Duels should be played with a smile.

"Oh dear~" Philvo suddenly exclaimed, her startled appearance completely unlike her usual self, more like a snow woman causing trouble.

I don't know when she learned it from the Snow Woman, or... maybe she already knew these skills?

As the controller of the virtual world, she can freely view countless data streams, which, by all accounts, could be considered "having watched countless films"?

Filford's exclamation sounded somewhat unpleasant and strange to Y.

Immediately afterwards, Y saw the librarian on his field suddenly disappear.

In its place is the turtle that just left.

"I'm so sorry~ My hand slipped just now. The turtle just came back from the sea, and I accidentally missed it, so it ran to you again."

"What should I do now? The Beast King has already worked today, and I can't go against its wishes and make it work overtime."

"Why don't we just let the turtle stay with you a little longer? It'll still have 2200 attack points after all~"

Just moments ago, Y had five monsters on the field, but after Turtle ate three times and Galaxy Eyes exploded twice, only the lone Super Thunder Dragon remained, along with Turtle, who was sitting next to Super Thunder Dragon with its full belly, comfortably closing its eyes to rest.

The turtle wasn't behaving itself today, and every now and then it would stretch out its little paws to poke the super-snake dragon next to it.

Faced with the infamous turtle, Super Thunder Dragon dared not make any big moves and could only pretend nothing was happening, letting the turtle poke and stab it here and there.

Just looking at it evokes a sense of melancholy.

You could even imagine replacing Y's black hood with a green one?

Simply changing the color is no big deal.

"Looks like I've run out of things to do, so let's just end this round. It's your turn now, and I'm really looking forward to your performance!"

Snowflake's deck lacks backrow cards other than Snowflake's Light, and Philvo naturally has no cards he can set.

However, after consuming two waves of the opponent's resources, even though the monsters on Philvo's field weren't particularly strong, they weren't something that the Destruction Sword could easily overcome.

After the round ended, the initiative returned to Y, but Y no longer had the same confident demeanor as before.

It was very quiet.

If I had to describe it in one suitable word... it would probably be "Busan Library"?

"My turn, draw a card."

With brief sentences and a bland tone, Y seemed unusually quiet at this moment.

"I..."

"Don't rush," Philvo interrupted.

"Preparation phase, activate Kaguya's effect, and launch your Super Thunder Dragon!"

Regardless of whether there is a ban list, only one copy of the Super Thunder Dragon is usually included in the deck. With Kaguya's super strong speed effect, Y's Extra Deck doesn't have a second Super Thunder Dragon to send to the Graveyard, so he can only watch as the Super Thunder Dragon on his field disappears in the blink of an eye.

There were five monsters standing neatly together just a moment ago, but now there's only one lonely sea turtle left.

Moreover, that turtle monster seemed to be mocking him for being like a clown.

"This duel... I've really become a clown," Y sighed softly.

Upon hearing this, Philwar smiled, his playful demeanor vanishing completely, and he reverted to his previous intellectual self.

"It seems you have some self-awareness."

"As a duelist, you may not know your opponent's deck, but you must be extremely familiar with your own deck... So in my opinion, self-awareness is an essential quality for a duelist."

"I can't believe you can say something like that." Philvo glanced at him slightly. Why did the other person suddenly become philosophical just because he wasn't happy?

Is the next step to start working on Yu Yu?

"Hurry up and proceed with your turn. You have an incredibly powerful monster on the field with an attack power of 2200. You can launch a powerful attack now."

"Or perhaps, it can serve as a form of entertainment after a tense and exciting scene?"

While processing data recently, Fairwoy stumbled upon an interesting piece of work, and after reading it, she gained some new insights into the word "leisure."

"Just for fun?" Y said softly, as if mocking himself. "You're right, the Destruction Sword is really only 'for fun' compared to your Kaguya Kaibun."

"I don't know what came over me that made me think of using the Destruction Sword as a countermeasure, and embarrassingly, it didn't even work..."

"so..."

"So what?" Philvo sensed something was wrong and immediately became alert, lest Y, who was already in a hopeless situation, do something bad.

"So... I'm not going to continue this duel and humiliate myself!"

No one knows what Y did, but a powerful data storm spread outwards from Y in all directions.

Data storms differ from ordinary storms in the real world. In the virtual world, in addition to possessing the characteristics of ordinary storms, things caught in them are also eroded by the chaotic data within the storm.

The moment the storm erupted, Philvo, who was prepared, transformed back into his original form and used his authority and power to forcibly stabilize the surrounding data stream—the storm came suddenly, but its power seemed to be very limited.

only...

"Goodbye~ I've achieved my goal of stalling for time to some extent. Next time I see you, I'll be really going to give you a piece of my mind!"

"Want to run?!"

Philvo instantly realized Y's intention. At this moment, she discovered that the monsters summoned during the duel had all been transformed back into cards and returned to the deck under the impact of the data storm.

"I really think that your intelligence work has not been done well."

