Preliminary Match

The vast arena grounds were dominated by a duel venue that resembled a towering ancient city. Though the competition hadn't officially begun, the spectator stands were already packed.

Kira arrived outside the venue gates with his senior from the dojo, Koji Sato. After getting out of the car, he looked up and immediately saw the towering Dark Magician statue standing at the main entrance of the venue.

Although Dark Magician's appearance rate in official tournaments had plummeted since Yugi Mutou's retirement and his status as a rare card, as the ace monster of the former Duel King, he still served as the face of many tournament venues.

"Alright, I'm going to go get ready for the match. The preliminary rounds should start soon."

Koji Sato said to him.

"You should also get ready as soon as possible, junior."

"Okay. I look forward to meeting you on the field again, senior," Kira replied politely.

But upon hearing this, his senior's expression turned strange. He looked like he had something he wanted to say, but couldn't bring himself to.

I really didn't want to run into you again.

But ultimately, he couldn't say it out loud.

Bidding farewell to his senior, Kira went to the front desk staff to collect his competitor's pass and number tag. He took the tag and looked at it – it was number 39.

For a duelist, it was quite a lucky number. Kira put away the number tag, nodding with satisfaction.

It looked like his luck was good today; he should be able to get off to a winning start.

"Seems like the Moonflower Cup is high quality this year."

As soon as he entered the venue lobby, he heard spectators talking.

"I think I just saw Kajiki Makoto from the Psychic Style Dojo. Looks like he's participating in this year's competition too."

"Kajiki? That rising duel genius from the Psychic Style? Wow, that should be interesting to watch."

Then he heard someone else say, "I don't really care about Psychic Style dueling. I just hope my buddy who plays Spellcaster Type can advance."

"You wanna see your buddy advance? Psh, I'm almost embarrassed to call you out, but you just wanna see him summon Magical Valkyrie, don't you?"

Magical Valkyrie, who wore a cool mage outfit similar to the 'Dark Magician Girl' from the legendary Yugi's deck. With an innocent face and slender arms, she surprisingly carried a weight in certain areas that seemed too much for her slight frame. She was one of the Waifu Cards long favored by gentleman duelists.

The person who was called out immediately blushed. "But she really is big!"

His companions stopped arguing upon hearing this and all nodded.

"To be fair, yeah."

"It's certainly hard to argue with."

"..."

Kira walked through the venue. After only a few steps, he heard a young girl exclaim.

"Oh my god, really? Are you sure you didn't see wrong?"

"Absolutely certain!" the girl next to her said with great conviction. "There's no mistake, that's Dinosaur Ryuzaki! The Legendary Duelist!"

Kira's steps paused slightly upon hearing this.

Dinosaur Ryuzaki? The one from Yu-Gi-Oh! DM?

When he first appeared, he was portrayed as a skilled duelist, even being the national runner-up of a tournament – back when Yugi, Kaiba, and a host of other powerhouses from later in DM weren't competing.

"Really? But isn't the Moonflower Cup a non-professional, lower-tier tournament? Why would a Legendary Duelist like him..."

"I heard someone say that Ryuzaki had been in seclusion cultivating for several years without appearing publicly. Now he's come out of seclusion; this is his comeback match."

"Wow, then the participants in this year's Moonflower Cup are really unlucky. They ran into a major boss."

"Yeah, doesn't that mean the champion is already decided?"

"..."

Kira tried to recall. He didn't have a strong impression of Ryuzaki, but he did remember Weevil Underwood, the close buddy who was always with him in the anime. Both of them had despicable personalities, resorting to any means necessary to win, though Ryuzaki was slightly stronger than Weevil. After all, the latter even went so far as to throw Yugi's entire Exodia deck into the sea.

However, in a way, his action could also be seen as saving all the later bosses in DM.

Imagine if Exodia's five pieces hadn't been tossed into the sea by that guy; with Pharaoh (Atem)'s cheat-level Divine Draws in the later stages – pulling whatever he needed seemingly on command – the Three Phantom Gods, the Legendary Dragons, and everything from the Orichalcos arc would have just been irrelevant.

It wouldn't be an exaggeration for Marik, Dartz, and Dark Bakura to each give Weevil three deep bows of thanks.

However, since losing to Pharaoh and the Vanilla Monster Katsuya Jonouchi respectively, the two of them seemed to have shifted from competitive players to comedic relief, with their dueling styles also kept developing in a more comedic direction.

Speaking of which, Jonouchi's soul card, 'Red-Eyes Black Dragon', was even won from Ryuzaki. Ryuzaki genuinely hadn't won a single match since then.

DM didn't really explain what happened to him at the end, and he didn't appear in the sequel, the GX Anime. But thinking about it now, the GX timeline was only set eight years after the end of DM, so running into him now wasn't that strange.

