Yu-Gi-Oh!: Starting with an Underworld Deck and Depressing the World

By now, Alexis's two little followers had tied Syrus Truesdale's hands with a rope and brought the miserable boy to a lit spot nearby, where he knelt on the ground to apologize.

A short distance in front of him stood Alexis and the other two girls.

Her followers stood on either side of her, scolding him angrily.

Only Alexis, standing in the middle, said nothing. Arms folded, she stared coldly at Syrus, frowning in thought.

She intended to see how things developed.

Earlier that day, she had just heard that the little Truesdale was apparently the younger brother of her own brother's friend, Zane Truesdale, the Kaiser.

By rights, he shouldn't have done something like this.

"I wasn't peeping! I came because I got a letter from Alexis! It was in my shoe locker this afternoon!"

Syrus hurriedly defended himself.

He even used his bound hands to pull the letter from his pocket and prove his innocence!

Watching them, Jiang He wanted to cover his face even more.

The love letter Crowler had forged was riddled with flaws.

Anyone in a normal state of mind would have spotted them with one more glance...

"Hm?"

On the other side, Jasmine, the more impatient of Alexis's two follower friends, immediately took the letter from him.

She opened it, took out the love letter inside, and read it with Alexis and Mindy.

The moment Alexis saw the writing, she frowned.

She looked straight at Syrus. "My handwriting isn't this ugly! It doesn't even look like a girl's handwriting."

"Not to mention that huge, disgusting-looking lipstick mark."

"And it seems to say... 'To Jiang He'?" Her other follower friend, Mindy, interrupted with a strange expression as she studied the contents.

"N-no way?!" Syrus was dumbfounded.

Then Mindy turned the letter around and showed him what it said.

"It... really does...!"

"..." Alexis and her two followers stared speechlessly at Syrus's utterly dejected expression.

He had been completely fooled by a forged love letter and lured behind the Obelisk Blue girls' dormitory.

Worse still, he had come without even reading what it said...

Were all the Slifer Red students complete idiots after all?

Except... perhaps Jiang He, who had answered Professor Crowler's question in theory class that day.

"Alexis, what should we do with this idiot who came to peep on the girls' dormitory? Should we turn him over to the academy again?"

Her two follower friends looked at Alexis as they asked.

"No, I have an idea." Alexis suddenly seemed to think of something, and the corners of her lips curved up slightly as she smiled.

"Someone must have wanted Jiang He to be mistaken for a pervert, so they used my name to lure him here."

"Isn't that interesting? I was already looking for a suitable chance and reason to have a proper duel with him and see something clearly!"

As Alexis spoke, her smile grew wider.

She hadn't expected to find a chance to duel Jiang He so soon!

She wanted to see just what "secret" that man had hidden away for dealing with someone who countered his one-turn-kill Exodia the Forbidden One deck!

"Alexis really does... want to see into that guy's heart, like she said today." Her two follower friends exchanged a glance.

Both immediately wore excited, gossipy expressions, having arrived at the same mistaken conclusion!

"So she's planning to challenge me to a duel..." Jiang He muttered to himself, faintly hearing the voices from over there.

He rubbed his chin and thought for a moment. Taking the opportunity, he quietly slipped away from behind the bushes, then rowed a small boat farther out onto the lake, putting some distance between himself and the Obelisk Blue girls' dormitory!

About halfway across the lake, Jiang He put down the oars and stopped. He took the time to slowly browse the system's options for a new underworld deck to redeem.

Meanwhile, he waited for word from Alexis, asking him to "come" duel!

If it were anything else, Jiang He couldn't say.

But if it was a duel, he said he would be more than happy to oblige!

How could he refuse someone delivering emotion points right to his door?

"System, show me the redemption options."

Jiang He considered which underworld deck to redeem as he looked over the virtual screen that appeared before him.

[System shop (randomly refreshes every two days, offering four redemption options each time)]

Today's options:

[Deck: Cyber Dragon deck (Zane Truesdale version)] 500 points.

[Deck: Gravekeeper deck (underworld version)] 1,000 points.

