Is this the world of card dealers? Yada thieves!

Rein Wilson's plan was quite comprehensive—as long as he activated the effect of [Greybird] to retrieve [Golden Palace of Rapids] from his deck and activate it, the Field Spell Card would become advantageous to him and would no longer be affected by [Temple of Mind's Eye] in terms of the damage that monsters could inflict.

Furthermore, [Golden Palace of Rapids] has the ability to Special Summon a monster from your Deck to the field in Attack Position once per turn during the Main Phase. By using the effect of [Live Water] to revive [Iron Knight] and then using [Golden Palace of Rapids] to summon any other monster, you can assemble a monster combo on your field that can defeat your opponent!

The idea was so wonderful, but the moment Renn Wilson placed the "Golden Palace of Rapids" card he had retrieved from his deck into the Duel Disk's field area...

The power suddenly went out inside the Seahorse Dome.

Chapter 445 Konoha Collapse... Kaiba Group's Collapse Plan

Logically speaking, it would be quite strange for Kigu Lloyd, who dislikes both the Kaiba Corporation and Seto Kaiba himself, to buy expensive tickets at the Kaiba Dome and give money to Kaiba.

However, today, Qigu Lloyd was sitting in the Seahorse Dome venue, which was quite unusual. After the Seahorse Dome suddenly lost power and went dark, a smug and cunning smile appeared on his face.

The darkness lasted only a few seconds. Before the audience could even panic, the many devices inside the Seahorse Dome, which had a backup generator, were powered back on, and the lighting turned on, as if the power outage had just been an illusion.

However, the multi-directional screen above the central dueling arena of the Seahorse Dome no longer displayed the data of Hayato and Rein who were dueling. Instead, a strange clock appeared, with the second hand not rotating clockwise, but rather going backward counterclockwise like a countdown.

In the back-end monitoring room, Tianma Yuexing, who had arranged for the emergency restart of the pre-prepared generator to restore power, frowned when he saw the clock on the screen. The clock currently showed 1:00, but the second hand was spinning backward at a rate of two ticks per second, and it was expected to go back to 12:00 in half an hour.

Tianma Yuexing remembers that the original program should not have had such a strange function.

"Check the central control program. What's the anomaly?" he ordered, and the programmers on standby immediately began checking the program, lines of code appearing on their computer screens.

However, the test results showed that everything was normal.

Just then, Tianma Yuexing received a call from Haima.

"Hey, Pegasus Moonwalker, what's that clock?!" It was clear that the seahorse wasn't in a good mood. "I shouldn't have given you this kind of 'surprise,' so get rid of it right now!"

Although Tianma Yuexing is not an employee of Haima Group, as the organizer of the KC Cup, Haima Group has the absolute right to question Tianma Yuexing, who was sent to be in charge of back-end supervision.

Tenma Tsukiyuki's hands were also busy. After ordering his subordinates to check the program status to no avail, he personally stepped in and started typing on the keyboard. With his neck tilted and phone between his fingers, he calmly said, "I'm checking it with the others, Kaiba-kun."

"But the problem now is not that we can't remove the clock, but that we can't even see the clock!"

"Can't you see the clock?" On the other end of the phone, Seahorse frowned. "At least ten thousand people have seen that clock."

"No, it's not the clock you can see with the naked eye, it's the clock written in the main control program of the Seahorse Dome. There is no 'clock' here at all!"

Tenma Yuexing paused for a moment, as if he had suddenly remembered something, and then quickly added, "Besides here, is there any other place where we can control the situation inside the venue, Kaiba-kun!"

Upon hearing Pegasus Moonwalker's words, the seahorse's expression froze.

Although, according to the agreement with Pegasus, Kaiba entrusted the backstage area of ​​the Kaiba Dome venue to Pegasus Gekiyuki, dispatched by the International Illusion Society, Kaiba secretly made some changes due to his own aversion to Pegasus.

The back-end control room can indeed serve as a coordination center to manage the lighting, power supply, sound system, and even the data transmission of the dueling system within the Seahorse Dome venue. However, in addition to that, the Seahorse Paradise building next door also has the same control rights, and its authority is even higher than that of the back-end control room at the Seahorse Dome.

