The Sakaki household was now quieter as they had finished celebrating Yuya's victory against Strong Ishijima.
With Eddie sitting next to him on the sofa as the boy held his deck in his hands, clearly still in a bit of a daze.
"That was one heck of a shining draw, dude." Eddie said, sucking on a throat lozenge. She had actually cheered herself hoarse.
"I… I don't actually really remember what happened," Yuya admitted. "I just drew and then my body just went on autopilot."
"Did you in any way feel possessed and/or influenced by an outside source, or was it more like 'this feels natural' kind of autopilot?" Eddie asked, checking for potential possessions. Most Yu-boys got possessed wholly or partly after all.
"This feels natural," He answered. "In that moment, I knew how these cards worked, and well now I have no clue… but you do, don't you Eddie? You said you had Pendulum back in your dimension, so how did I…"
"Magic- sorry, Duel Energy can do some crazy things, Yuya, especially when you're down to the wire." Eddie said, dodging the answer of she had no clue actually. "But going off the fact I haven't seen anything about them until today? You now have exclusive access to one of- perhaps the- strongest summoning methods in all of Duel Monsters."
"But many people had it back in your place, and if I could do it, who is to say others can't get their own Pendulum Cards. For a single second I thought these were going to be mine and mine alone." Yuya said.
"Odd-Eyes is yours." Eddie said definitively. "I can feel it. No one will have it, or any Pendulums you make that support it, but you. That's your badass dragon."
"...You're right, there exist multiple Ritual Cards, but only one Chaos MAX." Suddenly Yuya froze up.
"...Yuya?" Eddie asked, concerned. "You okay?"
"I will be right back," Yuya said as he sat his cards on the table got up and quickly sprinted through the living room, scaring the dogs and cat, and up the stairs, she heard a door open, and then not even a minute later she heard the door being closed as Yuya came back down the pole, a large binder under his arm. "When I said ritual, a thought came to me as a lot of cards in my deck changed, so I wondered…"
Yuya opened the binder, which was filled with cards she recognized, new and old.
But between some of the cards, there were Pendulum cards.
A few she recognized.
Performapal Skullcrobat Joker, Monkeyboard, and as he filtered through them she saw two Ritual cards.
Odd-Eyes Ritual Monsters, one of which was now a Pendulum Card.
"Well, Yuya, looks like you have a lot of deckcrafting to do." Eddie said mildly.
"...Eddie?"
"Yeah? Whazzup?"
"Could you teach me how Pendulums work… Big Sis?" The word 'Nee-chan' was clearly spoken.
"Kngh…" Eddie coughed blood (metaphorically speaking) as she gripped at her heart.
"Kyaa!" Came Yoko's voice. "Does that mean, I can now adopt you into the family now that Yuya has recognized you as his big sister?"
"M-mom!?" Yuya blushed as the words he said actually settled in his own mind.
"NEIN! Absolut verboten! I'm still trying to go home and I don't want to make that hurt even more if it turns out one way only." Eddie said with a lot of fire, crossing her arms in an 'X'.
"Understandable." Yoko said as she returned to the kitchen to finish cleaning.
"And so for you." Eddie said, looking at Yuya.
"I am sorry, it just kinda slipped out." Yuya apologized as he back peddled. And then was very confused when he was pulled into a hug.
"Course I'll teach ya. Big sis knows a lot about Duel Monsters." She said, repeating something the Guppies had said a lot.
Yuya blushed a little as he was let go. "Thanks, so how do they work?"
"Alright, so to start with, you see how they're half green, half brown?" Eddie said, picking up Odd-Eyes.
"Yeah, I was wondering about that." He replied.
"So, when you summon them, they're monsters, but when you Set the Scales with them," wow she wasn't even trying and she could feel the capitalization there, "they're spell cards."
"Eh… What does setting the Scales mean?" Yuya asked.
"Alright, so this little number here?" Eddie said, pointing to the Pendulum Scale. "This is the card's Pendulum Scale. Pendulums get their own, unique zones they can be placed in, which is when they become spells, and then the only stats that matter are they're Scale and Pendulum Effect, which we'll get to in a moment. But if, say, we took Skullcrobat and Odd-Eyes and Set the Scale with them, that would mean we've got a Scale going from 4 to 8. That would let you Pendulum Summon monsters with levels between those numbers, so in this case 5, 6, and 7. You with me so far?"