Come to think of it, although Pharaoh had already returned to the Underworld, characters from the DM era like Yugi Mutou and Jonouchi should still be around in this era, it's just that it wasn't revealed where they went or what they were doing.

As a veteran from the DM era, Ryuzaki, carrying the title of 'having dueled Katsuya Jonouchi', had even managed to become a 'Legendary Duelist'.

These days, even the fodder who were instantly defeated by Yugi back then dare to call themselves legends. Some of them even really made a name for themselves relying on that gimmick.

Some might genuinely have the skill, but others were just riding the wave. Their 'fought the Duel King' claim likely holds no more weight than Kakuzu from next door telling everyone he 'fought the First Hokage back in the day'.

Neither Weevil nor Ryuzaki appeared in GX, so it's hard to say what their strength is now. However, Kira kept it in mind, figuring if he ran into them later in the tournament, he should show some basic respect and make some targeted adjustments to his deck.

Kira bought a cup of milk tea, found a seat, and casually looked through the list of registered participants.

The average Duelist Level of the participants was generally higher than at the duel hall. After this tournament, he should definitely be able to reach Four Stars smoothly, so he wouldn't have to worry about the academy application requirements.

Scanning the list, besides Dinosaur Ryuzaki, most of the names were unfamiliar; there didn't seem to be any other characters he recognized.

Hmm?

Kira's gaze fell on a name that seemed somewhat familiar.

Jun Manjome?

That eternal runner-up from GX, the one who completed the reverse climb from elite to comedian in just one year?

He checked Manjoume's personal information as well.

An elite student from Duel Academy's attached middle school, expected to be recommended into Duel Academy's high school this year.

Hmm... judging by their enrollment age, the main cast of GX should be the same age as him.

No big deal.

He then glanced at the information for his first-round match in the preliminaries.

Nakamura Tsubasa, Duelist Level Four.

Looks like there won't be much pressure.

In fact, when Nakamura Tsubasa walked onto the preliminary dueling field and stood across from Kira, that's exactly what he was thinking.

Fujiki Kira, Level One, no tournament experience, no awards, a completely blank resume...

Nakamura read over the short personal profile several times, and only saw two words between the lines.

Giving away wins.

Sometimes, you get lucky in tournaments and get matched up against opponents like this. These people are known in the community as Charity Duelists. They're terrible, but they just love to duel, essentially just giving away free wins.

Well, this match is in the bag.

But Nakamura didn't know that when Kira stood across from him and drew his five starting cards, he immediately felt sorry for his opponent.

Sorry, buddy, but I got the nuts.

Looks like only one of us gets to play Yu-Gi-Oh! this game.

Kira had the first turn. He started with the Spell Card "Seizure," paying 1000 Life Points to look at his opponent's hand and discard one card. Next was "Confiscation," which lets him look at the hand and return one card to the deck. He followed up with "Mischievous Twins," paying another 1000 Life Points for the third strike, making the opponent randomly discard one card and then discard another card of their choice, discarding two more cards in total.

The legendary Hand Destruction trifecta, pulled off in one devastating combo.

It wasn't even his opponent's turn yet, and his opponent was still stunned, already down to just one card in hand.

And because he had seen his opponent's hand, Kira knew clearly that the opponent's last remaining card was the Spell Card "Double Spell." This card allows the user to discard a card from their hand to use a Spell Card from the opponent's Graveyard.

Not very useful.

After executing the quality triple combo in one smooth sequence, Kira didn't summon a single monster, set one card face-down, and ended his turn. It was incredibly stylish.

Finally, he elegantly made a "please" gesture.

Alright, I'm done. Do whatever you want.

Nakamura Tsubasa felt completely awful.

He hadn't even had his turn yet and was down to one card in hand. What was he even supposed to do?

But upholding his principles as a duelist, he didn't give up. Nakamura Tsubasa steadied himself and drew a card from his deck.

Then, he saw his opponent dramatically flip face-up a Trap Card, "Confiscation."

The card he had just drawn was sent straight to The Netherworld before it even warmed up in his hand.

Nakamura was bewildered.

Is this guy seriously determined not to let me play any cards?

He had no choice; he was holding onto "Double Spell" but had no cards to discard as a cost to activate it. He could only end his turn in frustration.

It feels like my turn ended before it even began, I wonder if that's just my imagination...

Then it was Kira's turn again. Kira activated the Spell Card "Reinforcement of the Army," which allows him to search his deck for a Warrior-Type monster. Kira immediately took "Head Zaluug," then Normal Summoned Zaluug and attacked directly.

Following the attack, Zaluug's effect activated; when it inflicts battle damage to the opponent, it can discard one card from the opponent's hand.

Nakamura Tsubasa: "..."

Now he had zero cards left.

Seriously...

What kind of karma did he build up in his past life to get matched against this kind of stalling deck?