The Academy's main building was a cathedral for order, glass and steel stacked into geometry so neat it almost hummed. Every hallway echoed like it was proud of itself. Even the sunlight came in on schedule, sharp through the upper windows and perfectly aligned to the hour.
Julian liked it that way. The place promised sense, logic, and quiet. All the things that had defined his first week, at least before Sunday night leaving him with a dozen new roommates that didn't technically exist.
This morning, quiet had apparently been outlawed.
He sat in the middle rows of the tiered lecture hall, notebook open, pen angled just right. The math professor: a thin, angular man with a voice like ticking glass was already at the board, writing formulas about deck probabilities.
"If you have your deck lists this will make more sense." he said, "If you don't, copy quickly, so we can start the explanation."
The whiteboard marker hissed loudly as numbers formed. Julian took a breath… and then someone giggled right next to his ear.
"Draw two! Draw two!"
He didn't flinch. He had learned not to flinch.
"Not now." he murmured.
A breeze brushed the back of his neck: Petit Dragon, trying to peek at his notebook again. "Write faster!" it chirped.
"I'm writing as fast as I… please don't blow on the paper."
"Blow?" Petit Dragon repeated, clearly testing the word, and did exactly that: a puff of warm air that moves a few pages, causing a mistake in the writing.
Julian shut his eyes. 'Structure.' He told himself. 'Logic. Patience.'
The professor's marker clicked again. "Expected value of drawing both starters for a two-card combo, forty-card deck, five-card opening. No searches, no mulligans. Mr. Misawa, walk us through it."
Bastion, up front, pressed a few keys on his calculator without even looking up. "Assuming the player drew a sixth for its turn and one copy of each combo piece, you're at 1,92%." he said calmly. "Two copies of each, 6,9%. Three of each, 13,9%." He stopped typing. "Same deck, same hand size. Multiplicity is everything."
"Excellent." the professor said. "Assumptions first, answers second. And he was correct to assume a sixth card for the turn draw. Remember that, class. Good sense will get you far."
Julian underlined the figures neatly and wrote good sense in the margin, only to feel his pencil twitch as a small invisible hand tried to take it.
"Mokey!" squeaked Mokey Mokey.
"No." Julian whispered.
"Mokey!" Mokey Mokey replied, tugging harder.
He pressed his palm over the pencil. "We can share when I'm done."
A muffled "Mokey…" sounded like a pout.
Two rows over, Jaden was watching with open amusement, chin in hand. He caught Julian's eye, eyebrows lifted in the kind of sympathy that said been there. Julian mouthed. "Don't laugh." Jaden's grin widened anyway.
And then the spirits noticed him.
Half the tiny cluster around Julian's desk turned midair, suddenly aware of the other boy: a familiar brightness like gravity to them. Several zipped across the aisle in little streaks of light. Jaden's duel disk, hanging loosely on the side of his chair, flickered once in greeting.
Julian froze. Jaden didn't.
"Hey, guys." Jaden said under his breath, as if greeting actual children. "Inside voices, remember?"
The air around him quieted like a wave flattening. The few that had drifted over landed on his desk, or floated lazily in circles. He gave one a patient look when it tried to sit on his pen. "No hitchhiking during equations."
The professor turned, oblivious. "All right, if each card in your hand is drawn independently…"
"Independently..." whispered a little echo near Julian's notebook, imitating the tone perfectly. Another voice giggled. A third tried to pronounce it and failed spectacularly.
Julian covered his mouth to hide a smile.
Jaden leaned back in his chair and gestured slightly with one hand, palm down, the way someone might calm a startled animal. The spirits obeyed, their erratic movement smoothing into soft glides. He didn't force it. just radiated a kind of unthinking steadiness. The room seemed to take the cue.
Julian couldn't decide whether to be impressed or jealous. Probably both.
The class moved on. Numbers multiplied, examples sprawled, but the air around him stayed busy. Spirits darted between desks, too curious for their own good. Happy Lover tried to mirror the marker strokes on Julian's notebook margin with glowing fingertips that left no mark. Soul Tiger crouched on the corner of the desk like it was ready to pounce on bad math. Every time the professor said "combination," half of them repeated it like a game.
Julian did his best to keep his focus narrow: pen to paper, ear to logic. And still, every now and then, he caught a glimpse of something bright skimming across the edge of his vision.
He turned a page. The top corner was already bent, courtesy of Petit Dragon's enthusiasm. He pressed it flat and kept writing. The glare from the overhead lights hit the whiteboard just wrong, bouncing straight into his eyes. He blinked, and for a heartbeat the lines at the board looked like they were floating: not on the surface, but in the air itself.
Too much light, he thought. Not enough sleep. The ache behind his eyes pulsed once, dull and brief. He rubbed the bridge of his nose and felt the faintest hum there, like the kind of fatigue that came from staring at a screen too long.
Bastion answered another question from the front row. Syrus took notes in handwriting shaped like panic. Jaden, still half-turned in his chair, seemed to be having a quiet conversation with something hovering near his ear. He nodded once, said "Later, okay?" and the air around him relaxed again.
Julian watched that with quiet envy. He knew about Jaden's abilities before ever meeting him, the anime and manga did a good job at that: the boy who dueled like breathing, who had some strange connection to Duel Monster spirits. Seeing it in real time, though, was something else entirely. It wasn't mystical. It was casual. Natural.
Julian's connection felt like standing in the middle of a playground at recess. Jaden looked like being part of the game.
"Mr. Ashford?"
The professor's voice cut through his thoughts.
Julian straightened. "Yes, sir?"
"You look like you're trying to calculate the shape of the ceiling. Keep the focus here, please."
"Yes, sir."
He forced himself back into the rhythm of note-taking. The spirits whispered among themselves in faint and musical background noise now. Maybe Jaden's example had worked indirectly, some sort of borrowed calm spreading across them. For the next few minutes, everything almost made sense.
When the bell rang, it sounded like salvation. Julian exhaled, closing his notebook. Pens, papers, and duel disks snapped shut all around him as students stood and stretched. The room swelled with conversation: normal voices, physical laughter, footsteps on tile.
He waited for it to thin out before packing his things. The spirits had already regrouped around him, their excitement renewed by freedom.
"Lunch time!" cried one.
"No, play first!" insisted another.
"Lunch then play!" said a third, and everyone agreed by cheering at once.
Julian pressed a hand over his ear and laughed softly. "All right, all right guys. But quietly, please."
They quieted. Mostly.
"Lunch!" came one last whisper.
He let it slide.
As he stepped into the corridor, Jaden caught up beside him, walking backward as usual, a grin waiting. "Man, I thought you were gonna snap in there." he said. "You've got the full fan club now."
"I noticed." Julian said dryly. "Do they usually… narrate everything?"
"Only when they're happy." Jaden said, as if that explained everything. "They like being around people who can hear 'em. Seems kind of rare around here."
Julian adjusted the strap of his bag. "Well, lucky me."
"Hey, they mean well." Jaden shrugged. "They just don't get classroom etiquette. Takes a while to teach 'em."
Julian arched an eyebrow. "So you've done this before."
"Since I was a kid." Jaden said simply. "You don't fight the noise, you guide it. Like dueling with music instead of against it."
"Guide it."
"Yeah. Doesn't mean you'll get it right away." Jaden said, turning forward again. "They're learning with you, too."
Julian looked past him down the hall, where sunlight spilled through glass and made everything shimmer faintly. For a moment, it was easy to believe the brightness belonged to something alive.
"Guide it." he repeated under his breath, smiling briefly before adjusting his backpack to continue to the cafeteria.
His head still throbbed a little from the lights and the chatter and the energy of too many presences crammed into one space, but it felt… ordinary. Like a tension headache earned the usual way: sleep deprivation and stress. Nothing worth worrying about.
As they reached the stairwell, one of the smaller spirits zipped ahead and circled near the railing, humming like a gnat. Jaden waved it back toward Julian's shoulder.
"You see?" he said. "They just need a hand sometimes."
Julian nodded. The ache behind his eyes flared once, brief as a flashbulb, then faded. "Sometimes we all do."
