Is this the world of card dealers? Yada thieves!

However, the sight of Hayato walking towards her stirred something within her, and a smile crept onto her face as she tried to maintain a composed expression. She unconsciously murmured, "Hehehe, Hayato-sama, the moving Hayato-sama."

"Hey, Angelo." After walking past Samejima, who was standing there like a statue for some reason, Hayato asked Ayukawa Emi with some curiosity, "So, what happened, Ayukawa-sensei?"

"The specific situation is complicated, but to put it simply, this lady who came to inspect our school on behalf of the PTA feels that the school does not attach enough importance to the PTA and wants to meet you." As Ms. Ayukawa spoke, she pointed to the PTA representative who was wiping the corner of her mouth. After Hayato's gaze shifted to her, she immediately took a step back, trying to make herself inconspicuous so as not to be defeated by the other party's words.

However, after Ayukawa took a few steps back, she discovered that as Hayato began to make contact with the PTA representative, Samejima, who had previously been petrified, Chronos, and Daitokuji, who had been in a depressed state, had all recovered and were hiding with her.

"You lot!?"

"Shh, this is also part of the tactics used by people in society, Mr. Ayukawa." Aoki straightened his tie. "It's definitely more reassuring to pass the buck to the boss than to go through the trouble of solving problems yourself."

“To be honest, that’s true.” “Me too.” “Yes, that’s so true, bro.” Samejima, Chronos, and Daitokuji nodded in agreement.

"Hello, ma'am, I am Hayato Kobayashi, the principal of this dueling academy. May I ask what problems you encountered during your visit to the academy, and if I can help you with any of them?"

"Ah, no, no, no, Mr. Hayato, there's absolutely nothing wrong with your academy, how could there be any problems?" Completely different from his behavior in front of Samejima and the others, the PTA representative displayed an unwavering attitude of unconditionally supporting Hayato. "This is the conclusion I reached after conducting a thorough investigation of the Duel Academy, which is trusted by the parents of the PTA!"

"Huh? But aren't we still at the academy gate—!" Chronos blurted out instinctively upon hearing the PTA representative's words, but was immediately silenced by Daitokuji and Aoki who covered his mouth to prevent him from continuing.

"There's no need to go into the academy to see those teaching facilities. Those things are just decorations to appease those big shots who don't understand anything. To really judge a school's quality, just look at the teachers' demeanor," the PTA representative said righteously. "Take Principal Kobayashi, for example. He looks like a self-disciplined and excellent person, with strong and powerful muscles all over his body."

"Excuse me, ma'am, please have some self-respect."

Hayato subtly shifted his position, dodging the hand that was reaching for his abdomen, and looked at the PTA representative in front of him with a hint of helplessness.

Although it's all in the past, it's worth mentioning again that when Hayato was in Domino City High School, he was ranked number one on the list of "most people who want to date him". After the Duel City quarterfinals were broadcast online, his popularity spread all over the world along with the popularity of Duel Monsters.

To say that all ten Duel Monsters fans are Hayato's fans would be an exaggeration, but to say that only nine are definitely not entirely accurate. And the PTA representative standing before Hayato happens to be a Hayato fan, and seemingly a rather fanatical one at that.

While Samejima and his team had a lot of trouble dealing with this lady, Hayato's mere presence was enough to earn her approval of the Duel Academy. Nevertheless, Hayato still led the PTA representative into the Duel Academy for a tour and informed her about the unequal division system that the Duel Academy would be implementing.

Hayato could, of course, simply use the fact that the other party was a fan of his to get through the visit, but he didn't want to do that. Duel Academy was, after all, an educational institution, and to do something so fake in a place like that would be too much of a disgrace to the sanctity of the school. Even if Hayato did do that, it might cause parents to worry about their children's treatment due to the academy's branch system, which could lead to a decrease in the number of students enrolled.

However, to Hayato's surprise, the woman representing the PTA had no objection to the intramural division system. On the contrary, she felt that this kind of open competition was much better than those schools that seemed to be equal for everyone but actually hid bullying.

Besides, she's not some newbie just entering society, and she doesn't really believe in equality for all. The world isn't as wonderful as schools portray it; it's good for students to realize the inequalities of society early on.

Watching the ship carrying the PTA representatives leave the dock, Hayato breathed a sigh of relief: "Phew, at least one troublesome matter has been resolved. Although our academy won't accept it even if the PTA has objections, it's still much easier to work together."

“But Principal Kobayashi, we’ve only managed to persuade this PTA representative this time. After she goes back and shares her experiences at our school with the other parents from the PTA, we won’t know their final opinions yet,” Ayukawa Emi reminded Hayato.

