Is this the world of card dealers? Yada thieves!

Atum paused, then placed his hand on his heart. "And I will always be watching over you from the underworld. Don't forget that we are soulmates, of one heart and one mind. So even if there is a barrier between the underworld and the human world separating us, we will still fight together."

"The other me..." Yugi paused, then placed his hand on his heart, looking at Atum with a smile. "Yes, I will, because we are invincible as one."

"Are you two invincible as one?"

A voice sounded beside them. Game and Atum turned their heads and saw that it was Sera, who had suddenly disappeared and then suddenly reappeared. The golden inverted triangle Prana mark on her forehead was like a faulty light bulb, dimming every now and then, as if it was about to go out at any moment.

Looking at the game and Atum, Sera solemnly said, "The dimensional gate has not been completely closed, otherwise Pharaoh Atum, your soul should have already been taken back to the underworld. The battle is not over yet, so I'm entrusting the rest to you two. You must defeat that person!"

Hearing Sera's words, Yugi was somewhat confused: "It's not over yet? But, wasn't Hayato already—"

"...In the short eighteen years of my life, I learned one thing: human ability has its limits..."

Hayato's voice came from not far away. He was holding the Quantum Cube in his hand. His head was lowered. He slowly stood up from the kneeling position when he took the Quantum Cube and turned around to face the direction of the gamers.

"It is true that Kobayashi Hayato obtained the Quantum Cube, but at the moment he obtained it, although we do not know how he did it, he successfully gained control of the Quantum Cube and connected it to the collective consciousness of Prana."

Sera's youthful face showed a serious and slightly fearful expression. "I felt it. The profound terror and darkness emanating from his consciousness, as well as the emotionless coldness and unrestrained greed, were negative emotions that one should never come into contact with from a higher dimension!"

"With only a hint of hatred in his heart, Deva... also known as Blue God, actually fell into the dark side of the dimension and became that twisted form. It's unimaginable what will happen to Kobayashi Hayato next!"

Glancing at Blue God, who was still sticking out his butt in a begging pose, not far away, Sera tried to maintain her pity, sympathy, and sorrow for Diva, but she couldn't help but laugh. She quickly turned to look at Hayato, who had his head down, and said, "If we don't stop Kobayashi Hayato, he can easily reopen the dimensional gate with the Quantum Cube. He will become the destroyer of the world!"

"...The more cunning, scheming, and manipulative one is, the more likely they are to encounter unexpected setbacks and frustrations..."

Following Sera's words, Hayato spoke again, once again drawing everyone's attention.

Sera looked serious, yet somewhat puzzled, and said, "Kobayashi Hayato, he's supposed to be controlled by the [Quantum Cube]? But what exactly is he trying to say?"

It seemed that Sera's question, "What exactly are you trying to say?" triggered some key phrase, because Hayato suddenly looked up, held the Quantum Cube above his head, and shouted, "...the more you understand, the more you realize that humanity has its limits!"

"I'm not going to be human anymore, game!"

Sera saw that Hayato was holding the ominous Millennium Wisdom Wheel in his other hand. It was that very thing that had caused Mani and Deva's drastic personality changes, making them unable to resist their negative emotions and leading them to extremes, ultimately resulting in their deaths. Could it be that Hayato Kobayashi's transformation was due to the reaction between the Millennium Wisdom Wheel and the Quantum Cube?

Hayato grabbed the Millennium Wisdom Wheel that Blue God had forged, slapped it onto the Quantum Cube in his hand, and continued to shout, "I will surpass humanity, and I will use the power of the Quantum Cube!"

The moment the Millennium Wisdom Wheel made contact with the Quantum Cube, golden light burst forth. After a brief release, the light quickly recoiled and converged on Hayato's forehead, adding a second mark to the existing golden inverted triangle Prana mark.

Most people with Prana talent can only discover their talent after going through a lot of hardship. Then they need a certain resonance to connect with Prana's collective consciousness. The golden inverted triangle mark is the proof of Prana talent awakening. After being able to connect with the collective consciousness, the mark will light up like an indicator light on an appliance when resonating with the collective consciousness.

However, the situation of having two Prana marks is not normal. None of the companions that Sera has seen so far have shown such signs. It's not that she has never seen anyone with two marks, but the last person with two marks was Lord Shadi Sin, who adopted and nurtured their Prana talents!

