The air did not so much move as thicken.
Jinzo's aura swelled on the Duel Disk's projected readout like a dark tide, his LP counter flaring into existence in a sickly red. Four thousand. The number felt wrong, not because of the math, but because the spirit across from Julian had no business being reduced to digits. It was a thing of wires and rusted meat, a will that hummed like an overloaded transformer in the back of his skull.
Nightmare-Eyes stayed just behind him. Not invisible, not subtle. The towering, alien shape was visible to everyone in the room now, its mass of impossible geometry coiled above and behind Julian's shoulders like a second shadow that reached the ceiling. The small spirits from the Reject Well massed in a cluster at his back, pressing against his legs, crowding his ankles and calves and the hem of his uniform jacket. Watapon flattened itself like a white puffball against his shin. Petit Dragon tried to vanish inside the fold of his pants. Happy Lover twisted its tiny hands together, hovering just behind his knee.
He could feel their fear. He could feel everything.
"Draw."
The intention brushed the room more than the word itself. Jinzo's holographic side of the field pulsed, and one card slid up and out of the invisible deck on his Duel Disk, riding a column of red static before snapping into the spirit's waiting hand.
It did not look at the card like a human duelist. There was no glance, no microexpression, no tell. There was only the sense of recognition, like a lock agreeing to a key.
A card hit the Monster Zone. "Psychic Bounder. Summon. Attack Position."
(LIGHT/Machine/Level 4/1700 ATK)
The voice was wrong. It came from everywhere at once, riding the still air instead of traveling through it. On the field, a capsule-like machine unfolded, plated metal blooming outward on jointed arms, its central eye glowing a malignant gold. Sensors rotated with enough precision to grasp an insect midflight. Its presence clung like static to Julian's skin.
"Psychic Bounder…" Bastion's voice came out hushed, almost reverent, the scientist in him momentarily overriding the fear. "When summoned, it searches a Jinzo or a card that lists it. That thing is tutoring itself."
Julian did not look away from the spirit to answer, but he heard him. Heard Alexis's quiet intake of breath beside Bastion. Heard Syrus shuffle his feet, shoes squeaking faintly against the arena floor.
The machine eye on Psychic Bounder flashed. The card on Jinzo's field glowed with the same harsh gold reflected in the spirit's thin metallic face. "Effect. On Summon. Search."
Cards slid in the projection of Jinzo's deck, as if invisible fingers were riffling them. One floated out toward the red LP counter and burned itself into Jinzo's hand. The aura around the spirit flexed, pleased.
Jinzo's gaze flicked to the card still hovering in the air beside him, as if the spirit was rifling through an invisible hand. One more shimmer peeled away from that not-quite-solid silhouette, coalescing into the shape of a Quick-Play Spell that hung over the ruined console like a neon afterimage. The card snapped into focus, text and circuitry-bright art etching themselves into place.
Psychic Wave. Julian felt Nightmare-Eyes tense behind him, a warning ripple through their shared link.
"Impact incoming." The presence whispered across his thoughts, not in words so much as the clear premonition of pain.
Jinzo's arm rose, fingers crooking toward the Machine body already on his field. Its metal frame thrummed in answer. Somewhere in the depths of the shadow-duelist's "deck," a second copy of that faceless head, the original Jinzo, dissolved into static and dropped into nothingness.
The Spell resolved. It did not look like much. No pillar of fire, no thunderbolt from the ceiling. Just a pulse: a tight, focused ripple of psychic force that rippled out from Jinzo's chest and slammed into Julian's sternum like a closed fist made of electricity.
His vision flared white. Heat knifed under his ribs and up his spine, too precise to be a normal shock, too real to be just numbers ticking down. His knees buckled before he could stop them. Nightmare-Eyes shoved back through their bond in the same instant, catching a chunk of the force and bleeding it off into itself; that made it survivable instead of catastrophic, but it still felt like someone had reached in and yanked six hundred points straight out of his soul.
The LP counter at his side stuttered, then rolled down from 4000 to 3400 with a harsh digital buzz.
Alexis flinched like she'd been hit with a ghost of the same blast. Mindy's hand flew to her mouth. Jasmine grabbed the railing so hard her knuckles went white.
"Julian!" Syrus yelped, starting forward on instinct.
Bastion's arm shot out across his chest, more reflex than calculation. "Don't." he said, voice thin. "The barrier— if you cross it—"
On the floor, Torrey's fingers twitched, as if some part of his body recognized the pattern of that pain even unconscious. The Reject Well spirits reacted as one frightened animal. Watapon shrieked, its round little body puffing like it might burst, then shot up against Julian's hip. Petit Dragon coiled tighter around his shoulder, wings mantling in useless protectiveness. Happy Lover's tiny face crumpled, eyes wet, hands reaching toward where the impact had landed as if it could smooth the hurt away.
Nightmare-Eyes' aura lashed out in a dark, protective flare, folding around Julian's back and shoulders like a second skin. The next aftershock that tried to bite into him hit that invisible shell first and guttered, reduced to a dull ache.
"Breathe." the Ka murmured into his mind. A cool line of intent cutting through the static. "This was only the first shot. Your life force is diminished, not broken. Hold tight."
Julian sucked in air through his teeth, forcing his knees to lock, dragging himself upright again one heartbeat at a time. The trembling in his hands was very real. So was the way his lungs fought to draw a full breath.
So this was what it had really felt like for Torrey. Not the dramatized version on a Duel Disk display. Not life points as clean little numbers in the corner of a screen. A Spell card resolving and leaving your nerves screaming and your soul feeling… thinner.
He swallowed, tasted copper and ozone, and made himself look straight back at Jinzo.
"Okay." he rasped, more for his friends than for the monster. "An opening burn to make me quiver. How ingenious."
Behind him, the little spirits pressed closer, a shivering wall of color and worry. Up in the stands, Alexis' eyes were locked on him, wide and furious and afraid. Syrus looked like he might be sick. Bastion's gaze flicked between Julian and the LP counter, horror and analysis wrestling behind his glasses.
Julian rolled one shoulder, testing the way his body answered, and forced his voice steady.
"I'm still here." he called over his shoulder without turning. "Nobody moves. Nobody interferes. Got it?"
The fear in the room didn't disappear. But it had something to orbit now. Not pure helplessness, but the sight of him still standing after psychic fire to the chest.
A Spell/Trap slot on Jinzo's side lit next, a card slamming face-down into existence with a heavy, metallic clunk that echoed off the arena walls. The whole light fixture grid overhead flickered for half a heartbeat as the spirit's influence brushed the wiring.
"One face-down." That everywhere-voice again. No change in tone. No need for words like "turn" or "phase". Everyone in the room felt the intention. "End."
