eyed Teacher Daitokuji into confusion.

"The Academy's Academic Affairs Office, the guys specialized in handling extraordinary situations..." Daitokuji looked terrified. "Why would such frightening individuals come to our dormitory?"

It is said that life is like a play, relying entirely on acting; Teacher Daitokuji's dedication was such that he maintained his persona even when no one was watching nearby.

"Open the door."

Someone hammered heavily on the door.

Judai, still in his dreams, slowly woke up, rubbed his eyes, and struggled to jump out of bed.

"What's going on?"

Judai yawned.

The voice from outside came again: "If you don't open the door, we will execute a breach."

Judai was still rubbing his eyes.

"B-Breach!?"

As if suddenly awakened by shock, Judai hurriedly jumped out of bed and opened the door.

What met his eyes was unmistakably a female teacher with a serious expression and long, snow-white legs, surrounded by a large group of burly men.

"You are the mastermind, Jaden Yuki, correct?" the female teacher asked coldly.

Judai was bewildered: "Huh? Mastermind?"

"You are to come with us to the Academic Affairs Office," the female teacher's voice brooked no argument. "Immediately."

At the same time.

You Xuan, having washed up early in the morning and preparing to attend class, received a call on his student terminal.

"Hello, is this student You Xuan?"

"It is I. Who is speaking?"

"Oh, I see. This is a teacher from the Academy's Academic Affairs Office. Regarding the incident at the abandoned dormitory last night, we heard you were present at the scene. Could we ask if it would be convenient for you to come to the Academic Affairs Office to describe the situation?"

"But I have a first-period class this morning and am on my way there..."

"Is that so? Then could you tell us what time today would be convenient for you to come to the Academic Affairs Office?"

"I have nothing scheduled during the second period... Would that time work?"

"Certainly, thank you very much for your cooperation, student You Xuan."

A beautiful female voice came from the other end.

"Wish you a pleasant day at the academy."

(End of Chapter)