The two of them stepped out into the sunlight that led toward the cafeteria, the noise of students spilling into open air. The spirits followed like lazy sparks, content to hover at a respectful distance now, at least until the next class. For now, peace held. Or something close enough to pass for it.
The cafeteria took sound apart and put it back together wrong. Chairs scraped louder than they should, trays struck notes that didn't belong to food, and the ceiling fan made a dull, heroic effort to keep the air in one piece. The room surprised you with smells: steam, salt from the open windows, and something tomato-red that had given up pretending it wasn't industrial.
Julian stepped into the doorway and felt his entourage of small, bright presences draft with him like birds finding the slipstream. They fanned out in excited wedges, then folded back around his shoulders, arguing about lunch with the unembarrassed confidence of toddlers.
"Round little cups!" a voice announced, ecstatic.
"Not round enough." another corrected, as though geometry had feelings.
"Bread." a pair decided reverently, naming the shape of the rolls as if it were a star they recognized.
"Let's keep the volume friendly, guys." Julian murmured. "We're sharing space."
The voices softened by degrees, obedient not to the words but to the weight on them. He matched his tone to what he meant: not a lock, a door half-closed so it wouldn't slam.
Jaden sidled up beside him with a tray already balanced like a trick. "You're getting good at that." he said, low, grin tucked in the side of his mouth. "They're listening to you now."
"They're trying." Julian said. "I'm trying too."
"That's how it works." Jaden said. "These ones are young." He tipped his chin toward the air, casual, careful not to turn the sentence into a revelation. "Think… kindergarten. They like to be near. Doesn't mean they have to be on you."
"Near is manageable." Julian commented. "On is impossible."
"You don't have to contain everything." Jaden added, quietly enough that only Julian would catch it. "Just give it somewhere to go."
"Direct their energy, not limit it." Julian said, testing the shape of the idea.
"Pretty much."
Syrus caught them in the line, tray steady with both hands. "Please tell me the red stuff isn't as dangerous as last week's curry."
"Define dangerous." Jaden said.
"Flammable." Syrus said.
Bastion materialized on Julian's other side with the air of someone who had already measured the line's rate of advance and accepted his fate. "The curry was an outlier." he said. "We'll be fine."
"With that tone?" Jaden said. "You do not sound fine."
"I am fine." Bastion replied. "Glad we don't have curry anymore, it was enough at the dormitory."
Julian agreed with his head, complementing the other yellow. "Prof. Sartyr is a good man, but he's obsessed with his curries. They are good, but eating the same thing almost every night sucks, no matter how well made it is."
They shuffled forward. The servers had the patience of saints and the speed of people who knew adolescents turned into bottlenecks if you gave them time. Julian took rice, vegetables, the chicken with sauce that made a good case for itself, and the pudding that had been the subject of three whispered petitions from the moment he walked in. He set the small cup on the tray where the light could cat's-eye off the plastic lid and satisfy everyone aesthetically.
"Pudding!" one voice sighed, purely decorative.
"It's yours, just wait until we're alone." Julian said, amused. "We don't wanna gather unnecessary attention."
"Un-nece-ssary" another small voice repeated, willing the word to fit in its mouth.
"Very good." Julian said, gentle. "Let me eat first, then you can play a bit later."
Jaden glanced over, pleased. "That's the dad's voice…" he said. "Good use."
"I don't have a dad voice." Julian said.
"Buddy…" Jaden said, "you have a dad aura. Mr. Right and Wrong way to do things."
They found an empty table near the window, the kind that pretended it was quieter because the sea took some of the sound away. The horizon cut a clean line past the glass. Hologram towers blinked in tired test patterns along the practice fields, and the wind carried salt in like a promise that the day still belonged to the island.
Julian set down his tray and felt the small presences choose edges: the harmless rim of his water cup, the safe margin of his tray, the warm strip of sunlight on the table. One perched near his pudding and peered, all curiosity and no intent.
"Look, not touch." Julian said, soft enough to not enforce the rule too harshly. "This part is just for me. You guys can go outside and play in the park if you want."
The little thing bobbed once, content. No sulking. No argument. The acquiescence was immediate and oddly proud, as if it liked the trust in being told where rather than no. Someone, something… eased the air a fraction. Relinquished, still and high behind them, drawing a wider circle so the small ones could be close without crowding.
Jaden slid into the seat across, already mixing items on his tray into one dish he alone would recognize. Syrus, careful as ever, folded his napkin with surgical precision before touching the food. Bastion arranged his cutlery like coordinates.
They had barely started eating when Jaden lifted his chin toward the far door. "Heads up." he said, cheerful. "Slifer at six o'clock."
Chumley appeared, tray in hands, like someone who had walked straight out of a quiet room into weather he'd forgotten existed. His jacket hung a little loose. He looked at the corners first, searching for a place that wouldn't ask him to prove it.
"Chumley!" Jaden called, as if the cafeteria might fail to notice him without help. "Roommate privilege. Sit here."
Chumley made it to the table with a small exhale, the kind that saves energy and hope both. "Thanks." he said, setting his tray beside Syrus's. "I got in the other line first by mistake."
"Well, it's not like they would have let you get two trays." Bastion said. "Your registration ID only allows one meal per student."
Chumley blinked. "It would be beautiful if we could. I don't know about several other plates, but I could do with a couple more cups of pudding."
"So do I, buddy. So do I." Jaden said.
Introductions took all of the next minutes: He knew the boy's identity behind the screen, but theoretically he was a new presence. Jaden and Syrus' roommate, failed his freshmen year studies last semester. Obsessed with Koalas, Kangoroo's and things like that. Julian gave him a polite nod, Bastion's eyes in full evaluation mode for a bit, and then they just fell into the ordinary arrangement of a shared meal.
It took about thirty seconds for the spirits to notice Chumley properly. They drifted toward him and then… slowed. Not stopped. Just… matched. The small lights that had been skittering along the edge of Julian's tray changed gait without being asked, catching the frequency of Chumley's presence: grounded, patient, the kind of slow that leaves space in it for other people to breathe. They hovered near his shoulder as if discovering a handrail they hadn't known they needed.
Julian watched it happen and felt his own shoulders go down a degree. "He's… good for them." he murmured, more to himself than anyone.
Jaden's eyes flicked up; he'd already clocked it. "Babysitter energy." he said. "The calm kind. He doesn't pull. He…" Jaden rotated his hand, searching for the right verb. "He offers. They know when they're safe to explore."
Syrus heard the shape of the sentence, not the hidden freight. "Chumley offers what?"
"Silence." Jaden said lightly, pointing with his fork at Chumley's tray. "And half of that roll if we're negotiating."
Chumley nudged the roll across without comment, then, almost as an afterthought, pulled a small, battered sketchbook from his jacket pocket and set it at the edge of his tray. He didn't open it. He didn't announce it. He just kept eating with that slow methodical speed that made time feel less expensive.
"Drawing?" Julian said, half a guess, half a memory from the way Chumley had held the notebook.
Chumley's mouth twitched. "Yeah. When the day won't sit still."
Syrus leaned, trying to see. "What do you draw?"
"Lines, mostly."
"Lines of… what?" Bastion inquired.
Chumley flipped the book open with two fingers. The pencil studies weren't pretty in the way people usually meant; they were alive in a way paper rarely forgave. The Dark Magician leaned forward out of the page in a stance that was motion, not pose, cloak weight dragging the air behind it as if it had mass. A Kuriboh napped under a duel disk like a small dog under a chair, one eye open in a trickster's version of vigilance. A Spell Counter floated like a lantern with nowhere to land yet.
Jaden whistled. "You did that?"
Chumley shrugged, embarrassed. "I don't have a camera brain. I have a… movement brain? I draw the way it feels, then I erase until it looks like the feeling."
Julian was aware of two separate responses: his own genuine admiration, and a delighted stir from the small presences who recognized themselves in the graphite. They gathered to look and, for once, didn't interrupt. The Dark Magician's trailing lines suggested a pivot of weight, the spirits seemed to lean with it. Kuriboh's nap drew them into silence.