Julian exhaled only when the oppressive push of that turn eased. Nightmare-Eyes did not relax behind him. It was still coiled and ready, the bare suggestion of a clawed hand resting in the space above his shoulder without touching.
'Our turn.' The thought came not in words but in a clean, layered chord of meaning. His Duel Disk responded in the physical world, his deck pulsing with pale blue light as the top card moved up to meet his fingers.
He drew. The edges of the cards felt familiar, grounding. Julian forced his lungs to take a full breath and dragged his focus back to the card in his fingers instead of the phantom ache still buzzing through his ribs.
Pot of Greed, Pre-Preparation of Rites, Night Assailant, Apprentice Magician, Scapegoat and Emissary from the House of Wax. If his life had not been in danger, if there were not three unconscious Obelisk boys on the floor behind him and a kill-hungry Machine spirit across, it would have been a nice opening.
"Alright…" he said, more for the benefit of the kids clinging to his legs than anyone else. "Let's see what we can do."
Watapon peeked around his knee like a terrified marshmallow. Nightmare-Eyes did not speak, but he felt a calm pressure at the back of his mind. A 'yes, go on'.
Julian slid the first card onto his Monster Zone. The green border was almost comforting. Of all the things that could have followed a spirit literally throwing lightning into his life points, seeing one of the most familiar spells in existence staring back at him felt almost kind. He set it into his Duel Disk with more care than usual, like the paper might tear if he moved too fast.
"I activate Pot of Greed."
The hologram flickered to life between them, that wide-mouthed jug grinning like it knew every joke he had ever made about it from the other side of a screen (Oh no, what does it do?). Light poured out of its open top, arcing down into his deck. Cards shifted in a ripple he could feel against his fingertips as the disk prompted him.
Two cards slid free, offered up as if the game itself was apologizing for the hit Jinzo had just landed.
He drew them. The first was a familiar dark silhouette framed in black and blue. Nightmare Apprentice.
The second, a Spell with clean lines and a glint of stylized tomes. Magician's Library.
Julian's shoulders eased by a fraction. Of all the things he could have drawn, this was almost ideal. Apprentice meant he could convert that Emissary he'd into field presence and more pieces. Magician's Library was a treasure he never saw in the TCG back home. An anime-only card that would be on three copies in almost every single deck in existence. It was exactly the kind of "cheat" engine this deck needed to keep pace with a murderous spirit that could make life points hurt.
The burn in his chest was still there, but it settled into the background as his mind lit up, paths branching and refolding.
'Okay. Breathe. You took the hit. Now you make it matter.'
Across the room, the gathered spirits huddled a little closer behind him, watching with wide eyes as the glow from Pot of Greed faded and the two new cards joined the fan in his hand. Jinzo's aura crackled impatiently at the far end of the arena, but for the first time since the duel began, Julian felt the shape of a plan that didn't end with him on the floor next to Torrey.
He closed his hand around Nightmare Apprentice and Magician's Library, pulse evening out.
"Good," he thought, more to himself than to anyone else. "If you want to play real, we'll play real. Discarding one card from my hand I can Special Summon Nightmare Apprentice."
(DARK/Illusion/Level 6/2000 ATK)
The hologram that answered was a slash of dark cloth and pale skin, a figure that looked like it had stepped out of the shadow of an older card. Her blue eyes sparking with jou and possibility, lips curved in a knowing almost-smile. A staff in one arm, ending in the familiar outline of the Eye of Anubis (also known as 'the millennium symbol').
She rose to full height at his side of the field, ATK indicators flickering to life beneath her and landing in a solid 2000 points.
Syrus let out a tiny, startled sound. "That's…"
"A Illusion support." Bastion finished for him, mind snapping back to card text and interactions even with a ghost trying to eat them. "Her effect searches…"
"Yeah." Julian's voice cut gently across Bastion's explanation. He met Nightmare Apprentice's blindfolded face and nodded, addressing both her and the trembling crowd of spirits braced behind him. "And I'm going to use that right now to add another Illusion monster to my hand."
A ripple of magic rolled out from the Apprentice's feet, a ring of black-and-violet script that circled her before diving down through the floor of the projection. His deck responded. One card glowed in the projection, circled by the same glyphs, before launching out into his waiting hand.
The stylized eye on the artwork glared up at him in a bright glow, like it was looking into his decklist for a single card. Emissary from the House of Wax.
Relief was a sharp little spike in his chest.
"Good girl." he murmured, barely moving his lips.
Happy Lover made a quiet cheering sound, fluttering up to bump against his elbow before retreating behind him again.
"Illusion?" Syrus asked, unsure.
"Yeah, it's new support came recently. Before that, only Pegasus' monsters had it." Bastion clarified. And yes, that was quite a difference from what he lived, but something he already knew. In the manga, all of Pegasus' Relinquished and Eyes-Restrict monsters were always considered Illusions instead of Spellcasters.
He could not afford to burn his Big Play just yet. Not with a hand like this, not when Jinzo already had a search locked in and a set he could not read.
"Battle Phase." Julian called, voice steady.
Psychic Bounder's sensor array twitched, angling toward Nightmare Apprentice as if it could already measure what was about to happen.
"Nightmare Apprentice, attack Psychic Bounder."
He saw the Apprentice move twice: once as a hologram and once as a layered, spiritual double, her Illusion nature flickering in the corner of his eye. Ethereal chains snapped forward, the eye-shaped sigil at their end flaring with hungry light. She cut across the arena with more grace than her ATK value deserved, shadows trailing from her sleeves.
The impact, when she hit Psychic Bounder, came with both sound and something more. The machine's casing split under that conjured weight; sparks arced, sensors shattering like glass. The hologram burst into shards of red light, dissolving into motes that the duel system obediently counted as destruction.
Jinzo's LP counter flashed: 4000 -> 3700
The whole arena felt the dip. It was not numbers. It was a slight lessening of pressure, the briefest stagger in the spirit's posture.
Nightmare Apprentice's strike should have shattered Psychic Bounder into digital dust. Should being the keyword. Instead, the mechanical form only staggered, skidding back across the arena floor as if repelled by an invisible cushion of air. No explosion. No fragments. No fading pixels. Just… resistance.
Mindy blinked first. "Wait. Didn't it hit harder? Shouldn't that…?"
"It should've blown it apart." Jasmine finished, gripping Alexis's sleeve.
Even Bastion narrowed his eyes, calculations already firing. Syrus's confused "Huh?" was the most honest reaction in the room.
Julian exhaled, steadying the tremor at the edge of his ribs where Psychic Wave's earlier burn still lingered.
"Nightmare Apprentice is an Illusion." he said, loud enough for his friends in the corner to hear. "Illusions don't fully 'exist' in this world. Most of them, Apprentice included, can battle, deal life point damage, but they can't destroy the monsters they hit. And they can't be destroyed by them either."
