YGO/HP cross...still debating on pairings.
It took her several moments of searching to locate the silver hair...mostly because he had Hedwig on his shoulder.
She made a beeline right for him.
"Hello Uncle Max. It's nice to finally meet you properly."
Uncle Max wasn't actually her uncle, but her second cousin from America. Considering the age difference, it was easier to claim he was her uncle.
He smiled at her, glad he had taken a chance when the owl first showed up on his window. If it wasn't for the lab test confirming her story about being his cousin and the investigation he had done into her home life, he never would have come at all.
He might be manipulative, but he wasn't heartless. Besides, she only needed him to act as her legal guardian until she was eighteen or until they could get her emancipated.
Seeing the faces heading their way, he easily guided her outside to the waiting car. It took a few seconds to get the trunk into the boot, but once that was done they were off into traffic before the oddly dressed people could catch up to them.
Max, or rather Maximillion Pegasus, looked at his second cousin with interest.
He had mostly agreed to this arrangement for one single fact.
Iris was a witch, and therefor had access to the magical alleys and a wand. Which meant he could improve his main source of income, I/E Duel Monsters, with cards based off of actual spells and creatures from the magical world that he had been denied upon learning he was a squib.
So maybe he hadn't fully accepted the fact he had been denied access to the same world his cousin was a part of. With any luck, he could find a way to access it regardless of his ability to use it.
Iris crashed roughly ten minutes after they had left England behind, causing Pegasus to frown. What exactly caused that much stress in a fourteen (soon to be fifteen) year old girl?
Somewhere in America...
Being the responsible party for a teenager wasn't nearly as trying as he had been told...rather repeatedly at that, by his guards. Then again, Iris wasn't most teenagers.
She was already fairly independent, was able to take care of herself, and was quite polite.
Considering what he discovered of her previous home life, Pegasus gave it a few months of settling in before she started testing the waters. At the moment she was a bit subservient and submissive, likely because she was worried he would send her back to England to those...people.
It had taken him a full week and a half to find a therapist who had roots in the magical community that Iris could see at least twice a week. He didn't have to be a genius to realize the girl had been heavily traumatized and if he missed his guess, slightly brainwashed by whoever was keeping her in that house during the summers.
It took her a month before she finally opened up to the therapist he found, and the evidence was pretty damning. Though more telling were the articles (including the backdated issues he got).
Iris went from 'golden girl' to 'pariah', and he highly doubted any of these reporters had actually spoken to her before. From the sound of things, the magical society of England seemed to be of the belief that Iris was some rare caged bird they could bring out and show off, and took offense whenever she tried to spread her wings and be herself.
Worse, even when they were proven in the wrong, not a single retraction or apology was written. Far from it, they seemed to believe Iris would sweep the matter under the rug and ignore the ridiculous and often degrading things they kept printing about her.
If the limited information the therapist and the newspapers provided wasn't bad enough, then the pensieve memories gave him a very detailed idea of why she had been desperate enough to leave what she knew behind for a man who was quite literally a complete stranger simply because they shared the same bloodline on her mother's side.
Even if they found they couldn't stand each other, he would still set her up with a minor trust fund in normal currency and make sure she had a decent apartment until she was old enough to get a normal job.
Pegasus had to admit, it was surprising that the MACUSA hadn't paid him a discreet visit sooner about his card game. Then again, he had been basing it off an Egyptian game that a special branch of mages used to play 5,000 years ago so very few would have caught on to it.
Now that he was using actual monsters and magic in his more recent expansion, the Ministry took notice.
He wasn't sure what surprised the officials sent to have a 'chat' with him more. Learning he was in fact a squib who had stumbled across an ancient magical game and found a way to sell it to the no-maj, or the fact that he was the legal and magical guardian of Iris Potter, the "girl who lived".
On the plus side, the issue of Iris being able to take her primary magical exams had been solved. As was her citizenship. The American magical congress was all too happy to irritate the English Ministry.
Mostly because they still had a minor score to settle with the English for not keeping a better leash on Newt Scamander. Wizards had long lives and longer memories, and quite a few of the officials who had been sent to talk with Pegasus remembered the "Scamander Incident" far too vividly, even if he did help erase the memory of an entire city using the venom of one of his creatures, thus protecting the secrecy act.
"You're not going to get into trouble for using actual creatures and spells, are you?" asked Iris nervously, once they left. While she was happy to be given tutors, she was still worried that Dumbledore would somehow find out where she was and drag her back.
"From what I was told, the main issue was that the cards kept registering some sort of magical trace and it only got worse with the new expansion. Fortunately the only way for the No-Maj to unleash even a fragment of that trace is via the duel arenas, since very few people would know how to activate the original function of the game," said Pegasus.
"Original function?"
"It was a test of magical skill for ancient Egyptian mages that were part of a very selective sect. I merely repurposed the original concept of the game to fit a more modern standard," explained Pegasus. "And only those with a similar inclination as the original mage sect can use the game itself for it's intended purpose. For anyone else it's a simple card game."
All true without going into graphic detail about the Shadow Realm or the set of seven Items that went with it. Let alone the fact that the losers were oftentimes sacrificed to that realm.
Iris decided to look it up later.
"So what was this about a special tournament?"
Pegasus perked up at the change of topic.
"Nothing promotes a game or a new expansion better than a tournament and this is going to be a special one. Though in this case I'm mostly trying to advertise the special duel arenas and test out some new features, since they aren't as widely available as I would like. It will also act as a way for duelist across the world to test their skills against opponents outside their comfort zone," said Pegasus rather proudly.