"You caught the rhythm of something that's supposed to be alive." Julian said, surprised into honesty. "Not just shape."
Chumley shook his head. "It's practice. I mess up the hands eight times and then the ninth remembers it's attached to an arm."
"Hands are hard." Jaden said, very wise. "At least from what I heard."
"Everything's hard." Bastion said, and then, because he couldn't help himself. "But yeah, hands are harder."
Syrus, who loved anyone good at anything, beamed. "You should, like, actually do something with this."
"Like finish lunch?" Chumley asked.
"Like… more than lunch." Syrus said, undeterred.
"These look like they could step off the page." Chumley glanced at Julian, as if to check whether that was a joke or a warning. Julian held his eyes and said, careful. "That's a compliment."
Chumley nodded once and closed the book, not protectively, just kindly. He tucked it back near his tray where the small lights could still see the edge of it if they wanted to remember.
Jaden wiped his mouth with a napkin that did its best, then leaned on his elbows. "Okay, field trip after this. Bastion, you said you wanted to test?"
Bastion sat up straight; his posture always adjusted to verbs. "I would like to run two controlled shells. We need data. I propose we…"
Julian cleared his throat lightly. He hadn't brought the six-deck plan to them yet, not because it was a secret, but because it had still been a seed the night before. "I've been building some lists." he said, keeping the words simple. "Six of them. Small cores. I want to see if they function outside my head."
Bastion felt the phrase outside my head the way an engineer feels prototype. "Parameters?" he asked.
"Different win paths, similar interaction counts." Julian said. "I'll bring them. You and Syrus can run a match."
Syrus perked up in a way that would have humiliated him two days ago and didn't today. "Me?"
"You." Julian confirmed. "You were precise during Banner. I want to see that translated on the table."
Syrus looked like he was trying not to grin as big as he felt. "I… Yeah. Yes. I can do that."
"Good." Bastion said, already counting things in his mind. "Ten hands each. No mulligans. Honest lines. We log everything."
"Not everything needs to be just statistical analysis, man. You need full duels just as much as test hands." Julian probed. "It doesn't matter if the ratios for your starter hands are perfect if you don't practice how to navigate the lines in the match."
"And it is more fun too." Jaden echoed. "I'll be there after I swing by the post office."
"Post office?" Syrus asked.
"Gotta mail a box." Jaden said, breezy but with that careful, coded weight he used when he was sharing information with Julian and no one else. "Someone asked me to drop it. Community service."
Julian caught it: the anywhere pile from the well, promised a path out that wouldn't hurt, a way to be near people until the right ones found them. Jaden didn't look at him. He didn't need to.
Bastion, happily ignorant of subtext, nodded. "Fine. We'll start without you."
"I assume your definition of 'start' includes the part where you prepare the sleeves and look at the list of cards in every deck." Jaden said.
"It includes all essential pre-steps, obviously." Bastion said, which was how he said yes to anything that sounded like work.
"I'll meet you on the neutral field." Jaden told them, already calculating the walk to the mail window in the main building. "Kick his ass, Sy."
"I don't know about kicking, but I'll do my best." Syrus answered, responding to the raised fist from Jaden with his own.
They ate, but the table had changed shape. An idea lived in the middle of it now: six boxes, an afternoon of dueling, the right kind of noise waiting outside. The spirits felt it too. They hovered a little higher, as if saving their excitement for later, the way children behave in the last ten minutes before recess because they've been promised the field.
Julian noted how they held themselves. "See what I mean?" Jaden said gently in a low tone, picking up on a thought Julian hadn't voiced. "They don't need to be glued to you. They're learning what near means."
"They're young…" Julian said. "But not helpless."
"Right." Jaden said. "They know that you mean well. They can feel it. That's why they like you even when you're in strict lecturer mode."
"I'm not…" Julian started, then stopped. He heard himself as others might hear him: the careful rules, the quiet no, the insistence on boundaries that didn't pinch. Strict wasn't wrong, not if you said it kindly.
"You're the dad." Jaden continued, softly amused. "I'm the older brother who winds them up and then remembers to apologize. Chumley's the babysitter who keeps everyone from losing shoes."
Chumley, without looking up, raised a hand in sleepy acknowledgment of a role he hadn't applied for and was already good at. The small lights near his sleeve bobbed, pleased with the title none of them had heard.
Julian glanced toward the window. The sea lit itself in thin sheets. His eyes did that thing again — too bright, too fast — and the world whited out for a heartbeat before he blinked the color back in. He pressed one finger to the point just above his eyebrow until the ache reconsidered its options and chose to be polite instead of loud.
"You all right?" Jaden asked, too quiet for the others.
"Light." Julian answered, a bit louder than the question. "Not enough sleep, I guess."
"Hydrate and rest." Bastion said, misreading the exchange but offering a universal truth.
Julian drank. It helped because the motion had edges. He breathed and felt Relinquished's attention ease across the table, a perimeter set to keep the small ones from going out of control if unattended. It wasn't a command. He stood like a living hedge, limiting the scope of what the little ones would do in a simple enigmatic gaze.
"Okay." Jaden said, wiping his hands. "Let's get moving before 'after lunch' becomes 'tomorrow.'"
They stood. Trays clicked against trays. The room shifted in a small tidal movement toward the dish return. Chumley tucked his sketchbook into his jacket. Syrus folded his napkin with ritual dignity and then ruined it by dropping his fork into the wrong slot and apologizing to it. Bastion lifted his tray like a gavel he intended to use later.
At the door, the fan's hum caught a higher pitch and held it until someone opened a window. Sunlight cut the floor into careful rectangles. The bulletin board, still innocent of flyers that would change days sat with its usual notices: maintenance in Dorm B, practice schedules, a poster about the safe handling of hologram projectors that no one had ever read.
"Corner field?" Bastion asked.
"Yeah, let's go." Syrus echoed.
"As I said, I'll meet you there." Jaden said, pointing with two fingers toward the main hall. "Post office, then straight to you."
"You sure you don't need a second pair of hands?" Julian asked.
Jaden's grin came easy. "Nah. It's a small box. Besides…" He tilted his head toward the air around Julian, warm mischief in it. "You've got company."
Julian didn't look offended by the truth. "Be quick."
"Sure thing." He split off along the corridor with the walk of someone who trusted doors to open.
The four others pushed into the light. The generators on the far side of the field spooled up and down, grids turning to rings turning to nothing. Behind them, the cafeteria took its noise back. In front of them, the practice field held itself like an answer. The small lights shifted forward with the kind of joy that kept quiet on purpose because it believed it would get what it wanted soon.
The lunch tables behind the Ra practice field weren't meant for dueling. They were rough planks, bleached by salt air and the half-merciful sun, but they were flat, shaded, and conveniently ignored by faculty. Perfect.
Julian arranged six deck boxes in a neat line. The sleeves, once torn and stained, had been washed, flattened, and resealed: they gleamed faintly, proud in their imperfection.
Syrus leaned closer. "So these are the famous six?"
"Prototype lists." Julian said. "Each built around a different rhythm. We'll run a best-of-three so you get the full arc. Swap decks each round."
Bastion adjusted his vest, scanning the boxes like instruments on a bench. "What inspired this sudden expansion of your portfolio? You said you were saving for your true deck."
Julian hesitated only a heartbeat. "Reject Well."
That got all three of them to look up.
"The what now?" Chumley asked.
"It's a pit behind the Obelisk dorm." Bastion said before Julian could answer. "A disposal site for cards students throw away after losing with them or when they think they're weak. Mostly low-rarity monsters with no competitive utility."
Julian nodded. "That's right. The kind people call useless. I figured they deserved better than to rot under a staircase."
Syrus frowned. "You went down there? That's… kind of creepy."
"It's quiet." Julian said. "Peaceful, in its own way. And the cards…" He glanced briefly at the invisible shapes gathering around him, faint silhouettes of small forms waiting to see themselves matter again. "... they just needed someone to believe they still had purpose."
Bastion examined the six boxes with clinical interest. "You've built structure around inherently weak engines. That's not efficient."
"Maybe not." Julian answered. "But I'm not measuring power today."