Unsure of the situation, Sera sensed that Hayato Kobayashi was indeed a dangerous individual, and quickly turned to Yugi and Atem, saying, "Please, Yugi-san, Pharaoh Atem, for the sake of protecting the world, please defeat him—"

However, Sera didn't see any "surprise" or "anger" in Yugi and Atum, the emotions one would feel when betrayed by a comrade or when someone important is taken away. She only saw Yugi mutter to himself, somewhat embarrassed, "Hayato, what is he doing again?"

“So Jonouchi and Honda were right after all, Hayato is back again.” Atum said with a hint of helplessness, “But I feel like he was more like him last time.”

"To be honest, that's true." The game player nodded in agreement.

The conversation between the two left Sera somewhat bewildered. Glancing at Yugi and Atum, who showed no intention of making a move, Sera, though knowing she was no match for Hayato, immediately confronted Hayato, whose golden light had dissipated, and asked, "Kobayashi Hayato, what are you doing!?"

"Hehe, Sera? Why would you ask me a question that sounds like why we need to exhale after inhaling?"

His school uniform vanished, replaced by a black bodysuit that accentuated his muscular chest and abs. He wore what appeared to be gold braces around his ribs, a luxurious gold skirt armor around his waist, and a white cloak. Hayato, whose attire gave Atum a strong sense of déjà vu, crossed his arms and arrogantly said, "You should still be connected to the collective consciousness of Prana, shouldn't you? Can't you find the obvious answer yourself?"

Hayato lifted his bangs, his hand seemingly coated with hair gel to keep his hair standing upright, and gestured with his hand in front of him: "This was a trial, a trial to obtain the Phowa. Using your brother, Blue God, I successfully obtained the Quantum Cube, which serves as a dimensional gate. And all of this is thanks to you, Sera. You brought the Quantum Cube to Blue God, and then I obtained this power from Blue God!"

"Card sprites, Millennium Treasures, and Dimensional Phowa! It's you foolish Prana who keep me standing at the pinnacle forever! Hmph, hehehehehehehe!"

After letting out a loud laugh, Hayato pointed in the direction of Yugi and Atem, "Blue God has been defeated, and no one else can stop me from destroying this world. You're next, Yugi!"

"It feels... not as good as when I joined Dorma."

Although Hayato looked very serious, as if he were a villain who had always stood with the main characters in order to obtain the ultimate power, and then resolutely switched sides to obtain the strongest power when the opportunity came, among the people on the high platform, apart from Sera who actually believed it, neither Yugi nor Atem felt any sense of crisis.

The game even commented on Hayato's performance, since at least Hayato actually sealed Pegasus's soul with the "Orichalcos Barrier" in front of Jonouchi and the game, compared to the last time. However, killing Pegasus seems like doing a good deed.

“That being said, Aibo, I actually really want to duel with Hayato once.” Atum said with a relaxed smile, “Although I am very satisfied that you are my opponent in the Duel Ritual, it is a bit of a pity that I could not have one last duel with Hayato before returning to the Underworld, even though Kaiba has dueled with me.”

"In that case, since you, my other self, have finally managed to come to the mortal world, why not fulfill this regret?" Yugi smiled at Atem, then looked at Hayato, "Shall we team up again after all this time?"

“Of course, after all, we are—” Atum, who was standing next to Hayato, raised his arm and extended his fist, just like Yugi did, and gently touched Yugi’s fist, which was raised in sync.

Atum's body transformed into points of light that scattered and flowed into Yugi's body. The fusion was completed without the aid of the Millennium Puzzle. The golden Eye of Ugato appeared on Yugi's forehead, its eyes shining brightly and its hair moving without wind.

"The strongest duo, one in two!"

Chapter 987 The Crimson King deleted time 159.

"Hey, Hayato, your days of opening dimensional gates at will are over. Give me the Quantum Cube."

"If you want it, you should come and take it yourself. You already know the rules."

I knew you'd say that.

How many times have we dueled?

"It's hard to say, we're always dueling in our spare time."

"It's time to end all of this, Hayato, let's finish this once and for all!"

The above is purely a little skit from Hayato's own imagination. Neither Atem nor Yugi has the flamboyant personality of a certain red demon hunter. Even though they have undergone a rare fusion, they are only in a state of coexistence of two personalities.

Although there are two wills controlling one body at the same time, Atum and Yugi have a closer tacit understanding than even the deepest brothers, long-time spouses, or twins with innate synergy. Their movements are so synchronized that it is impossible for outsiders to tell that two people are controlling the body at the same time.

