Duels should be played with a smile.

"Chain activation of Gree's effect: If this card is Special Summoned from the Extra Deck, target 1 [Divine Monument] Spell Card in your Graveyard (excluding Quick-Play Spell Cards) and add it to your hand!"

"I'm activating this attack targeting the [Fountain of the Divine Stele] in the cemetery!"

Gri stirred up the power of wind and thunder, attempting to rebuild the shattered Spring of the Divine Stele.

"Recycle Field Spell Card? Don't you already have one here... Wait?! It's once per turn, not the card name once per turn?!"

The Faceless One recalled the explanation just now and quickly clicked on the Divine Stele Fountain, which had already revealed one effect. He checked it repeatedly, word by word, and found that there was indeed no "card name" before the "once per turn" effect.

"Using it once recycles 3 cards and draws 3 more, and you can even reset the effect by switching to another field—what kind of fake card is this?! How can you possibly let me recycle such a fake card?!"

The Faceless One was already shouting; he had never seen anything so fake.

Even the Pot of Greed would be ashamed of itself in comparison!

"Chain your effect, activate the effect of [Effect Veiler] in your hand, target your Grell and negate its effects until the end of the turn!"

Leyou's hand trembled almost imperceptibly. Now that he only had one monster left in his hand, he almost thought that the other party was going to use some method to stop him from drawing 3.

If the draw 3 is interrupted, that would be bad, but fortunately it's just the loss of a field spell, which is acceptable.

The effect of the veiled one passed smoothly, and the storm of Gree was quelled. However, the spring of the divine monument, which still flows with clear water, brought the three cards back to Leyou's hands through the circulation of the water.

“YA☆DA☆ZE!”

Upon seeing the three cards he had drawn, Leyou was overjoyed, but his mind also began to work—these three cards revealed a possible opportunity.

"Quick-Play Spell Card [The Edge of the Divine Monument]: All Quick-Play Spell Cards of the Divine Monument are limited to once per turn by their card name, and skip your next Battle Phase after use. They also have the effect of Special Summoning monsters from the Extra Deck, as well as another unique effect of their own."

The characteristics of the Divine Stele were briefly explained. Just as the name of the card activated by Leyou suggests, the Divine Stele is about to reveal its power.

"What I'm going to activate here is the effect of 'Sharp Edge': search my deck for one [Divine Monument] card other than the one with the same name. I search for [Divine Monument Fountain]!"

"After that, banish one card from your deck!"

On the skill tree on his left, a skill with a sword icon was lit up, and the weapon on his right, which had transformed back into the shape of a sword, also absorbed the power of the divine monument from this skill, sharpening its edge.

With a sharp blade drawn, the sword was hurled by Leyou, striking the Faceless One's Duel Disk and taking away a card from the top of his deck—a Value-Added G.

"Looks like I'm lucky; I didn't get any crucial cards." The Faceless One let out a soft sigh, as if he had finally relaxed.

"Now your Extra Monster Zone is occupied by a monster that negates effects, which means one of your Quick-Play Spell Card's features is useless. In addition, with the limitation of using the same card once per turn, the brilliance of your Divine Monument seems to be lacking."

Normally, Leyou would definitely reply with "Solvadocana," but now, because he had concealed his identity, he could only silently point to the monster on his field that had been pushed up by the famous deduction.

Two solar-powered battle axes appeared beside Gri and Avank respectively, and the light from the warp crystal enveloped the two monsters.

"Wait, Gain monsters and non-Gain monsters?! You want to?!"

Before the Faceless One could finish speaking, the pre-recorded, chuunibyou-esque lines that Yuki-onna had been forced to record by Leyou were played from the Duel Disk.

"Witness the brilliance of the light of harmony! This is the mechanism that reflects the radiance of crystal!"

"Reveal yourself! Open a new path of hope for a shattered future!"

"The summoning condition is 2 monsters, including Tuner monsters!"

"Link Summoning! Link 2! [Crystal Mechanism - Inherited Fiberglass]!"

Beneath the Faceless One's "unexpected yet reasonable" expression, the Light of Harmony descended.

At that moment, somewhere in the same dimension, a delicately carved, androgynous child raised his head. In his hand, a crystal that blended ice blue and bright yellow was shimmering with dazzling light.

Behind Him are sacred beasts carved from gemstones and crystals, and equally small and adorable golden boys and jade maidens.

