"Every last one of them is useless."
Professor Cobra shook his head and turned off the screen.
Satou had been the most useful pawn he had found at Duel Academy. For years, the man had harbored immense darkness within his heart, struggling to suppress it himself. After years of accumulation, with the proper guidance, he could easily be turned into a pawn to be used.
More importantly, the man had once been a Professional Duelist. He had decent skill and considerable experience. If even he could not force out the opponent's true ability, then there probably were not many people in the world who could.
"Forget it. I'll have to do this myself."
Professor Cobra snorted. He shut down the device before him and lowered his head to look at his right hand.
The screen had gone dark, and the lights throughout the facility had also been turned off. Amid the boundless darkness, the only source of light was his right hand, which glowed with Red Glow and flickered in the blackness.
Judging by its glowing outline, it did not even seem to be a human arm.
Cobra stared at it, entranced. In his eyes, a youth wrapped in light seemed to appear before him, smiling brilliantly at him.
"Just a little more. Just a little bit more."
"Soon, we can be together."
The youth's childish voice spoke.
"Yes. Just a little more."
Cobra murmured to himself.
Those painful memories, and the despair he had felt then, surged back into his heart once more.
His child—that child who had once been so sunny and lively. He had loved dueling so deeply and dreamed that, once he grew up, he too would become a duelist.
But he never got to grow up.
Cobra's memories of his child were forever frozen at