Golden light materialized on Yugi's wrist, and the familiar weight of the Duel Disk pressed down on his left wrist. He raised his hand and inserted a deck into the slot. The Duel Disk instantly transformed, unfolded, and pieced itself together, with the Life Divisions lighting up.

"Duel!" x2

[Yugi Muto: 4000 LP, 5 card in hand]

Atum's voice rang out: "All good things must come to an end, even for us, Hayato."

"My other self is fighting alongside me, so let's settle this once again with this duel, Hayato."

The game's sound also followed, two similar but slightly different voices coming from the same mouth, causing Hayato to raise an eyebrow: "Hmph, then try to get a little closer, Kazama Shunsuke."

"Who is that person I've never heard of before?!"

Hayato raised his Duel Disk, ignoring the game's sarcastic remarks, and reached for the card box at his waist. At the same time, he opened the warehouse in the system panel that was not closed, and selected to receive the reward he had obtained when he completed the achievement, a random pre-built deck called "Otherworldly Power".

Just like the beginner pre-built deck that Hayato once bought, this reward is also a pre-built deck that is randomly drawn from a given range. The reason Hayato chose to receive the pre-built deck at this time was that even if it was a fun deck, it might include a couple of useful cards.

Even a 【Jade Beast】 deck can include one 【Ash Blossom】.

Hayato envisioned that the decks he could draw with the so-called "other-dimensional power" would be nothing more than decks composed of informal terms like "DD," or cards related to monsters that frequently cross dimensions and are active in the story of the card illustrations, such as "Wild Warrior" and "Lightsworn Hound - Lightning." The appeal wasn't really that great.

In his view, the biggest reward that "Otherworldly Power" can bring out in a deck is probably the first champion deck that has gathered all five Extra Deck Special Summoning methods: Fusion, Synchro, Xyz, Pendulum, and Link, namely the "Otherworldly Demon" [DDD] deck.

But when he opened the warehouse to take out the reward card deck, he was stunned when he saw the reward drawing interface.

[Random "Otherworldly Power" pre-build draw is in progress. A preview of the card pool is being shown.]

"One Lifetime of Ruin" - [The Clan of Tears and Lamentations];

"War of the Ages" - [The Terrifying Claw Beast Clan];

"Wu Shihuai" - [the Mona Foolish Clan];

"Lu Shihuai" - [Jushe Nuwei Clan];

"Knight of the Star Key" - [Machine Knight];

Ragnarok – [King's War]

"Apostles of the world" - [teaching];

...]

Although the list of decks was very long, Hayato had no intention of continuing to look at it, his eyes fixed on the deck at the top of the list—[Tears of Elegy Tribe].

As is customary, Hayato's decks will not contain any Synchro, Xyz, or Link abilities that are ahead of their time, even if those decks are designed to focus on such summoning methods. Therefore, to maximize his benefits, the most suitable decks are those that do not have or do not rely on Synchro or similar summoning methods, namely, Tribute, Ritual, Soul, and Fusion decks.

I, Hayato Kobayashi, hereby swear that I will exchange twenty years of Pegasus's lifespan for the chance to draw the [Tears of Elegy Clan]!

What? I told Pegasus not to create such a disgusting deck as [Tears of the Gods]? Impossible, absolutely impossible, I never said that. Someone must be framing me. I look down on [Tears of the Gods]? Not at all! I will always love the [Tears of the Gods] archetype!

Look at the prefix "[Tears of the Pearl]", "a lifetime of evil", it sounds extremely dangerous, like they're going to destroy the world. In that case, I, the righteous Hayato Kobayashi, must immediately strike and bring them to justice! The best course of action is to leave the [Tears of the Pearl] Clan in my hands, Hayato Kobayashi!

Although that's what he thought, Hayato was actually very clear in his heart that the list of cards provided by the system was probably similar to the cover characters in the limited card pools of card games. It was just a decoration to lure you to look over and spend money to draw cards. Apart from the whales who were tempted and the lucky ones who got lucky with a single draw and should commit seppull, how could ordinary players get the grand prize so easily?

Although he might recklessly attempt to sneak in through single draws, Hayato was also acutely aware of his own luck. Besides, he didn't believe the system would be so kind as to unlock the [Tears of Elegy Clan] so easily to him.

In particular—what Hayato was facing couldn't even be considered a pay-to-win gacha pool, but rather a one-time draw pool as an achievement reward. Even though Hayato had a lot of DP points, he couldn't spend a single one and could only leave it to fate, letting the system arrange and allocate the cards to him.

