Spirit

The treasure of the dojo, the symbol of its style.

To be honest, the first thing that description made Kira think of was that saying card players passed around:

You should give up on all meta decks and play my invincible Cyber Dragon—

—in other words, Cyber Dragon.

Zane Truesdale, the Kaiser of Duel Academy, had already become the heir to the Cyber Style Duel Dojo before entering the Academy. According to the Cyber Style Master, Principal Samejima of Duel Academy later on, Zane had moved the spirit of Cyber End Dragon through his unwavering persistence and earned the chance to inherit its legacy.

Well, in the anime, this so-called "moving the spirit" meant Zane practiced drawing god hands every day until he finally mastered the 502 technique of always opening with three Cyber Dragons and a Fusion no matter how he shuffled.

According to Principal Samejima, mastering that god-hand technique apparently meant his training was complete.

Other than that, the only dojo that appeared later in the anime was the Psychic Style Dojo, whose treasured symbol of inheritance was Jinzo.

So our dojo had something like that too?

For a moment, countless Rare Cards from that era flashed through Kira's mind as he tried to imagine what kind of deck it might be.

".I always wanted to carry our style forward too, but unfortunately, I simply lacked the ability. After we lost our Master, the dojo declined day by day. Recently, hardly anyone had even heard the name of our style anymore."

Takeuchi Master continued, then drew a deep breath and looked at Kira solemnly.

"But now, I have seen your transformation. I had nearly given up, but now I think perhaps you are the person I have been waiting for all this time.

Perhaps you can inherit this name, which has nearly vanished, and make it great once more."

"So the deck you mentioned, our style's deck?" Kira probed cautiously.

If this were some ordinary fantasy story and he had reached the point where his master was about to shower him with treasure, he would definitely have been looking forward to some divine pill or high-grade magical artifact.

But the first thing that came to Kira's mind was whether that thing would brick his hand.

It could not be helped. Though the Master's eyes were shining with confidence as he spoke, Kira did not dare be too optimistic. He knew perfectly well that anime duelists had a different definition of a "powerful" deck from real players.

Kira knew that his skill at card games came from deckbuilding and planning. If the Master eagerly stuffed some Level Eight vanilla monster into his deck, he really would not be able to carry it.

Takeuchi Master smiled mysteriously. "Have you heard of the legendary LV Series?"

Kira's heart immediately sank.

This was bad.

The LV Series was a type of deck where monsters automatically leveled up according to the number of turns they remained on the field. They generally had effects like, "Send this monster to the Graveyard to Special Summon a higher-level LV Monster from the deck."

It had been mentioned in Yu-Gi-Oh! GX that LV Series cards were Rare Cards ordinary duelists could not buy at all, priceless and unavailable. For example, the Armed Dragon LV Series shown in the anime had been the treasured symbol of the Duel Academy Northern Branch School, handed down from Academy Headquarters before eventually making its way into Manjoume's hands.

But that was anime logic.

The reason Kira's heart had sunk was that, in the Real Card Environment, most LV Series decks seemed to be complete garbage.

"Exactly! And the Silent Style inherited by our dojo originated from the tactics pioneered by the Duel King Yugi Mutou! As the pinnacle of our style, the card symbolizing that inheritance is this one—"

With great ceremony, the Master presented Kira with the card that had been sealed away for many years.

"—True Silent Magician!"

"Hm?"

Kira raised an eyebrow, unable to hide his surprise.

Silent Magician, level four, ATK 1000

Effect: This card cannot be Normal Summoned. It can be Special Summoned by Tributing one Spellcaster Type monster on the field.

This card gains 500 ATK for each card in your hand. Once Per Turn, you can negate the activation of a Spell Card.

When this card on the field is destroyed by battle or an opponent's Effect Destruction, you can Special Summon one "Silent Magician" monster other than this card from your hand or deck.

It was still quite a powerful card in the current environment. However, Kira remembered that in reality, this should have been a new Silent Magician form printed in the future, so its strength naturally stood out in an early environment.