"Yeah, I am following," Yuya replied. "Need to remember that, between, not from and too."
"I had trouble with that too at first." Eddie said with a commiserating nod. "Very importantly though, when you Pendulum Summon, you can summon any amount of monsters from your hand or extra deck that fit the bill."
"Wow, does that mean if I had fusion monsters, I could summon those directly?" Yuya asked.
"Sorry, got ahead of myself there." Eddie said. "It doesn't ignore the basic conditions, fusion monsters need to be fused first, ritual monsters need to be ritualed, that kind of thing."
"Ah okay, I still need Odd-Eyes Advent for Gravity Dragon," Yuya said. "But how would I summon from the Extra Deck?"
"So Pendulum Monsters, when they are destroyed- so not if anything says it's banished or just sent to the graveyard or bounced etc, but specifically destroyed- or used as Material, go to the Extra Deck, face up instead of going to the graveyard. And then you can Pendulum Summon them later."
"...That's broken." Yuya said.
"Haha! We're not even in the half of it yet, Yuya, that's the basics of Pendulums." Eddie laughed, yet again not mentioning the horror of Link monsters. "The vast majority of Pendulum monsters, especially Performa-type ones, have what's called a Pendulum Effect, which can be activated, or passive, a lot like a continuous spell. So here, Odd-Eyes lets you reduce the damage from an attack involving a Pendulum, attacking or defending, to 0, and lets you destroy itself to search a card from your deck with 1500 or less atk at your end phase, both once per turn each."
"Hmm, monster effect is a lot better, but what about Skullcrobat?" Yuya asked. "That isn't really an effect."
"If Odd-Eyes wasn't a one-off I'd say you'd be surprised, but for Skullcrobat, a lot of Pendulums are very 'on archetype'. A lot of the really high or really low scaled monsters force you to only use their archetype, like D/D has its Savants which can have a scale of… I wanna say 1-12, though they do change each turn by 2 automatically."
"Those are Pendulum cards in your Dimension?"
"Oh yeah, there's a lot of Pendulums in my world but that's cause they were introduced like, a decade ago from my perspective. You just made the very first ones, meaning people are gonna have to Shining Draw up more, and we already know that's rare."
"To intrude," Yoko said. "They could also start printing them through sufficient analysis and testing, it's been a while, but I believe, Yusho explained the card making process to me as making the correct formula the ARC system has to then approve before it can be produced the normal way."
"Thankfully, Odd-Eyes is a Ghost Rare, so you don't have to worry about anyone printing more. Which also means it's permanently a one-off, but I don't think that's a downside for you, huh?" Eddie said, feeling something about the card that she was 95% certain was a Duel Spirit. A very territorial Duel Spirit.
"I guess so, I have a lot of Ghost Rares now don't I?" Yuya said as he laid out his cards, and Eddie could see some like Timegazer, and Stargazer.
Which were the only ones she'd ever physically owned herself.
"...Huh, guess so." Well, that definitely cemented Yuya as the protagonist, now that she was thinking about it.
Oh who was she kidding.
The day's duel already did that.
"Well it's been a long day, so the two of you should probably head to bed soon," Yoko said. "I am going to start the paperwork to sue the stuffing out of Strong Ishijima for using your image without my permission. Let alone yours." And with that, the most dangerous woman Eddie knew walked away.
"...I'm really glad she's on our side."
"Me too, Mom can be kinda scary."
"...Wait, I almost forgot about special pendulums!" Eddie realized.
"Special Pendulums?"
"So check out Pendulumgraph here." Eddie said, holding up the Ritual Pendulum. "This dude can ignore what I said earlier, and you can Pendulum summon him from your hand, but when he's on the field, you can place him in your Pendulum Zone to negate a spell card or effect, and then special summon an Odd-Eyes monster from your Extra Deck. So it's a ritual, and it's a Pendulum, so I call those Special Pendulums. If you come up with a better name for them, we'll go with that."
"Oh wow that is pretty cool, and during the End Phase I can get Odd-Eyes Advent, and if I have Spiral Strike Flame in my hand, I can get Gravity, which is kinda why I put their original version in the binder, I had trouble getting both cards in my hand consistently." Yuya said.
"Makes sense, and… looking at Pendulumgraph… I have a hunch, can I see your deck proper real quick?"
