"Go Starving Venom!" Oleander punched the air in front of him. "Send that thing to the scrapyard!" His dragon lunged forward and, with a summersault, used his tail to slice Steam Gyroid in half. The machine exploded shortly after, causing Syrus to fall flat on his ass.

Oleander Hemlock: 3000 LP

Syrus Truesdale: 0 LP

Winner: Oleander Hemlock

Syrus groaned as the holograms disappeared. He sat from the ground while dusting himself, letting out a crestfallen sigh while shaking his head in a disappointed fashion.

"Come on, Syrus, cheer up!" Oleander offered his friend a helping hand. "You managed to deal me some damage this time," he said, giving him a reassuring smile.

"Yeah, but still it wasn't enough" he spoke in a miserable tone of voice as he accepted the helping hand that was being offered to him.

"Come on, Sy!" Jaden spoke up as he and Chumley walked over to the duo. "Yesterday you couldn't even take down his Gigaplant, but now you managed to take down that Chimero..Chimare…" Jaden turned to Oleander with an embarrassed expression. "Dude, how do you manage to say that thing's name?" He scratched his cheek with his index finger while chuckling awkwardly.

"Predaplant Chimerafflesia?" He tilted his head to the side with a bit of a confused expression.

"Yeah!" he said, turning to Syrus once more. "You managed to take down that Pedraplant Chimareflacid'' he motioned to Oleander, who in turn had to take a few steps back lest he get hit by Jaden's arms.

"By sheer dumb luck" he looked down at his feet while his shoulders slumped downwards "I just got lucky that I drew the right cards"

"Don't say something like Syrus." Oleander had a concerned expression. "You shouldn't diminish your own achievements like that," he said, gently placing a hand on the Slifer's shoulder.

"Whatever," he mumbled under his breath before leaving the cliffside, and Oleander couldn't help but feel terrible for him. Zane was a jackass who, despite preaching about respect all the time, never showed it towards his own brother, and it made Oleander's blood boil.

"Dude?" Jaden placed a hand on his shoulder, which snapped Oleander from whatever trance he was in. "You good?" His voice didn't carry the usual upbeatness or excitement.

"It's just… This thing involving Syrus's brother really grinds my gears," he rubbed the back of his head with a frustrated sigh. He already knew all about Syrus's self-esteem problems, but witnessing them firsthand was a whole other story.

"I feel you." Jaden placed his hands on his hips, and both youngsters then proceeded to just stand there in awkward silence, which was broken when Oleander's PDA rang.

"Time to work," he said in a neutral tone of voice. He gave Jaden a fist bump before making his way to the Slifer Red dorm to get his uniform.

[At the Slifer Red dorm]

Oleander was standing in front of the door that led to his room, looking at what had been tapped into it.

It was the monster card "Tenderness," a vanilla monster with flavor text that read, "An adorable fairy that celebrates the gift of love".

He smirked as he took the card in his hands and started to look around, trying to see if he could spot who was placed, but other than the occasional Slifer Red student, he didn't see anyone out of the ordinary.

But he appreciated the gesture; it seemed like he had a secret admirer. He placed the card in his deck holster and entered the room, leaving shortly after with a duffle bag containing his uniform and a spare jacket.

He had a bit of a spring on his step, which did not go unnoticed by his fellow Slifer Reds, and that made the already large grin on his face grow even more.

[At the card shop]

When he got to his workplace, Sadie was finishing opening the whole place, and Damon was dutifully sweeping the floor, which he started to do with considerable more vigor once he saw that Oleander had entered the establishment.

"Hey boss lady" He greeted his coworker with a two finger salute and a grin "You not gonna believe what I found taped to my door" he had a cheeky grin on his face as he pulled the "Tenderness" duel monster card.

"O-oh! I-I wonder who could have placed that card there." Sadie's cheeks immediately became red as her eyes slowly drifted away from Oleander and her fingers started to idly tap on the glass surface of the counter.

Oleander immediately caught up with Sadie's reaction when he showed the card, but instead of calling her out, he'd simply play into it and do what he does best: play dumb.