The arenas had only become publicly available a few months ago, and only a few businesses even had them set up. The backlog was pretty bad and he was hoping that by setting up a special tournament he could convince some of the smaller businesses to buy arenas as well.
The headache was that it took months to plan a tournament, especially an international one like this. Nevermind the fact that there wouldn't be any amenities like a place to sleep on the island, since only those who earned the right into the finals were allowed into the castle. It was going to be a logistics nightmares, since it meant a bunch of teenagers roaming around and they would need people guarding them to prevent accidents.
"So you're bringing a bunch of kids to the island...and you aren't going to supply anything like tents or food?" said Iris dubiously.
"Most of the weaker duelist will be eliminated pretty early," said Pegasus. "Besides, camping never killed anyone and you know there's no dangerous animals on the island."
"This could easily turn into a PR nightmare if someone died of exposure from a sudden rainstorm," she pointed out. "How long do we have until the tournament is officially announced?"
"At least another year or so. It takes time to set one of these up, especially considering the temporary arenas that are almost finished."
"Then we have plenty of time to stock up on cheap, easy to make food, tents and other supplies for the duelists to 'purchase' during the tournament."
Pegasus looked as his niece with interest.
"Oh?"
"Think of it this way. You're planning to use these 'star chips' as currency anyway to get into the castle right? Well what if we sold basic supplies to the players for one to two chips each, with the 'price' going up the more lavish something is. Like a basic tent and camping supplies would be two to three chips, and extras like soda and junk food would be another two chips per purchase. We could even sell cameras and recordings of their duels so they can improve on themselves later if they bring their wallets with them."
Pegasus was already grinning. This sounded like a good way to eliminate even more of the less strategic players early on, and if they had any sense they would bring their own supplies with them. And selling the video of their duels sounded like an excellent promotion and a way to make a little extra cash on the side.
"And that's not getting into the live-streaming video of all official duel arenas, which we could sell access to. Since most of them are only accessible during daylight hours, we could sell the access to them and offer special promotional access to the limited night-time arenas to further add to the hype. Naturally we could use this to insert commercials for in-between duels and promote the next expansion pack. I'm sure several companies would love to get in on promoting to duelists, which is primarily made of teenagers anyway."
Pegasus could barely refrain from rubbing his hands with glee. Iris was a genius and this was an excellent way to mitigate the costs of installing the temporary arenas. It would also get the board of directors off his back because they could easily start making money off of this tournament which he had mostly made on a whim after discovering the Millenium Puzzle had been solved and the owner was giving Kaiba headaches.
"So what else would you suggest?" he asked eagerly.
Iris smirked.
"We announce a special rare card and tell people it's going to be released at random in the new expansion starter packs. The winner and runner-up of the tournament you're planning get the card for free, but everyone else will have to try and find it the old fashioned way. We could also sell starter and booster packs during the tournament for real cash, not to mention shirts and everything else. Maybe a special t-shirt to show that they managed to make it into the tournament?" she mused.
"Hmm...I agree selling extra cards does sound somewhat lucrative, but the shirt idea sounds slightly tacky unless they want to pay for it. I could set up an online store for people to buy videos of their favorite duelists, and a minor online betting site on who would actually win the whole thing with the company taking a cut."
"So what's this tournament's theme anyway?"
"I'm going to call it Duelist Kingdom considering the finals will take place in my personal castle."
"...You are keeping a few doctors and helicoptors on standby in case of accidents, right?" she asked.
"Do I look like I want the bad PR of someone dying because they didn't get to a hospital in time?" he countered.
"Just checking."
"Which reminds me... I want your opinion on these."
"...Are these high schools?" she asked.
"The tutors I hired told me that you're finally up to where you should be now that you've stopped holding yourself back, and I know that several countries offer magical tutoring after normal school hours, especially in Japan. They have a special cram school for those with magical abilities but are unable to commit to the official school for various reasons."
Honestly, the idea of going to Japan to finish her schooling was highly appealing to her. Mostly because it was one place that the English wouldn't think to look for her, and they never would have considered her cousin trusted her enough to live on her own with basic financial support. It would only take one person to alert Dumbledore or the Ministry where she was, and then her life would become miserable again.
She was just lucky Fawkes couldn't find her for some strange reason.
Iris looked at the schools he had selected, and picked one in Domino. It was relatively low-key, had access to a very extensive cram school, and it had connections that allowed one to take the international equivalent to the Ordinary Wizarding Levels without having to leave the city. That plus it was close to a major shopping center, an amusement park and was one of the 'hot zones' as she had dubbed areas of high duelist activity.
Then again Seto Kaiba lived in the area and went to school there as well, so it wasn't that shocking.
Pegasus internally cackled as his niece picked the one school in the entire district that he knew for a fact Seto Kaiba was attending as an official student on the roster. Never mind the fact he could easily pass the high school exam with private tutors.
"Hmm...if we're going to transfer you to Domino, perhaps an alias to further throw off anyone trying to drag you back to England would help. After all, they would be looking for Iris Potter, not an alias."
"Prudence Evans," said Iris immediately.
Pegasus had jokingly introduced her to Charmed and she had fallen in love with Prue. Piper was too high strung and Phoebe was too flighty, but Prue amused her greatly. Besides, it had nothing to do with flowers and Evans was common enough that it could pass inspection.
"Prue it is. Now we just need to set things up so you can attend after their next break is over," said Pegasus.
A month later, Prue had her own two bedroom apartment close to the supermarket and the school and was soon to start attending Domino High. She couldn't wait, since it meant a completely clean slate to work with. Especially since she had new glasses and even a set of contacts.