Jamie sat behind the counter of his card shop, waiting for customers to arrive.
Over the past few days, he had combined the money provided by the System with the profits from selling some of the rarer cards he had taken from Weevil and used it to acquire the shop itself.
His memories of the original story were somewhat hazy, but he vaguely recalled that an important event was supposed to happen in a card shop around this point in the timeline.
Even if that event never occurred here, buying the place was hardly a waste.
At the very least, it gave him somewhere temporary to live.
More importantly, every card inside a card shop was a potential resource.
Jamie had also spent the past few days experimenting with the special mode the System had mentioned.
The concept was simple.
Before a Duel began, the System randomly selected one Deck from its enormous archive.
Jamie would then use that Deck for the Duel, and if he won, every card included in the selected Deck would become available for him to unlock.
There was one condition: his opponent needed to be considered roughly equal to him.
How the System determined what counted as “equal” was something Jamie could not begin to guess.
The entire feature was essentially a Duel Chronicle roulette.
Everything depended on luck.
Jamie had asked the System about using future summoning mechanics in the current era.
Since Synchro particles had not yet been activated, the Overlay Network required for Xyz Summoning did not yet exist, and the necessary conditions for the other later mechanics were similarly absent, the world’s normal Dueling environment currently supported only Fusion and Ritual Summoning.
When Jamie used the special mode against random Duelists, he had occasionally been assigned Decks whose Extra Decks were packed with Synchro, Xyz, Pendulum, and Link Monsters.
Unfortunately, the conditions of the era made them impossible to Summon normally.
The System was still a System, however.
Because Jamie’s Duel Disk served as its physical carrier, it could independently create the conditions necessary for those later summoning methods—but only when manifesting the Duel Monster spirits themselves outside an actual Duel.
In other words, after a Duel ended, Jamie could theoretically call out powerful Synchro, Xyz, Pendulum, or Link Monsters and have a thrilling real-life brawl with somebody.
During an actual Duel, however, he still had to obey the era’s limitations.
That was fair enough.
Jamie already possessed an overwhelming advantage simply by understanding future strategies and having access to cards from later generations.
Using powerful Extra Deck monsters that his opponents could not even conceptually answer would feel downright unsporting.
If Jamie opened with ten minutes of combo lines, built a field with more than ten thousand total ATK and two or three negates, then watched his bewildered opponent Set one monster and pass, there would be no collision of souls and certainly no stage worth watching.
The Decks chosen by the special mode were wildly unpredictable.
Jamie had even nearly lost once after being assigned a strategy that depended heavily on its Extra Deck, only to discover that nearly every monster he needed was impossible to Summon under the current world’s conditions.
Fortunately, he had top-decked an absurdly strong low-Level monster at exactly the right moment, stabilizing the Duel and preventing his first loss from being handed to some random passerby.
In fact, after randomly receiving ten janky Decks in a row and somehow winning with every single one, Jamie unlocked another achievement.
[Achievement Unlocked: Jank Players Don’t Die from Bricking!] [When using a jank Deck, consistency is increased.] Jamie looked over his Deck list.
Including the two Decks he had brought from his original world, the System had classified more than ten of his current Decks as “jank.” He did not know whether to laugh or feel insulted.
Jamie would have loved nothing more than to randomly pull one genuinely powerful, respectable competitive Deck and steamroll everyone with it.
Unfortunately, the roulette simply refused to cooperate.
His natural laziness had returned in force today, and Jamie could not bring himself to wander around Domino City hunting random Duelists.
Instead, he sat alone behind the counter, repeatedly shuffling the cards in his hands until they produced a steady series of crisp snaps.
Kuribohrn had become terrified of this habit over the past few days.
At the rate Jamie kept petting and rubbing it, the poor creature was going to lose its white fur.
The clear chime of the shop’s doorbell finally snapped Jamie out of his boredom.
He straightened up and looked toward the entrance.
No customer was visible.
Jamie stared for a moment before lowering his gaze.
A small hand was raised enthusiastically above the counter.