"To be honest with you, I really appreciated the gesture." He had a fond smile on his face as he inspected the card before ultimately staching it in his deck.

"Y-you did?" She spoke with sudden enthusiasm before she gave a little awkward cough. "I mean good for you," she said, still averting eye contact.

"If you find the mystery boy or girl that left this card, tell them I really liked it" he gave her a wink before making his way to the locker room.

And once the door had closed, she immediately went to the room behind the counter and had a giggling fit while clapping her hands. Before returning to the counter with a straight face, she looked left and right just to make sure no one heard or saw that. Once she was sure the coast was clear, she allowed a small smile to form on her lips, and she could tell that today would be a good day.

A few minutes later, Oleander left the locker room in his uniform, and she could immediately tell that he missed wearing that uniform and working there because he didn't waste a millisecond before helping Damon restock and organize the shelves.

A few hours had passed, and the shop was now seeing a healthy influx, with Oleander and Damon being ready and more than willing to help any students with anything. Of course, there was the occasional Obelisk Blue trying to bully a Slifer, but a certain purple dragon quickly ended things in an amicable fashion.

Sadie snorted at that. At this point, they should just get on with it and just hire Starving Venom as a full-time employee; she's sure that Oleander would agree with that.

But her mood immediately soured when none other than Seika and her little groupie walked in, no doubt looking for Sadie to make her life a living hell, and her suspicions got confirmed when they locked eyes with one another and what could only be described as an evil smirk appeared on Seika's face.

"Hey Saddie~" she sang in a ´lovely´as she waved at her "Still slaving away in this card shop of yours I see?" she and her friends started to giggle at the comment.

"Seika." Sadie bitterly said, making no attempt whatsoever at hiding her frustration upon seeing Seika's smug face. "What in the blazes do you want?" She arched an eyebrow.

"Just checking on this place" she said, extending her arm forward and poking her hat "But like always it doesn't have anything worthwhile" she had a bored expression on her face as her eyes wandered over the cards in the glass display.

"Then get the hell out of here" She groaned while rolling her eyes "There's a line behind you" she gave a quick glance at the quickly growing line of people behind Seika, some of which were already complaining

But before she could open her mouth to be a smug ass, a familiar plant scorpion dropped from the ceiling and straight into her face, and not even half a second later, she started to freak out.

Amidst all of the confusion, Sadie managed to spot Oleander off the side, his duel disk strapped to his arm, giving her one of his signature two-finger salutes alongside a wink, and she felt compelled to return the gesture.

But the fun didn't end there as he slapped two more Predaplants in his duel disk, and from a brief flash of light, Sarraceniant and Darlingtonia Cobra scurried and slithered their way to the other two girls in her groupie, which in turn also caused them to freak out.

The little circus went on for quite some time with the girls trying and failing to remove the plant abominations from them until Oleander himself clapped his hands together, and like clockwork, the monsters left the girls alone.

"So, will the three of you leave my colleague alone?" He crouched down and picked up Ophrys Scorpio and started to pet it like a cat. "Or do I need to send them again for a round too?" He tilted his head to the side, and the trio of plants started to grumble and snarl at the girls.

"This is not over!" Seika snapped before quickling, leaving the card shop with her two goons following right behind her. The purple-haired employee, for his part, just snorted before returning to his job like nothing had even happened, the trio of plants dutifully following him around.

And after a brief moment of awkward silence the customers returned to whatever they were doing, like nothing had even happened to begin with

[Outside of the main building - evening]

Oleander, Sadie, and Damon walked out of the main building. The large man said his farewells to both youngsters and quickly lept into a tree before quickly disappearing into the dark forest.

Making their way through the path leading to the Obelisk Blue Girls Dorm, they decided to strike up some small conversation, and while Oleander was having fun hearing some of Sadie's stories, he couldn't shake an odd feeling he was having on the back of his head.

He suddenly stopped dead on his tracks and decided to focus his attention on the forest around them. Quickly snapping his attention at the smallest of sounds, he was clearly on edge.

"Oleander?" Sadie had an uneasiness to her voice as she too started to frantically look left and right "What's wrong?"