Hayao shook the marker in his hand and said with a smile, "Otherwise, what do you think that stack of autographed photos I let that lady take away was for?"

"As expected of Hayato-san, he easily accomplished what we couldn't!" "I admire you so much!" "Even I am deeply moved!"

"Stop flattering me, you guys. School starts soon, so get ready to get busy." Hayato waved his hand at Daitokuji, Chronos, and Aoki, saying, "The future of Duel Academy is truly something to look forward to."

Chapter 1042 The Start of School in 2001

"Keep burning soul! Burn until it's scorching hot!"

"Kick everything aside like a storm and floor the gas pedal!"

"Full power, time to go, Clear Mind!"

A burst of rousing music, so inspiring it made you want to run on the track right away, woke Hayato from his dream. After a quick check that rolled a 20, he casually slapped the alarm clock off.

He dreamt that he was wielding the invincible "Chinese sword" [Xiangjian] and fought his way to the finals of the Duel Monsters World Championship. When he faced a player who used the Dragon Fist technique, he even drew two [Jiehang Shengfu] cards, risking his life to draw more.

Even so, he still narrowly lost to his opponent in the end. What impressed him most was the four limited-edition cards that his opponent used, representing the four colors "red", "yellow", "pink" and "blue". Hayato called them "Lonely Rock", while his opponent Ryuken called them "Abyss Four".

"I actually dreamt I was defeated by a Dragon Clan duelist! Could it be that Kaiba has been thinking about me all day and night, causing this?" Hayato slammed his fist on the table, waking up Rainbow Kuriboh, who was sleeping on the bedside table. "Unforgivable, Pegasus!"

“…Curry?” Rubbing its sleepy eyes, Rainbow Kuriboh looked at Hayato, who was acting crazy as usual, and tilted its head.

Has Hayato, lacking a worthy rival in reality, finally resorted to dreaming of equally matched opponents to compete against each other?

Hayato tapped the table and glanced at the alarm clock he had just turned off. He realized that although he had set the alarm for 9 a.m. yesterday, it was now showing 10 a.m.

And at 10 o'clock, the time for the Duel Academy's division ceremony to begin!

"Oh no, I'm going to be late..." Instinctively, Hayato was about to jump out of bed and rush out the door, but as soon as he put on his slippers, he belatedly realized, "Wait a minute, I think I'm the principal? Oh well, so what if I'm late? No one's going to expel me, right?"

Thinking this, Hayato decided to lie back down on the bed and "go wild" and sleep soundly. Anyway, he didn't have anything to do today; he just needed to say a few words after the "Sorting Ceremony" and that would be it.

The process was slightly different from the opening ceremony for new students at the Duel Academy. Since they were the first batch of students after the school was established, there was no welcoming ceremony prepared for them by their seniors on the first day of school, so the first day was left empty.

Hayato and Samejima decided to use the students' first day at Duel Academy Island as a "sorting ceremony." The new students would duel with the school's teachers to demonstrate their strength, and the teachers would then make preliminary sortings based on the talents displayed by the students during the duels.

—Although on the surface, the only people you can name in Duel Academy seem to be Daitokuji, Chronos, and a few others, in reality, even if you don't include the two principals, Hayato and Samejima, as well as the dormitory teachers of each academy, there are more than a dozen minor teachers that Hayato can hardly name.

Even if not every teacher goes up to duel and test the students, this year's eighty-odd students only need ten teachers to each play eight games. Having a group of adults who can pass Kaiba's test to become teachers play cards with a group of students, even if they play eight games, it won't take too long. After all, not everyone has the talent of Jun Manjoume, Judai Yuki, or Ryo Marufuji.

Even if a teacher goes easy on a student to assess their abilities, a duel would only take nine or ten minutes at most. After eight duels, including the time for substitutions, it would take at most two hours. Hayato could then sleep for another hour or so, and get up again around midnight to meet the new students.

"(|3【_____】This is such an easy job, I feel like I'm becoming decadent. It would be even better if I had a body pillow."

As he said this, Hayato turned his head and found that, without him noticing, Mimi—[Kamikage-Midrush]—had somehow ended up on his bed and was lying next to him. Although her face was expressionless, her eyes were full of anticipation for him to hold her while they slept.

However, in the next second, a dragon's tail wrapped around Xiao Mi's waist and lifted her up. Unaware of the tail on her waist, Xiao Mi watched as the distance between herself and Hayato increased, and subconsciously reached out and grabbed wildly in the air, trying to reach Hayato.