A moment of stunned silence. Bastion mouthed the word as if tasting it. "…Illusion… as in a separate interaction axis? A non-physical projection layered over…"
"Dude." Syrus elbowed him gently. "I think he means it's ghost-punching."
Jasmine nodded, earnest. "Yeah. Ghost-punching tracks."
Alexis didn't look away from Julian, reading him sharper than the others. "So your deck… it's built around that? Around monsters that bend the rules of… reality?"
Julian gave the smallest shrug he could manage while still keeping his stance ready, eyes fixed on Jinzo's aura crackling behind the Bounder.
"It's built around working with what I've got."
Nightmare-Eyes stirred behind him, shadows stretching in agreement. The smaller spirits pressed closer. They felt the logic even if they didn't understand the mechanics. Julian lifted a card from his hand.
"Main Phase Two." A new card slid into place on his Duel Disk, materializing on the arena floor in a soft shimmer. "I set a monster."
The face-down sigil pulsed once. Its hidden identity, Apprentice Magician, humming beneath the card sleeve like a secret waiting for the right collapse. "And I set one card face-down."
The hologram of the back of a card appeared beside it: Scapegoat. Quiet, unassuming, innocuous… unless you knew exactly what it meant in a duel where a homicidal spirit could turn a single bad turn into another body on the ground.
He looked up at Jinzo. At the half-formed apparition, at the pulsing core of malice inside the ghostly armor.
Nightmare Apprentice returned to a neutral stance, spectral chains coiled loosely at her side. She was still an attack point, still a statement: he was not going to turtle up and pray.
"My turn is over." His voice did not waver this time. "Your move."
The lights shuddered again as Jinzo's aura coiled, rising like a wire heating toward overload. The second turn began.
"Draw."
The card didn't so much slide from his deck as tear free, dragged into his metal hand by an invisible current. The half-formed body on the field twitched, more static than substance. Then it moved.
"Tribute." Jinzo intoned. The word felt like a verdict.
Psychic Bounder's frame lurched forward, joints locking in unnatural unison as if seized by a command it couldn't refuse. Its lights flickered once in protest. Its outline shattered into a shower of crackling particles, pulled upward and crushed into a single point of light that slammed into the spirit's core. The arena boomed low, like distant thunder inside a steel drum. Where Bounder had stood, Jinzo finished forming.
(DARK/Machine/Level 6/2400 ATK)
Now it was fully here.
The plates on its body sealed; the cables along its spine hardened into armor; the metal collar around its neck locked with an audible click. The dome of its head glowed from within and every Trap card in the arena went silent.
The kids from the Well flinched as one, clustering tighter behind Julian's legs. Nightmare-Eyes uncurled further behind him, wings widening in a subtle, protective arc that didn't quite touch the physical world but changed how it felt to stand there.
Jinzo's presence pressed on the room like a hand on a speaker cone, warping everything else around it.
"That… thing's on the field now." Syrus whispered, voice thin.
"It was already influencing the area before." Bastion said, staring, forcing himself to translate horror into language. "But as a proper summon… its influence is stronger. Any Traps he might have relied on are…"
"Dead in the water." Jasmine finished, hugging herself. "Great."
Julian didn't look back at them. He could feel their fear; more than that, he could taste it on the air thanks to Nightmare-Eyes' presence braided into his own.
His duel disk hummed, waiting. Jinzo raised one hand.
"Battle."
Its single word rolled across the arena like a cold front. It didn't turn toward Nightmare Apprentice. It rotated, purposefully, toward Julian's facedown monster.
"That's…" Mindy started.
"Of course it is." Bastion cut in, voice tight but clear. "Illusion monsters cannot destroy by battle and cannot be destroyed by battle. Attacking into Nightmare Apprentice is inefficient. Eliminating the set monster instead reduces Julian's actual board presence."
"So it's… picking the better move?" Syrus asked, throat dry.
"Yes." Bastion swallowed. "It's… not just a brute."
Energy built at Jinzo's palm, a sphere of distorted light buzzing with static and the faint echo of distant screams. It fired in a straight line, a brutal beam that smashed into Julian's face-down.
The card flipped for a heartbeat: Apprentice Magician flashed on the hologram, startled, hands half-raised and shattered into shards of light.
Julian raised his hand.
"Apprentice Magician's effect. When it is destroyed, I can Special Summon a Level 2 or lower Spellcaster from my deck."
The Duel Disk offered him options in a gentle glow. He selected the card he already knew he wanted.
A ghostly image of Old Vindictive Magician flickered for a second above his deck, just enough for everyone present, including Jinzo, to register what he'd chosen, before the projection folded in on itself.
The card materialized on his field face-down, dropping onto the holographic grid with a soft thunk as a new set monster.
Watapon peeked around Julian's knee, wide-eyed, watching the brief silhouette of the bent old spellcaster disappear under the card back.
Across from them, Jinzo didn't react beyond a faint, contemptuous crackle along its armor. It had noted the information; that was all.
"End." it said.
The oppressive weight of its turn settled like dust on metal. Julian inhaled slowly, letting his shoulders relax just enough to move.
And then…
"Okay, what did I miss?" The voice came from the top of the stairs. It wasn't loud. It didn't have to be.
Every head in the room turned as Jaden loped down the steps two at a time, Duel Disk clipped to his belt, jacket half-unzipped, hair exactly as chaotic as always. He took in the scene in a single sweep: the half-lit arena, the unconscious bodies, Alexis and the others pressed to the rail, Jinzo glaring murder at the world… and then his eyes found Julian.
"…Huh," he said. "You take three days off and the whole island decides to speedrun 'worst case scenario?'"
Syrus almost sagged with relief. "Jaden!"
"I had to sweet-talk a very angry cafeteria lady into giving me an extra juice box for our patient." Jaden held up the unopened carton as evidence, then squinted past Julian's shoulder. "Sorry for the delay. And good to see you're still here."
Nightmare-Eyes loomed at full height, visible to everyone now: a towering, alien guardian with too many limbs and eyes that weren't quite eyes, a presence that bent perspective around itself. The children from the Well were smashed into a terrified cluster behind Julian, trying to hide behind a human body that was tiny compared to their other protector.
Jaden gave Nightmare-Eyes a brief, easy nod, like greeting a very large, very weird neighbor he'd already met.
"Guess you've been busy too." he said under his breath.
Nightmare-Eyes responded with a faint tightening of its aura, a ripple that tasted like wry acknowledgement more than anything. Julian felt it as a shared impression: He knows. He accepts. This is within parameters.
Jaden's gaze flicked to Torrey's crumpled form, then to the scorch marks on the floor where previous attacks had landed. His smile thinned just a fraction.
"Yeah. Definitely a worst-case kind of guy." He jerked his chin at Jinzo. "How deep in are we?"
"Deep," Julian said. "But not sunk."