It seemed like Hayato had been thinking for a long time, but in reality, drawing the reward only took less than ten seconds. Amidst Hayato's prayers, most of the names in the previously lit deck list went dark in an instant, including the [Tears of Elegy Tribe] and [Kusha's Wrath Tribe] that Hayato was particularly concerned about.

Tsk, what a pity. Not only did I not get [Tears of the Pearl], but I also didn't get to enjoy [Kusha's Wrathful Clan] which I didn't even have an over-limit version of? I was thinking of using B-rank Three Wolves to give the duelists of this world a little spinning shock.

However, although he didn't draw the super mainstream deck that once dominated the environment, Hayato was still somewhat gratified when he looked at the deck he got. At least it was a deck with considerable strength, and it was also a Psychic-type deck that Hayato didn't have, filling that gap. One of the cards included in the pre-built deck was also quite "talked about".

Hayato quickly picked out a few cards from his pre-made deck and added them to his pre-prepared deck. He then took out the deck from the card box at his waist, inserted it into the Duel Disk, and said, "The people of this dimension have souls bound by gravity, unable to soar through the sky. Even though they know of the existence of the universe, humanity is still attracted by gravity and devours the Earth."

"Humans will eventually go to heaven, so I, Kobayashi Hayato, will purge humanity from the earth!"

"Duel!"

[Kobayashi Hayato: 4000LP, 5 cards in hand]

Although the actual situation was that Atum and Yugi were dueling Hayato in a 2v1 match, because they were sharing the same body, the rules of the duel still applied to the 1v1 match, with both sides having 4000 base points.

Furthermore, because Hayato had spent some time adjusting his deck, and because Atem and Yugi finished preparing first, even though Hayato's Duel Disk had a card ejection mechanism specially designed by Keipai to speed up the card draw, Atem and Yugi still gained the first move.

"We'll take the first turn! Draw!" As Hayato drew his five initial cards, Yugi also drew a card, gaining the first move. Without even looking at the card in his hand, he played it. "Then, I'll activate the spell card 'Pot of Greed' and draw two cards from my deck."

"Not bad, Aibo." Atem wasn't surprised at all by Yugi's ability to know what cards he had drawn without even looking at them. After all, Yugi had defeated his powerful duelist. Wasn't that a basic skill that any true duelist should possess?

"After all, the opponent is Hayato. If I don't take it seriously and go all out, I'll be instantly killed, right?" Yugi smiled and muttered to himself after seeing the two cards he had drawn. "Go ahead and attack. Leave the defense to me, my other self."

“Oh, I won’t let you down.” Atum responded and played the card he had drawn. “Then, during my Main Phase, I activate the Spell Card [Dark Magic Circle] and determine the top three cards of my Deck based on its effect.”

The [Dark Magician Circle], also known as "Stargazing," allows you to see the cards at the top of your deck. If there is a [Dark Magician] or a Spell/Trap Card with the [Dark Magician] name on it, you can show it to your opponent, add it to their hand, and freely arrange the order in which the remaining cards are put back into the deck. It is perfect as the first step in a deck-building strategy.

As expected, it was as if there was no deck above Atem's deck. Three magic cards, all with the name "Dark Magician," namely "Rescue of the Magus," "Servant of the Soul," and "Tether of Master and Disciple," were waiting for Atem to choose from.

"Based on the effect of [Dark Magic Circle], I will show [Rescue of the Magister] to you, Hayato, and add it to my hand. Then, I will place the remaining two cards back on top of the deck in the order I want."

【The Sorcerer's Rescue】 was not added to Atum's hand, but was played directly: "Then I immediately activate this Field Spell Card 【The Sorcerer's Rescue】. As part of its activation effect, I set 【Eternal Soul】 on my back row from my deck."

Two spell cards appeared in Atem's back row in the blink of an eye, waiting to provide assistance to the spellcasters who would come out later. The face-down trap cards were also a considerable problem, but Atem still had a full six cards in his hand.

"Normal Summon [Magical-Transformed Rijin]. As long as he exists in my Monster Zone, I can, in addition to the Normal Summon, Tribute Summon one Spellcaster monster face-up Attack Position only once during the Main Phase." A clown-dressed mage with the [Dual Summon] ability jumped out in front of Atem, then immediately jumped into a magic circle. "Next, I will Tribute Summon [Magical-Transformed Rijin]!"

"Come to my side, [Dark Magician Girl]!"