Chumley flipped open his sketchbook. "What are we measuring?"
"Fun." Julian said.
That earned a small laugh from Syrus. "Then I better not lose too fast."
Julian smiled. "Take a look at the lists and choose one. Best of three. Switch decks each round so everyone gets a turn. I tried to keep the cores distinct so they'd all play differently. A couple are a little experimental."
Bastion leaned in at once, analytical reflex already firing. "Experimental in what sense? Ratios? Archetypal overlap?"
"In the sense that I built them with heart instead of math." Julian said dryly.
Chumley whistled. "That's the most heretical thing I've ever heard you say. Thought you yellow-guys didn't believe in heart."
"Blame the Well." Julian smiled. "I didn't have much to work with. I filled in the gaps with cards I've retired from my main list. So they're stable enough to function, just… not tournament-tier. At least they're leveled with each other."
Syrus picked up the first box, turning it over in his hands like something fragile. "What's this symbol?"
"Spiral means dragons." Julian said. "Petit Dragon, Twin-Headed Fire Dragon, maybe a Luster Dragon if you're lucky. Lightweight stuff but fast."
Syrus's eyes brightened. "Dragons are cool."
"Statistically overrepresented in fiction." Bastion noted, already inspecting another box. "And this one?"
"The skull mark's a zombie list. Mostly Skull Servant, The 13th Grave, a couple Gross Ghost of Fled Dreams I found in good condition."
"Undead recursion with no real payoff?" Bastion asked, intrigued despite himself.
Julian shrugged. "If you get Call of the Mummy and Book of Life together, it can snowball along with removal. You can also win on a resource grind, it has a couple copies of Card of Safe Return."
Chumley opened another box: the one with a tiny cube doodle. "And this little guy?"
"That's the fairy-beast deck." Julian said. "Mostly Mokey Mokey, Happy Lover, Dancing Fairy. Think morale over muscle."
"Mokey Mokey?" Syrus repeated, grinning. "Please tell me it does something funny."
"You'll find out."
The small spirits had gathered by now, invisible to everyone but Julian. They hovered eagerly around the boxes, pointing and gesturing at their own cards, whispering things he couldn't fully hear. One of them, a shimmering Happy Lover, fluttered over Bastion's shoulder, trying to peek at the box he'd taken. Another, a squat Soul Tiger, pawed at the dragon deck in Syrus's hands, like a cat demanding to be chosen.
Julian pretended not to notice, though he couldn't hide a small smile. The spirits were practically vibrating with anticipation.
"Did you build them around themes or just whatever fit?" Bastion asked.
"A bit of both." Julian said. "Six approaches, six moods. I wanted them to feel like they belonged to someone."
"Someone being?" Bastion pressed.
Julian hesitated a moment, then gestured toward the air above the table. "Whoever still had something left to prove."
Syrus blinked, unsure whether that was a joke. Chumley just hummed. "Man, you sound like Pegasus when you talk like that."
"I'll take it as a compliment." Julian said.
Bastion fanned the zombie deck, reading each card name under his breath. "Skull Servant, Clown Zombie, Master Kyonshee… rather antiquated. But the structure's consistent. Fine removal as well."
"That one's yours, then." Julian said. "I'll improve the lists over time, that's what I had in hand."
Syrus looked up from the dragon box. "I guess that means I'm the dragon guy."
"Seems fair." Julian said. "They like you already."
Syrus blinked. "They?"
"Figure of speech." Julian said quickly, correcting his mistake.
The Petit Dragon spirit darted around Syrus's arm, tracing invisible circles, and Julian could almost swear the small creature was wagging its tail.
Bastion returned to shuffling, precise as ever. "Assuming normal variance, a forty-card list gives each archetype roughly equal probability of fielding their key monsters. You've balanced them neatly."
"That's the idea." Julian said. "Their absolute power doesn't matter as much, as long as their playfield is balanced. Didn't want anyone feeling outclassed."
Jaden's voice drifted from the path behind them. "Then you've come to the wrong school, man."
They turned to see him walking over, grin in place, hands shoved in his pockets.
"You're early." Julian said.
"Couldn't miss this." Jaden replied, hopping onto the bench beside Chumley. "So these are the six decks, huh? You building a new club?"
"Just giving the rejects another go." Julian said. "They deserve some playtime."
"Well, I'm here to cheer for the underdogs." Jaden said, leaning back with a lazy smile. "Which, I guess, is everyone."
The small spirits around them responded like an audience to applause: fluttering, twirling, some darting toward Jaden in recognition. He waved instinctively, even though only Julian could see them.
"All right." Julian said, tapping the table. "Let's get started. Syrus, you're up first buddy. Do your best."
"Decks chosen." Bastion said.
"Decks ready." Syrus answered, grinning. "Hope you're not afraid of dragons."
"Only bad probability." Bastion replied.
Julian smiled, watching the cards slide from one hand to another. The motion was smooth, familiar… alive once again. The spirits hovered low, anticipation shimmering like heat over the table.
The Reject Well had been silent for too long. Now, they were about to remember what laughter sounded like.
Syrus fanned his opening hand, swallowed, and set a card with care. "Petit Dragon in defense mode and one face-down." The tiny reptile manifested with a proud little chest-puff, wings buzzing like it was trying to lift an ego three times its size.
Bastion's reply was tidy enough to belong in a textbook: "I'll set one monster, and activate Card of Safe Return. One backrow as well." His fingertips tapped the Continuous Spell once, as if underlining a heading.
Jaden leaned in, voice low and bright. "Heads up, Sy. Once he starts knitting the graveyard, it becomes a pain in the ass."
"I know." Syrus said, eyes on his hand. "I've seen this engine."
Julian's tone was even. "Knowing it isn't the same as dealing with it, especially without a tailored list. Let's see how you handle it."
"Well, it seems that I'm clearly not the crowd's favorite." Bastion mocked, joyfully.
"Yeah, I mean. Red here is a sucker for underdogs." explained Julian smiling.
Jaden did not missed the beat and complemented. "And our future blue wants to see Sy's efforts shine."
Almost like it was planned, Julian returned. "It's the first step for 'getting me back' for Levianeer, y'know? I wanna see it."
Beside them, Chumley's pencil began to glide: loose, confident strokes catching Petit Dragon's too-serious eyes. He shaded a crescent under the wing so the hover felt real. "He looks like he's pretending to be brave." Chumley said, amused.
"That's half of bravery." Jaden answered, stopping the jointed dynamic.
Syrus snapped Stamping Destruction onto the field. A ribbon of red licked over Bastion's set; pixels burst. The boys laughed as Petit Dragon beat its tiny chest like it had just toppled a mountain. When he attacked, the face-down flipped to Skull Servant as it shattered. On the way out, the skeleton threw a theatrical back-of-the-hand faint that made Jaden snort.
"The little bugger is a show-off, I like it." he murmured.
Bastion, unbothered, set Pyramid Turtle and advanced a square. On attack, the turtle spirit actually yawned mid-dash, and Julian's mouth tilted. Too much personality for a stock animation. Only he and Jaden seemed to notice the extra life in the holograms, Syrus and Bastion read it as polish and kept playing. A battle trap stopped the offensive, just for next turn Petit Dragon to get equipped and bounce back.
"Battle: Petit into Turtle." Syrus said, pressing.
"Accepted." Bastion replied.
Turtle cracked and was destroyed, summoning a Armoured Zombie in its place. In the next turn, the aisle of possibilities began to widen for Bastion. "Book of Life. Return Skull Servant in defense, banish your Lesser Dragon in the grave." He drew off Safe Return, posture loose, patient.
Jaden tapped the table twice. "Here comes the scarf."
"Yeah, yeah." Syrus said, and he did… but his rhythm stuttered for the one turn recursion wants. He summoned Divine Dragon Ragnarok to push a little damage. Bastion's Trap Hole answered. The floor under the monster "opened". The spirit flailed his tiny wings to the other as trying to save it from falling before the trap actually resolved, and then the card popped for real. The timing sold the joke, the boys at the table just laughed and moved on.
"Reset pace." Julian said softly.
