The duel ended. The virtual images gradually dispersed. Hikaru casually put away his deck.
Not far away, Misawa rolled a few times on the ground as if hit by some huge impact, landing in standard Yamcha pose. Didn't know if he was injured.
Soon, Misawa rubbed his head, sucking in cold air, muttering: "Really hurts, Hikaru, couldn't you go a bit easier?"
Looked like his memories had recovered.
The weight on Hikaru's heart finally lifted.
"Ha, Kishin, you should feel grateful it's me. If it were Jaden or Chazz, they wouldn't have the good temper to accompany your rehab."
"Tch, I prefer you calling me by name."
"Hahaha, Kaiyō, why are you blushing."
Hikaru laughed for a bit, then said with a smile: "Then, Misawa, welcome back."
Misawa took a deep breath, feeling lost. Just as he was about to say something more, beside him, a sandbag-sized fist was already pressed against his face.
"Too slack, Misawa!"
Under many eyes, Misawa "spontaneously" flew up, spinning two more times in the air, before slamming into the wall with a bang.
"Ta, Tania..." Misawa covered his face, coughed twice, then looked at Tania in astonishment.
Mm.
Hikaru silently nodded from the side.
Not only had the memories returned, it seemed the sealed spirit vision had also returned.
"Too slack, too slack, Misawa!"
Tania had beaten Misawa into the wall, showing no sign of concern. Instead, she clenched her fist and stood before Misawa: "Recall your original dream, recall last year's efforts!
Just arriving in this dimension and being enchanted by other cards, losing your own personal talent. Someone like you, how can you be a good diplomat!"
A flash of embarrassment crossed Misawa's face, but then he coughed and acknowledged: "You're right... Tania, my training isn't enough."
"Good, starting from today, extra training!"
Tania also looked angrily at her own fist.
She wasn't just angry about Misawa being controlled by the fox demon. She was also angry at herself.
In the Xyz Dimension, because they were simply diplomatic members, they basically didn't participate in any duels. So both Misawa and she had grown slack in training.
Especially, she herself had actually failed too.
Even though she'd trained for a long time before leaving the camp, she sank into the "soft life," and ended up being caught off guard during dimensional transport, then being taken advantage of by the fox demon.
She too needed to intensify training!
Watching the two's heated atmosphere, Atticus Rhodes and Syrus couldn't help laughing softly. Shay didn't know what had happened, but under explanation, slowly understood.
Mm.
In short, his own cards were replaced, and he hadn't even realized it.
That meant his will and spirit weren't iron enough. He definitely needed training!
Compared to the relatively quiet dueling arena, the Duel Academy classmates and friends watching the broadcast chattered excitedly.
The cards Hikaru used this time were basically all cards they'd seen before. Besides Triphyoverutum, they basically all knew everything.
Precisely because of this, they felt even more astonished at Hikaru's duel this time.
"When the deck was completely milled just now, I felt my heart was about to stop." Chazz let out a sigh of relief.
If he'd lost, their efforts during this time would have been wasted.
"Yeah, as expected of Hikaru. Even in this situation, he could still counterattack."
"Salamandra with Chain, haven't seen that card for a long time either."
"Though many cards have been swapped, Fighting Flame Swordsman is definitely in Hikaru's deck. That's naturally expected."
"Oh, thinking about it this way, that professional duelist back then wanting to completely destroy Hikaru's deck was also impossible. As long as Hikaru's turn arrived, Hikaru could always recover Fighting Flame Swordsman once?"
"Crush and re-sublimate. That's Hikaru's Fusion."
Including Yusei, Crow, and the others, everyone was discussing the previous duel.
The duel with Throne could certainly show Hikaru's strength, but actually only showed strength.
This duel showed Hikaru's uniqueness, Hikaru's Fusion.
Just like his own Fusion philosophy, Fusion conviction, as long as he was still dueling, he would absolutely follow his Fusion path. This meant even if the deck returned completely to nothing, he would restart everything and Fusion again.