Jaden's eyes sharpened. For all his casual posture, he was reading every line of the field, every tremor in the air.
"You finishing this one?" he asked quietly. The words were simple. The meaning under them wasn't: If you can't, I step in. If you can, I'll hold the line behind you.
Julian met his gaze. Felt Nightmare-Eyes' steady bulk at his back. Felt the cluster of tiny spirits clinging to him, terrified but trusting.
"I've got it. The duel has already started." he said.
Jaden studied him for a second longer, then nodded once, satisfied. The big, reckless grin snapped back into place.
"Cool. Then make it quick, yeah?" He hooked his thumbs in his pockets, deliberately loosening the tension around them. "I was planning on hitting the snack bar before they close. I'm not letting some rusted can-opener mess with my post-trauma carbs."
Mindy let out a short, strangled laugh. Jasmine elbowed her, but she was smiling despite herself. Even Alexis's jaw unclenched a notch. Jaden tilted his head toward Jinzo, eyes bright.
"Hey, bucket-head." he called. "Hope you enjoyed the warm-up. Now you're up against the guy who does homework for fun."
"Jaden…" Julian muttered, but there was a small, reluctant huff of amusement in it.
Jaden didn't break eye contact with Jinzo, not really. His grin was wide, lopsided, familiar, but underneath it, something sharpened. His stance shifted almost imperceptibly: feet braced, shoulders angled forward, weight centered like someone ready to spring between danger and the people behind him.
It wasn't bravado. It wasn't dismissal. It was Jaden being Jaden: the boy who faced terror with a laugh because someone else in the room needed that laugh to breathe.
The effect was immediate.
Syrus' shaking eased. Bastion looked like he could truly focus once more. Mindy released a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding. Jasmine's posture straightened by a degree, tension bleeding out of her arms. Even Alexis,her eyes still tight with fear and calculation, seemed to ground herself on that single absurd, perfectly timed joke.
Because Jaden wasn't mocking the danger. He was defying it.
He was saying, in the most Jaden way possible: You're scary, but you don't get to decide how scared we are.
Julian could feel the shift like a change in air pressure. Jinzo's spiritual pressure, which had felt crushing and predatory only moments before, no longer dominated the room. It was still there, heavy and lethal, but something had interposed itself: something warm, human, stubborn. A gentle decree from a still unknowing heir of the Gentle Darkness.
Nightmare-Eyes sensed it too. The Ka's aura rippled, adjusting, coiling more tightly around the cluster of duel spirits behind Julian. The power of Julian's spirit shielding had protected them. Jaden's influence went beyond that: it was not only a protection against the threat, it uplifted the whole scene with his mere presence and energy.
This was the strange miracle of Jaden Yuki: not that he didn't fear, but that he refused to give fear any authority and his friends, every one of them, even the terrified Slifer beside him rose a little straighter simply because he was there.
Julian met his gaze for a moment. Jaden didn't wink or smirk or offer another joke, not this time. He just nodded once, a quiet affirmation: I've got you. You're not alone. Do your part, I'll handle the rest.
And somehow, the arena felt a fraction less haunted.
Julian lifted his hand over his Duel Disk. The next card waited at the top of his deck, humming with possibility.
Behind him, Nightmare-Eyes unfurled its wings one notch further, a shield of shadow and glass between Jinzo and the trembling cluster of children.
It was his turn. "Draw."
The card touched his fingers with a pulse, like someone tapping the inside of his palm to get his attention. Nightmare-Eyes murmured approval, a soft vibration behind his thoughts, urging him forward.
He exhaled once, grounding himself, and raised his arm. "I activate the Spell Card: Black Illusion Ritual."
The room dimmed. Blue fire spiraled upward from the card, forming the familiar cylindrical shrine etched in shifting glyphs, hovering weightless above the arena floor. The pressure from Jinzo's aura pushed back against it, like two forces trying to overwrite one another.
Julian reached toward his field. "I offer Magician of Faith as the tribute."
The card briefly appeared on the grid, dissolving into threads of deep indigo light. For a heartbeat, the specter of the pink-haired spellcaster bowed towards Julian, toward Nightmare-Eyes, toward the trembling children behind him. Then, her form unraveled, drawn into the Ritual's core.
The shrine flared open. "Come forth, Relinquished!"
A shadow peeled itself into existence. A single, enormous eye opened first. Rotating, searching… and the black, half-molten body followed, dripping like liquid darkness woven with memories. The air seemed to fold around it, bending light, bending presence. Even incomplete, this form was old in a way most creatures had never been.
Mindy grabbed Jasmine's arm hard enough to leave marks. Jaden just grinned wide and proud.
"There he is." he said warmly. "The OG babysitter."
The Reject Well children peeked around Julian's hips, stunned into silence. Not by fear, but by recognition. Their first guardian had returned to the world.
Jinzo jolted. Not physically. Not with movement. With terror.
Not fear of Julian. Not fear of defeat. Fear of being devoured.
Relinquished's pupil contracted sharply, then dilated as it locked on its target.
"Relinquished's effect." Julian said, voice steady now. "Jinzo is absorbed into my friend here."
Jinzo's plating clattered like loose machinery. For a moment, its form flickered. Not the hologram, but the entity wearing that hologram, the spirit clawing desperately at whatever tether kept it cohesive.
Black tendrils burst from Relinquished's body, snapping outward like whips of liquid shadow. Jinzo raised its arms, energy flaring, trying to resist, but its body was incomplete, its anchor unstable, its balance already fractured by the earlier overreach.
The tendrils wrapped around its torso, threading between plates, binding cables and circuitry into a crushing embrace. Jinzo's mechanical scream rattled the arena lights.
The sound wasn't just digital. It wasn't metal. It was alive.
Then Relinquished pulled. The spirit slammed into its body with a shudder that shook the ground. Jinzo's metallic shell dissolved into dark energy, sucked inward like water spiraling down a drain, until nothing remained but the red glow of its former eye now burning in Relinquished's chest.
The shrine shattered. Silence fell.
"Holy—holy crap," Syrus whispered. "It… ate him."
"It's his effect." Bastion said faintly, though even he sounded unsteady. "Or. Or a spiritual extrapolation of it. Or something. I don't know."
Julian drew a breath, steadying himself as the pulse of Nightmare-Eyes throbbed faintly behind him. A towering presence, but not a burden. More like a second heartbeat.
Across the field, Jinzo's side was empty. Relinquished's earlier absorption hadn't been an attack, it hadn't destroyed anything. It had only collapsed the temporary manifestation anchoring Jinzo to the field as a monster.
For a moment, it seemed like more than that. Torrey inhaled sharply, the first real breath he'd taken in minutes. His fingers twitched, as some of the oppressive weight crushing him loosened, just for an instant. Jasmine even lurched forward, instinctively reaching out.