"I know, I'm trying." Syrus gritted out, setting a second back row and nudging a small attack through to keep Bastion honest. He even found another Stamping Destruction to peel Safe Return, pinging five hundred once more. "There."
"Good hit." Julian acknowledged.
Bastion kept knitting with quiet hands: Call of the Mummy to spill a body without burning the Normal Summon, a modest trade to thicken the bin, then another Book to restock. For two turns the surface looked even while the bones of the game tilted.
Jaden nudged Julian. "He knows not to play into Bastion's stuff, but…"
"Execution's a muscle. He needs time to adapt." Julian completed.
Syrus bought a turn with respectable blocking, but the loom wouldn't stop. When King of the Skull Servants arrived, it didn't roar: it established. ATK ticked up in neat thousands. One sweep cleared Syrus's last defender, and the follow-up line ended it.
"Concluded." Bastion said, returning the King to center like a chess piece.
Syrus stared at the zero, then exhaled and laughed at himself. "Dang, I almost had you."
"That's real progress. You should have destroyed his Card of Safe Return at the beginning." Julian said.
"Yeah, but he would have kept his Sakuretsu Armor set. I was trying to win in aggro before he could outgrind me." explained the red student.
Jaden clapped Sy's shoulder. "A sound strategy, but buying time is the kind of thing his deck is prepared to do. Next round, don't let him knit. Steal the needles."
"I hate that that makes sense." Syrus said, grinning despite himself.
Chumley flipped his sketch: Petit Dragon's earnest posture on one page, Skull Servant's melodramatic collapse on the next. He penciled a tiny caption under the fall: 'I meant to do that', and smirked.
Bastion was already looking to the other decks as the zombie one was returned to the deckbox. "Game two?"
"Swap." Syrus said, hand hovering over the cube-stamped box.
Bastion was already sorting his cards with surgical precision, lining the sleeves in neat geometric rows. "Interesting…" he murmured. "Two distinct Dragon lists in the same set. I would've expected a single variant."
Julian, who was closing the latch on the box Syrus had just used, nodded once. "Young boys like dragons, what can I say? There were plenty of them down there, enough to split between two builds. They share a few bones, but one's faster, one's heavier. Call it instinct versus patience."
Jaden grinned. "So basically Syrus's and Bastion's personalities, printed on cardboard."
Syrus groaned but didn't argue. "At least mine breathes fire."
"Statistically unimpressive fire." Bastion said, deadpan.
"Still fire." Syrus shot back, and that earned a small ripple of laughter around the table. Even Julian's mouth twitched.
"Calling another person instinctive, Jaden? Well, look at you, Mr. Pot calling the kettle black." joked Julian.
Beside them, Chumley had returned to his sketchbook, flipping back to the page with Petit Dragon. He'd added Skull Servant at the edge of the panel now, caught mid-faint. The skeleton's dramatic swoon almost touched the little dragon's wing. He turned the book toward Julian. "I'm thinking of inking this one. What do you think?"
Julian studied the composition: two small creatures locked in an exaggerated, almost theatrical moment. "You caught movement." he said. "The line feels alive."
Chumley rubbed the back of his neck, embarrassed. "Guess I just like when they look like they're still in the middle of something."
That, oddly, was what triggered the memory. Julian's eyes drifted to the open door, toward the corridor beyond, where a cluttered bulletin board sat half in shadow. He remembered catching a flash of color there earlier, a logo too familiar to ignore.
"I'm pretty sure I saw something on the board." he said suddenly, setting the box aside. "One sec."
He rose in a smooth motion that didn't stay smooth. The world tilted sideways for half a breath, like the floor had shifted under the soles of his shoes. Jaden's reflexes were faster than thought; a hand landed steady on his elbow.
"Hey. Easy, man." Jaden said quietly. "You good?"
Julian steadied himself, blinked until the edges of the room stopped swimming. "Yeah. Just stood too fast."
"You do spend half your life sitting cross-legged on the floor tinkering with decks." Jaden said, half-teasing. "Blood pressure's staging a protest."
Julian gave a dry huff that might have been a laugh, then crossed the hall. The chatter of the table softened into background static, the kind that made everything else fade. He reached the board, found what he'd remembered: a glossy poster pinned slightly crooked among club notices and class schedules. Industrial Illusions Creative Design Contest: Open to Student Submissions.
He took a photo and returned to the table, sliding the phone across to Chumley. "Thought you'd want to see this."
Chumley stared. "You're kidding."
"Nope. Pretty sure the logo's legit."
Jaden leaned over his shoulder, eyebrows climbing. "Man, if that's real, you've got to enter."
Chumley's ears went red. "I… I don't know, man. I mean, that's a pro company. They are the printers for all of Duel Monsters. They don't need my doodles."
"They do if they want good ones." Jaden said.
Syrus nodded enthusiastically. "Yeah! That Skull Servant art alone's better than half the cards I've seen. It would make a nice spell, like the lore is being told on screen."
Even Bastion allowed a humble note. "The motion reads correctly. That's not easy to produce."
Chumley ducked his head, smiling despite himself. "I'll think about it after we finish the series."
Julian lowered himself back into his seat, careful this time, the faint echo of that tilt still somewhere behind his eyes. He flexed his fingers once, dismissing the fog, and gestured toward the remaining boxes.
"All right." he said evenly. "Angels versus dragons the second. Let's see how they fly."
Syrus grinned. "Rematch time."
And just like that, the table came alive again: the shuffle of cards, the crackle of spirit-light, and the gentle hum of laughter spilling into the afternoon.
Bastion made the first statement with a clean Luster Dragon, a set that glinted with unknowns, and posture that said play around me. Syrus opened softer: Dancing Fairy, then a set that read like retreat until it wasn't.
The "holograms" were having the time of their lives. The fairy host treated every minor buff like champagne: Happy Lover clapped with her wings, Dancing Fairy pirouetted after negligible life-gain as if she'd just bought the moon on clearance. When Bastion flipped Waboku, a pearly bubble settled over his monsters, Dancing Fairy bonked it with the flat of her wand and pouted, then blew the shield a kiss before retreating. The table laughed as if Industrial Illusions had pushed a new animation patch; only Julian knew whose timing that really was.
"You expected restraint?" Julian said dryly, as Petit Dragon on Bastion's side pantomimed polishing its claws before a very small attack. "Pegasus ran Toons, man. The company culture is chaos."
"Canonically correct." Jaden added, delighted.
The middle turned into a dance of inches. Bastion used a Stamping Destruction of his own to peel a back row. Syrus used an Enemy Controller at the exact beat it mattered, swinging a dragon sideways and taking initiative he would've once given away. He didn't look at anyone for approval. He didn't need to.
"That's it, that's it." Jaden breathed, fist closing around air.
Bastion removed the next threat with a trap and looked set to stabilize, but Syrus threaded one careful sequence: Shining Angel replacing itself after a trade, into a small lifegain that kept him outside a lethal line, then quietly laid The Sanctuary in the Sky. The light changed. The room felt it even if half of them didn't know the text.
"Geez. And now it's a sermon." Jaden said, grinning.
Syrus pressed. Not recklessly, not timidly. Correctly. The last points slipped off Bastion's total with that gentle digital chime that means well done more than you lose.
Syrus stared at the life point counter for a full second before it sank in. Then a chair next to him screeched back as he ran towards the others, both fists shooting into the air. "I actually won!"
The words came out half-laugh, half-shout, like someone who didn't quite trust the world to let it be true. The spirits cheered before the others did: Watapon spinning like a falling star, Happy Lover twirling midair, Dancing Fairy clapping her wings until glitter scattered through the projection.
"Attaboy, Sy!" Jaden whooped, slamming a hand on the table so hard the cards jumped. "That's how it's done!"
Bastion studied the field, nodding once in quiet approval. "Your line in the midgame was… elegant. Correct tempo shift after my trap chain. You adjusted better than me."
Syrus blinked, then grinned. "I… I think I just did it, yeah. Didn't panic this time."
Julian allowed himself a small smile. "That's the trick. Keep your head steady even when the board isn't."