"Looks like the changes from the duel with Lady Tierra were even greater than I imagined." Jaden Yuki clasped his hands behind his head, thinking about this duel's contents, pondering.
That fated duel, that inevitable duel, all of them had watched the whole thing.
But actually, nearly most of them were only shocked by the exaggeration of Hikaru's and Tierra's duel and the directness of their words.
Even Chazz was somewhat distracted during the process.
Those actually fully invested in the duel from start to finish were only him and Yusei.
Jaden Yuki pondered.
That duel wasn't just the two opening their hearts. Looking at it now, Hikaru's dueling had actually also grown stronger.
He was somewhat excited.
Truly exciting!
The already strong-enough Hikaru, the Hikaru who basically had sufficient understanding of dueling, was still growing stronger!
Jaden deliberated.
That wouldn't do.
Beside him, Yubel seemed to hear Jaden's inner voice. Her eyes kept blinking. She pointed at herself, as if hinting to Jaden.
Jaden watched her and lightly smiled, nodded slightly, but didn't respond.
Though he didn't express his own meaning, he had indeed thought of Yubel.
Yubel's Phantom could directly return Yubel in the Graveyard to the Deck and summon from the Extra Deck. It was indeed also a recovery method.
Though he preferred Elemental HERO, Yubel had been very enthusiastic during this time. He could consider adding Yubel to the deck.
But this matter, for now, he kept in his heart without immediately expressing it.
Actually, he'd had some other ideas before, just that due to the sudden situation, he hadn't acted.
Because of worry about Misawa and Zane, he'd followed to this dimension. But actually, he himself had other things he wanted to do.
Though the chaos Yubel caused in the human world wasn't much, actually, the destruction Yubel caused in the spirit world wasn't small.
He originally wanted to visit those dimensions during vacation, then try to make up for the mistakes and solve the difficulties.
Not only that.
Jaden Yuki had more and more other things he wanted to do.
Besides spirit dimensions hurt by Yubel, there were a few special dimensions he wanted to see personally.
For this, he needed time.
A lot of time.
He wanted to go to the Dark World.
The Dark World controlled by the Dark World's Dragon God, and the Dark World controlled by Reign. Most importantly, that was the world the Supreme King had once ruled.
He hadn't wanted to acknowledge the Supreme King's identity before, but now, as Jaden Yuki, he had to make his showing.
Let me go check it out with Hikaru later.
He thought.
Actually, he more wanted to directly pause his fourth semester and even later studies, focus on going to other dimensions to search for all that was lost, all that was destroyed, then find a way to rebuild a brand-new world.
But leaving so abruptly might make friends and juniors worry.
Go check it out with Hikaru first, then slowly ask for leave, slowly request Professor Crowler. Should be fine.
On one hand, he even thought that if it was Hikaru, he might even reproduce "The Dragon King of the Dark World." That might be quite helpful for Hikaru's deck.
Mutual benefit.
He glanced at Professor Crowler who was excitedly moved to tears, celebrating that Misawa had finally recovered his memories. He couldn't help sighing inwardly.
What a shame.
If he were still that silly, cheerful Jaden Yuki who didn't care about classmates' and teachers' moods, that would be good. Once Zane was found, he could directly leave.
But not bad either.
He enjoyed the current atmosphere, the current classmates, teachers, because they were living very happily, very warmly.
Hikaru didn't yet know what Jaden was thinking. After defeating Misawa, he found a seat and sat down. Over there, Misawa and Tania shouted slogans passionately for a while, then half red-faced, Misawa awkwardly came over to apologize and thank the few people.
During this, Hikaru also asked Misawa about his experiences during this time. The result was Misawa awkwardly scratched the back of his head.
He had indeed learned quite a bit in the Xyz Dimension, mastered Xyz Summoning. But besides that, he'd basically been loitering around the Xyz Dimension every day as a street wanderer.