Reminded by Tianma Yuexing, Haima not only remembered that he had control over Haima Park, but also the recent incident where the Duel Robots at Haima Park were hacked.

The answer is obvious.

Even if it had been hacked, the monitoring room shouldn't be so bad that they couldn't find the "clock" even after searching through the underlying code. After all, even a Trojan virus needs space to store a "Trojan horse." Since there's nothing wrong with the Seahorse Dome, the problem must be with the Seahorse Park.

After giving a perfunctory reply, telling Tenma Yuexing to keep trying to find the problem, Kaiba hurriedly hung up the phone and was about to turn around and head towards the passage leading from the Kaiba Dome to Kaiba Paradise when he suddenly noticed that not far from him, a pink-haired man stood up from his seat and walked towards the emergency exit with a smug look on his face.

Qigu Lloyd?

No, it should be Chigurhfried von Schreidt.

Because the [War Goddess] deck was completely exposed during the duel with the game, Kaiba followed the clues and found information related to [War Goddess] on the Internet. He discovered that a long time ago, there was a news report that the new president of the Schreid Group, Chigurhfrid von Schreid, had taken office and transformed the group from an arms group to an entertainment group, while also announcing the acquisition of the [War Goddess] deck.

It was almost exactly the same operation as Kaiba's back then: acquiring powerful Duel Monster cards—Blue-Eyes White Dragon and Valkyrie—while simultaneously releasing information about the company's transformation, letting shareholders know that the transformation was not a trivial matter but a grand scheme, using twice the traffic to stabilize the stock price.

Just as Seto Kaiba used the Blue-Eyes White Dragon, the only person who could use the rare War Goddess deck was Chigurhfrid von Schreid, which is how Kaiba confirmed the other's identity.

However, it was after that that the seahorse also began to have doubts.

Since Chigurhfrid von Schreidt came to power, the conflict between the Seahorse Group and the Schreid Group, which had been somewhat at odds since the days of the arms industry, has intensified. Even after both companies transformed into entertainment groups, the conflict has continued. Although Seahorse himself does not take the other party seriously, Chigurhfrid von Schreidt has always regarded Seahorse as a thorn in his side.

So why would someone he doesn't get along with participate in the KC Cup? Even though his opponent has been defeated and eliminated in the game, Kaiba still cares a lot about the existence of Chigurhfrid von Schreid, especially since he has never bought a ticket before and has no habit of watching KC Cup matches, yet he actually bought a ticket for the first time.

Right now, although his rational mind tells him that he needs to hurry to the Seahorse Park building, which is not far from here, and stop the countdown clock that is currently inside the Seahorse Dome, his intuition tells him that he needs to stop Chigurhfrid von Schreid, who is standing up and preparing to leave.

That guy definitely knows something!

—A cough that seemed to come from nowhere—

"Cough-cough-"

Sitting next to the game, Xingzi, who was drinking water, was startled by the sudden darkness and coughed, choking a little.

"Are you alright, Anzu?" Yugi asked Anzu, who was coughing while covering her mouth, with concern. He even patted Anzu's back to help her catch her breath, which earned him a jealous look from Rebecca, who was sitting on the other side.

"Cough, cough!" Rebecca coughed awkwardly twice and reached out to tug at Yugi's arm. "Darling~ I think I choked. I feel terrible."

With such terrible acting skills, not only could the game not tell, but even Jonouchi and Honda sitting in the back could tell that Rebecca was faking it.

However, Honda wisely kept quiet, but the outspoken Jonouchi pointed out: "Yeah, right, you're perfectly fine. How can someone who's choked have such a strong voice!"

"Shut up, you idiot!"

Enraged by being confronted, Rebecca turned around and roared at Jonouchi with a flushed face, only to receive a smug smile in return.

Honda chuckled, but then he noticed that Keihei, who was sitting next to him, had a rather serious expression on his face.

"What's wrong with that clock?" Although he was young, Keihei, who was already quite mature, looked seriously at the countdown clock displayed on the central screen. "Although I didn't help my brother arrange the various tasks for the KC Cup this time, I did check some minor issues."