"Something is coming," he declared while dropping his duffle bag on the ground. He quickly activated his duel disk and summoned the Starving Venom Fusion Dragon. The dragon took a defensive stance in front of his master, piercing yellow orbs that scanned the treeline.

He didn't know how or why, but part of him could tell that something or someone was fast approaching—maybe the Duel Giant filler? Or maybe Wheeler, that dueling monkey, had appeared? No, it was something else; he was so focused on the apparent threat that he didn't notice as Sadie grabbed his hand and tightly squeezed it.

And then he heard it. A thumping sound could be heard far away, but it was quickly approaching. As the sound became louder and louder, the trees started to shake, and the birds quickly took flight to avoid whatever was coming.

And from the treeline, a creature leaped high in the air before landing in front of Starving Venom while lifting a huge cloud of dust. The only visible feature of whatever it was were a pair of red and green glowing eyes.

Once the dust had settled and everyone now had a clear view of the monster, Starving Venom dropped his guard while emanating what could only be described as an annoyed sigh while shaking his head to the side.

In front of them was a bipedal dragon with thick red plates covering its body, with the exception of its tail and neck, while a giant shiny blue orb was engraved on its chest, two white protrusions extended from the dragon's back side, and a golden mask covered half of its face.

And Oleander's eyes were wide with shock as he quickly recognized the card in front of him; it was Odd-Eyes Dragon, not the Pendulum Dragon variant, but its previous iteration was standing in front of him.

The dragon tilted its head to the side, its eyes carefully analyzing Oleander's face before it made a barking noise and quickly strode to the purple-haired Slifer, but it was clear by its body language alone that it did not had any malicious intent.

Once the dragon was close to him, it started to sniff him, then it started to happly jump up and down while wagging its tail like a dog.

"It's…friendly" Oleander then noticed her hand on his "Sadie…do you mind?" he lifted his hand with a bit of an embarrassed expression and she quickly pulled away while covering her red face.

Once everything seemed to have calmed down, Oleander picked up his duffle bag and gave it a good smack to get the dirt off of it before he once again turned his attention to Odd-Eyes, who now had its attention squarely on Starving Venom.

The dragon then walked to the purple-haired duelist and started to stare at his duel disk. It tilted its head to the side, briefly shifting its eyes to Starving Venom, then back to Oleander, and without warning, bit down hard on the machine.

"H-hey!" Oleander shouted as he tried to get the dragon's maws off the duel disk but to no avail "Let it go!" sparks of green electricity started to jump from the machine as Odd-Eyes increased the strength of the bite.

"Oleander!" Sadie tried to get close but was pushed back by a stray spark

"Don't get close!" he managed to say amidst his struggle with the dragon, which, alongside Starving Venom, started to glow with a red and purple aura, respectively. The auras only intensified once Starving Venom pierced the machine with one of his claws.

Both dragons disappeared amidst wisps of purple and red energy, but the machine continued to spark with green electricity before it exploded, throwing Oleander against one of the nearby trees.

The last thing he saw before slipping away was Sadie, crouched down in front of him with a horrified expression while she cupped his face, and two figures: one was a brownish red and was carrying what seemed like a sword, and the other was blue and was carrying a staff.

He closed his eyes as his consciousness drifted away all the while Sadie tried and failed to wake him up

[Author's Notes]

Hey there folks! It's ya boy! Mac!

And man, what a crazy chapter this was, huh? Odd-Eyes appearing out of nowhere and doing something to Oleander alongside Starving Venom and those two mysterious figures behind Sadie... I wonder what could be happening.

But on a more serious note, you could say this is the end of the "First Arc," and from here on out, I'd like to move the story to a more story-driven narrative rather than a merely comedic Slice of Life story.

But don't worry! Yu-Gi-Oh! - Venom is, at the end of the day, a comedy fanfic, so I will keep the same light-hearted tone to it, only with some story sprinkled here and some serious moments sprinkled there.

However, the first chapter of "Second Arc" will take a while since I am going through some personal issues and I still need to fix Chapter 2.

But anyhow, that's it, folks! Mac sign' out!