Chumley chuckled, scratching behind his ear. "Guess the cube brigade earned their wings." He angled his sketchbook, showing the quick doodle he'd made of Mokey Mokey holding a makeshift trophy.
The table broke into laughter, the kind that doesn't chase tension away so much as confirm it's gone. Syrus sat back down, still glowing, still glancing at the cards as if expecting them to vanish and prove it a dream.
"They're not going anywhere." Jaden said, catching the look. "That win's real."
Syrus laughed again, softer now. "Yeah… it is."
"Congratulations." Julian said. It was not loud and not flowery, yet Syrus straightened like someone had hung a medal around him.
They reset once again for game three. No repeats: new boxes, new shapes. The table had that hush that comes between songs at a concert, where the audience breathes together.
The last game opened messy on purpose. Both players set small stones to step on later, disguising intention under harmless moves. Bastion looked a little behind at first; Syrus, buoyed by the win, played like a student who believed the next answer could be his.
"Remember." Jaden murmured "You don't have to swing big just because you're ahead."
Julian watched that land without Syrus nodding. He knew it by the way Syrus took the small line instead of the glamorous one, turning a lopsided exchange into clean tempo. He even ate a minor hit to keep a better angle open a turn later. The spirits, reading "advantage" as "time to ham it up," put on a matinee: Soul Tiger flexed at nothing, Happy Lover used its tail as a microphone and pretended to interview the tiger. Even in the field, one of Bastion's defenders feigned wobbling when a trap hole was negated, like it was about to fall, but got back on their feet.
"That's not how holograms work." Syrus told it, delighted. "I never saw something like that."
"Probably Industrial Illusions testing new AI, there was a update to the software friday." Julian said gravely.
"And they would probably start these tests with decks less powerful, less impact in the pro scene." Jaden added.
The board got sticky. Bastion dissolved pressure with neat trades, the kind that look small and feel huge. The life totals dipped toward a meaningful range and hung there, both decks telling the truth about who they were.
Syrus drew, and something kindled behind his eyes: recognition rather than luck. He threaded a three-card line that looked like vanity for a beat and then bent into economy, tilting the field. If it held, he could force lethal two turns from now.
Bastion blinked once, appreciative. "I see it." he said, and slid a set into a chain that undid just enough: Dust Tornado eating the lynchpin back row, a modest follow-up that made Syrus's prettiest angle no longer exact. It wasn't calamity. It was a seam rip.
"Still alive, dude." Jaden murmured. "Keep on it."
Syrus didn't chase. He took the slower line, found a tiny pivot that left Bastion on a single draw to answer. It looked like nothing. It was everything, until Bastion drew, stilled, and a small satisfaction reached his eyes.
He looked over the field once. Syrus held a clear advantage: Gyaku-Gire Panda and Gazelle the King of Mythical Beasts stood in the center, the first one equipped with an Axe of Despair. Around them, smaller creatures: Silver Fang and a couple of Nimble Momonga swayed restlessly, waiting for the final push with a single facedown.
On Bastion's side: a quiet field. Two face-downs, one Aqua Spirit in defense, a few cards in hand. Syrus's life points were at a healthy 2000, Bastion's hanging by only 300.
And then, the smallest smile touched Bastion's face. "Solution found." he said softly.
He set a card. "First, Monster Reborn. I'll target Abyss Soldier."
A surge of holographic water spiraled upward; a lean figure formed, its body made of ocean pressure and muscle. The light across the field rippled blue.
"Now." Bastion continued "I discard one card to activate Abyss Soldier's effect. I'll return your set card to your hand."
The oceanic glow shot outward, sweeping through Syrus's board. Syrus' card disappeared like markings on a sand at the shore after the tide.
"He's going for lethal." Julian murmured, mostly to himself.
Bastion's tone remained steady. "Then, I'll normal summon Amphibious Bugroth MK-3. And because Umi is treated as active, courtesy of A Legendary Ocean…" he flipped the field spell already in play, "... it can attack directly."
The entire projection shifted tone: the air thick with salt, water curling around the edges of the virtual arena. The spirits of fish and serpents moved beneath the surface, flickering like memories.
Syrus's monsters growled, restless. Silver Fang lunged at reflections, while Gazelle lowered its horns, eyes tracking movement no one else could see.
"Battle phase." Bastion said simply. Bugroth turned its cannons forward. The blast carved a path through the projection, hitting Syrus's life points directly.
He frowned, gripping his last card. "That won't be enough."
Bastion's eyes flicked to his remaining card in hand. "Not quite. Damage step, Rush Recklessly."
The pulse thickened mid-flight, the way a wave grows just before it crashes. Bugroth MK-3's cannons glowed brighter, its thrust doubling as the attack stat spiked past the remaining 2000 life points on Syrus's screen.
Julian murmured. "That's lethal alright."
The hit landed in a burst of blue-white light: not loud, but final. Syrus's LP counter dropped straight to zero with a soft chime, as if almost apologizing for the brutality of the math.
Syrus sagged back in his chair, blinking at the fading hologram. "I… seriously lost to Bugroth?"
Jaden laughed, wide and delighted. "Dude, you lost to Bastion. Bugroth was just the delivery system."
Bastion's expression was thoughtful rather than smug. "I had it for a couple turns, but you were well guarded with traps. Monster Reborn guaranteed a clean hit with Abyss Soldier."
Around them, the spirits erupted into a flurry of excited chatter: Watapon spinning like a tiny comet, Dancing Fairy fluttering in bright approval, even the beast spirits on Syrus's side offering consoling pats on his shoulders that he couldn't feel.
Syrus finally let out a breath, half-frustrated, half-proud. "Okay… lesson learned. Don't underestimate direct attackers."
Julian gave a faint, tired smile. "And don't underestimate Bastion when he says he 'sees the pattern.'"
Chumley held up a doodle he'd sketched during the attack: Bugroth wearing aviator goggles and surfing a tidal wave. "I'm calling this one Reckless Tsunami."
The table laughed, the spirits sparkled, and for a moment everything felt warm: a perfect little bubble of play, friendship, and the kind of joy the Reject Well had forgotten for far too long.
They packed the decks in easy ritual: sleeves to boxes; boxes to case; case closed with the soft click of something that belonged to more than one person now. The small spirits took their bows as if they'd rehearsed.
Petit Dragon shook Skull Servant's hand, exactly like Chumley had sketched it earlier. Mokey Mokey tried to lift Soul Tiger, failed, and threw its arms up in victory anyway. Dancing Fairy pantomimed pinning a medal to Syrus's shirt, Watapon spun once, dignified as a planet in a slow orbit, then settled against Julian's wrist as if to say we were here.
"Those animations today… they are getting too good." Syrus said, still a little pink with happiness.
"Pegasus raised the bar by making it a joke first." Julian said, a ghost of a smile.
Bastion inclined his head. "Toons were really a terrible precedent."
"A perfect one." Jaden countered. "Joy is the optimal strategy."
"That is not…" Bastion said, but the corner of his mouth betrayed him. "Ugh, I don't know."
They lingered a while, talking nonsense that mattered. Syrus narrated the exact second he'd felt brave mid-game and how he planned to feel it earlier next time. Bastion offered two quiet corrections that sounded like compliments and were. Chumley pretended he wasn't already composing an email draft in his head with the photo Julian had shown him.
Julian closed the case and let the weight of it anchor his hands. The world outside the table came back in, sound by sound: the wind, a distant shout from the practice yard, the low hum of the island's day. Inside the small circle of friends, the air felt warmer than when they'd sat down.
The spirits felt it too. They gathered loosely around the boys' ankles and elbows, content in a way that had nothing to do with winning. The "holograms" would be blamed for the extra life in the animations; the truth was kinder. For the little souls who had once learned to measure time by the echo of a well, the heat of a game table… the shuffle, the chatter, the shared focus. That was a kind of homecoming.
They had been looked at, and not as trash. They had been played with, and not as a joke. They had been part of human noise again: laughter, teasing, the quiet work of getting better. And for a little while, that was enough.