"Huh? When did He appear in this world?" Inherited Fiberglass murmured in confusion, while His companions behind Him exchanged glances and all showed expressions of "I knew it"—He always gets confused whenever something crucial happens, and it seems this time is no exception.

However, they didn't really have the right to interfere with inheriting the fiberglass business, so they just let it be. Anyway, all they had to do was follow this little tyrant, and let everything else take its course.

On the other side, having summoned the water machine and seeing that Leyou on the other side had no other reaction, they had already begun the unfolding process etched into their DNA.

"Water Machine effect, Special Summon Tuner Monster [Stationer Cyberman 001] from the Deck."

"Using the water machine and stationery androids as materials, I link and summon a Link 3 monster, [Phantom Beast Machine: Dawn Goddess Hundred-Headed Dragon]!"

"If the Hundred-Headed Dragon effect is activated and a Link Summon is successful, Special Summon 3 Tokens, then..."

Just as Leyou was about to continue his performance and create a huge spectacle, the Effect Masker, who had just appeared and nullified Gri, reappeared.

"Don't get your hopes up! Because of your multiple Special Summons, I've drawn some very crucial cards!" Faceless One revealed his second Effect Cover card and mercilessly tossed it to Hundred-Headed Dragon.

Just kidding. If you can pass the water machine, and then pass the hundred-headed dragon, if you don't have any other hand traps, it's simpler and more efficient to just click on it!

The key step of the Water Machine Hundred-Headed Dragon was the Hundred-Headed Dragon Token being cut off, and Leyou's plan was forced to stop. While marveling at his good luck, the Faceless One was also preparing for his turn - the Water Machine Hundred-Headed Dragon was cut off, and he even drew 6 cards in his hand. This time, it's a sure thing!

"Well then, it's my turn..."

"When did you get the illusion that my turn was over?"

The Snow Woman's somewhat indifferent, somewhat frivolous, and somewhat arrogant voice not only gave the Faceless One a great sense of unease, but also made his heart, which had just been at ease, hang in suspense again.

This line was specially recorded, just waiting to be used against opponents who want to forcefully end their turn!

"Activate the effect of Hundred-Headed Dragon! Once per turn, you can activate this effect by Tributing up to 3 monsters you control. The effect varies depending on the number of monsters you Tribute!"

"But your Hundred-Headed Dragon has been neutralized! And you only have one monster on your field!" Faceless Man paused for a moment, then quickly spoke up, trying to stop Leyou from committing a possible foul.

"That's right! The effect was indeed nullified, but!"

"When did you start having the illusion that I activated it for the Hundred-Headed Dragon's effect?"

"All I need is the 'activation' operation, and the cost to activate it!"

"What you're ineffective at only has an effect! It can't stop me from activating it!"

That's one of the charms of dueling!

"Activate the Hundred-Headed Dragon's effect! Free yourself! The effect will be nullified, but my goal has been achieved!"

"Now, my extra monster zone is empty! The power of the Divine Stele will be displayed once again!"

"Did you know that taking the long way around is the greatest shortcut?"

Chapter 54 Using Duel to Bring Pain to the Opponent

The duels took place at various locations within the competition area. Today, there were half as many participants, but the frequency of duels was actually much higher.

"It's getting a bit out of control... I was just thinking of bringing the Faceless Ones into the virtual world to capture and study them through data, but I didn't expect that these things would have such amazing adaptability in the virtual world... How exactly do they 'proliferate' in the virtual world?"

Fingers flew across the keyboard as the researchers of Arc Domain dared not take their eyes off the screen for even a moment. An unexpected situation had arisen in the match, and until the situation was brought under control, they were forced to become 007 programmers, keeping a close eye on these monsters.

It's not just the researchers who are feeling very annoyed; many contestants are also finding the NPCs that used to bring them extra rewards to be too annoying because their appearance frequency seems a bit too high.

Most of these contestants' opponents have changed from normal duelists to mysterious NPCs, all of whom are lifeless. Even though defeating these weak opponents can earn them extra rewards, which is a good thing for them, they are not President Kaiba after all, and no one likes to fight against rigid human-machine opponents.

And if we actually lose to these NPCs, we'll be incredibly embarrassed.

Among these players who hate encountering NPCs, Jack is currently the most upset.

His status in the Synchro Dimension is actually quite high, after all, he was once the Duel King, but he is not Yusei after all, and he has not truly come into contact with some hidden information. He knows about the existence of Faceless Men, but he does not know the deeper meaning.

