Is this the poker world?Ada thief!

Chapter 1759 The trap was to make the students think they were protected; did the Duel Monsters know that?

"The number of students involved in this 'Great Transfer' that have been gathered within the academy totals 120, and the supplies collected so far are enough to support everyone for a month on average."

Professor Chronos was reporting to Hayato, not in Hayato's principal's office on the top floor of the academy, but in the broadcasting room next to the gymnasium.

After Duel Academy was moved to the Pokémon world, it seems that due to a collision with the "space bubble" where Hayato was located, the three dormitories were not only knocked off their original positions and no longer near Duel Academy. Fortunately, the power station built by Duel Academy was not disconnected from the academy, so Hayato and his friends could still use a considerable portion of the academy's facilities normally, preventing their living standards from regressing to the pre-electric age.

The reason for using the broadcasting room as a temporary office instead of the principal's office is that all the students who need to be managed are currently concentrated in the gymnasium. The broadcasting room not only allows for direct observation of any problems that arise among the students, but it is also much more convenient for someone to look for Hayato or for Hayato to look for someone.

Beside Professor Chronos, Coach Napoleon, whose right eye was rimmed with black, chimed in, "This is all thanks to Principal Hayato! We're so grateful for those canned fast food items that can be stored for a long time. Otherwise, even if we had enough food reserves, some perishable foods like vegetables would have been consumed very quickly."

—The wounds on Napoleon's face weren't from the attack by the Harpy; they were inflicted by Professor Chronos. Of course, Professor Chronos didn't fare any better; as if for the sake of symmetry, his left eye also became a "panda eye." It's clear they fought quite fiercely.

Coach Napoleon's words revealed the crux of the matter: the Duel Academy was facing a shortage of vegetables. It wasn't that anyone in the academy had the dietary habits of a "pure-hearted, scheming widow bassist from the Moon Forest—a long-term vegetarian," but rather that the school's food reserves were mostly meat and pasta dishes. Vegetables, on the other hand, could only be stored once a week. The academy's vegetable supply relied primarily on cargo ships and the cultivation of crops on some reclaimed land on the island.

Many vegetarians have personally verified the consequences of not eating meat for a long time through their own physical changes. However, not eating vegetarian food for a long time and not getting enough vitamins is also bad, especially since many students in schools are in need of comprehensive nutrition to recover.

However, that was under the condition that Duel Academy was stuck in the world of Duel Monsters for a long time, and Hayato had not made any prior preparations. Although there were still some things he hadn't considered, such as insufficient medical supplies, Hayato had prepared a large amount of military rations, instant food, and canned food at the school before the start of the semester this year. Naturally, there were also vegetable reserves. Although they were certainly not as effective as fresh vegetables, they were at least enough for the students to last for one or two months with other supplies.

Moreover, Hayato also instructed Harpy 2 to end its patrol and return to Harpy's territory to inform Harpy Queen, requesting that she provide some fruits and vegetables for the Duel Academy. It wasn't intended for direct use as food for the students; Hayato wouldn't be so careless as to allow humans to directly consume Duel Monsters' food—who knows what the reaction would be? But at least it could be used for research first, and once confirmed to be harmless, it could be used as a food supplement.

As for whether the Harp Queen would follow Hayato's orders, Hayato felt that she was probably not an idiot.

(One of the possibilities: eating food from Duel Monsters)
While Hayato was giving instructions to Harpy 2, Professor Chronos and Coach Napoleon were also present. So Professor Chronos continued Coach Napoleon's words, saying, "I just wonder if humans can eat the food that Duel Monsters eat. I hope that humans won't turn into Duel Monsters after eating fruit?"

"It really feels absurd to think about it; we've actually come to the world of Duel Monsters, aru," Professor Napoleon said, looking into the gymnasium through the glass of the broadcasting room.

Ms. Ayukawa has cleverly begun to use the power of Duel Monsters to assist in healing her students. Standing beside her is the Duel Monster she summoned, [Fallen Angel Nurse - Refikul], helping her take care of the students—although Coach Napoleon can't understand how a monster whose effect is to reverse life point recovery into effect damage can heal students.

Not only Ayukawa-sensei, but also some students have successfully summoned their own Duel Monsters, but the number is small, mostly third-year students—after all, only they went to the "Duel-Links" world when they were first-year students and had an experience of directly summoning Duel Monsters that is very similar to what they are doing now.