The walk back to the dorm was shorter than it should have been. Every sound seemed to flatten beneath the steady hum in Julian's ears. Waves striking the cliffside, the faint rustle of palm leaves, even the mechanical chirp of duel disks idling somewhere in the distance. It wasn't unpleasant, just dense. Like the world had decided to whisper for a while.
By the time he reached his room, his body had folded into fatigue so complete it felt borrowed. His fingertips were cold, his pen grip unsteady when he fished the notebook from his satchel. The script of his own handwriting had become loose, the lines uncertain.
'Symptoms of ordinary exhaustion' he told himself. He'd spent half the day refereeing spectral children and the other half pretending that was a normal extracurricular. Fatigue was mercy, not omen.
The room greeted him with a familiar stillness. Or rather, with the kind of stillness that breathed. Dozens of little shapes peeked from the edges of shelves, the corners of the bedframe, the rim of his mug left on the desk. Shadows with eyes, outlines of cheer. The spirits had beaten him home.
"Already back?" Julian asked, voice too tired to be stern.
The response was a swarm of light. Petit Dragon spun in circles near the ceiling fan. Watapon drifted down and bounced against his shoulder with a soft chirp. Happy Lover and Dancing Fairy were pretending to braid each other's hair with threads of dust and sunlight. Somewhere by the window, Mokey Mokey tried to fit inside the cup and got stuck halfway.
Julian set his bag down and sighed, but it was the kind of sigh that ends in a laugh. "You know, when people talk about getting roommates, this isn't what they mean."
Mokey Mokey waved its cube arms helplessly until Watapon tugged it free. Soul Tiger rolled its eyes and flopped on the floor with the dramatic exhaustion of an old cat.
Julian hung his jacket by the door and turned back just in time to see Petit Dragon land in his open textbook, peering at the equations like it was reading them out loud. "That one's Bastion's fault." Julian said. "Not mine."
The dragon chirped indignantly, then nudged the pencil toward him, as if insisting he write anyway.
He almost did. Then his hand trembled midair, a soft shake he only noticed because the pencil clattered against the desk instead of landing where he meant it to. His reflection in the window glass looked pale, almost translucent under the lamplight.
"Overworked." he murmured, and forced the small smile of someone refusing to make more of it.
The spirits, however, seemed to notice in their own way. Happy Lover fluttered close, touching a fingertip to his forehead like she was checking for fever. Watapon bobbed anxiously near his elbow.
"I'm fine, guys." Julian told them. "You don't need to hover."
They hovered anyway.
He relented and dropped into the desk chair, letting his head rest against his palm. The room around him moved like a dream of home: the gentle brightness of creatures too kind to be real, a draft from the window that smelled faintly of salt and card paper, the smallest of heartbeats in a place that once had none.
Relinquished waited in the background of it all. Not visible, but present like a mirror on the edge of the eye, an illusory constant in his field of view. Julian felt it when he blinked, the way one might sense their own pulse after running: an echo against the skin, something vast folded just behind perception. If the others were sparks, Relinquished was gravity. Watching. Guarding.
Julian straightened, forced his body to move again. "All right…" he said, more to himself than them. "Order."
The word alone was enough to gather attention. Spirits turned, sat, hovered in line or close to it. It was endearing chaos, like a classroom of toddlers trying to salute.
"Tomorrow…" Julian said, pointing toward the far wall, "You guys can have the morning outside. The courtyard has sun, and the fountain's big enough for most of you. If you want to come with me to class, you can, but we'll keep quiet there, okay?"
Petit Dragon saluted. Mokey Mokey mimicked it a beat late, bonking its own forehead. The others giggled soundlessly, their wings scattering faint glitter over his desk.
"Inside voices after sunset in the room." Julian continued. "I have to study, and you…" he gestured vaguely at the whole gleeful mob "... have to not break anything that glows."
The spirits nodded. Or at least, the ones with heads did.
Satisfied, Julian slumped back against the chair. "Compromise. That's progress."
Watapon drifted up beside him again, curling into his lap like a cat. The warmth that bled through his uniform felt heavier than it should, but soft. He reached out and brushed the small creature's head with his fingers.
"You're all a bit too much at the start…" he whispered, "But I'm getting used to it."
They answered in their way: a flurry of motion, then quiet. Each settling somewhere that didn't require supervision. Mokey Mokey tucked itself in his drawer. Happy Lover and Dancing Fairy perched on the curtain rod. Petit Dragon curled around a lamp bulb like it was an egg to protect. The faint light turned its scales the color of sleep.
Julian pushed himself up to change, the simple act of standing heavier than it should've been. He barely made it through washing his face before he had to steady himself on the sink. Cold water felt wonderful, grounding. When he looked up again, Relinquished's single eye seemed reflected over his shoulder in the mirror, but only for an instant, like a trick of light.
"Not tonight, buddy." he said quietly, but not unkindly.
Back at the desk, he closed the notebook. His handwriting from earlier looked like someone else's: tremors in every line, thoughts abandoned mid-sentence. It felt wrong to add anything above that silence. Instead, he turned off the lamp and let the darkness fold around him.
When he lay down, the spirits drifted to their corners, half awake, half whispering in a language without words. Some part of him understood anyway: gratitude, reassurance, a lullaby shaped like breath.
He could feel Relinquished near the foot of the bed now, the air cooler there, stiller. Not looming, but attentive. Watching over the smaller ones, perhaps. Or watching him.
Julian's body sank faster than thought. The pillow felt like an anchor pulling him into something deep and soft. Just before sleep caught him, a pulse of faint warmth crossed his chest, like a heartbeat that wasn't his. He exhaled and let it happen.
Relinquished moved closer. A shimmer barely visible in the dark, it extended one distorted hand, resting it above his chest without touch. The room's faint light bent slightly around it, like a veil drawn inward.
Julian stirred once, murmuring something half-lost—maybe a name, maybe just a sigh. The color returned faintly to his face as if a drained circuit had been mended.
Around him, the small spirits slept, their breathing a rhythm of tiny, uncoordinated sounds: flutters, squeaks, the rustle of wings.
And somewhere beyond that, Relinquished watched over them all. He was a guardian and a parasite, promise and shadow in one.
When the first light touched the window, the spirits were already stirring again, quieter now, content. The boy who had found them slept without dreaming. He was still a bit pale, but his expression was a lot more peaceful, his hand half-curled as if holding something unseen.
Julian woke to the slow rustle of wings and the faintest glow pooling against the ceiling: no chaos, no tugging, no chorus of voices arguing over who got to speak first. The spirits drifted in quiet pairs, moving as if the whole room had agreed on a softer rhythm overnight.
He sat up, waiting for the usual dizziness that sometimes followed long nights, but it didn't come. His head was clear, his body heavy but steady. Functional, he thought, and that was enough.
"Morning, guys." he murmured. Watapon wobbled up from the desk, still half-asleep, and pressed its small body against his arm before curling back into a floating doze. Petit Dragon blinked awake on the curtain rod, stretched its wings with a satisfied squeak, then dropped a single thread of light onto Julian's shoulder like a greeting.
It felt ordinary now. That was the strangest part, how easily the unreal had begun to fold into the day-to-day. He washed, dressed, and gathered his notes while the smaller spirits tidied in their own way: stacking pencils, dragging papers into uneven piles, trying to help with gestures that were more symbolic than practical. By the time he left for class, the air felt lighter, as though even the walls had learned to breathe in peace.
The walk to the Academy was different from the previous day's blur. The sun was soft through the leaves, and the hum he'd felt behind his eyes was gone. Happy Lover floated a few paces ahead of him, darting around the edge of a bench. Mokey Mokey and Petit Angel trailed behind, arguing over a leaf they'd found shaped vaguely like a heart.
When a pair of students passed by, the spirits melted into the shadows without prompting. Julian almost smiled at the discipline, they were learning faster than some first-years he'd tutored.
Classes passed smoothly. Professor Banner's tone was pleasant enough to keep half the room awake, and even Dr. Crowler, while dramatic, didn't inspire Julian's previous headache. The spirits that followed him to the building found their places naturally: Watapon curled beneath his chair, Petit Dragon peeked out from his bag, Soul Tiger yawned through half the lecture and didn't knock anything over.
