Yu-Gi-Oh!: Starting with an Underworld Deck, Depressing the World
"You're seriously out of shape."
"Damn bastard!"
Hearing that, Chazz suddenly wanted to duel Jiang He in person!
Had he gotten worn out from pressing a few buttons on his Duel Academy communicator?!
He was clearly furious because he'd dueled this bastard!
"Pfft!" Alexis covered her mouth and chuckled.
Then she gave Jiang He an interested look.
This guy really knew how to infuriate people without a care.
Just as she'd expected, he was an interesting person.
Faced with the situation on the field, Jaden Yuki and Syrus Truesdale awkwardly scratched their cheeks.
They didn't know what to say.
Before long, however, Jaden suddenly seemed to think of something and stepped forward excitedly.
He said to Chazz, "Chazz, duel me too!"
"Nani? You want twenty million too?!" Chazz glared at Jaden in anger.
Even Jiang He gave Jaden a surprised look.
Was this hot-blooded fool interested in money and things like that, besides dueling?
"No, I just want to duel Obelisk Blue's number one too, to see how strong an Obelisk Blue elite really is!"
Jaden smiled as he raised the Duel Disk on his left wrist.
"After all, when you dueled Jiang He just now, you didn't get to use a single card! I couldn't see your deck or how strong you are at all."
"Damn it!"
Jaden had rubbed salt in the wound, reminding him that Jiang He had beaten him in one turn.
Chazz's expression darkened again.
Then he pulled himself together and raised his Duel Disk too!
"Since you want to be my punching bag, I'll give you the chance to challenge me! Slifer Red's underachiever, Jaden Yuki!"
"As for our grudge, Jiang He, we'll settle it later! Next time, I won't let you get so lucky!"
"If it's another duel with twenty million at stake like this one, I'd be more than happy to." Jiang He put away the Duel Academy communicator in his hand and smiled unconcernedly.
Then he walked straight off the dueling platform, leaving the spot to a certain hot-blooded fool.
He watched the duel from below!
"I'm already getting fired up about dueling an Obelisk Blue elite!" Jaden declared from the platform, full of fighting spirit.
"Hmph! Slifer Red underachiever Jaden Yuki, don't think you can beat me with petty tricks like that lucky guy did!" Chazz said.
"Duel!"
"Aren't you even a little worried about the next time Chazz challenges you to a rematch?"
As the two on the platform began their duel, Alexis, a little curious, struck up a conversation with Jiang He and asked him.
As one of the top female Obelisk Blue students in Duel Academy, after watching Jiang He and Chazz's duel,
She had already gotten a rough idea of how Jiang He's Exodia the Forbidden One one-turn-kill deck worked and some of its weaknesses.
It contained only a handful of monsters, while the rest were Spell Cards for drawing cards.
As a result, pulling off a one-turn kill with this deck depended heavily on drawing its core monster, [Royal Magical Library].
And if an opponent managed to go first, there was a good chance they could counter Jiang He.
For example, they could destroy Royal Magical Library.
Or use a Trap Card to banish any one of the Exodia the Forbidden One pieces Jiang He drew into his hand.
Either would immediately defeat this somewhat extreme Exodia the Forbidden One one-turn-kill deck.
In other words, it could only achieve a fairly high one-turn-kill win rate against people unfamiliar with the deck.
It wasn't hard for Alexis to figure out.
Now that Chazz had already suffered a loss at Jiang He's hands,
If he sought revenge next time, he would very likely find a way to counter it!
That was also why, she thought, Chazz was still in the mood to stay and accept a duel challenge from that Slifer Red student, Jaden Yuki, despite being quite angry.
He probably also believed he would be able to defeat Jiang He the next time he sought revenge.
Alexis was very curious.
Was Jiang He still so calm because he had something to rely on, or was it simply confidence in himself?
Chapter 17: Jiang He: Could It Be Love at First Sight?
"Who knows?"
Jiang He hadn't expected Alexis Rhodes to strike up a conversation with him or ask him about it.
He gave an offhand, ambiguous answer with a faint smile.
Then he stroked his chin, remembered something from the original plot, and casually joked to Alexis:
"Senior Alexis, you're so concerned about me. Could it be that you fell in love with me at first sight?"
"Uh..." Alexis froze, then blushed slightly and gave him an embarrassed, annoyed look.
This guy.
If he didn't want to say, he didn't have to. There was no need to say something like that to her.
She wasn't trying to pry out information.
Still, Alexis didn't blame Jiang He for the joke.
She thought Jiang He had prepared some secret to winning that he couldn't reveal lightly.
If that was true, then her question just now did seem a little inappropriate.
However, Alexis was also considering something.
Later, she would uncover Jiang He's secret in her own way!
No one could hide a secret from a powerful woman whose interest it had already piqued.
That reaction seems a little different from what I expected. Did she misunderstand something...? Jiang He muttered to himself.
Naturally, he was well aware of the weaknesses of his Exodia the Forbidden One one-turn-kill deck.
As for a way to address those weaknesses,
Jiang He hadn't planned one at all!
He figured that if that goofball Chazz wanted to exploit the weaknesses of his Exodia the Forbidden One deck and come after him for revenge,
Then, when the time came, he could use the extra Emotion Points he'd earned this time
To exchange for a new underworld deck from the system and bring Chazz even more "healing smiles." Wouldn't that solve everything?
He could even fleece him again and earn another batch of Emotion Points!
In other words,
Jiang He's solution was
To switch decks!
"My turn, draw!"
At that moment, on the dueling field,
Jaden and Chazz's duel had already gone through one turn.
Chazz had gone first and summoned a defense-position monster with high Defense to the field.
He had also set a Trap Card!
Now it was Jaden's turn, and he had just drawn his card.
"I activate the Spell Card [Polymerization] to fuse [Avian] and [Burstinatrix] from my hand!"
"I summon my favorite ace HERO, Flame Wingman, in attack position!"
A blue, green, and yellow vortex of fusion light flared up, sweeping Avian and Burstinatrix into it.
In the blink of an eye, amid an orange-yellow glow, the figure of a humanoid, single-winged monster with a black, green, and red body emerged,
Appearing on the field in front of Jaden!
Is this the so-called bond between a duelist and a Duel Spirit...? Jiang He thought, the corner of his mouth twitching as he watched.
His opening hand had the two tireless workhorses, Avian and Burstinatrix, along with the Spell Card [Polymerization].
It was as if the three cards were stuck together and hadn't been shuffled.
But in fact,
Jiang He knew that after a deck was placed in a Duel Disk, the Duel Disk would automatically shuffle and cut it before the duel began.
So there was no possibility that Jaden hadn't shuffled.
All he could say was that although not every other card in Jaden's deck had awakened a spirit, it wasn't far off.
Whenever Jaden needed a card, it would do its best to answer his call and automatically appear on top.
In other words,
It made Jaden highly likely to god-draw the card he wanted.
Jiang He had actually felt something similar, albeit faintly, when he activated Clear Mind.
But his deck had nothing in it except five sealed "body parts" and two immobile libraries.
There were no Duel Spirits in his deck to speak of...
On top of that, he didn't have the ability to see Duel Spirits right now.
He couldn't truly sense anything.
So even when he activated Clear Mind, all he felt was a faint sense that something was different.
All Jiang He could say was,
There was a reason this hot-blooded fool Jaden Yuki could god-draw, as the chosen one selected by this world of dueling.
"Tap, tap, tap..."
Just then, footsteps gradually approached from a distant corridor in the venue.
"Oh no, the academy patrol is coming!"