Even so, there are only a handful of people who actually summon Duel Monsters, such as Kagurazaka from the Helios-Yellow dormitory. This makes Professor Chronos think that perhaps in the first exam of this academic year, this student, who has worked hard for three years and has already forged his own path by "imitation dueling," a dueling style that seems to imitate others, will be able to advance to the Obelisk-Blue dormitory.

But then he realized what was happening and shook his head, lamenting that he had been a teacher for too long and was still subconsciously thinking about the students' education. Even though the entire school was caught up in this massive spatial transfer event, there was no point in talking about exams.

“No matter how unacceptable it may seem, it is still reality. As educators, this is how it is. Students only need to do their own thing, but we teachers have to consider many more things.” Professor Chronos then looked at Hayato and said, “The students have solved their basic living problems, but Principal Hayato, I remember that Harpy saying that the area where the school is located seems to be a territory with unclear ownership?”

Hayato nodded: "Although we generally refer to this desert as the Harpy's Hunting Ground, in reality, what territory could the forest dwellers, the Harpies, possibly have that large as their hunting ground? It's just a piece of desert adjacent to the forest they live in. But we are actually deep in the desert now, a place that even the Harpies and the Phantom Griffins, who compete with them for territory, can hardly reach."

“If it weren’t for the huge commotion at the Duel Academy, Harpy 2 wouldn’t have even ventured this far. This area is actually inhabited by many independent, powerful Duel Monsters, each occupying a region as their own territory. There are also many relatively weaker Duel Monsters roaming between these territories to survive.” Hayato paused, his gaze deep. “Compared to a forest with a unified leader, where defeating one would allow for complete control, this desert is almost impossible to suppress because it’s just too troublesome and chaotic.”

"So, this is why Principal Hayato, you specifically arranged for us to set up traps and obstacles in an area around the academy, huh? To protect those Duel Monsters from invading Duel Academy?"

When faced with Napoleon's question, Hayato shook his head: "Those things only make people feel that the students are under our protection; they're practically just for show."

"Uh, let's have a Duel Monster?" Professor Chronos guessed, recalling the methods of scaring animals he had heard about before.

"No, it's about making the students feel like we're protecting them, while the Duel Monsters know they aren't," Hayato said helplessly, shrugging. It's just some barricades and pitfall traps; what can they possibly stop? Harpies in the sky? Earthworms digging underground? Forget wild Duel Monsters, even a student like John, or any random member of his family like a Gemmon Amber Mammoth, could easily crush those crude defenses.

Just like Hayato said, setting up traps was just a way to reassure the students, whether they were being protected or were assigned to design traps so they didn't have time to overthink things.

Professor Chronos understood Hayato's meaning and skipped the topic: "There's one more thing, which is about the three missing dormitories. Although the students' emotions have been calmed down for the time being, I think it might not be appropriate to involve the students in the search for the three missing dormitories if we're going to organize a team to explore the surrounding area."

"On the one hand, it's because only a few students actually have the ability to summon Duel Monsters like Manjoume-kun, and Yuki Jaden, Tenjouin Fubuki, and Manjoume Hayabusa have only just returned to school and haven't even had half a day of rest," Professor Chronos said, glancing at the clock hanging in the room.

—The time in the Elf World seems to be exactly twelve hours different from that in the Human World. It is now six hours after the Great Transfer, which is five o'clock in the morning in the Human World, but the three suns outside the school are showing signs of setting, as if it were five o'clock in the evening.

"On the other hand, they do have more important things to do now, aru."

Coach Napoleon paused, then looked at Hayato and said, "But is what you're saying true? Someone has actually spread a special virus in the school that specifically targets students who have lost their immunity due to the 'death bracelet'? And also—the key to our return to the human world is that exchange student named John Anderson, Aru?"

“Of course it’s true. Why would I lie to you?” Hayato tapped the file on the table with his pen and said, “Although I don’t know how far it has spread, I’ve asked Ms. Ayukawa to pay special attention to conducting physical examinations for the students. Her previous decision was correct. We absolutely cannot give up on any student, otherwise the lurking virus might start spreading and sweeping across the entire school through the first student who falls ill.”

"As for John Anderson, although he did awaken the dormant [Ultimate Gem God - Rainbow Dragon] through his duel with Jaden before he traveled to this world, it is clear that he only awakened the power of [Ultimate Gem God - Rainbow Dragon] as a Duel Monster Card."