So now he has to deal with these opponents who appear in front of him and whose duels are not interesting at all, while also figuring out why such things appear in this virtual world and are given the name "NPC".

"This is so annoying! I have to ask Carly how her investigation is going after today's match."

Jack really wanted to ask Yusei; his intuition told him that asking Yusei would likely yield results, but... he was a little too embarrassed to ask.

However, thinking about how Carly at home would probably feel uncomfortable seeing how dependent he was on her, Jack thought it wouldn't be a bad idea to ask Yusei.

Just say it's been a long time since we last met and we'd like to catch up.

Then invite Kro and Ronkoronya over, and have a 5DS team gathering. During the gathering, casually ask them about it so that it won't seem out of the ordinary!

Jack gave himself a thumbs up for his brilliant idea.

Then, turning around, the Lucky D-Wheel, due to the pilot's absent-mindedness, crashed into a passing Faceless One, forcing the pilot to curse and start another human-machine duel.

……

"That's strange... Where are the other players? Why are they all NPCs who don't say a word?"

Yuza Naoma defeated an NPC using the Pure Dragon Takumi deck with the Bear Takumi deck. Now he felt that the nature of the match had changed. What should have been an opportunity to communicate with other duelists had turned into a boring and tedious dummy fight.

"Looks like I need to avoid these guys... Speaking of which, is Brother Leyou also participating in the competition? Should I go find him?"

Taking advantage of his height and physique, Shangmo began to consciously avoid the NPCs and started looking for Leyou's whereabouts.

……

"Normal Summon Tuner Monster [Yatamochi]".

[Water · 1★ · Sea Dragon · Attack Power 0]

A monster with an extremely cute chibi-style appearance, which could be described as a moe version of the Yamata no Orochi, was summoned by Leyou. Faceless looked at this monster with zero attack power and his heart skipped a beat again.

"Don't worry, although its attack power is 0, it is really as harmless as its appearance."

This time, Leyou came up with a new trick. While using the Snow Woman's voice, he also created a virtual image of Tanji based on his memory and had it float beside him. He then transferred the Snow Woman's voice to Tanji, allowing Tanji to communicate with the Faceless One using the Snow Woman's voice. This attracted the Faceless One's attention and disrupted his thoughts.

To be fair, this is probably a kind of chat flow, but if you actually use this many tricks when dueling with someone, your opponent might praise your fancy moves instead of realizing that they have fallen for the ultimate tactic of chat flow.

"The little octopus is harmless, but something harmful is about to make its appearance again!"

"Quick-Play Spell Card [Ice Curse Monument]! Based on its effect, I Special Summon an additional [Monument Fang Gri]!"

The light of the Divine Stele flashed again, and Gree, who had just left, reappeared. The power of wind and thunder swept in again, reconstructing the broken Divine Stele Spring in the graveyard. The Divine Stele Spring, which had already been reconstructed once, flowed with a handful of clear water.

"The effect of Divine Stele Fountain is once per turn, therefore, I target the three 'Divine Stele' cards in my Graveyard, return them to the bottom of the Deck, and draw 3 cards!"

"At the same time, since Gree's effect is not available once per turn, I will reclaim the Divine Fountain in the graveyard!"

I quickly arranged the chains and put the Divine Monument Fountain in C1 to defend against Ghost Rabbit. At this moment, I felt that the Divine Monument deck was really fun to play - I could draw 3 cards easily, and if I was lucky enough, I could draw more than ten cards in one turn. Anyone would feel great with that!

At this point, Faceless One had no more hand traps left and could no longer block the effects of Gree or Divine Stele Fountain. He could only watch helplessly as Leyou's hand instantly increased from 1 to 5 cards, his face turning green with frustration.

"Now, it's time to begin the real Synchro Summoning!"

"I will synchronize my LV1 tuner and LV4 non-tuner!"

"The wisdom of the future will ignite our path forward! Let it shine upon our future!"

"Summon Synchro Summon! Come on! LV5 [Tech-type Super Librarian]!"

A noble and powerful restriction card appeared at this moment, and the Faceless One's brow twitched again upon seeing this monster.

This monster is incredibly powerful. In terms of effects, it has the strong ability to draw 1 every time it is used in a Synchro Summon. In other aspects, it also has the legendary class of Librarian. No matter how you look at it, Librarian is practically invincible.