Who Let Him Play Yu-Gi-Oh!-Chapter 77: Number One

"I lost."

Alexis let out a breath.

She felt a bit defeated, but she could accept it. Her opponent had the upper hand in traps, disruption, and field control.

She was convinced, with nothing to complain about.

"You win," Alexis stood and said, "But I won't give up. I'll work to get stronger over the next three years and challenge you again."

Kira almost wanted to say, "Sure, let's play for double credits next time, thanks for your business." But the atmosphere wasn't right, so he saved it for later.

Easily earning ten more credits, he thought he wouldn't mind more duels like this.

At this point, student council member Nakamura cautiously approached: "Um... so, Kira, who do you want to vote for?"

Kira suddenly remembered: Oh right, this duel was supposed to be for the election, not his credits.

He didn't care who to vote for, but Alexis spoke up first: "Vote for Seika-sempai. She needs the vote more than I do."

"Don't joke around," Seika, standing outside with her arms crossed, looked away with an awkward expression, "After that duel, the rest of the votes don't matter."

Alexis: "?"

Seika turned and waved her hand: "Whatever, I'll just withdraw."

The unexpected turn left Alexis a bit stunned. She hesitated, "But I want to be recognized as a duelist, not as..."

Seika paused, then glared at her: "Idiot, why do you think I'm withdrawing?" frёewebnoѵel.ƈo๓

"Huh?"

"This is Duel Academy. Every title must be earned through dueling. That's why... I lost to you."

Alexis was speechless.

When she turned to look for the opponent who had taught her this lesson, Kira was already gone.

It seemed he only cared about dueling itself, not any of the aftermath or results.

Alexis: "..."

Maybe... he's a pure duelist too.

Meanwhile, no one noticed that in the crowd, a Slifer Red with jellyfish hair was looking around with a duel disk: "Huh? Has anyone seen Kira? I want to duel him!"

Elsewhere, Seika, who had withdrawn from the election, secretly took out her student terminal in a corner and cast a vote for Alexis Rhodes.

She looked satisfied.

So that's what it means to turn from black to fan.

"..."

Kira, pushing through the crowd, happily counted his newly earned credits as he checked the academy's card inventory for new arrivals.

He immediately spotted a newly restocked card:

Chaos Sorcerer!

He'd wanted this card since before the entrance exam, but the only copy had been bought. Now, it was finally available again.

Of course, Kira reserved it right away.

With Black Luster Soldier and Chaos Sorcerer, he could finally build the world-champion deck he'd planned.

The Chaos archetype won three consecutive world championships—an absolute powerhouse. Kira couldn't remember every detail, but he knew the core strategy and would adapt with his available cards.

He still needed a few pieces, but nothing too rare. He had enough money and credits to buy them from the academy shop.

As he walked, someone addressed him: "Hey, Number One."

He paused and looked up—it was Bastion Misawa from Ra Yellow Dorm.

"That was an awesome duel. As expected of Number One," Bastion greeted him. "The exchange matches have lasted a week, and only we're undefeated."

"You're strong too," Kira replied, then asked, "So, do you want to duel?"

He was already thinking of betting more credits.

But Bastion shook his head: "Not yet. We're not matched up yet, and I'm not ready. When I duel you, I want to use my strongest deck—one that blends my blood and soul. It's not finished yet."

Kira raised an eyebrow. That reminded him: Bastion Misawa was also a counter-strategy player.

In the original story, when he fought Chazz, he realized his opponent used FIRE monsters, so he pulled out a WATER deck from his Six Attributes collection. Its ace, Water Dragon, reduced all FIRE monsters' ATK to zero, utterly crushing Chazz.

Against Jaden, he concluded that HERO decks were weak without Fusion, so he printed "Cursed Seal of the Forbidden Spell" to ban Fusion, shutting Jaden down for the whole duel.

Kira realized: this guy was a counterplay specialist like me.

So, the "strongest deck designed to beat me" Bastion mentioned must be...

"Don't worry, Number One. It'll be soon," Bastion smiled confidently. "You know the first-year entrance test is coming up, right?"

Entrance test?

Kira quickly realized: this was the practical test from episode 4. New students are matched against others in their dorm with similar rankings.

But in the original, Professor Crowler rigged it, pairing Jaden with Obelisk Blue's top, Chazz Princeton, for a dramatic match.

Of course, Chazz got destroyed.

But if there's no rigging, it's based on internal dorm ranking...

"Right, so we'll probably be matched up," Bastion smiled, "I heard there's a lot of credit for winning, so I won't hold back.

Let me see what the Number One can do."

Kira didn't hear much else—he only heard "tons of credits".

He thought it was just a routine test.

But now, it looked like he had to win!