Chapter 63: The Choice of the Strong

Several days later, Gui Ping sent him the rare card list he had promised, originally intended for the Duel Academy.

As You Xuan had expected, he immediately spotted the “VWXYZ” series dominating the list; without hesitation, he claimed it first.

Since these cards were meant for internal Duel Academy sales, their prices were ones never seen outside. Besides, the bonus he had received from Kaiba Corp remained largely untouched, so his budget was still ample.

Next, he set his sights on the “Treasure Hammer,” used by Banjou in the anime. Its effect allowed him to shuffle any number of cards from his hand back into the deck, then draw the same number.

It was a card that could replace any hand cards during a hand disaster.

The real card had been neutered to “shuffle and replace all hand cards except this one,” instantly turning it into a net loss of one card and drastically reducing its utility.

You Xuan considered it: if the anime effect were real, swapping hands without losing cards might still be usable. But in this anime world dominated by fate power, even deck-search effects were unpopular—let alone this.

Besides, he already hoarded a large pile of anime-limited draw cards; normally, he had no need for the Treasure Hammer at all.

Still, checking the price, the Treasure Hammer seemed the cheapest in the entire box. Though useless in normal play, it might be handy for certain gimmick decks, so he bought three copies.

Then he saw the key plot card: “Evolution Wing.” It allowed him to discard two cards from hand to evolve Winged Kuriboh into a Level 10 rare card.

Yet only one person in the entire Duel Academy possessed Winged Kuriboh, so this card might as well have been stamped with “Jellyfish Head Exclusive.”

You Xuan owned Kuriboh, not Winged Kuriboh; this card was useless to him, so he decided to leave it to Jounouchi.

But after this selection, there seemed to be almost nothing left for Banjou.

“Don’t worry,” Gui Ping told him. “Before sending it to the Duel Academy, we’ll add more rare cards as supplements.”

Hmm, You Xuan reasoned that these good cards would likely end up ruined in Banjou’s hands anyway; to prevent waste, he might as well keep them.

Two days remained until the Duel Academy’s opening.

The day before departing for the island, he visited the dojo one last time to say farewell to the headmaster and fellow students.

Upon entering, he found all students kneeling on the floor, heads bowed. Headmaster Takeuchi stood before them, spitting out furious reprimands.

Intrigued, You Xuan stepped closer and listened for a moment, gradually piecing together what had happened.

In short, the headmaster was furious that the dojo had become overrun with dark energy, and students had begun taking pleasure in tormenting society.

And that was bad enough. Soon, the students realized every fellow dojo member had become a dark energy user—but when dark met dark, the fun diminished. So they turned their attention to nearby duel arenas.

Rumors spread through surrounding arenas: the Silent Dojo’s duelists were all hell’s emissaries, delighting in dragging every opponent they faced into the underworld. Whether they won or lost, the goal was simple: make sure the opponent couldn’t play.

Even more terrifying was how this trend spread like a plague, showing signs of further contagion wherever these people went.

Headmaster Takeuchi could never have imagined that one day his Silent Style would truly flourish—but not as he envisioned. Instead, it spread by “knocking opponents silent through duels.”

By now, the students had thoroughly studied You Xuan’s structure from the Yuehua Cup. Everyone in the dojo now stuffed their decks with Sacred Defense Narako Torrent, Hand Destruction Three Treasures—clearly copying homework.

Of course, You Xuan had anticipated this would happen sooner or later. He was still an unknown, at most a surprise winner in a local amateur tournament, drawing brief local attention to him—so only those nearby studied his deck. But if he ever became as famous as Kaiba, his deck would be dissected by countless others. Some would build counters; others would copy him—inevitable.

Yet through recent duels and research, as his understanding of the anime world deepened, You Xuan began to grasp something: a deck’s strength alone wasn’t enough.

Like in early GX, R-Blue’s student Kagamisaka stole Yugi’s deck and duelled Jounouchi—only to be crushed. Then Jounouchi and Caesar explained this theory in their own ways.

According to Caesar, a duelist must use a deck built with personal emotion and effort; only then will the deck respond to the duelist’s heart and unleash its full power. Using someone else’s deck, no matter how perfectly copied, remains foreign—it cannot win duels.

You Xuan interpreted this as: copying homework reduces the duelist’s own “fate power.” Even if the copied deck is stronger, draw failures increase, miracle draws decrease, and overall personal growth may not improve.

Thus, in many anime duels, players chase "soul"—not merely for flair or style, but because lacking soul makes facing experts harder.

So over these two days, You Xuan had been considering this: the ideal state would be maintaining competitive strategy while using methods—including shattering opponents’ mental state—to dominate, yet also leveraging the spirit’s advantages.

In other words, finding balance between competitiveness and soul.

But that applied only to high-level duels.

For these dojo kids, however, he thought copying homework and relying on strong decks wasn’t so bad.

From his observation, their fate power levels were already low; most lacked talent and would never improve in their lifetimes. Yet switching to a powerful deck visibly boosted win rates.

Indeed, over these two days, their win rates at the arenas had improved since copying his deck.

Though it had damaged the dojo’s reputation.

“We duelists must believe in our own decks!”

Headmaster Takeuchi was scolding the students.

“A deck built with personal intent is unique to each person!”

Though spoken with righteous fervor, one student couldn’t help whispering.

“But Master, I saw you pick up ‘Detention’ just two days ago, and ‘Mischievous Twin Demons’ three days ago.”

Headmaster Takeuchi: “...”

He paused for several seconds.

Then he placed his hands on his hips, lifted his chin, and stood tall.

“I simply share the same insight as Student You Xuan! Great duelists often choose similar cards—it’s natural.”

All students: “...”

(End of Chapter)