"Sure," Yuya said. And she looked through and she found Odd-Eyes Pendulum Arc Dragon, a Normal Pendulum Monster, Odd-Eyes Lancer Dragon, Odd-Eyes Phantom Dragon, Odd-Eyes Mirage Dragon and Odd-Eyes Persona Dragon…
Eddie couldn't help but whistle appreciatively at the cards. "Dang, okay, looks like you're already pretty stacked on Odd-Eyes, but this doesn't disprove my hunch."
"What is your hunch?"
"Well, I think- and again, this is a hunch, an educated guess- that maybe, once you Learn how to do the other summoning types, you might be able to Shining up a few Odd-Eyes extra deck monsters, maybe even more Special Pendulums." She was pretty sure there were Odd-Eyes ones specifically, right? "If you had less Odd-Eyes Pendulums right now, I would actually be more certain, but with 6 of them including Pendulumgraph, I still think it would make sense, Mr. Pendulum." Pendulum was going to stop sounding like a word soon.
"You think?" He asked with wide eyes, his crimson eyes almost glowing.
"I'd bet good money on it, actually." Eddie said, her previous hunch turning into a feeling at that reaction.
"But LDS controls them…" Then it looked like a light bulb went off in Yuya's head.
"Are you having a big brain moment? It looks like you're having a big brain moment." Eddie said eagerly.
"Mom basically said there is a high chance they are going to make their own, especially if other people Shining Draw them as they then would have cards to study. So… what do you think the Leo Corporation would give if we let them have a head start?"
"...Yuya, that's brilliant!" Eddie said. "That's-" Her eyes unfocused as she thought through the potential implications. "...Yeah, no, that's brilliant!" She concurred after a moment. "You just need to make some more first that we could give them wholesale!"
"...How do I do that?" Yuya asked.
"Uhhhh… maybe use other decks that we know have Pendulums? I know Superheavy Sam… no, if we make those, Gong should keep those… Archfiends? There's Eccentrick… hmm… maybe if we replicate the feeling you had in that duel? Putting you down to the wire to Shining Draw more?" She asked. "Just spitballing here."
"...We can try that tomorrow, I wanted to have a rematch anyway." Yuya challenged her. "I am going to break that win rate of yours!"
"Muahahaha! We'll see about that!" Eddie laughed evilly (she'd been practicing). "Tomorrow, it's on!"
—
"Wow, Leo Corp works fast." Eddie said in surprise.
"Yeah, they do," Mr. Hiiragi said as they looked at the modified Duel Arena that now had a new Real Solid Vision Projector, and in the control room there was a brand new console, much more durable and had better specs, allowing for better terrain to be made than before. "And it seems this new Pendulum of Yuya attracted a wellspring of potential students."
And that was true as a proverbial horde of children of various ages had shown up at You Show's doors all of them wanting to join to learn how to 'Pendulum Summon.'
Many of which were now in the Observation Area.
"Speaking of, like Fusion, Xyz and Synchro, you need the cards don't you?" Mr. Hiiragi asked as he looked over at Yuya who was currently doing some warm up.
"Just to Set the Scale, but I'll let Yuya demonstrate, that's his thing to show." Eddie said, miming zipping her lips.
"Well, let's see what they are about then." At that Mr. Hiiragi left for the control room, to play with his new toy. Which Eddie meant, as the man had been hugging the machine after it got installed.
"Alright Yuya, you ready to see how well your Epic Dragons do against my Wicked Angels?" Eddie asked as she turned on her new custom left-handed duel disk, the blade stylized to look like a stylized feathered wing, outlined in Darklord Halo Red.
"Hmm, and this time they shall win, now come Miss Bad Angel, you shall face the Master of the Pendulum!"
Ugh, that nickname, why was that the name they'd chosen for her? Why not something cooler or at least meaner? Wicked Angel, Fallen One, she would have accepted Jashin. Whatever, she just had to roll with it. "Alright, Master of the Pendulum. Get your game on."
And thus they spoke the oath.
Eddie LP: 8000/ Yuya LP: 8000
"I'll let you go first to show off better… and make it that much sweeter when I crush you~." Eddie said, totally manipulating at the moment- that, and because everyone else had been deciding who went first, and she was getting sick of it.
"And it seems that I also get home field advantage for this one," Yuya said as a proverbial circus formed around them showing off the specs of their new model (and, Eddie realized, perfectly setting up Yuya regardless of if it actually had an effect, which she was fine with).