[Deck: Lava Golem deck (underworld lockdown style)] 1,000 points.

The original fourth option, the Duel Spirit Sight Ability, had already disappeared after being redeemed.

Only these three options remained.

Jiang He naturally didn't consider the first one, Zane Truesdale's Cyber Dragon deck, at all.

It was so normal that it looked completely out of place next to the other two.

It wasn't underworld at all,

and clearly wasn't what Jiang "the Great Benefactor," who had resolved to bring people smiles, should choose.

Most importantly, Jiang He knew very well that even if he used it, he might not match the bond between the deck and its original user, Zane Truesdale...

Wouldn't that make him an inferior imitator?

If it were the complete "shameless Cyber Dragon deck" from later times, Jiang He would have considered it!

Besides, after telling Jaden's little brother, Syrus Truesdale, stories three times during the day and farming 700 emotion points,

he now had a "fortune" of a full 1,500 emotion points on hand!

Naturally, he had to pick the expensive one!

Jiang He immediately began considering the last two options.

The underworld version of the Gravekeeper deck should be a life-point-draining OTK, the kind that sent an opponent's blood pressure soaring all at once.

The Lava Golem deck, on the other hand, was an underworld lockdown deck that made the opponent's blood pressure rise steadily.

Jiang He nodded, pleased with his analysis, and soon made his choice!

When it came to the "perfectly depressing" experience of raising someone's blood pressure, the latter was indeed superior!

He just didn't know whether Alexis Rhodes would challenge him to a real-life PK after their duel...?

Jiang He suddenly fell silent,

glancing at the new underworld deck he had just redeemed.

"Beep, beep, beep."

A faint notification sounded and a vibration came from his pocket.

Is it here?

Jiang He's expression shifted. He pulled out his Duel Academy communicator and saw the message he had expected.

"We have Syrus Truesdale. If you want him back, come to the lake behind the girls' dormitory..."

Chapter 25: What a Coincidence!

"If we're meeting on the lake behind the girls' dormitory, then I won't have to row over there..."

Seeing the message from Alexis and the others on his Duel Academy communicator put Jiang He in an even better mood.

He simply waited where he was at his leisure.

"Huh? Jiang He, you're here too...!"

Just as Jiang He put away his communicator and deck and waited for Alexis and the others to come over,

before the boat from the Obelisk Blue girls' dormitory across the lake arrived,

he suddenly heard the puzzled voice of a familiar hot-blooded idiot from behind him.

Jiang He raised an eyebrow.

Turning around, he saw a figure in red with chestnut-shaped hair rowing a short distance away.

Wasn't it that hot-blooded idiot Jaden?!

And behind him in the boat sat a simple-looking, chubby boy with a large nose who looked remarkably like a human-shaped koala at first glance!

He wore the red-and-white Slifer Red uniform of an upperclassman.

Clearly, he was Chumley, the other roommate of Jaden Yuki and Syrus Truesdale who had been mentioned earlier.

"How did you get here?" Jiang He asked Jaden Yuki in surprise.

No matter how he thought about it, even if Alexis had also sent Jaden a message to make sure Jiang He came,

asking him to come to the lake,

Jaden and the others should only have just set out by now!

There was no way they could already be here with him!

"Syrus suddenly sent me a message earlier with just a few words, telling me to come rescue him."

Jaden Yuki pulled out his communicator with a troubled look and showed Jiang He as he answered truthfully.

He still had no idea what had happened.

"At least he's a little clever..." Jiang He remarked with a grin as he looked at the words "SOS, Blue girls' dorm" on the screen.

Syrus had managed to send a distress message without Alexis Rhodes or her two follower friends noticing.

That was a skill of another kind.

"Did Syrus's distress message bring you here too, Jiang He-san?" Chumley, sitting behind Jaden, asked in puzzlement.

"Ahem... something like that. It's just that the message I got wasn't from Syrus."

Jiang He coughed and spoke without batting an eye.

Naturally, he couldn't tell them that he knew everything that had happened.

Or that he had been nearby the whole time.