It wasn't peace exactly, but it was coexistence, and it held magnificently.
At lunch, he found the usual table already claimed by Jaden, Syrus, Bastion, and Chumley. Winged Kuriboh was perched proudly on Jaden's shoulder, the tiny creature's fur catching bits of sunlight like floating dust.
"You look better today." Jaden said when Julian joined them. "No ghosts hanging off your back anymore?"
"As you said, channel the energy instead of containing it." Julian replied, setting down his tray.
Jaden grinned. "Always does the trick."
Bastion, precise as ever, pointed a fork for emphasis. "Your complexion has improved by quite a significant margin from last night."
"Thanks, man." Julian said jokingly. "I'll add that to my medical file."
The laughter that followed was easy. The smaller spirits gathered around the edge of the table, visible only to Julian and Jaden, chatting in tiny movements and flashes of light. Watapon perched on the rim of Julian's juice glass, dipping one small paw and pretending to sip. Mokey Mokey leaned dangerously close to Chumley's sketchbook, staring at a doodle of its own cube-shaped face.
"See?" Jaden whispered, glancing at the faint glimmers only he could see. "They're learning the schedule."
Julian nodded. "Or training me into theirs."
"They could've done worse." Jaden said, tilting his head toward Mokey Mokey perched at his elbow. "This guy's been teaching my Kuriboh how to nap mid-duel. Real talent."
"An underappreciated skill." Julian hid a smile behind a spoonful of rice. "Honestly, I don't care if they are changing me, if I'm changing them or somewhere in between. At least we're able to achieve some kind of harmony."
By the time the afternoon sun softened into amber, the air over Duel Academy was warm and lazy. Classes had ended early, and the small group was drifting down the walkway toward the arena with no particular rush, just that post-lecture energy that felt too big to stay indoors.
Syrus was chattering beside Jaden, half-excited and half-anxious.
"I think I'm finally ready to use Power Bond in a real duel." he said. "Not just in mock rounds. I just…" he hesitated. "I need to stop thinking it'll blow up in my face every time."
Jaden gave a bright laugh. "That's the trick, Sy! You don't wait until you're not scared you just do it anyway. Confidence first, sense later."
"That explains a lot about your dueling." Bastion said dryly from behind them.
"Hey, it works." Jaden replied with an easy shrug. "If you listen to your cards, they tell you what they want to do. Mine practically yell."
Julian followed a few steps behind, his expression somewhere between fond amusement and quiet observation. The spirits floated in lazy formation around him—Petit Dragon bobbing along the fence posts, Watapon drifting beside his shoulder, Happy Lover circling the group in slow loops. They were behaving, for once, but he still found himself counting them like a parent making sure none had wandered off.
Only Relinquished was missing. He hadn't felt its presence since morning, and the absence left a subtle hollow under his ribs.
"Everyone has a different answer to their problems." he pointed to his student. "You already know my style, and you just heard Jaden's. I can help and show the paths, but the one you take is a personal choice. In regards to that final step in each problem, I agree with your brother."
"Yeah, and what better way to do that than testing?" Jaden said, stretching his arms behind his head, "The arena is open until six. We've got, what, a couple of hours? We can get a match in before dinner. Make you test that in practice."
Chumley frowned. "You're assuming we don't run into a Blue who tells us to scram."
"Then we don't scram." Jaden said. "We duel."
Syrus sighed. "Every time you say that, something explodes."
"Only the good kind." Jaden grinned. "C'mon, Sy, you can't train courage sitting down."
They reached the wide doors of the arena around four o'clock. The sunlight hit the glass roof, scattering into bright reflections across the floor. Inside, a few Obelisk Blue students were finishing their own matches, holograms flickering as monsters dissolved back into light.
When Jaden led the way in, one of the Blues turned immediately: a tall boy with a perfect uniform and that effortless smirk all the Obelisks seemed to practice in mirrors.
"Slifers. And a couple Ra kids." he said, arms crossing. "You're out of schedule. This time slot's reserved for Blue dorm priority."
Bastion muttered under his breath, "Hierarchy alive and well."
Julian's voice was calm. "If the arena isn't booked, it's open use. I'm sure you can share the space for one match."
The Obelisk tilted his chin. "Generous of you to assume you'd last a match."
Jaden's grin flashed sharp and friendly. "Careful… My record against Blue's kind of legendary. Ask your dorm head, I beat him last month. Julian here also got a good score into your kind too, right?"
"Seven to one, if my memory serves me correctly." pointed Bastion.
"Which is always the case..." confirmed Jaden.
That landed like a slap. The Obelisk's composure cracked. "Then let's see if lightning strikes twice. I'll duel you, Slifer. Right now."
"Sure." Jaden said, already rolling his shoulders. "But maybe stretch first. Don't wanna pull something when you start crying for your loss."
Syrus winced. "He's doing the thing again."
Julian exhaled through his nose, amused despite himself. "Confidence first, sense later." he murmured.
Chumley's face was pure white, but he also chuckled. "Guess we're about to see if that motto holds up."
Jaden stepped toward the platform, activating his Duel Disk. The ring of light spread down his arm with a familiar hum. The Obelisk mirrored the motion on the opposite side, his own Disk flaring a cold, precise blue.
Julian moved closer to the rail, his spirits gathering like a small audience. Watapon hovering beside his hand, Petit Dragon perching near his collar. The energy field's faint buzz filled the room, static humming through the air.
He blinked once. The light around the platform seemed to shimmer oddly, doubling for a heartbeat before settling again. He told himself it was the reflection off the glass roof.
Jaden called over his shoulder. "Hey, Julian, you taking bets?"
Julian's reply came with a half-smile. "On you? I'll take some free money if some of them want to forfeit it."
"I'll take it. A grand, even odds?" pointed another blue student.
"A grand is nice. Two sounds like a real bet." he smiled, confidently, adding a jab to rattle their heads. "Unless you think your buddy cannot beat a red."
The Obelisks stiffened at the taunt, a few exchanging sharp looks that flickered between insult and pride. Jaden's grin didn't waver. He leaned lazily on the railing, hands in his pockets, radiating the kind of confidence that made people want to prove him wrong.
"Fine." said another Blue, a lean student with silver hair and a Duel Disk already strapped to his arm. He stepped forward, voice clipped but steady. "Make it two thousand, then. Let's see if that confidence of yours holds when it actually costs something."
The first Obelisk smirked, already pulling his own Duel Points card from his pocket. "Two grand in total, one from each of us. No take-backs when you lose."
Jaden blinked, half laughing. "I meant, like, loser buys lunch, man. I'm not looking to rob anyone."
But Julian's tone was calm, almost thoughtful. "Lunch doesn't buy cards." he said, eyes narrowing just slightly. "A proper deck costs more than meals. If they're so confident, they can fund someone who actually wins."
That quiet, composed logic cut deeper than Jaden's teasing ever could. The Obelisks bristled, pride pricked in all the right places, and the soft murmur of students nearby shifted into a low ripple of interest.
Julian felt the hum of energy ripple through the air as both Blue students uploaded their wager. The light from the Duel Disks shimmered faintly across the glass walls, almost too bright. It made his vision pulse for half a second before the world tilted, and the sounds of Jaden's laughter dissolved into echoing static.
The sound hit something in Julian's chest, warm and distant at once. He leaned slightly against the rail, watching as both duelists prepared their opening hands. But the air around him thickened unexpectedly, heavy and slow.
The glow of the arena sharpened until it hurt to look at. The voices blurred, distant, as though underwater.
He blinked hard, willing the dizziness away, but the floor seemed to shift under him: a slow, spiraling turn that made the world breathe sideways. "I just stood too fast." he thought. "That's all."
"Julian?" Syrus's voice came faint and worried.
He opened his mouth to answer, but the sound fell apart before reaching the air. His vision stuttered. Light, shadow, white. For a second, he thought he saw the faint outline of Relinquished at the far wall, eye dim and silent. Watching.
Then Watapon pressed desperately against his cheek, a soft pulse of warmth, and the world went dark.