Julian recognized the pattern. Relinquished only pulled what was on the field. It didn't take the spirit itself. Not yet. He raised his arm.
"Battle Phase." A tight, collective inhale rippled through the group. Even Jaden, newly arrived, tilted his head forward.
— "Is… is it over?" Mindy whispered, half hoping.
Nightmare Apprentice moved first. Her form, warped, stylized, an Illusion's aesthetic in unreality. Flickered at the edges, a creature that never fully obeyed depth or lighting. Relinquished drifted beside her, its single eye not on a monster, but on the space where a monster should have been.
Julian frowned. But nothing prevented him from attacking. The duel wasn't over, and Jinzo's Life Points still glowed at 3400.
"Nightmare Apprentice, direct attack!"
The air snapped. A sharp, electric crack, like a bulb exploding under pressure, echoed across the arena.
And Jinzo reappeared. Not as a hologram. Not as a glitching projection, but as the spirit forced back into the duel slot. It was flickering, strained, its internal aura dimmed to a wavering amber. Alexis recoiled instinctively.
"He… he came back?!"
Whatever relief Torrey felt evaporated. His body sagged again, shoulder striking the floor as Jinzo's returning presence pulled at him, draining him more violently than before.
The machine-spirit lifted a hand. Not to strike, but to block. Light blossomed there: a wavering, translucent figure waving in a pendulum motion. Battle Fader.
A fiendish little guy appearing with Jinzo's pure defensive impulse, an emergency wall ready to block the offensive that would finish the game.
Julian exhaled sharply. "Figures…"
(DARK/Fiend/Level 1/0 DEF)
The tiny fiend chirped silently, appearing on the field in defense position and releasing a wave that collapsed the entire Battle Phase. Nightmare Apprentice stumbled back, forced out of her attack posture. Relinquished simply hovered, unblinking.
Syrus let out a shaky, half-panicked breath. Alexis stared at Jinzo with cold fury: not fear, but offense at seeing Torrey collapse again.
Jaden, meanwhile, gave a low whistle.
"Okay, he's tougher than he looks. Still just a bucket-headed antique trying to buy time, though. Don't sweat it, Jules. Your field is still way stronger."
Julian's fingers hovered for a moment over the set card, but he didn't flip it.
"Not yet." he murmured, more to himself than anyone else.
Old Vindictive Magician flickered faintly beneath the card sleeve, its presence felt even through the concealment. Turning it face-up now would destroy Battle Fader instantly… but that wasn't the win condition. Leaving a frail monster exposed in attack position would hand Jinzo a free opening next turn, and in a duel where every inch of tempo mattered, that was a risk Julian couldn't justify.
I'd rather keep my options. He thought quietly, eyes still on the field. Old Vindictive is worth more to me face-down than traded for a token wall, even if it's a tribute fodder still in the field. If Jinzo brings out something stronger with it, that's when it'll matter.
Nightmare-Eyes murmured agreement at the back of his mind. A cool, strategic pressure that echoed the logic. Patience. The strike reserved for the right moment.
Julian set his jaw and moved on. His claws would remain hidden, Old Vindictive would wait. "That's it, I end my turn."
Jinzo straightened. Its aura rippled darker, heavier.
Its turn was beginning. And it was angry.
The lights above the arena dimmed again. Soft at first, then sharp, like a heartbeat stuttering in the dark. Jinzo's draw was not a motion so much as a surge, a pull of energy that made the very air grind. Julian braced himself.
A low, metallic hum spread outward as a spell circle ignited under the spirit's feet: Monarch's Stormforth. He felt the weight of it instantly: oppressive, crushing, the kind of authority that twisted the rules around itself.
"Oh no." Bastion breathed. "That's bad."
The golden sigil expanded across the arena floor and hooked itself around Relinquished.
Jinzo's mechanical voice stated, cold like an equation. "Your ritual monster. Tribute. Summon Jinzo again."
Relinquished, still flickering, still half-stabilized after the strain of absorbing Jinzo moments earlier was wrenched off the field in a single violent pulse. It didn't explode, it didn't break. It simply collapsed, devoured by the spell's authority and forced back into Julian's Graveyard like a flame smothered under a lid.
Torrey's body twitched again as the machine essence inside him fractured and recoiled, a shudder rippling through the boy's frame.
And then the arena shook once more. A pillar of violet light erupted as Jinzo manifested again. Fully, violently, returning to the field through a brutal Tribute Summon that made several flickering bulbs overhead burst in their sockets.
Alexis flinched at the sound. Mindy covered her ears. Jasmine swore under her breath.
And Jaden, dropping down onto the platform just as the shockwave faded, let out an exasperated huff.
"Great." he announced. "Bucket-head shows himself once again. Clearly one time was not enough."
Despite the joke, his stance was protective, sharply aware, more serious than his voice allowed. Jaden was here, and with a few words the world felt less like it was ending.
But Jinzo wasn't finished. A second spell carved through the field. Something sharp, something targeted. "Spell card, shield crush."
Julian's set monster erupted under the impact. The hologram flared just long enough to show the faint outline of a Spellcaster before shattering into dust.
"Old Vindictive…" Julian exhaled.
"He's dismantling his defense one piece at a time." Bastion muttered, watching the last fragments fade.
And then Jinzo moved. The machine lunged forward with another burst of psychokinetic force, its aura rippling like wires stripped of insulation. It brought its arm down on Nightmare Apprentice, the impact bursting against her frame with a sound like breaking glass.
She didn't fall. She didn't even flinch. Julian did.
White fire lanced across his ribs and up his shoulder, stealing his breath with the suddenness of a slap and the bite of electricity.
"Julian!" Alexis' voice cracked.
Syrus stumbled forward. Jasmine reached out as if she could steady him across the distance.
Nightmare-Eyes roared silently behind him, its fury shaking the air like a storm trying, and failing, to break free.
Julian forced in a breath. "My Illusions can't be destroyed by battle… but their hits still go through me."
His Life Points dipped: 3400 -> 3000. The Apprentice remained standing, Jinzo didn't care.
It wasn't trying to break his field anymore. It was trying to break him.
Next to it, Battle Fader hovered awkwardly. As the attack ended, silence followed. A heavy, electric silence composed of the hum of the high voltage.
Nightmare-Eyes murmured in Julian's mind: a quiet, cold flame of affirmation.
"We adapt. Continue."
Julian set his stance, lifted his duel disk, and breathed once, deeply.
"My turn. Draw."
A cool ribbon of air brushed his fingers as the card slid free—swift, clean, almost anticlimactic.
Mystical Space Typhoon. Useful… later. Right now? It solved nothing. Jinzo's field wasn't built on spells or traps: it was built on pressure. A choking, metallic, predatory pressure of a spirit forcing its way further into manifestation with each stolen breath.