"Master, it's time to get up." It was Yaoguang in human form, namely [Half-Dragon Maid/Dragon Girl Butler], who pulled Xiao Mi away from Hayato. She stood in front of Hayato's bed with her hands folded over her abdomen and bowed respectfully. "This was your order yesterday. Even if you don't want to get up, I have to wake you up."

"Damn it, they betrayed me yesterday!" Hayato said, but he didn't actually want to sleep that much. He was just feeling lazy because he lacked motivation. Even though he slept until 10 o'clock, it was because he had stayed up too late playing games with Pegasus, who was in America, the day before.

There's no way around it, that game called "BoO Gate" is just too fun.

"By the way, the new students are supposed to take the 8 o'clock ferry to the island, right? It takes about two hours to get there. It's 10 o'clock now, they should be on the island by now." Sitting up, Hayato took the clean clothes that Ran had washed and dried from her hands, and then handed her her pajamas. After ruffling Ran's hair, Hayato started to get dressed.

While Hayato was washing up, Yaoguang was rubbing Xiaolan's hair so hard that she almost rubbed it bald, as if she wanted to transfer Hayato's caresses from Xiaolan. Meanwhile, Xiaohong, also known as the [Half-Dragon Maid - Distillery Dragon Girl], started cooking what could be considered breakfast for Hayato with the help of the other elves.

Since Hayato was about to leave, Xiao Hong prepared a sandwich that was easy to carry and nutritious enough. She used toast that was fried until it was slightly crispy on the outside and still soft on the inside, sandwiched cheese, bacon and fried egg separated by crunchy vegetables such as lettuce and cucumber slices, and finally cut it in half along the diagonal of the quadrilateral, making two sandwiches with not many ingredients but just the right proportions.

"Breakfast is good, but it's a bit too early." Taking a bite of the sandwich and savoring Xiao Hong's excellent cooking, Hayato waved to the Pokémon in his dormitory, picked up a bottle of milk, and walked out of the house. "I'm off!"

So, Hayato wouldn't believe Dartz's nonsense, like "elves can't be trusted." Didn't you see how comfortable he was after handing over the household affairs to the [half-dragon maids]? Come on, being waited on hand and foot is super enjoyable, okay?

———The dividing line for the little blue pajamas that fell to the floor———

Unlike the head teachers who live in their respective student dormitories, and the other teachers who live in the faculty dormitories next to the academy, Hayato's dormitory is located by a lake on Duel Academy Island, surrounded by forests and with one side facing the lake, offering a beautiful view.

This is also a privilege that Hayato enjoys as the principal of the Duel Academy. Even Samejima only lives in a single room in the teachers' dormitory building. However, to be precise, this house, which is called a dormitory but is actually more like a villa, was actually extorted from Kaiba after Hayato was tricked into taking the position of principal.

The construction team from Haima Group spent nearly two days building this villa for Hayato after he had chosen the site, as compensation from Haima to Hayato.

After walking for about ten minutes from his "dormitory," Hayato arrived at the Duel Academy and quickly found a spacious dueling arena used for the "Assignment Ceremony."

Although it cannot accommodate tens of thousands of spectators like the Kaiba Dome in Domino City, this indoor dueling arena was designed to hold several hundred students. However, since this was the first day of school after the Duel Academy was established, the students in the stands were quite sparse.

Since the division into colleges had not yet been completed, the students were temporarily sitting with those who had already established interactions during their short time as classmates. They were divided into countless small groups here and there, watching the students undergoing assessments in the dueling arena in the center of the venue. At the same time, several teachers were sitting in the front row with scoreboards, watching the duels up close.

On the field, dueling with the teacher, was a pink-haired boy with gray-blue eyes and hair that might be unusually conspicuous in other worlds, but in this world of card players, he could only be described as someone who knew a little about cards.

"Open the face-down card, [Deck Destruction Virus]! This can only be activated by Tributing one DARK monster with 1000 or less ATK on my field. I Tribute [Death Stalker], which has 900 ATK on my field." Opposite the new student, the examiner activated a Trap Card during the student's turn, and amidst Hayato's subtle expression, exclaimed, "This is a necessary sacrifice!"

"Huh? I thought you summoned [Death Stalker] because you idolized Duel King, but it turns out you're just trying to unleash monsters like him." The pink-haired boy paused. "But, it seems like there's nothing wrong with Duel King's fans unleashing monsters like him, is there?"

"Hmph, still haven't realized what I'm about to do? Your knowledge of those common cards isn't enough," the teacher commented. "The effect of [Death Deck Destruction Virus] destroys all monsters with 1500 or more ATK in your opponent's hand or on the field. Additionally, your opponent can destroy up to three monsters with 1500 or more ATK from their deck!"