“Mister, can you teach me how to play Duel Monsters?” The little boy had jellyfish-shaped hair and a cheerful smile, while his huge eyes were practically shining with anticipation.
“You’re Ju—” Jamie caught himself before the name escaped.
“What’s your name, kid?” “I’m Jaden Yuki!” The moment Jaden introduced himself, another figure appeared behind him from a perspective ordinary people could not perceive.
The spirit was androgynous and demonic in appearance.
Its eyes were filled with affection.
And possessiveness.
Jamie had not even had a chance to speak before the spirit glared viciously at him.
At the exact moment it focused its hostility on Jamie, another bizarre spirit appeared behind him.
Calling it an entire Duel Monster spirit would have been generous.
It looked more like the phantom image of a single body part belonging to something much larger.
The only clearly visible feature on it was a skull.
The instant this strange presence appeared, the spirit behind Jaden changed completely.
Until then, ninety-nine percent of its attention had been devoted to Jaden, with the remaining one percent directed toward discouraging Jamie from getting too close.
Now every trace of its attention snapped toward the apparition behind Jamie.
Its posture became tense.
Wary.
As though confronted by a genuine threat.
“What’s wrong, Yubel?” Sensing that something was strange, Jaden turned around.
For an instant, an unusual light flashed through his eyes before they returned to normal.
“Oh!
I get it!” He turned back to Jamie excitedly.
“Mister, you can see my Yubel, can’t you?” “Yeah.
I can.” As Jamie answered, Yubel silently withdrew as though nothing had happened.
The strange spirit behind Jamie disappeared back into his Deck as well, replaced once more by the harmless and adorable Kuribohrn.
For the young Jaden, meeting someone else who could see Duel Monster spirits was far too exciting to ignore.
He immediately forgot why he had entered the shop in the first place and launched into an enthusiastic conversation with Jamie.
He talked until his mouth was dry.
Only then did Jaden finally remember his original purpose.
“You want me to teach you how to Duel?” Jamie scratched his head.
“That might actually be harder than it sounds.” Jamie had no idea how he had managed to run into Jaden Yuki this early, nor was he entirely sure what he was supposed to teach the future protagonist of GX.
Should he teach Jaden how to burn five cards from his opening hand just to make one monster?
Or perhaps he should teach him the timeless strategy of Water Enchantress of the Temple into Fateful Adventure, searching Wandering Gryphon Rider and Dracoback, the Rideable Dragon, then calmly passing behind the Adventurer engine.
What?
Teach him HEROes?
Be realistic.
Fusion Destiny had already been banned!
By the time Fusion Destiny came back, Destroyer Phoenix Enforcer would probably be the one getting thrown onto the Forbidden List instead.
Jamie thought about it for quite a while and still could not come up with much worth teaching Jaden in this era, other than the basic principle that turning five cards into one monster was usually a terrible idea.
Unfortunately, Jaden interpreted Jamie’s thoughtful silence very differently.
“What’s wrong?” the boy asked anxiously.
“I’ll work really hard!
I promise I’ll study properly!
I want to become like you, Mister—a hero who beats the bad guys!” Jamie stared at him.
“Me?
A hero?” He sounded genuinely baffled.
As far as Jamie was concerned, there were plenty of situations where he was probably closer to the villain.
“Weevil Underwood is a bad guy!” Jaden insisted.
“He’s taken rare cards from lots of Duelists around here before.
Everyone who lost their cards looked so sad.
I didn’t want to see them crying, but I wasn’t strong enough to beat him.” Perhaps it was only fitting for the boy who would one day bear the title of the Supreme King, but even at his young age, the determination and stubbornness on Jaden’s face did not look childish in the slightest.
Jamie studied him for a moment before smiling.
“If that’s what you want to become, then I think there are a few things I can teach you.” He exhaled softly.
“But before that, I’ve got something for you.” Jamie reached into one of the Decks registered with his System and pulled out a card.
He held it toward the young Jaden.
“This little guy seems pretty determined to go with you.”