If [Ultimate Gem God - Rainbow Dragon] had been a completed Duel Monster card back then, John's [Ultimate Gem God - Rainbow Dragon] might have been able to unleash its power accumulated over a thousand years, just like [Yubel] did in the original timeline—sending everyone, including the Duel Academy, back to their original world.

But at least in the current timeline, the [Ultimate Jewel God - Rainbow Dragon] was not completed back then. Even though it was created in the modern era with John's help, its power is ultimately not mature enough and it cannot unleash the same abilities as in the original timeline—Hayato has confirmed this with John.

However, the nature of [Ultimate Jewel God - Rainbow Dragon] is somewhat special. It's not that changing who uses it, like Hayato holding the card, will unleash different powers. There is a strong bond between the [Jewel Beasts] and John. Not only are the [Jewel Beasts] John's family, but [Ultimate Jewel God - Rainbow Dragon] is also bound to John. In another timeline, when [Yubel] took over John's body, he even imprisoned John's consciousness in the gems within the corrupted [Ultimate Jewel God - Rainbow Dark Dragon].

The only card that truly possesses the power of [Ultimate Gem God - Rainbow Dragon] is itself. The other [Ultimate Gem God - Rainbow Dark Dragon] is merely [Ultimate Gem God - Rainbow Dragon] cloaked in shadow, manipulated by [Yubel] through John's body. Not to mention the [Sin - Rainbow Dragon] that Paradox will steal in the "past" or rather the "future"—that card doesn't even have the [Ultimate Gem God] title; it's just an empty shell with the appearance of [Ultimate Gem God - Rainbow Dragon].

"So, you mean John can bring everyone back once he reaches a certain level? Then he really can't afford to fail," Professor Chronos said seriously, as if he would unhesitatingly step in to protect John if anything happened to him. "But shouldn't duelists need to duel to become stronger? And the 'Death Gloves' still..."

Seeing Professor Chronos raise his hand and show the "death gauntlet" he was also wearing, Hayato waved his hand to reassure him: "I was prepared for this a long time ago. I didn't activate it before because I didn't want that guy to take advantage of me and increase the intensity of the protection as soon as he saw that the students would be safe. In the end, the students would not be protected and she would get the funding."

“But now, the number of people who will still duel across the school has dropped significantly to a reasonable level, and it’s time to activate that thing.” Hayato said, taking a tube of orange “liquid” from his duel disk. “Let’s use my ‘backup hidden energy’—I mean duel energy—to pay for the ‘cost’ that John and the others need for their duel.”

What Hayato was referring to was a byproduct of the "Duel Energy Collection Device" that Hayato had asked Kaiba to create a year ago—not like [Yubel] which collects the duel energy of the entire island into one place, but rather releases the duel energy of one place to cover a certain area, a device that Kaiba named the "Kaiba's Wide-Area Spiral Seahorse Element Dispersion Special System"—yes, Kaiba still insists that "Duel Energy" should be called "Seahorse Element".

In short, with the help of that device, which can be simply called the "Duel Energy Distributor," the duel energy that Hayato has collected from his own duels is enough to support Jaden and the others in their free duels without them collapsing due to the "Death Gloves" draining too much of their duel energy.

However, such a thing certainly has side effects. On the one hand, as Hayato said, Yubel discovered that the extracted duel energy was continuous and did not cause anyone to collapse. She could increase the extraction intensity, and the massive amount of duel energy provided by Hayato would actually benefit her.

On the other hand, back in the human world, the activation of the "Duel Energy Distributor" caused Duel Monsters within an island to materialize. Nobody knows what the result would be if this device were activated again in the Duel Monsters world.

Ayukawa-sensei's fighting style is actually quite aggressive, employing a drug-based damage-dealing strategy. However, the core issue isn't the drug-induced side effects, but rather the [Fallen Angel Nurse - Refiku] mentioned in the text.

But what's even more ferocious is the [Campfire] card she casually pulled out; it looks brutal.

And—it's great news that the Skyfang Gang hasn't been forgotten by Konami, there are actually new cards! As for the Skyfang Gang's own self-imposed restrictions, let's not worry about that for now. Having new cards is a good thing (it's better than something like Cloud Monster, right?).