"Huh!?" To the pink-haired boy's astonishment, half of his cards vanished in the blink of an eye, and even the several monsters that had been on the field were destroyed and sent to the graveyard.

For a moment, the only monsters left on both sides' fields were the same one that looked rather weak.

[Teacher: 2200LP, Hand: 0]

【Little White Rabbit】【DEF2050】

[Youngster: 1000LP, 3 cards in hand]

【Little White Rabbit】【DEF2050】

"Using such despicable means to prevent me from summoning a powerful monster? The second effect is so stupid, who would willingly send their powerful monster to the graveyard?" The pink-haired boy said, glancing at the remaining cards in his hand. "Even though my invincible ace monster was sent to the graveyard by you, teacher, it's alright! This turn, I'm going to Tribute Summon my 'Little Rabbit'!"

"Come forth! The invincible [Lion Wizard]!"

The little white rabbit munching on a carrot disappeared from the pink-haired boy's field, replaced by a lion wearing a cloak, baring its teeth and claws at the other little white rabbit trembling in the teacher's field.

【Lion Wizard】【ATK1350】

"A 5-star monster with 1350 ATK?! Why would anyone include that in their deck?!" Even the experienced teacher, who had seen plenty of students' crazy antics, felt a wave of dizziness upon seeing the pink-haired boy's move. "And it's even a Normal Monster!"

"But it's precisely because the [Lion Wizard]'s attack power is below 1500 that it successfully dodged your [Deck Destruction Virus], teacher!" The pink-haired boy, completely oblivious to the fact that the examiner had started writing something on the paper because of the [Lion Wizard] he had summoned, said smugly, "The [Lion Wizard] is too strong, it's simply invincible!"

"Even if you say that, that monster's attack power still can't even break through the [Little Rabbit's] defense, right?"

Hearing the teacher's words, the pink-haired boy replied, "In that case, as long as you can't use [Little Rabbit] to defend, wouldn't that be great? Use the spell card ['Defense' Seal] to change your [Little Rabbit] from Defense Position to Attack Position, and finally equip my invincible [Lion Wizard] with the spell card [Dull Axe]!"

[Little White Rabbit] [DEF2050→ATK150]

[Lion Wizard] [ATK1350→2350]

"Entering the battle phase, use [Lion Wizard] to attack [Little Rabbit]!"

[Assessment Teacher: 2200LP→0]

"Ya☆da☆zei!" The pink-haired boy exclaimed excitedly as he watched himself successfully defeat his teacher. "To be able to defeat a teacher so soon after enrolling, how can I say I'm satisfied? I'm invincible, unstoppable, and at full power!"

The examiner opposite him: "..."

This idiot, does he not know that the decks these teachers are using are not their own, and that they are even holding back in the duels?

"Hmph, no matter how I think about it, I'm definitely capable of getting into the top-level Sun God - Yellow Dormitory, right, teacher!"

"The best student is in the Obelisk-Blue dormitory." After correcting the pink-haired boy's mistake, the examiner collected the joint score from his colleagues for this student: "Minazuki-kun, duel score 59 points, Osiris-Red."

"Huh?! This doesn't make sense, teacher. How could the excellent me who defeated you be the Osiris Red, who sounds like such a lousy character!"

"Who would add a 5-star Normal Monster with less than 1500 attack power to their deck? You can't even figure out how to use the effect of 'Dead Destruction Virus'. Your deck building and dueling knowledge are inadequate. 59 points is already the average score after removing my lowest score of 40 points!"

"Funky!"

In the audience, Hayato sat by Samejima: "70 points or above is the Sun God - Yellow, 90 points or above can go to Obelisk - Blue, but I didn't even pass."

"But isn't that the very reason our Duel Academy exists?" Samejima smiled and said, "The level a student is at upon enrollment only indicates their strength. It's not until graduation that we can see how well the school has developed their talents. And before graduation, no one can predict whether a student will be a poor student or a top student."

"But compared to that, Hayato, why are you only arriving now? I was the one giving the speech in front of the freshmen on your behalf just now."

"Haha, because I've lost my way on the path of life."

Chapter 1043 The Peace of 2002

"Okay, let's play cards this time!"

Wearing a yellow uniform, the pink-haired boy with a side ponytail arrogantly pulled out a card. "As a student of the top-tier Sun God - Yellow Dormitory, the deck I'm using this time has naturally been trained to its strongest state. How can I be invincible?"