"First I will activate the Spell Card - Spiral Flame Strike, which allows me to add an Odd-Eyes monster from my deck to my hand!" Yuya said as he used and with a quick look at the card as it was played, Eddie noticed that the card had an extra line of text on the second effect, as unlike before it could now add Face-up Odd-Eyes monsters from the Extra Deck to the hand as well. She hadn't even realized the line was missing before. "Next I will Set Odd-Eyes Pendulum Arc Dragon in the Pendulum Scale."
The newest dragon that he had obtained appeared in that pillar of light she had seen before, with the number 8 beneath the monster. Eddie noted the placement on his duel disk, right near the edge.
"This allows me to activate a brand new Spell Card - Pendulum Alliance, if I have a card in the Pendulum Zone, I can add a "Pendulum" Pendulum Monster or a "Pendulum" Spell or Trap, and I shall choose a Monster." Yuya explained as he added the card. "Which will be put in the other Pendulum Zone as Scale 4, which means I can now Pendulum Summon monsters from Level 5 to Level 7."
He placed his new Ritual Pendulum card on the opposite edge.
"Swing, pendulum of souls! Draw an arc of light across the ether! Pendulum Summon! Appear my comrade! Come forth Phantom Dragon with dual colored irises, Odd-Eyes Phantom Dragon(2500ATK/2000DEF)!"
"What an interesting summoning method." Eddie said, playing up the mystique of Pendulums. "And quite the interesting dragon! So your Pendulum Summoning lets you summon Pendulum Monsters?"
"Ah ah ah," Yuya waggled his finger. "I can summon any Monster that has a level between the Scales, not just other Pendulum Monsters."
Everyone in the peanut gallery was audibly awed at that.
"But since I went first I can not attack, so I will go to End Phase, because during that, the Pendulum Effect of my Odd-Eyes Pendulumgraph Dragon activates, by returning it to the hand I can add any Ritual Spell to my hand."
"Interesting." Eddie said, still playing it up a bit. "I'll draw, and Normal Summon the Darklord Ukoback I just drew, using his effect to send Darklord Ixchel to the graveyard. I'll then discard two Darklords to summon Darklord - Nasten using his own effect! But wait, there's more! I'll activate Darklord - Contact from my hand to summon the Darklord - Superbia I just discarded, who gets to bring a friend! Say hello to Darklord Ixchel!"
And just like that, she now had a nearly full board. She really needed to go second more often.
"The ability of your fallen comrades to swarm the field is truly impressive," Yuya spoke as he looked for Action Cards.
"Allow me to put that impressive power to use! I'll move into the battle phase! I'll attack and destroy Phantom Dragon with Nasten! Heavenly Haymaker!" Eddie ordered.
And then the dragon was vanquished.
"With the destruction of my Phantom Dragon, the Pendulum Effect of my Odd-Eyes Pendulum Arc Dragon Activates!" Yuya declared. "If an Odd-Eyes monster is destroyed I can Special Summon an Odd-Eyes Monster from my Hand, Deck or Graveyard. Now let's say hello to Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon!"
And like that the newest was replaced by the new.
"Hmph, now while I can't get over your dragon using Ixchel… this Action Card I picked up earlier means I don't need to! Wonder Chance, which gives one target an additional attack in this battle phase!" Eddie said, unbothered, even as she knew she was setting up Yuya for a crazy play later. Damn Pendulums.
"Oh no!" Yuya cried dramatically. "My monsters are being destroyed one by one!"
"And now your next! Ukoback, Ixchel! Reduce his life points!" Eddie ordered.
Eddie LP: 8000/ Yuya LP: 4600
"So much for the power of your Pendulums." Eddie said mockingly, fully well knowing what was coming next. "Your move."
"I draw, and I shall activate another Spiral Flame Strike!" Yuya said. "Now allow me to show off my evolved Ritual Dragons, I activate Odd-Eyes Advent! Now everyone let me tell you something special about Pendulum Monsters, specifically when they are destroyed on the field, they do not go to the Graveyard, they go to the Extra Deck, Face-Up."
"How does that help?" One loud kid asked.
"You will see, but first since I control no monsters, and Eddie controls more than one monster, I can use an Odd-Eyes Monster from Extra Deck to fuel this Ritual Summoning. So I make a sacrifice, Dragon with dual colored irises, that controls the power of gravity! I Ritual Summon! Come forth! Level 7! Odd-Eyes Gravity Dragon(2800ATK/2500DEF), and next I shall Set Pendulumgraph Dragon as Scale 4 once more to Pendulum Summon, return from the Extra Deck, Odd-Eyes Phantom Dragon!"