The enemy had already declared their intention to flee, but Philvo did not immediately begin to stop them. Instead, the pure white color of her body gradually transformed into a jade-like color with a shimmering glow.

"Using a deck that even dogs wouldn't play to counter Hui Huai's strategy, sending a guy with such a personality to influence my judgment, and then using Data Storm as cover in front of me... I can take all of this as your mistakes. After all, sometimes you really have to admit that the enemy's IQ is that low, otherwise many things can't be explained."

After Fairworth's wings were also dyed crimson, the data storm that had just been unleashed quietly subsided.

The enemy, who had already declared his intention to flee, did not escape as smoothly as he had expected.

"But I just can't understand... why do you have the audacity to attack me in the virtual world, on my own turf?"

"Who gave you the courage? Was it the [Flag of Courage]? It increased your attack power by 200, and you've gotten cocky?"

Y, praised by Philvo for his immense courage, had a face full of terror beneath his black mask—he had never intended to risk his life to complete the mission; from the very beginning, he had planned to run away if things went wrong.

He didn't even engage in a dark duel, just to have a backup plan for himself.

Now, he watched helplessly as his escape route vanished without a trace.

"Don't be afraid." Philvo transformed back into human form, manipulating the cage formed by the data stream to bring Y to his front.

"I'm very gentle... Hmm, I feel like I've said that to him before, but I can't quite remember when..."

"Forget it, it's not important. I just want to see which disgusting guy made you look like him to disgust me... As for you, you counterfeit, you should just go back to your proper self!"

He clenched his fist at the data cage that trapped Y, and the cage instantly collapsed inward, squeezing out the things inside.

Under Philvo's control, there were no bloody scenes inside. When the cage was removed, there was only an ordinary card.

【Demon King of the Swamp】

"Heh...that's interesting."

"But unfortunately, they stepped on my landmine."

"Don't blame me for being unreasonable now... Women, being unreasonable should be forgivable, right?"

Anyway, he will forgive me.

With a wave of his hand, Philvo easily opened a portal to the Synchro Dimension. Stepping inside, his figure disappeared on the other side of the door.

A moment later, the portal disappeared, transforming into several specially processed streams of data that flowed in several different directions.

Chapter Fifty: Friends

"This is..."

A somewhat ambiguous yet strangely familiar message was anonymously sent to him, and Judai fell into deep thought in the waiting area.

After experiencing some twists and turns recently, Jaden finally investigated and cleared up all the anomalies in the surrounding area. After handing over the work with the people sent by the Super Magician, he finally decided to go back to the academy first.

Thinking back to his previous plan to travel across the fused dimensions on foot, Jaden felt helpless. Faced with the current strange occurrences, his plan had to be temporarily shelved.

"The plane bound for Fusion Academy is about to take off. Passengers, please..."

The boarding announcement came over the loudspeaker. Jaden rubbed his temples, put away his Duel Disk, picked up his backpack, and headed towards the boarding gate.

The contents of this news are quite concerning; we must investigate it thoroughly once we return to the academy.

In the waiting area on the other side, Caesar, who had also heard the announcement, looked around and, not seeing any familiar faces, leisurely stood up and walked toward the boarding gate.

He was quite carefree; he had already checked in his luggage beforehand, so he only needed to bring his Duel Disk.

Recalling his duel with that somewhat eccentric woman, Caesar suddenly heard a series of rapid footsteps behind him.

"Ha-ha-hoo-finally, I made it."

Some familiar voices came from behind him. Caesar frowned slightly and turned around.

"Asuka?"

"Huh?!"

Her long, flowing hair and unique color were just as Caesar remembered. If it weren't for the fact that the woman in front of him was wearing a trench coat that Asuka wouldn't have worn in the first place, Caesar wouldn't have used a questioning tone.

"Caesar?" Asuka looked up, equally surprised, at the familiar face standing not far in front of her.

"Aren't you in the Hyperdimension?"

"I came back after finishing my cultivation for a while."

The waiting area wasn't exactly a suitable place to talk, especially since the two of them were standing at the entrance of the passageway. After catching their breath, Asuka nodded slightly to Caesar, suppressing her doubts for the time being, and the two of them walked side by side toward the boarding passageway.

During this period, due to the impact of the dimensional storm, not only has the number of flights decreased significantly, but many people, out of a "just in case" mentality, will generally not fly unless they have no other choice.

Asuka and Caesar both booked first class. With many seats available, they showed their academy ID badges to the flight attendants and were moved to sit together. Both of them had taught at the academy for a period of time after graduation, and the special status of the Fusion Academy made their academy ID badges more useful than many other passes.

Sitting on the smooth plane, the two recounted their experiences over the past period, and both were filled with emotion.

"I never imagined you'd go through so much since I left..."

Once again, he entered the legendary lost ritual rift, and once again met the legendary duelist of the past. As Caesar listened to Asuka's story, he also truly felt the changes that had taken place in his old friend.

Compared to her past self, who was somewhat insecure due to setbacks, Asuka now possesses an incredibly determined gaze.

Perhaps this is the change that "mission" or "responsibility" can bring to people.