Julian's fingers lingered a moment on the cards left in his hand. Magician's Library rested at the top. Quiet, unassuming, but dangerous in the right sequence. If he committed now… if he forced his engine online… He could try to pull the duel into his momentum. There was even a world where it spiraled into a winning line.
But Jinzo still had resources, possible answers. It would be a gamble, not a play. Jinzo hadn't shown its teeth yet, not fully, and firing off a full commitment with the rest of his cards before the machine overextended would be the kind of mistake he could never accept.
Nightmare-Eyes' presence pushed gently behind Julian's thoughts.
"Not yet." Not warning, agreement. Patience wasn't hesitation. It was preparation.
Julian let out a slow breath. "Yeah. Not yet."
Across the arena, his friends watched with tight shoulders. Even Jaden stood with his hands in his pockets but laser focus locked, ready to act even if there was nothing he could do.
Julian didn't want them to see hesitation. He wanted them to see intent. He placed a hand over his cards.
"Alright… first, I'll set a monster." A small ripple of shadow spread across the field as Night Assailant tucked itself face-down. The Well-spirits reacted immediately: some peeking, others whispering tiny, fearful noises that only Julian could hear.
Next, Nightmare Apprentice's form flickered, waiting. Its painted grin twitched in the light of Jinzo's aura.
"I'll turn my Nightmare Apprentice into defense position."
The illusory spellcasters dissolved into ribbons of blue-black light, reforming low to the floor, its staff stuck on the floor with prismatic illusory barriers rising like shields against the mounting psychic pressure. Then Julian slid another card into his spell/trap zone.
"And I'll set one card." Mystical Space Typhoon. That one would matter when Jinzo overreached, to clear his backrow when the machine pushed too far, revealed too much. When opening a crack in its armor meant something.
Julian stepped back from the field, expression composed.
"That's all. Your move."
For a heartbeat, the arena quieted. The oppressive hum of Jinzo's energy throbbed like a second pulse under everyone's skin.
Bastion whispered. "Standard Julian. He's preparing a long-game defense and buying time for a swift comeback."
"You would think that his signature by now." Alexis said. "Oh well, you don't throw spells at a wall of metal. You wait for a hinge."
Syrus nodded rapidly, clinging to the explanation even if fear still shook his voice. "Y-Yeah… Julian knows what he's doing."
Jaden's smile was small but confident. Julian met Jinzo's single burning optic. "Let's see what you do next."
The machine's response wasn't verbal, just a sharper, hungrier surge of aura that rolled across the arena like a wave of iron filings.
The storm did not begin with sound. It began with stillness.
Jinzo raised its metal-plated hand over the Duel Disk, and the air tightened around the platform. The spirit's presence, normally simmering like a faulty engine, deepened into something heavier, the electric hum in the field crawling beneath the skin of all present. Even the trembling children fell silent, as if some instinct told them a predator was stretching to full height.
Julian watched with that steady, unblinking calm that had become his signature. Nightmare-Eyes crouched behind him in a half-visible spectral outline, its giant eye glowing brighter, aware of the incoming shift in tempo. Jinzo's clawed fingers snapped downward.
"Draw."
A cards materialized in the spirit's hand in a flicker of cold green light. It was immediately activated without even a glance, as if the decision had been predetermined long before the duel began.
"Pot of Greed. Activate."
Gasps rose from the group watching at the edge of the broken platform. Not because the card was powerful, though it was, but because the spirit played it without hesitation, as if accelerating into a plan already too big to contain, a calculation already made into a sure thing.
Jinzo raised its arm again, the next card sliding forward with mechanical certainty.
The moment its fingertips brushed the hologram, the spiritual static snapped. "Activate Raigeki."
Lightning erupted from the sky. Violent, immediate, tearing down through the chamber like a divine spear. The children flinched and buried their faces. Even Alexis recoiled instinctively.
Julian's monsters didn't stand a chance.
Nightmare Apprentice vanished first, the staff she carried burning apart like firewood. Night Assailant shattered into fractured polygons of blue light, leaving behind a faint shimmer. When the smoke parted, Julian's field was bare.
Only two face-down cards remained, quiet slivers of cardboard in a suddenly enormous space.
"Oh no." Syrus whispered, gripping the railing so tightly his knuckles paled. "That's… that's a total wipe…"
Mindy covered her mouth. Jasmine stared wide-eyed. Bastion ran scenarios on his head so quickly his lips trembled with a terrified conclusion. But Jaden's eyes drifted past the glowing spell card and back to Julian's face.
His expression didn't change. Not during the draw. Not during the acceleration of resources. Not even with the powerful lightning rendering all of his monsters into useless particles. He simply breathed, steady, unhurried.
Alexis also looked at Julian, and the worry in her chest tightened for a moment, until she realized he wasn't tense. He just watched the field with the same quiet focus as before, as if his mind had already stepped into the next turn, like Jinzo was tap dancing in the palm of his hands.
Jinzo wasn't even close to finished. The spirit gestured sharply toward its old body on the field.
"Sacrifice. Summon Jinzo – Lord."
(DARK/Machine/Level 8/2600 ATK)
The original Jinzo's form broke apart instantly. It was shredded into spiraling circuitry, data fragments drawn upward into a vortex of red light. The swirling mass condensed, threads of energy tightening into a tall, jagged silhouette that slammed into the ground with a thunderous impact.
The arena lights flickered. A towering metal android stood in its place, almost doubling in size. Its presence like a guillotine held aloft, and even the air felt sliced by its arrival.
One of the children whimpered; Nightmare-Eyes placed a spectral hand around Julian protectively, though Julian himself remained perfectly still.
Torrey, unconscious nearby, once again shifted slightly for the excessive sudden drain at the husk of his body, his essence captured once again to empower the monster's evolution.
Jinzo spoke again: cold, clipped:
"Tribute. Summon."
Battle Fader fragmented into noise and dissipated, and from the circuitry-laced sigil left in its wake erupted Jinzo the Machine Menace, its limbs sleek, armor angular, its eye glowing a deeper, more aggressive red.
(DARK/Machine/Level 7/2400 ATK)
Another monster with over two-thousand attack against his open field.
Whispers rippled across the platform. But the spirit was still not done. A third card materialized from its hand.
"Monster Reborn, activate."
A sarcophagus of static-lined metal appeared behind Jinzo, its lid sliding open with a shrill whine. Broken pieces of the original Jinzo recompiled themselves, reassembling into a fully functional body emerging from the spectral coffin.
Three monsters, the core powerful aspects of his spirit all in the same place. A field designed to break bones, break wills, break games. The group went white.
"Three of them?" Syrus squeaked. "He would need a lot to survive!"
Alexis took one step forward involuntarily. Her pulse thundered in her ears. "What is he going to do…?"