Still, the Silent deck had existed since the Duel Monsters era, and this world had always placed special emphasis on developing classic ace cards used by legendary duelists like Yugi and Kaiba. Kaiba had already printed Blue-Eyes Alternative White Dragon years ago in the movie, so this seemed fairly normal by comparison.

The moment he took the card from the Master's hand, something seemed to enter the corner of his vision.

To his right, in a corner of the hall, there seemed to be a faint silhouette. White as the first snow of winter, flowing robes brushed the sky like clouds. A tall, elegant figure was wrapped in loose mage's robes, with long silver-white hair swaying softly and silently.

But when Kira abruptly turned his head, there was no one there.

Only a patch of shadow.

"What is it?" Takeuchi Master seemed not to have noticed anything and asked strangely.

"Nothing." Kira fell into thought.

Was it an illusion? Or perhaps—

Takeuchi Master did not ask further. He simply told him solemnly, "Take good care of it. This is not merely a Rare Card. They say it is a card inhabited by a spirit."

"A spirit?"

Kira looked at the beautifully illustrated card, then toward the direction where he had seen that vision.

But there was still nothing there.

".Maybe. I do not really know either. Hahaha."

Takeuchi Master scratched his head.

"I only heard about it before; I have never seen one myself. The previous Master said not everyone could see spirits. Who knows? Just treat it as real, hahaha."

Kira examined the card from every angle, but he truly could not sense anything special about it. Still, considering the peculiar nature of this world, he felt it was better to believe such rumors than dismiss them.

If it was a spirit card, then that changed everything.

With ordinary cards, he might only consider their practicality, strength, and whether bringing along something of unclear purpose would brick his hand. But spirits were different.

As long as you had not gone grave-robbing in Egypt or unearthed some ancient artifact, Duel Monsters spirits generally accounted for eighty percent of this world's supernatural power. They were the easiest way for ordinary duelists to touch the supernatural world.

Take Judai Yuki in the anime. Before awakening the Power of the Supreme King in the Different Dimension, he had basically relied on spirits whenever he encountered supernatural situations.

Early on, he had Winged Kuriboh, which Yugi gave him. Several times, when he faced Dark Duels or his opponent tried to pull underhanded tricks outside the game, Kuriboh had been the one helping him. By the middle of the story, he even had Ultraman—Elemental HERO Neos—who could fly directly out of the deck to clash energy blasts with villains, and even fly beyond the atmosphere to destroy satellites and save the world.

So in this world, even setting aside their usefulness in duels, spirit cards were essential if one wanted to survive in a world filled with cheats, gods, and demons. Even if a spirit was a useless deck brick, it had to be included.

"Next week is the Duel Academy entrance exam, right?"

Takeuchi Master abruptly changed the subject and walked over to a table.

He picked up a small Card Box.

"I heard from some students that you had been asking around for a few cards and were willing to pay for them. Some cards are not easy to get these days, but this old man has been around for many years. I may not have much skill, but I do have a few friends and some channels of my own..."

He opened the Card Box and held it out before Kira.

".Though quite a few of the cards you asked about were unavailable, I managed to get these before the exam. See if they can help, and take them for now. If there are other cards you want, you will have to find a way to get into the Academy and use its internal purchasing channels."

Before he even looked at anything else, Kira spotted the top card in the Card Box. It was exactly the "Jinzo - Psychic Shocker" he had searched for from the very beginning.

In other words, Jinzo.

"Ah, this... Master, you actually went out of your way to find these?"

Kira took the Card Box and slipped it into his pocket.

".This is far too generous. It would not be right, would it?"

Takeuchi Master narrowed his eyes.

If it was not right, then take it back out of your pocket.

"You do not think these are free, do you?" the Master said irritably. "This is an investment. Keep track of it. Once you get into the Academy and make it big, you will pay me back at market price.

"Also, there is one more thing."

The Master drew a deep breath and spoke seriously.

"To be honest, our dojo has not had a single student successfully get into Duel Academy so far. But this time... failure is not an option. Understand?"

"Fine," Kira agreed.

It was just an exam. What was the big deal?