"Really embarrassing, Misawa." Hikaru raised his brow. "No wonder you were captured so simply."
"Hey!"
Misawa really wanted to shout that Zane had also lost his memories, but quickly restrained himself.
Because unlike him, Zane had clearly received super-luxurious treatment. Not only was he housed separately, he even had different attire and special power added to him. It belonged to multi-faceted integration.
Compared to him, Zane was more pardonable. After all, Zane's body hadn't even fully recovered.
Regardless, the duel had ended. Under Misawa's recounting, everyone also knew that Polaris was indeed Zane.
Because when Misawa came to this dimension, he actually had some memories. At that time, he and Zane had fallen into a luxurious place. Not long after, they lost their memories.
Very likely at that time, they were together had their memories modified by this world's existence.
Hearing this, Atticus Rhodes let out a sigh of relief.
Good, as long as it's Zane!
As long as he could be found!
Syrus also let out a sigh of relief, but similarly felt dread.
Then, this way, the next round was expected to be, big brother!
"Please wait, everyone." A staff member came to tell them. "The President has contacted the Noble Council. Lord Polaris will come here shortly."
Here he comes!
The group lifted their spirits.
Syrus became agitated. He couldn't sit still. His gaze wandered. He occasionally stood up wanting to do something, then sat down bewildered.
"Syrus, do you want me to go?" Atticus Rhodes asked this question again.
"No... no, I can do it!" Syrus tried hard to encourage himself.
Watching him like this, Atticus Rhodes was somewhat worried.
Syrus, had he really grown enough to awaken Zane?
But he didn't show his worry. Instead, he goofed around as always, patting Syrus's back and laughing. He said he believed in Syrus. He also added things like "later give Zane a hard slap" "let this kid know how worried everyone was" "Kaiba Corporation spent so many resources just to find him, can't let this guy feel at ease!"
Hikaru smiled and occasionally chimed in. While waiting for Zane, he took out his deck and looked through it with Tierra.
Hadn't dueled with Misawa for a long time. Hikaru was quite curious what cards this duel would produce.
Those cards that had gained energy naturally went without saying. They were all progressing normally. What made him more curious was whether there would be some strange brand-new lower-level monsters.
As if responding to his thought, Hikaru found that his deck had indeed produced brand-new cards.
Magnet Warrior?
Hikaru was startled for a moment.
Oh, there was this matter.
Hikaru remembered.
Misawa himself was indeed a Magnet series user. Producing Magnet monster lower-levels from the duel with him was indeed very normal.
Hikaru thought of the card he'd obtained earlier.
Mm.
Imperion Magnum the Superconductive Battlebot.
This was a card Yugi Muto had given him. But because he'd been busy during this time, he hadn't collected the related cards for a long time.
Thinking carefully, since then, Darkness and the One God war matters seemed to have crammed together, madly converging. Hikaru really hadn't had a second to spare specifically collecting scattered cards. Though Professor Crowler helped buy them, it was absurd that this Magnet Warrior was truly a rare card.
But now, by gathering, he could try to use this card.
Though its Fusion material requirements were very high, he didn't need to gather its material's materials. He only needed Valkyrion the Magna Warrior and Berserkion the Electromagna Warrior. He had already gathered the related cards, so he could really take time to make the materials.
Using Graveyard Fusion, Deck Fusion, or cards like Fusion Birth, he could easily fuse it out. Gaining a free use that didn't consume anything was still worth trying.
Just as he was thinking, he heard a series of steady footsteps.
The corners of his mouth rose. He put away the cards and looked at the door.
At the same time, Syrus also excitedly jumped up, looking outside the door.
A tall, mask-wearing man, with starlight seeming to protect him, each step on the ground as if stars were falling, this absurd pretty-boy type lightly walked into the dueling arena.
"I've already seen your duels. Very interesting!" The man's voice, familiar to everyone, rang out with vigor. "Let me be your opponent! But regardless, the victor will absolutely be me!"