"THAT IS BUSTED!"
"Incredible!" Eddie said, genuinely a bit awed at the actual dragons before her; much more menacing looking down the 'barrel' so to speak. "The staying power of Pendulums is insane!"
"And Gravity Dragon could you get me that Action Card over there?" Yuya asked and Eddie watched as the dragon gravitationally (that felt like the right verb) pulled a distant Action Card into Yuya's hand.
Since, y'know. The boy was in the middle of climbing one of the towers giving him an aerial view. "Battle Phase Time! Odd-Eyes Gravity Dragon attack her Darklord Nasten!"
The dragon roared as it flew up and then fucking goomba stomped Nasten into pixels.
"Your dragon is a gravity impeller that is… that is so cool." Eddie broke character to say, caught off guard by that.
"If you think that is cool, watch this, I activate the Action Card - High Dive, to increase Phantom Dragon's attack by a thousand!"
(2500ATK 3500ATK)
"In response, I'll activate Ixchel's effect to use Contact from the grav-yard," She stumbled in her walk as the gravity around her tangibly increased and made her trip, losing her an additional 500 lp. "Right, forgot your card did that, still using Contact to bring Nasten back in defense position."
"Then, Phantom will attack Darklord Ixchel with Phantom Spiral Burst!"
"Though thanks to a Miracle, while I'll still take the same amount of damage, I won't lose Ixchel!" Eddie said, stumbling once again, but this time brought into a roll as she grabbed another Action Card she'd been heading towards and jumped back to her feet- or at least tried.
"At the end of the Damage Step, if Odd-Eyes Phantom Dragon inflicts Battle Damage, his effect activates allowing him to deal effect damage equal to the amount of Odd-Eyes in my Pendulum Zones times 1200, so that is 2400 points of effect Damage!"
Eddie was genuinely blasted back off ass-over-teakettle onto the soft crash-pad like floor of the circus. "...Ow."
Eddie LP: 2900/ Yuya LP: 4600
"And I shall go into my Main Phase 2, and sorry Eddie, but this is the end of the Duel."
"Huah!?" Eddie asked in genuine surprise as she got back to her feet. How was he gonna? "How?"
"I release my Odd-Eyes Phantom Dragon, to Advance Summon! Level 8! Odd-Eyes Advance Dragon!" Yuya shouted as the phantom was replaced by the most evolved form of Odd-Eyes. "And when he is Advance Summoned, I can destroy one monster you control and you will take damage equal to its original attack!"
And she had exactly… 2900 oh no. "NO!"
Yes, for your Superbia has the exact amount needed!"
"My perfect win streak! CURSE YOU PENDULUUUUUMMS!" She cursed as she was blasted with her own monster.
Eddie LP: 0/ Yuya LP: 4600
Winner: Yuya!
"Ah, I won, I actually won!" Yuya shouted in happiness as he rode a balloon down before it vanished.
"I lost… I actually lost…" Eddie said quietly as she laid on the rapidly returning to normal ground, staring up at the caged sky as the crowd went nuts for Yuya. "...ow…"
"So how do we do it?"
"Yeah, how do we Pendulum Summon?"
Those were some of the questions that were being flung at Yuya by the crowd who had pushed their way into the Field.
"Okay everyone calm down," Yuzu said as she tried to get the horde of children under control.
"Well as some of you noticed, Pendulum Cards are special cards," Yuya said as he showed off Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon and one of his older Performapals. "Like Extra Deck cards of LDS, you need these kinds of cards to do it, but if you apply to join You Show Duel School, you can be some of the first to get new Pendulum Cards when we start getting new ones made." Yuya lied out of his ass. She was so proud.
"Yes, yes, that is correct," Mr. Hiiragi said, the man breathing heavily from having quickly sprinted down from the Control Room, "Please take a form back to your parents, and we will see if you can join."
Sounds of disappointment came from the vast majority of kids as many assumed they could just easily get it. Apparently.
Which was dumb, but they were kids… but free cards were less free here than in her world.
And like that most left without taking a form with them, though a few did, from what she could hear.
"Hey aren't you the kid that wanted to apply a few days ago?" Yuya asked.
"Yeah," Eddie heard the kid.
"So now that we have Pendulums you wanna join?" Yuzu asked.
