I honestly have no clue why this series happened to pop into my mind now. But I'm hoping I can really take this somewhere because we're dealing with minor characters plus Rua. That shall be fun.


Rua's face was burning red. It was probably from all the running. Yeah, it was the running. Why else would he be panting so hard. But he still wasn't caught up. Thankfully, Sly stopped, but they would just continue running no matter what, right? It'll go until someone collapsed and needed medical attention. And that would probably be him. Because Rua was look worn out. Sly, however, looked like he could go through a couple more rounds of this.

"Give it back!"

There was a laugh. Why was it always laughter with this guy? He really hated it. It was just another thing that ticked him off, and he honestly couldn't see why his sister even liked the guy.

She won't when she hears this story though. At least, he hoped that was the case. If not, he had some serious questioning to do when he got home.

"I don't see the point in someone keeping a valuable card they don't need."

"She needs it!"

A smirk. It didn't help with his suspicion though. Rua was certain that neither him nor Sly were Signers, but as for Sly being a Dark Signer, he wasn't sure. He thought he was timid and shy when they first met, him blushing rather frequently when the teacher asked them to be his friend, but his own name fit him better. Because he was apparently better than them. So much that he denied any invitation from anyone else. And Rua just didn't understand what his problem was. Especially since he never even bothered to talk to anyone about it. So of course he didn't know his standpoint on the spectrum of good and evil. He was too much of a liar for him to be even sure of that much. But of course, he didn't seem dead, so that ruled the Dark Signer part out.

"Or does she? She quit dueling, didn't she? So why would she need a card of such value?"

Would he tell him? No, that was his own problem. If he wanted to be destroyed or watch this place get destroyed, whatever those Dark Signers wanted to do, then that was his problem. Especially since he was taking one Signer's card away.

"She got back into it," Rua lied. Not exactly a lie, but definitely not the full truth. Because Ruka definitely got into dueling. Maybe not tournaments, but enough to do her job. But Sly didn't need to know that. Why would he? He was already being a big jerk about everything, so he didn't really deserve to know about the future could potentially look like. It would probably make him have a change of heart, but he didn't know if that'd be temporary or not.

"Oh?" There was a pause. But it wasn't long enough for Rua to formulate a reasonable comeback to that. "Don't worry, I didn't take that card."

No, he was bluffing. He obviously took Ancient Fairy Dragon. That was the card that Ruka prized most. He would definitely steal that one. He most definit…

But the card in Sly's hand turned over so Rua would see the card and its name. Despite it being almost midnight, he was able to see the light brown border that told him it was a normal monster. Not an effect monster, not a Synchro. Just a regular old normal monster.

"Regulus," he said. "Not the most valuable card in the market, but to some people, it is." Sly examined Rua. He wanted to tell him to knock it off - it felt weird being carefully watched by someone you hated. But he stopped, much to Rua's relief.

"I would say we duel for it, but it appears you don't have anything on you."

And Rua had to admit that Sly was right. He just so happened to see his silhouette in his room rummaging through his and Ruka's things. So he just acted quickly, not even bothering to take his deck with him. Because this was probably some burglar who was stealing valuables, not cards. And he had to mentally curse himself for not even thinking that it was possible the thief played Duel Monsters. That had to be the first time he made such a silly and dumb mistake.

"Well, I guess I'll be leaving then."

No, he will not.

"Give back Regulus!" But his cries nested in the trees and stayed there. Sly had already disappeared, and there was no way Rua could even get the card back from that guy.

In the end, he really failed at being his sister's protector.