Bastion shook his head, both horrified and impressed. Jasmine leaned into Mindy, whispering, "Can he even block all that?"
Jaden laughed softly.
"You're asking the wrong question. Look at him."
They did.
Julian stood alone in the flickering light of three tyrants towering over him, the wind of their spiritual presence tugging at his dark coat. Yet not a single strand of his composure shifted.
His breathing smooth, shoulders still relaxed and eyes calm. He had expected this. Planned for it. Built his defenses in layers specifically for this moment.
Jinzo slid into its stance. The air vibrated.
"Battle Phase."
The words hit like a strike of metal. Julian moved. One card turned with the gentle, precise motion of a surgeon's hand.
"Activate Scapegoat."
Light burst across his field. Four Sheep Tokens unfurled into being. Tiny, gentle creatures of shimmering white energy, floating together in a loose arc. They formed a buffer between Julian and the looming cybernetic monsters, a soft glow standing against the cold, metallic domination before them.
Syrus nearly collapsed with relief. "Oh thank goodness! He had a backup—!"
Alexis exhaled, a hand going to her chest. "He saved it until now… From the first turn. He really waited for the exact timing…"
Mindy nodded rapidly. "That's why he was so calm…"
"He never lost control." Bastion murmured. Jaden tilted his head, grinning.
"That's Julian for you. Bucket-head only knocked down his first wall. There's another one standing right in front of him."
Julian turned his head slightly. Barely a shift, just enough to show he'd heard the comment. His voice, when he replied, was soft but edged with confidence, the kind that slid under the skin and lingered. "And a third waiting in my hand."
A brief glance toward Alexis.
"You worry too much, hun."
A subtle line. Not flirtatious enough to draw gasps, but warm enough to land.
Alexis blinked, caught off guard by the softness in his tone. Jasmine's eyebrows rose. Mindy elbowed her lightly with a soft, conspiratorial smile.Syrus just stared.
Jaden replied with a relaxed, wide grin. "And he even has the spirit to talk smack and hit on the ladies."
Jinzo - Lord struck first. Its charged blast annihilated the first Sheep Token in an explosion of light. The tiny creature disappeared with a soft bleat, particles drifting like dandelion seeds.
Machine Menace moved next, slicing the second with a brutal downward arc.
The revived Jinzo fired a psychic pulse that shredded the third.
Only one token remained. Quivering but bright, its luminous body floating before Julian like a stubborn spark refusing to be extinguished.
The field was quieter now. Nearly empty, but not broken. Julian smiled for a moment. The worst had passed, his line had held and the enemy overextended, just as he wished for.
And if Scapegoat had failed? If Jinzo had found some way to pierce or negate that thin layer of defense?
Then the card resting in Julian's hand, the waxen figure waiting in silence, would have stepped forward. Emissary from the House of Wax, added from Nightmare Apprentice in his first turn, ready to take form and shield him with a body that could not be destroyed by battle, absorbing every blow without yielding.
Three walls. Three layers. Three calculations.
Julian never walked into a storm without an umbrella. And a backup umbrella beneath it, just for good measure..
Jinzo's glowing eye dimmed slightly, annoyed. Not thwarted, but slowed. The spirit jerked its arm downward.
"End."
The arena returned to stillness. The three Jinzo monsters stood poised in formation, humming with psychic energy, but they had failed to break through entirely.
Julian lifted his gaze, his eyes meeting the red lens of Jinzo – Lord without a trace of intimidation. He drew in a quiet breath. And spoke two words that made the entire group freeze.
Not shaken or desperate, just certain… like the strike of a clock at the precise second of midnight. "Last turn, draw."
The atmosphere flipped instantly as he took his final piece. Alexis felt a chill run down her spine. Not of fear, but anticipation.
Syrus whispered. "H-He said that so casually…"
Bastion adjusted his collar, pulse accelerating. "He believes he can end the duel here."
Jaden grinned, eyes bright.
"Oh, he's not just believing it." he said. "He's already decided it."
Julian's fingers hovered above the top card of his deck as it was taken, the quiet hum of energy around him shifting just slightly. Three metallic titans glared down at him, humming with psychic and electric fury, their cyclopean eyes fixed in expectation.
Behind him, the last surviving Sheep Token floated like a lone candle in an endless night.
Julian looked at the new card on his hand, Millennium-Eyes Illusionist.
His expression didn't change. It didn't need to. Everything was already in motion. With surgical precision, his first card for the turn was activated, touching the back-row card he had set turns ago in a flick of his wrist. "I activate Mystical Space Typhoon."
Wind howled across the metaphysical field, a spiral of azure pressure tearing downward like a sudden coastal gale. Jinzo's set card trembled, circuitry sparking, then it shattered. A burning holographic sigil for Psychic Shockwave whirled into static and dissolved.
Syrus smiled. "And with that, no more protection!"
"That was Jinzo's only reliable countermeasure, if he had one." Bastion murmured, voice taut.
Alexis's eyes snapped wide. "That means…"
Jaden grinned. "You heard him. He's going for the kill." He nodded toward Julian. "Open board. Open path."
"Only three giants still on his way and no board presence besides a little sheep token for more than three thousand damage still needed." Pointed Mindy.
"Yeah, easy game." Stated Jasmine ironically.
"Right?" Agreed Jaden. No one knew if the irony was missed by the red boy or taken into consideration and summarily ignored.
Julian raised a second card from his hand.
"Activate Magician's Library. Quirky little spell, it allows me to search my deck for a spell card and add it to my hand." The spectral tome appeared at his side, a floating book bound in gentle blue light, its pages fluttering open one by one as if seeking something in its depths, the pages inside shimmering with projections of ailes and ailes of different books, as if this tome alone contained an infinitude of knowledge by itself.
A pulse of illumination. A whisper of power. A card slid free from the ether, projected to between Julian's fingers with elegant finality: Relinquished Fusion.
Alexis's breath trembled. "I saw that on his opening hand. He planned this… from the start."
Bastion nodded slowly. "Layered preparations. Each step designed for when his enemy's defenses were the lowest."
"Just like in our lessons." confirmed Syrus.
Jaden smiled wider. "Julian doesn't improvise. He foresees."
Julian lifted the added spell forward, the grey-ish glow around him intensifying. "I activate Relinquished Fusion."
The card expanded, spiraling into a dark vortex lined with golden inscriptions. Two shapes stirred within the depths of Julian's Duel Disk: two silhouettes, pulled from the grave. One was a warped, twisting shadow of an eye-laden creature: Relinquished. The other was the familiar robed figure shattered by Raigeki: Night Assailant.
Both victims of Jinzo's earlier pressure, and now reborn as fuel. Julian's voice remained steady.