"No!" He denied. "I was a bit disappointed last time, but then I saw Yuya duel yesterday, and just now. I could see what Dueltainning was about, and I don't care about Pendulums, I wanna learn how to duel just like you, Yuya-nii!"
Eddie lifted her head from her position on the floor (the repeated falls had hurt she was staying there till it didn't) to see if she could spot Yuya's face at that, his back was to her but she could see the kid, a bluenette who was looking up at Yuya with genuine admiration.
"Those are the things we wanna see in the people joining You Show," Mr. Hiiragi said. "We've always been a small school, as we want people, who want to make people laugh using dueling to do so. That is how we carry on Yusho's legacy."
"You're right about that Sensei, people like you, Tatsuya are the kind of people dad wanted to teach," Yuya said.
Now she was glad Yuya had his back to her, so he didn't see the look on her face at that.
Though she would admit, it was at least partially pride.
"Hmm, Eddie you okay?" She heard Yuzu ask as the pinkette was now looking at her.
"Yuya brought my eternal enemy to bear- gravity." Eddie said seriously. "Just… grappling with that fact… and staying here till it stops hurting…"
"Emotionally or physically?"
"The fall or the loss?"
"Yes."
"You need medical attention?" The adult in the room asked.
"I'll get back to you on that in a few minutes, I think I'm just sore."
"Well I will be in my office, call using your Duel Disk if you need help." Mr. Hiiragi said as they all left the Duel Arena so Eddie could mend her pride.
And then, once she'd heard everyone leave, she couldn't help but laugh. "Ahaha, finally, I lost, that's more like it…" She said to herself as she sat up, massaging her right shoulder, the one she'd rolled on earlier. "Alright, do I need medical attention… no, okay we're good…"
She stretched and got up, dusting herself off, ready to go congratulate Yuya… and then realized she had a unique opportunity here.
Eddie was the only one in the Duel Field at the moment, and a quick glance confirmed no one was in the Observation or Control Rooms, the guests likely preoccupied with Yuya's awesomeness (she really needed to congratulate him a bit and make sure he knew there was no hard feelings, that was a blast, even if she could tell her deck had been stacked for him to show off his new cards).
Meaning…
She turned on her duel disk, drawing five cards, and somehow getting exactly what she needed. "I'll activate Darklord Ixchel's effect, discarding herself and Banishment to draw two more cards. I'll then activate Darklord Contact from my hand to summon her from the graveyard in defense position!" Eddie said aloud, as if it were the incantation for a spell.
Because she was pretty sure it was.
And appearing on the field sat the rather large form of Darklord Ixchel, the many black wings of the fallen angel covering her body, in a rather seductive manner, as it complimented her rather revealing outfit. The red and jagged halo floated above her head, that was covered in long purple hair, and a singular batwing. Her eyes were crimson, and ears elf-like, but her skin was a lovely tan fitting her mesoamerican origins.
Which coalesced into what could be called a seductress.
"Huh, so that's what you look like from the front." Eddie said, having only seen the card from this angle during heated Action Duels for moments at a time.
"Do you like it, Mistress?" She asked.
"Don't call me that." Eddie said, not surprised by this. "I'm your summoner, not a… whatever, I'm just happy this worked, honestly." Eddie said, unable to keep the smile off her face.
"This Real Solid Vision gives our spirits a physical body, without the need for it to be a Shadow Game." She answered.
"I knew it!"
"What a smart summoner we have, though it is considered bad manners to talk to during a battle between summoners, though most spirits do not choose to inhabit, so many vessels for most of them so they do not bother." Ixchel explained.
"That makes sense, only stick with the ones you think are worth your time." Eddie said with a nod. "Speaking of, was it one of your bosses responsible for this, or someone higher up?"
"The Solemn One chose you as an agent for this mission."
"Damn Solemn Bastard…" Eddie cursed. "Do you know what that mission is? Cause I don't."
"A demon that will herald the destruction of both the physical and spiritual world is set to awaken, you were selected to help prevent that." Ixchel answered.
Eddie stared at the angel in stunned silence. "Uh… why me? Why not someone who's actually, uh, good at the game?"
"Spiritual reasons, according to the Solemn One, this is the tenth time this has been attempted."
"...Oh, so we're the backup for the backup for the backup, that's why he lowered himself to beg you guys for help?"