"But that clock wasn't in any of the arrangements. I even checked the code of the main control program at the venue. What on earth was that?"

"And what was that power outage just now?"

Honda was taken aback when he heard Keihei's mutterings: "Wasn't that a special performance that Kaima arranged?"

"Who would arrange something that could accidentally cause panic as a special performance!" Guiping complained, standing up. "No, I have to go backstage right away. There's a high chance the backstage program has malfunctioned, or even that the firewall has been breached by hackers like it did a few days ago!"

But just as Guiping got up, Malik, who was sitting by the aisle, reached out and stopped him.

“Wait a minute, kid.” Malik’s face was no longer the carefree one he had been before. His expression turned serious, as if he had reverted to the leader of Gurus. He pointed around with a solemn look in his eyes. “Before you take any action, you’d better take a look around.”

"What's the situation around us?"

Reminded by Malik, the people present looked around and were quite surprised to find that Kyoko's cough seemed to be contagious, as someone else was also coughing. Although they were at the KC Cup venue, it looked like they were in some kind of infectious disease treatment center.

Kyoko lowered her hand from her mouth. Although her cough had subsided somewhat, she suddenly felt weak, as if she had caught a bad cold. Her breathing was heavy, and her eyelids drooped. "Yu-Yu!"

"Kyoko!" Seeing that his friend was in a bad state, Yugi hurriedly pulled Kyoko back from her chair, while Honda and Jonouchi were also quite anxious. Jonouchi, concerned for his companion, directly shouted at Malik, "Do you know what happened, Malik?!"

“Idiot, I don’t even know where the end of the universe is, how could I possibly know that answer?” Malik plopped down in a chair, tilting his head back so that Jonouchi would notice his rather terrible complexion. Leaning back in his chair, Malik calmly said, “Although I’m not entirely sure, pay a little attention to the characteristics of those who are weak, Jonouchi.”

"It's not Jonouchi, it's Jonouchi!" Jonouchi complained. Jonouchi and Honda immediately followed Malik's instructions and began to observe the audience members who appeared to be weak. However, the composition of those audience members who were not in good condition was too mixed. There were elderly people and children, as well as strong men and young people, both men and women.

"It includes the elderly, teenagers, and young adults; it doesn't seem to be related to age?"

"And the ratio of men to women is about the same."

"Is this some kind of randomly occurring disease?"

Honda and Jonouchi didn't see anything wrong, but Mai Kujaku noticed something very keenly: "No, this isn't random? Don't look at those weak guys, pay a little attention to the people who haven't shown any problems yet!"

"They are all duelists!"

Thanks to Mai's reminder, Jonouchi realized that it was indeed the case. The characteristics of the fallen people varied, but those who were still in good condition were all duelists without exception. Although they did not necessarily wear their Duel Disks on their wrists, they could at least be seen wearing a shiny metal box around their waist as a card holder for their decks!

The game also looked up at the surrounding audience. But as soon as he did, he noticed a blond man in the distance staring straight at him, with nothing unusual about him.

The game recognized the opponent; wasn't that the person named "Rafael" who had faced him in the previous duel but surrendered halfway through?

'Aibo, that guy—'

The voice of Yami Yugi came from the Millennium Puzzle. Yugi nodded: "Yes, it's him. He suddenly surrendered during the duel yesterday."

'That person's performance in the duel proved that he should be a true duelist who can resonate with the spirit of the cards; logically, he wouldn't have given up the duel so easily.'

"But he still gave up the duel without any reason." Yugi watched Rafael stop observing them and turn to walk towards a certain direction. After glancing down at Kyoko, Yugi said firmly, "My duelist's intuition tells me that Rafael should—no, he absolutely knows something!"

Looking at Rebecca, who seemed to be in relatively good spirits, Yuqi solemnly said to her, "Rebecca, can I ask you for a favor?"

"Darling?" Rebecca's doubts were temporarily put aside when she saw the determined look on the game's face, and she smiled. "Do you want me to help take care of Apricot Jam? Sure, go ahead and do what you need to do, darling."