"Fusion Summon." The vortex twisted, folding over itself. Light bled into shadow. Shadow bled into light. A form rose from inside: a terrible, elegant silhouette with metallic hands, a gaping central bright eye and tendrils with a thousand stares that shimmered in hypnotic waves. Nightmare-Eyes Restrict.
(DARK/Illusion/Level 1/0 ATK)
It had zero attack, but the number felt irrelevant. What mattered was the moment Nightmare-Eyes touched the field.
Because the Ka of Julian vanished from his side and reappeared standing as the fusion monster.
Everyone felt it. Not saw, felt.
A pressure in the lungs, not painful but unfamiliar. A shiver in the spine that didn't signal fear, but wrongness. The instinctive awareness that what stood there was not a ghost, not a spirit, not a monster.
But a presence. Alien, primal, finally in full power and glory. Not shaped by rules mortals understood.
Alexis stepped back. Her throat tightened, eyes locked on Julian's manifested Ka shimmering over the duel: humanoid only in silhouette, wrapped in vibrating patterns of geometry no one's brain wanted to process. Syrus stuttered incoherently and even Bastion lost his composure, mind scrambling to dissect what didn't belong in any academic framework.
In special, the children from the Reject Well froze. Their reactions were… complicated.
They adored Nightmare-Eyes. They trusted Julian. They lived with that spirit almost all of their whole short lives (at least short for spirits). But this aura… This was a Relinquished/Nightmare-Eyes in a state they'd never seen:
Not playful, paternal or gentle. Predatory, ancient. Protector in its deadliest form.
They whimpered, clutching Julian's coat, using him as a shield. Not from Nightmare-Eyes, but from the moment itself.
They could feel that Nightmare-Eyes was about to hurt something for them, that his hatred was not directed towards them. But it was the first time the kids had the anxiety of seeing this paternal figure in his fighting mode.
Julian's calmness anchored them. His presence told them: You're safe. I'm here. And that made the aura survivable.
Nightmare-Eyes Restrict lifted its many tendrils. Its single massive eye dilated. Julian's arm lowered in a silent command.
Julian raised a hand toward his monster, voice steady and clear. "As Nightmare-Eyes Restrict is Special Summoned, its effect activates."
Nightmare-Eyes tilted its head, tendrils coiling like serpents waiting for prey.
Julian's tone sharpened, pointed to the bigger machine in the center. "When it hits the field, it can absorb one monster my opponent controls. Consume."
A tendril whipped toward Jinzo – Lord. The towering cybernetic monarch tried to brace, metal plating sparking, but Nightmare-Eyes Restrict had already made contact. A pulse of black light consumed the titan, ripping its spiritual form apart into strings of data and folding it into a dark sphere that vanished into Nightmare-Eyes' core.
The audience jolted at the violence of the absorption.
Julian continued, professional, composed, fully in command. "Jinzo – Lord becomes an Equip Card for my monster and Nightmare-Eyes Restrict gains its full attack power."
The hologram updated, it's attack raising to 2600.
Jaden grinned. "There we go. That's the first bite."
Syrus shivered. "Why did he say it like that…?"
Mindy whispered, "Because it looked like a bite."
Alexis stared at Julian, unable to look away.
Julian reached into his hand again.
"And I'm not done." He held up a card between two fingers, Millennium-Eyes Illusionist. "By discarding Illusionist, I activate its effect."
He pointed to the fusion monster with a graceful, almost theatrical motion.
"Once per turn, I can force Nightmare-Eyes Restrict to equip another one of your monsters."
Jinzo's scoped visors dimmed sharply, the closest thing it had to a flinch. Julian extended one finger.
"Targeting: Jinzo the Machine Menace. Consume."
A ripple of psychic noise erupted. Nightmare-Eyes Restrict shot another tendril across the field. Jinzo the Machine Menace let out a distorted, mechanical shriek as its metal limbs twisted, fractured, and were dragged into the eldritch mass of the fusion spirit. It's attack raised to an absurd five thousand.
The ground shuddered beneath everyone's feet.
Syrus nearly fell over. Alexis covered her mouth.
"Five… thousand…?" Bastion questioned, astonished.
"Absorbing two monsters like that? Is that legal?" Jasmine questioned.
"I don't know about legal, but damn… You make a board and he just takes everything." Mindy whimpered.
Jaden laughed softly.
"Yep, that's Julian being Julian. He let's you play and when you're at full speed, bam! Straight into the wall."
Julian allowed himself a faint smile, razor-thin, confident.
He raised his voice again, calm and perfectly enunciated:
"And now the final piece." A card slid from his graveyard slot, wreathed in emerald light. Relinquished Fusion. Julian touched the hologram with two fingers.
"By banishing Relinquished Fusion from my Graveyard, I trigger its secondary effect." He turned to Jinzo, his gaze cool, steady. Not cruel, just the sheer joy of a solved equation.
"I equip a third monster you control to Nightmare-Eyes Restrict."
Jinzo hissed, voice harsh and metallic. "Invalid."
"On the contrary." Julian tilted his head. His hand cut the air. "Nightmare-Eyes, consume the last one."
The final tendril erupted. Thicker, darker, almost serpentine. It coiled around the original Jinzo, and for the first time, the rebellious spirit showed something like fear.
The monster's psychic plating shattered. A scream of static and distortion echoed through the chamber, then vanished as the last fragment of Jinzo was dragged into Nightmare-Eyes' abyssal core.
The fusion's eye dilated, its aura intensifying even more, its looming shadow covering almost the whole field as it raised even more in size and grew to a monstrous 7400 ATK..
The ground split in hairline fractures beneath it. The spiritual plane shoo and Jinzo's side of the field… was finally empty. Completely empty.
Alexis whispered. "He… he devoured all three…"
"Seventy-four hundred attack points. That's not a monster, that's a natural disaster." Bastion swallowed hard.
Jaden's grin widened.
"The Julian you saw before didn't used his partner or a deck of his own. Now you guys can see his real potential."
Nightmare-Eyes Restrict turned toward Julian. The bond between them pulsed, a bridge of power, hunger, and perfect synchrony.
"Battle Phase." Julian lifted his voice once more, letting the room feel the weight of the coming end.
A hush swept across the chamber until the fusion monster opened. Not its mouth or his eye, but something deeper. A rift. A tear in the spiritual surface, a black maw that no rulebook had ever prepared for. Nightmare-Eyes reached into that darkness, pulling, distorting, bending space as the last flicker of Jinzo's rebellious essence tried to flee.
Julian raised one hand, palm downward. A gesture of authority, precision, and inevitability.
"Nightmare-Eyes Restrict." The monster throbbed with anticipation. Julian dropped his hand. "End this."
The devouring was silent. No slash, laser or physical impact. Just a collapse.A vacuum implosion as Nightmare-Eyes Restrict swallowed the spirit whole from beyond the veil, ripping it from beyond the arena and into its metaphysical stomach.