"Yes, though other forces are also at work at the same time, as this situation has resulted in other issues rising, according to the Solemn One."
"Oh god, what messes did he involve us with?" Eddie groaned. "Please don't tell me it's Yubel, she hard counters our deck."
"I do not know if the Gentle Darkness is here, though if they are that means the Light of Destruction is here, we were sadly not given the full picture of the situation, as according to the Solemn One. More 'Meta' knowledge made the situation worse."
"Tch, bastard, at least explain the basics…" Eddie shook her head. "Well, if he's not gonna help, obviously, have you gotten any inclinations as to what's going on? I already have a bead on Leo Corp being involved in some way."
"A believable chance, but The First, believes that ones named Yuya Sakaki, and Yuzu Hiiragi are at the center."
"Oh I picked up on that a while ago." Eddie said with a nod. "On that note, two questions- one, is The First different from Morningstar or is that just an upgraded form of him?"
"That is his true form, The First Darklord." Ixchel answered.
"Makes sense, second question, do I have to earn the right to use said True Form or is it just a matter of needing the cards?"
"You shall need to earn the right, you must defeat an Alchemist Duelist, observe how it functions in this dimension and you shall be granted the power. The same is true for the rest, if you face and defeat duelists of the Accel, and the Anti-Matter, he shall pull strings to see if other Spirits shall be willing to support you."
"Oh, that's… I'm not gonna complain if that's all I gotta do, I was worried I'd have to go on a spirit quest." Eddie sighed in relief. "On that note, I'm assuming you guys will be helping protect me from any malicious spirits outside the game, right?"
"Of course, you are ours first and foremost, you've always treated us so kindly," Ixchel spoke with a smile on her face.
"Well, yeah, you guys are awesome." Eddie said like it was obvious, because it was. "I don't care what the meta is, I'll keep using you guys."
"Ehehee," Ixchel giggled at that and then leaned forward and gave Eddie a kiss on the forehead.
Eddie's mind short-circuited as the Darklord dissipated.
At that (or perhaps a few minutes later, Eddie's mind wasn't exactly keeping track of time) Mr. Hirragi entered back into the Duel Arena. "Eddie you okay? Was getting a little worried… why is your face all red?"
That snapped Eddie out of her funk. "I'm fine, just… realized I lost on turn 3 and that my awesome badass reputation I've been building here is gonna start crumbling into more like my rep back home."
"And what is your rep back home?"
"I once had a 146 match streak- so best of 3, not feature matches- where I won a total of 6 matches. 3 of which due to my opponent needing to do more important stuff." Eddie said, leaving out that all 146 of those matches were against the same person.
"...Oh wow, that is… wow." Was all Mr. Hiiragi could say to that. He wasn't even looking at her with pity, more sheer shock.
"You can't tell anyone about that." Eddie half-threatened, half-pleaded. "I have this cool big sis thing going with the kids and a Heel thing on the field, my rep would be ruined if that got out."
"I will not say anything, though question: were you using your Darklords for all those matches?"
"Not for a single one, why?"
"Well that answers that question," Mr. Hiiragi said. "You weren't using your favorite deck. Like if you gave Gongenzaka, Yuya's deck he would probably have a massive loss streak."
"...I guess that's true…" Eddie admitted. "Though to be fair… even discounting those, I still lost more than I won back home… though I always had fun with the Darklords…"
"That is the most important thing, if you can't have fun with your deck, well you will always lose." Mr. Hiiragi said. "Even the most try-hard and sweaty Pro Duelists have fun dueling with their decks."
"True, I suppose." Eddie said with a shrug, accepting that. And mentally agreeing with the term 'sweaty' which had different connotations here, since Action Duels involved a lot of running around and physical activity.
Eddie did not go near Yuya's room for a reason.
"Anyway, you need help with the no doubt numerous applications?" Eddie asked.
"Yeah, the help would be needed, going to reject most of them, but a few weren't acting like entitled brats." Mr. Hiiragi accepted.
"Maybe one or two entitled brats could be good for money, people pay to go here right?" Eddie asked. "Helping teach a few of those to not be entitled brats and getting paid for it could be good."
"I don't like being deceitful, but you have a small point," Mr. Hiiragi said. "So let's go?"
"Nothing deceitful about it, we're a school, we teach kids! That's still teaching kids, right?" Eddie asked as they walked out.
Xxx
Soul Subtitle: A Flashy Defeat! Sudden Breakthrough!