“Okay, please, Rebecca.” Yugi nodded, then looked back at everyone. “Sorry, everyone, I need to go find that person. I think he definitely knows something about what happened to Kyoko and the others.”

With that, Yugi, carrying the Duel Disk he had taken out and put in his backpack, as well as the card box containing his spare deck, ran towards the direction where Rafael had disappeared, putting the Duel Disk back on as he ran.

But after running only a couple of steps, Yugi heard Jonouchi's voice from behind: "Wait a minute, Yugi!"

Turning his head, Yugi saw Jonouchi frantically taking the Duel Disk out of his backpack, but he accidentally snagged the string on his backpack and was trying to forcefully break the string to get the Duel Disk out, muttering, "Why did that bastard Kaiba make the Duel Disk so sharp? Couldn't he have made it a little rounder, you jerk!"

After finally managing to retrieve the Duel Disk, Jonouchi nodded to Mai and jogged to Yugi's side: "Don't think about going alone, Yugi. I want a share of that honor too. I'll go with you."

With that, Jonouchi patted Yugi on the shoulder with an unquestionable air: "Yosh, the legendary duelist team of Domino City, off we go! Hero Jonouchi, Hero Yugi, invincible, full power, unstoppable!"

“Jonnouchi…” Yugi looked at Jonnouchi, smiled and nodded, “Well, let’s get going!”

"Yoshi! Ikuyo!" Jonouchi said, turning around with a grin. "Honda, you and Kyoko stay here and wait for Jonouchi-sama and Yugi. Mai, they're all yours!"

"Who do you think you are, Jonouchi!" Honda said dismissively. "Don't come back with a broken arm or leg, you idiot!"

When Mai heard what Jonouchi said, she simply raised her head haughtily and crossed her arms over her chest, as if she didn't want Jonouchi to see her slightly flushed cheeks.

Watching Jonouchi and Yugi walk away, Honda belatedly seemed to suddenly remember something and turned to look at Malik sitting in the chair: "Wait a minute, I remember you were supposed to be a very strong duelist, Malik?"

"Strong? Who do you think you are?" Although Malik was a little weak, he still managed to sit up in a very arrogant posture after hearing Honda's words. "Let me make it clear beforehand, I am super~ strong."

Malik, the supreme leader of the international criminal organization Gurus, who ruled with absolute power and fear, manipulated two of the three Egyptian God cards. Even among all the duelists in Duel City, he was one of the strongest. At that time, it would not be an exaggeration to say that Malik was "super strong".

"If that's the case, how come you, as a duelist, have also become like this?" Honda asked with some suspicion.

As time went on, more and more audience members inside the Seahorse Dome were in worse condition, collapsing exhausted in their seats like internet addicts who hadn't slept for three days and three nights in their quest to reach the highest rank in the game. There were still a few people who were able to stand and move around the venue, and these people were almost all duelists.

Although there were 64 participants in the official KC Cup competition, the number of duelists in the spectator area was more than 64. However, compared to the large number of spectators who were weakened, the number of duelists who could still move was simply a drop in the ocean. Even if they wanted to take care of the spectators who were having problems, they couldn't do so.

As for calling medical staff? Some people have already made calls immediately when someone around them has a problem, but unfortunately, even the medical team is paralyzed because most of its members have "fallen ill".

Upon hearing Honda's words, Malik could only roll his eyes in response.

He was indeed incredibly awesome back then, but that was then. Although Hayato "cured" his split personality, his body was "ruined" by the other "dark personality" that had already been destroyed. Since then, even normal duels have been difficult to play, let alone dark games.

To put it another way, although he can still fight as a duelist, he's basically a glass cannon—good at hitting people, but useless when he gets hit.

As for the current situation, although we don't know exactly what happened, it is obviously some kind of supernatural event, so it's normal for him to be out of commission.

But this guy...

Malik glanced at Honda, who seemed perfectly normal, frowned, and shakily stuffed a French fry into his mouth: "What's wrong with you now?"

Honda, after being asked by Malik, forgot to complain that Malik, even in his current state, still remembered to order some fries. He looked himself up and down with some confusion, scratched the back of his head strangely, and said uncertainly, "Maybe it's because I have superhuman strength?"